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Theory: Honor's Shard Shattered Like Adonalsium


FeatherWriter

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Alright, this one's Roshar-specific, but I figured it was a bit too Cosmere-y for the Stormlight boards, so I'm putting it here instead. Basically, during my reread, I came across a passage that piqued my interest. Kabsal is talking to Shallan about the devotaries when he goes into something a bit deeper for a second...

Did they teach you about the nature of the Almighty? The divine prism, with the ten facets representing the Heralds?

-- Pg. 509 WoK hardcover

This spawned what is most likely a crack-theory, but one I can't seem to shake. What if Honor shattered similarly to Adonalsium? Honor gets splintered, but for some reason it only breaks into ten pieces (from which we gain the arc number) but unlike other splinters, each of the ten pieces was specific and different from the others, similar to the way that the 16 shards represent unique attributes of Adonalsium.

Because their original shard was Honor, they are all specific types of honorable actions. We've mentioned before that "Honor" is some what of a nebulous term, so what if it's divided further into things like Truth or Commitment or such? These 'mini-shards' (I don't know that I'd call them splinters) would power the different types of Surgebinding. Honor powers it as a whole, and the pieces of Honor individualize the system a bit, dividing it into Orders.

From here, I suppose it could go two ways. My first assumption was that these mini-shards were either the Dawnshards or Honorblades; most likely whichever referred to the Herald's special blades (Honorblades is probably the right term, but Dawnshards comes up more often). This would make the Heralds each Slivers, explaining some of their exceptional abilities. It was the idea that the Heralds are "facets" of the Almighty which led me to this theory in the first place.

The other idea I had was that after the original separation of the ten, they were shattered into splinters, and these splinters are the different kinds of "bondable" spren that power the Orders. This coincides with the Spren Are Splinters theory that has been circling around for a while. This version is backed up by the likely assumption the the spren which follow Shallan are Truthspren, because truth is an honorable action. It's undermined a bit by the fact that Syl calls herself an Honorspren, because if one of the mini-shards was also Honor, that seems a bit redundant; like one of the 16 shards turning out to also be called Adonalsium. I suppose that the "bondable" types of spren could all be called Honorspren, and in actuality Syl is a more specific type within that category. (She is still kind of figuring all this out, so it's possible that she just picked up on the Honorspren thing and not that she's the kind of Honorspren who does Windrunning).

I suppose if I wanted to combine the theories, we could say that the Heralds originally weilded the mini-shards but later splintered them. Though the image of one of those blades suddenly turning into a bunch of spren is an odd picture. And it doesn't really make sense; the Heralds in the prologue mention the Radiants, which would indicate that they're already around, and if Talenel's blade never got splintered, we'd only have nine kinds of Honorspren which wouldn't work. So, I'm going to go ahead and throw the whole meshing-the-two-together thing out.

I feel like this could be a viable option. We've seen instances of shards breaking more than once. Adonalsium shattered, and then we have shards breaking down into even smaller pieces after that. What's to say that it couldn't happen an extra time in there? And just because we've never seen in instance of individual traits attatching themselves to pieces; it happened to Adonalsium somehow, because the shards are all different.

Thoughts? Opinions? Declarations that there's something in Dragonsteel/White Sand/Other which proves that this could never be possible without giving explanations for fear of incurring the wrath of Peter?

EDIT: Alright, looking over the Ars Arcanum, specifically the table of the Ten Essences, I'm even more convinced. The last column, "Primary/Secondary Divine Attributes" looks exactly like what I was talking about: different aspects of Honor. Shallan's soulcasting is likely essence number six, blood, for quite a few reasons (the first thing she soulcast was blood, the terms creative and honest describe her well) and this lines up with the wierd symbol-headed spren being truthspren. So because Kaladin's Windrunning - most likely based on the first essence, Zephyr - this would make Syl some kind of leadershipspren or protectionspren (probably a different name, thugh, but some synonym along those lines)

Edited by FeatherWriter
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Wow. I haven't responded yet, since I don't know how to respond. I still don't. All I can say is that this is a fascinating theory. I'll need to meditate on this for a while.

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Okay, that's reassuring. At first I was afraid no one was posting because y'all were afraid to tell me how silly or stupid my theory was. I suppose I'm going to espouse this one now...

Do it. It's a fascinating theory, which I find no obvious problems with. We don't know how Adonalsium was Shattered in the first place, so it's perfectly possible it could happen on a smaller scale.

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Do it. It's a fascinating theory, which I find no obvious problems with. We don't know how Adonalsium was Shattered in the first place, so it's perfectly possible it could happen on a smaller scale.

Once again, I don't know what to think of the theory, but it seems viable to start with. Just have fun.

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  • 1 month later...

First, great theory. Second, I think that the merging can be accomplished by saying that, yes honor was splintered and that is where the Heralds power comes from, while saying that the ten orders of Radiants are mortal people interacting with the divine power, manifest in the Heralds. I am too lazy to look it up, but somewhere Brandon said that this was how the magics in Mistborn came about, it is the way that "genetics and the realmatic theory" allow the power to be used by mortals, or some such. Essentially the Radiants tap into the Power of Creation through their specific Herald just as an Allomancer taps into the Power of Creation through Preservation. This is possible because the Heralds provide a direct link to Honor, which is in turn itself a direct link to the Power of Creation.

So the Heralds are each a piece of Honor, a diminished Shard you could say... Wait a second, I just had a thought. What if this is exactly what happens to every Shard that is splintered. Rayse splintered Aona and Skai right? Well I predict something similar to this splitting of powers happened to their Shards as well.

Ahem, sorry tangents are inevitable when talking about such awesomely intricate and undeniably Brandon things... So where were we... The Heralds are each like a mini Shard, weaker than a full shard but with the same connection to the Power of Creation as a full Shard. So the Truthspren and others like them could just be a manifestation of a specific shard's power... Okay, I see your problem. What are the spren?

Hmm, well let us just ignore the spren as a gap in our current knowledge, somehow the spren provide a to the Heralds power, which link is intended for the use of mortals. Thus you have Radiants and Heralds existing at the same time. Though this raises an interesting question: What does the Herald's leaving their post do to the Radiants?

Anyway, I thought I had something clear and relevant to add, but I see this has become more of a murky musing. I will post it anyway because if there is something to this I am sure you guys will be able to pick out and clarify it.

Edited by Thucydides
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I like your reasoning. There's one flaw though- it seems as if the Almighty is still around at the times of the (thought to be) last Desolation.

He could smell it. Almighty, he could smell it!
WoK pg. 16, Kalak

Now, this could be the same as when Vin still swears by The Lord Ruler's name in HoA. But I don't think so. I think this is meant to show us that the Almighty is still with Honor, and that the Heralds aren't splinters. Plus, doesn't the Almighty say something that indicates that he's been within the past 1000 years?

Yep, here it is: pg 1001

The Knights Radiant must stand again.

This means that the Almighty has already seen the end of the Knights Radiant. How could that be if he Splintered before the Heralds?

So we see that although the Almighty may have splintered, it has been fairly recently (in the terms of shards anyway).

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@Zas:

As to your last point about Honor, don't forget that Honor was able to see the future. We know it wasn't easy for him (especially, I would guess, when Odium interferes) but if there is anything that is certain to happen, I suspect he would know about it as well as though it had happened while he was alive. Thus knowledge of events doesn't seem to me to be a necessarily good indicator as to when he was killed.

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  • 1 month later...

This raises an interesting idea, though I don't necessarily agree with the theory in general.

IF Honor did splinter and the Heralds each had a piece, when they broke the Oathpact, what happened to those splinters? They would now be dishonored holders of the splinters of Honor and I don't think that would jive.

Perhaps they left the splinters in their blades when the departed and those splinters can only be pulled by someone with that kind of honor a-la Arthurian Sword-in-the-Stone?

Again, I'm not sure that I agree here, but it does raise some interesting ideas. Part of the difficulty is knowing what Honor could see in the future and when the visions of Dalinar take place in relation to one another. Did the Knights Radiant exist prior to the vision with Nohadon? It seems to imply that they didn't exist before the Way of Kings was written, but nothing definite, though the Heralds DID exist prior to the Way of Kings as Nohadon talks of the "next time the Heralds come". Knights Radiant still exist after the Heralds break their Oathpact, which to me implies that the access to Honor's power for Surgebinding isn't channeled through the Heralds, but it could be possible that the Knights Radiant ended up "falling" because the Heralds had abandoned Honor themselves so eventually that kind of "honor" died out in the world?

It could be possible that the Roashar of the current novel is a world with all but one type of honor gone for the present until someone who embodies that can take up the Splinter again...

On Honorspren being a generic term, I have to disagree with that idea. Syl calls herself an honorspren, and when she does she says, "I remember/know what I am". Spren seem to be very specific to what they are, windspren, alcoholspren, firespren, so I think if she says "I'm on honorspren" she is talking specifically. There is also the quote in the vision with Nohadon where Nohadon says "...[they] aren't as discerning as honorspren". So they seem to have been around for a while, even before the knights radiant.

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  • 4 months later...

I like this one. It make complete sense to me.

The Heralds are splinters of Honor;

Just like the Elantrians are splinters of Aona's Shard;

And Returneds are splinters of Endowment.

Seems legit.

EDIT: Just saw that Endowment is not splintered... There goes my opinion...

Edited by Aiken Frost
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I'm supporting zas on this one, it's definitely an interesting theory but there is one major hole. In the last vision that Tanavast gives to Dalinar, he says that he personally witnessed many/most of the visions himself. I don't have the book with me but if I recall correctly, many of the visions already had the Radiants and I believe it's commonly accepted that the Heralds each founded the different Orders yes? Of course this goes into the whole chronology aspect of the visions, there's a thread in the Stormlight Archive threads but it seems mostly accepted that Tanavast was still alive at least partway through the Desolations if not all the way to the Last Desolation or the Recreance. Side note, just though of this but maybe the Hierocracy is a result of Tanavast dying and therefore Odium gaining more control over Roshar? We saw something similar in Mistborn with Ruin messing with memories etc. and what else causes more chaos than a religious takeover?

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The Returned are not silvers, the Divine Breaths that power then are Splinters of Endowment.

Okay, thanks. My reasoning was that, once the Splinter (the Divine Breath) was invested in a human, the two (the Splinter + human; the Returned) would be a Sliver.

Re-reading the wiki article, I see where I got mixed up.

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Okay, thanks. My reasoning was that, once the Splinter (the Divine Breath) was invested in a human, the two (the Splinter + human; the Returned) would be a Sliver.

Re-reading the wiki article, I see where I got mixed up.

So, Endowment IS splintered, then? Guess my theory could be right after all.

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The other idea I had was that after the original separation of the ten, they were shattered into splinters, and these splinters are the different kinds of "bondable" spren that power the Orders. This coincides with the Spren Are Splinters theory that has been circling around for a while. This version is backed up by the likely assumption the the spren which follow Shallan are Truthspren, because truth is an honorable action. It's undermined a bit by the fact that Syl calls herself an Honorspren, because if one of the mini-shards was also Honor, that seems a bit redundant; like one of the 16 shards turning out to also be called Adonalsium. I suppose that the "bondable" types of spren could all be called Honorspren, and in actuality Syl is a more specific type within that category. (She is still kind of figuring all this out, so it's possible that she just picked up on the Honorspren thing and not that she's the kind of Honorspren who does Windrunning).

If thats true the blades/heralds can't be the original splinters because they still existed at the same time as the bondable spren and couldnt have shattered and even aside from that there would only be 9 types because one of the heralds stayed true. Its an interesting theory though, on the whole I like it, but someone needs to come up with an alternative for where/what the original 10 splinters were.

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If thats true the blades/heralds can't be the original splinters because they still existed at the same time as the bondable spren and couldnt have shattered and even aside from that there would only be 9 types because one of the heralds stayed true. Its an interesting theory though, on the whole I like it, but someone needs to come up with an alternative for where/what the original 10 splinters were.

Well, The returned are splinters.

What if Honor did the same, gave the heralds some of his power, they become splinters, thereby making himself weaker then Odium, same way that preservation was weaker then Ruin? Preservation could cheat and trap Ruin, ofcourse, Honour could not attack in such an unhonorable way.

Aka, Odium could kill him?

Just a thought, but that should be possible too right?

theoretically, I suppose its possible that Odium, after he killed Honor, discovered that Ska and Aona was weakened someway aswell, and used what he learned from his fight with honor, to take out the two unprepared shards more quickly? Aona and Skai on the other hand, was likely not fighting, and as such was unexperienced in "shard to shard" combat, or perhaps they too had fallen for the temptation of infusing someone/something else with their power aswell?

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Well, The returned are splinters.

I was recently corrected on this, so I thought I'd pass it along.

The Returned are not Splinters; the Divine Breaths are Splinters.

It is the fragment of a Shard that is held by a mortal that is the Splinter, not the mortal. The mortal may have supernatural abilities when holding the Splinter, but the mortal is not, itself, the Splinter.

I don't see any problems with the rest of your post, though. :)

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I like this one. It make complete sense to me.

The Heralds are splinters of Honor;

Just like the Elantrians are splinters of Aona's Shard;

And Returneds are splinters of Endowment.

Seems legit.

EDIT: Just saw that Endowment is not splintered... There goes my opinion...

So far as we have seen splinters are not/cannot be people, they are always things (spiritual objects?). The Divine Breath are splinters of Endowment, and, I may be wrong, but I think those are the only confirmed splinters that we have. It is heavily speculated that Seons and Skaze are splinters of SFHA (Shard formerly held by Aona) and SFHS (Shard Formerly held by Skaze), but I don't think we have any confirmation either way. We do know for a fact that Elantrians are not splinters or slivers. We had this all out with Brandon while back.

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