[OB] - The Cosmeric implications of Oathbringer's ending

[rdog2213]

I managed to get my copy of Oathbringer a bit early and have been thinking and trying to make sense of Dalinar's awesome transformation at the end. In crafting a theory to explain this, I made a list of some important details and thought I would share those with y'all in the hope of a good discussion:

Important Details:

• UNITE THEM! - Chapter 119 - I'll start off with the obvious detail, when Dalinar freaking grabs the fabric of reality with his hands and merges the Physical, Cognitive, and Spiritual realms together into a perpendicularity. We've had tidbits of perpendicularities in Arcanum Unbound and different things but to my knowledge, we've never seen anyone short of a Shard or splinter do something this powerful in the Cosmere as of yet. According to the Arcanum Unbounded, this generally requires "concentration of so much Investiture" that "creates points of ... friction, where a kind of tunneling exists". As far as I know, only Shards themselves have caused this in the past and it seems well outside the powers of a bondsmith so the question is how is Dalinar doing this? Syl says its Honor's perpendicularity so we at least know that it is Honor's power that Dalinar is wielding somehow. Whatever this power is, Dalinar seems to be able to do it on command now since he overcharged Kaladin with Stormlight in Chapter 122 before Kaladin takes off to find his missing bridgemen.

• I am Unity - Chapter 119 - When asked what he is by Venli, Dalinar responds with the awesome phrase "I am Unity", which could have many interpretations. Is this referring to his overall goal of unifying? Is it simply a cool way of leading into his unifying the Realms? Or is the capitalization of Unity important and does that signify that Dalinar has become something far more?

• WE KILLED YOU! - Chapter 119 - Perhaps my favorite detail is Odium's reaction to Dalinar's epiphany. Not only is Odium shocked by Dalinar's resistance, he seems to be downright scared here. And most interesting is the choice of pronouns here. In their previous discussion regarding Dalinar's sins, Odium always said "I" as in "I was there, influencing you", so this doesn't seem to be a royal "we". With the available information, I can see two possible explanations. One, Honor's death was a cooperative effort between Odium and some other party such as Autonomy though this seems unlikely since all of our evidence so far indicates that Odium killed Tanavast by himself. Second, and more intriguing, is the shattering of Adonalsium, which seems to better explain the anger, outrage, and fear in Odium's statements. What about Dalinar's Unity frightens Odium so much? What does Dalinar look like to Odium's eyes?

• How? What have you done? - Chapter 119 - Despite being the Cognitive shadow of a god, the Stormfather has no clue what or how Dalinar just accomplished. Is this just the typical Spren forgetfulness since he hasn't been bonded in millennia? Their later conversation seems to indicate that this really hasn't been done before...

• We are something different - Chapter 119 - Dalinar's own words to describe this event are "We are something different. His remnants, your soul, my will". This is interesting to me since it could be interpreted in a realmatic context as the combination of Physical (his remnants), Cognitive (my will), and Spiritual (your soul) components though the remnants seems like it should really be of all three and not just Physical.

• Dalinar was not supposed to Ascend - Chapter 122 - Another Odium line that stands out since the topic of Ascension has a known definition within the Cosmere: a vessel taking up a Shard of Adonalsium like in the Mistborn series. The context of this phrase is a bit murky though since Odium and Mr. T are talking about events in the past, present, and future so it's a bit unclear whether this is directly referring to Dalinar's display or if it is some future event that both Odium and Mr. T have foreseen. Still, this clearly indicates to me that something major is going on with Dalinar and it seems like Odium thinks that this is not a one-hit wonder use of power on his part. Interesting side note is how the heck do y'all think the "Renarin Kholin" reference fits into this conversation? Was he the one who should have Ascended or was he the catalyst that caused Dalinar's Ascension (perhaps in that one flashback where Renarin breaks Dalinar out of his drinking and makes him realize a bit how awful he is being)?

• A warmth that he had known once before - Chapter 119 - Right before Dalinar Unites, he feels this weird warmth. As far as I can tell, this seems to refer to Dalinar's curious dream/vision in Ch 89 of WoR, where he seemingly relives a childhood moment before stepping outside where "warm light bathed him. A deep, enveloping, piercing warmth. A warmth that soaked down deep through his skin, into his very self. He stared at that light, and was not blinded. The source was distant, but he knew it. Knew it well. He smiled". Still don't have a good explanation for what's going on here but we do have confirmation a few pages later that the Stormfather did not send this. Since all of Dalinar's previous interactions with Honor have been mediated by the Stormfather, what could this warmth be?

• Unite them - Throughout all books, Dalinar's thoughts are almost always drawn to a single phrase "Unite them" that has driven a lot of his actions so far. Presumably, the first instance of this was the vision that Honor/Stormfather gave him but it continues to be repeated time and time again in Dalinar's viewpoints. It's a phrase that has been interpreted to mean many things over the books like "unite the highprinces", "unite the world", and "unite the radiants" but here we see it once again in probably the most spectacular fashion as he physically unites the realms. Are these words just Dalinar's continual introspection on these words or is this an external voice speaking to him? The Stormfather said it wasn't him in Chapter 111 and Dalinar definitely perceived it to be an external voice. Was it always an external voice or just this time? Who or what could this be? 

Theories: Looking at the available evidence, I have come up with three possible explanations for the power that Dalinar is wielding now:

1. Dalinar has, or is in the process of, reforming Honor and is its new vessel - I believe we have some WoB that this is possible but very difficult. The "something different" and "we killed you" details seem like they dispute this but either one could be interpreted to support it. Syl claiming that the perpendicularity is Honor's does seem to support this however. Another possibility is that he has somehow accumulated enough of Honor's Investiture to become something like a mini-sliver like a Herald or above.

2. Dalinar has somehow accumulated enough Investiture to become something new, Unity - Perhaps not a full Shard but something akin to or above a Herald in power and not necessarily linked with Honor alone. At this point, he's had direct interactions with three Shards/remnants of Shards, which seems unique, and could somehow have taken some measure of power from each. To be specific, Odium has been shaping him into a Champion for what seems like his entire life and likely had to sink some Investiture in him to do so. Cultivation took a piece of him and perhaps gave something in its place when he visited. And we all know that he has a big piece of Honor in his pocket in the form of the Stormfather. Syl's claim that the perpendicularity was Honor's could just be her best guess or it could be that the bulk of Dalinar's new power is of Honor and that's what she's sensing. Has the combination of all of this Investiture made him into something unique? I think this is the most likely theory though the "we killed you" detail doesn't seem to quite fit.

3. Dalinar is, in some way, connected to Adonalsium on a deeper level than we thought - This is a bit more out-there than the other two theories and is predicated mostly on the "we killed you" detail. I think there's a WoB out there somewhere that Dalinar was one of the first characters of the SA that Brandon came up with (number 17 here) and this makes me curious. I'm probably reading too much into this random detail but could Dalinar be something like the reincarnation of Adonalsium? We've had absolutely no evidence of this before now but it kinda fits the fear in Odium's reaction to Dalinar's Ascension. Of course, I would expect a god to pick up on that fact if he's been watching and influencing a dude for most of his life but maybe there's more going on than we know? There was also that curious exchange between Wit and Dalinar in WoK regarding Adonalsium (Chapter 54) that could support this theory but there's a WoB (number 1 here) saying that was probably not that significant. Building off the previous theory, perhaps Odium interprets Dalinar's combination of the three Shard's Investiture as a preliminary attempt to reforge Adonalsium. 

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Edited November 14, 2017 by rdog2213

[Jess]

I don't have much to contribute to this fantastic summary, but for me "We killed you!" and Odium's claim that Dalinar capital-A Ascended were the biggest "Whaaaa???" moments of the book. It's hinting at very long-term implications I think. For now I tentatively subscribe to the theory that Dalinar has gathered up and is holding a small bit of Honor's power, a few Splinters perhaps. He's still mostly Dalinar, though.

[TheOneKEA]

Right now I’m leaning towards theory number 2. In particular, I think it’s very significant that the spren which flew towards Dalinar as the Perpendicularity formed were gloryspren. I would like to ask Brandon if gloryspren existed on Roshar before Honor was shattered.

[kmosiman]

I'm leaning towards theory number 1. In Mistborn the shard holder was killed and the power needed to be held together by a new host. 

Honor was actually shattered by Odium, but he left a good chunk of power with the Stormfather. In Mistborn when a person Ascended their physical body disappeared while they held the Shard. Dalinar still exists in the physical realm, so the same thing hasn't occurred. He can also directly provide Stormlight, but this tires him.

This is not to say that he cannot gain more power and come closer to reassembling the Shard. If I'm counting correctly, he only made the 3rd oath of the Bondsmiths. The next 2 should greatly increase his power.

[taxilian]

Ascension does not in the cosmere have to mean completely taking up a shard. Remember that Rashek Ascended (if only for a short time) when he used the power at the Well of Ascension.

Quote

“And if he did die?” Kelsier pressed. “He’d last even longer on this side than I am, right?”
“Oh, indeed,” Fuzz said. “He Ascended, if just for a short time. He held enough of the power to expand his soul.”

Excerpt From: Brandon Sanderson. “Mistborn: Secret History.”

Ascending seems to indicate that you take up enough of a shard to hit a certain point (arbitrary? specific? relative? no idea). It may well be that Dallinar has reached that point or it could have been something that happened only briefly... it's even possible that he can now Ascend now and again when he opens the perpendicularity (which btw is awesome, since we knew that Honor's moves but now we understand a bit more).

[ScavellTane]

Maybe he saw Adonalsium since the stormfather is also a part of it?

[Fifth of Daybreak]

On 11/14/2017 at 0:51 AM, rdog2213 said:

A warmth that he had known once before - Chapter 119 - Right before Dalinar Unites, he feels this weird warmth. As far as I can tell, this seems to refer to Dalinar's curious dream/vision in Ch 89 of WoR, where he seemingly relives a childhood moment before stepping outside where "warm light bathed him. A deep, enveloping, piercing warmth. A warmth that soaked down deep through his skin, into his very self. He stared at that light, and was not blinded. The source was distant, but he knew it. Knew it well. He smiled". Still don't have a good explanation for what's going on here but we do have confirmation a few pages later that the Stormfather did not send this. Since all of Dalinar's previous interactions with Honor have been mediated by the Stormfather, what could this warmth be?

At this point, I'm convinced this was Odium starting up the process to send Dalinar's memories back to him. I can pull the quotes on request, but Odium's associated with a golden light, to the point where Dalinar uses gold as Odium's standard color for their maps, and Cultivation stated that taking Dalinar's memories would be a weapon Odium could use to help make Dalinar his. Odium also references the memories casually at Thaylen City, so it seems fairly intuitive he would have wanted them to build up to that point to crush Dalinar, he just underestimated the Blackthorn, pretty easy to do.

Edited November 18, 2017 by Fifth of Daybreak

[Judsing99]

I had a different thought while reading this. There's a point in the book where Dalinar hears "Unite Them" and he asks the Stormfather if it was him who spoke. The Stormfather claims it wasn't him and Dalinar begins to wonder if he's going crazy hearing voices in his head. This experience, along with the use of the capital A in Ascension, leads me to wonder if a shadow/remnant of Honor himself is the one telling Dalinar to Unite them. And although we suspect that 'them' refers to the people of Roshar, what if it was Honor whispering to unite the splinters of his shard. He is a bondsmith that has the power of cohesion, which hasn't been fully explored, so there's a possibility that he could use his powers of uniting to renew the shard of Honor, or as someone shared earlier, perhaps bring the splinters together to form a new shard, Unity.

[Justin]

I personally like Theory number three. It seems to be the only reason why he would use the word we, and it would be an interesting twist to have Unite them not refer to the high princes or the kingdoms but instead the Gods. I am really interested in how the perpendicularly will be affected if Dallinar tries to open it up during a high or ever storm.

Edited November 18, 2017 by Justin

[Justin]

Sorry, I am new to this, and accidentally posted twice in a row.  The stormfather seems confused by what Dalinar did. I am assuming that this means nobody has done this before.

Edited November 18, 2017 by Justin

[Seonid]

5 hours ago, Fifth of Daybreak said:

At this point, I'm convinced this was Odium starting up the process to send Dalinar's memories back to him. I can pull the quotes on request, but Odium's associated with a golden light, to the point where Dalinar uses gold as Odium's standard color for their maps, and Cultivation stated that taking Dalinar's memories would be a weapon Odium could use to help make Dalinar his. Odium also references the memories casually at Thaylen City, so it seems fairly intuitive he would have wanted them to build up to that point to crush Dalinar, he just underestimated the Blackthorn, pretty easy to do.

I had thought that Cultivation had set things up so that Dalinar's memories would come back before Odium tried to bring them back. That way, Dalinar wouldn't be blindsided by his memories,  but instead would have a chance to deal with them and their implications before the confrontation with Odium.

[Fifth of Daybreak]

3 minutes ago, Seonid said:

I had thought that Cultivation had set things up so that Dalinar's memories would come back before Odium tried to bring them back. That way, Dalinar wouldn't be blindsided by his memories,  but instead would have a chance to deal with them and their implications before the confrontation with Odium.

Looks like I'm wrong. This is what happens when you haven't listened to the book 5 times.

Quote

IN DOING THIS, I PROVIDE FOR HIM A WEAPON. DANGEROUS, VERY DANGEROUS. YET, ALL THINGS MUST BE CULTIVATED. WHAT I TAKE FROM YOU WILL GROW BACK EVENTUALLY. THIS IS PART OF THE COST.

Sanderson, Brandon. Oathbringer: Book Three of the Stormlight Archive (p. 1079). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

 

 

Edited November 18, 2017 by Fifth of Daybreak

[TheKraken]

I think what Dalinar did ( that Odium referred to as ascending ) might be somewhat similar to what the original 16 shardholders did by "picking up" a big piece of adonalsium's investiture and imprinting an intent in it. He's not as powerful as the others but may somehow be in that path.

Maybe sprens like Smormfather and Nightwatcher are like god backup devices that can be wielded by the bondsmiths to remake the original shards.

[Xavien]

In Taravangian's first interlude he describes Renarin as a wild card 

Quote

The Diagram hadn't seen the effect the second son, Renarin would have - he was a completely wild element.

According to Dalinar, Renarin's name roughly translates to "Like one who was born unto himself" (page 515).  Put together with what Vargo sees when Odium expands the Diagram it sounds like Renarin can change the fate Odium foresees.  I think the hug he gave Dalinar is a great example, it helped put Dalinar on the path of seeking forgiveness and to change instead of just to forget.

[Xavien]

Thinking about this some more I really like #3.  I wonder if Dalinar will end up with the ability to re-forge Splintered Shards, and potentially Adonalsium itself.  Pure speculation but makes me think that at the end of the first half Dalinar leaves Roshar thinking Odium has been defeated, perhaps for Sel or somewhere else with Hoid.  With the power he is gaining and the second half having a separate cast of primary characters something has to happen to move him into the background.

[Fulminato]

1 hour ago, Judsing99 said:

I had a different thought while reading this. There's a point in the book where Dalinar hears "Unite Them" and he asks the Stormfather if it was him who spoke. The Stormfather claims it wasn't him and Dalinar begins to wonder if he's going crazy hearing voices in his head. This experience, along with the use of the capital A in Ascension, leads me to wonder if a shadow/remnant of Honor himself is the one telling Dalinar to Unite them. And although we suspect that 'them' refers to the people of Roshar, what if it was Honor whispering to unite the splinters of his shard. He is a bondsmith that has the power of cohesion, which hasn't been fully explored, so there's a possibility that he could use his powers of uniting to renew the shard of Honor, or as someone shared earlier, perhaps bring the splinters together to form a new shard, Unity.

it isn't the first time dalinar 'hear' something. in WotK for example

"Once these weapons meant protecting, a voice inside of him whispered. [...] A parshman nurse had practically raised Dalinar. Life before death. What was that voice?"

chapter 26, stillness.

[TheOneKEA]

I wonder if the words “UNITE THEM” are coming from a nascent mind forming from the coalescing of the gloryspren. I’m still leaning towards theory 2 though, and I wonder if any other Bondsmiths that appear on Roshar will be equally capable of this feat or if this is specific to Dalinar.

[ParadoxicalZen]

I think he may have acted as the conduit, representing the Physical, as we know Investiture flows from the Spiritual > Cognitive > Physical. It is a fascinating concept

[emailanimal]

4 hours ago, Fifth of Daybreak said:

Quote

IN DOING THIS, I PROVIDE FOR HIM A WEAPON. DANGEROUS, VERY DANGEROUS. YET, ALL THINGS MUST BE CULTIVATED. WHAT I TAKE FROM YOU WILL GROW BACK EVENTUALLY. THIS IS PART OF THE COST.

Sanderson, Brandon. Oathbringer: Book Three of the Stormlight Archive (p. 1079). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

 

When I read this, I thought "HIM" in the "I PROVIDE FOR HIM A WEAPON" referred to Honor.  Basically, Cultivation has a very different way of fighting this battle, but what she does is "grows" the people who will fight Odium (see, Lift and Taravangian as other examples, although the latter requires a separate conversation).  So, I took the phrase to mean "I am preparing you to be Honor's weapon".

 

But you may be right, this may be Cultivation's understanding of the gamble and the fact that Dalinar is in the danger of becoming Odium's weapon.

 

Very much want to see more of Cultivation. 

[taxilian]

4 hours ago, Xavien said:

Thinking about this some more I really like #3.  I wonder if Dalinar will end up with the ability to re-forge Splintered Shards, and potentially Adonalsium itself.  Pure speculation but makes me think that at the end of the first half Dalinar leaves Roshar thinking Odium has been defeated, perhaps for Sel or somewhere else with Hoid.  With the power he is gaining and the second half having a separate cast of primary characters something has to happen to move him into the background.

Based on what we've seen in other books, it seems likely that splintered shards don't need to be "reforged", just gathered together.  If you gather together enough of the splinters they forge themselves back together -- Harmony is the best example of this. The gathering itself could be very tricky, of course -- Hamony just picked up the powers of the two shards when they were laying around and hadn't been splintered.  Still, I don't think the reforging is the hard part, it's the gathering together of power.

[kmosiman]

The part that doesn't fully make sense to me yet is the rejoining. I guess it may be similar to stars and planets forming or maybe once a piece of power gets used to being separate it stays separate. Otherwise the other splintered Shards should have reformed. 

My personal theory is that Dalinar has reformed some of Honor's power but is still missing most of it. Over time he should be able to reform it, except the Stormfather mentioned that some wounds do not heal, so maybe Shards can't reform on their own.

[StormingTexan]

As far out there as it seems I like theory 3. Dalinar says a few times when he talks about Honor being dead and therefore not really God there is something “else”. I took that to mean Cultivation but now I’m leaning to another entity. Maybe the shadow of Adonalsium.  

[Nyctef]

Right now I'm in favour of theory 1 - characters having a crisis of faith before literally becoming God is something we've seen already, and I think Dalinar committing the ultimate heresy would be really fun to watch (if just for the reactions of everyone who's dismissed him so far...)

[manugutito]

21 hours ago, TheKraken said:

I think what Dalinar did ( that Odium referred to as ascending ) might be somewhat similar to what the original 16 shardholders did by "picking up" a big piece of adonalsium's investiture and imprinting an intent in it. He's not as powerful as the others but may somehow be in that path.

I am inclined to believe this. We know (Sel) that when a Shard is Splintered its power is not lost. Maybe what is lost is the Intent of the Shard, so if someone (Dalinar) were to pick up a big chunk of it, he/she could imprint a new Intent to it (Unity in this case).

 

I also don't believe he is a full Shard. So I guess what I'm saying is I am all in for Theory 2 .

[Jaconis]

Does anybody else find it odd, a coincidence, or a deeper meaning that the two orders of Knights Radiant (Skybreakers and Dustbringers) who, for the most part, are willing to oppose this new entity, Unity, are the two that have the Division surge?

On to be topic at hand. 

22 hours ago, Fifth of Daybreak said:

Looks like I'm wrong. This is what happens when you haven't listened to the book 5 times.

 

And I’m still not sure I understand her meaning. I think it’s clear her intent was to remove the memories, let him grow to be a better man, then return them when he was able to deal with them, but before his meeting with Odium. 

How could this have made Dalinar be a weapon for Odium then? Like, if the memories returned and Dalinar wasn’t able to cope with them, he would be ripe for Odium? But wasn’t he already set to be Odium’s? 

Quote

A warmth that he had known once before

Not sure which theory this supports, if any, but there’s also this, at the very end of the book. 

Quote

He dipped his pen again. “Would you close the balcony doors again, gemheart?” he asked her. “The sunlight is distracting me from the other light.”

“Other light?”

[...]

As Navani shut the balcony doors, he closed his eyes and felt the warmth of a distant, unseen light.

Whatever the source, he seems to be better connected to it now. 

Edited November 19, 2017 by Jaconis