theory [OB] What Could the Moons Story Really Mean?

[Wit Beyond Measure]

The Four Color Theorem:  Wit sets up four colors at the beginning of the story, before the big reveal.  Like all of Wit's eerily poignant tales, Mishim is a metaphor.  And Tsa, and Nomon, and Salas. 

We have three moons of green, blue, and violet.  And then we have Queen Tsa, whose tower is white and who turns the moon white when she ascends.  

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It was the time between the first two moons, the darkest period of night. The hateful hour, his people called it, for it was one of the only times when the gods did not watch men.

Sanderson, Brandon. The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, Book 1) (p. 447). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

Implied:  the moons are gods watching over men.

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It was a night when the moons were large, and these—everyone knows—are nights when the moons pay special attention to the actions of mortals.

Sanderson, Brandon. Oathbringer: Book Three of the Stormlight Archive (p. 671). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

The three moons represent three gods or three god-like immortals while the queen represents mortals - or a single mortal.

1. Violet – Most commonly associated with Voidlight, Odium's Investiture.  So Salas might be Voidlight or the guardian of Voidlight, which is currently BAM but used to be Odium.  
2. Green – The color of growth and the Nightwatcher and so probably the color of Cultivation's Investiture.  So Mishim might be Growlight, if there is such a thing, or whatever Cultivation's Investiture is.  Or she could be the guardian of this Investiture, so the Nightwatcher or Cultivation herself.
3. Blue – The color of honorspren, which are splinters of the Stormfather, guardian of Honor's Investiture.  Honor's Investiture is very likely the largest Investiture on Roshar, especially before Honor died, and so the largest of the three moons is a good fit for this Investiture.  So Nomon, by process of elimination and perhaps tenuous connection, might be Stormlight (Honor's Investiture) or the Stormfather or Honor himself.
4. White – Tsa's color in the story both as the white pillar and then the white moon, as she switches spots with Mishim.  I have no idea who Tsa represents!  She is clearly clever and sly and ever-so-cunning.  She outconned Mishim!  Does Tsa represent humanity?  Does Tsa represent the Natanatans?  Does Tsa represent the Heralds?  Or is Tsa just Tsa?  I doubt that last one but it could be.

(And then using only these four colors to represent contiguous countries, you could create a planar map of Roshar, or any land really, where no countries of the same color touch.  --Pattern)

Proof:  See Books 4 and 5 of the Stormlight Archive.  Q.E.D.

Err, no.  Not at all.  I'm throwing out ideas that might be true.  I'd love to hear other ideas.  And that's where you come in!  

Who do those baby blue god babies represent?

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“Um, well,” Sigzil said. “It’s obviously fanciful. Not the real reason that the Natan people have blue skin. And, um…”

Sanderson, Brandon. Oathbringer: Book Three of the Stormlight Archive (p. 365). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

The brilliance of Wit is how he tells tales so fanciful they cannot possibly be true, then he tells us that they cannot possibly be true, and then of course they are true.  He buries the truth by changing the characters and the settings.  And we think, oh, that's so beautiful but could never happen!  And then when it does happen, the poignancy of both the real and metaphorical stories burns in our minds forever. 

The Girl Who Looked Up (the humans) found that we were the monsters (Voidbringers).

When the Wandersail found the Uvaran emperor (Honor) dead, all those years, the murders the Uvarans (Radiants) committed of the peaceful people (Parshendi) were no longer the emperor's responsibility but their own.

Wit's punchlines - the ends of his tales - are often if not always true.  Here, we end with the Aimians birthed (metaphorically) on Roshar. 

When the mortals swapped places with the Green Goddess and then swapped back, they brought the Aimians back with them to Roshar.  (Or at least that's my big theory.) 

How?  The celestial sky might a metaphor for either the Spiritual or Cognitive Realm, which I think is one way or the only way worldhoppers travel.  If humans in the Physical Realm swapped places with Cultivation (or the Nightwatcher) in the Cognitive or Spiritual Realm, they could contrive to bring the Aimians through, with a little help from their new BFF Honor.

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“And that is why to this day, the people of Natanatan have skin of a faintly blue shade. And it is why Mishim, though still crafty, has never again left her place.

Sanderson, Brandon. Oathbringer: Book Three of the Stormlight Archive (p. 675). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

Everything I've said is highly theoretical.  Again, I'd love to hear your insights, interpretations of, and metaphors for this tale! 

Much if not most of what I've said was first said by others, of course!  I've mooned over many of the moon musings, but this thread is particularly my favorite (not because I follow the premise but because the ideas and presentation are remarkable!): 

 

Edited December 31, 2017 by Wit Beyond Measure

[Wit Beyond Measure]

The more I ponder over this tale, the more I'm wondering what could possibly cause Cultivation (Mishim) to experience such deep loss:

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“And that is why to this day, the people of Natanatan have skin of a faintly blue shade. And it is why Mishim, though still crafty, has never again left her place. Most importantly, it is the story of how the moon came to know the one thing that before, only mortals had known. Loss.”

Sanderson, Brandon. Oathbringer: Book Three of the Stormlight Archive (p. 675). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

Perhaps the Aimians aren't simply other-worlders, as I originally suspected, but somehow pieces of a god, demi-gods, perhaps even pieces of Honor, explaining Cultivation's jealousy and sense of loss.

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Question

How many different non-human immortals are there on Roshar?

Brandon Sanderson

Wow, very specific. Most of the Aimians count. They're both small races, but there are enough of them that there are dozens of each that count as immortal, and they're non-human. The two living Shards, I would say count as non-human immortals, and most spren count as non-human immortals. So there's a ton.

Sanderson has placed the Aimians in a list of two gods and the splinters of gods.  Very interesting!  Certainly, their immortality and incredible self-healing and -morphing abilities imply high levels of Investiture, where Skybreaker squires and even the Heralds themselves should and do know (respectively) to stay away from Arclo's kind - a different kind than the blue, admittedly, but I suspect the same applies.  (Edgedancer)

And then here is a note Sanderson gave on Axies in an autographed copy, though he's probably speaking of Siah Aimians or perhaps all Aimians in general here rather than just Axies:

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Axies is basically immortal because of an interaction with the magic.

First mortal and THEN immortal because of some interaction with magic, with Investiture?  Was their mortal form human?  And was that interaction with magic the event alluded to in Wit's tale?

[+Hoiditthroughthegrapevine]

I've been meaning to reply to this post for awhile now, have to get some work in every once in awhile.

On 12/30/2017 at 9:09 AM, Wit Beyond Measure said:

The brilliance of Wit is how he tells tales so fanciful they cannot possibly be true, then he tells us that they cannot possibly be true, and then of course they are true.  He buries the truth by changing the characters and the settings.  And we think, oh, that's so beautiful but could never happen!  And then when it does happen, the poignancy of both the real and metaphorical stories burns in our minds forever. 

The Girl Who Looked Up (the humans) found that we were the monsters (Voidbringers).

When the Wandersail found the Uvaran emperor (Honor) dead, all those years, the murders the Uvarans (Radiants) committed of the peaceful people (Parshendi) were no longer the emperor's responsibility but their own.

Wit's punchlines - the ends of his tales - are often if not always true.  Here, we end with the Aimians birthed (metaphorically) on Roshar. 

When the mortals swapped places with the Green Goddess and then swapped back, they brought the Aimians back with them to Roshar.  (Or at least that's my big theory.) 

I really like your formulation here. Wit/Hoid is one of the best characters ever written, and the stories he tells can be viewed on multiple levels. On their surface they are cautionary fables, highlighting a principle that is open somewhat to interpretation. The genius of this device is that it is a scale-able metaphor, it can exist simply as a morality tale, it can be showing a protagonist the principle behind an important lesson that they need to learn, and it can reveal shadowy hints of the deeper secrets of the Cosmere. Also, his stories are always amazing. The whole Girl Who Looked Up cycle in OB is one of my favorite things ever written. The initial story told by Shallan with her lightweaving, the retelling of the Story by Hoid contextualizing the central crisis that Shallan experiences about how to keep going when life is pain and failure, with the slight modification at the end where the story is fully personalized for Shallan and she changes from the Girl Who Looked Up to the Girl Who Stood Up. That is powerful story telling.

I love your interpretation of the Wandersail story, I was stuck on the mode of interpreting it solely as a lesson Kaladin needed to learn about responsibility for his actions and also the Cosmere secrets angle, but I think it total fits the moral crisis that the Radiants must have experienced when they realized what they had done to the Parshendi.

I like the Moon story being an Origin story for the Aimians a lot, but I think that they are more Cultivation than Honor.

The Dysian Aimians are a collective being, made of individual semi-aware pieces, but this would imply that their is some means of coordinating these constituent elements. My guess is that like the Singers, but even more so, they have a portion of their being permanently in the Cognitive Realm. Possibly they have super charged Connection and Identity, this might be the nature of their magic. Whether they were created out of whole cloth or if they were sentient beings that were converted into the deathless Sleepless is unclear, but their ability to readily dispatch skybreaker squires heavily implies that they have some sort of powerful magic they can access. The scene in Edgedancer where Lift sees Arclo in the alleyway, Arclo was doing some very strange things with the light and the apparent physical reality of the alleyway. If they exist primarily in the cognitive realm, possibly one of their magical abilities is to warp physical reality. If you think about it they exist really as just the idea of self, with the ability to project that Identity onto other semi-aware organisms. The individual cremlings are interchangeable/replaceable, so this heavily implies that they exist primarily in the cognitive realm (this is all just my own personal observations, WoB and textual references to the contrary would be awesome). @Wit Beyond Measure, if you have the Kindle Edition of Arcanum Unbounded, would you mind looking up the scene in the alley with Arclo and getting some good quotes out (you get the best quotes!)

The Siah Aimians also exhibit strange behaviors that would imply that they also exist partially in the Cognitive realm. They can change almost anything about their physiology except the color of their eyes and nails (there is probably something important to this detail, as the eyes are the window to the soul). They also cast shadows in the wrong direction (which seems like a big hint that they are somehow existing in both realms simultaneously or partially, whatever the ratio is). If Siah Aimians exist in the both the Cognitive and Physical Realms simultaneously it would be a far more interesting thing to do to track down all of the spren like Axies the collector is doing. The other interesting thing about the Siah Aimians is that they are generally disliked because they have a proximate curse effect, people around them experience bad luck.

With the above, I think, as I have said before, that Aimians seem like they are mostly if not entirely of Cultivation. We know also from the back of the book writings (which I think has been confirmed to be written by the Dysian Aimians) that the Sleepless are keeping an eye on the new orders of Radiants, and that they also seem to speak of the future with some awareness, which might be tenous proof that they are of Cultivation or working closely with Cultivation at the very least. Maybe the reason for the boon/curse paradigm of the old magic is that she is primarily manipulating Fortune, but the net effect in the system of Fortune has to be neutral. The good lord giveth, the good lord taketh away. If this is correct (again, total speculation here) then possibly the Bad Luck (or negative Fortune/bane) of the Siah Aimians is offset by the Good Luck (or positive fortune/boon) of the Sleepless. Also, we know from Taravangian's talk with Odium that Fortune is one of the qualities of Investiture that allows access to Future sight, so maybe the Sleepless are Cultivations gardeners extraordinaire and the Siah Aimians are the schlemiels that you stick behind the enemies ranks so that they stub their toes a lot.

Edited December 31, 2017 by hoiditthroughthegrapevine

[Wit Beyond Measure]

1 hour ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

The scene in Edgedancer where Lift sees Arclo in the alleyway, Arclo was doing some very strange things with the light and the apparent physical reality of the alleyway. If they exist primarily in the cognitive realm, possibly one of their magical abilities is to warp physical reality. If you think about it they exist really as just the idea of self, with the ability to project that Identity onto other semi-aware organisms. The individual cremlings are interchangeable/replaceable, so this heavily implies that they exist primarily in the cognitive realm (this is all just my own personal observations, WoB and textual references to the contrary would be awesome). @Wit Beyond Measure, if you have the Kindle Edition of Arcanum Unbounded, would you mind looking up the scene in the alley with Arclo and getting some good quotes out (you get the best quotes!)

Thank you, greatly! 

Here are the Edgedancer quotes I'd highlighted in that scene where Lift discovers the corpses and cremlings, which I think is the scene you mean.  I think all are Arclo speaking.

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“You needn’t fear me,” the old man said. “Your war is my war, and has been for millennia. Ancient Radiants named me friend and ally before everything went wrong. What wonderful days those were, before the Last Desolation. Days of … honor. Now gone, long gone.”

Sanderson, Brandon. Edgedancer: From the Stormlight Archive (Kindle Locations 2507-2509). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

 

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"They were not capable of killing me, so I can’t plead self-defense, any more than a soldier could plead it in murdering a child. But they did ask, in not so many words, for a contest—and I gave it to them.”

Sanderson, Brandon. Edgedancer: From the Stormlight Archive (Kindle Locations 2511-2512). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

This next quote makes it obvious that the Sleepless are the authors of the back of the books, but I've just seen a WoB confirming that, too.

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"We watch the others. The assassin. The surgeon. The liar. The highprince. But not you. The others all ignore you … and that, I hazard to predict, is a mistake.”

Sanderson, Brandon. Edgedancer: From the Stormlight Archive (Kindle Locations 2515-2516). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

 

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"I’m not the one that Nale is chasing; he knows to stay away from me and my kind."

Sanderson, Brandon. Edgedancer: From the Stormlight Archive (Kindle Locations 2524-2525). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

 

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"My siblings are more interested in you Radiants. If you ever encounter another of the Sleepless, tell them you’ve spoken with Arclo. I’m certain it will gain you sympathy.”

Sanderson, Brandon. Edgedancer: From the Stormlight Archive (Kindle Locations 2536-2538). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

 

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“I’m not here to answer you, human. I’m here because I’m interested, and you are the source of my curiosity. When one achieves immortality, one must find purpose beyond the struggle to live, as old Axies always said.”

Sanderson, Brandon. Edgedancer: From the Stormlight Archive (Kindle Locations 2538-2540). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

 

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"Child, I can grow what I need. Is my mind becoming full? I can breed new hordelings specialized in holding memories. Do I need to sense what is going on in the city? Hordelings with extra eyes, or antennae to taste and hear, can solve that."

Sanderson, Brandon. Edgedancer: From the Stormlight Archive (Kindle Locations 2544-2546). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

And then back to what you've said at the end:

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With the above, I think, as I have said before, that Aimians seem like they are mostly if not entirely of Cultivation. We know also from the back of the book writings (which I think has been confirmed to be written by the Dysian Aimians) that the Sleepless are keeping an eye on the new orders of Radiants, and that they also seem to speak of the future with some awareness, which might be tenous proof that they are of Cultivation or working closely with Cultivation at the very least. 

The Sleepless anatomy definitely reminds me of Cultivation!  The way that Axies and Arclo speak reminds me of Wit.  Perhaps it is an immortal thing.  I'm not certain if the Sleepless and Blues have the same origin stories or not.  They definitely share a great deal in common but are also decidedly different.

Those covers!  I don't get the backs of books, either, and when I read the Sleepless authored them, I looked at all of them today and was just floored!

WoK back cover:

So, this confirms what I'd wondered from Arclo's spiel about "the surgeon" being Kal.  Check.  And I'm thinking Dal or Kal or Lift for the one who will redeem us.  But who, who, who is "one of them will destroy us"?!!!!! 

(I love Orson Scott Card's Ender and Bean books, and I adore Rothfuss.  Robin Hobb has a quote somewhere about Sanderson, too, and she's the bomb.  I should have been paying more attention to Sanderson before now.)

The cover implies one of the four but I think it really means one of the new Radiants.  And my best guess is that the Radiant will be a Dustbringer since I believe that Dustbringers might be the real Voidbringers (in the physical sense of the True Desolation, where Odium brings an emotional void).

And the WoR cover talks about how the Explorer, "straddling the fates of two peoples, is forced to choose between slow death and a terrible betrayal of all she believes."  Uh, yeah, who?  Jasnah?  But what is the terrible betrayal?  That one still seems muddy.

The OB back covers don't seem to fit as well, either, but I can tell who they are probably supposed to be.

Edited January 1, 2018 by Wit Beyond Measure

[+Hoiditthroughthegrapevine]

As always, awesome quotes, thanks @Wit Beyond Measure!

I was looking specifically for the descriptions of the strange things happening to physical reality around Arclo, I'll look it up in my physical copy, but man it's a pain to manually type in book quotes.

[RShara]

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And the WoR cover talks about how the Explorer, "straddling the fates of two peoples, is forced to choose between slow death and a terrible betrayal of all she believes."

It's Eshonai.

[Vortaan]

51 minutes ago, Wit Beyond Measure said:

So, this confirms what I'd wondered from Arclo's spiel about "the surgeon" being Kal.  Check.  And I'm thinking Dal or Kal or Lift for the one who will redeem us.  But who, who, who is "one of them will destroy us"?!!!!! 

It's Dalinar, who was going to be Odium's chosen champion.

[Calderis]

The moon story is in world folklore. That's it. 

The Natan people have blue skin because they have Siah Aimian blood.

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/39/#e457

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Chris Hansen

Are either the blue-skinned Natans or blue-veined Babatharnams human-Aimian hybrids?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

Not everything has to be remarkably significant, and we've been told outright that the moons are nothing big. 

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/262/#e8788

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Questioner [PENDING REVIEW]

Back to Stormlight. Is there significance to the color of moons?

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

Yes, there is a significance to the colors of the moons in Stormlight, but it is not a major player in theories. There is a significance, but it's not, like, one of these things that you're going to read book seven and be like "The colors of the moons! It was there all along!" Sometimes, I put stuff like that in, right? It's not like that.

 

[+Hoiditthroughthegrapevine]

@Wit Beyond Measure found the quotes about the strange reality bending powers of Arclo the sleepless from Edgedancer (all from Chapter 18):

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She inched further down the alleyway, entering a place of undefined shadows. With the clouds overhead—and everyone having taken their spheres away—the place was nearly impenetrable.

Then later:

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How long was this alleyway?

Then later:

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Lightning flashed, granting her a glimpse of the corpse. A woman's face stared upward with sightless eyes. A black and white uniform, painted crimson by the lightning and covered in some king of silky substance.

Lift gasped and jumped backward, bumping into something behind her—another body. She spun, and the skittering, clicking sounds grew agitated. The next flash of lightning was bright enough for her to make out a body pressed against the wall of the alleyway, tied to a part of a shanty, the head rolling to the side. She knew him, just as she knew the woman on the ground.

And finally this one, which is the best sample that shows something truly strange is going on:

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Storms, storms, STORMS, lift thought, spinning around. The walls seemed to be moving, shifting, sliding like they were covered in oil. She tried shying away from the corpses, but...she'd lost where they were. Was that the direction she'd come from, or did it lead deeper into this nightmare of an alleyway?

These taken together seem to imply that Arclo has the ability to warp physical reality. The alleyway being unnatural dark (I know this is explained by the lack of spheres and possibly the darkness of the storm, but this seems like a special more enhanced kind of darkness) and the alleyway being unnatural long. The part where the walls seemed to moving and sliding around could potentially be explained by the synchronized mass movement of the hordelings, but the part where they were "sliding like they were covered in oil" doesn't seem like a description of a surface covered with synchronized cremlings, that would be discontinuous and bumpy, oil is smooth and viscous. And finally, the fact that Lift gets disoriented in the alleyway, heavily implies that some kind of strange reality bending magic is at play, because Alleyways are simple by design, two directions forwards or backwards.

Also interesting to note is that the Sleepless seems to have dispatched the Skybreaker squires in a peculiar way. The woman is covered in a silky substance and seems to be stuck to the floor, while the male Skybreaker is suspended from a shanty, body immobilized with his head rolling to the side.

I also think that this quote is very interesting, kind of like a living hive mind version of a Coppermind:

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You see, child, I can grow what I need. Is my mind becoming full? I can breed new hordelings specialized in holding memories. Do I need to sense what is going on in this city? Hordelings with extra eyes, or antennae to taste and hear, can solve that. Given time, I can make for my body nearly anything I need.

I also think this bit is incredibly interesting, when starting to talk about the philosophy of the Omnithi:

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I heard an interesting idea once, while traveling in a land that you will never visit.

Seems to heavily imply that Arclo at least is a worldhopper. With his self-described attempt to build a philosophy as his immortal goal, maybe he has something to do with the World Singers? I would love to see Hoid have a chat with Arclo, hopefully that's slated for a future book.

 

[Wit Beyond Measure]

43 minutes ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

@Wit Beyond Measure found the quotes about the strange reality bending powers of Arclo the sleepless from Edgedancer (all from Chapter 18):

Then later:

Then later:

And finally this one, which is the best sample that shows something truly strange is going on:

These taken together seem to imply that Arclo has the ability to warp physical reality. The alleyway being unnatural dark (I know this is explained by the lack of spheres and possibly the darkness of the storm, but this seems like a special more enhanced kind of darkness) and the alleyway being unnatural long. The part where the walls seemed to moving and sliding around could potentially be explained by the synchronized mass movement of the hordelings, but the part where they were "sliding like they were covered in oil" doesn't seem like a description of a surface covered with synchronized cremlings, that would be discontinuous and bumpy, oil is smooth and viscous. And finally, the fact that Lift gets disoriented in the alleyway, heavily implies that some kind of strange reality bending magic is at play, because Alleyways are simple by design, two directions forwards or backwards.

Also interesting to note is that the Sleepless seems to have dispatched the Skybreaker squires in a peculiar way. The woman is covered in a silky substance and seems to be stuck to the floor, while the male Skybreaker is suspended from a shanty, body immobilized with his head rolling to the side.

I'm so sorry I got all of the wrong quotes.  I had a feeling I wasn't understanding what you wanted, mostly because I hadn't noticed the same thing.  But I really see it now!  I am now picturing Arclo as Spiderman with silken webs shooting from one wrist to stick the Skybreakers to the floor and shanty, but with a special building-morphing oil shooting from the other wrist.

I think I'd read the scene as a simple lightweaving at first, but your highlights have convinced me that it could be something significantly different.

Quote

I also think that this quote is very interesting, kind of like a living hive mind version of a Coppermind:

I know, right?  How cool is that?  And not only an inanimate mind, but the cremlings seem to be sentient independently, functioning as little cremling spies, which makes it fun to go through and look for them all over the place (I search "cremling" or "legger"), spying on Lift throughout Edgedancer as well as spying on the assassin, the surgeon, the spy, and possibly the highprince, too.  One of them laughs at Lift!!!

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Lift remained in her seat on the stone, then smacked her hand at a cremling that had been inching across the step nearby. Starvin’ thing dodged, then clicked its chitin legs as if laughing. They sure did have strange cremlings here. Not like the ones she was used to at all. Weird how you could forget you were in a different country until you saw the cremlings.

Sanderson, Brandon. Edgedancer: From the Stormlight Archive (Kindle Locations 1767-1770). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

 

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Seems to heavily imply that Arclo at least is a worldhopper. With his self-described attempt to build a philosophy as his immortal goal, maybe he has something to do with the World Singers? I would love to see Hoid have a chat with Arclo, hopefully that's slated for a future book.

We may already have.  Brandon confirmed that, in the epilogue of WoR, Wit waits on Jasnah and blabbers on and on to a group of seemingly innocuous cremlings who are really a Sleepless.

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“This is a lot more satisfying,” he said, “when I have intelligent life whom I can render awed, rapt with attention for my clever verbosity.”

The ugly lizard-crab-thing on the next rock over clicked its claw, an almost hesitant sound.

“You’re right, of course,” Wit said. “My usual audience isn’t particularly intelligent. That was also the obvious joke, however, so shame on you.”

The ugly lizard-crab-thing scuttled across its rock, moving onto the other side. Wit sighed.

Sanderson, Brandon. Words of Radiance (The Stormlight Archive, Book 2) (p. 1076). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

That's only the beginning.  The whole bit is hilarious when viewed in the new light!

Edited January 1, 2018 by Wit Beyond Measure

[+Hoiditthroughthegrapevine]

8 minutes ago, Wit Beyond Measure said:

That's only the beginning.  The whole bit is hilarious when viewed in the new light!

Freaking awesome! Once again amazing quotes @Wit Beyond Measure! I am currently out of upvotes, but when they trickle in I'll give you one for those quotes.

This one is my personal favorite that you found:

10 minutes ago, Wit Beyond Measure said:

I know, right?  How cool is that?  And not only an inanimate mind, but the cremlings seem to be sentient independently, functioning as little cremling spies, which makes it fun to go through and look for them all over the place (I search "cremling" or "legger"), spying on Lift throughout Edgedancer as well as spying on the assassin, the surgeon, the spy, and possibly the highprince, too.  One of them laughs at Lift!!!

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Lift remained in her seat on the stone, then smacked her hand at a cremling that had been inching across the step nearby. Starvin’ thing dodged, then clicked its chitin legs as if laughing. They sure did have strange cremlings here. Not like the ones she was used to at all. Weird how you could forget you were in a different country until you saw the cremlings.

Nice work, as per usual.

[Calderis]

23 minutes ago, Wit Beyond Measure said:

I am now picturing Arclo as Spiderman with silken webs shooting from one wrist to stick the Skybreakers to the floor and shanty, but with a special building-morphing oil shooting from the other wrist.

Why would Arclo fight in a humanoid form? This just makes him a larger target. 

I don't believe there was anything magical in the deaths of the Skybreakers, or Arclo's appearance beyond his existence. 

In darkness, the shining carapace of bugs moving as a carpet along a wall could easily appear to be oil. 

The silk is an obvious product of the bugs themselves. 

Why constantly look for magical means when there's perfectly mundane explanations? The biggest strength of Brandon's writing is that his magic adheres to rules, and much of the time the magic can't do things that have to be figured out or overcome in other ways. Assuming that everything is a magical construct/production runs completely counter to that. 

[Wit Beyond Measure]

4 minutes ago, Calderis said:

Why would Arclo fight in a humanoid form? This just makes him a larger target. 

...

Why constantly look for magical means when there's perfectly mundane explanations? 

I was picturing Arclo as Spiderman as something funny and definitely not something that literally happened in the story.

Why constantly insist that the ultra-boring, obvious, and mundane explanations must be the only ones? 

[+Hoiditthroughthegrapevine]

13 minutes ago, Calderis said:

Why would Arclo fight in a humanoid form? This just makes him a larger target.

I agree that this is unlikely.

13 minutes ago, Calderis said:

Why constantly look for magical means when there's perfectly mundane explanations? The biggest strength of Brandon's writing is that his magic adheres to rules, and much of the time the magic can't do things that have to be figured out or overcome in other ways. Assuming that everything is a magical construct/production runs completely counter to that. 

I generally agree with this, but I'm still trying to figure out how the Dysian Aimians work. The single biggest clue that something strange is going on with the Alleyway is that Lift gets disoriented. This could be explained by the shifting movement of a mass of Hordelings, but an alleyway described as long without any mention of twisting around, seems like a very hard structure to get disoriented in. The other supporting details (the oil like wall, the unnatural impenetrable darkness, and the unusual length of the alleyway) add up, at least in my mind, to the conclusion that something strange is happening with the physical reality around Arclo. This could totally be wrong, but at the same time the way I read the scene this all added up to the impression that reality was bent and warped around the Aimian.

Edited January 1, 2018 by hoiditthroughthegrapevine

[Calderis]

58 minutes ago, Wit Beyond Measure said:

Why constantly insist that the ultra-boring, obvious, and mundane explanations must be the only ones? 

Because to assume otherwise is to stray further and further away from rule based magic, and into the realm of deus ex machina.

Edit: and really, the "mundane" explanations in the Cosmere are already extraordinary most of the time. We don't need to add layers of complexity. 

So many theories reach for crackpot explanations, and search for evidence to fit an idea they have, rather than looking at the evidence in the stories and WoBs and building an idea from there. 

We have an amazingly detailed and complicated world at our fingertips. There's plenty to find in what's already there, with trying to make our own ideas fit. 

55 minutes ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

The other supporting details (the oil like wall, the unnatural impenetrable darkness, and the unusual length of the alleyway) add up, at least in my mind, to the conclusion that something strange is happening with the physical reality around Arclo. This could totally be wrong, but at the same time the way I read the scene this all added up to the impression that reality was bent and warped around the Aimian.

I find it more likely (and still not likely) that some airborne toxin could have been produced in order to disorient those attacking. Lift did just wander into a spot where two Skybreaker apprentices were killed. 

Edited January 1, 2018 by Calderis

[+Ravioli]

52 minutes ago, Calderis said:

Because to assume otherwise is to stray further and further away from rule based magic, and into the realm of deus ex machina.

Edit: and really, the "mundane" explanations in the Cosmere are already extraordinary most of the time. We don't need to add layers of complexity. 

So many theories reach for crackpot explanations, and search for evidence to fit an idea they have, rather than looking at the evidence in the stories and WoBs and building an idea from there. 

We have an amazingly detailed and complicated world at our fingertips. There's plenty to find in what's already there, with trying to make our own ideas fit. 

By making everything significant, the actually significant things lose their punch. Some things are significant for their world but don't matter to the story. Speculation just for the sake of complicating things brings the focus on things that make people lose sight of the bigger picture. And as you said, the explanations for a lot of things are fascinating, but they don't really mean much and that's just how worlds actually are!

[Stormlightning]

8 hours ago, Calderis said:

Quote

The other supporting details (the oil like wall, the unnatural impenetrable darkness, and the unusual length of the alleyway) add up, at least in my mind, to the conclusion that something strange is happening with the physical reality around Arclo. This could totally be wrong, but at the same time the way I read the scene this all added up to the impression that reality was bent and warped around the Aimian.

I find it more likely (and still not likely) that some airborne toxin could have been produced in order to disorient those attacking. Lift did just wander into a spot where two Skybreaker apprentices were killed. 

I believe this is also supported by the interlude with the soulcaster girl. My book is lent out or I would look it up, but I believe that when the crew starts to die off it's related to a smokiness in the air. Or maybe it was something the Sleepless cook put in their food, but when she is finally killed, I think it was due to toxins in the air. @Wit Beyond Measure you may be interested in looking up some quotes from that interlude relating to distorted reality.

[RShara]

4 minutes ago, Stormlightning said:

I believe this is also supported by the interlude with the soulcaster girl. My book is lent out or I would look it up, but I believe that when the crew starts to die off it's related to a smokiness in the air. Or maybe it was something the Sleepless cook put in their food, but when she is finally killed, I think it was due to toxins in the air. @Wit Beyond Measure you may be interested in looking up some quotes from that interlude relating to distorted reality.

It was definitely in the food.

 

Quote

“Ah…” a voice said from behind her. “I should have guessed the drug would not affect you as quickly. You are barely human anymore.”

Kaza rolled over and found someone approaching on quiet, bare feet. The cook? Yes, that was her, with the tattooed face.

“You…” Kaza croaked, “you poisoned us.”

“After many warnings not to come to this place,” the cook said. “It is rare I must guard it so … aggressively. Men must not again discover this place.”

Other than that, Kaza is probably not the most reliable narrator about physical events, given that a good chunk of her is already smoke, and she's seeing into the CR when she's not careful.

[digitalbusker]

I read Lift's disorientation in the alley as the prose equivalent of a dolly zoom; letting us know Lift is freaked out without resorting to having her day "I'm freaking out, man!"

[RShara]

6 minutes ago, digitalbusker said:

I read Lift's disorientation in the alley as the prose equivalent of a dolly zoom; letting us know Lift is freaked out without resorting to having her day "I'm freaking out, man!"

I think I agree.  She is a very small and rather young girl, out of food/power, confronted with something suuuuuper creepy and weird that had just killed several people.

[+Hoiditthroughthegrapevine]

Except the base elements of the dolly zoom existed before she discovered the dead bodies ( the unusually long alleyway, the impenetrable darkness.)

Could be argued these are all natural explainable phenomena used to create a particular mood, but the whole scene still to me has a pervasive sense of magically altered reality to it. At this point though I could agree to disagree.

[RShara]

The moving walls and getting lost were after she found the bodies and heard the skittering clicking sounds.  I just feel something as crazy as flat out reality manipulation is something Brandon isn't likely to use.

But the Sleepless ARE weird, so who knows?

[Spoolofwhool]

1 hour ago, RShara said:

The moving walls and getting lost were after she found the bodies and heard the skittering clicking sounds.  I just feel something as crazy as flat out reality manipulation is something Brandon isn't likely to use.

But the Sleepless ARE weird, so who knows?

Crazy, not to mention that we don't have any precedence for localized physical spacial distortions in the Cosmere. 

The closest we have is in The Emperor's Soul

Spoiler

When Shai used forgery to make her room bigger, but that did actually change surrounding architecture to fit, so it's not the same at all.