Soulburst capabilities?

[QuaN7umVo1D]

Do you think a Soulburst (nicrosil compounder) could store not just bare investiture but also a manifestation of said investiure, like for example would he/she be able to store a Gravitation lashing? Also do you think it would be possible for a Soulburst to convert between Investiture from different worlds, for example converting a Breath into Stormlight or something similar? Furthermore a compounder can effectively multiply a stored unit tenfold, so if a Soulburst can multiply Investiture, how will that effect the Shard which fuels the magic system, since the Investiture comes from it.

Edited April 1, 2018 by QuaN7umVo1D

[Krios]

I think a soulbearer misting could potentially store any other ablities he has. Loosing access to them for a time and then being able to power them up through tapping his nicrosilmind.

[Yezrien]

Feruchemical nicrosil is one of the great mysteries of the modern cosmere, so it's hard to speak with any confidence about it.

But I'll say this much: all compounding draws huge bursts of investiture from Preservation. A nicrosil compounder and an iron compounder are both doing basically the same thing; the only difference is that the iron compounder turns that investiture into weight, and the nicrosil compounder turns it into... something else. Drawing this quantity of investiture from Preservation does not seem to affect the Shard itself in any noticeable way.

And even if the soulburster was storing investiture from a foreign shard, like surgebinding, the compounding would still draw power only from Preservation. It would be using Preservation's power to mimic Honor's, but it should not affect Honor. I think.

[Guest Breaker]

That’s not entirely for sure. Didn’t atium burning draw power from Ruin? Couldn’t, then, /hypothetically/ some kind of Nicrosil compounding do the same? 

[The One Who Connects]

11 hours ago, QuaN7umVo1D said:

Do you think a Soulburst (nicrosil compounder) could store not just bare investiture but also a manifestation of said investiure, like for example would he/she be able to store a Gravitation lashing?

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Question
Could feruchemical Nicrosil be used to store other invested abilities, such as a Returned breath or the abilities of the Knights Radiant?

 

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, that's possible

 

Source.

[+hwiles]

12 hours ago, QuaN7umVo1D said:

Do you think a Soulburst (nicrosil compounder) could store not just bare investiture but also a manifestation of said investiure, like for example would he/she be able to store a Gravitation lashing? Also do you think it would be possible for a Soulburst to convert between Investiture from different worlds, for example converting a Breath into Stormlight or something similar? Furthermore a compounder can effectively multiply a stored unit tenfold, so if a Soulburst can multiply Investiture, how will that effect the Shard which fuels the magic system, since the Investiture comes from it.

(Emphasis mine)

Last I checked, by WOB, in the Cosmere, Investiture (along with momentum, matter, and energy) is conservative when all 3 realms (Physical, Cognitive, and Spiritual) are considered.  This means that drawing Investiture away from a Shard does in fact weaken it.

My understanding is that Shards can, to some extent, draw the Investiture they expend (or have siphoned from them) back to themselves through a kind of "natural" process of entropy that is local to the Cosmere.  IE: Investiture is siphoned from a Shard to create matter or energy or a storage of Investiture, then that matter or energy or Investiture is, in a roundabout way, eventually returned to the Shard.  The process by which atium is burned then coalesced back into a bead without any intervention while Preservation and Ruin were both crippled is, I think, a good demonstration of how this process naturally works.

The consequence of this cycle is that, theoretically, a compounder could "store" the entirety of Harmony's Investiture if they had a sufficiently large metalmind and a sufficiently large store of metal to burn.  This would kill Harmony and, as a bonus, since the metalmind would be keyed to the person who made it, they would likely be able to ascend by drawing it all in at once.

The problem with this is, by most estimates, it may not be reasonably possible for a compounder, or even a large group of compounders, to siphon Investiture from Harmony fast enough to be meaningful; Preservation and Ruin did create a planet from the void and swing it across orbits for fun if you recall...Also, Harmony may have trouble acting himself, but he probably wouldn't be afraid of asking his kandra to assassinate someone if he thought they were going to try to kill and replace him (speculative).

The other problem is that Scadrians probably have not yet observed that Investiture is conservative; without free access to all three realms, making any hypothesis about conservation in the Cosmere would just be nonsensical speculation and grasping at straws rather than true scientific investigation.  Most of them probably don't realize that Harmony might actually be killable and Investiture might actually be finite (in a sense).

[Elenion]

1 hour ago, hwiles said:

he probably wouldn't be afraid of asking his kandra to assassinate someone if he thought they were going to try to kill and replace him (speculative).

I don't think he'd have a problem with that one, even with direct action, because he'd be Preserving himself while bringing Ruin to someone else.

[Weltall]

On 4/1/2018 at 7:37 AM, QuaN7umVo1D said:

Furthermore a compounder can effectively multiply a stored unit tenfold, so if a Soulburst can multiply Investiture, how will that effect the Shard which fuels the magic system, since the Investiture comes from it.

Quite simply, it won't. Shards are too powerful for them to 'run out' of Investiture in any plausible way, to the point that even Nightblood isn't capable of seriously jeapordizing one.

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Brandon Sanderson

Just as a point you should understand, the amount of MATTER in the cosmere is finite too. As is the amount of energy.

Worrying that Endowment will run out of Breaths to give is a little like worrying that the amount of carbon on Earth will run out because people keep being born.

source

Brandon has on multiple occasions described the Shards as possessing essentially infinite power, it's just that an originally mortal and decidedly finite Vessel can't possibly access all of that power at once. Here's an example:

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Questioner [PENDING REVIEW]

For Adonalsium to create the universe, therefore he must have infinite power to create an infinitely sized universe. Therefore, infinity divided by sixteen is equal to infinity. Therefore, why don't the Shards have infinite power, which they clearly don't, because they can be killed?

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

The power can't be killed. The entity controlling the power can. Infinite power existing and being able to access the infinite power are different things, and a finite mind, even added to a very powerful sense of power, isn't necessarily able to tap all of that.

source

So compared to the infinite power at its disposal, Preservation isn't even going to notice the drain caused by someone drawing on their power, not even for hacks like compounding.

[QuaN7umVo1D]

@Weltall @hwiles, at first  I though you guys are contradicting each other, but  I think I got it. @hwiles is saying that the holder will die since the power a holder* of a Shard can use is finite, but that will in no way affect the wellbeing of the Shard itself*, as @Weltall implies. Thank you fellas!