True Effect of Lerasium

[HSuperLee]

Stop me if someone's made this theory before, but I've been thinking. We know from WoBs that Lerasium making people into mistborn is a side effect, not the actual allomatic property of the metal.

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Regardless, if a person can get more Preservation into them, they become better Allomancers. Hence Elend becoming a Mistborn. Like all people, he had the potential within him—it was just too small of a potential to be awakened through normal means. That little jolt of Preservation's body, however, expanded and awakened his Allomancy.

As a tidbit, that was a side effect of what that bead of metal did. It wasn't the main purpose of the bead, and if another Allomancer were to burn it, it would do something else.

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So here's my train of thought:

Lerasium is the solid form of Preservation's power. The mist is the gaseous form of Preservation's power. When both Vin and Elend burn the mists, it acts as any and every metal (except atium), but amplified. So my thought is as such, when burned, lerasium can act as any other allomatic metal, or even multiple metals at once.

 

[Voidus]

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17th Shard

If a Mistborn burns lerasium, as in, not just ingests it, what effect would it grant Allomantically?

Brandon Sanderson

That is a RAFO. It would do something, but the thing you've gotta remember is that, when ingesting lerasium for the first time and gaining the powers, your body is actually burning it. Think of lerasium as a metal anyone can burn. Does that make sense? By burning it you gain access to those powers. It rewrites your spiritual DNA, and there are ways to do really cool things with lerasium that I don't see how anyone would know. Were most Mistborn to just burn it, it would rewrite their genetic code to increase their power as an Allomancer.

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/294/#e10116

Just as a side note here, most Mistborn would not be able to do anything other than increase their Allomantic strength.
I doubt that it'd simply function as a universal metal, if anything that would seen like more of a side effect. It'd be a bit of a waste of Lerasium to just use it to fuel some Allomancy.

[HSuperLee]

51 minutes ago, Ookla the Lurker said:

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/294/#e10116

Just as a side note here, most Mistborn would not be able to do anything other than increase their Allomantic strength.
I doubt that it'd simply function as a universal metal, if anything that would seen like more of a side effect. It'd be a bit of a waste of Lerasium to just use it to fuel some Allomancy.

Even in the WoB you quoted he RAFOs what it's actually supposed to do. Sanderson has been very keen about letting us know lerasium has another effect that he's not telling us about. Yes, I get that due to the generally limited amount of lerasium in the world, the side-effect is more useful, but that doesn't change that there's still a hidden ability that occurs when lerasium is burned "properly."

Even so, I wouldn't call what Vin did while powered by the mists a waste. Let's say lerasium burns as fast as atium, so you get roughly a minute from a bead. Imagine what a Mistborn could do with a minute of having all allomatic powers, and them all being turned up to eleven.

Edited November 30, 2018 by HSuperLee

[Voidus]

Not trying to say that there isn't a primary effect, just that it's obviously not as simple as simply burning it. If most people tried to burn Lerasium all that would happen is they'd become a Mistborn/stronger Mistborn. If it was as simple as just powering Allomancy I doubt Brandon would have said:

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there are ways to do really cool things with lerasium that I don't see how anyone would know.

Additionally, burning the Mists is what gives super powered Allomancy and Brandon has said that it does something different in each of its forms (Solid, Liquid, Gas) so I'm not sure if it'd just be the same power. I think Lerasiums primary effect is more likely some form of generalized spiritweb rewriting or something Spiritual in nature.

[+Invocation]

Probably part of the "really cool things" involve Hemalurgy and hacking your way into other magic systems. Though since Preservation is essentially the opposite of Ruin, and atium makes you an effective killer (read: Ruiner), wouldn't the condensed version of Preservation do something like turn you into an effective Preserver, maybe showing the thing you could do to generate maximum stability?

[Calderis]

Lerasium is going to function differently than the Mists. The Mists can fuel any metal precisely because of their gaseous nature. The solid form of a Shards Investiture is meant to do one specific thing. 

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Kaimipono

Allomancy is fueled by Preservation's body? How exactly does that work? And how does that interact with Atium—it's fueled by both gods' bodies?

Brandon Sanderson

The powers of Ruin and Preservation are Shards of Adonalsium, pieces of the power of creation itself. Allomancy, Hemalurgy, Feruchemy are manifestations of this power in mortal form, the ability to touch the powers of creation and use them. These metallic powers are how people's physical forms interpret the use of the Shard, though it's not the only possible way they could be interpreted or used. It's what the genetics and Realmatic interactions of Scadrial allow for, and has to do with the Spiritual, the Cognitive, and the Physical Realms.

Condensed 'essence' of these godly powers can act as super-fuel for Allomancy, Feruchemy, or really any of the powers. The form of that super fuel is important. In liquid form it's most potent, in gas form it's able to fuel Allomancy as if working as a metal. In physical form it is rigid and does one specific thing. In the case of atium, it allows sight into the future. In the case of concentrated Preservation, it gives one a permanent connection to the mists and the powers of creation. (I.e., it makes them an Allomancer.)

So when a person is burning metals, they aren't using Preservation's body as a fuel so to speak—though they are tapping into the powers of creation just slightly. When Vin burns the mists, however, she'd doing just that—using the essence of Preservation, the Shard of Adonalsium itself—to fuel Allomancy. Doing this, however, rips 'troughs' through her body. It's like forcing far too much pressure through a very small, fragile hose. That much power eventually vaporizes the corporeal host, which is acting as the block and forcing the power into a single type of conduit (Allomancy) and frees it to be more expansive.

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[HSuperLee]

Ah. Well, as usual, my ideas are crushed by Calderis. I'm not upset by that fact, I just find it funny that it keeps happening. Okay. So, lerasium no fuel all allomancy. Back to the drawing board.

[I think I am here.]

I think we have a word for that that someone else made up.

Calderized.

[+robardin]

So if lerasium is expanding the little bit of "Allomantic potential in everbody" - i.e., Essence of Preservation - to make a non-Allomancer like Elend into a Mistborn, would it work as well for a non-Scadrian? It's the natives of Scadrial who were literally created by the combined powers of Preservation + Ruin, after all.

I guess all other humans in the Cosmere are descended from pre-Shattering bloodlines and so are sparked to life by Essence of Adonalsium, which is a superset of Preservation?

 

[Calderis]

4 hours ago, HSuperLee said:

Ah. Well, as usual, my ideas are crushed by Calderis. I'm not upset by that fact, I just find it funny that it keeps happening. Okay. So, lerasium no fuel all allomancy. Back to the drawing board.

As I normally say in response to this... I do it to myself too, on a daily basis. 

"whoa, what if...

Crap, no. 

Well what about... 

That's stupid. 

OK, okay, but maybe if... 

Did you forget everything you've read? Stop it" 

It's frustrating. 

Edited November 30, 2018 by Calderis

[amflare]

4 hours ago, robardin said:

So if lerasium is expanding the little bit of "Allomantic potential in everbody" - i.e., Essence of Preservation - to make a non-Allomancer like Elend into a Mistborn, would it work as well for a non-Scadrian?

5

Yes, Hoid took one of the beads and uses emotional allomancy in Way of Kings, so its effect is not limited to Scadrians or Scadrial

[Quantus]

There was a theory (I cant claim credit) and a recent confirming(?) WOB that Lersium will Connect you to the Shard of whatever Godmetal it is alloyed with (allowing you to hack yourself into otherworldly magic systems) and that the reason creating Misting/Mistborn is a Side effect is that when lacking another Godmetal alloy to provide a target shard for that permanent Connection, it will simply default to Connecting you back to Preservation. 

 

 

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Stormlightning [PENDING REVIEW]

If Hoid was to get his hands on "bavadinium," could he alloy it with lerasium and get Sand Mastery?

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

This is theoretically possible.

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[Lumgol]

It was mentioned somewhere, I forget where, that atium is a Hemalurgic "wild card" - that it can grant any ability of the other spikes. So, each atium spike grants more ability in Ruin's Investiture. Therefore, it makes sense for burning lerasium to grant any Allomantic capabilities and generally increase Allomantic power when burned.

[Voidus]

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Chaos2651

Hemalurgically, atium steals Allomantic Temporal Powers. But, that seems unlikely, since atium is a god metal. It wouldn't fit in with the rest of the magic system. Did Preservation, in addition to switching Cadmium and Bendalloy for Atium and Malatium, also switch atium's Feruchemical and Hemalurgic powers with Cadmium? Because it seems to me there's not a lot of atium Marsh can use to live for hundreds of years into the next Mistborn trilogy.

Brandon Sanderson

Preservation wanted Atium and Malatium to be of use to the people, as he recognized that it would be a very powerful tool—and that using it up could help defeat Ruin. But he also recognized that sixteen was a mythological important number, and felt it would make the best sign for his followers. So he took out the most unlikely (difficult to make and use) metals for his sign to his followers. But that doesn't have much to do with Hemalurgy's use here.

Remember that the tables—and the ars Arcanum—are 'in world' creations. (Or, at least, in-universe.) The knowledge represented in them is as people understand it, and can always have flaws. That was the case with having atium on the table in the first place, and that was the case with people (specifically the Inquisitors) trying to figure out what atium did Hemalurgically.

Their experiments (very expensive ones) are what determined that atium (which they thought was just one of the sixteen metals) granted the Allomantic Temporal powers. What they didn't realize is that atium (used correctly) could steal ANY of the powers. Think of it as a wild card. With the right knowledge, you could use it to mimic any other spike. It works far better than other spikes as well.

As for Marsh, he's got a whole bag of atium (taken off of the Kandra who was going to try to sell it.) So he's all right for quite a while. A small bead used right can reverse age someone back to their childhood.

But this was a little beyond their magical understanding at the time.

Bolded for emphasis.


And we do know that Lerasium would increase Allomantic power if you burned it, but that's still the side effect. I believe the OP was trying to suggest what the primary effect of burning it would be.

[HSuperLee]

5 minutes ago, Ookla the Lurker said:

Bolded for emphasis.


And we do know that Lerasium would increase Allomantic power if you burned it, but that's still the side effect. I believe the OP was trying to suggest what the primary effect of burning it would be.

As the OP, that is entirely correct.

[+ILuvHats]

Here’s a link to a thread discussing the theory @Quantus mentioned, for anybody who hasn’t seen it. 

 

Edited December 1, 2018 by ILuvHats

[SwordNimiForPresident]

Slightly off topic, but is there any WoB out there about what the 32 alloys you can make from Atium and Lerasium do? I've only ever even seen reference to them in the Ars Arcanum in BoM. On that same track, I wonder if Harmony's metal can be alloyed to make a 4th set of 16. Would be pretty out of control to have a Fullborn tapping and burning 48 metals.

 

Edit: What about all of the other Shards metals as well? Are there secretly 256 metals out there for metalborn to use?

Edited December 17, 2018 by SwordNimiForPresident

[Calderis]

@sword_nimi

Lerasium, alloyed with the other 16 metals makes you a misting of that metal. 

For atium, we only have this. 

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Maru Nui

What would an atium-electrum alloy do in Allomancy?

Brandon Sanderson

The alloys of atium have various temporal effects.

Footnote: The Allomancy chart poster reveals that atium alloys have various temporal and mental effects.
source

 

[SwordNimiForPresident]

4 minutes ago, Ookla, the Hivemind said:

@sword_nimi

Lerasium, alloyed with the other 16 metals makes you a misting of that metal. 

For atium, we only have this. 

 

The Lerasium alloys sound boring and his answer in that quote sounds like he hasn't made the Atium alloys up yet, just generic timey wimey stuff. Are their Feruchemical properties just as mundane? Now I'm worried about what the other Shard metals would alloy into. Autonomy's 16 alloys just make you lonely and too cool for friends. Odium's alloys make you hangry. Honor's alloys make you into a white knight on tumblr.

[Arith Matic]

I think that this might be the case because in the end of The Well Of Ascension when Elend ingested lerasium and Vin found out he was burning pewter, so Elend might have gotten his pewter source from it.

[HSuperLee]

36 minutes ago, Arith Matic said:

I think that this might be the case because in the end of The Well Of Ascension when Elend ingested lerasium and Vin found out he was burning pewter, so Elend might have gotten his pewter source from it.

Vin gave Elend one of her vials of metal flakes to wash down the lerasium bead as it was the only liquid she had to help him swallow it. There would have been pewter in there.

[Arith Matic]

Oh, okay

[Tglassy]

I think Lerasium's primary ability is being a Deus Ex Machina.  You know, it saves the day.  

Got fired from your job?  Have some Lerasium.  You instantly get a phone call with a job offer that was better than your old one. 

Have a terminal illness?  Here's some Lerasium.  You get a phone call from a doctor who just discovered the cure and wants to test it on you. It works, and you gain superpowers as a result. 

Whatever your issue, however difficult the problem, if you burn Lerasium, your problem is solved, and you become a Mistborn to boot.  

It just so happens that the two only times we've seen Lerasium burned, the "cure" for the current problem was 'become a Mistborn.'   Elend was dying, Hoid was being Hoid, TLR wanted to be a Fullborn.  

[+Oltux72]

On 12/17/2018 at 3:14 AM, Calderis said:

@sword_nimi

Lerasium, alloyed with the other 16 metals makes you a misting of that metal.

If you take that to its logical extreme Lerasium, if used "correctly" or in alloys with other metals up to now considered inert, can create a new metal (as they would see it) or technically more correct, a new kind of allomancy. For example, if you alloyed it with silver and burned it, you might become able to control shades.

[+Invocation]

59 minutes ago, Oltux72 said:

If you take that to its logical extreme Lerasium, if used "correctly" or in alloys with other metals up to now considered inert, can create a new metal (as they would see it) or technically more correct, a new kind of allomancy. For example, if you alloyed it with silver and burned it, you might become able to control shades.

You're not the first to think about taking it to an extreme with alloying and getting something new, but that silver idea is an angle I hadn't heard yet.

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Stormlightning [PENDING REVIEW]

If Hoid was to get his hands on "bavadinium," could he alloy it with lerasium and get Sand Mastery?

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

This is theoretically possible.

source