Jump to content

A mistake in the Hero of Ages epigraphs?


PhoenixWaffle

Recommended Posts

I was reading over the Hero of Ages epigraphs and I noticed that in it Sazed writes "Nuggets of pure Allomancy, the power of Preservation itself. Why Rashek left one of those nuggets at the Well of Ascension, I do not know." But that's wrong, there were two, one Elend took and one (as we see from Kelsier in the Mistborn Secret History) that Hoid took. And it can't be that Sazed didn't know because not only did he know the information from the power itself, but he was in constant contact with Kelsier. So, am I missing something, or did Sazed/Brandon Sanderson make a mistake?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

11 minutes ago, PhoenixWaffle said:

I was reading over the Hero of Ages epigraphs and I noticed that in it Sazed writes "Nuggets of pure Allomancy, the power of Preservation itself. Why Rashek left one of those nuggets at the Well of Ascension, I do not know." But that's wrong, there were two, one Elend took and one (as we see from Kelsier in the Mistborn Secret History) that Hoid took. And it can't be that Sazed didn't know because not only did he know the information from the power itself, but he was in constant contact with Kelsier. So, am I missing something, or did Sazed/Brandon Sanderson make a mistake?

Sazed is not all knowing and we do not know that Kelseir proofread his work before he published it.  In fact given that Sazed gave Spook his book only a few hours or days after ascending I am inclined to doubt it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Sazed admits to Wax in Era 2 that he's not all-knowing, even after three centuries of getting used to his power. We see that his understanding has grown with time, consider how he only got the barest idea of Adonalsium at the time he gave Spook the book but three centuries later he knows more. It's quite possible he didn't know that another lerasium bead existed at that time.

It's also possible that he did know and was deliberately keeping that fact a secret to avoid sending any number of people off on a quest to find more of the stuff. If the idea that there were originally sixteen beads is true (Brandon called it an excellent guess wtihout confirming or denying it) then there should be several more beads unaccounted for which Sazed might be aware of but which he doesn't want the population as a whole to know about. Could be he knows where they are and is protecting them in case he ever needs to make somebody a mistborn (without expending more of his own power to either create a new bead or rewire a spiritweb like he did with Spook) or he just wants to avoid setting off a potential conflict as people try to find them and possess that powe for themselves.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If anyone knows how to ghost a Shard, its Hoid. Saze even wonders in The Letter how Hoid avoided detection.

Spoiler

Friend,
Your letter is most intriguing, even revelatory. I would have thought, before attaining my current station, that a deity could not be surprised. Obviously, that is not true. I can be surprised. I can perhaps even be naive, I think. I am the least equipped, of all, to aid you in this endeavor. I am finding that the powers I hold are in such conflict that the most simple of actions can be difficult. I am also made uncertain by your subterfuge. Why have you not made yourself known to me before this? How is it you can hide? Who are you truly, and how do you know so much about Adonalsium? If you would speak to me further, I request open honesty. Return to my lands, approach my servants, and I will see what I can do for your quest

I also can't help but wonder if Brandon hadn't yet created the full story of Secret History when he wrote HoA, and therefore did not know that he would be putting two beads in the chamber instead of one.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 5/29/2019 at 7:36 AM, SwordNimiForPresident said:

I also can't help but wonder if Brandon hadn't yet created the full story of Secret History when he wrote HoA, and therefore did not know that he would be putting two beads in the chamber instead of one.

This is just a guess, but I would assume that Brandon at least knew that Hoid took a bead. Brandon may not have known he was going to write that scene, but from what I've seen of Brandon's process, he knows more about the character's actions than is published.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

40 minutes ago, Govir said:

This is just a guess, but I would assume that Brandon at least knew that Hoid took a bead. Brandon may not have known he was going to write that scene, but from what I've seen of Brandon's process, he knows more about the character's actions than is published.

Maybe. The books were published 8 years apart though, so I would say that it is at least possible that he hadn't fully developed that story yet.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

27 minutes ago, Govir said:

This is just a guess, but I would assume that Brandon at least knew that Hoid took a bead. Brandon may not have known he was going to write that scene, but from what I've seen of Brandon's process, he knows more about the character's actions than is published.

Adding to this, remember that the Words of Founding are an info dump from Sazed immediately after remaking the world, and before Spook and Friends re-emerge from the storage caverns.

The newly Ascended Harmony:

  • knew everything that mortal Sazed did, including everything from his copperminds
  • could see/hear/grok everything on Scadrial in the present time, after the Double Ascension
  • could see "the history of the power", everything that had been done with the powers of Preservation and Ruin (e.g., what Rashek did to move/remake the world)

None of those sources of information would have told him about the second bead at the Well, since that would have been something related to what Rashek did with the nuggets after he had de-Slivered from taking the power of the Well. He doesn't get to know everything that Kelsier knew in his head at the time Kelsier took up Preservation, only what Kelsier did (and perhaps, why he did it) while Kelsier was Preservation.

Same thing with the conversation about that event that Kelsier had with the shadow of Leras, who recognized "Cephandrius" from Kelsier's account; that was something Ghost Leras knew, separate from the power of Preservation. (Same reason why Hoid's letter to him was so "revelatory", he doesn't know very much at all about any of the other Shards.)

I would assume that Sazed knows the "initial count" value of the number of lerasium nuggets that Leras as Preservation (not Rashek) created at some point, nuggets that Rashek "had to get", and which didn't have a "natural condensation" cycle the way that atium beads did at the Pits of Hathsin

I read it as Rashek learning about the nuggets' creation by Leras while Ascended, and how/where to get them; and that Sazed now knows the same thing, while also knowing (from his human history) that Rashek already went and got some number (all?) of them, disbursed at least ten of them to the founders of the major noble houses of the Final Empire to seed Allomancy among them, and that Vin and Elend found one in a small ceramic dish at the Well of Ascension that made Elend into a very strong Mistborn.

And no, He can't just "sense" where the lerasium is, if any remains, any more than Ruin could just sense where the atium stash was in Era 1.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 5/28/2019 at 10:24 PM, Weltall said:

It's also possible that he did know and was deliberately keeping that fact a secret to avoid sending any number of people off on a quest to find more of the stuff. If the idea that there were originally sixteen beads is true (Brandon called it an excellent guess wtihout confirming or denying it) then there should be several more beads unaccounted for which Sazed might be aware of but which he doesn't want the population as a whole to know about. Could be he knows where they are and is protecting them in case he ever needs to make somebody a mistborn (without expending more of his own power to either create a new bead or rewire a spiritweb like he did with Spook) or he just wants to avoid setting off a potential conflict as people try to find them and possess that powe for themselves.

The answer was good, thanks, but in regards to there still being more there, how could there? When Kelsier was there when Hoid took the bead, Kelsier "saw" two beads there, so how would there be more in the cavern?

Also, again, thanks for the answers, I guess I didn't think it through as much as I thought I did

Link to comment
Share on other sites

55 minutes ago, PhoenixWaffle said:

The answer was good, thanks, but in regards to there still being more there, how could there? When Kelsier was there when Hoid took the bead, Kelsier "saw" two beads there, so how would there be more in the cavern?

Just because there were only two there during the time of WoA doesn't mean that there couldn't have been more spare beads there before that Rashek did something with or moved to another location as a backup plan.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

48 minutes ago, Weltall said:

Just because there were only two there during the time of WoA doesn't mean that there couldn't have been more spare beads there before that Rashek did something with or moved to another location as a backup plan.

Indeed, wasn't there a mention that there were ten original Mistborn or something, kings and leaders of the world who allied with Rashek and founded the major noble houses? I don't know why I have that in the back of my head - an e-book search through the Mistborn Era 1 trilogy didn't find a hit - but I remember thinking at some point there were quite a few missing from a presumed tally of 16 lerasium beads, versus the recorded or legendary count of original Allomancers (excepting TLR).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 6/3/2019 at 8:32 AM, Govir said:

This is just a guess, but I would assume that Brandon at least knew that Hoid took a bead. Brandon may not have known he was going to write that scene, but from what I've seen of Brandon's process, he knows more about the character's actions than is published.

Actually, there were developments in the story between the two. For instance, while writing the trilogy, Brandon had Hoid looking for the well of ascension, that's why he was up north in Terris, he was fooled by the LR same as everyone else. But in Secret History, the Well is how he entered the planet, so he knew where it was. So its not impossible that a detail like him taking the bead could have been added later.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

13 hours ago, Wandering Investor said:

Actually, there were developments in the story between the two. For instance, while writing the trilogy, Brandon had Hoid looking for the well of ascension, that's why he was up north in Terris, he was fooled by the LR same as everyone else. But in Secret History, the Well is how he entered the planet, so he knew where it was. So its not impossible that a detail like him taking the bead could have been added later.

We have known that Hoid took a bead of lerasium since at least 2011, possibly earlier. My cursory glance through Arcanum turned up a lot of hits; this is the earliest one I found without doing a deep dive:

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/232/#e4803

Link to comment
Share on other sites

We see from SH that Sazed and Kelsier only spoke for a moment and not about the Well, in the minutes between when Sazed was done fixing the world and when he disappeared (and presumably left the Words of Founding). So it's plausible enough that Sazed didn't know that Hoid had taken a bead. He didn't even know who Hoid was when he received the Letter during SA.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Chaos locked this topic
Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...