theory Unity, Ashyn and Dawnshards theory

[KandraAllomancer]

This is something I came up with at 3 am, so let me know if it gets too crazy  Here it goes:

We know that Ashyn doesn't currently have any Shard (WoB), but a question if there was ever a Shard there is considered a spoiler (WoB). Ashyn magic wasn't always disease-based (WoB), but used to similar to surgebinding (WoB). Given that Ashyn people used Dawnshards “known to bind any creature voidish or mortal” (Poem of Ista) to destroy their planet and were able to escape it using powers “of spren and Surges” (Eila Stele), it seems certain that there were spren (and therefore probably a Shard) there. Could that Shard be Odium? That seems very unlikely – it would mean that sometime during his Shard killing spree he decided to make a stop (next to a dishardic planet!), Invest there and give people weapons potentially able to harm him (Dawnshards). No, Odium would make a detour to Ashyn only if there was a real threat to him there that needed to be neutralized before taking care of Roshar. That leaves Cultivation and Honor, but as far as we know they've Invested in Roshar before the arrival of humans, so it's unlikely that any of them is responsible for Ashyn magic.

My theory is that this Shard was a child of Cultivation and Honor – Unity. It was confirmed that Shards Vessels could have children (WoB) and that being a Shard affects pregnancy (WoB). I assume here that a Shardic child would be considered a Shard with a big asterisk (using terminology from this WoB on Patji), but would still count as two Shards together with their parents (Tanavast + Slammer + Unity = Honor + Cultivation). This way, we still have three Shards overall in the Rosharan system, even though the number of Vessels may not match. Unity would probably have a very atypical childhood (to say the least), so many human concepts (such as gender) could be foreign to them – and this attitude would be shared with their godspren, the Sibling (WoB). It's hard to say if Unity would have their own type of Investiture, but if they used Cultivationlight (WoB) instead, it would explain why we see so little of it compared to Stormlight. Finally, Unity would explain why we see two mixed (Cultivation + Honor) magic systems – Surgebinding was created directly by their Investment in Roshar and fabrials (part of the another magic system per this WoB) were originally developed on Ashyn by Unity and then brought to Roshar by humans. The latter is corroborated by the fact that humans left Ashyn using a type of Oathgate before there were any fabrials on Roshar at all (this WoB, though it's technically not canonized yet due to Spiritual Realm mechanics issues).

At the beginning Unity would be underpowered as a Shard, but nothing stops them from travelling across Cosmere. gathering unclaimed Honor/Cultivation Investiture and growing stronger. This would also explain Unity's apparent effect on some of Cosmere's religions (Shu-Keseg concept of unity on Sel, “The One” worshipped by Iriali who later travel to Roshar). This sounds a lot like Autonomy, doesn't it? I think this might set up a future (post–Stormlight) conflict between both Shards, which can be seen as opposing forces. I also believe that at some point during their Cosmere journey, Unity recruited Dysian Aimians (whom we know to be worldhoppers present on many worlds: WoB here and here) as their agents, possibly because of their nature being an actual embodiment of Unity's intent. Anyway, Unity finally brings some humans to the Rosharan system, settles on Ashyn and Invests there, creating a fabrial–based magic system using Dawnshards (probably Unity's splinters, analogically to Honor and Honorblades).

What are Dawnshards? I think they're tools for capturing, storing and transforming spren of any kind. The first two are kind of obvious, but what about transformation? We know that in many ways spren behave like wave–functions in quantum mechanics (flamespren study in one of interludes in The Way Of Kings). If so, we should theoretically see things like quantum superposition or Bose–Einstein condensates. In Cosmere terms, it would mean that spren could be merged with each other to create something new. Merging lesser spren associated with a given order of Knights Radiant is already believed by many to be the source of Shardplates. I believe that a similar process, merging of one or many inkspren and lighspren, leads to the creation of unique Oathgate spren (the same mechanism applies to other Surge fabrial spren as well). This could also explain the origin of the Unmade, who were “made, then unmade”. Not created or born. Made – created from other spren by Dawnshards, only to be later corrupted by Odium. For example, Yelig–nar might have originally been an attempt to create a spren able to form Nahel Bond giving all the surges (Rosharan version of lerasium, basically). Re–Shephir seems like a supercharged version of creationspren, Chemoarish – ashspren etc.

We know that one Dawnshard is different from the rest (WoB) and that at least one of them is “known to bind any creature voidish or mortal” (Poem of Ista). I believe they're one and the same, and that binding a mortal creature means creating a Cognitive Shadow copy of a person, providing exactly the same form of immortality that the Heralds and the Fused would later use. What is more, this particular Dawnshard seems to be still active on Roshar. That's why Dalinar can be forgiven by Evi during the Battle of Thaylen Field and that's why his second vision of Nohadon is so strange – they are both Cognitive Shadows. The Tranquiline Halls myth in Vorinism is not just a tale of how people left Ashyn – it has additional hidden meaning. Some chosen people don't just go Beyond, they are given some sort of immortality to join the fight with Odium (or be useful to Unity in other ways). I think that's the reason Odium created Moelach. His power seems useless to Odium at first, but he can “seeps into a soul as it breaks apart from the body” (Diagram) and works “at the transition point between realms. When a soul was nearing the Tranquiline Halls” (Hessi's Mythica). He can prevent a person from being captured by a Dawnshard and extract information from them (something the Sleepless of Aimia are afraid in Kaza's interlude in Oathbringer). Moelach's purpose is to search for Dawnshards and interfere with their activity. It's hard to tell if Cognitive Shadows can be merged just as spren, but if they do, that might potentially explain the weird nature of Cusicesh the Protector with it's multitude of rapidly changing human faces.

The special Dawnshard also provides an explanation for another question – how Unity could survive their fight with Odium. Before Ashyn was destroyed, Unity's followers (the Sleepless) escaped to Roshar with two Dawnshards. One of them, used for creating Surge fabrials, ended up in Aimia (WoB). The other one, storing a copy of Unity's mind, was hidden by Cultivation (we know that her magic can hide things from Odium – Lift hides from Odium in one of Dalinar's visions). Where such a thing could be stored? My best bet is the Origin of Storms. This place is clearly important, as indicated by Puuli's interlude and Wandersail story (also, Cusicesh always looks in that direction). If the Highstorm really originates there (or, more likely, simply recharges there), the place must be full of Investiture to power a device storing Cognitive Shadows of a Shard and a great number of people. Also, as Investiture resists Investiture, the Origin would be very hard to spy on by Odium's forces. As a result, Odium isn't aware that Unity is alive until the Thaylen Field (his future sight is useless here, as Cultivation and Unity are together equally good at it, or even better) and ends up screaming "No, we killed you. We killed you!".

tl;dr version: Unity is the child of Cultivation of Honor and the original Shard on Ashyn. They created the first fabrial–based magic system utilizing Dawnshards that can (A) bind and merge spren into more powerful, unique spren (e.g. Surge fabrial spren) and (B) create Cognitive Shadow copies of people. Using the latter, a Cognitive Shadow of Unity survived the fight with Odium and was hiding with Cultivation's help, planning to strike Odium and finally revealing themselves during the Battle of Thaylen Field. 

Edited November 11, 2019 by KandraAllomancer

[supersmith]

Idk enough to poke holes in this, but it seems like a pretty good theory. Take an upvote 

[Karger]

17 hours ago, KandraAllomancer said:

At the beginning Unity would be underpowered as a Shard, but nothing stops them from travelling across Cosmere. gathering unclaimed Honor/Cultivation Investiture and growing stronger

I don't really think they would need to.  Strength for a shard is a bit odd.  Only how much free investiture they have seems to really matter.  Otherwise they still have shard status.

17 hours ago, KandraAllomancer said:

Merging lesser spren associated with a given order of Knights Radiant is already believed by many to be the source of Shardplates. I believe that a similar process, merging of one or many inkspren and lighspren, leads to the creation of unique Oathgate spren

Adds to the theory.  This could explain why there are only a limited amount of those kinds of fabrials in circulation.  Odium is irritated and steals a dawnshard to make the Unmade.  The KR freak out and have to hide or destroy the remaining dawnshards.

17 hours ago, KandraAllomancer said:

That's why Dalinar can be forgiven by Evi during the Battle of Thaylen Field and that's why his second vision of Nohadon is so strange – they are both Cognitive Shadows

I personally dislike this(not saying your wrong or anything).  Adapts theory so that I like it better.  I would prefer if we got something more like a Spiritual Shadow.  IE the ideal of the person is preserved rather then their memory.  This would explain why they say that all "men are drawn toward the spiritual realm eventually."  It would also be a cool new mechanic.  A group of people who exist outside of time and can't really change but instead exist in a state of ideals.

17 hours ago, KandraAllomancer said:

"No, we killed you. We killed you!".

This still begs the question.  Who is this we?  Perhaps the child was an attempt to recreate adonalsuim on a small scale?  On ordered being whose job was to create and bring together?

 

You did some great work on this theory BTW.

Edited October 28, 2019 by Karger

[Halyo_Alex]

Ok, this is amazing. Even if only one of these ideas is actually correct (unity being the child of honor/cultivation, the function of the dawnshards, etc), that's still amazing. Also it would make sense for Unity based dawnshards to be able to merge spren (unify them) in unique ways. Binding them (honor) to make something new (cultivation). I can definitely see the Oathgate spren being some sort of paired Unified spren based on the 2 Radiant spren that grant Transportation.

I wonder if a KR could be bonded to a spren like that...

[Aon Tia]

Nice work there on the theory.. 

now I really want to know what happens with such a shard child... !! 

[+ILuvHats]

Storm it. I’m always torn over good theories, because I’m afraid that some parts of them might come true in the books, and I’ll have been spoiled. The fact that I feel that way goes to show how great this theory is. Its obviously impossible to say how much of it is accurate (especially because this theory is mostly speculative), but there are so many seeds that I wouldn’t be surprised to see some of the ideas prove to be true. And you’re new to the shard too! Fantastic job.

Edited October 29, 2019 by ILuvHats

[What's a Seawolf?]

Excellent theory, and something I haven't heard anyone else come close to mentioning before.

I don't really have anything to add right now, except that this does tie together a bunch of Stormlight mysteries in a way that seems feasible.

(And now I really want to see a Shard baby.)

[KandraAllomancer]

Thanks for the feedback!

 

21 hours ago, Karger said:

Odium is irritated and steals a dawnshard to make the Unmade.

This would also explain the differences in Unmade's intelligence. The three great Mindless Unmade (Nergaoul, Moelach, Ashertmarn) seem to be made mostly of corrupted lesser spren (gloryspren, deathspren and hungerspren probably). True spren are responsible for higher level of intelligence. Ba-Ado-Mishram would probably have a very clever voidpsren (or maybe even some Fused if chronology allowed for it) thrown in the mix.

[Karger]

2 hours ago, KandraAllomancer said:

This would also explain the differences in Unmade's intelligence. The three great Mindless Unmade (Nergaoul, Moelach, Ashertmarn) seem to be made mostly of corrupted lesser spren (gloryspren, deathspren and hungerspren probably). True spren are responsible for higher level of intelligence. Ba-Ado-Mishram would probably have a very clever voidpsren (or maybe even some Fused if chronology allowed for it) thrown in the mix.

Maybe.  Or perhaps they were made in stages by different Dawnshards.  Only this dawnshard is dangerous and only this one and this one.  It would take time for people to except that extremely useful devices that they relied on were a liability as a rule rather then an exception.

[ND103]

I'm not sure I agree with all of this one, but I like it! 

[Impact]

I kinda like this theory and kinda don't.  ITs a very interesting one, but I also like the idea that Unity is something new and nor originally shardic (in that it was not already part of a shard).  But it does have cool implications and ideas.  

[SzethIsBadAsHell]

Well I think Dalinar will combine the two shards left and the remnants of Honor together to form Unity . He was Forged by Odium ( Thrill) Tempered by Cultivation ( Boon /curse ) and Bound by Honor ( Bondsmith . When he ascends it will be by Unifying the 3 . I know many Cultivation fans will get mad at me for saying it but I think that’s what will happen . Interesting theory though.

[KandraAllomancer]

9 hours ago, SzethIsBadAsHell said:

Well I think Dalinar will combine the two shards left and the remnants of Honor together to form Unity . He was Forged by Odium ( Thrill) Tempered by Cultivation ( Boon /curse ) and Bound by Honor ( Bondsmith . When he ascends it will be by Unifying the 3 . I know many Cultivation fans will get mad at me for saying it but I think that’s what will happen . Interesting theory though.

I don't disagree. I believe that Dalinar will be Unity's vessel and (at the end of Stormlight) the last Shard standing on Roshar. I think that Odium will end up splintered, with his Investiture stored safely on Braize, so that Unity/Dalinar can tap it whenever needed (like a planet-sized, Shardic equivalent of metalmind).

[Honorless]

Huh, this seems actually plausible Realmatically and narratively (from what we know so far), very intriguing theory @KandraAllomancer!

Edited November 26, 2019 by Honorless

[Fractalfire]

I really like this theory. There seem to be a number of hints that something is... off... about the number of Shards on Roshar. There are a large number of hints that seem to imply that there were at one point three, not two, god-rulers of Roshar and I find it incredibly difficult to think of Odium as one of these three. 

Listing them off: 

- Three godspren -- but only two shards to which they can be linked, which leaves an odd third that belongs to... who?

- "Three of 16 ruled, but now the broken one reigns." -- A plausible misinterpretation if you don't know that the third is not actually one of the original 16. 

- The Horneaters recognize "three gods" -- the gods of trees, waters, and mountains. The "god of mountains" is almost certainly Cultivation, since that's the location of her perpendicularity. The "god of forests" might be Honor (I believe Jasnah arrives in a forest? Perhaps this is/was the location of his perpendicularity). This leaves the god of waters, which could then be the hypothetical Unity. The "god of waters" would fit in nicely with speculation that Unity's perpendicularity is at the origin. 

- The Dawnsingers recognized three gods -- "For their betrayal extended even to our gods: to spren, stone, and wind." Now, this may refer to the Nightwatcher, Sibling, and Stormfather, OR perhaps it is also a hint and refers to Cultivation, the hypothetical Unity, and Honor.

- The three moons may be unconnected, but I think the same number popping up again is telling, particularly in that they are occasionally referred to as god-like (ie. in the story with queen Tsa). 

The idea of three gods shows up a lot and I've always thought it didn't make sense in context to include Odium as one of their number  -- Why would the Horneaters appeal to Odium? Why would the third godspren be of Odium? Why would the Dawnsingers be mad about a betrayal from Odium? None of this makes sense, yet there is clearly a pattern of three, repeated multiple times. Now, the one thing that does seem to work against this theory is the following WOB:

Spoiler

 

Quote

 

Questioner

The line about "three of sixteen [ruled] and now the Broken One reigns" - did Odium follow three other Shards to Roshar or is he the third Shard?

Brandon Sanderson

Odium is the third Shard on Roshar.

Footnote: The questioner is referring to the epigraph of Chapter 11 of The Way of Kings: "Three of sixteen ruled, but now the Broken One reigns."
Words of Radiance Washington, DC signing (March 20, 2014)

 

However, Brandon has a certain amount of wiggle room that might permit him to be misleading. Unity, if it exists as a child of Honor and Cultivation, might not really be a separate Shard from Cultivation and Honor, so much as a being like Harmony that draws on the power of two shards. Odium could genuinely be the "third shard" to be on Roshar, but Honor, Cultivation, and the hypothetical Unity might still be the three that this death-rattle, and all the other hints, are referring to. 

 

I do think this is much more plausible than "Dalinar will become Unity by merging shards together." I don't think the chances of a repeat of Sazed's ascension are high. Why, when he has all the options in the world, would Brandon repeat what we have already seen? 

I do think though, that there are really three separate theories here: 1) That Unity is a child of Honor and Cultivation, and 2) that the dawnshards work by merging spren, and 3) that the dawnshards are somehow creating cognitive shadows of people.

I think theory one is most plausible and I tentatively support it. Theory two is intriguing, but based on such slight information that I'm going to withhold judgment till more information presents itself. The cognitive shadow bit, on the other hand, is very out there and strikes me as unlikely. 

[KandraAllomancer]

On 26.11.2019 at 5:34 PM, Fractalfire said:

Now, the one thing that does seem to work against this theory is the following WOB

I think it's a reasonable to assume that Odium did Invest on Roshar at one point in the past (it's hard to explain ten levels of Voidbinding otherwise), but it doesn't exclude the possibility of third Vessel using Investure originally assigned to Cultivation and Honor. Counting Shards gets really ambiguous when the number of Vessels don't match, like in case of (Mistborn spoiler)

Spoiler

Harmony who can be counted as either one or two Shards

Brandon has huge wiggle room here, so any WoB should probably be taken with a grain of salt

[Karger]

@KandraAllomancer

Please add your theory to my hall(can't believe I did not ask earlier).

 

[KandraAllomancer]

@Ookla the Prolific

Done, thanks!

[Karger]

4 minutes ago, KandraAllomancer said:

Done, thanks!

Of course.

[KandraAllomancer]

Huh, I just found this:

Quote

Questioner

Has an unborn child ever been Ascended?

Brandon Sanderson

Ascended to be a Shard? No, that has not yet happened.

Questioner

Maybe not a Shard but...

Brandon Sanderson

Oh. Ascend to like a... No. I would say no. It hasn't ever happened. It's not implausible that the mother could Ascend and the child would... But it hasn't happened.

Starsight Release Party (Nov. 26, 2019)

Unless there is some wiggle room here that I don't see, the key part of the theory might be disproven