Adolin/Maya

[Mistborn Surgebinder]

So, feel free to debunk me by any means necessary, but I'm relistening to RoW, and a thought occurred to me as to what's happening to adolin and maya. We know that a nahel bond grants special abilities to radiants. What if it can work the other way as well... Is it possible that adolin is becoming, for lack of a better term, Mayas... "spren?" What if adolin isn't destined to become a radiant, because Maya is destined to become... Something new? 

[Use the Falchion]

I don't think we have enough to fully debunk this, but this theory has been floating around more or less since Oathbringer. So...welcome to the theory train! 

[AquaRegia]

Agreed.  I think a significant number of us, perhaps a majority, feel that it's unlikely Adolin becomes a Radiant.  My main reason for thinking so is purely narrative: there are already too many Kholin Radiants, and the story NEEDS at least a few non-Radiant major viewpoint characters.

I also agree Maya and Adolin will break new ground (and are already breaking new ground, e.g., less than ten heartbeats) in the sense that the "rules everyone knows" about 1) how Shardblades work, 2) how Radiants work, and 3) what Deadeyes can and cannot do are certainly NOT all there is to know.

[LuckyJim]

I’ve never liked the “reverse Nahel bond” idea, because the Nahel bond doesn’t seem to be something that can be reversed. It’s always been a two way thing, with human and spren gaining something from the bond. I’m RoW, we also see Syl changing in ways she doesn’t completely understand, becoming more human like, gaining something from her bond with Kaladin.

[Bejarden]

I’ve actually never heard of this “reverse Nahel bond” before…

Thiugh it may explain why Adolin  was the first person to heal a deadeye, the Spren were probably the only people to try to heal them post-Recreance 

41 minutes ago, AquaRegia said:

think a significant number of us, perhaps a majority, feel that it's unlikely Adolin becomes a Radiant

I mean Maya ended her bond for a reason, right?

Why would she want to start a new one?

[AquaRegia]

11 minutes ago, Bejardin1250 said:

I mean Maya ended her bond for a reason, right?

Why would she want to start a new one?

A fair question, and Maya's ultimate answer might support your implication that she WON'T want a new bond.  However, I think it's also reasonable that the answer may include

1)  The expected "benefit" of the Recreance - somehow "saving" Roshar from the dangers of Surgebinding - did not last.  The danger is rising again, and new solutions are needed.

2)  The cost of breaking the bond - the Deadeye state - was both unexpected and horrible.

3)  Her gradually increasing ability to listen, act, and speak is evidence that she already shares some kind of bond with Adolin, beyond that of a "normal" bonded Shardblade.

I think it's entirely possible that Adolin's relationship with Maya will eventually pave the way for ALL Deadeyes to be restored.

[Thaidakar the Ghostblood]

5 hours ago, AquaRegia said:

A fair question, and Maya's ultimate answer might support your implication that she WON'T want a new bond.  However, I think it's also reasonable that the answer may include

1)  The expected "benefit" of the Recreance - somehow "saving" Roshar from the dangers of Surgebinding - did not last.  The danger is rising again, and new solutions are needed.

2)  The cost of breaking the bond - the Deadeye state - was both unexpected and horrible.

3)  Her gradually increasing ability to listen, act, and speak is evidence that she already shares some kind of bond with Adolin, beyond that of a "normal" bonded Shardblade.

I think it's entirely possible that Adolin's relationship with Maya will eventually pave the way for ALL Deadeyes to be restored.

making a huge army of deadeyes come and kill voidspren, like the atium soldiers in HoA.

[Stitof]

Blended explicitly stated at the end of RoW that although Adolin is not a radiant, they are bonded. We just don't understand the nature and consequences of their bond yet. But something clearly happened right before Maya's first words when Adolin tried to "give her strength." Like how suddenly Adolin can feel all of her emotions which he couldn't do before that moment. We'll just have to wait till book five to see what that bond will do to the two of them.

[Honorless]

Eheheh

Maya with Adolinblade

[Frustration]

5 minutes ago, Honorless said:

Eheheh

Maya with Adolinblade

That is the most cartoonish thing I can imagine, and I love it.

[Halyo_Alex]

7 hours ago, Frustration said:

That is the most cartoonish thing I can imagine, and I love it.

It always reminds me of Syl's complaint about someone using a dead shardblade, except funny and lighthearted because adolin wouldn't be, yknow, dead.

[GroundPetrel]

17 hours ago, Honorless said:

Eheheh

Maya with Adolinblade

I don't think that this will happen but the concept is so inherently hilarious that I like it anyway.  

[Leuthie]

Of course the bond works both ways. The spren becomes more Physical and more human through their bond with a Radiant. The most obvious case is with Stormfather. He has changed significantly since bonding Dalinar.

Adolin isn't an entity made of pure Investiture, so changing his form into a sword wouldn't be possible, nor would he give Maya any magical abilities since he has no Connection to the fundamental surges of Roshar like a spren does. However, Adolin can share his humanity and Cognitive abilities with Maya, which is probably why she's awakening a bit.

Quote

I mean Maya ended her bond for a reason, right?

Why would she want to start a new one?

Because the reason for ending the bond has changed and the consequences for ending the bond aren't what she thought they would be?

Edited June 21, 2021 by Leuthie

[Bejarden]

3 minutes ago, Leuthie said:

Because the reason for ending the bond has changed and the consequences for ending the bond are what she thought they would be?

I mean we don’t know the reason, right?

If it was that they would destroy Roshar that hasn’t changed 

And Dalinars deal with Rayse practically ends the war and with that any need for extra Radiants

 

[LuckyJim]

32 minutes ago, Leuthie said:

Of course the bond works both ways. The spren becomes more Physical and more human through their bond with a Radiant. The most obvious case is with Stormfather. He has changed significantly since bonding Dalinar.

Adolin isn't an entity made of pure Investiture, so changing his form into a sword wouldn't be possible, nor would he give Maya any magical abilities since he has no Connection to the fundamental surges of Roshar like a spren does. However, Adolin can share his humanity and Cognitive abilities with Maya, which is probably why she's awakening a bit.

This is a really good take on the subject. Maybe instead of the bond happening "in reverse" what's going on is the balance is shifting a little bit, Adolin's giving more and receiving less than he would if it were a traditional bond between spren and human/singer.

[RedBlue]

On 17/06/2021 at 7:29 PM, Mistborn Surgebinder said:

We know that a nahel bond grants special abilities to radiants. What if it can work the other way as well... Is it possible that adolin is becoming, for lack of a better term, Mayas... "spren?" What if adolin isn't destined to become a radiant, because Maya is destined to become... Something new? 

This got me thinking about how the bond might work. I’ll start with laying out what we know about how traditional Nahel bonds work:

1) The spren, which would otherwise exist mostly in the Cognitive realm, is pulled through to the Physical realm

2) The human gains the ability to manipulate Surges, due to their Connection to the spren (because the spren is kind of a personified force of nature)

3) The spren gains the ability to learn, grow and think in more human-like ways, due to their Connection to the human

From this point, all we have is speculation. My guess is that, if a ‘reverse’ Nahel bond is possible, points 2 and 3 would remain more or less the same. It seems to me that the abilities gained by the human and spren are gained because the bond exists, and would not be fundamentally altered by the polarity of the bond (though details of the Surgebinding would probably be different, because apparently the details of regular Surgebinding come down to Ishar and his shenanigans).

The first point, though, could work the other way around. A reverse bond could cause the human to be pulled into the Cognitive realm with the spren. I have no idea what that looks like in practice. The form a spren takes in the Physical realm is often very different from how it looks in the Cognitive realm, so I don’t think a human pulled into the Cognitive realm in a similar way would just be walking around as if they’d come in through an Oathgate.

So, going from this train of thought, we get a more aware, capable version of Maya and her bestie Adolin with Edgedancer-adjacent abilities running around in Shadesmar.

21 hours ago, Honorless said:

Eheheh

Maya with Adolinblade

And this. I want this very much. And Adolin is the exact sort of person who would get a kick out of turning into a sword.

[coppercloud]

Quote

Maya’s howls came to a crescendo of anguish, then she fell silent, gasping for breath. Weak. Too weak.

Take it, Adolin thought to her. Take some of my strength.

She looked right at him, and despite her scratched-out eyes, she saw him. Adolin felt something, a warmth deep within him. Maya drew in air, filling her lungs. Her expression livid as she gathered all of her strength, she prepared to shout again. Adolin braced himself for the screech. Her mouth opened.

And she spoke.

Ive too been thinking of mya and adolins bond as being a reverse or mirriored nahel bond . an ado bond .

[LuckyJim]

14 hours ago, RedBlue said:

The first point, though, could work the other way around. A reverse bond could cause the human to be pulled into the Cognitive realm with the spren. I have no idea what that looks like in practice. The form a spren takes in the Physical realm is often very different from how it looks in the Cognitive realm, so I don’t think a human pulled into the Cognitive realm in a similar way would just be walking around as if they’d come in through an Oathgate.

So, going from this train of thought, we get a more aware, capable version of Maya and her bestie Adolin with Edgedancer-adjacent abilities running around in Shadesmar.

I have to disagree here. Spren are able to travel freely between realms because they are sentient investiture. Humans are not, they are physical beings and can only travel between realms through the use of a perpendicularity. Unless Adolin and Maya’s bond somehow allows them to open one at will, Adolin won’t be getting pulled into Shadesmar.

I will concede that it could be possible for him to interact with Shadesmar in the same way Lift does though.