Zahel's Phantoms might save Roshar

[+Cyprian Wiley]

Zahel's Phantoms might save Roshar

This is a theory I thought about a long time but I have not found someone else talking about it that much. And I would like you to help me find clues or forshadowing about this.
The theory is based on a few important informations  from multiple books and the coppermind. But in its core it is simple an obvious for me.

• Zahel = Vasher = Kalad

  Quote

  Vasher, Kalad the Usurper, ... , Zahel, ...

   

• Kalad's Pantoms are Humans encased in stone and basically undead supersoldiers created by Kalad with awekening.

• You can awaken someone soulcasted into stone. WoB (It is even easier)

• There are many stone Humans in Roshar
   

  Quote

  High-ranking lighteyes are often Soulcast into stone after death so that they may be preserved forever.

   

So we have someone who can create an army of stone soldiers by awekening.
We have humans that have been soulcast into stone and can be awakened. 
We have a lot of investiture on Roshar.

The questions  remaining are if Stormlight can be used to awaken or if it can be transformed to Breath? Navani might be on to something and Zahel can clearly use Stormlight instead of Breath to not just die.

I do not think, that this will be a main part of SA5, because it has too much to the with the Cosmere as a whole, could end as a copy of the Warbreaker ending, but it might come up or be more important in the later books.

Do you maybe have a discussion about that possibility somewhere, some insights or maybe information about foreshadowing?
What do you think of this idea?

It seems really obvious for me that Brandon has at least thought about that, especially when I look at the Wob from above.
 

 

 

[Elegy]

Interesting idea!

There are two problems though, one in-world and one meta problem.

The in-world problem: Vasher created the Phantoms specifically to awaken them. They have human bones built in to work. Humans on Roshar soulcast to stone are completely stone as soon as they are transformed, so they would be significantly harder, I'd guess close to impossible to awaken in a way that would allow them to move. It would make for a cool moment, but I don't think it works within the framework established in Warbreaker.

The meta problem: It would provide an important plot development that would require reading a non-Stormlight book to understand. That's something that Brandon does not do since it contradicts his first law of magic - the law that the solution to problems should only ever work on the basis of what the reader understands - and not every reader understands Awakening, by far. He explained his crossover method in this WOB (fittingly using Zahel Awakening in Rhythm of War as an example):

Quote

Brandon Sanderson

Chapter Fifteen

I've been waiting for you guys to read this one, as it has some of my favorite moments in the first part. From the conversation with Rlain, and me finally being able to talk about some of the mechanics that let the Listeners survive on the Shattered Plains, to--of course--being able to write a fight using Awakening for the first time in a while. I also enjoy writing about Kaladin through the eye of someone like Zahel, as it gives me some interesting opportunities.

Obviously, I'm pushing (again) the boundaries of what a reader can be expected to remember/know about the cosmere to enjoy these books.

It's my opinion that thinking "Zahel can do weird, mysterious stuff I don't understand" is all right for those readers who don't have a larger cosmere experience. In fact, I'm confident that even if Warbreaker hadn't been released, I'd be writing scenes like this in the same way. It's a common trope in fantasy for the powerful figure, like Gandalf, to do things that seem outside the rules everyone else has to follow. One thing I like about having the cosmere to play with as a creator is that it lets me do scenes like this, which both are mysterious but also fully explained by the greater magic system, if you want to dig into it.

I will say that Zahel is making an informed guess about Szeth in this chapter. He doesn't know 100%.

This is your last relatively cosmere-aware chapter for the previews, I'm afraid. There are a few more similar to this much later in the book.

Rhythm of War Annotations (Oct. 13, 2020)

Which means that he does things like this to create a mysterious effect, but not in a way that resolves important conflicts in a way that can only be properly understood by people who have read specific books outside of the Stormlight Archive.

Edited April 18, 2022 by Elegy

[+Cyprian Wiley]

3 hours ago, Elegy said:

Humans on Roshar soulcast to stone are completely stone as soon as they are transformed, so they would be significantly harder, I'd guess close to impossible to awaken in a way that would allow them to move.

Thank you for your answer.
I completely agree with the meta problem. That is exactly  why I think that this could be important later but not in SA5. (Which does not mean, that I think it will be important, I just think it is interesting because of the in-world solution.)

I thought about this a long time, and it does not seem, that the solidness of stone is an issue. Neither with the original phantoms nor with how stone can be shaped with investiture on Roshar. 
Especially this really old WOB makes me believe in the theoretical possibility.
The word "definitely" makes it seem like something Brandon thought about before he was asked this question.
 

 

Quote

 

EMTrevor

Would an Awakener be able to awaken a corpse that was soulcast into stone more easily because it used to be living, thereby being able to create lifeless similar to Kalad's Phantoms without having bones in the framework?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. That would definitely work.

Tor.com The Way of Kings Re-Read Interview (June 10, 2014)

 

 

But Wobs are not canon.

[Duxredux]

2 hours ago, Cyprian Wiley said:

EMTrevor

Would an Awakener be able to awaken a corpse that was soulcast into stone more easily because it used to be living, thereby being able to create lifeless similar to Kalad's Phantoms without having bones in the framework?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. That would definitely work.

Tor.com The Way of Kings Re-Read Interview (June 10, 2014)

Now this is interesting. I think this indicates that Breaths are looking not at the physical state, but something to do with the Cognitive or Spiritual that allows Breaths to stick to an object. I wonder how formerly organic soulcast objects compare to say, cloth in terms of "steps away from life" when looking at Breath compatibility. It also makes me wonder if it's possible to make a Nightblood counterpart with far less Breaths using soulcast metal. The shape of the item will still matter for the number of Breaths, but maybe not the material.

I'd guess that Stormlight can't make Lifeless, at least not without serious hacking of the system that we haven't seen yet. Lifelight could be a different matter, but we don't know that much about it, nor do we know how to consistently/easily get it. We see Zahel Awakening cloths when sparring with Kaladin, but since a lot of the cloth ends up gray, he's using Breath to do that. Since we know he can utilize Stormlight, at least to eat, that probably means he can't use the Stormlight for Awakening. That does however imply that he has a couple hundred Breaths presently that he could use to Awaken some Phantoms. Breaths are a very limited commodity on Roshar so he could probably make a small strike force, but not be able to put out an army. At least not without some way of hacking the current Lights to do it. 

I'm also not sure if they would be as effective as we would hope. The Phantoms would tear through regular Singer troops with ease but would probably be countered by the same Fused and Regals that have been targeting non-Radiant Shardbearers. They would throw off the Fuzed for the first couple of encounters, but they're the best examples at learning from being killed. That said, there is a pretty high chance due to the nature of the Alethi nobility that have been soulcast into stone that the existing statues would be extremely good at fighting as if they were Shardbearers, especially if they were to retain their fighting skills over the two transformations. I could see Phantoms making a crucial tip to the balance in an important battle, but I wouldn't expect them to flood Roshar sweeping the enemy before them. From this, I could see the Phantoms potentially making a relatively small impact, but for the meta reasons @Elegy stated, I don't expect them to save Roshar.

There might be foreshadowing if you look into a bunch of WoBs but I can only think of a couple from canonical sources. We see Azure making cloth soldiers to fight Fused, and I posted earlier that I thought the Phantoms were based on Shardplate, but I haven't seen anyone in-universe even thinking about Awakening soulcast objects.

Edited April 18, 2022 by Duxredux

[KaladinWorldsinger]

Ok, i don't get that WoB at all, how does awakening soulcast statues immediately translate to lifeless soldiers? The main problem with awakening stone was that stone is not flexible. Kalads phantoms can move because they are actually skeletons, just encased in stone. My assumption was that the joints have gaps or spaces or something for it to be able to move. Is that wrong? Thunderclasts can move because the made of many individual prices of stone. But soulcast statues would be in one price right? No mobility then...

[Frustration]

On 4/19/2022 at 9:32 AM, KaladinWorldsinger said:

Ok, i don't get that WoB at all, how does awakening soulcast statues immediately translate to lifeless soldiers? The main problem with awakening stone was that stone is not flexible. Kalads phantoms can move because they are actually skeletons, just encased in stone. My assumption was that the joints have gaps or spaces or something for it to be able to move. Is that wrong? Thunderclasts can move because the made of many individual prices of stone. But soulcast statues would be in one price right? No mobility then...

Thunderclasts are one piece of stone.

Edited April 22, 2022 by Frustration

[KaladinWorldsinger]

1 hour ago, Frustration said:

Thunderclasts are on piece of stone.

Then how do they move?

[HSuperLee]

1 hour ago, KaladinWorldsinger said:

Ok, i don't get that WoB at all, how does awakening soulcast statues immediately translate to lifeless soldiers? The main problem with awakening stone was that stone is not flexible. Kalads phantoms can move because they are actually skeletons, just encased in stone. My assumption was that the joints have gaps or spaces or something for it to be able to move. Is that wrong? Thunderclasts can move because the made of many individual prices of stone. But soulcast statues would be in one price right? No mobility then...

Awakening seems to slightly distort the properties of the objects imbued with it to allow them to accomplish their awakened task. After all, a rope doesn't have any muscles by which to wrap itself around something, and Vasher's pants and shirt certainly shouldn't be able to be ridged enough to enhance his strength and grip. While there might be some stiffness to a soulcasted body, I actually imagine that since it would still have the full shape of bones and muscles and joints it actually would be easier for awakening to animate it, as all that would be needed is for the breath to mimic life in the material, which is explicitly what it is very good at, as shown by the fact that awakened materials like cloth take on the shape of things like hands or limbs regardless of the initial form of the material, if at all possible.

[Frustration]

38 minutes ago, KaladinWorldsinger said:

Then how do they move?

MAGIC

[HSuperLee]

2 hours ago, Frustration said:

MAGIC

I was intentionally avoiding giving that answer. So thanks, Frus, for having my back here so that I don't have to give the Doyalist answer when I don't want to.

[Frustration]

7 minutes ago, HSuperLee said:

I was intentionally avoiding giving that answer. So thanks, Frus, for having my back here so that I don't have to give the Doyalist answer when I don't want to.

No problem.

[Duxredux]

On 4/19/2022 at 9:32 AM, KaladinWorldsinger said:

Ok, i don't get that WoB at all, how does awakening soulcast statues immediately translate to lifeless soldiers? The main problem with awakening stone was that stone is not flexible. Kalads phantoms can move because they are actually skeletons, just encased in stone. My assumption was that the joints have gaps or spaces or something for it to be able to move. Is that wrong? Thunderclasts can move because the made of many individual prices of stone. But soulcast statues would be in one price right? No mobility then...

By my understanding, the issue with awakening stone is that you normally can't awaken something inorganic, not the issue with flexibility. As Vasher puts it, BioChroma is the power of life and seeks to follow patterns of life, which is why stone and metal are usually out. This is why Nightblood is so unusual, and took the Ninth Heightening to create. Lifeless are made from dead creatures that are for the most part in the same general shape they were in life. I think Vasher's workaround was using the skeletons as the focus for the Breaths to create Lifeless rather than the stone itself, so I'm not sure if the stone itself was awakened or not. They're odd, I'll give you that. Makes you wonder why they don't carve hardwood statues to use for awakening, even if they probably couldn't be made into Lifeless.

Thunderclasts probably use some variant of surgebinding that operate on different mechanics than Breaths. Breaths change an object to act as if it were alive based on the person performing the awakening, forming the shape of musculature even when the formerly living object such as a linen cloth never had musculature. Not sure what thunderclasts use (Surge of Cohesion? If it's that, then why can't reshape amputated limbs?), but Stormlight and Voidlight definitely don't have the restrictions on inorganic material that BioChroma does.