Hemalurgy's Intent Conversion

[Trusk'our he/him]

For awhile, I've wondered how Hemalurgy's inner mechanics that deal with the original Intent of the parasitized Investiture. After all, it takes pieces of other Investiture, with their Intents, such as Preservations, but it somehow Connects you to Ruin more, despite you taking Investiture with a different Intent.

I'm now thinking along the lines that when you take a piece of Investiture via Hemalurgy, it converts the Intent of the Investiture taken to Ruin's, at least until the Investiture leaks out and returns to the Spiritual Realm. This would explain how it Connects you to Ruin. 

I also think that it is possible for this to be done since we've seen another thing do this on screen. 

Spoiler

Nightblood's color of Investiture is the same as Ruin's, which makes sense, since it's Command is to destroy. It also consumes foreign Investiture, and then converts (not corrupts; there is no red involved with Nightblood's Investiture) it into more of Nightblood.

This probably isn't a huge deal, but the whole idea that Hemalurgy somehow didn't involve any of Ruin's own Investiture bugged me. Of course, this may be incorrect, but it makes the most sense to me, so this will be my head cannon until some other piece of information tells me otherwise (which I will be open to, if someone else has any ideas).

Edited July 17, 2022 by Trusk'our

[Stormtide_Leviathan]

It seems there are ways to fuel many invested arts with foreign investiture. It's not always easy, but there do seem to be ways to.

Stormlight spoilers

Spoiler

Like how knights radiant surgebind, which is normally fueled by honor's investiture, can be fueled by cultivation's investure by Lift or Odium's investuture by Venli

So my guess is, with hemalurgy, you're fueling whatever magic with ruin instead of the usual shard.

In fact, next time there's a spoiler stream, here's a question brandon might answer.

"Normally, allomancy is fueled by drawing power from Preservation. If that allomancy was gained through hemalurgy, are you instead drawing on the power of Ruin? Or are you still drawing on preservation's power?"

[Trusk'our he/him]

16 hours ago, Stormtide_Leviathan said:

It seems there are ways to fuel many invested arts with foreign investiture. It's not always easy, but there do seem to be ways to.

Stormlight spoilers

  Reveal hidden contents

Like how knights radiant surgebind, which is normally fueled by honor's investiture, can be fueled by cultivation's investure by Lift or Odium's investuture by Venli

So my guess is, with hemalurgy, you're fueling whatever magic with ruin instead of the usual shard.

In fact, next time there's a spoiler stream, here's a question brandon might answer.

"Normally, allomancy is fueled by drawing power from Preservation. If that allomancy was gained through hemalurgy, are you instead drawing on the power of Ruin? Or are you still drawing on preservation's power?"

It's true that you can fuel Invested powers with foreign Investiture, it just feels off to me that Ruin's magic system wouldn't involve it's own Investiture at all, plus those who have Hemalurgic spikes imbedded in them are more strongly Connected to Ruin than those without, and having Investiture converted to Ruin's own Intent held within the spikes would help explain both of those issues.

But I suppose I may just want an easy answer, and I could be completely wrong.

[Duxredux he/him]

19 hours ago, Stormtide_Leviathan said:

It seems there are ways to fuel many invested arts with foreign investiture. It's not always easy, but there do seem to be ways to.

Stormlight spoilers

  Reveal hidden contents

Like how knights radiant surgebind, which is normally fueled by honor's investiture, can be fueled by cultivation's investure by Lift or Odium's investuture by Venli

So my guess is, with hemalurgy, you're fueling whatever magic with ruin instead of the usual shard.

In fact, next time there's a spoiler stream, here's a question brandon might answer.

"Normally, allomancy is fueled by drawing power from Preservation. If that allomancy was gained through hemalurgy, are you instead drawing on the power of Ruin? Or are you still drawing on preservation's power?"

There may be something to this, that Hemalurgic abilities are powered by Ruin. If you think about it, there should be a power difference between Ruin and Preservation based on how all Allomancy is fueled by Preservation, unless there isn't a "cooldown" for the Investiture after an Allomancer utilizes the power. The second option seems unlikely to me, as Preservation's end plan was to burn away Ruin's body to weaken him, even with the fact that Investiture can't be lost in the system. If all Hemalurgic entities are to an extent powered or otherwise enabled through Ruin's Investiture, that would explain why there isn't a disparity from the Shards based on power consumption from using their Invested arts.

[Mr. Misting he/him]

On 7/17/2022 at 5:57 PM, Trusk'our said:

For awhile, I've wondered how Hemalurgy's inner mechanics that deal with the original Intent of the parasitized Investiture. After all, it takes pieces of other Investiture, with their Intents, such as Preservations, but it somehow Connects you to Ruin more, despite you taking Investiture with a different Intent.

I'm now thinking along the lines that when you take a piece of Investiture via Hemalurgy, it converts the Intent of the Investiture taken to Ruin's, at least until the Investiture leaks out and returns to the Spiritual Realm. This would explain how it Connects you to Ruin. 

I also think that it is possible for this to be done since we've seen another thing do this on screen. 

  Hide contents

Nightblood's color of Investiture is the same as Ruin's, which makes sense, since it's Command is to destroy. It also consumes foreign Investiture, and then converts (not corrupts; there is no red involved with Nightblood's Investiture) it into more of Nightblood.

This probably isn't a huge deal, but the whole idea that Hemalurgy somehow didn't involve any of Ruin's own Investiture bugged me. Of course, this may be incorrect, but it makes the most sense to me, so this will be my head cannon until some other piece of information tells me otherwise (which I will be open to, if someone else has any ideas).

I think you might be reading to much into this. Even though the art itself is of ruin, that doesn't mean all the investiture is of ruin also. If I steal someone's allomancy I think that the power source would still be the same because its just a copy and paste. Yes hemalurgy is of ruin but I think that just means it mirrors ruin's philosophy, not necessary his investiture. "Hemalurgy was not specifically created by Ruin but rather arose from the interactions between Preservation, Ruin, and Scadrial itself." (Coppermind). I could totally be wrong, but this is just what I think.