Which Shards are Marasi and Moonlight discussing?

[Fish613]

Quote

Marasi frowned, considering. "I have one of sixteen pieces of art... and I must ensure mine is the most valuable?"

"Yup."

"I'd try to create an air of mystique around it," Marasi said. "I wouldn't show it off. I'd let the other fifteen become common by comparison - and the value of mine would increase as people shared the story. There is one more. One no one has seen."

"Clever," Moonlight said. "I'm impressed."

"And what would you do?" Marasi said.

"Steal the other fifteen," Moonlight said. "Then I'd be able to manipulate the market however I wanted."

This is part of the conversation between Marasi and Moonlight in Chapter 20 of TLM. Moonlight goes on to give two other options: destroy all the others, which is what Odium is doing; or crowd the others out by copying your one, which is what Autonomy is doing.

It seems to me quite possible that the "Air of mystique" and "Steal the others" options are foreshadowing for other Shards that we haven't really met yet. Which Shards could those be?

"Air of mystique" might relate to the as-yet-unknown "Survival Shard". I've had a look at the Coppermind and we only really know a little about this one from WoBs: There is a Shard, whose name & intent are not yet known, whose original plan was to just hide and survive, though over time they've realised that may not be the most desirable course of action.

"Steal the others" doesn't seem to me to obviously fit with any of the Shards we know about. If I had to pick one, I'd pick Ambition based purely on the name, but we know that names can be a little misleading as to what the Shard is actually doing (e.g. Autonomy isn't exactly promoting true autonomy...) A wild theory, that I'm not sure I believe, could be that it refers to Hoid. We know he doesn't hold a Shard, so it doesn't work exactly, but he's certainly working hard to collect as many forms of Investiture as he can.

I'm really liking my theory that these are foreshadowing, but I don't know for what. What do other people think?

[RedBlue]

I like your theory.

Moonlight’s suggestion of stealing the other 15 artworks/Shards would correspond to a Shard that wants to absorb all the others. What that Shard would become at the end of that is unclear — they probably wouldn’t know themselves. I’m fairly sure no Shard is currently attempting this, since Harmony is the only merged Shard around right now. Enough time has passed that, if a Shard were actively trying to merge, they would have to have gotten somewhere by now.

I don’t think that what Autonomy or Hoid are doing counts as ‘stealing the others’. Autonomy is copying herself rather than stealing, and Hoid’s collecting of different types of ‘magic’ doesn’t seem to fit the ‘stealing’ metaphor either.

I think it’s likely that we’ll see Shards adopt new, more aggressive strategies as the cosmere goes forward and more conflicts develop.

[Frustration]

I found the idea of a hidden shard rather cheeky, almost like Brandon was intentionally taunting us.

[Fish613]

6 hours ago, RedBlue said:

Moonlight’s suggestion of stealing the other 15 artworks/Shards would correspond to a Shard that wants to absorb all the others.

Thanks! That sounds plausible, and I agree that there's no real indication of which Shard that could be.

 

6 hours ago, Frustration said:

I found the idea of a hidden shard rather cheeky, almost like Brandon was intentionally taunting us.

Which he is not above at all - I can't be the only person who read Harmony's comment to Wax in Chapter 19 as rather meta:

Quote

Wax blinked.

"You were not expecting so straightforward an answer?" Harmony asked.

"I've not always gotten them in the past."

"I'm trying to do better."

By the way, I really liked your Firepower Index!

[JustQuestin2004]

30 minutes ago, Fish613 said:

Thanks! That sounds plausible, and I agree that there's no real indication of which Shard that could be.

Perhaps Mercy? Maybe Mercy could be trying to absorb the Splintered remains of Ambition after the battle in the Threnody System?

That could be an answer as to why Harmony says that 'Mercy worries him'. Bit of a stretch but it could be possible.

[Ixthos]

2 hours ago, JustQuestin2004 said:

Perhaps Mercy? Maybe Mercy could be trying to absorb the Splintered remains of Ambition after the battle in the Threnody System?

That could be an answer as to why Harmony says that 'Mercy worries him'. Bit of a stretch but it could be possible.

While it would contradict my "Silverlight is Ambition's corpse" theory (or at least require some reworking), it would be interesting if Mercy followed - or, if as I suspect, Mercy was physically somewhere else in the Cosmere while Ambition and Odium were in the Threnodite system and Odium, as the Shard of Conflict and Opposites, was able to bring Mercy into the fight in the Spiritual Realm as an antithesis to Ambition (as Mercy would be primarily selfless and focused on helping others at one's own expense, while Ambition is primarily selfish and focused on helping oneself at the expense of others), and afterwards Mercy tracked down the wounded Ambition while Odium was unable to do so, drawn by Ambition's pain - and then "mercy killed" Uli Da, and then picked up fragments to protect nearby worlds from the harm they might do - a selfless act that would change Mercy - then Mercy would be changed, and possibly pick up some of Ambition's ... ambitions, while still being "mostly" Mercy. Thus Mercy would be warped into the darker facet - wanting to "help" others, but in ways they don't want, and in ways that, at least slightly, help Mercy. Ruin didn't want to Ruin itself, but Preservation wasn't focused on self preservation, and indeed seemed to have planned for its own nature to be changed in the formation of Harmony, who would be better able to preserve Scadrial and possibly the whole of the Cosmere. I feel Mercy, driven to help others, would be one of the Shards least affected by the desire to remain "pure," and would be more likely to let itself be changed if it helped others - and once changed, but still at least mostly selfless, Mercy might be the most dangerous Shard after Odium to the status quo - a Shard unburdened by the desire to remain as it is, but fully prepared to change. Ambition likely would have sought out the other Shards to consume them, which might be why Odium feared her, but Mercy combined with traces of Ambition ... that Shard almost certainly would seek out more power, to "help" others, and to do so in a way that both "hurts" and "helps" themselves.

Edited December 26, 2022 by Ixthos

[Fish613]

6 hours ago, JustQuestin2004 said:

Perhaps Mercy? Maybe Mercy could be trying to absorb the Splintered remains of Ambition after the battle in the Threnody System?

That could be an answer as to why Harmony says that 'Mercy worries him'. Bit of a stretch but it could be possible.

I'd forgotten that line about Mercy - interesting. I agree it's a stretch, but it's as good as anything else for now.