Lifeless Mass Production

[The Stick]

I do not think the following theory is at all right or moral. However, it struck me on how no Nalthians have ever thought of it. If every Nalthian was to give a relative or awakener their breath seconds before they die, and then stop loss of breath through death. The person given the breath could then use the one breath lifeless command to bring the dead relative immediately back to sentience. You could basically create a society where nobody ever dies in a sense where they stop working. This would easily give Nalthian a massive advantage in potential Cosmere conflict. They would have access to massive Lifeless armies, hundred of thousands. They could use the Lifeless buildup to fund massive factories to gain a monopoly on Cosmere goods. One final thing is that this method may be a way to splinter Endowment. The natural path Endowment plans is to endow each one person a single breath at birth. This person then naturally dies, returning the power to her. This forms an endless natural cycle. She cannot stop endowing breaths, that is against her intent and would kill her. So, once enough Investiture is bled from her, Endowment is shattered into millions of Lifeless Splinters.

[alder24]

14 hours ago, The Stick said:

I do not think the following theory is at all right or moral. However, it struck me on how no Nalthians have ever thought of it. If every Nalthian was to give a relative or awakener their breath seconds before they die, and then stop loss of breath through death. The person given the breath could then use the one breath lifeless command to bring the dead relative immediately back to sentience. You could basically create a society where nobody ever dies in a sense where they stop working. This would easily give Nalthian a massive advantage in potential Cosmere conflict. They would have access to massive Lifeless armies, hundred of thousands. They could use the Lifeless buildup to fund massive factories to gain a monopoly on Cosmere goods. One final thing is that this method may be a way to splinter Endowment. The natural path Endowment plans is to endow each one person a single breath at birth. This person then naturally dies, returning the power to her. This forms an endless natural cycle. She cannot stop endowing breaths, that is against her intent and would kill her. So, once enough Investiture is bled from her, Endowment is shattered into millions of Lifeless Splinters.

No. First of all, many Nalthians believe that Breath is their soul, and giving it away is a very bad thing. There are also those who believe that creating Lifeless is an unholy abomination. You can’t convince the entire planet to do such a thing. If you manage to convince at least Hallandren, it would already be a success. Yet people in Hallandren still steer clear of them.  

Secondly, people don't know when they will die. Most people die due to sudden illness, believing that they will recover, and before they will realize, they're in coma/sleep, or have some mental troubles due to illness. They won't be able to think straight enough to pass on their Breath. Others die due to accidents, which by their name are accidental. Some will die due to wounds sustained in a workplace or a battle if they’re soldiers (who don’t have a time to think about their Breaths). Not to mention those who die in their sleep, without any previous indication of incoming death.

Thirdly, you need to first prepare bodies before making them into Lifeless, this includes replacing their blood with Ichor-alcohol (which makes Awakening Lifeless with one Breath possible in the first place). People don’t have necessary knowledge to prepare the body nor is Ichor-alcohol widely available to common folks.

Making dead bodies into Lifeless don’t make them sentient, nor are they the person who died - their soul is replaced by Breath, and that person is mostly gone, Lifeless is self-aware, but isn’t sentient. Then you have a problem with the economy, people would lose jobs, as they would be replaced by expandable Lifeless, which basically means big economical crisis. Not a good thing.

Next, there are no two Lifeless alike. Most of them won’t be good soldiers, because they weren’t one when they were alive. Person’s skill and body's physical attributes are carried into a Lifeless. This means that an old person, who was made into a Lifeless after a long illness, which greatly reduced his body mass, will make a bad Lifeless, not to mention a Lifeless soldier. Bodies with disabilities would be even worse.

Furthermore, Lifeless breaks apart. They require maintenance, fixing damaged muscles (which requires very advanced anatomical knowledge), replenishing Ichor-alcohol and stuff like that. If they are properly treated, they would last at best several years. But they would still sustain some damage during those years, which would make them useless or require you to invest another Breath to fix them and make them keep working. Lifeless won’t last forever. 

And lastly, no again, Endowment won’t get splintered nor shattered. She has vastly more investiture than the planet can even hold. She won’t run out of it even if you stop Death itself.

Spoiler

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From a very recent signing, we have this new Word of Brandon...

chasmfriend's son: Is there a finite amount of Investiture?

Brandon: Yes.

chasmfriend's son: So is Nightblood consuming it?

Brandon: Yes. Very, very slowly.

This worries me somewhat because of the following observation.

Nightblood consumes Breath (and other Investiture, but let's limit ourselves to Breath for a second).

Every person on Nalthis is born with one Breath.

Populations tend to grow. Which means that under normal rules of demographics, population of Nalthis should keep increasing.

This in turn means that under normal circumstances the number of people with Breath on Nalthis should be growing.

I can see the following possible explanations to this:

1. Endowment can give Breath to many more people than are currently living on Nalthis. So, the exponential population growth has not yet reached the level at which Endowment's ability to award a Breath to each Nalthis-born human is seriously challenged. When it happens though, things will not go well.

2. There is some built-in mechanism controlling population growth on Nalthis, making certain that the population stays within the limits. Nightblood's consumption of Breath makes these limits smaller, and overall may lead to Endowment's inability to grant Breath to Nalthis-born, but not for a while (essentially, Endowment controls population trends at she sees fit).

Thoughts?

Brandon Sanderson

Just as a point you should understand, the amount of MATTER in the cosmere is finite too. As is the amount of energy.

Worrying that Endowment will run out of Breaths to give is a little like worrying that the amount of carbon on Earth will run out because people keep being born.

uchoo786

So just for clarification, once Nightblood consumes investiture, that investiture gets recycled? That's what I've always assumed. That it enters the cognitive/spiritual realm?

Brandon Sanderson

The investiture he consumes is not gone forever--it's not leaving the system, so to speak.

General Reddit 2015 (Dec. 14, 2015)

 

Keep in mind, Awakening is a relatively new thing on Nalthis (as during Warbreaker). Returnings have been happening for a few hundred years now, but Awakening as an invested art was explored more deeply by the Five Scholars, a bit more than 300 years before Warbreaker. That's not a long time. And Nalthians are far from being globally united.

Edited April 23 by alder24

[Treamayne]

2 hours ago, alder24 said:

this includes replacing their blood with Ichor-alcohol (which makes Awakening Lifeless with one Breath possible in the first place).

Not quite accurate.

The one-breath command and the development of ichor alcohol were separate (competing) "advances" during the Manywar.One by Shashara, one by Yesteel:

Spoiler

Quote

Ch 51:

Shashara had always been the most talented of them, far more capable than Vasher himself, who had used tricks—like encasing bones in steel or stone—to make his creations. Shashara had been spurred on by the knowledge that she’d been shown up by Yesteel and the development of ichor-alcohol. 

Quote

Ch 53:

That Shashara had needed to die? It had been bad enough when she’d revealed the Commands to make Lifeless from a single breath. What if the way of making Awakened steel, like Nightblood, had entered the Manywar? Undead monsters slaughtering people with Awakened swords thirsting for blood?

 

The single-breath command allowed the users to make more lifeless cheaper. Using Ichor-alcohol allowed the users to keep their lifeless from degrading due to decay/necrosis and made it easier to fix/repair injured lifeless.

After the Manywar, both techniques were adopted by Hallendren to make thier armies.

[alder24]

9 hours ago, Treamayne said:

Not quite accurate.

The one-breath command and the development of ichor alcohol were separate (competing) "advances" during the Manywar.One by Shashara, one by Yesteel:

  Reveal hidden contents

 

The single-breath command allowed the users to make more lifeless cheaper. Using Ichor-alcohol allowed the users to keep their lifeless from degrading due to decay/necrosis and made it easier to fix/repair injured lifeless.

After the Manywar, both techniques were adopted by Hallendren to make thier armies.

You're right. That's what I get for writing a long response half asleep   But the fact remains, Lifeless without alcohol last far shorter than with it.