Nightblood and The Division Surge

[Fallen Rope he/him]

Idea.

When Nightblood is destroying walls and lifeless, it is using the division surge.

Reasoning.

Some Nahel spren can use the surges themselves, Syl has used adhesion and pattern can hold light weavings. It is very likely that all Nahel spren can use surges.

If Szeth is going to become a Skybreaker from a bond to Nightblood then it will act as a spren, so it will likely be able to use Surges, but what if Nightblood can already use the surges.

Why can Nightblood use Surges?

“I will destroy evil” is one of the Skybreaker ideals, or close to one. This would be why Nightblood can act like a high spren and bond to Szeth. The ideals are a part of surgebinding so Nightbloods command gives access to surgebinding with endowment investiture.

[Shaggai]

Surgebinding is a specific type of Investiture connected to Honor and Cultivation. Nightblood was Invested with Breath, which is Cultivation's Investiture. It's more likely that Endowment's Investiture is simply having a similar effect to Division, like how Yolish Investiture is similar to Lightweaving.

[skaa he/him]

Surgebinding is a specific type of Investiture connected to Honor and Cultivation. Nightblood was Invested with Breath, which is Cultivation's Investiture. It's more likely that Endowment's Investiture is simply having a similar effect to Division, like how Yolish Investiture is similar to Lightweaving.

I don't think the Surges are necessarily of either Honor or of Cultivation. I say this because we have WoB that the Metallic powers are not really of Preservation or Ruin:

As a note here, the powers granted by all of the metals--even the two divine ones--are not themselves of either Shard. They are simply tools. And so, it's possible that one COULD have found a way to reproduce an ability like atium's while using Preservation's power, but it wouldn't be as natural or as easy as using Preservation to fuel Allomancy.

The means of getting powers--Ruin stealing, Preservation gifting--are related to the Shards, but not the powers themselves.

My conclusion from this is that the specific powers granted by Investiture (metal-pulling/pushing, gravity-manipulation, destruction, illusion magic, reanimation of corpses, etc.) are all from Adonalsium. The Shards, being parts of Adonalsium, can access all these powers. It's just a matter of which powers a specific piece of Adonalsium chooses to grant people, and how it wants people to access those powers. That depends on the piece of Adonalsium's Intent.

So yes, I wouldn't be surprised if Nightblood, a Splinter of a Shard and therefore a piece of Adonalsium, can give Szeth access to the Surge of Division, since it fits his Intent ("destroy evil"). Division is the Surge of destruction, after all, and is the same general power that Nightblood has been using even while on Nalthis.

What I'm not quite sure of is whether Nightblood will grant Szeth access to the Gravitation Surge. Perhaps there's a special aspect of Gravitation that Nightblood is using, like, maybe it's how he makes "evil" people gravitate towards him. Seems like a stretch, though.

Edited June 29, 2014 by skaa

[Fallen Rope he/him]

Maybe each spren can only use one surge themselves, Syl has only used adhesion but has used never gravitation. The surge the spren/sword can use is the one that is close to its intent, honor spren bind, cryptics make illusions and Nightblood destroys. The second surge is only used by the surgebinder.

 

Surgebinding is a specific type of Investiture connected to Honor and Cultivation. Nightblood was Invested with Breath, which is Cultivation's Investiture. It's more likely that Endowment's Investiture is simply having a similar effect to Division, like how Yolish Investiture is similar to Lightweaving.

 

I think that the surges maybe the forces of the spiritual realm as they are thought as fundamental forces, surgebinders can change them.

Edited June 29, 2014 by Fallen Rope

[Shaggai]

I don't think the Surges are necessarily of either Honor or of Cultivation. I say this because we have WoB that the Metallic powers are not really of Preservation or Ruin:

My conclusion from this is that the specific powers granted by Investiture (metal-pulling/pushing, gravity-manipulation, destruction, illusion magic, reanimation of corpses, etc.) are all from Adonalsium. The Shards, being parts of Adonalsium, can access all these powers. It's just a matter of which powers a specific piece of Adonalsium chooses to grant people, and how it wants people to access those powers. That depends on the piece of Adonalsium's Intent.

So yes, I wouldn't be surprised if Nightblood, a Splinter of a Shard and therefore a piece of Adonalsium, can give Szeth access to the Surge of Division, since it fits his Intent ("destroy evil"). Division is the Surge of destruction, after all, and is the same general power that Nightblood has been using even while on Nalthis.

What I'm not quite sure of is whether Nightblood will grant Szeth access to the Gravitation Surge. Perhaps there's a special aspect of Gravitation that Nightblood is using, like, maybe it's how he makes "evil" people gravitate towards him. Seems like a stretch, though.

That WoB is just saying that it's possible to obtain similar powers even with different Shards. The specific magic systems are connected to the Shards. Perhaps other Shards could create the same magic systems, but it doesn't seem like any other Shard has replicated Surgebinding and the Surges.

[skaa he/him]

That WoB is just saying that it's possible to obtain similar powers even with different Shards. The specific magic systems are connected to the Shards. Perhaps other Shards could create the same magic systems, but it doesn't seem like any other Shard has replicated Surgebinding and the Surges.

 

It is not a matter of replication. All Shards are part of the same whole. It is only their Intent that is keeping them from giving their creatures access to the same exact set of powers. I suppose the Shardworlds themselves might also have a hand in the specific way power is accessed by people (as I discussed in another thread), but my point is that the powers themselves, apart from the specific system used to access them, are not necessarily Shard-specific or Shardworld-specific. It's just that certain Shards prefer certain powers, and certain people have a particular Innate Investiture that can only interact with Shards/Splinters in a certain way.

 

In other words, Roshar Lightweaving and Yolish Lightweaving aren't just similar powers. They are the exact same power accessed differently (one via Stormlight, the other via... whatever Hoid is using). In the same way, every single Invested power specifically aimed towards destruction is actually the same power accessed differently. And every single power that binds things is the exact same power accessed differently. You get what I mean?

 

So, now that Nightblood, a Splinter with a destructive Intent, is on Roshar, the rules affecting the Innate Investiture of Rosharians will now take into effect once he bonds with a human. He is now a spren (or at least, the Breaths forming his consciousness are), and so he can do whatever it is that the Nahel spren did to grant powers to humans, though perhaps he'll do it a bit differently since he's not of Honor.

Edited June 29, 2014 by skaa