What happens to your Spiritweb when you go to the Beyond?

[Walter The Moral]

We know that every person has a Spiritweb that is made up of Investiture, and we know that Investiture can not be created or destroyed. My question is what happens to that Investiture when you die? We know that most souls go to the Beyond, but I don't think the Spiritweb would go there, since that seems a bit like Investiture being destroyed. It would also allow people to trace things into the Beyond, which I'm pretty sure is impossible.

[Newly Awakened]

So this WoB answers the question:

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Argent

Is death in the Cosmere a two-stage process? It seems to me like (under normal circumstances) the body dies first, sending the mind fully in the Cognitive Realm; the soul, presumably, remains in the Spiritual for the entire process. I am a little unclear on what happens after that though - what is it that passes into the Beyond, just the mind? Does the soul / spiritual aspect / Spiritweb just kind of... break down in the Spiritual Realm, turn into free iInvestiture?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. It's a two stage process, and most of what you said is correct. The odd thing is, though, that the Spiritweb doesn't completely break down (just like your body doesn't immediately break down.) Even after a long time, there's a record of that Spiritweb in the Spiritual Realm.

Oversleep

Wait wait wait. If there is a "corpse" of Spiritweb (so to speak) and actual, physical corpse is also there... Could it be still viable for Hemalurgy? Could it be still viable for Hemalurgy if you really know what you're doing and have some useful powers (manipulating Connection comes to mind)?

Could you patch the remnants of the Spiritweb and staple it to the body and end up with some zombie-zombie Lifeless? You'd still need to give it a mind but I figure Awakening is just doing that?

Brandon Sanderson

RAFO.

Stormlight Three Update #6 (Feb. 5, 2017)

So it seems that the spiritwebs do stay around even after the person goes into the Beyond.

Edited June 21 by Newly Awakened
Adding some thoughts that occurred to me afterwards.

[Leuthie]

9 hours ago, Newly Awakened said:

So this WoB answers the question:

So it seems that the spiritwebs do stay around even after the person goes into the Beyond.

Brandon hasn't made it clear whether or not Cognitive Shadows are the original person hanging around or an imprint left by significant Investiture playing around with the Spirit Web while the individual heads to the Beyond. He probably won't clear that up, actually. It's similar to the Star Trek transporter question: Is the reformed person the original person or a copy made by the transporter with the original person dying in the process? Does it matter?

[Quantus]

What is confirmed is that there is a fuzzy window of time between physical Death and "final" death, where a cognitive shadow (and associated spiritweb) are still around.  This window is extended by Investiture. After that window passes, what's left is going to get recycled by the system, along with any other "consumed" Investiture. But even after tons of time passes, even just the physical aspect (the meatsuit corpse) of the dead person will still have a "spiritweb" enough to be targeted by Forgery (as any object can, but it's going to be the object/bead level of existence that doesnt take spiritual damage from a Shardblade, doesnt have enough Investiture to charge a Spike (per WOB's about spiking stuff out of Lifeless), and wont physically be particularly Invested but would still be Connected to the person they used to be (because the Spiritual Realm is all Times and Places at once).

 What is intentionally not confirmed is whether there actually is anything separate and distinct that Goes Beyond, or even if a Beyond itself exists.  One Returned believes he's a copy of a "real" person that already died and went Beyond, leaving a Investiture Fossil behind that gets to be all depressed about it. Others say the Returned get grabbed in the grey area and Returned before they get the chance to go Beyond (more like what apparently happened to Szeth).