What is Yumi?

[+Oltux72]

To cut to the core of the question: Is Yumi a Cognitive Shadow? That is, what happened to her spiritual aspect? By reincarnating her, did Painter do what the Surge of Regrowth does combined with creating a body out of nothing? Or did he give a body to a true Cognitive Shadow?
Does she retain the ability to call up the Spirits?

[Brgst13]

Yumi was a Splinter of Virtuosity.  I suspect she was able to access a large chunk of Virtuosity's Investiture to help Painter reincarnate herself.

Also, being a Splinter of Virtuosity, the machine could not strip her Investiture away.  I would argue that the others she perceived in her reality were Cognitive Shadows, aligned with the Shades from Threnody.

[Argenti]

17 minutes ago, Oltux72 said:

To cut to the core of the question: Is Yumi a Cognitive Shadow? That is, what happened to her spiritual aspect? By reincarnating her, did Painter do what the Surge of Regrowth does combined with creating a body out of nothing? Or did he give a body to a true Cognitive Shadow?
Does she retain the ability to call up the Spirits?

Yumi has been a cognitive shadow for a long while. Painter didn't reincarnate her, he just gave her loose investure shape, form, and connection. Since she has a lot of investure, the bond Painter formed between the 3 realms basically manifested her body into a physical one.

Ado only knows if she can still call spirits. Probably not though since they love TV now.

[+Oltux72]

1 hour ago, Argenti said:

Yumi has been a cognitive shadow for a long while. Painter didn't reincarnate her, he just gave her loose investure shape, form, and connection. Since she has a lot of investure, the bond Painter formed between the 3 realms basically manifested her body into a physical one.

Then I have to ask the obvious question. Is she fully human now? Or is she basically a Returned? Does she, going for the book's example, eat, digest and return stuff to the ecosystem?

[Argenti]

56 minutes ago, Oltux72 said:

Then I have to ask the obvious question. Is she fully human now? Or is she basically a Returned? Does she, going for the book's example, eat, digest and return stuff to the ecosystem?

I'll re-read it, but probably closer to a Retuned? *shrug*

[+Oltux72]

12 hours ago, Argenti said:

I'll re-read it, but probably closer to a Retuned? *shrug*

Sorry to be obnoxious, but let's be clear. If she is a Returned, then Hoid has just told somebody that there is a way to artificially create Returned with their full memories and without the need to consume Breaths. That is not a matter you can just shrug off.

[Argenti]

2 hours ago, Oltux72 said:

Sorry to be obnoxious, but let's be clear. If she is a Returned, then Hoid has just told somebody that there is a way to artificially create Returned with their full memories and without the need to consume Breaths. That is not a matter you can just shrug off.

They need incredible amounts of innate Virtuosity investure, a strong connection to the physical world, A skilled Painter with a strong connection to them must be nearby on death and they need to be made a Cognitive shadow first, not to mention the shroud leaving probably made the barries between realms thin. If you really want to imagine it, she probably closest to a hearld, given her physical body is long gone. This set of circumstances will likely never happen again, and is not a reliable way to produce anything. 

[StanLemon]

I'm assuming she's a flesh and blood human again. All the other Cognitive Shadows we know of need some kind of "tether" to have physical bodies like Kelsier's Spike, The Oathpact, Divine Breath, etc. There's nothing like that even hinted at to be the case at the end of the book

[ftl]

There is - the Shroud is basically a bunch of raw Investiture, Yumi is stated to be extremely invested (far more Invested than a Returned, more like an Elantrian).

I think Realmatically, the part about how Yumi got a body again is not unique. Because she's super Invested, she persisted in the Cognitive realm for a while, not being pulled to the Beyond very quickly at all; in that time, Painter and Yumi formed a body for her out of all this Investiture around (her will and his painting), using their Connection to each other through their weird bond to pull her into it.

That's basically all you need - somebody who's Invested enough to persist in the cognitive realm while you do your thing, and a boatload of investiture to make them a new body, and some way to pull them into it. The main blocker for it is the Investiture required - it's a lot.

...we still don't know why exactly Endowment takes the memories of the Returned, but as far as I can tell it's not that becoming a cognitive shadow stapled back into a body inherently removes memories, it's that Endowment is specifically choosing to remove the memories of the cognitive shadows she creates with divine breaths, for some as-of-yet unknown reason.

[Werewolff Studios]

2 hours ago, ftl said:

There is - the Shroud is basically a bunch of raw Investiture, Yumi is stated to be extremely invested (far more Invested than a Returned, more like an Elantrian).

I think Realmatically, the part about how Yumi got a body again is not unique. Because she's super Invested, she persisted in the Cognitive realm for a while, not being pulled to the Beyond very quickly at all; in that time, Painter and Yumi formed a body for her out of all this Investiture around (her will and his painting), using their Connection to each other through their weird bond to pull her into it.

That's basically all you need - somebody who's Invested enough to persist in the cognitive realm while you do your thing, and a boatload of investiture to make them a new body, and some way to pull them into it. The main blocker for it is the Investiture required - it's a lot.

...we still don't know why exactly Endowment takes the memories of the Returned, but as far as I can tell it's not that becoming a cognitive shadow stapled back into a body inherently removes memories, it's that Endowment is specifically choosing to remove the memories of the cognitive shadows she creates with divine breaths, for some as-of-yet unknown reason.

Well said! I agree - it's basically high-end Radiant Healing. When injured, they convert Stormlight (Raw Investiture) into new body tissue, matching the Spiritual aspect but filtered through the Cognitive. That's kind of what happened here - Nikaro Connected her back to the Physical Realm through his painting and Intent, and Yumi (or I suppose both of them) converted the shroud into a new body. As you said, it would certainly take a lot of Investiture, like how the Lopen needed a lot of spheres to fully regrow only his arm, but certainly possible through current Realmatic Theory. 

[StanLemon]

3 hours ago, ftl said:

There is - the Shroud is basically a bunch of raw Investiture, Yumi is stated to be extremely invested (far more Invested than a Returned, more like an Elantrian).

Except the Shroud stops existing at the end of the book. It's like saying a Returned who has used their Divine Breath is still being kept alive by that Divine Breath that doesn't exist anymore. All Cognitive Shadows we know of need something to hold their physical bodies. There Heralds need the Oathpact, Kelsier needs his Spike, the Returned need Divine Breath. Yumi doesn't have that limitation 

With the Shroud dissipating at the end, it's not there to hold her physical body. I agree with you that her regrowing a body isn't any different than Investiture healing, but I think it's fair to say she's not a Cognitive Shadow anymore and truly came back to life

[Underwater_Worldhopper]

23 minutes ago, StanLemon said:

Except the Shroud stops existing at the end of the book. It's like saying a Returned who has used their Divine Breath is still being kept alive by that Divine Breath that doesn't exist anymore. All Cognitive Shadows we know of need something to hold their physical bodies. There Heralds need the Oathpact, Kelsier needs his Spike, the Returned need Divine Breath. Yumi doesn't have that limitation 

With the Shroud dissipating at the end, it's not there to hold her physical body. I agree with you that her regrowing a body isn't any different than Investiture healing, but I think it's fair to say she's not a Cognitive Shadow anymore and truly came back to life

We don't know enough about Cognitive Shadows to say whether a tether to the Physical Realm is always needed; Kelsier needs the spike because he doesn't have a Physical Aspect that he's Connected to, and The Oathpact doesn't necessarily bind the Heralds to their bodies, it just keeps them from passing onto the beyond. Isolating them in a gem separates them from the Oathpact, and so they move on, but that's all we know for now, we can't say whether or not the Oathpact is needed to keep them in their bodies once they form/enter one. The Returned are the way they are for a specific reason, how much of their nature is due to them being CS and how much of it is because of Endowment's design isn't known. They're all corner cases in their own right, so we can't assume that it is always needed. However, I do agree that as a general rule of thumb, it does seem that CS need a tether to allow them to exist in the Physical Realm, since they lose that Connection at death.

What I think is going on with Yumi is different. She's incredibly Invested, she doesn't need to rely on the Shroud to form a new body. If she wanted to, she can do that with her own Investiture. What she needed to form a body was Connection, and Painter provided that just by existing (she was already Connected to him) and amplifying it through Painting, which made that Connection stronger. Yumi then accepted his proposal of a new life, and manifested herself a body. It's like a mix between Stormlight healing and Shardblades; Just like Connection to a Radiant can be exploited to pull a Spren into the PR as a Shardblade (and Stormlight healing can convert Investiture directly into living body tissue), she used her Connection to the PR through Painter to manifest herself a body. She's basically a regular human now, just like all regular humans are technically CS' (but actually authentic souls instead of Inveted copies) attached to their physical bodies.

11 hours ago, Oltux72 said:

Sorry to be obnoxious, but let's be clear. If she is a Returned, then Hoid has just told somebody that there is a way to artificially create Returned with their full memories and without the need to consume Breaths. That is not a matter you can just shrug off.

She is (or used to be) a Cognitive Shadow, but she isn't a Returned, the same way Kelsier isn't a Returned. They're all Cognitive Shadows, and they can all be similarly Invested, but a Returned is different because they're made for a specific purpose, with specific abilities to facilitate that, with weaknesses to keep them in check. Hoid is telling someone how a Cognitive Shadow formed, which happens quite a lot. Returned are the odd ones out, every single other CS is the way you describe. Tossing the CA of someone after they die into a Perpendicularity is enough to achieve the same effect. Yumi, or Kelsier, the Heralds, Shades, Fused, or any other Cognitive Shadows that we know of, are exactly what you describe: Returned who have their memories and don;t need to consume Investiture. He isn't giving some super important trade secret away. Besides, he gives no specifics. Yumi was Invested, and Painter somehow brought her back. That's about it, and even if he outlined exactly how, it still doesn't matter, because it's not nearly as important or ground-breaking as you seem to be assuming. What Argenti meant was that they were something akin to the Returned: A CS in a human form that's the same as/mimicking their own, with similar levels of Investiture.

Apolgies if I get anything wrong, I just finished the book and it's late at night for me, so sorry in advance if I misundertood what was trying to be conveyed

[Werewolff Studios]

1 hour ago, StanLemon said:

Except the Shroud stops existing at the end of the book. It's like saying a Returned who has used their Divine Breath is still being kept alive by that Divine Breath that doesn't exist anymore. All Cognitive Shadows we know of need something to hold their physical bodies. There Heralds need the Oathpact, Kelsier needs his Spike, the Returned need Divine Breath. Yumi doesn't have that limitation 

With the Shroud dissipating at the end, it's not there to hold her physical body. I agree with you that her regrowing a body isn't any different than Investiture healing, but I think it's fair to say she's not a Cognitive Shadow anymore and truly came back to life

That would be correct, except the shroud doesn't dissipate in one single instant. As it's made up of semi-sentient Investiture, it lingers. And as Yumi, as a yoki-hijo, is one of only fourteen with an intact and highly Invested spiritweb, she would've lingered more than the others. That gave Nikaro time to Connect her Cognitive and Spiritual aspects back to the Physical Realm. 

After this act, I agree - functionally, she's no longer a Cognitive Shadow (or, at least, she'd be indistinguishable from a regular human, spare her highly Invested spiritweb). Her Cognitive, Spiritual and Physical forms are all in alignment, and her innate Investiture's no longer linked to the machine. Realmatically/ arcanically, she may still be considered a Shadow in Physical form, but for the sake of narrative, she's not anymore.

[Stigmadiabolicum]

On 7/3/2023 at 11:29 AM, ftl said:

...we still don't know why exactly Endowment takes the memories of the Returned, but as far as I can tell it's not that becoming a cognitive shadow stapled back into a body inherently removes memories, it's that Endowment is specifically choosing to remove the memories of the cognitive shadows she creates with divine breaths, for some as-of-yet unknown reason.

Well Vasher theorizes she takes their memories because as cognitive shadows, they can philosophically be seen as a new person, a copy, not the original and should form new memories (personally i think it's just the same as a Trek transporter, or Stargate, its still the same person but thats not something BS will ever clarify, and hed likely believe their soul goes to the beyond)

The other possibility is it makes Returned take a lot longer to degrade, we know CS like heralds and fused slowly just become spren like and lose their mind, partially because the immortality and their status as CS, but that's the reason why Hoid stores memories in breath to stay sane. (Worldhoppers dont age the same, but most all weve seen haven't gone mad over centuries, but their quasi immortality hasnt been elaborated, if its a cheat method like rashek or just relativity, the daughter from elantris popping up in TLM as codenames is the only one weve seen age, but likely before they became a WH)

 

The thing with Endowment is shes always the exception not the rule haha, she hacks the system, none of the rules apply and her investiture is less "sticky" than other methods, tied to her shard. Returned can gallivant around the cosmere without being tethered like Kel or the Heralds.

[Uncle Karlos]

On 7/3/2023 at 7:12 PM, Werewolff Studios said:

That would be correct, except the shroud doesn't dissipate in one single instant. As it's made up of semi-sentient Investiture, it lingers. And as Yumi, as a yoki-hijo, is one of only fourteen with an intact and highly Invested spiritweb, she would've lingered more than the others. That gave Nikaro time to Connect her Cognitive and Spiritual aspects back to the Physical Realm. 

After this act, I agree - functionally, she's no longer a Cognitive Shadow (or, at least, she'd be indistinguishable from a regular human, spare her highly Invested spiritweb). Her Cognitive, Spiritual and Physical forms are all in alignment, and her innate Investiture's no longer linked to the machine. Realmatically/ arcanically, she may still be considered a Shadow in Physical form, but for the sake of narrative, she's not anymore.

Piggybacking on this, I got the impression that the shroud was just raw investiture (the remnants of the original people) that the machine was using to repair itself. There’s a quote when Father Machine dies that references most of its physical body was at that point made of the shroud, and those pieces deteriorated/evaporated once it turned off. We also had Design directly state that matter, investiture and energy are ultimately the same and can convert between phases. We also know that as a highly invested entity, Yumi has the direct ability to control and manipulate the shroud, as well as feed off/absorb it (Design says it, and she does it at the end with the scholars).

As mentioned above, the shroud itself dissipated over a short time, not instantly. I got the impression that Painter and his art called to Yumi’s cognitive shadow/spiritweb, and served as an anchor. Then Yumi’s inherent power allowed her to control the remaining shroud in the area (aka raw investiture) and create a physical body linking her cognitive and spiritual aspects from the raw investiture (which we know she can control), so she is anchored to all three realms.

I don’t have an answer to why, if she’s made of shroud, she didn’t dissipate with the rest, but it is implied that her control of the shroud is even greater than Father Machine’s. Maybe her willpower is enough to retain the shroud/investiture that makes up her new body. 

[Werewolff Studios]

6 hours ago, Uncle Karlos said:

I don’t have an answer to why, if she’s made of shroud, she didn’t dissipate with the rest, but it is implied that her control of the shroud is even greater than Father Machine’s. Maybe her willpower is enough to retain the shroud/investiture that makes up her new body. 

I believe it has to do with both Nikaro and Yumi's Connection and the nature of Intent and Command. 

We can see this in the text itself. Before Nikaro called out to her (end of Chapter 41) she was content to fade away. "Because this is what I have to do" and "I was created to serve, she said. My life is not my own." Her Intent was not to stay, so she began to dissipate. 

Nikaro wouldn't let that be though, and so he painted with Intent (line in the book). The text even states how he began to paint with the wisps of shroud left around him - ie, using Intent to manipulate Investiture, similar to Navani and Rabonial making Warlight in Rhythm of War.

When he re-established the Connection to Yumi's lingering Cognitive aspect and Spiritweb, he asked her; no, convinced her to stay. For this, for him and her friends, she changed her Intent and pulled the shroud together with a Command. The Command itself, I feel, is this line;

"Our world, Our rules. I deserve to choose. I deserve love."

A Command, made with Intent, to use Investiture to heal and restore her physical body. Similar to Radiant Healing .

And, as the last line of that chapter says, she was "As real as anyone else. Because she wanted to be." 

So yes, I feel it was her willpower/ her Intent, that was enough to keep it all going.  

[Firesong]

I h

On 7/6/2023 at 10:38 AM, Uncle Karlos said:

Piggybacking on this, I got the impression that the shroud was just raw investiture (the remnants of the original people) that the machine was using to repair itself. There’s a quote when Father Machine dies that references most of its physical body was at that point made of the shroud, and those pieces deteriorated/evaporated once it turned off. We also had Design directly state that matter, investiture and energy are ultimately the same and can convert between phases. We also know that as a highly invested entity, Yumi has the direct ability to control and manipulate the shroud, as well as feed off/absorb it (Design says it, and she does it at the end with the scholars).

As mentioned above, the shroud itself dissipated over a short time, not instantly. I got the impression that Painter and his art called to Yumi’s cognitive shadow/spiritweb, and served as an anchor. Then Yumi’s inherent power allowed her to control the remaining shroud in the area (aka raw investiture) and create a physical body linking her cognitive and spiritual aspects from the raw investiture (which we know she can control), so she is anchored to all three realms.

I don’t have an answer to why, if she’s made of shroud, she didn’t dissipate with the rest, but it is implied that her control of the shroud is even greater than Father Machine’s. Maybe her willpower is enough to retain the shroud/investiture that makes up her new body. 

I have a solid theory on it right here. Going into theorizing over the Cosmere mechanics that brought this forth. 

 

[Cocoa]

On 7/2/2023 at 0:39 PM, Argenti said:

Yumi has been a cognitive shadow for a long while. Painter didn't reincarnate her, he just gave her loose investure shape, form, and connection. Since she has a lot of investure, the bond Painter formed between the 3 realms basically manifested her body into a physical one.

Ado only knows if she can still call spirits. Probably not though since they love TV now.

Those darn modern hijo, always glued to their screens. No appreciation for a good old-fashioned stack of rocks, I tell ya.

[Lightspine]

Jumping in maybe a little late in this discussion, but here's my take on it: Yumi is basically the same as those people from Torio that Painter painted out of the stable nightmares during the attack, except that she has enough Investiture to choose not to dissipate with the rest of the shroud.

To elaborate just a bit more: as Design says, raw investiture is given form by human perception, which is why Painter is able to force them into the shapes he draws. Painter used this method to give the investiture that is Yumi's cognitive shadow a shape, which she then maintains with her own will. Importantly, I don't think she needed a physical body to get "stapled" to like we've seen for other cognitive shadows (Kelsier, Fused) because her cognitive shadow or some part of its investiture somehow already existed in the Physical Realm, unlike those examples.

Edited July 15, 2023 by Lightspine

[Argenti]

2 hours ago, Cocoa said:

Those darn modern hijo, always glued to their screens. No appreciation for a good old-fashioned stack of rocks, I tell ya.

Why has no one else gave you rep!? Come on people this is what it's for!

[IndigoAjah]

On 06/07/2023 at 11:48 PM, Werewolff Studios said:

I believe it has to do with both Nikaro and Yumi's Connection and the nature of Intent and Command. 

We can see this in the text itself. Before Nikaro called out to her (end of Chapter 41) she was content to fade away. "Because this is what I have to do" and "I was created to serve, she said. My life is not my own." Her Intent was not to stay, so she began to dissipate. 

Nikaro wouldn't let that be though, and so he painted with Intent (line in the book). The text even states how he began to paint with the wisps of shroud left around him - ie, using Intent to manipulate Investiture, similar to Navani and Rabonial making Warlight in Rhythm of War.

When he re-established the Connection to Yumi's lingering Cognitive aspect and Spiritweb, he asked her; no, convinced her to stay. For this, for him and her friends, she changed her Intent and pulled the shroud together with a Command. The Command itself, I feel, is this line;

"Our world, Our rules. I deserve to choose. I deserve love."

A Command, made with Intent, to use Investiture to heal and restore her physical body. Similar to Radiant Healing .

And, as the last line of that chapter says, she was "As real as anyone else. Because she wanted to be." 

So yes, I feel it was her willpower/ her Intent, that was enough to keep it all going.  

I kind of agree 

 

Also I think it answers part of the "Cognitive Shadow anchor" problem. I'm not sure that Yumi is a Cognitive Shadow in the simple term (I think she's something unique) but we've seen CS use a non-physical bond to tether them - the Oathpact. 

 

Yumi ALREADY has some such an anchor, one she has explicitly used as an anchor already - her Connection to Painter. That may have been (though who knows if fully?) cut by the machine but it's explicitly reformed after that, seen in how the two can mentally communicate.

Why would she need any other anchor?