Spiking Spikes (but Better)

[Trusk'our]

We know that it's possible to spike basically anything that has a functional Spiritweb, including Spren and AI.

This got be thinking, can you spike a spike? More importantly, can you spike something into a spike?

Here's the idea; you take a non-Invested spike that is going to be used for Hemalurgy and you hollow out a portion on the back and fill it with some rubber or another fleshy material. You then charge the spike and implant it into the Hemalurgist you wish to.

Then you take another, smaller spike and charge it with a different donor and implant the smaller spike into the rubber section of the larger spike imbedded into the Hemalurgist.

This method means that you get to add more Investiture to your spike without needing to Blank Identity (probably), plus you can swap the small spike out as you please for other spike without causing the Hemalurgist any damage- the spike with a rubber section is effectively a USB port into your Spiritweb.

I believe that there is an argument against this, saying that even if you could staple a spike into a spike that it would essentially just be adding to the total charge, but we see that Metalborn powers granted by Hemalurgy don't get passed on genetically and Koloss children don't receive all of their parent's altered genes. This means that a Hemalurgical graft must somehow be considered distinct from the rest of the Hemalurgist's Spiritweb.

Additionally, there is already precedent for a "middleman" when granting powers between Spiritwebs, as we see with the Aviar/worm/human Bonds and the Spren/Radiant/Squire Bonds (though admittedly Hemalurgy doesn't seem to work through Bonds per se.). I believe this points to the possibility of such a situation being possible according to Cosmere mechanics.

Plus, even if you did add on a spike to your own spike, I don't think that it would cause extra damage to your own Spiritweb, increasing your vulnerability to the Flaw; emergent properties of the Spiritweb such as Savantism and Resonances don't seem to be carried over by Hemalurgy, as those seem to be created by an interaction between the Spiritweb as a whole and the sections of the Spiritweb that can be taken by the spikes. As such, even if you completely maimed the Spiritweb of the primary Hemalurgic spike by stappling one or more spikes into it, that damage should not transfer over to the Hemalurgist themselves, as it is a separate piece of Spiritweb.

[JustQuestin2004]

Spike-Ception is what I'd call this.

The main problem is that Hemalurgy requires that a Spike comes into contact with blood, hence the name. Or at least an equivalent with Spren.

Let's not forget that you can't just spike anything that has a soul, you can't spike plants even though they have souls (Says so on the coppermind). It all depends on sentience I believe. You can't spike something that doesn't have a minimal level of sentience. And Spikes aren't what I'd call sentient. I'd say they're about as sentient as a transplanted organ.

So while an interesting idea, I'd have to disagree on it.

[Ookla of Void]

5 hours ago, JustQuestin2004 said:

And Spikes aren't what I'd call sentient

What if you Awaken them in a way similar to Nightblood?

Edited November 16 by Xiahida
spelling

[alder24]

7 hours ago, Trusk'our said:

This got be thinking, can you spike a spike? More importantly, can you spike something into a spike?

Here's the idea; you take a non-Invested spike that is going to be used for Hemalurgy and you hollow out a portion on the back and fill it with some rubber or another fleshy material. You then charge the spike and implant it into the Hemalurgist you wish to.

Then you take another, smaller spike and charge it with a different donor and implant the smaller spike into the rubber section of the larger spike imbedded into the Hemalurgist

No. The "rubber" section isn't metal, it isn't the part of the spike, doesn't hold any hemalurgic charge nor investiture, it isn't a viable hemalurgic target.

I was expecting you to ask if you heat up a spike to the point of almost melting and then push another solid spike through it, would it count as Hemalurgy? Maybe? No idea tbf. It depends how much "alive" the spike is. But then every creature has different binding points, it's not as easy as just pushing a spike through something, you still have to find proper binding points and that would be really hard in a non-human thing, as you can't miss even by a millimeter.

7 hours ago, Trusk'our said:

This method means that you get to add more Investiture to your spike without needing to Blank Identity (probably), plus you can swap the small spike out as you please for other spike without causing the Hemalurgist any damage- the spike with a rubber section is effectively a USB port into your Spiritweb.

No. even if that would work, it would be the spike that would gain the ability, not you. It would be like a spren being able to change its appearance, or fly around, or use Surges on their own, on which their knight has no influence.

Edited November 16 by alder24

[Trusk'our]

20 minutes ago, Xiahida said:

What if you Awaken them in a way similar to Nightblood?

You can Hemalurgically spikes animals but not plants, so I think that @JustQuestin2004 is probably right that you'd need to increase the complexity of the primary spike for it to be a viable target for Hemalurgy, but if it has a Spiritweb it should be fair game.

6 hours ago, JustQuestin2004 said:

The main problem is that Hemalurgy requires that a Spike comes into contact with blood, hence the name. Or at least an equivalent with Spren.

True. I think that the rubber section on the spike would play that roll though. Spren don't have blood after all, yet they can be spiked.

1 minute ago, alder24 said:

No. The "rubber" section isn't metal, it isn't the part of the spike, doesn't hold any hemalurgic charge nor investiture, it isn't a viable hemalurgic target.

Not even if it's accepted as a part of the whole, cognitively speaking?

1 minute ago, alder24 said:

I was expecting you to ask if you heat up a spike to the point of almost melting and then push another solid spike through it, would it count as Hemalurgy? Maybe? No idea tbf. 

Yeah, I didn't think about that until after I made the post, but that was going to be question #2. After all, Metalminds retain their charge after being melted or even dissolved via electrolysis, so Hemalurgic spikes should retain their charge after being melted or at least softened by heat.

4 minutes ago, alder24 said:

But then every creature has different binding points, it's not as easy as just pushing a spike through something, you still have to find proper binding points and that would be really hard in a non-human thing, as you can't miss even by a millimeter.

That's true. It would definitely take some experimentation to find the correct Bindpoint and potentially some Fortune or SR shenanigans.

6 minutes ago, alder24 said:

No. even if that would work, it would be the spike that would gain the ability, not you. It would be like a spren being able to change its appearance fly around, on which their knight has no influence.

Alright, but could there be other benefits to altering/augmenting the Spiritweb of a spike embedded in your body? It's hard for me to imagine that directly linking another source of power to something that is linked to your Spiritweb would have no beneficial effect.

[alder24]

16 minutes ago, Trusk'our said:

Not even if it's accepted as a part of the whole, cognitively speaking?

No, it isn't metal, it won't hold any Hemalurgic charge, it isn't  a Hemalurgic spike. 

17 minutes ago, Trusk'our said:

Alright, but could there be other benefits to altering/augmenting the Spiritweb of a spike embedded in your body? It's hard for me to imagine that directly linking another source of power to something that is linked to your Spiritweb would have no beneficial effect.

There might be something you would get from it (it's still more investiture), but I doubt you would get the second power. If that would work, you would need to make the spike sentient so it could give you the second power, otherwise it would be dormant in the spike as the spike can't even use it itself. Just like spren gives you the power of Surgebinding and can cut you off (like Syl did to Kal in WoR), or like if you give an animal a power through a spike, it won't be able to use it, as it isn't intelligent and sentient enough to do it.

Spoiler

Questioner

Is a chull able to receive some form of Investiture? ...I'm thinking of Scadrial... Would it have the presence of mind to be able to use the abilities?

Brandon Sanderson

Not as it is right now. But you can see in the way that Ryshadium are working that we have animals that are reaching beyond-animal intelligence. Aviar are the same way. And it is possible to assume that you could get to the point where you could use such powers. But none of them are there yet. But the Aviar kind of use their powers, so I guess some of them are. So, yes, I will say that's possible.

Skyward Seattle signing (Nov. 10, 2018)

 

[Quantus]

I think to make a Spike, or really anything including the AI example, viable for Hemalurgy would require a fully Awake target, something that is either naturally or artificially sapient.  On the other hand WoB says you can make a viable Spike from a Forges Spiritweb, so some interaction with other magics does work. 

I suspect you could subdivide a Spike, though, using a living person.  For example, I think it could be possible that you steal "Full Mistborn" with a Duralumin Spike (stealing/Spiking  the Connection to Preservation) and then use that person to Charge individual Spikes of Steel, Bronze, Cadmium, or Electrum with each of the individual Powers.