Edgedancer61 Posted August 12, 2024 Posted August 12, 2024 So I was reading Tress of the Emerald Sea, and I noticed that she used steel to make the spores grow away from it (pushing) and iron made the spores grow towards it (pulling). I also realized that in Oathbringer, Azure (Vivenna) lines a room with aluminum to stop the screamers from noticing them using investiture inside, while on Scadrial, Aluminum makes an allomancer lose all there metals. So I was wondering, what would these metals do on other worlds, and what would other metals do? A specific question I had was what would aluminum do on Nalthis? Could you just destroy someones breath by touching it with aliminum? I'm pretty sure none of this has been confirmed, but I would like to hear everyone's theories. PS. I have not read Elantris or Mistborn era 2 yet, so no spoilers pls. 2
StanLemon Posted August 12, 2024 Posted August 12, 2024 So metal has specific reactions to Investiture, this is most clearly seen in the epigraphs in RoW. They don't always line up 1 to 1 with the Allomantic effects. Aluminum doesn't really destroy Investiture but neutralizes it's effects. This is why it blocks other Investiture. It wouldn't destroy a Breath, but you may be able to contain a Breath with Aluminum. Brandon has confirmed that you could scoop up the Investiture from a Perpendicularity like the Well of Ascension in an Aluminum container for example 1
alder24 Posted August 12, 2024 Posted August 12, 2024 26 minutes ago, Edgedancer61 said: So I was reading Tress of the Emerald Sea, and I noticed that she used steel to make the spores grow away from it (pushing) and iron made the spores grow towards it (pulling). I also realized that in Oathbringer, Azure (Vivenna) lines a room with aluminum to stop the screamers from noticing them using investiture inside, while on Scadrial, Aluminum makes an allomancer lose all there metals. So I was wondering, what would these metals do on other worlds, and what would other metals do? A specific question I had was what would aluminum do on Nalthis? Could you just destroy someones breath by touching it with aliminum? I'm pretty sure none of this has been confirmed, but I would like to hear everyone's theories. PS. I have not read Elantris or Mistborn era 2 yet, so no spoilers pls. Metals in Cosmere have a spiritual component to them that predate the Shattering and Metallic Arts. This is what makes them react to investiture in a certain way. This is what Metallic Arts are "based" on. But this is not a one to one relationship. We don't know all of those properties, but we know almost half of them from Farbrials. Aluminum is a weird one. It's like an isolator. It can't be invested/Awakened, can't be cut by a Shardblade, can't be Forged and a box made out of aluminum seems to isolate Connection. However it doesn't destroy - investiture CAN'T be destroyed in Cosmere, it can only change forms, but aluminum doesn't do that. Silver also has some interesting properties, it seems to disrupt connections, but it doesn't block investiture like aluminum does. Spoiler Questioner Quick question on aluminum. Why does it affect other forms of Investiture? Brandon Sanderson When I was building the cosmere, I just had to build certain themes into it, and metal was one of those. And the metals have kind of a Spiritual integrity, and Spiritual component, that if I can get into Dragonsteel explaining why, you'll get your kind of origins. Questioner And that's why, in Warbreaker, metals are different with Awakening, and stuff. Brandon Sanderson And even in Roshar, the cages that you're building for fabrials, once you start to figure out how those metals affect it, you'll be like, "Oh wait, that makes sense!" And these are just across the cosmere. And if you want an in-world answer, it has to do with stuff in Dragonsteel. But really, the answer is, I was building this and I'm like, "I just want this to be a theme. So I'm just going to give this Spiritual component to metals." So it works in Mistborn, and it works all across everything. LTUE 2020 (Feb. 15, 2020) Spoiler Argent On Nalthis, can aluminum prevent somebody from Returning? So if you kill somebody with aluminum and leave the weapon in them? Brandon Sanderson I don't think that's going to be enough. I think that… Argent Different way then? Brandon Sanderson Yeah there are totally ways. I don’t think that that’s going to be enough. There's a difference between being inert and blocking Investiture, and actually sucking out Investiture. If you stuck Nightblood inside of a corpse; there are certain things… if you had a larkin or whatever sitting there that ingests the Investiture as it was coming in, that would prevent [Returning]. I think with aluminum you would just have somebody that comes alive with a wound, so maybe... But I think it would just heal around [the aluminum] and you'd just have a spike in you, kind of like Hemalurgy—but not like Hemalurgy. It's inert, but you know what I mean. Argent Which suggests you can't actually Awaken aluminum. Brandon Sanderson No. It's not going to hold a charge. Kurkistan I assume you can't Forge it, either. Brandon Sanderson No. In fact the unForgable metal- Argent Ralkalest? Brandon Sanderson There's an unForgeable metal mentioned. Kurkistan Could we call it aluminum if we wanted to? Brandon Sanderson Let's just say that aluminum through most cultures was considered a mythological metal, and when people could actually find some, they considered it more valuable than gold, in our culture. So just sayin'... Shadows of Self Chicago signing (Oct. 12, 2015) Spoiler Bridge4AM (paraphrased) What would happen if you tried to cut aluminum with a shardblade? Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased) A shardblade would not cut aluminum. Footnote: This contradicts a previous WoB where Brandon said shardblades could cut aluminum. This contradiction is addressed here. An Evening with Brandon Sanderson (Feb. 1, 2017) Spoiler OrangeJedi So, Kaladin obviously draws Stormlight from a pouch, all the time... If the pouch was coated in, say aluminum, would he still be able to draw the Stormlight? Brandon Sanderson No. Good question. OrangeJedi What about if it was coated in silver? Brandon Sanderson Yes, he probably still could. Oathbringer release party (Nov. 13, 2017) Spoiler Ace Heat Would it be possible to use an aluminum spike to permanently kill a spren? Brandon Sanderson No, that's not gonna work. Silver, on the other hand, there's some possibility. YouTube Spoiler Stream 4 (June 16, 2022) Spoiler Questioner Does silver break Connection or bonds? If silver does have this effect, does it get used in the creation of unkeyed metalminds? Brandon Sanderson These are good questions. Silver, as I have it right now, is not capable of that. What silver's doing is is disrupting. It's more like interference. You know how, in White Sand, people can have these columns of sand. If you swiped silver through that, they would fall; but then they would be able to do it again. It's this little nullification for a short time. It's very dangerous to things like shades, and stuff like that. It's more disruptive. If you hit a spren with this, it would be like hitting them with a Shardblade. They're gonna come back together. They're not dead; they're gonna reform eventually, and probably won't take too long. So it's not severing Connection; you're gonna need anti-Investiture to do really destructive stuff. But you can disrupt with some silver. It's specifically bad for Shades for reasons maybe I'll get into someday. Dragonsteel 2023 (Nov. 21, 2023) 3
Elite01 Posted August 12, 2024 Posted August 12, 2024 StanLemon mentioned it but you can see a lot of similarities in the metals used in Fabrials on Roshar to the metals used on Scadrial. If you are looking at threnody (from shadows and silence from the forest of Hell) And I think tress as well Spoiler Silver destroys shades and spores. So we can assume silver destroys investiture and aluminum blocks it. Makes me think silver could destroy other investiture like breaths. I would be interested to see what effect metals have on other forms of investiture such as shades, the hion on Komashi. With the hion specifically I think Painter said they can be cultivated and manipulated. I wouldn't be surprised if its with iron and steel tools. 1
Trusk'our he/him Posted August 12, 2024 Posted August 12, 2024 3 hours ago, Edgedancer61 said: So I was reading Tress of the Emerald Sea, and I noticed that she used steel to make the spores grow away from it (pushing) and iron made the spores grow towards it (pulling). I also realized that in Oathbringer, Azure (Vivenna) lines a room with aluminum to stop the screamers from noticing them using investiture inside, while on Scadrial, Aluminum makes an allomancer lose all there metals. So I was wondering, what would these metals do on other worlds, and what would other metals do? A specific question I had was what would aluminum do on Nalthis? Could you just destroy someones breath by touching it with aliminum? I'm pretty sure none of this has been confirmed, but I would like to hear everyone's theories. PS. I have not read Elantris or Mistborn era 2 yet, so no spoilers pls. Actually, I'm planning on making a longer post to explore a very similar topic. Perhaps some of what you're curious about will be there.
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