The kandra THEY don't want you to think about...!

[+robardin he/him]

The "beggar stolen off the street" who visited Edwarn in prison and exploded them both at the end of BoM, with softly glowing red eyes and a determined, purposeful stride, was described as a "Faceless Immortal".

I took that to mean, just as they had spikes of trellium (bavadinium?) that could function as hemalurgic spikes "with a twist", the Set must have had trellium spikes that could be used as kandra Blessings. And had done so, multiple times ("the Set had Faceless Immortals of their own", plural).

Spikes used on mistwraiths, I suppose? If any kandra other than Paalm had "gone rogue" and turned from Harmony, surely we'd have learned about that in TLM, right?

In which case, even as Trell/Autonomy departed from Scadrial at the end of TLM ("for now"), those spikes and any remaining red-eyed kandra would still be there, left behind. And we already know that kandra are able to leave Scadrial, as MeLaan has done.

So... Just remember... The "suspected kandra" you see out there in various Cosmere stories, could be one of Autonomy's!

[+Lewis Nethur He/Him]

I dunno why autonomy gets such a bad rep. She just wants people to be totally free, her angels ought to be the absolute best one's...

[alder24]

1 hour ago, robardin said:

The "beggar stolen off the street" who visited Edwarn in prison and exploded them both at the end of BoM, with softly glowing red eyes and a determined, purposeful stride, was described as a "Faceless Immortal".

I took that to mean, just as they had spikes of trellium (bavadinium?) that could function as hemalurgic spikes "with a twist", the Set must have had trellium spikes that could be used as kandra Blessings. And had done so, multiple times ("the Set had Faceless Immortals of their own", plural).

Spikes used on mistwraiths, I suppose? If any kandra other than Paalm had "gone rogue" and turned from Harmony, surely we'd have learned about that in TLM, right?

In which case, even as Trell/Autonomy departed from Scadrial at the end of TLM ("for now"), those spikes and any remaining red-eyed kandra would still be there, left behind. And we already know that kandra are able to leave Scadrial, as MeLaan has done.

So... Just remember... The "suspected kandra" you see out there in various Cosmere stories, could be one of Autonomy's!

I don't think those are Kandra. Paalm was the only one to betray Harmony and that's known because of the binding contract that Connects them all. If any other Kandra had done what Paalm did, Harmony would have been aware of this. Moreover, Paalm was forced to wear only one Trellium spike at a time and yet Harmony could still catch glimpses of her - two spikes, even made out of Trellium, would have opened her to Harmony's direct action. This means those immortals can't be Kandra.

I doubt those were Mistwraiths because you still need two spikes to create them and that would expose them to Harmony. 

I think they aren't from Scadrial, they came off-world. Some kind of invested shapeshifters created via one of Autonomy's invested art from another world, who serve her goals. And it's supported by the fact that shapeshifting is fairly common throughout Cosmere:

Spoiler

Questioner

Axies the Collector, is he a kandra-like species? Are they common throughout the whole cosmere?

Brandon Sanderson

So, the Aimians reside on Roshar right now. They are... I would not say kandra-like, in that the other species of Aimian has more kandra-like qualities. There's two that used to live there, before it was Scoured. But they are a different species; they are not human.

Questioner

*inaudible*

Brandon Sanderson

Shapeshifters, there are multiple types of shapeshifters, but... even, you would call the Royal Locks a type of shapeshifting. So, shapeshifting is a common thing in the cosmere. Having the ability... Once you know how the magic works, you will see why. So, there are other, kind of, species of shapeshifter.

Arcanum Unbounded release party (Nov. 22, 2016)

 

[+robardin he/him]

4 hours ago, alder24 said:

I don't think those are Kandra. Paalm was the only one to betray Harmony and that's known because of the binding contract that Connects them all. If any other Kandra had done what Paalm did, Harmony would have been aware of this. Moreover, Paalm was forced to wear only one Trellium spike at a time and yet Harmony could still catch glimpses of her - two spikes, even made out of Trellium, would have opened her to Harmony's direct action. This means those immortals can't be Kandra.

I doubt those were Mistwraiths because you still need two spikes to create them and that would expose them to Harmony. 

I think they aren't from Scadrial, they came off-world. Some kind of invested shapeshifters created via one of Autonomy's invested art from another world, who serve her goals. And it's supported by the fact that shapeshifting is fairly common throughout Cosmere:

  Hide contents

Questioner

Axies the Collector, is he a kandra-like species? Are they common throughout the whole cosmere?

Brandon Sanderson

So, the Aimians reside on Roshar right now. They are... I would not say kandra-like, in that the other species of Aimian has more kandra-like qualities. There's two that used to live there, before it was Scoured. But they are a different species; they are not human.

Questioner

*inaudible*

Brandon Sanderson

Shapeshifters, there are multiple types of shapeshifters, but... even, you would call the Royal Locks a type of shapeshifting. So, shapeshifting is a common thing in the cosmere. Having the ability... Once you know how the magic works, you will see why. So, there are other, kind of, species of shapeshifter.

Arcanum Unbounded release party (Nov. 22, 2016)

 

I think the specific “Faceless Immortal” form of shapeshifting, one that requires “stealing a beggar off the street” for a body (obviously not bound by any Contract forbidding the killing of humans), strongly suggests they are much more kandra-like.

Not ACTUAL kandra who turned, like Paalm - hence my thinking they were mistwraiths made sentient using trellium spikes for Blessings, which we’d already seen Paalm doing.

And the Set seems to always have been “representing” Autonomy with their local Scadrian magic/tech. They explored deeply of hemalurgy and the Metallic Arts, aggressively researched stole Southern tech as soon as they could, and pushed the “steam age” tech of Era 2 Scadrial in the direction that Autonomy probably suggested was possible, even as Harmony had hinted (projecting pictures and sound - no moving pictures yet, though).

But other than somehow being given trellium as a godmetal, we see no evidence that they ever were provided with off-world technology or magic, unlike the Ghostbloods.

It was their way of “proving themselves” to Autonomy, with a competition to select one of their leaders to become an avatar on Scadrial.

And just as whatever trelium was transmitted to Scadrial remained there as a stockpile, so too whatever “Faceless Immortals of the Set” must also ahve done, whether you agree that was trellium spiked mistwraiths or not.

[alder24]

8 hours ago, robardin said:

I think the specific “Faceless Immortal” form of shapeshifting, one that requires “stealing a beggar off the street” for a body (obviously not bound by any Contract forbidding the killing of humans), strongly suggests they are much more kandra-like.

Well, that's the very same thing Fused are doing. Maybe Fused don't shapeshift a lot, but they do steal bodies of people they inhabit. And I think that's more similar to what is happening with Trell's faceless immortals. I reason this because the Suit was "allowed to serve in another Realm.” We don't know what it meant, but becoming some sort of Cognitive Shadow that can possess other people's bodies sounds like a plausible faceless immortal candidate for me. 

8 hours ago, robardin said:

Not ACTUAL kandra who turned, like Paalm - hence my thinking they were mistwraiths made sentient using trellium spikes for Blessings, which we’d already seen Paalm doing.

Except for needing two spikes to gain sentience, a newly formed Kandra also needs to spend years, or even decades to develop skills necessary to properly form human body parts. It's a long and complicated process. Moreover, the explosion that killed the Suit in BoM epilogue would have also killed that faceless immortal, which sounds like a big waste if it was a mistwraith. And one or two Trellium spikes would have been found in the rubble, yet there was no mention of this anywhere and because of its significance I doubt Wax would have just omitted this, so I think they aren't mistwraiths with Trellium spikes. 

Spoiler

Oudeis16

TenSoon comments that when the unbirthed are given Blessings, they lose the mimickry instinct that mistwraiths have and have to be taught anew. If their only native senses are touch and taste, how exactly do you teach a blob of muscles how to form things like eyes and ears?

Brandon Sanderson

Basically, you feed it some partially digested eyes, then some more eyes, then eventually it starts making eyes on its own. It takes a while; Kandra 'children' grow more slowly than human ones.

[...]

/r/books AMA 2015 (July 16, 2015)

It's still possible though. Paalm created a new Trellium Blessing and a new Hemalurgic construct. It's possible she created a new type of Kandra, or at least inspired the Set to make them. However those faceless immortals aren't Set's servants (which they most likely would be if made by the Set), they are above and outside the Set's hierarchy - they are directly under Autonomy control. I just find it less likely than some other options (but still very probable). 

And if they are Kandra, they are doing a really bad job at it - they can be easily recognized by the way they walk, not to mention those glowing red eyes. It's hard to miss them. BoM epilogue:

Quote

You could tell them by the way they walked. Never a stroll, never leisurely. Always fast, determined. Purposeful.
Of course, the softly glowing red eyes were another sign

So this:

14 hours ago, robardin said:

So... Just remember... The "suspected kandra" you see out there in various Cosmere stories, could be one of Autonomy's!

isn't a problem for us  

 

8 hours ago, robardin said:

But other than somehow being given trellium as a godmetal, we see no evidence that they ever were provided with off-world technology or magic, unlike the Ghostbloods.

Rocket technology was given to them by Autonomy - she directly ordered the Set to figure out ballistics. I wouldn't be surprised if radio, film and other technology we saw the Set had was also given to them by Autonomy, or at least was hinted to them. Autonomy has a history of directly contributing to the technological progress of her people and it makes sense that she would do it with the Set because of how important it was to claim this world for her. TLM ch 66:

Quote

“The rockets never worked,” he muttered. “Not well enough.”
“Autonomy wanted to figure them out,” Telsin said. “Turns out advanced ballistics and self-propelled rocketry proved a little beyond our grasp. Curiously, with this power I can … see hints of what is to come. But the mechanisms? Well, that takes experimentation, learning, iteration…”

 

[+robardin he/him]

Right, Autonomy gave "hints of what is to come" but not the mechanisms, i.e., not technical explanations, blueprints, etc. Same thing as Harmony dropping a hint that "if you think a projected evanotype is awesome, wait until they start moving".

Just knowing something is possible, and a few steps beyond what you've already got, is a big propulsion, but not the same as full-on giving the tech to them.

And other than providing her own godmetal, she didn't give or send them any off-world resources the way the Ghostbloods have with their imported jars of Dor, presumably Breath, what seem like maybe Skybreakers, and so on. Her MO is to reward initiative, and while one of the reasons Moonlight hates Autonomy is the hypocrisy of calling "going where you pointed" as "initiative", Telsin did explain that Autonomy was basically testing the Set at the same time as using them to take over Scadrial, to see if they'd be worthy of it.

As such, the Set were supposed to use Scadrian resources and knowledge, to build off of their existing understanding to reach her goals. Sending off-world "shapeshifter equivalents", even if they were much more like kandra than the abilities of Dysian Aimians to simulate or a Returned to change human appearance, would be "going too far".

That's why I think Edwarn's visitor was a kind of "trellium kandra" (t-kandra). They clearly knew about giving the right kind of spikes to mistwraiths to bring them to sentience -- it's in the Words of Founding, and they knew to remove the spikes from ReLuur and MeLaan. And we saw their monstrous trellium hemalurgic "experiments" when TenSoon first goes with Wax in SoS -- perhaps those were part of them figuring out how to create t-kandra.

And just as "normal" kandra have a direct comlink to Harmony, so did the t-kandra to Autonomy, as it's clear that the ragged visitor spoke with the full authority of Trell.

As for the tell of the softly glowing red eyes, either a t-kandra can ordinarily hide them (because, you know, kandra) but was intentionally giving the signal to Edwarn since it was just the two of them there (my theory), or they just go around wearing sunglasses or contact lenses if they have to? LOL

Good point to remind us all that Edwarn was promised that he'd be "allowed to serve in another Realm". So yeah. An Autonomy version of the Fused? Because he sure didn't Return!

Edited September 19, 2024 by robardin