Zahel: short of breath. Or Breath.

[Nitpicking]

So, with the Highstorm and Stormlight over ... what is Vasher/Zahel going to eat to avoid consuming his Breath? Can he consume Towerlight? Can Lift learn to feed him Lifelight?

[logicless.bt]

34 minutes ago, Nitpicking said:

So, with the Highstorm and Stormlight over ... what is Vasher/Zahel going to eat to avoid consuming his Breath? Can he consume Towerlight? Can Lift learn to feed him Lifelight?

He's still got infinite Towerlight! So he's pretty much set for the near future.

Retribution is unlikely to give him Warlight, so he's reliant on theft or anonymity if he ever tries to leave the tower. Lift CAN feed him lifelight by infusing spheres with it, but it seems a bit impractical.

Also, he just needs to eat one breath a week. Given that he has so many, he'd likely be fine for several years at least even if the Tower failed.

[teknopathetic he/him]

Are we sure Towerlight is as plentiful as before? The Tower is on, but can people get the light out easily still? I could see a situation where The Tower is running on low power mode either because the barrier is taking up a lot of energy or because the changes to the world have weakened The Sibling. 

If not, he may be able to use the Lifelight that Lift can produce. We know that there is a way to move it out of Lift and into gemstones. 

Edited December 17, 2024 by teknopathetic

[Nitpicking]

5 hours ago, logicless.bt said:

He's still got infinite Towerlight! So he's pretty much set for the near future.

Like I wrote, it isn't clear whether he can eat Towerlight. It apparently took him quite a while to learn to eat Stormlight. I think the narrative says it's possible, but I have to wonder if the Tower can recharge gemstones while the Sibling is in suspended animation.

I was thinking he could steal Warlight. He's Vasher.

[The Sovereign]

I suspect that Vasher can feed off any Unkeyed Investiture (in addition to any keyed to Endowment). Given that he was making Antivoidlight and was presumably unkeying Stormlight to feed on before, I'd say it is reasonable that he would be able to unkey and feed off of Towerlight and/or Warlight provided that he has access to it.

[alder24]

15 hours ago, teknopathetic said:

Are we sure Towerlight is as plentiful as before? The Tower is on, but can people get the light out easily still? I could see a situation where The Tower is running on low power mode either because the barrier is taking up a lot of energy or because the changes to the world have weakened The Sibling. 

If not, he may be able to use the Lifelight that Lift can produce. We know that there is a way to move it out of Lift and into gemstones. 

Towerlight is still available even in the Shadesmare side of Urithiru. WaT ch 147:

Quote

It took an embarrassingly long time for her to recover. Fortunately, the part of her that was Radiant was able to assess the situation. There was food and water here, transported from offworld—and regular shipping lanes were planned to Urithiru, where Towerlight would also allow manifesting and the creation of food and water for humans.

 

13 hours ago, Nitpicking said:

Like I wrote, it isn't clear whether he can eat Towerlight. It apparently took him quite a while to learn to eat Stormlight. I think the narrative says it's possible, but I have to wonder if the Tower can recharge gemstones while the Sibling is in suspended animation.

I was thinking he could steal Warlight. He's Vasher.

If he can use Stormlight, he can use any light - it's the same method. As a Returned, he can feed on any available investiture. 

Spoiler

Ilkhan2016

Breath and Stormlight are both forms of Investiture. AFAIK you can power any of the magic systems from any form of Investiture. Zahel is on Roshar, I believe, primarily due to how easy Investiture (Stormlight) is to come across.

AFAIK the form of Investiture doesn't change anything about the abilities. For example, Szeth was sucked out of Stormlight when he drew Nightblood; and Azure used Stormlight to Awaken in Shadesmar.

/u/mistborn is that right?

Brandon Sanderson

A lot of this depends on the Investiture and the magic in question. Azure was legit using Breaths, for example--ones she'd brought with her. But Szeth was able to feed Stormlight to Nightblood, much as Vasher uses Stormlight to keep himself alive.

To Awaken with Stormlight, the easiest thing to do would be to first change Stormlight into Breaths--something that Azure doesn't know how to do. (Admittedly, Hoid doesn't either, so it's not like it's a simple thing to achieve.) You could also theoretically use some magical (or mechanical) means to power your Awakening with a different form of Investiture.

Extesian

This is very interesting. Is it possible then in the Cosmere for the 'intent' (spin or however described) of Investiture to be changed? And I mean within reasonable limits (not the powers of six shards or any of that). Can a Shard effectively grow in power in a place (e.g. toward an avatar) through another Shard's Investiture being changed (not just corrupted)? Or is it just making one type ('intent' - you should canonize a word for this :D) of Investiture mimic the properties of another?

Brandon Sanderson

Most of the ways of accomplishing what you're talking about would involve either 1) fooling/overwriting your spiritual makeup somehow. (This is what Hemalurgy does, for example.) 2) Refining the power somehow into a more pure form.

But there are a lot of variables. The way magic from Nalthis works, for example, the system is just looking for any available Investiture to power itself--and so basically anything will do, regardless of the source. This includes consuming your own soul, in some cases...

You'll see terminology coming along eventually that facilitates talking about all of this. I'm not yet decided on some of it.

Celestial_Blu3

How many Breaths does [Azure] have by her final appearance in OB?

Brandon Sanderson

That's a RAFO, I'm afraid.

General Reddit 2019 (April 25, 2019)

 

Spoiler

Questioner

Is it possible to turn Breaths into... how does Awakening work on Roshar and Shadesmar?

Brandon Sanderson

You can still use it normally, as you would expect it, as the magic works. People are trying to figure out how to turn one type of Investiture into another, and it it is harder than it seems. They haven't cracked it yet.

Questioner

So they always have to bring their own form of Investiture?

Brandon Sanderson

A Returned can feed off of other Investiture, just like Nightblood can. One of the reasons to move to Roshar is: it's easier to get Stormlight than it is Breaths.

Questioner

That makes sense why Zahel, then.

Brandon Sanderson

That explains Zahel, right.

FanX 2021 (Sept. 18, 2021)

 

[SwordNimiForPresident the sword/that sword]

He also implied during the torture scene in the interludes that he had enough Breath to just wait for Axindweth to die of old age.