Will It Hemalurgy?

[SpartanBrigade He/Him]

So in WaT Moash gets an upgrade thanks to Odium. His sight is restored through crystalline spikes but what exactly happened? It seems to work the same as Scadrian Hemalurgy but it uses crystals and not metal. What is this? Is it the same but with a different material? Is this a Yolish Lightweaving situation where it's the same general mechanics but also different? What's going on here?

[Trusk'our he/him]

1 hour ago, SpartanBrigade said:

Is this a Yolish Lightweaving situation where it's the same general mechanics but also different?

Yes, it is still Hemalurgy, but seems to be using a more primal iteration than found on Scadrial. Spiritweb transformation via Investiture being spliced in the Physical Realm. 

1 hour ago, SpartanBrigade said:

So in WaT Moash gets an upgrade thanks to Odium. His sight is restored through crystalline spikes but what exactly happened? It seems to work the same as Scadrian Hemalurgy but it uses crystals and not metal. What is this? Is it the same but with a different material?

We don't know much of what's going on with it right now, but I'm guessing Moash's spikes contain a type of Voidspren (either captured through standard means or pinned like the Spren Szeth found in Ishar's cave) that are then grafted to his Spiritweb. 

Basically, replacing human Spiritweb donors with captured Spren.

But again, that's just a guess. We really aren't sure yet on what's truly going on there.

[SpartanBrigade He/Him]

9 minutes ago, Trusk'our said:

Yes, it is still Hemalurgy, but seems to be using a more primal iteration than found on Scadrial. Spiritweb transformation via Investiture being spliced in the Physical Realm. 

We don't know much of what's going on with it right now, but I'm guessing Moash's spikes contain a type of Voidspren (either captured through standard means or pinned like the Spren Szeth found in Ishar's cave) that are then grafted to his Spiritweb. 

Basically, replacing human Spiritweb donors with captured Spren.

But again, that's just a guess. We really aren't sure yet on what's truly going on there.

Ah good to know thank you! What leads to to believe they're voidspren?

[Trusk'our he/him]

33 minutes ago, SpartanBrigade said:

Ah good to know thank you! What leads to to believe they're voidspren?

The color of the gemstones was that of Voidlight and Secretspren are a type of Voidspren that can detect kinetic Investiture.

Extending that function to a person so they can see innert Investiture seemed most likely to me, perhaps like how Steelsight in Inquisitors is similar but not quite identical to standard Steel/Iron sight (though I'm also assuming Inquisitors use Allomantic iron or steel for eye spikes and not another physical Allomantic power).

[LuckyJim]

I strongly disagree with the idea that it's hemalurgy. Hemalurgy is specifically Ruin's investiture. I think it uses the same principles of channeling Investiture into bind points, but we currently don't know if it has the same elements of stealing abilities, power decay or the significance of blood that would make it hemalurgy.

[Trusk'our he/him]

21 minutes ago, LuckyJim said:

I strongly disagree with the idea that it's hemalurgy. Hemalurgy is specifically Ruin's investiture. I think it uses the same principles of channeling Investiture into bind points, but we currently don't know if it has the same elements of stealing abilities, power decay or the significance of blood that would make it hemalurgy.

I believe that Moash's crystal eye spikes are a manifestation of Hemalurgy in the same way that there are Lightweaving magics separate from Surgebinding or Awakened objects Invested without a hint of Endowment's Breath.

Spoiler

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/518-shardcast-interview/#e16167

Comatose

Kind of a similar question about the Midnight Essence, now that we have seen that crop up in Tress as well as in Stormlight Archive. Is something similar happening with the Midnight Essence? We have also the nightmares, in Yumi, that appear similar, they're also mimicking things.

Brandon Sanderson

So, there's a couple of things getting interwoven here. The actual idea of Midnight Essence is a concept like Lightweaving that predates the Shattering of Adonalsium, that various magic systems are basically "borrowing" a law of the cosmere and creating a parallel effect from the same basis, if that makes any sense.

Yumi is a little distinct from that. It's feeling similar; I would not call it true Midnight Essence. It's an awful lot more like a Lightweaving that has--because Lightweavings can have mass to them, because investiture can have mass to it--so you're looking a little bit more like... imagine a bunch of Stormlight becoming tangible, you can touch it, because of a powerful Lightweaving or something like that. Of course, these things all bleed together because I'm using the same fundamental principles to make them. But, for me, Midnight Essence has this personality that comes prefixed. What the Midnight Mother is making, what you're seeing in the Midnight Sea and things like this, you're gonna get some similar personalities to these things, and not necessarily the same with the nightmares.

<snipped for relevance>

Spoiler

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/518-shardcast-interview/#e16178

Argent

Staying with Yumi, since we're asking the big questions here. I want to talk about the big machine, the father machine.

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

Argent

There are some really interesting what feel like intentional parallels between it and Nightblood.

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

Argent

There's smoke involved, there's eating of souls, there's a whole bunch of things. So what I do want to ask is: one, was the father machine Awakened using Breaths, using Nalthian Awakening? Or are you using Awakening as Lightweaving or Bondsmithing which is an overarching system in the Cosmere?

Brandon Sanderson

It's the second. This wouldn't exist in the pre-space-age as much; by space age there's a certain terminology that is going between... basically it's starting with the arcanists and moving to the general population. What certain themes in the Cosmere magics mean. And so when Hoid says "this is an Awakened machine" his audience understands what that means. It does not necessarily mean Breaths Awaken, but Breaths are one of the main ways that people see things be Awakened. You should be noticing those parallels, but that's a term that in the Cosmere is becoming genericized to mean un-living object being given some measure of sentience and even sapience by application of Investiture, Commands, and these sorts of things. By this point they've all interacted with various Awakened machines of sorts in the future Cosmere. They know what this means. They've talked to an Awakened computer.

<snipped for relevance>

Many- I suspect most- MoIs piggyback off of pre existing Cosmere wide Realmatics, putting a new twist on them but maintaining the core components.

[LuckyJim]

I

44 minutes ago, Trusk&#x27;our said:

I believe that Moash's crystal eye spikes are a manifestation of Hemalurgy in the same way that there are Lightweaving magics separate from Surgebinding or Awakened objects Invested without a hint of Endowment's Breath.

  Reveal hidden contents

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/518-shardcast-interview/#e16167

Comatose

Kind of a similar question about the Midnight Essence, now that we have seen that crop up in Tress as well as in Stormlight Archive. Is something similar happening with the Midnight Essence? We have also the nightmares, in Yumi, that appear similar, they're also mimicking things.

Brandon Sanderson

So, there's a couple of things getting interwoven here. The actual idea of Midnight Essence is a concept like Lightweaving that predates the Shattering of Adonalsium, that various magic systems are basically "borrowing" a law of the cosmere and creating a parallel effect from the same basis, if that makes any sense.

Yumi is a little distinct from that. It's feeling similar; I would not call it true Midnight Essence. It's an awful lot more like a Lightweaving that has--because Lightweavings can have mass to them, because investiture can have mass to it--so you're looking a little bit more like... imagine a bunch of Stormlight becoming tangible, you can touch it, because of a powerful Lightweaving or something like that. Of course, these things all bleed together because I'm using the same fundamental principles to make them. But, for me, Midnight Essence has this personality that comes prefixed. What the Midnight Mother is making, what you're seeing in the Midnight Sea and things like this, you're gonna get some similar personalities to these things, and not necessarily the same with the nightmares.

<snipped for relevance>

  Reveal hidden contents

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/518-shardcast-interview/#e16178

Argent

Staying with Yumi, since we're asking the big questions here. I want to talk about the big machine, the father machine.

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

Argent

There are some really interesting what feel like intentional parallels between it and Nightblood.

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

Argent

There's smoke involved, there's eating of souls, there's a whole bunch of things. So what I do want to ask is: one, was the father machine Awakened using Breaths, using Nalthian Awakening? Or are you using Awakening as Lightweaving or Bondsmithing which is an overarching system in the Cosmere?

Brandon Sanderson

It's the second. This wouldn't exist in the pre-space-age as much; by space age there's a certain terminology that is going between... basically it's starting with the arcanists and moving to the general population. What certain themes in the Cosmere magics mean. And so when Hoid says "this is an Awakened machine" his audience understands what that means. It does not necessarily mean Breaths Awaken, but Breaths are one of the main ways that people see things be Awakened. You should be noticing those parallels, but that's a term that in the Cosmere is becoming genericized to mean un-living object being given some measure of sentience and even sapience by application of Investiture, Commands, and these sorts of things. By this point they've all interacted with various Awakened machines of sorts in the future Cosmere. They know what this means. They've talked to an Awakened computer.

<snipped for relevance>

Many- I suspect most- MoIs piggyback off of pre existing Cosmere wide Realmatics, putting a new twist on them but maintaining the core components.

I'm not saying that they aren't related, but I don't think Hemalurgy is the "origin", for lack of a better word. I think they are both manifestations of the manipulation of bind points, but Hemalurgy refers to the manifestation specific to Scadrial and Ruin, which relates to metal spikes, stealing powers and the decay of Investiture, while this new thing with the crystals would have some other name.

I'll admit, it's basically quibbling over details, but the reason I think this way is the way the "hema" prefix relates to blood, which specifically refered to how the spikes needed to be stored in blood to prevent the decay of the abilities, and we don't even know if the crystal spikes steal anything that can decay.

[Trusk'our he/him]

1 hour ago, LuckyJim said:

I'll admit, it's basically quibbling over details, but the reason I think this way is the way the "hema" prefix relates to blood, which specifically refered to how the spikes needed to be stored in blood to prevent the decay of the abilities, and we don't even know if the crystal spikes steal anything that can decay.

Personally, I think the "hema" portion came from the need for spikes to touch moving blood to graft a Spiritweb fragment, at least initially. 

Spoiler

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/105-17th-shard-forum-qa/#e1265

Master_Moridin

What is the relationship between blood and the Spiritual Realm? (Since Hemalurgy needs blood to graft the sDNA in a spike into someone else's sDNA)

Brandon Sanderson

The blood being in motion is part of it.

But yeah, it's mostly a matter of semantics.

1 hour ago, LuckyJim said:

I'm not saying that they aren't related, but I don't think Hemalurgy is the "origin", for lack of a better word. I think they are both manifestations of the manipulation of bind points, but Hemalurgy refers to the manifestation specific to Scadrial and Ruin, which relates to metal spikes, stealing powers and the decay of Investiture, while this new thing with the crystals would have some other name.

I'd say that's a fair takeaway.

When referring to Hemalurgy in the future of the Cosmere I kind of  doubt other forms will come into play as much as Scadrial's own version- Ruin directly facilitates it as long as you have metal and Intent, while we don't know what requirements other manifestations may demand. Ruin may not even directly interact with them.

I'd still refer to any Spiritweb splicing via bindpoints as Hemalurgy, as I think both phenomena are close enough in nature to be counted as the same "class" of MoI.

[LeondeBowa]

I think a more interesting question is that this means that any physical form of investiture can be used for hemalurgy, which has interesting implications

[JustQuestin2004 he/him]

4 minutes ago, LeondeBowa said:

I think a more interesting question is that this means that any physical form of investiture can be used for hemalurgy, which has interesting implications

I mean, DahKor is kinda like Hemalugy, if only through the concept of 'Human Sacrifice for Magical Enhancement' type of effect, and especially since they both cause the body of their practitioners to become warped, with DahKor twisting bones and Hemalurgy rearranging the body so you don't die from the spikes.

I don't really see any Hemalurgy being possible with Awakening, at least not unless it's a very esoteric use that we haven't ever seen before. Though Awakening can create pseudo-Shardblades like Nightblood and Azure's Blade, which is a pretty esoteric use in and of itself, so I'd say there might a chance.

We know that there's a similar thing going on with Cinderhearts in Sunlit Man, and they even got those from future Scadrians!

[alder24]

On 4/12/2025 at 3:23 AM, LuckyJim said:

I'm not saying that they aren't related, but I don't think Hemalurgy is the "origin", for lack of a better word. I think they are both manifestations of the manipulation of bind points, but Hemalurgy refers to the manifestation specific to Scadrial and Ruin, which relates to metal spikes, stealing powers and the decay of Investiture, while this new thing with the crystals would have some other name.

Those two things are still Hemalurgy and are still of Ruin, they simply are manifested a bit differently in different worlds. Ruin is everywhere in Cosmere, affects the entire Cosmere and it doesn't care who and where uses its power. Hemalurgy is like Lightweaving, a natural part of Cosmere which exists everywhere, but manifests differently on different worlds. On Scadrial, metal is a core part of the planet's identity, on Roshar its gemstones and that's why Hemalurgy on Roshar manifests with crystal spikes (but metal spikes would still work). So we have Rosharan Hemalurgy and Scadrian Hemalurgy, both are of Ruin, both are Hemalurgy, but the difference is in their manifestation due to how Hemalurgy/Ruin interacts with both planets.

Spoiler

Questioner

I'm trying to understand the relationship between Hemalurgy and the Shard Ruin. Most of the Invested Arts involve inputs of energy of the Shardic Investiture that corresponds to it. That doesn't seem to be the case for Feruchemy and Hemalurgy. So I'm wondering what the relationship is between the corresponding Shards and those two Metallic Arts.

Brandon Sanderson

There's a whole lot going on here, and I'm not sure how much I can get into right here. But one of the basic concepts I built for the cosmere, way back when, was that a lot of the different magics would be showing up in different systems. And there are certain underpinning fundamental rules. And this is why you'll see Lightweaving working the same way across three different magic systems; I think you've seen it in three different ones so far. Elsecalling's gonna work the same way. Hemalurgy is a thing that is, like, part of the nature of the cosmere, that the Shard simply knew and was able to tell people how to do

So is it of that Shard? Well, yes, because you would have to be following that Shard's Intent in order to use it. But it could be discovered on other planets, as well.

Questioner

And independent of Ruin's presence, really, except for as Ruin affects the cosmere as a whole?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. Exactly. You are correct.

Dragonsteel 2022 (Nov. 14, 2022)

 

Spoiler

asmodeus

You've said before that a lot of the magics we see across the cosmere come from an interaction of Shards and their Investiture with the planets they Invest in. What does this mean practically? If Scadrial explodes tomorrow, will Hemalurgy stop working across the cosmere?

Brandon Sanderson

Hemalurgy wouldn't stop working, most likely, but it could. There are ways that you could make it stop working. I kind of mean that the Shards are an innate part of physics in the cosmere, and the magics that arise are an innate part of physics because of that. Like atium seeped out into the Pits of Hathsin, in the same way, these magics are just gonna leak out, and different places are going to affect them. You'll see Lightweaving happening in different places, and the way the Shard is interacting with the local... The way the Shard is is going to affect how Lightweaving is administrated in the various magics, but it's still gonna be there. Hemalurgy is kind of a similar thing to that. You will see Midnight Essence, you will see some of these recurring ideas popping up, and these are like natural parts of the physics, but they're influenced by the Shards on the local planets.

I don't know if that answer, that's gonna be a really fun one for them to transcribe into the Q&A thing, because I go around in circles on that question a ton. Put this part in when you do it.

Footnote: It was a really fun one.
YouTube Spoiler Stream 4 (June 16, 2022)

 

Spoiler

[...]

Kaimipono

On a broader level, is Hemalurgy officially dead, then? Or is it still extant in some Ruin-free (but still messy) form? (If it's gone, is there any imbalance since Preservation's magic power is kept and Ruin's isn't?)

Brandon Sanderson

Is Hemalurgy dead? No, not at all. It, like the other two powers, was not created by Ruin or Preservation, but by the natural state of the world and its interaction with the gods who created it. It still requires the same method of creation, but very few people are aware of how it works.

Hero of Ages Q&A - Time Waster's Guide (Oct. 15, 2008)

 

[ChickenBonanza]

6 hours ago, alder24 said:

On Scadrial, metal is a core part of the planet's identity, on Roshar its gemstones and that's why Hemalurgy on Roshar manifests with crystal spikes (but metal spikes would still work). So we have Rosharan Hemalurgy and Scadrian Hemalurgy, both are of Ruin, both are Hemalurgy, but the difference is in their manifestation due to how Hemalurgy/Ruin interacts with both planets.

How can one be certain that Ruin interacts the same way with Roshar as it does with Scadrial? Ruin being Invested on Scadrial would certainly tie it to its Focus, but how would it be tied to Roshar and Crystal? (If, indeed, that is Roshar’s Focus as metal is Scradrial’s. I don’t think it is, but that’s not too relevant.)

Can’t help but see those WoB as talking about Hemalurgy not as a specific thing, but as a Realmatic process of ‘Spiritual-surgery’ through Bindpoints.

That is to say, Hemalurgy is a process waiting in the wings, able to be put into the forefront through various methods, like Lightweaving. It is not necessarily tied to a Shard as a rule. That’s how I read “independent of Ruin’s presence, really, except for as Ruin affects the Cosmere as a whole.”

Though the bit about Intent above could be confusing, I read that as in the philosophical sense. By wanting to destroy things, you are aligned to Ruin’s Intent. By wanting to honor an obligation, you are aligning to Honor’s.

Edited April 16, 2025 by ChickenBonanza
two blurbs