Hemalurgy's danger

[Khyrindor]

Wouldn't a Returned who awakened an object with their Divine Breath die the same way they do when giving it away for healing? I think it was WoB or the annotations, but Brandon has referred to Nightblood's creator wielding it, so I don't think it's possible that Nightblood would be Invested with a divine breath if his creator survived his creation.

I'm not 100% that you could retain a Divine Breath the way you propose, to be honest, given the nature of how they're used to achieve the resurrection.

 

You're right, it would kill them. But in the same way that one can hold more than one Breath, I don't see why you couldn't hold more than one Divine Breath. I'll dig into the annotations later, but I couldn't find any WoBs that contradict what I propose. 

 

EDIT: I have found this:

 

 

CHEESE NINJA

Is it hypothetically possible to Awaken an object using a Divine Breath?

BRANDON SANDERSON

Yes

Source. Scroll to #13.

Edited December 18, 2015 by khyrindor

[Voidus]

Now, here's a pointless ponderance: can Nightblood be used as a Spike, and if so, what would be the result? We could probably go anywhere from "I don't think Nightblood is made from a proper metal" to "oh my glob, everyone everywhere would be doomed!"

I imagine that the Command would override the nature of the metal anyway even if he was made of a perfect Allomantic alloy, he'd probably just steal Investiture or evilness or something to that effect.

Nightblood is full of Investiture. Technically, he could be used as a spike, but items have a certain limit they can be invested, and Nightblood is maxed out.

Not necessarily, he's probably fuller than most things but a person can hold more Breaths than it took to make Nightblood so I imagine there's room to cram a piece of Spiritweb in there somewhere, Hemalurgic spikes aren't very Invested as things go.

[Charononus]

I wonder if you could spike someone into a state where they become a biological nightblood,  feeding off investiture and destroying things instantly on all three realms when they strike them.

[Stormgate]

I wonder if you could spike someone into a state where they become a biological nightblood,  feeding off investiture and destroying things instantly on all three realms when they strike them.

Someone posted something somewhere about what would happen if someone were spiked with a Hemalurgic spike made from Odium's God metal. I think it's unlikely that Odium would invest himself so much, but that may be what it would do.

[iBambam]

I think we're overlooking a rather obvious reason why Hemalurgy is so dangerous. Anyone, and I mean anyone, that had the knowledge of Hemalurgy can perform it correct? I think in that lies the danger.

[natc]

Not that you'd ever get that knowledge without a shard spelling it out for you and a lot of practice victims.

[Stormgate]

The victims part is dangerous.

[King's Twit]

On an individual level, yes, but I think that the Ars Arcanum referred to it as dangerous to the Cosmere. All of the magic systems can kill people, and most of them can kill more people more quickly than by just spiking as many victims as you can.

[Yata]

On an individual level, yes, but I think that the Ars Arcanum referred to it as dangerous to the Cosmere. All of the magic systems can kill people, and most of them can kill more people more quickly than by just spiking as many victims as you can.

Maybe because "killing people" are a relevant part of how the Magic works. While in other Magic System "killing someone" is just a a possible outcome of how the power are used.

 

PS: Also if you don't kill someone with Hemalurgy, you rip piece of their soul that are a Deprecable act in most of the Cosmere.

[iBambam]

Yata's point is along the one I was trying to make, I just couldn't think of the words. Thanks, Yata!

[King's Twit]

I understand that hemalurgy is more inherently "bad" than other magic systems, but if we're assuming that the practitioner has evil intentions with respect to the Cosmere, there are more effective systems of Investiture for massacres than someone going around stabbing people in the heart with metal spikes.

You may be right, we don't really understand hemalurgy very well right now, but I believe that the Ars Arcanum author was worried about the possible uses for the spikes after they've been charged, or possibly the spiking of a shardholder or a splinter, if that can be done. Or the Investiture decay in spikes that others have suggested here.

[Stormgate]

I don't really view Hemalurgic decay as really a problem. I think the Investiture returns to the Shard it originated from. That's just my two bits, take it with a pinch of copper as you will.

[King's Twit]

I don't really view Hemalurgic decay as really a problem. I think the Investiture returns to the Shard it originated from. That's just my two bits, take it with a pinch of copper as you will.

I don't really believe that it's a problem, either, but it's a possible way that Hemalurgy could be a threat to the Cosmere, so I included it in my list.

[Khyrindor]

It might be possible that the decay destroys the Investiture. After a while it could be a danger. But I believe that Hemalurgy is most dangerous because it is possible to create people like the Lord Ruler or worse. And, perhaps such people could hold enough Investiture inside them to ascend and become another scary mini shard.

[King's Twit]

Random thought. There's some level of ambient Investiture permeating the Cosmere, right? What if this is like a galactic-scale spirit web, and spiking shards, splinters, or even mortals for their investiture pokes holes in the web. Enough holes and it all falls apart.

I doubt this is the case, though; I'm just spitballing possible dangers from Hemalurgy

[Stormgate]

Not sure how likely this is, but you get an upvote for looking at the big picture

[Charononus]

I wonder, hemalurgy is from ruin, but ruin is from adonalsium, so hemalurgy might have existed pre-shattering. If it did, the danger could be something yet unseen that helped create the conditions of the shattering.

[Stormgate]

I think that aluminum somehow caused the Shattering.

[Yata]

The problem is that Pre-Shattering the magic has to work differently.

If we think ad Andonalsium as "a super-Shard" (that contain every 16 Shards) we have a problem.

 

How large was the Adonalsium's Reach ? We know that the Shards Invested a specific zone/Shardworld and that his mayor influence is limitated to that Zone. But we know that Adonalsium Invested all the Cosmere, therefore we may think to him/it as a Supershard with almost all the Cosmere as zone.

 

This creates another problem, now a magic system is the result of 2 things: Shardic Influences+ Local focus. If we think at Adonalsium as I writed before. We have the 16 Shardic Influenes in any point of the cosmere (and there is no problem) but what is the Cosmere's Focus ?

There is a Cosmere's Focus or the Did the Magic Systems borns different in any worlds about the Local Focus ?

 

With both of them we can't have "Hemalurgy" without the Metal as focus. With other focus Ruin's Shardic Influence would create another magic system not related to the "Stealing/gifting of SpiritWeb.

[Khyrindor]

Hemalurgy isn't just with metal though

[Moogle]

Hemalurgy isn't just with metal though

 

Apologies, but did we get a WoB on this that I missed? As far as I know, every question on this has been a RAFO.

[Landis963]

Apologies, but did we get a WoB on this that I missed? As far as I know, every question on this has been a RAFO.

 

There's no specific answer on this, but RAFO's can be suggestive.  

[King's Twit]

There's no specific answer on this, but RAFO's can be suggestive.  

They can be, but Brandon has been very tight-lipped about Hemalurgy, and telling us that there are only metal spikes tells us almost as much about Hemalurgy as telling us that there could be spikes of other materials.

Edited December 21, 2015 by King's Twit

[Khyrindor]

Apologies, but did we get a WoB on this that I missed? As far as I know, every question on this has been a RAFO.

 

EDIT:

http://www.theoryland.com/intvsresults.php?kwt=%27hemalurgy%27

 

Take a look through there moogle. There are at least a dozen WoBs that outright say Hemalurgy works with everything. I tried to quote most of the relevant ones but my post broke and only posted one of the WoBs. 

 

I'll put this one down:

 

OUTIS

Given that Investiture is Investiture, would there be potential Investiture of like, kandra to Parshendi using Hemalurgic spikes?

BRANDON SANDERSON

Hemalurgic spikes can be used on any planet.

OUTIS

Would it be potential for Parshendi to develop a form using the spikes?

BRANDON SANDERSON

Wow, that would be a really weird hack of the magic system that would be theoretically possible. But that's a really weird one. I had never even considered that one. Parshendi adopting other Investiture could happen, the spikes is not one I've considered.

Emphasis mine. #96 tagged Hemalurgy on the link above.

Edited December 21, 2015 by Khyrindor

[Moogle]

EDIT:

http://www.theoryland.com/intvsresults.php?kwt=%27hemalurgy%27

 

Take a look through there moogle. There are at least a dozen WoBs that outright say Hemalurgy works with everything. I tried to quote most of the relevant ones but my post broke and only posted one of the WoBs. 

 

I'll put this one down:

 

With respect, I think you're misinterpreting them. I don't think any of the linked WoBs mean that you can use non-metal spikes. They just say Hemalurgy can be used off-world - presumably metal spikes will still work, just like you can burn metals off of Scadrial in Allomancy.