Extinct Mistborn? (Spoilers)

[atiumcompounder]

Hey guys

Very new to this community, I used to be a big fan of the original Mistborn series and recently read the new Mistborn novels with wax and Wayne. I am confused as to why Mistborn and full feruchemists have gone extinct in the new series?

Granted it's been a few years since I read the original Mistborn trilogy but I do remember that at the end of the third book, Sazed (Harmony) made the tin eye (forgot his name) full Mistborn and restored his sight (he's the one called Lord Mistborn in the new series I think). So how come in the new era there aren't any Mistborn who can burn all 16 compounds? Similarly what happened to all feruchemists? In the original, all feruchemists could store all 16 attributes in various copper minds if I remember correctly.

So why are there misting only in this series and single attribute feruchemists? Also, the phenomenon of being twin born, while intriguing, why was it missing in the original trilogy. I supposed the Lord Ruler was the ultimate twin born with the inquisitors being hemalurigcally induced twin born, but what about the normal mistings? Why weren't they twin Born? Or this something harmony did for his era?

Thanks guys, I really need to do a re read of the original trilogy.

[Oversleep]

Welcome to the 17th Shard! Do you want a cookie? (Don't take cookies from anyone else, because their cookies are obviously Hemalurgical spikes. Mine aren't )

Okay, let's do this. Not compounds, but metals. Feruchemists store attributes in metalminds, copperminds are only one of the sixteen basic metalminds.
Lord Ruler was a Full Feruchemist who burned Lerasium becoming Mistborn. Thus, he had become Fullborn (somebody who has all Feruchemical and Allomantic abilities).
Twinborn is somebody who is both Misting and Ferring. So Wax is a Coinshot (Steel Misting) and Skimmer (Iron Fering). This combination of powers is known as Crasher.

The answer to your questions is mixing Allomantic bloodlines with Feruchemical bloodlines. It didn't happen during The Final Empire, because of The Lord Ruler breeding program for Terrisan people. So nobles didn't have children with Terrisans, because TLR was afraid that a child could be born who was both a Full Feruchemist and a Mistborn, like him.
But he didn't wipe Terrisans because he needed a source for Feruchemical abilities to spike and give his Inquisitors.

While mixing bloodlines allowed for existence of people with both Allomantic and Feruchemical abilities, at the same time these genes repress each other, so there are none or almost none Mistborn or Full Feruchemists. But Metalborn (term for people with Allomantic and/or Feruchemical abilities) are much more common than they were during TLR rule.

There is some speculation that there could be Full Feruchemists still around, but it is not confirmed as of now. Mistborn would be even more rare, since blood was diluted already during Final Empire (hence Mistings and rarity of Mistborns. Remember Straff's attempts to have a Mistborn child?).

Edit: Edgedancer ninja'd with my addition of last paragraph!    Buahahahaha!

Edited December 27, 2015 by Oversleep

[Edgedancer he/him]

It should be added that as far as we know both Mistborn and full Feruchemists are both still possible just less likely because of the decay of the genes. Getting another Mistborn would likely either require a statistical miracle or a specific breeding program. Full Feruchemist might actually still exsist in terris communities that hold memebers that are still rather pure of heritage.

Edited December 27, 2015 by Edgedancer

[Stormgate he/him]

Oversleep has Hemalurgic spikes.

Feruchemy and Allomancy are both recessive genes. When mixed together, they are diluted so that the offspring are extremely unlikely to be a Mistborn or Feruchemist, instead more likely being Twinborn, Ferring, or Misting.

[baby he/him]

I'm pretty sure that I read somewhere that Harmony changed the way feruchemy interacts with allomancy, thus allowing twinborns.

[Oversleep]

Oversleep has Hemalurgic spikes.

Feruchemy and Allomancy are both recessive genes. When mixed together, they are diluted so that the offspring are extremely unlikely to be a Mistborn or Feruchemist, instead more likely being Twinborn, Ferring, or Misting.

Damnation, Stormgate! All my careful wording for nothing!

 

I am not sure that passing of Metallic Arts is that simple. Traits often aren't coded by a single gene.

My personal theory is that Investiture genes are coded in Spiritweb, and each are mutually paired with Investiture. So Mistborn has more Investiture (that's confirmed) than Misting and it's related to their powers. Feruchemists are alike.

Now things get sticky, because Feruchemical and Allomantic genes interfere with each other. The amount of Investiture is higher, but not necessarily expressed. Hence more Metalborn, but no Full Metalborn (Mistborn xor Full Feruchemist). Number of people with heightened Investiture is higher, but the most probable outcomes are Ferrings, Mistings and Twinborn.

If I were to order Metalborn probabilities, it would go like this:

Ferring->Misting->Twinborn---->Full Feruchemist->Mistborn---->Full Feruchemist Misting -> Mistborn Ferring ----> Fullborn

-> means equal or slighly more probable than the next

----> means much more probable than the next

Edited December 27, 2015 by Oversleep

[DeadFencer]

Feruchemy is a dominant gene. That's why the lord ruler couldn't breed it out of the Terris.

[CthulhuSpren]

Didn't The Lord Ruler use the power of the well to grant him his allomantic powers?

 

Also, IIRC, dont allomancy and feruchemy interfere with each other so that what TLR was wouldn't be possible without the well?

 

I dunno

[Voidus]

Just to clarify a few things.
We know that Allomancy genes mess with feruchemy genes to make ferrings possible, we don't know that feruchemy genes do much of anything to allomancy, the reason there aren't Mistborn more likely has to do with the fact that there have been too many generations since the last Lerasium Mistborn. Most Allomancers were killed during the events of era 1 so there weren't strong enough genes left to produce a Mistborn.

Also TLR probably didn't keep the Terris around for their feruchemical abilities, he went to great lengths to minimize the amount of feruchemists through breeding programs and turning all the old feruchemists into Mistwraiths, I think the reason he didn't kill them has more to do with his inherent nostalgia, he didn't want to wantonly slaughter his own people.

As for why there were no Twinborn in the first era that's likely due to those mentioned breeding programs, Terris breeding was strictly controlled precisely to prevent any Twinborn since TLR didn't want to have any competition or to give anyone any clues as to how his powers worked.

[Stormgate he/him]

Also, if skaa children of nobles were hunted fiercely, knowledge of an unauthorized child of a Terriswoman would likely result in a manhunt using every Inquisitor in the Empire.

[atiumcompounder]

Wow, so much stuff I didn't know. Was it Brandon Sanderson who mentioned the genetic interference thing? can't remember having read that in any of the books. Thanks a lot guys.

Also, atium was of one of the 16 metals that Mistborn could burn, since atium is no longer around (at least in theory), does that mean a new Mistborn (like the that wax's uncle is planning to breed) would burn only 14 metals as atium and its alloy wouldn't be around?

[Kaymyth she/her]

Wow, so much stuff I didn't know. Was it Brandon Sanderson who mentioned the genetic interference thing? can't remember having read that in any of the books. Thanks a lot guys.

Also, atium was of one of the 16 metals that Mistborn could burn, since atium is no longer around (at least in theory), does that mean a new Mistborn (like the that wax's uncle is planning to breed) would burn only 14 metals as atium and its alloy wouldn't be around?

 

There are a whole horde of WoBs out in Theoryland.  Over the years, diligent Sharders have wheedled bits of information out of him question by question.

 

Mistborn can burn all of the Allomantic metals, so if there were a new Mistborn pop up, they should be able to burn the normal 16 (this includes Cadmium and Bendalloy, as Preservation had swapped them out during the FE era for various reasons), as well as the godmetals and their alloys.

[natc]

Feruchemy is a dominant gene. That's why the lord ruler couldn't breed it out of the Terris.

Except feruchemists can clearly arise from functionally "normal" Terris parents. At the time of Ascension all existing feruchemists were converted to mistwraiths, so the first generation of Terris in the Final Empire would lack abilities. Yet they obviously have feruchemical blood.

Honestly dominant genes should be slightly easier to get rid of, since it's easiest to tell when it's entirely absent, while recessive genes take several generations to determine which of the original stock were carriers. And, as said above, it isn't that simple.

[skaa he/him]

Wow, so much stuff I didn't know. Was it Brandon Sanderson who mentioned the genetic interference thing? can't remember having read that in any of the books. Thanks a lot guys.

 

As Kamyth said, Brandon mentioned it in an interview. We call these bits of information that he reveals outside of the books "Word of Brandon" or WoB.

 

Here's the WoB (taken from here) regarding genetic interference:

 

The Ferrings are a new development since Mistborn, as the Feruchemists have been interbreeding with the Allomancers. Basically, the Allomancy genes interfere with the Feruchemistry genes, breaking it down and creating the limitations we see in Alloy of Law.

That WoB in particular isn't verbatim. A person just paraphrased what Brandon told her, which makes it not as ideal as a verbatim WoB. Here's a verbatim WoB that basically says the same thing as the one above:

 

The change to Feruchemy is more a matter of other factors such as the large amount of interbreeding that happened following...and things like that. And so a lot of people with Feruchemy sDNA mixing with people with people with Allomantic sDNA has affected the way the magics blend, so to speak.

Edited December 28, 2015 by skaa

[atiumcompounder]

Great, thanks a lot guys

[Ookla the Absent]

SoS spoiler/theory I've seen:

Some people think Wax's grandmother was a full Feruchemist. Don't know if it's true or not, but might be. Definately be interesting.