[BoM spoilers] Something I expected to be addressed in this book

[yurisses]

Hello!
 
In the past, Brandon has said that the Lord Ruler had taken a bead of Lerasium for himself.
 

Question
What's lerasium?

Brandon Sanderson
That is the bead of metal that Elend finds at the end of Book 2, that Vin finds and gives to Elend.

Question
Oh so there were only two and the Lord Ruler kind of left it there?

Brandon Sanderson
There actually were a bunch of them, and the first Mistborn came from people who ate that. The Lord Ruler took one for himself and he left others there to use if he needed them.
(source)

 
He has also said that the Lord Ruler, although confirmed to have taken one bead for himself, did not use it to grant himself allomancer powers.
 

Chris King (Miyabi)
This is the last one here we have from Mistborn: Did the Lord Ruler use lerasium to gain his super Allomantic abilities or did he grant that to himself with the Well's power? If he used the bead, does he count as one of the nine original Allomancers that Sazed mentions?

Brandon Sanderson
Excellent question. He did not use the bead. In all of this he granted himself basically, he rebuilt himself to be extremely powerful and he did not use one of the beads.
(source)

Another relevant WoB:
 

Herowannabe
The Lord Ruler, he had his Lerasium beads, did he use them for Feruchemy?

Brandon Sanderson
[impish grin] Ah ha ha ha. The Lord Ruler, heh heh heh, That is an excellent question.

Herowannabe
Not going to answer?

Brandon Sanderson
Not going to answer that one.

Herowannabe
Would you answer if Hoid used it for Feruchemy?

Brandon Sanderson
His bead? Hoid’s bead was—He originally got it because he wanted to be an Allomancer. [Note that he doesn’t actually answer the question.]
(source)

 

So, I was expecting Bands to have new information on Lerasium, since Brandon's word suggests the Lord Ruler might have used Lerasium feruchemically or hemalurgically. (And, you know, since we know that it's possible to make a metalmind that can store any attribute, maybe you can store anything in Lerasium, and just like anyone can burn it, anyone can tap it later. Wild theories...)
 

I wonder when we are going to learn more about the properties of Lerasium. Especially since we still do not know what happened to the real Lord Ruler's bracers in the first place, which seem likely to have contained lerasium. (On the other hand, we have been given no indication that "Kelsier's" bands of mourning contain Lerasium.)

Edited February 2, 2016 by yurisses

[Uilos]

I'm with you there. I'm interested to see how, if at all, it will play out in The Lost Metal. It's interesting that it's titled that, because I don't think it's related to the metal that was used for Bleeder. I think that, in the Lost Metal, we may see Lerasium make a reappearance as well as a resurgence of full Mistborn. Note, that's a lot of WILD speculation on my part. But I think that either Lerasium or Atium (or, hell, whatever Harmony would have constituted) will make a return.

[TheOneKEA]

Do we know for sure that The Lost Metal refers to exactly one metal?

Perhaps all three of the god metals will return, and we will see all of them used for their various purposes. I don't think we have to restrict ourselves to only one metal.

[Argent]

That's a good catch, I had forgotten that the Lord Ruler had a bead. 

[Weltall]

Well, the Ars Arcanum for the Wax and Wayne books have repeatedly mentioned the possible feruchemical applications of godmetal alloys so I wouldn't be surprised if Lerasium eventually shows up again. And Atium too of course, especially since it's the one known as 'the lost metal' in the present day.

 

As far as learning about any remaining Lerasium, one possible explanation is that the only beads to be found at the time were the one Hoid took and the one Vin used on Elend. Also, I think the ending of BoM might explain why we don't find out more.