[AU Spoilers] LIft's Surgebinding

[Flungus]

I have been listening to the audiobook version of Arcanum Unbounded recently and something stood out to me. The specific way that Lift uses the food she has eaten to facilitate her surgebinding is very similar to how sandmasters use the water in their own bodies to facilitate investiture on Taldain. This leads me to one of three conclusions,:

 1) One of her parents were a worldhopper from Taldain and her unique surgebinding is a result of having parents from two different magic systems.

2) She herself is somehow a worldhopper from Taldain resulting in something similar (though I think this unlikely.)

3) Knowing that she went to the Nightcrawler to ask for a favour, is it possible that the Nightcrawler is a sliver (similar to the Stormfather for Honor) nor of cultivation as has been previously guessed but of Autonomy?

Thoughts? Comments?

Edited December 9, 2016 by Flungus

[Argent he/him]

2 minutes ago, Flungus said:

 

I have been listening to the audiobook version of Arcanum Unbounded

 

Then you should add something like [AU Spoilers] to your thread's title

[Spoolofwhool]

Interesting thoughts with regards to how sandmastery works, but I think it's really just as Wyndle explained, that she is more into the cognitive realm than most people are normally, so she can reach ambient stormlight somehow. In addition, when someone asked Brandon asked about Lift converting food into stormlight, he strongly implied that it was as a result of the Old Magic from visiting the Nightwatcher. It regards to theory 3 though, Brandon has said that the Nightwatcher is to Cultivation as the Stormfather is to Honor, so I don't think there's any room for Autonomy to fit in there.

In addition, I don't actually see how the sandmastery really works, because it seems like a different process. Sandmastery uses water in order to manipulate the investiture around the sound while Lift burns calories to draw upon stormlight. It is in fact more analogous to allomancy that sandmastery in my opinion.

[Weltall]

Wyndle makes an implicit connection between the Nigthwatcher and Cultivation (he's cultivationspren and refers to the Nightwatcher as 'mother', honorspren like Syl call Stormfather 'father') so while we can't rule out Autonomy meddling in Roshar in some way, this doesn't seem to be one of them. And the way Lift Invests is different from how Sand Masters do it. Lift is able to process food (specifically glucose, based on how Brandon has described it) into Stormlight which then fuels her Surgebinding. Sand Masters give up some of their water to create a temporary connection to the already-Invested white sand which lets them control it. Different resource and different process, only the effect on the user's health is vaguely similar.

Oh, and welcome to the Shard!