The lost bead of Lerasium

[yurisses]

'ello!

So before SoS came out I had some notes about the lost bead of Lerasium, and then I realised the issue would probably be addressed in BoM so I stopped thinking about it.
 

Quote

TLR uses Lerasium for Feruchemy:

1. No answer to whether TLR and Hoid use Lerasium for Feruchemy

2. TLR did not eat a Lerasium bead

3. However, he did take a Lerasium bead for himself

Conclusion: The Lord Ruler either uses Lerasium for Feruchemy or some other unclear purpose.

...what happened to that Lerasium bead?! Was it lost forever in the corpse of The Lord Ruler?

Thing is, as you know, BoM did not at all deal with this issue, since the titular Bands were not TLR's!

What do we know that I am missing as to what happened to the lost bead?

...

Read The Lost Metal and find out?

 

Edited December 16, 2016 by yurisses

[VirtuousTraveller]

Quote

QUESTION

When Hoid took the bead of Lerasium, did he actually eat it or did he just hang on to it?

BRANDON SANDERSON

You have seen him use Allomancy in other books, so… that’s your answer

This WoB was from his signing at Herald Washington Library on December 3rd, so I think this pretty much settles it.  He used it to become an allomancer.

AT LEAST THAT'S WHAT I THINK YOU'RE SAYING BRANDON! =)

[yurisses]

29 minutes ago, VirtuousTraveller said:

This WoB was from his signing at Herald Washington Library on December 3rd, so I think this pretty much settles it.  He used it to become an allomancer.

AT LEAST THAT'S WHAT I THINK YOU'RE SAYING BRANDON! =)

First of all, I'm not talking about the bead Hoid stole but the one TLR took for himself and held onto. Check out the quoted section in the opening post for more details. (That said, it's technically possible the two are one and the same. Hoid would have stolen TLR's bead that he kept near the well. edit: I now doubt that this is the case, or that Rashek's bead was the one Elend ate.. The WoB's wording suggests TLR owned at least three beads, one of which for personal use. "The Lord Ruler took one [Lerasium bead] for himself and he left others there to use if he needed them.")

Second, we already had an old WoB saying something very similar, and coincidentally, I had something talking about this bead in my notes, too, and I don't agree with your conclusion:

Quote

Hoid's use of Lerasium:

1. Hoid’s bead was—He originally got it because he wanted to be an Allomancer.

2. BS suggests Lerasium can grant the power of many shards (though he could also simply say that Hoid has the power of Preservation)

3. "It rewrites your spiritual DNA, and there are ways to do really cool things with lerasium that I don't see how anyone would know. Were most Mistborn to just burn it, it would rewrite their genetic code to increase their power as an Allomancer."

4. Lerasium has Feruchemical and Hemalurgical powers.

5. "Let me first assure you that the element is quite safe. I have found a good home for it. I protect its safety like I protect my own skin, you might say." This suggests that Hoid keeps the Lerasium inside his body, either for Feruchemical purposes or as a spike. However, Hoid is very bad at hurting people, suggesting Feruchemy. Furthermore, this WoB says outright that Hoid does not have Hemalurgy.

Conclusion: Hoid seems to use the Lerasium for Feruchemy, but it's likely something more complicated is going on.

 

Edited December 16, 2016 by yurisses

[VirtuousTraveller]

57 minutes ago, yurisses said:

First of all

First of all to you, I sincerely apologize for not reading the entirety of your post.  I sometimes shard at work and the afternoon was busier than I anticipated.  I glanced through your post, got excited because of the new WoB that I think sums up a question we've all had about a missing bead of Lerasium, and posted without thinking.  Mea culpa @yurisses!

TLR was a fullborn - all the powers of feruchemy and allomancy which he could compound.  IIRC, there's a WoB that also said TLR augmented his sDNA to make himself more powerful.  So I don't know what purpose a bead of Lerasium would serve him, unless this is the premise of the titular "The Lost Metal."

Would you suggest TLR perhaps learned how to do something with Lerasium that Hoid had likewise figured out?

Secondly, I'm not sure we can conclude anything else with the new WoB - Hoid used the bead to become an allomancer.  How else can we read Brandon's quote?

[yurisses]

25 minutes ago, VirtuousTraveller said:

First of all to you, I sincerely apologize for not reading the entirety of your post.  I sometimes shard at work and the afternoon was busier than I anticipated.  I glanced through your post, got excited because of the new WoB that I think sums up a question we've all had about a missing bead of Lerasium, and posted without thinking.  Mea culpa @yurisses!

TLR was a fullborn - all the powers of feruchemy and allomancy which he could compound.  IIRC, there's a WoB that also said TLR augmented his sDNA to make himself more powerful.  So I don't know what purpose a bead of Lerasium would serve him, unless this is the premise of the titular "The Lost Metal."

Would you suggest TLR perhaps learned how to do something with Lerasium that Hoid had likewise figured out?

Secondly, I'm not sure we can conclude anything else with the new WoB - Hoid used the bead to become an allomancer.  How else can we read Brandon's quote?

No worries, I hope my wording didn't make me sound angry, because I don't mind at all. (truth be told I wanted to discuss Hoid's use of the bead too but was on the fence about making a thread so you gave me an opportunity to merge the two subjects)

My suggestion is that Lerasium feruchemy/hemalurgy can probably make you a stronger allomancer and/or other cool things we can't even imagine. The way Brandon worded his RAFOs suggests that Lerasium feruchemy is important and cool... And yep, my belief is that both Hoid and TLR used Lerasium feruchemically and figured out cool stuff with it. Heck, maybe even Kel was doing it.

As for the new WoB, it could be misdirection, "you have seen him use allomancy in other books, but I won't tell you if he got it by eating the bead or other means, that's your answer!" The wording of the old WoB also suggests Brandon is trying to avoid the question and misdirect us hard to leave him be on the subject of Lerasium feruchemy, but maybe that's confirmation bias on my part... Although it is definitely something we have seen Brandon do a bunch of times.

Edited December 16, 2016 by yurisses

[Weltall]

Doing the math, yes, there should be a missing lerasium bead out there. On the TImewaster's Guide, there's a Word of Peter where someone counted the number. They got nine for the founders of the Noble families (and totally not the Nine Rings...), one Elend used and one Rashek used. Peter said that count was correct plus 'at least one more' (which we know Hoid took from the Well) bringing us to twelve. Peter didn't explain at the time that Rashek didn't actually use that one bead so it seems that yes, at minimum 'Rashek's bead' is potentially out there somewhere.

Now, I still suspect that The Lost Metal will focus in some way on atium since that's exactly how the metal is referred to in Era 2 Scadrial but the prospect of learning more about lerasium shouldn't be discounted as well. There's been enough teasing about the prospect of godmetal alloys with special note of lerasium alloys and we still don't have any clue what lerasium does on its own in Feruchemy or Hemalurgy, so we've almost got to find out eventually. Hopefully next book will give us something, though I wouldn't put it past Brandon to make us wait for Era 3 or even 4 if Metallic Arts-based FTL requires godmetal alloys.

Edited December 16, 2016 by Weltall

[Argent he/him]

Wasn't there a WoB around about how Rashek was more powerful of an Allomancer than a Mistborn who gained their powers from lerasium?

[Samaldin he/him]

Is there a WoB for how Lerasium works feruchemicaly? I don´t remember if it´s my headcanon or if theres an actual WoB that Lerasium works in Feruchemy like Atium does in Hemalurgy, so it can store everything and also better than other metals. If this is correct it could mean everything which could potentially be stored could be stored in Lerasium, propably including Allomantic strength. The problem with this theory is Feruchemy is from both Shards and Atium only worked feruchemicaly like a normal metal...

[Eki]

26 minutes ago, Samaldin said:

Is there a WoB for how Lerasium works feruchemicaly? I don´t remember if it´s my headcanon or if theres an actual WoB that Lerasium works in Feruchemy like Atium does in Hemalurgy, so it can store everything and also better than other metals. If this is correct it could mean everything which could potentially be stored could be stored in Lerasium, propably including Allomantic strength. The problem with this theory is Feruchemy is from both Shards and Atium only worked feruchemicaly like a normal metal...

I think there is a WoB that lerasium works Feruchemically, but not how.

[Spoolofwhool]

2 hours ago, Argent said:

Wasn't there a WoB around about how Rashek was more powerful of an Allomancer than a Mistborn who gained their powers from lerasium?

Not that I can find. Only that he rebuilt himself using the well. I imagine that he could've rebuilt himself into a mistborn stronger than a regular person turned mistborn by lerasium since lerasium mistborns are not the peak of allomancy.

[JE19426]

3 hours ago, Argent said:

Wasn't there a WoB around about how Rashek was more powerful of an Allomancer than a Mistborn who gained their powers from lerasium?

I haven't seen any WoB like that but in Hero of Age Pre chapter monologue (for Chapter 22) it stated " That is part of why he was so mighty compared to other Mistborn—though, admittedly, his ability to mix Feruchemy and Allomancy was what produced many of his most spectacular abilities ". I assumed after read BoM that compounding Nicrosil enhanced his Allomancy.

[Yata he/him]

@FiveLate TLR didn't become an Allomancer as Side effect of holding the Well's Power. He actually used the Well's Power to change his own Spirit Web to obtain it. In the end He rebuild himself to be an Allomancer as strong as it is possible to be.

Other users of the Well or also Preservation's Vessels (if they were alive) didn't become like him as side effect of using Preservation's power (but it's possible that if they are Scadrialian, The new forged Connection to Preservation will be enough to Snap as Allomancer I think)

[Argent he/him]

On 12/17/2016 at 0:03 PM, FiveLate said:

To be able to even take up Preservations power, he needed to have a certain minimum connection to Preservation.

He was a Terrisman, they worshiped Preservation. That ought to be Connection enough.

Edited December 19, 2016 by Argent

[Eki]

On 12/17/2016 at 7:03 PM, FiveLate said:

He saves that 1 bead (it is strongly hinted to use in case he needs to increase his allomantic powers later).  

Is it? If that's the case, why not just increase it to begin with? It seems much more likely to me that he saved it either for experimentation or possibly Feruchemy. Or for any of the other uses of lerasium we don't know about.

[Yata he/him]

8 minutes ago, Eki said:

Is it? If that's the case, why not just increase it to begin with? It seems much more likely to me that he saved it either for experimentation or possibly Feruchemy. Or for any of the other uses of lerasium we don't know about.

Yes it is more likely he kept it to use for other purposes. Example: Feruchemy, Hemalurgy (it's possible that Ruin can't  easy exploit a Lerasium's SPike) or simply to make the Allomancy grows to the original level in the nobles.

[Bromo_Sapien]

TLR became Realmatically aware at the same time; I wonder if he kept a lerasium bead for the same reason Hoid took one: experimentation of the Spirit Web. I don't know how much he would be able to use lerasium for Feruchemy or Hemalurgy; I don't imagine the beads are all that large (I imagine them to be roughly pill-sized, considering they were dry-swallowed with ease and can be hidden under Hoid's skin). However, given how he witnessed first-hand the manipulation of the spirit web with the first nine Allomancers (and knew what was happening, since he had already Ascended), I wonder if he wanted to experiment with adding more power to himself. It's just that he's not smart/ realmatically-aware enough to actually do it like Hoid can.

[Spoolofwhool]

Are we talking about the beads of lerasium kept at the edge of the well of ascension, or a third bead he removed from their and kept personally? If it's the beads in the well, I believe it was said or at least postulated by Sazed that he did so in the off chance that he somehow stopped being a mistborn, so he could regain that power.