Imprisonment of a Shard

[LightSong77]

We know that Odium is trapped on Braize, that Desolations came at intervals and that they (presumably) have something to do with Odium's attempt to escape.

We also know that Ruin was trapped, that the Well of Ascension fills with Ruin's power at intervals and that this is related to Ruin's eventual release/escape.  

I was wondering if we have any information or theories on whether this is related, i.e., that even when a Shard is imprisoned, after a period of time its power consolidates and something must be done to disperse the power to keep it trapped?  

i started thinking about this once I read the Lord Ruler say to Kelsier, "Only a year left.  So close. i would have again ransomed this undeserving planet."  Also, Preservation says something to Kelsier about Ruin seeping out into the world even though he is imprisoned.  Maybe something similar happens with/to Odium?

(Also, first post so please go easy)

[SpeakoftheDeval]

Well, it's the power of preservation that gathers at the well of ascension, so the relation is probably not as direct as you you were thinking

[Fezzik]

Preservation's power coalesces every 1024 years, at which point a mind has to take control of the force (the Lord Ruler) or disperse it (Vin, leading to Ruin's escape. The Desolations are not nearly as regular. Best guess is centuries-ish between the original Desolations and 4-5000 years before the Final Desolation because Taln is a bada$s and can resist torture in Damnation for that long.

[Yata he/him]

Actually the Odium and Ruin cases are extremely different.

- Ruin strictly speaking wasn't imprisoned, simply Preservation's power automatically counter every action Ruin tried to take. This is "Ruin's prison". Also the risk of release every 1024 isn't stricly part of the "prison" simply Preservation's power understand an user who give away the Well's power as "give it to ruin" and as "I am done with my job" and the auto-counter stops.

- Odium is harder to understand, we don't know actually how he is bound, but remember Odium isn't trapped on Braize. Odium is trapped inside Great Roshar's System and choose to stay on Braize...probably after thousands of years, He will find hard leave that Planet, but the same thing happen to every other Shards who remain long in a place.

[Yezrien]

As I understand it, there are two different types of Shard-imprisonment. The first type is Ruin's prison, a cage of investiture, built by one shard to trap another. 

The second type is more common. When a Shard's power is invested in a planet's ecosystem, it's like the Shard lays down roots. It becomes impossible for them to leave. As far as I know, all Shards are imprisoned in this sense. But most of them are okay with it. They're happy with the planets they settled on. It's only a form of imprisonment for guys like Odium and Ruin, who yearn to be free and rampage across the Cosmere.

To clarify, Ruin is affected by both types. Even once he was free from Preservation's cage, he was still bound to Scadrial because his investiture was still localized there (both in atium, and in the Scadrian people.) He was free to run amok, but he couldn't leave Scadrial until he reclaimed his investiture (by finding the atium stash, and then destroying mankind).

It's not exactly clear what keeps Odium trapped, but I suspect it's the second type, the investiture roots. With all these voidspren and voidbindings and voidlight around, it sounds like Odium has a lot of investiture on Roshar (and perhaps Braize). But he might also be confined in a Ruin-style cage. That might explain why (as far as we know) he hasn't appeared or spoken to any characters on Roshar.

[Landis963 he/him]

Assuming Taldain is still a thing that exists in the Cosmere, Autonomy has Invested in Taldain and is still relatively free to meddle (or so it appears).  Scadrial might be a special case in that it was not a thing before Ruin and Preservation arrived, which implies a much greater Investment than a planet that was already there.

[Oversleep]

16 hours ago, Yata said:

remember Odium isn't trapped on Braize. Odium is trapped inside Great Roshar's System and choose to stay on Braize...

I didn't know this. WoB by any chance?

[Spoolofwhool]

1 hour ago, Oversleep said:

I didn't know this. WoB by any chance?

I don't think there's a direct WoB for this, but it's more an expansion from what we've been told. Odium's power can be felt in the entire system, so it feels more like he's bound to the system than a single world, and is more choosing to remain on Braize.

[Yata he/him]

15 hours ago, Spoolofwhool said:

I don't think there's a direct WoB for this, but it's more an expansion from what we've been told. Odium's power can be felt in the entire system, so it feels more like he's bound to the system than a single world, and is more choosing to remain on Braize.

Also Frost said something like

" Rayse is captive. He cannot leave the system he now inhabits. His destructive potential is, therefore, inhibited "

[Thanatos]

So are the sentient spren on Braize prisoners, or the guards?

[Turtle373 he/him]

2 hours ago, Thanatos said:

So are the sentient spren on Braize prisoners, or the guards?

I don't think they are either, they are what the shards have invested in and it keeps them trapped on their planets, the roots that keep them on their planets

[Thanatos]

turtle373

 

I agree that the Roshar system has spren and if another shard came say Harmony then there would be Harmony spren. So Braize spren could be of all shards acting as guards over Odium. Small possibly.

Or Cultivation metals on Scadrial.

But why is the prison planet Braize the only planet that only has spren? I think there either prisoners themselves or the prison guards.

Edited January 18, 2017 by Thanatos

[cometaryorbit]

On 1/17/2017 at 6:07 PM, Thanatos said:

But why is the prison planet Braize the only planet that only has spren? I think there either prisoners themselves or the prison guards.

Well, if Odium's spren are the only life there they can't really be guards.

But I don't think Braize is really a "prison planet" inherently -- for the Heralds it is, but that probably isn't the original intent, and they're only ten people on a whole planet (assuming the Heralds even go to the physical planet Braize rather than its Cognitive reflection).

IMO Braize is Odium's home base and its inhabitants are his spren. I guess they could be prisoners in a sense -- they might have 'inherited' Odium's desire to escape -- but they're really "natives", I'd expect.

I agree with Belzedar that Odium's imprisonment is primarily because he's Invested in Braize. There's some kind of relationship that allows him to attack Roshar occasionally through his spren, but I don't think he's ever 'there' infused in everything and everyone, analogously to Ruin and Preservation on Scadrial.

[Thanatos]

cometaryorbit

Hey digger, theres a WoB saying its a prison planet. What type we can only speculate. 

Theres also another WoB saying that Odium isnt invested in anything. His trapped/contained within the greater Roshar system. Most likely due to the oathpact. 

[Ari he/him]

2 hours ago, Thanatos said:

cometaryorbit

Hey digger, theres a WoB saying its a prison planet. What type we can only speculate. 

Theres also another WoB saying that Odium isnt invested in anything. His trapped/contained within the greater Roshar system. Most likely due to the oathpact. 

That WoB said he was trying to avoid investing in planets to have a comparative strength advantage to other Shards. (I think Brandon mentioned some power left behind after Odium shattered Devotion and Dominion, and the particular question was about whether that power was Odium's, and hence the refutation-) That doesn't mean he hasn't had to change that policy now that he is stuck in Greater Roshar.

[Thanatos]

1 hour ago, Ari said:

That WoB said he was trying to avoid investing in planets to have a comparative strength advantage to other Shards. (I think Brandon mentioned some power left behind after Odium shattered Devotion and Dominion, and the particular question was about whether that power was Odium's, and hence the refutation-) That doesn't mean he hasn't had to change that policy now that he is stuck in Greater Roshar.

The question is, is he stuck because of him investing in Braize, or because his been 'confined' in the greater Roshar system due to some other reason. 

The oathpact seems to be that reason.

[lidrevan]

Odium is the warden. Braize is a prison for the heralds and when they all go back to Roshar. Odium goes on vacation and is free to reign terror again. Thats why he is stuck there, he has to work.

[Ari he/him]

10 hours ago, Thanatos said:

The question is, is he stuck because of him investing in Braize, or because his been 'confined' in the greater Roshar system due to some other reason. 

The oathpact seems to be that reason.

Why would he be stuck because he's invested if he's been strategically avoiding that until now? We don't to my knowledge even have any evidence that the Oathpact predates Odium being trapped in the system, so it's entirely possibly that it was Honour's response to Odium, rather than a pre-emptive defense. (In fact, there are some indications that the Oathpact formed part of a set of rules of engagement between the two, which would not have been necessary before Odium was trapped. That's not concrete proof or anything, just saying that it doesn't yet fit together with what little we know about the Oathpact) If Honour was openly prepared to defend against Odium there might be other targets that he would prefer to fight first... if he knew in advance he'd need to Invest himself heavily in Greater Roshar to win, I would be very surprised if he'd pick a fight with Honour before picking off anyone else he could kill more easily first.

My suspicion has always been that Honour and Cultivation managed to lay something like a trap for him that bound him to the system when he first tried to Shatter them. It would certainly be well within Honour's intent to force Odium into a protracted war rather than simply assassinating other Shards one by one.

It was certainly worth considering the possibility that investing is what caused Odium to get stuck, the issue is that I can't see any valid motivation for him to invest in a system when he's previously avoided it that wouldn't simply give him an incentive to try shattering some other Shard before Honour. I suppose it's possible that Honour knew what Odium was up to and simply offered him the Oathpact as a way to make him need to put down roots rather than tricking him into getting bound to the system, but it raises real questions as to why Odium would agree when sneaking around picking Shards off while they're not alert to his intentions has been reasonably effective to date. This would change if we knew that all the remaining Shards were on to his plan, for instance, but we don't know that yet.

[Thanatos]

Ari, i agree with your thoughts above. 

Pretty sure theres a WoB saying Odiums not invested in anything but confined within the greater Roshar system 

[Oversleep]

55 minutes ago, Thanatos said:

Pretty sure theres a WoB saying Odiums not invested in anything but confined within the greater Roshar system 

WoB that Odium did Invest since he has his own magic:

Quote

Q: When one of the shards, like Odium, move from world to world in the cosmere, does their presence, like the metals they leave behind and their magic, leave with them?

A: Umm... Odium never really settled on a planet.  He is now settled on Roshar and his magic has permeated things.  Leaving would be very difficult for him.  It would either involve leaving behind some of his power or ripping that out, which would be a difficult process.  So yes it is very tough to leave.
source

Edited January 20, 2017 by Oversleep

[lidrevan]

On 1/19/2017 at 8:03 AM, lidrevan said:

Odium is the warden. Braize is a prison for the heralds and when they all go back to Roshar. Odium goes on vacation and is free to reign terror again. Thats why he is stuck there, he has to work.

this was very simplified and I apologize. I think the oathpact lets odium work on the heralds in the jail. With the option of one day winning cause the heralds will break after so much time in torture.

[The Voiceless One he/him]

On 1/17/2017 at 6:07 PM, Thanatos said:

But why is the prison planet Braize the only planet that only has spren?  I think there either prisoners themselves or the prison guards.

Roshar has spren as well.  If the spren were prisoners, what are they doing on Roshar?

Edited January 21, 2017 by The Voiceless One

[Gizmosowner he/him]

3 minutes ago, The Voiceless One said:

Roshar has spren as well.  If the spren were prisoners, what are they doing on Roshar?

I don't know much about spren because I'm not a sprenologist but wouldn't it make sense for odium to create guards on his own prison planet of torture so the prisoners can't escape wouldn't it make sense to make his own kind of guard spren aka void spren? I don't know if this has been covered at all and what I'm saying must be worse than eating crem dung to this educated on cosmere matters but I'm just a bridge man so I'm not smart enough to be smart

[The Voiceless One he/him]

10 hours ago, Gizmosowner said:

wouldn't it make sense for odium to create guards on his own prison planet of torture so the prisoners can't escape wouldn't it make sense to make his own kind of guard spren aka void spren?

That still does not explain why there are spren on Roshar if they are supposed to be guards on Braize.

[cometaryorbit]

IMO Odium Invested in Braize because he found out he needed to if he was going to have a chance against the Heralds. Honor figured out some way to force their conflict into a battle of champions, then gave his champions (the Heralds) so much power that Odium had to fully Invest (trapping himself in the system) to counter it.

That's why the Oathpact 'indirectly' trapped Odium - directly it's just between Honor and the Heralds, but it gave the Heralds so much power that Odium had to trap himself to match it.