[OB] The Wicked Thing of Eminence

[Naerin]

There's been a lot of speculation about what the secret was that destroyed the Knights Radiant, as well as speculation into the causes or mechanics of the Desolations and the Oathpact. I have a wild theory that connects the two. There's probably a thousand things wrong with it, and even I see a bunch of holes and leaps in logic, but hopefully it will at least be entertaining. 

It starts with a WoB exchange I saw posted in another topic earlier today by Steeldancer, so credit goes to them for finding this quote:

Quote

What caused a Desolation to end? Was it just the defeat of Odium's forces? Because the Desolations start when the Heralds break under torture.

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

Because the Heralds can no longer be in existence. There is a certain period of time that they can be there, and after that, if they're there, they will start a new one. So the Heralds do need to leave for a Desolation to end

darkanimereal1 (paraphrased)

Oh. So they've got a time limit.

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

They do. Otherwise the Desolation will start again. What they discovered is not all of them have to. As long as one remains, the Desolation will not start again.

luke.spence (paraphrased)

So, by the nine leaving, did that actually break the Oathpact for them? Did it change the cycle of Desolations?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

They have not completely broken the Oathpact, despite what they may think.

So we know that the Heralds all being present on Roshar causes another Desolation to occur. The question is, why? 

Well let's consider what we know of Worldhopping, because that is essentially what is happening. Spren (and perhaps originally the Listeners themselves) come from Braize to Roshar. Other worldhoppers transition between the Cognitive realm and the Physical realm using Perpendicularities. Other WoB have confirmed that perpendicularities could be caused by a massive amount of Investiture. I believe it was confirmed that Jasnah essentially did a miniature version of this to return to the physical world. 

My theory is that the Heralds act like Investiture lodestones. If they stay long enough in the world, there is a kind of critical mass that occurs, creating enough of a perpendicularity for Odium's forces to transition en masse into Roshar. This is basically how the new Everstorm worked. Once a critical mass of Fused Listeners was reached, they were able to call the storm.

I believe the Everstorm itself is Odium’s perpendicularity on Roshar, at least this time around. We know it carries Voidspren with it, and could be what allows them to come into the Physical realm in large numbers. We also know that it was created by a large number of Fused (ie, Invested) Listeners pooling their energies. That sounds like a recipe for a perpendicularity to me.
Now what if the Highstorm works in the exact opposite way (which would make sense, since they are reversed in every other way). The Highstorm is described by (suspiciously colour-obsessed and oddly familiar) “Zahel” as “invested to the hilt and looking for somewhere to stick it.” (As an aside: god bless “Zahel”). The Highstorm disperses Investiture. It takes a huge amount, maybe enough to form a perpendicularity, but then spreads it out across literally the entire world. 

I submit that this was its primary purpose (because remember, the Stormfather has been tasked with keeping the Highstorms coming, and presumably Honor would have some reason for unleashing these things periodically upon the world). My theory is that there are other ways to enable (or hasten) a Desolation. Perhaps with sufficiently concentrated Investiture, Odium can create a workaround, or at least speed things up, with less time between Desolations. The Highstorm is a check against this by dispersing Investiture, whereas the Everstorm keeps it concentrated (which is which it doesn’t infuse gems with Stormlight). So Honor works to prevent (large) perpendicularities from forming, and Odium tries to create more. Smaller perpendicularities ensure that the two worlds will never be entirely isolated, but might not facilitate a lare-scale invasion. The Oathpact, then , could be an agreement. Honor creates a bargain by which Odium has a shot at Roshar every once and a while. Honor essentially creates the Honorblades as a controlled means of opening a path between worlds by way of highly concentrated Investitute (which could be why Syl refers to Szeth using a dangerous amount of Stormlight with the Honorblade). At the same time though, he makes them double as a means of fighting against the very invasion they facilitate. Odium, in turn, agrees not to just come over to Roshar and destroy it himself, an agreement that binds him even after Honor's death. 

So how do the Knights Radiant fit in? Well we already know that they were not intended by Honor. They were the result of the spren taking it upon themselves to mimic what he had done. They mimic the Honorblades, which are presumably involved with the Oathpact (see above). What if, unintentionally, they have re-created certain aspects of the Oathpact as well, as a side effect of the nahel bond? The Heralds, when concentrated on Roshar, kicked off Desolations. The Fused, when concentrated on Roshar, kicked off the Everstorm. And for however many centuries, human beings, Invested to the hilt, as it were, were concentrating themselves in a specific location: Urithiru. What if this was enough to, if not cause the Desolations, at least exacerbate them in some way? What if it created enough of a perpedicularity to allow some of Odium's forces onto Roshar in a consistent manner, like a door propped open even between the Desolations. 

Spoilers from Edgedancer:

Spoiler

We know that the Herald of justice is deliberately killing potential Knights to prevent them from coming into their true powers. And we know that he is doing this to prevent another Desolation. He fails, obviously, which is why he spares Lift. But he only fails because another group of Invested figures gathered in high enough concentrations to summon the Everstorm. It stands to reason that once a certain critical mass of Knights Radiant was reached, they could also start causing similar phenomenon, perhaps even unintentionally.

To me, this seems like the kind of revelation that would utterly crush a group dedicated to sacrificing for the good of all. To learn that they and their spren had in fact been causing or at least hastening/worsening the Desolations, that all of their efforts and sacrifice were only perpetuating a cycle of endless violence, I could see that breaking them, and causing the Recreance. 

 

 

Edited November 9, 2017 by Naerin

[The Invested Beard]

Well thought out, however I can see one issue already and that is that the Highstorms were in existence before the shards came to Roshar. If you can accommodate for that point you may be on to something.

[Naerin]

That's a good point! But presumably the Stormfather didn't exist before the Shards came, and he/it is now what controls the Highstorms. I agree it's a potential hole in the theory, but I don't think it's a stretch to assume that an existing phenomenon could have been repurposed for Honor's own agenda. So I guess there's two possibilities. 1) The Stormfather was just associated with storms so often by mortals that he developed control over them natural (and therefore Honor had nothing to do with it) or 2) Honor created the Stormfather as a way of utilizing the Highstorms for the above purposes. 

Option two still supports my theory. Option one punches a hole in it, but I think a relatively small one. Even if the Highstorms aren't a mitigation system, the parallels between Heralds and Knights Radiant (and to a lesser degree between the KR and the Listeners at the end of WoR) still hold.

[paperstones he/him]

The Stormfather was there pre Honor. It was when Honor was Splintered that his cognitive shadow merged with the Stormfather.

[Ryder]

I really like this theory, but another problem is that we know there's a perpendicularity in the Horneater peaks that Hoid uses.  I've always assumed that it's Cultivation's perpendicularity.  But anyway, assuming it's always there, we'd need an explanation for why the voidbringers don't just use that one to move between the realms.

[Varion he/him]

Wow. Great theory. Reading it, I had that "of course!" moment that you get when you hear the answer to a difficult puzzle or riddle, which seems obvious in retrospect. All the information was there in front of us, you were just able to put them together in the right way. If anyone else has managed to state this so clearly, I haven't seen it. Big upvote!

One thing that makes me feel like this is a correct interpretation is the way that it elegantly explains several different questions at once. How do voidbringers make the jump? Why do the desolations occur when they do? What is the (post-shard) purpose of the high storms? How did the Listeners create the Everstorm and how did it bring the desolation?

It also might explain why the Everstorm was described in WoR by the Stormfather as something "new" but of ancient origins (paraphrasing as I can't check the text). Assuming that the Listeners were able to fuse with Stormspren and create Stormform in previous desolations, then this would be something with old origins. But the concentration of enough Stormform to build up enough investiture to create the Everstorm would be new. Odium would not have needed or thought to create an Everstorm before because the Oathpact guaranteed a chance to bring regular Desolations - he just had to focus on breaking the Heralds. I'm going to assume he only had to break one Herald each time to trigger a new desolation. A chain is only as strong as its weakest link, and so Odium would only have to break the weakest Herald each time. But this time was different and Odium needed to find a different way to create a desolation:

1: Nine of the Heralds broke the Oathpact and remained on Roshar. Assuming as I do above, that Odium only needed to break the weakest Herald out of the 10 in the past, then having only Taln to torture might actually hold him longer. If Taln is more resistant to torture than the others (not an unreasonable assumption) then he'd take much longer to break.

2: If the Recreance occured, at least in part, because the Radiants realised they'd unwittingly concentrated enough investiture to create a perpendicularity that Odium could use, then it's possible that Odium will have learnt from that and realised that he could mimic this process with voidspren. He could then have developed a plan to build up enough stormspren on Roshar to create the Everstorm.

3: He probably needed time to build up enough stormspren in Roshar to accomplish this. I love the description of the Radiants "leaving the door ajar" for a slow trickle of voidspren to enter Roshar. The Recreance could have been triggered once the Radiants finally noticed this 'void-leak'. The enslavement of the Listeners may thus have been a knee-jerk reaction to the fear that there may already be enough voidspren on Roshar to start a desolation, if they all fused with the Listeners.

4: the Recreance and the enslavement of the Listeners will have temporarily stopped Odium from tranfering more voidspren to Roshar, and limited his ability to fuse enough Listeners. He needed either A) to send more stormspren to Roshar, and/or B ) convince some of the remaining free Listeners to fuse with those Stormspren, despite the fact that these Listeners had turned away from their "old gods".  He thus began a long campaign to create the right conditions for one or both of these things to happen.

5: The Alethi become more warlike thanks to the influence of the Thrill. Gavilar and Amaram were somehow infected with the idea that they needed to bring back a desolation to refound the KR. Certain spren begin to interpret certain events as signs that they need to bond with humans and create new Radiants. We don't know enough about these events yet, but it's a solid bet that Odium had a hand in seeding them. The end result was the return of surgebinders, and a war with the Listeners that ultimately caused them to fuse with stormspren in desperation.

 

 

Edited November 9, 2017 by Varion
Clarity

[QuantumHarmonix he/him]

I've had a similar thought running through my head, except that it is tied to an investiture cycle. It would go like this, as people use investiture they pull it from one location and cause it to build up in another. When enough has built up in a certain location, say a specific shardpool, then a desolation could start. I think it would be a particularly interesting and honorable requirement if the amount of investiture in Odium's and Honor/Cultivation's shardpools had to be equal. Then the abandoning of the shardblades was an attempt to freeze a large amount of investiture and stop the cycle. I've never posted it because there isn't really anything to base this on, other than the highstorms make me think of the water cycle and things from the Mistborn trilogy. Spoiler just in case.

Spoiler

Namely that there is a cycle for both of those shardpools to refill and recharge.

I'm not sure this adds anything to your theory, but maybe it sparks something. At the very least I'm just glad to know I'm not the only one that gets invested in coming up with wild theories. People on this site always have such well though out and researched theories, you all make me feel inadequate. 

[Andy92]

Your theory reminds me of something from Edgedancer:

Spoiler

Nale to Szeth: "If the bonds between men and spren are reignited, then men will naturally discover the greater power of the oaths. Without Honor to regulate this, there is a small chance that what comes next will allow the Voidbringers to again make the jump between worlds."

Maybe you're into something, and "the greater power of the oaths" could be Nale referring to the forming of Shardblades and Shardplate, things that create large concentrations of Investitute. As more and more Radiants start progressing in their oaths, their usage of Investiture can increase...hence the Voidbringers making the "jump between worlds" by using perpindicularites. 

The problem with Nale's theory is that the stormform Parshendi already opened up a perpendicularity by summoning the Everstorm. The oddity with this one though is that the current Everstorm seems to be different compared to the ones from the old Desolations.  

 

[StrikerEZ he/him]

I think this theory relies too much on the idea that Odium was trapped due to the Oathpact, which is not true.

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/160-words-of-radiance-dayton-signing/#e2898

Besides that, this is a pretty good theory, good job!

[Naerin]

2 hours ago, Andy92 said:

Your theory reminds me of something from Edgedancer:

  Hide contents

Nale to Szeth: "If the bonds between men and spren are reignited, then men will naturally discover the greater power of the oaths. Without Honor to regulate this, there is a small chance that what comes next will allow the Voidbringers to again make the jump between worlds."

Maybe you're into something, and "the greater power of the oaths" could be Nale referring to the forming of Shardblades and Shardplate, things that create large concentrations of Investitute. As more and more Radiants start progressing in their oaths, their usage of Investiture can increase...hence the Voidbringers making the "jump between worlds" by using perpindicularites. 

The problem with Nale's theory is that the stormform Parshendi already opened up a perpendicularity by summoning the Everstorm. The oddity with this one though is that the current Everstorm seems to be different compared to the ones from the old Desolations.  

 

To be honest, that was the origin or seed of the theory. The Highstorm occured to me as a way of Honor "regulating" the system, and Nale is almost flat out confirming that the Knights Radiant could at least potentially cause another Desolation. 
And I don't think the Parshendi summoning the Everstorm actually refutes his theory. It's not that he was wrong necessarily, it's that he failed. It's like if someone spent all their effort barricading the doors into their home, and then a theif climbs in through the window. And this gets back to what has been mentioned above by others: there are existing perpendicularities. Like the Horneater lakes. Maybe there is some reason these don't work for Odium's purposes, or maybe they do work, it's just that it is a matter of scale. Because obviously some voidspren can find their way to Roshar (hence the stormform Fused), but maybe the perpendicularities are either too weak, too small, or too unstable to allow for large-scale invasions. So Odium can sneak in spies through the cracks in the walls, then once inside they can kick open the doors from within.

That's how I interpret it anyway, but I agree there is something that doesn't quite line up with what we know of perpendicularities. It is entirely possibly that the mechanisms of the Oathpact are similar but not quite the same thing. As in, the critical mass of Investiture through the Heralds or Knights Radiant or what have you does somehow allow the Voidbringers to cross between the worlds, but in a way that is a bit different from how we've seen normal perpendicularities work. 

[Naerin]

12 hours ago, Varion said:

Wow. Great theory. Reading it, I had that "of course!" moment that you get when you hear the answer to a difficult puzzle or riddle, which seems obvious in retrospect. All the information was there in front of us, you were just able to put them together in the right way. If anyone else has managed to state this so clearly, I haven't seen it. Big upvote!

One thing that makes me feel like this is a correct interpretation is the way that it elegantly explains several different questions at once. How do voidbringers make the jump? Why do the desolations occur when they do? What is the (post-shard) purpose of the high storms? How did the Listeners create the Everstorm and how did it bring the desolation?

It also might explain why the Everstorm was described in WoR by the Stormfather as something "new" but of ancient origins (paraphrasing as I can't check the text). Assuming that the Listeners were able to fuse with Stormspren and create Stormform in previous desolations, then this would be something with old origins. But the concentration of enough Stormform to build up enough investiture to create the Everstorm would be new. Odium would not have needed or thought to create an Everstorm before because the Oathpact guaranteed a chance to bring regular Desolations - he just had to focus on breaking the Heralds. I'm going to assume he only had to break one Herald each time to trigger a new desolation. A chain is only as strong as its weakest link, and so Odium would only have to break the weakest Herald each time. But this time was different and Odium needed to find a different way to create a desolation:

1: Nine of the Heralds broke the Oathpact and remained on Roshar. Assuming as I do above, that Odium only needed to break the weakest Herald out of the 10 in the past, then having only Taln to torture might actually hold him longer. If Taln is more resistant to torture than the others (not an unreasonable assumption) then he'd take much longer to break.

2: If the Recreance occured, at least in part, because the Radiants realised they'd unwittingly concentrated enough investiture to create a perpendicularity that Odium could use, then it's possible that Odium will have learnt from that and realised that he could mimic this process with voidspren. He could then have developed a plan to build up enough stormspren on Roshar to create the Everstorm.

3: He probably needed time to build up enough stormspren in Roshar to accomplish this. I love the description of the Radiants "leaving the door ajar" for a slow trickle of voidspren to enter Roshar. The Recreance could have been triggered once the Radiants finally noticed this 'void-leak'. The enslavement of the Listeners may thus have been a knee-jerk reaction to the fear that there may already be enough voidspren on Roshar to start a desolation, if they all fused with the Listeners.

4: the Recreance and the enslavement of the Listeners will have temporarily stopped Odium from tranfering more voidspren to Roshar, and limited his ability to fuse enough Listeners. He needed either A) to send more stormspren to Roshar, and/or B ) convince some of the remaining free Listeners to fuse with those Stormspren, despite the fact that these Listeners had turned away from their "old gods".  He thus began a long campaign to create the right conditions for one or both of these things to happen.

5: The Alethi become more warlike thanks to the influence of the Thrill. Gavilar and Amaram were somehow infected with the idea that they needed to bring back a desolation to refound the KR. Certain spren begin to interpret certain events as signs that they need to bond with humans and create new Radiants. We don't know enough about these events yet, but it's a solid bet that Odium had a hand in seeding them. The end result was the return of surgebinders, and a war with the Listeners that ultimately caused them to fuse with stormspren in desperation.

 

 

Awesome breakdown of the implications. That is basically what I was thinking in terms of the chronology of things, but you took it a step further (upvote!) by pointing out how the the Alethi war on the Parshendi fits into it all, which I hadn't considered. Now whether Odium literally set up the whole thing is open for debate, but at the very least he capitalized on the war to pressure the Parshendi into becoming Fused. I hadn't thought about that in terms of a long play by Odium, so that's very interesting.