[OB spoilers] Is Maya alive?

[Calderis]

I don't know how the damage is repaired, but it's definitely possible. 

I don't believe that the bond itself is composed of investiture. Bonds should be a form of connection, which is more akin to a force than investiture itself. 

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Aurimus [PENDING REVIEW]

As the two Realms, the Cognitive and the Spiritual, are, well, fictional... Are they all comprised of Investiture, completely?

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

Yes. No, completely? Well, here's the thing. Investiture, matter, and energy are all the same thing in the cosmere. So, just like energy and matter are the same thing here. So, yes, everything's made of Investiture, in the same way that everything's made of energy in our world. Does that make sense?

Aurimus [PENDING REVIEW]

So, what about what spren are made of in the Cognitive Realm? Is that just Investiture?

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

So, yeah, I'll dig more into that. I'm gonna go with Investiture for now, but I could change that as I move along. What I'm kind of debating is, is there a separate Cognitive state, and I don't think so. So I'm gonna go with Investiture for now.

Aurimus [PENDING REVIEW]

How about Connection?

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

Connection is, like, the equivalent of a quantum connection in our world, so it's more like a force than something comprised of something. The question is like, "What is gravity comprised of?" And then you start asking weird questions.

source

So the damage to the spiritweb of the spren should be at the point of connection, but isn't the bond itself. 

I don't know where the investiture that heals a spren comes from, but as far as that healing goes, I don't think it's any different in the case if a deadeyes with someone else, or with their original Radiant. The insane difficulty in my mind, comes from establishing a bond with a dead spren in the first place. This is why I believe that the Shadesmar sequence, and Adolin's seeing and accepting Maya in that place is relevant to the process. 

When Kaladin killed Syl, she would have been dead in the exact same way. When the bond was restored and she healed, where four that investiture come from? It didn't come from Kaladin, because he couldn't infuse at the time, and the bond itself isn't investiture. So why would Maya need some other investiture input? 

[Guest]

1 hour ago, Calderis said:

When Kaladin killed Syl, she would have been dead in the exact same way. When the bond was restored and she healed, where four that investiture come from? It didn't come from Kaladin, because he couldn't infuse at the time, and the bond itself isn't investiture. So why would Maya need some other investiture input?

My point is, that we have established, that the point of connection is missing - gone -, right? It has been ripped out, but logically following that, the part, that has been ripped out, must still be hanging on the Radiant's Spiritual aspect, right? Hence Brandon saying, that you'd normally need the Radiant, that broke the bond to revive the spren (reattach the ripped out part of the soul), through rebonding and respeaking oaths - like Kaladin did.

What I'm essentially saying is, that for a Nahel bond between Maya and Adolin, who definitely is not the Radiant, that broke the oath, even being able to occur, you'd have to reconstruct the missing point of connection beforehand. Because that is not rebonding an once-existing bond, but creating a new one. For that you'd need a healthy spren first.

The question then is: How do you reconstruct that missing piece of information in Maya's Spiritual aspect? Simply attaching Adolin's Spiritweb in place would not be the same information, that was in there. Maybe it is possible, but what are the implications of it? Does it even give Adolin powers, which is what everyone is already concluding with finality? The point of the Nahel bond is, that the spren attaches to the human's Spiritweb, altering it to give him powers, and not vice versa. Why should Adolin attaching to Maya's Spiritweb give him powers? How can we easily decide, that the mechanics of a possible reverse Nahel bond are the same of a traditional one?

By the way, sorry if I seem rambly, but that are just questions, that I think are worth asking.

Regarding an investiture source: I always thought, that the spren itself acts like one, because of them essentially being Splinters of Shards, which basically are huge pools of investiture anyway (like how Preservation directly gives Allomancers investiture from itself, if they have the correct Spiritweb and the metals as foci). Spren hold a bit of Honor's and/or Cultivation's investiture. That always was my theory on it. The investiture source wouldn't be the problem, the problem is, that you can't just reverse the bonding process to fill the gap in Maya's Spiritweb with another random Spiritweb and then just consider her fixed, because the resulting soul wouldn't be the same. You either have to reconstruct the missing piece or reattach the original piece.

Edited March 11, 2018 by SLNC

[RShara]

I kind of saw it as akin to what happened to the parshmen.  Part of their minds were ripped away as well, and the Everstorm was able to Heal that.  And it seems like the parshmen who were healed that way were still themselves afterward.

We don't know a lot about the mechanics of the Nahel bond, but it's not beyond the realm of possibility that whatever is forming between Adolin and Maya can result in a similar healing?

[Guest]

12 minutes ago, RShara said:

but it's not beyond the realm of possibility that whatever is forming between Adolin and Maya can result in a similar healing?

It definitely isn't. I agree on that.

I even think, that a Nahel bond might be formable after a successful healing, but I don't think you can just apply the rules of a bond reestablishment to the reconstruction of an incomplete spren Spiritweb. It is not the same process.

Whatever happened between Adolin and Maya during their time together might be the right track for a healing though.

Edited March 11, 2018 by SLNC

[Calderis]

49 minutes ago, SLNC said:

My point is, that we have established, that the point of connection is missing - gone -, right? It has been ripped out, but logically following that, the part, that has been ripped out, must still be hanging on the Radiant's Spiritual aspect, right? Hence Brandon saying, that you'd normally need the Radiant, that broke the bond to revive the spren (reattach the ripped out part of the soul), through rebonding and respeaking oaths - like Kaladin did.

If that were the case, why would the Radiant lose their abilities? If that were the case, then they would still be bonded to the chunk of investiture that gave them their abilities in the first place. 

I think the only reason it's easier is that they are living and their spiritweb has a record of what they were bonded with, so restoring their oaths and their bond automatically reattached to the Spren itself, and the healing that occurs is exactly the same in either case, other than speed. For which a dead spren is slower, if the person goes through the process of establishing a connection in the first place. 

I've never used the term "reverse Nahel bond" because I don't think it exists. The bond is symbiotic. It is mutual. One is not changed, both are. 

Spren aren't an investiture source they are living investiture. Surgebinding and fabrials are both fed via Stormlight. The Spren are a component in the process, but if they were to fuel the process they would be consuming themselves. 

Again, I don't know how the healing occurs, because in both cases it seems like spontaneous reconstitution. I don't see how the process differs though, beyond a Radiant reestablishing their connection being nearly instantaneous because of the record in their own spiritweb. 

[Guest]

15 minutes ago, Calderis said:

If that were the case, why would the Radiant lose their abilities? If that were the case, then they would still be bonded to the chunk of investiture that gave them their abilities in the first place.

Nope. Since that chunk of investiture is the whole spren. The bond is what gives the powers and the spren the ability to manifest in the Physical Realm.

21 minutes ago, Calderis said:

I've never used the term "reverse Nahel bond" because I don't think it exists. The bond is symbiotic. It is mutual. One is not changed, both are. 

I know. I did because it is the only explanation of how something similar to a Nahel bond could be forming in the current situation. Maya is not able to bond right now, because of her incompleteness. Previous knowledge tells us, that only healthy, complete spren are able to do that. Saying that incomplete spren can too is just an assumption.

25 minutes ago, Calderis said:

Again, I don't know how the healing occurs, because in both cases it seems like spontaneous reconstitution. I don't see how the process differs though, beyond a Radiant reestablishing their connection being nearly instantaneous because of the record in their own spiritweb. 

So, you don't know how the healing works, but can definitely say, that it is the same process as a bond reestablishment, even if the initial situation is quite different? Where does the information of the missing part of Maya come from? Definitely not Adolin's Spiritweb.

On the topic of it just taking longer: I must ask again, where is the difficulty in that, that has been confirmed by Brandon?

[Calderis]

39 minutes ago, SLNC said:

So, you don't know how the healing works, but can definitely say, that it is the same process as a bond reestablishment, even if the initial situation is quite different? Where does the information of the missing part of Maya come from? Definitely not Adolin's Spiritweb.

Don't put words in my mouth. You say they're different by your interpretation. Fine. I've never said they are mechanically, because I don't believe they are.

The healing process didn't come from Kaladin with Syl, he just restored his bond to her. The healing process in Maya isn't coming from Adolin, he's just establishing a bond with her. 

The difficulty, the near impossibility, is in establishing a bond with a mindless entity. 

As I've gone over elsewhere, if Adolin's blade were any type but an Edgedancer, this would be a lot harder than it already is, because his treatment of the blade plays into the very oaths the blade requires. 

[insert_anagram_here]

9 hours ago, Calderis said:

When Kaladin killed Syl, she would have been dead in the exact same way.

Correct if I'm wrong but Syl didn't become a deadeye, did she? Yes, we couldn't see her manifestation in the Cognitive Realm at that time, but wouldn't she turn into a weapon in the Physical Realm as well? Am I missing something?

Edited March 11, 2018 by insert_anagram_here

[RShara]

Kaladin was only on the 2nd Ideal at the time, so she wouldn't have been able to turn into a Blade at all.  I think she was probably a deadeye in the CR, but had no presence in the PR.

[Yata]

15 minutes ago, insert_anagram_here said:

Correct if I'm wrong but Syl didn't become a deadeye, did she? Yes, we couldn't see her manifestation in the Cognitive Realm at that time, but wouldn't she turn into a weapon in the Physical Realm as well? Am I missing something?

As R'shara said, Kal wasn't enough into his Radiancy to manifest Syl as a Blade and therefore she didn't became a physical Blade upon the Oathbreak. But she was mind-broke like Maya and she became a Deadeye

[insert_anagram_here]

1 hour ago, Yata said:

As R'shara said, Kal wasn't enough into his Radiancy to manifest Syl as a Blade and therefore she didn't became a physical Blade upon the Oathbreak. But she was mind-broke like Maya and she became a Deadeye

Well maybe for a nahel spren to become a Deadeye, it needs their Radiant to reach that far enough into Radiancy first. Either way we are comparing two different cases.

Edit: To clarify, 'Syl became a Deadeye' isn't proved or disapproved in the books, it's an assumption. Neither did she appear in the Cognitive realm with her eyes scratched out, nor did she become a weapon in the Physical realm, which are the two indications that we know of how Deadeyes manifest. So we can't know for sure if she indeed became a Deadeye or not at that point.

Edited March 11, 2018 by insert_anagram_here

[Guest]

Fine, I've said my piece, because I was asked to.

I didn't want to spread any bad vibes and I'm getting the impression, that different views are unwelcome, seeing the rather tense tone at the moment. It doesn't seem like a discussion, but rather a competition of proving yourself right.

I'm off before my involvement escalates things.

Edited March 11, 2018 by SLNC

[Yata]

3 hours ago, insert_anagram_here said:

Well maybe for a nahel spren to become a Deadeye, it needs their Radiant to reach that far enough into Radiancy first. Either way we are comparing two different cases.

Edit: To clarify, 'Syl became a Deadeye' isn't proved or disapproved in the books, it's an assumption. Neither did she appear in the Cognitive realm with her eyes scratched out, nor did she become a weapon in the Physical realm, which are the two indications that we know of how Deadeyes manifest. So we can't know for sure if she indeed became a Deadeye or not at that point.

She was dead, but her own admision.

A Deadeyes is what happened when a Spren is "killed" by an Oathbreaking. We didn't see her, you have right...But the context points more to her Deadeye-ness than other outcomes

[insert_anagram_here]

Quote

That left him with only one. Syl—in the form of a young woman in a fluttering dress, full-sized this time—hovered before him. She smiled as the storm moved beneath them. 
“That was very nicely done,” she said. “Perhaps I’ll keep you around this time.” 
“Thank you.” 
“You almost killed me, you realize.” 
“I realize. I thought I had.” 
“And?” 
“And . . . um . . . you are intelligent and articulate?” 
“You forgot the compliment.” 
“But I just said—” 
“Those were simple statements of fact.” 
“You’re wonderful,” he said. “Truly, Syl. You are.” 
“Also a fact,” she said, grinning. “But I’ll let it slide so long as you’re willing to present me with a sufficiently sincere smile.” 
He did. 
And it felt very, very good. 
-WoR l.20179 p.1042(Kindle edition) - ending of Chapter 86

Syl didn't admit she was dead, she said that Kaladin almost killed her.

45 minutes ago, Yata said:

She was dead, but her own admision.

A Deadeyes is what happened when a Spren is "killed" by an Oathbreaking. We didn't see her, you have right...But the context points more to her Deadeye-ness than other outcomes

I'm not sure I understand what you are saying but we do not have any indication that what happened to Syl and what happened to Maya is the same thing.

Deadeyes could be a completely different case of KR bond break.

 

To clarify, I'm not saying that Maya isn't reviving for certain, but the evidence that we currently have is still inconclusive.

[maxal]

I am late into replying to earlier posts, but this WoB is relevant to the current conversation:

 

Quote

 

Questioner (paraphrased)

If after speaking the Third Ideal, Kaladin were to betray his oaths, would Syl turn into a Shardblade?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

Yes.

 

 

Syl was most definitely "dead" now whereas spren bonded with lesser bonds than the third oath do become dead-eyes, it is not obviously stated, but I do think it comes across as a most definite "yes". 

[insert_anagram_here]

13 minutes ago, maxal said:

I am late into replying to earlier posts, but this WoB is relevant to the current conversation:

(...)

Syl was most definitely "dead" now whereas spren bonded with lesser bonds than the third oath do become dead-eyes, it is not obviously stated, but I do think it comes across as a most definite "yes". 

Yes, that WoB is what you said in your last post as well and it proves that Syl wasn't a dead Shardblade as Maya is, so we are indeed comparing apples and oranges.

As the last in book quote I provided, this quote also proves that Syl was not completely dead as she retained some consciousness while Kaladin was reforming their bond. 

Quote

The knife slipped from Kaladin’s fingers, clanging to the ground. He was too weak to hold it. His arm flopped back to his side, and he stared down at the knife, dazed. 
I don’t care. 
HE WILL KILL YOU. 
“I’m sorry, Kal,” Moash said, stepping forward. “I should have made it quick at the start.” 
The Words, Kaladin. That was Syl’s voice. You have to speak the Words! 
I FORBID THIS. 
YOUR WILL MATTERS NOT! Syl shouted. YOU CANNOT HOLD ME BACK IF HE SPEAKS THE WORDS! THE WORDS, KALADIN! SAY THEM! 
“I will protect even those I hate,” Kaladin whispered through bloody lips. “So long as it is right.” 
A Shardblade appeared in Moash’s hands. 
A distant rumbling. Thunder. 
THE WORDS ARE ACCEPTED, the Stormfather said reluctantly. 
“Kaladin!” Syl’s voice. “Stretch forth thy hand!” She zipped around him, suddenly visible as a ribbon of light. 
“I can’t . . .” Kaladin said, drained. 
“Stretch forth thy hand!” 
-WoR l.19663 p.1014(Kindle edition) - Chapter 84

 

(To clarify, I'm not saying that Maya isn't reviving for certain, but the evidence that we currently have is still inconclusive.)

[CrazyRioter]

That was as you said while Kaladin was reaffirming his oaths and reforming the bond.

[Calderis]

She was dead. She says he almost killed her after she was brought back. 

While she's gone, the Stormfather says that Kaladin killed her. Considering his nature as a Spren of Honor, I'd find it very very unlike he was lying to make Kaladin feel bad. 

Edited March 11, 2018 by Calderis

[insert_anagram_here]

2 minutes ago, Calderis said:

She was dead. She says he almost killed her after she was brought back. 

While she's gone, the Stormfather says that Kaladin killed her. Considering his nature as a Spren of Honor, I'd find it very very unlike he was lying to make Kaladin feel bad. 

So either Syl or Stormfather lied, but they are both made of Honor, thus paradox

[maxal]

1 hour ago, insert_anagram_here said:

Yes, that WoB is what you said in your last post as well and it proves that Syl wasn't a dead Shardblade as Maya is, so we are indeed comparing apples and oranges.

Huh? The WoB directly states the only reason Syl didn't turn into a Shardblade was because Kaladin hadn't say the third oath yet, but she most certainly was dead. And dead sprens are dead-eyes, she just was one without a physical manifestation.

I honestly do not know what you are trying to prove. It seems to me you are just arguing for the sake of it: we aren't exactly swimming within the darkness here, there are some story elements which are explained within the narrative. Syl was dead. This is crystal clear, why arguing she wasn't really dead? The difference in between Syl and Maya is Syl still had her knight, Maya doesn't.

Anyway. I think I will respectfully bow out of the this conversation as well. I cannot argue if WoB keep on being dismissed as valid sources of information and if the canon narrative is being disregarded just so the "Maya is not really trying to bond Adolin" theory can have more traction.

[Calderis]

9 minutes ago, insert_anagram_here said:

So either Syl or Stormfather lied, but they are both made of Honor, thus paradox

When someone is flatlining in the hospital, when the heart has stopped and lack of medical intervention means permanent death... They died. 

When we bring someone back from that, they can honestly say that they died. Most don't though, because we think of death with permanence. Most say "I almost died." 

I think it's the same thing. Syl's not lying, but saying she died when she's alive just isn't the way people word things. 

[insert_anagram_here]

1 hour ago, Calderis said:

When someone is flatlining in the hospital, when the heart has stopped and lack of medical intervention means permanent death... They died. 

When we bring someone back from that, they can honestly say that they died. Most don't though, because we think of death with permanence. Most say "I almost died." 

I think it's the same thing. Syl's not lying, but saying she died when she's alive just isn't the way people word things. 

That's a very good analogy! 

So following that thought, you could say that Maya isn't a person flat lining at the moment, that you can resuscitate back to life, but a corpse, that has been dead for a long time and their family (the original KR) already had their funeral, done and buried them and vanished from site.

[CrazyRioter]

Well yes, that's basically what makes it difficult to revive the deadeyes at this point. But it's still possible. Spren aren't like people.

[Calderis]

38 minutes ago, insert_anagram_here said:

That's a very good analogy! 

So following that thought, you could say that Maya isn't a person flat lining at the moment, that you can resuscitate back to life, but a corpse, that has been dead for a long time and their family (the original KR) already had their funeral, done and buried them and vanished from site.

Exactly. Which is why we have multiple WoBs that in world its believed that it would be impossible to revive the Spren. 

All of those WoBs contain some key words. 

[Bigmikey357]

On 3/3/2018 at 8:25 PM, SLNC said:

They have been described as graceful and higly mobile on the battlefield. Nale has not been calling them "dangerous".

When we look at armies, Edgedancers fit one role like a glove. The combat medic. Their surges are perfect. Abrasion for mobility and Progression for healing. Medics are not aggressors. Medics have historically been known to be more pacifistic, than the normal soldier. On a battlefield, the forgotten are often the wounded. It fits. I'm sure, that the Edgedancers will be medics in the battles to come. Not aggressors, who enjoy killing.

I think it's unfair to say that Adolin enjoys killing. Sadeas is the only character on Adolin's bodycount that he felt anything approaching enjoyment. And even that had him questioning himself throughout OB. Mostly we see regret and at times even disgust with the act of killing. For textual evidence, refer to his scenes during the Battle of Narak.

Weighing in on the Maya debate, I can see enough of Adolin and his behavior to consider him a possible Radient and a decent candidate for the Edgedancers. If it is indeed true that Adolin is reviving Maya then he is basically living the second Ideal. He's listening to one who has been ignored. Others have had differing opinions but I agree with those saying Adolin is on the path to Radiance through unconventional, unprecedented means.