Why does Marsh have feruchemic atium?

[+Lewis Nethur He/Him]

As the title states, why did Ruin grant Marsh feruchemic atium? Do we have any reason for that? He was making a champion he only planned to need for a few days and was going to kill off afterwards by destroying the planet. He could have given Marsh, or one of the other inquisitors with fewer spikes, any other feruchemic power with that same spike, why waste it giving him eternal youth?

[The Harlem Worldhoppers he/him]

I made a post discussing this very thing just a few days ago

Very short story: I think Ruin intended on destroying as many worlds as he could which would take a very long time. His inquisitors act as his ground forces and would need to live very long lives to turn Ruin's plan into a reality.

 

[Calderis he/him]

Ninja'd by the OP of the thread I was going to reference. 

The other alternative is that Sazed gave him the ability, because he could. No spike needed. 

Edited July 3, 2018 by Calderis

[The Harlem Worldhoppers he/him]

10 minutes ago, Calderis said:

Ninja'd by the OP of the thread I was going to reference. 

Ninja-ing you is probably my greatest achievement so far on these forums  

 

13 minutes ago, Calderis said:

The other alternative is that Sazed gave him the ability, because he could. No spike needed. 

Nah we know for certain that the spike came from the dead inquisitors in Luthadel, not Sazed.

 

zas678

Why on earth does Marsh have a Feruchemical atium spike? You've said that Ironeyes is in fact Marsh. Did Ruin spike someone for him? Or did Sazed grant him the power?

Brandon Sanderson

Dead inquisitors Vin killed. Some were granted the spike for reasons I haven't spoken of yet.

[+robardin he/him]

2 hours ago, The Harlem Worldhoppers said:

Nah we know for certain that the spike came from the dead inquisitors in Luthadel, not Sazed.

zas678

Why on earth does Marsh have a Feruchemical atium spike? You've said that Ironeyes is in fact Marsh. Did Ruin spike someone for him? Or did Sazed grant him the power?

Brandon Sanderson

Dead inquisitors Vin killed. Some were granted the spike for reasons I haven't spoken of yet.

That raises an even more interesting question, then: why Marsh, as the super-spiked Inquisitor that was apparently Ruin's favorite, didn't have the F-atium spike initially, but had to harvest it from a dead Inquisitor killed by Vin. It's highly improbable that the spike came as a mandate from TLR, right? It must have been a spike created from a Feruchemist taken in the Inquisitor raid on the Synod after Rashek's demise.

Which brings to mind another issue I've always wondered about: aside from plot reasons (that Marsh would be strong enough of will and originally in league with Kelsier, and also be the main pawn of Ruin), it seems an odd choice to me that Ruin would settle on Marsh as his primary piece, as he was an Inquisitor originally created from a Seeker Misting. The Steel Ministry would value such Inquisitors as it would mean their A-bronze would "stack" with the hemalurgic spike to the point of being able to pierce copperclouds (as we saw with Bendal following Vin on the rooftops, until Sazed rescued her), but shouldn't there have been at least one Inquisitor who had been made originally from a full Mistborn, and thus require far fewer spikes, or who would "stack" multiple allomantic powers instead of just A-bronze, that would be more attractive to Ruin?

Or was there something about Marsh's strength of will (in betraying TLR at the end of The Final Empire) that attracted Ruin?

 

[MountainKing]

19 minutes ago, robardin said:

That raises an even more interesting question, then: why Marsh, as the super-spiked Inquisitor that was apparently Ruin's favorite, didn't have the F-atium spike initially, but had to harvest it from a dead Inquisitor killed by Vin. It's highly improbable that the spike came as a mandate from TLR, right? It must have been a spike created from a Feruchemist taken in the Inquisitor raid on the Synod after Rashek's demise.

Which brings to mind another issue I've always wondered about: aside from plot reasons (that Marsh would be strong enough of will and originally in league with Kelsier, and also be the main pawn of Ruin), it seems an odd choice to me that Ruin would settle on Marsh as his primary piece, as he was an Inquisitor originally created from a Seeker Misting. The Steel Ministry would value such Inquisitors as it would mean their A-bronze would "stack" with the hemalurgic spike to the point of being able to pierce copperclouds (as we saw with Bendal following Vin on the rooftops, until Sazed rescued her), but shouldn't there have been at least one Inquisitor who had been made originally from a full Mistborn, and thus require far fewer spikes, or who would "stack" multiple allomantic powers instead of just A-bronze, that would be more attractive to Ruin?

Or was there something about Marsh's strength of will (in betraying TLR at the end of The Final Empire) that attracted Ruin?

 

Marsh was one of his favorites because he didn't focus on Marsh, Marsh would break away.

[MountainKing]

3 hours ago, The Harlem Worldhoppers said:

I made a post discussing this very thing just a few days ago

Very short story: I think Ruin intended on destroying as many worlds as he could which would take a very long time. His inquisitors act as his ground forces and would need to live very long lives to turn Ruin's plan into a reality.

 

How do you do those fancy quote boxes?

[The Harlem Worldhoppers he/him]

30 minutes ago, robardin said:

Marsh would be strong enough of will and originally in league with Kelsier, and also be the main pawn of Ruin), it seems an odd choice to me that Ruin would settle on Marsh as his primary piece,

I found this odd as well. As you said above, it had to be Marsh as Ruin's main pawn from a narrative perspective as Marsh would then be in a position to resist Ruin at that one key moment. I guess Ruin's in world logic might have been to demoralise Vin and co. as they watch their former friend become their greatest foe. Ruin did enjoy toying with people and he probably felt so confident in his control over Marsh that he neglected the strength of Marsh's resolve. 

I think the feruchemical Atium spikes were made in between Final Empire and Well of Ascension by the Inquisitors that attacked the Synod (filled with Feruchemist's to harvest from) under Ruin's influence. Marsh was not fully under Ruin's control at this stage and due to this as well as the decrease in potency of hemallurgic spikes over time, the Inquisitors that attacked the Synod would have been granted the spikes ahead of Marsh.

Edit: @MountainKing you copy and paste the url of the separate post you want to quote.

Also, you can quote fragments of someone's post by highlighting the specific text and clicking 'quote this'

Edited July 3, 2018 by The Harlem Worldhoppers

[Calderis he/him]

3 hours ago, The Harlem Worldhoppers said:

Nah we know for certain that the spike came from the dead inquisitors in Luthadel, not Sazed.

Bah, I knew that, just like he replaced his missing eye spike from them. 

Thank you for correcting me. It's already hard to remember all the WoBs. What are we gonna do in 20 years? 

Edited July 3, 2018 by Calderis

[The Harlem Worldhoppers he/him]

Just now, Calderis said:

Bah, I knew that, just like he replaced his missing eye spike from them. 

Thank you for correcting me. It's already hard to remember all the WoBs. What are we gonna do in 28 years? 

Hopefully technology has advanced to the point where humans can get cybernetic upgrades  

Then all of the WoB's ever uttered can be stored in an internal hard drive for perfect recollection. I'd call my hard drive a coppermind of course.

[Calderis he/him]

4 minutes ago, The Harlem Worldhoppers said:

I'd call my hard drive a coppermind of course.

I've joked before about uploading my consciousness to the internet, and living on as a Digital Shadow. 

Edited July 3, 2018 by Calderis

[The Harlem Worldhoppers he/him]

1 minute ago, Calderis said:

I've joked before about uploading my consciousness to the internet, and living on a Digital Shadow. 

Getting serious Westworld vibes from this  

[Weltall]

17 minutes ago, Calderis said:

Thank you for correcting me. It's already hard to remember all the WoBs. What are we gonna do in 20 years? 

Get cyberpunk copperminds implanted in our heads?