"It was Min who figured it out."

[Ripheus23]

I don't know if I should have figured it out beforehand, but when in WoT that's said, I thought that was really cool, clever, whatever, like, of course that would work, and just so. Now it got me thinking, I think that's part of how the Cosmere works. There's always another twist, you could say.

Hoid said something once about being born as words on a page, IIRC, but what if that was literally true? Let's say Adonalsium's magic system used the Cognitive Realm itself as the focus, or in some similar capacity. At any rate, for poetry's sake, the magic system was one based on books about magic. Adonalsium could have those who used Its magic system to cause stories to become real. On Yolen, then, there were prototypes for kinds of magic that would appear later in the Cosmere, because many of those magics came from the stories upon which they were, as such, based. For example, at one time Adonalsium's power was drawn upon so much that the entire Rosharan solar system was manifested like celestial clockwork.

Meanwhile, a popular set of stories about a sort of Cosmere-wide police became real, as Vax, which is a place in Yolen's Cognitive Realm. Or it might just BE that entire region of that Realm, I think there was a thread suggesting so (because Ati mistakes Scadrial's CR for Vax? And Scadrial was based to some extent on Yolen?). Anyway, let's say Hoid was the name of a man who made a character in the story of Vax, named after himself maybe or something. And so on and on, there could be other reasons for this but I suspect there was a special class of people on Yolen who were directly created by Adonalsium. Not as Shards, or even Splinters or Slivers, "just" mortals, but nevertheless these people's degree of Connection to Adonalsium would be extremely special, I imagine. Hoid was one of these, and like the Time Lords, Hoid's order were the guardians of their known universe [random guess: Waxillium will be invited to join in MBE2 book 4]. Maybe the Vessels were also such people, and this is why they thought themselves fit to Ascend. Or at least some saw fit for this reason?

For some reason---maybe inherent darkness, maybe the chaos of the magic It unleashed---Adonalsium's unity became foreboding. So the future Vessels conspired to destroy this unity. That is, some joined for this reason, and others joined to work with those who had joined for this reason. And whatever else was required to convince them of such a deed as the slaughter of God, if anything.

In any event, to the dismay of the Shards, they discovered that over the ages of the ages, Adonalsium was almost guaranteed to be reforged by nature. This knowledge was imparted to them on Ascension, and this set the stage for the problem of the Cosmere thenceforth.

The 17th Shard were formed, then, to help avert the reforging. They might disagree with Odium's methods but he might be the only Shard who was doing much that might have prevented the reforging. Generally they favor nonintervention in a certain sense. Hoid might agree that Adonalsium ought not to be brought back, or at least not without preparation or something like it, but find Odium's mindset so horrific he will prioritize proving that mindset wrong over following his own external course. He's honor-bound to fight Odium's methods, so to say.

This, then, becomes the process of the Cosmere question. Several Shards settle on one world. As a result, they accelerate the reforging almost automatically, or at least pose a serious risk of acceleration this. This happens several times. Ambition's goal is actually to gain all the Shards herself, to control the acceleration. Or she is suspected of such, and Odium, who cherishes his autonomy, does not desire for her mission to be completed. (Autonomy is anomalously linked to all the other Shards' Investiture, maybe. Like, there's a quantity of Investiture assigned to the 15 other Shards, and then some of each 1/15th is assigned dual with Autonomy. IDK but maybe it's possible?) Honor either believes or knows that his marriage to Cultivation is something able to block Shardic fusion. Odium either doesn't believe or doesn't care about this.

However, by now Rayse is trapped in the Rosharan system. I was trying to imagine an ending for SA5 that would be symmetrical to the end of MBE1. So, I thought, Odium needs to be trapped, so what if it's not that Dalinar holds the Shard of Honor but that he and Kaladin and the other protagonists force Odium to hold Honor? The twist would be that we know from Harmony's situation that there's not an instant leap to ultimate deity. Honor and Odium are as per a WoB capable of equilibrium far more easily than Ruin and Preservation are, but at least because he was so averse to holding other Shards, maybe Odium would have to spend a period of time "sealed away" for the duration of his acclimation. This could explain the inter-timetable for the two five-book SA arcs, with Rayse having to spend the corresponding time reconciling his newfold handling of two Shards.

I think what could happen next would be that Odium kills Cultivation when he emerges from his short stasis, or is killed and his Shards are taken by Cultivation, who becomes the first triadic Shard (and unlike Sazed is a Shard at the time she does so), or maybe Endowment steps in and after Odium and Cultivation are both dead and takes those Shards, with Honor, back to Nalthis, to insulate her world against the other Shards (as a tetradyadic Shard she'd have what would at that time be an unusual level of magical power). Who knows but I think the epilogue issue will be that with Rayse dead, no one is out there halting the reforging of Adonalsium, and there is at least one Shard actively trying to accelerate this event.

I'm speculating in these directions based on my impressions of factions like the Ire or the Ghostbloods. The Ire, for instance, might be highly aware that Ascensions that can be manipulated are likely to take place here or there, and be interested in trying to affect the flow of the reforging process thereby. Sel is also a prime planet for a fusion episode, depending on what is done to AonDor in the future. (On a meta-note, I wonder if the healing-and-revival magics of the different systems, being used, would be able to add to the reforging in general, if such a thing is taking place as such?) Let's say there are different notions of how to deal with the day of the Lord, so to speak. And the Ghostbloods always want to profit off the apocalypse.

Now, when Scadrial overcomes Trell (I'm guessing end of MBE3), they might be interested in finding out where Trell came from, so they would, if they hadn't by then, discover the issue of the reforging. This would be a good time to introduce the survival Shard (not, I think, a Shard of Wisdom---I think most if not all of the Shards are wise enough anyway to "want to survive"; it's more likely this Shard prides itself on its Intent so much that it can't bear to see itself, as such, die), the not-on-a-planet Shard, maybe bring in problems with Ambition's remains (as a presumed cause of Threnody's problems?). Not that other times couldn't be good but the "takes/took place in outer space" theme of all this interludes might just as well, or more easily, add up to an aspect of MBE4. At any rate, there might even be only a few Vessels by then, like maybe just 4, one holding 8, another 4, and the other two 2 each. Or some other combination (10, 2, 2, 2; 6, 5, 3, 2; etc.). Autonomy might be a likely candidate for absolute Ascension, or maybe the Ghostbloods were organized as the equivalent of uppity Cosmere skaa who want to place a Vessel during the super-Ascension, and so on and on or whatever. A lot can happen, and a lot, it will turn out, couldn't have happened.

[TrдVψLшR 0115 he/him]

Could u provide some context to that wot quote? I can’t remember...

[Calderis he/him]

2 hours ago, Ripheus23 said:

Hoid said something once about being born as words on a page, IIRC, but what if that was literally true?

To my knowledge, it is... Not quite sure how that works though. 

Quote

Questioner

(...) like Hoid saying he got his life as words on a page.

Brandon Sanderson

It can be taken both ways, but it is actually literal. I'm not sure how much I can say about this, but... Let's say that it's referencing where he got his nickname/pseudonym.

Questioner

I thought he maybe stole a character from a book and (hid himself? indistinctive...)

Brandon Sanderson

It is something like that. People think it's like a big wink breaking the 4th wall, but at the time I was just looking back at his past and wanted something I could say that is esoteric and referenced his past.

source

As to the rest of your post... I don't agree and I'll leave it at that. 

[TrдVψLшR 0115 he/him]

Ok @Calderis what does he mean by “it can be taken both ways”? Because it sounds to me like Hoid is just saying I took my mentors name position mission whatever. If that’s one way what’s the other? That it’s completely literall?

[Calderis he/him]

@PelekinikeleT I think his persona, his name and his goals, started out as a story and grew into something he took on. Not that he was literally a character.

We have to RAFO though 

[Ripheus23]

LOL I came up with some crazy fanfiction idea based on this. Some prologue where a world has magic based on vehicles so they invent a spaceship and some weird dude stows away on it and reveals he's Hoid when the ship accidentally reaches some huge meeting where there are Scadrian ships and Rosharan ones, something from Vax (ships made long ago directly by Adonalsium's power maybe), etc. Then Hoid thanks the captain for giving him a ride to the meeting and says something like, "My name is Hoid. Or, if that's not mysterious enough, you can call me 'Cephandrius' or 'Midius.' If you prefer impressive titles, I go by 'the Herald of Adonalsium' and 'the God's Wit.' 'The Bearer of the First Gem.' 'The Last Betrayer,'" or something, and so on and on.

EDIT:

Some other articles of evidence...

Hoid uses proto-Lightweaving and possibly an Awakened musical instrument, during storytelling episodes.

Ruin can change scriptures in the Physical Realm.

Also it occurred to me, why are none of the Cosmere religions correct? They all worship non-Shards or treat Shards as God, or some other error, it seems. The Terris religion did worship Preservation but let's suppose it was technically incorrect since Ruin helped create Scadrial. And so on and on. And then there's the Austre issue on Nalthis, along with the Hallandren problem. Basically, my guess is that scriptural documents inherited Adonalsium's power to some extent, or are the exemplars of it, or whatever, something that makes it so that Shards have to be "careful with" religions or they'll be controlled by them, maybe. Like how the Lady of Pain in D&D is obviously transdivine but refuses worship for some reason.

So also this gave me an idea for where the Scadrian prophecies came from. It seems as if Ruin altered those to make giving up the Well's power seem imperative, but those prophecies might've had a different source for their original wording. (If Ruin made up that prophecy in the first place, why not just automatically have it speak of giving up the power?) Also Preservation must've been aware that the Hero of Ages situation wasn't going to go the way the prophecy said, so I think if the prophecies were supposed to be transcripts of Preservation's plans, well, that didn't go so well. (Also, wouldn't Preservation know that Ruin was going to mess with the transcripts?) So, what if the whole story of Era One Scadrial had already been written, so to speak, as a series of stories on Yolen? Let's suppose the story was itself geographically/setting-wise based on Yolen, so when Ati and Leras made a world, they made it based on a story based on Yolen, so that Scadrial is, still, based on Yolen. But anyway, in this story there was a description of a Rabzeen or Anamnesor or whatever, and so on and on. So that would be where those prophecies came from.

(I had a thought that Khriss and Nazh are aware of the stories used by Adonalsium in evolving the Cosmere pre-Shattering, if that kind of thing happened. (I also thought: let's say Adonalsium was like the Childlike Empress of Fantastica in The Neverending Story, and Sanderson was going to write up some wild homage thing where Adonalsium "has to be given a new name" or he'll die, and the Vessels killed him by refusing to "give him a new name.") I was thinking: there's the 17th Shard, the Ghostbloods, the Ire, Hoid's group (all storytellers? the Worldsingers and the Worldbringers...?), but Khriss and Nazh seem to be in their own group. If the 17th Shard is a high-level government-like group, the Ghostbloods a rebel/covert group, the Ire a group trying to maneuver an Ascension (let's say their goal is to resurrect Aona and they believe this would be possible if they had the power of a living Shard to draw on as such, so their rationale is nationalistic), then if, nevertheless, there were these Yolish fantasy books spread across the Cosmere, there might be a group of non-Yolish who have found copies of these books and that's their raison d'etre (to figure out where the books came from, and what is going to happen if the books come true---Khriss, et. al. are living the RAFO life, so to say).)

Edited October 6, 2018 by Ripheus23