Hemalurgic Table and Roshar

[jamesgrey]

Hi, a bit of an oddball thought that came to me when reading the new hemalurgic metal table coupled with the fact that we have quotes that “hemalurgy is the magic system with the greatest likelihood of cosmere wide impact” and we know we have seen hemalurgy used elsewhere.

For Lerasium and Atium I simplified the table definitions in my mind to “Lerasium can steal everything” and “Atium can steal anything.” Basically, Atium is much more versatile and nuanced (or in other words, it *ruins* the original whole) while Lerasium is much more powerful but broad (in other words, it *preserves* the original by moving everything notable at the same time).

Over in Roshar we have had a WOB then when Moash killed Jezrien he prevented his soul from entering the normal herald cycle of rebirth (seemingly by sealing it in that gem). That also felt to me a bit like a hemalurgic trick although focused on his spiritual and cognitive being rather than a specific investiture power.

After this table, my nutjob theory is that the dagger moash used was made of Lerasium or some similar god metal and it basically stole “everything” that is Jezrien and put it into that gem rather than another body. My even crazier theory is does that mean that someone with that dagger could (if aimed properly) implant Jezrien, fully, in another body?

 

 

 

[SwordNimiForPresident]

I believe it is widely speculated that each Shards metal would have its own unique Hemalurgic properties. As an example, the spike that Paalm used in Era 2 wasn't from Ruin/Preservation/Harmony, and is therefor likely from an off world Shard. It seems plausible to me that the golden metal that the dagger was made of is Odium's metal.

[jamesgrey]

Yea, my main point is that the dagger itself is likely a hemalurgic spike made of some god metal and st least as important as the flashing gem on the pommel. I had forgotten it was gold though, so I like that idea it is made of Raysium(?)

[+Invocation]

It is very likely that it functions in a similar way to Hemalurgy at its fundamentals, but Moash would have had to know that it was Hemalurgy to make it work correctly, as Intent is a large part of Hemalurgy's correct workings, at least on Scadrial, though I do not know why it would change on another planet, per the second WOB.

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Questioner

Allomancy requires, you need to be either a Misting or a Mistborn to be able to do that. But Hemalurgy you just need to stab someone through the heart. So what would stop someone on Roshar from using Hemalurgy, because it's not Innate? Do you have to be in proximity to Ruin?

Brandon Sanderson

Intent is a big part of a lot of the magics, including Hemalurgy, meaning that you need to know what you're doing. Or somebody needs to-- There needs to be Intent involved in what's happening to you.

Questioner

So like with Spook when he got spiked, where was the Intent?

Brandon Sanderson

The person who was driving that spike was being influenced by Ruin, and the Intent was there.

Questioner

So unless you knew what you were trying to do with a Hemalurgic spike, you couldn't do Hemalurgy?

Brandon Sanderson

You could not steal attributes no.

Questioner 2

Is it possible to steal Surgebindings.

Brandon Sanderson

It is possible to steal Surgebinding.

Questioner

Is there going to be crossover, like is someone going to have Feruchemical powers and also Surgebinding?

Brandon Sanderson

That's a Read And Find Out.

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katkov

How important is Intent to Hemalurgy? If two people who didn't know about Hemalurgy were running and tripped, falling perfectly onto a spike, would Hemalurgy occur? What about if it was a sick psychopath who liked stabbing people with spikes instead of an accident?

Would the planet these events occurred on matter?

Brandon Sanderson

Location is not relevant to most of the magics.

As for those specifics of Hemalurgy, I will RAFO for now.

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[jamesgrey]

That’s a great point, although a simple line from his handlers to Moash like “go hear, stab him in this place and it will kill him and trap his soul. It worked if the gem flashes,” would give him all the intent I think he would need. And godmetals may require less precision in aim.

You could also argue that Moash was being influenced by Odium and the Intent was *there*

[SwordNimiForPresident]

1 minute ago, jamesgrey said:

That’s a great point, although a simple line from his handlers to Moash like “go hear, stab him in this place and it will kill him and trap his soul. It worked if the gem flashes,” would give him all the intent I think he would need. And godmetals may require less precision in aim.

You could also argue that Moash was being influenced by Odium and the Intent was *there*

The Inquisitors spiked a bunch of people while under Ruin's control, so maybe Odium's intent is enough to allow one of his minions to spike someone. Granted, Ruin was directly controlling the Inquisitor's not just influencing them.

[Quantus]

1 hour ago, jamesgrey said:

For Lerasium and Atium I simplified the table definitions in my mind to “Lerasium can steal everything” and “Atium can steal anything.” Basically, Atium is much more versatile and nuanced (or in other words, it *ruins* the original whole) while Lerasium is much more powerful but broad (in other words, it *preserves* the original by moving everything notable at the same time).

 

Lerasium spike steal "All Abilities" while Atium spike steal "any Power".  I dont know what the exact difference it, but I think that's going to be a very key distinction. 

Based on the word choice in the rest of the chart, I think Atium will specifically steal Investiture-related abilities (allomantic, feruchemical, etc) while Lerasium will instead be able to all the victims actual personal attributes like Senses, Strength, Mental Fortitude, etc.  This would be a change from our previous belief that Atium could mimic the function of any other spike (making it limited to Powers) but it would better fit the chart as written.  If "Powers" can equal those other innate things, then an aluminum spike should turn the recipient into a mindless slug...

[Weltall]

2 hours ago, SwordNimiForPresident said:

The Inquisitors spiked a bunch of people while under Ruin's control, so maybe Odium's intent is enough to allow one of his minions to spike someone. Granted, Ruin was directly controlling the Inquisitor's not just influencing them.

As you say, we see one of these spiking scenes from Marsh's viewpoint and not only was he acting on Ruin's orders to spike someone, he had Ruin literally guiding his aim to hit the right bindpoint. Odium would have to have been doing something similar to Moash if he was actually doing hemalurgy and there's absolutely no indication in the text that it's happening, nor is there any reason for us to think that Odium knows enough about hemalurgy to provide the necessary guidance anyways.

Brandon has said that Moash's knife is 'similar' to hemalurgy but it's not the same thing. The dagger itself is probably Odium's godmetal ('Rayseium' or something like that) since it doesn't look like any of the other known godmetals but the faint golden color does fit with how Rayse presents himself both to Dalinar and to the Singers and requires far fewer assumptions than Odium somehow getting his hands on godmetal from other planets. Since we're looking at something similar to but not identical to hemalurgy, whatever Moash did probably doesn't have the same requirements as hemalurgy and just killing Jezrien with the knife was enough to do the trick.

Edited January 15, 2019 by Weltall