Who will bond Yelig-Nar?

[Pathfinder]

17 hours ago, Invocation said:

Amaram also talks about him like they're speaking together, so intelligence is likely, I'd just forgotten about that bit until just now.

I do think Amaram was beginning to lose control by the end because that's what Kaladin was trying to do, it's why he was verbally sparring with Amaram as much as physically sparring, but he was in control enough to still experience legitimate emotions for a good period of time. At the end, though, he was probably driven mad by pain and anger, just in time to get killed.

Aesudan might have lost control because Yelig-nar was struggling within her, actively trying to overwhelm her, unlike Amaram, leading the way for Odium to move in with his forces directly once she was gone.

Personally I think based on the descriptions that Aesudan and Amaram reached the same point of transformation. If we are led to believe Aesudan could not control Yelig-nar, then I think the crystals forming and actually consuming the person's body is an indication of loss of control. I feel the progression of each individual supports this. Aesudan swallowed the crystal just prior to Elhokar walking up. Right after that the crystallization progressed rather quickly. In Amaram's case the crystallization started slow, but then started to accelerate. That indicates to me that he barely had more control than Aesudan, and over the course of the battle was quickly losing it. I posit that had Amaram not been killed, he too would have been consumed. But that is my opinion based on the reading. Got nothing completely conclusive to back it up. 

13 hours ago, Ripheus23 said:

Nightblood will bond Yelig-nar and the Night of Sorrows will become the Night of Blood  The Transdesolation cometh, en garde!

I think that would be a competition on who could consume who first lol. Or it could be an endless loop like the snake that eats its own tail. Yelig-nar consumes Nightblood, as Nightblood consumes Yelig-nar, thus making the perfect host!

9 hours ago, Ciridae said:

Do we know how long Aesudan had the gem ingested? As soon as Amaram swallowed it he started transforming. But it seems to me like Aesudan had swallowed the gem long before and was just "activating" it when Kaladin and Elhokar came along. Is it possible to  transform back from the crystal body? I wouldn't think so, because it's messing with your spirit web pretty severely but anything is possible. 

I will need to pull up the scene again, but I feel I recall as Elhokar and Kaladin run up, they notice it appears as if she had just swallowed something. So that says to me it is a similar time frame to Amaram, just he seems to last a bit longer than her. 

3 hours ago, Quantus said:

Probably depends on the nature of the process. If it's like a Listener Form it might be reversible, and I think that's likely since it appears to act as a Gemheart.  I tend to think Amaram was being more actively manipulated and/or accelerated by Odium directly, he seemed to be taking command of a lot of things during that battle. 

I'd go with that.  I tend to consider Yelig-Nar as the Ultimate Form of Power (with the Gem acting as a supplemental gemheart) and the Forms (even forms of Power) are specifically provided by the "lesser" spren rather than the fully-sapient types.

 

As far as who might get him, I dont think it will need to be a Fighter like Amaram. We're talking about a person who gets ALL surges, which would imply that Anything Radiants can do s/he can do.  That would theoretically include the non-combat things like Elsecalling, Truthwatching (whatever that is) and what Im pretty sure are damnation scary spiritual things that a Bondsmith could do.  Not to mention the potential for all kinds of unique resonances.  The other question I have is which Version of the surges they'd get? Even setting aside the potential Inverted Surges of Voidbinding, Bondsmiths and Stonewards use Tension differently, so I wonder what manifest differences might come. 

If I had to guess on a new bearer purely based on narrative potential, I'd look to Mrall:  he has the ability/Authority to put Mr.T in a metaphoric (maybe literal) box, a fact that I fully expect will be exploited at some point. He's a linchpin...

 

Multiple powers of a certain threshhold no longer produce resonances. So mistborn do not get resonances. As per WoB. So Yelig-nar would not produce resonances. 

 

 

edit:correction, we may be thinking in the wrong direction. Aesudan may have been better at it than Amaram. I re-read the scene, and it showed she had already bonded with Yelig-nar. In fact she implies she had bonded with him awhile ago. When they first walk in she seems fine, and speaks of turning her men into her own radiants. It wasn't till Kaladin and Elhokar arrived and they talk for a bit before her eyes start to glow red and she begins to change. Conversely, the moment Amaram swallowed the gem he started to change. So potentially Aesudan controlled it better for longer. The only other possibility I can think of, is as you use the surges, or tap into Yelig-nar he starts to actively consume you. Since Amaram was using the abilities from the get go, he got consumed in a short period of time, while Aesudan didn't start really using Yelig-nar till Kaladin and Elhokar showed up. 

Edited January 18, 2019 by Pathfinder

[Quantus he/him]

9 minutes ago, Pathfinder said:

Multiple powers of a certain threshhold no longer produce resonances. So mistborn do not get resonances. As per WoB. So Yelig-nar would not produce resonances. 

Excellent point, Id forgotten that mistborn bit. I still do wonder what version of each Surge it provides, given that different Orders manifest them in qualitatively different ways.

[Kon-Tiki he/him]

Do they? Jasnah and Shallan soulcast the same way. Kaladin and Szeth fly the same way. Renarin and Shallan's Illumination is different but there's pretty clear reason that that might be the case. Renarin and Lift's Progression seems to work the same way at the very least. Even Dalinar and Kaladin's Adhesion works the same way, unless you're talking Spiritual Adhesion. But I'd chalk that up as Just Bondsmith Things.

[Pathfinder]

12 minutes ago, Quantus said:

Excellent point, Id forgotten that mistborn bit. I still do wonder what version of each Surge it provides, given that different Orders manifest them in qualitatively different ways.

Thank you. I think it provides the radiant surges from what little we see, though I admit it is far from conclusive. Cohesion seems to work the way we saw the stoneward use it in Dalinar's vision. Division seems to work in the manner alluded to in the past writings. Abrasion allows Amaram to skate forward on one leg. I think he also reduces his gravity to jump up and catch Kaladin at one point. 

7 minutes ago, Kon-Tiki said:

Do they? Jasnah and Shallan soulcast the same way. Kaladin and Szeth fly the same way. Renarin and Shallan's Illumination is different but there's pretty clear reason that that might be the case. Renarin and Lift's Progression seems to work the same way at the very least. Even Dalinar and Kaladin's Adhesion works the same way, unless you're talking Spiritual Adhesion. But I'd chalk that up as Just Bondsmith Things.

People theorize that Jasnah can soulcast at range due to the combination of transportation and transformation while Shallan theoretically can not. Others theorize that Shallan can make her illusions solid with a combination of transformation and illumination while Renarin theoretically would not (if he had been a normal truthwatcher). Some theorize that what Shallan did to inspire the soldiers that deserted by combining illusion and transformation. Renarin seems to be more natural at his use of regrowth than Lift. That is kind of the point being made. A Bondsmith thing regarding adhesion is spiritual and brings people together. A windrunner thing may be more physical. 

Edited January 18, 2019 by Pathfinder

[Kon-Tiki he/him]

People seem to think that each Order gets a big singular Resonance but I've always seen it as a bunch of little resonances. But that doesn't mean that the Surges respond "qualitatively differently" for each Order as @Quantus said, that's just a blurring of lines due to multiple Surges. In theory, Yelig-nar wouldn't be able to blur those lines.

[Pathfinder]

29 minutes ago, Kon-Tiki said:

People seem to think that each Order gets a big singular Resonance but I've always seen it as a bunch of little resonances. But that doesn't mean that the Surges respond "qualitatively differently" for each Order as @Quantus said, that's just a blurring of lines due to multiple Surges. In theory, Yelig-nar wouldn't be able to blur those lines.

Brandon has confirmed that the windrunner resonance is the number of squires and the power of said squires. I think he said the lightweavers resonance is their mnemonic memory ability, though that I can not recall if it was expressly confirmed. I will need to check. 

[+Hoiditthroughthegrapevine he/him]

1 hour ago, Pathfinder said:

The only other possibility I can think of, is as you use the surges, or tap into Yelig-nar he starts to actively consume you. Since Amaram was using the abilities from the get go, he got consumed in a short period of time, while Aesudan didn't start really using Yelig-nar till Kaladin and Elhokar showed up.

I think this definitely seems to be the case, and further I think that this self-consuming transformation when bonded with Yelig-nar is symbolic of the main theme of Odium, namely that by fueling your hatred with your passion you consume yourself and are left with a void. It's no coincidence I think that both Aseudan and Amaram's chest cavities were hollowed out wrecks, and also that their hearts had seemingly been replaced with the swallowed Gem.

Hatred enflames passion which leads to passion fueled self-consuming acts of hatred which leads to the Void, the whole Odious journey all tied up in a nice visual metaphor.

It would be interesting to re-read the Aseudan and Amaram scenes and see if there is a positive correlation between the rate of gem-ification to the apparent magnitude of their hatred/passion.

If like @Pathfinder surmises, Yelig-nar also consumes the bonded vessel's spirit web, then Yelig-nar will always only be an auxiliary temporary force, unless the transformation is reversible. Though, since Aseudan is dead and wasn't killed directly, it seems likely that the transformation is irreversible and given the extreme physical transformation (kind of similar to soulcaster's turning into the substance they soulcast) it seems likely that once the transformation has reached a specific threshold it is a terminal condition.

That's why I think it would be pretty awesome if the Yelig-nar only consumes the physical vessel. That would opens up 3 of the coolest possibilities in my mind.

1. A Fused like Turash like @Invocation suggests.
2. A Herald like Nale or I think even more likely to succeed Ishar/Tezim
3. A Sleepless.

Any of the above three could handle the destructive side effects of bonding Yelig-nar if it's restricted to damage to the physical vessel, and like I said earlier I think the most interesting case would be Ishar. That fact that one of his divine attributes is guiding might help him to control Yelig-nar without the downside of having his physical form consumed, and possibly if Yelig-nar consumes the spirit web as well, Ishar would be able to circumvent this side effect as well?

The sleepless are ostensible allies of the Radiants, but really, we don't know too much about them other than that Arclo is super creepy and is capable of making short work of two Skybreaker squires. They could probably also withstand being consumed physically and spiritually, and probably have the best chance of disengaging or reversing the bonding process.

 

 

Edited January 18, 2019 by hoiditthroughthegrapevine

[Quantus he/him]

51 minutes ago, Kon-Tiki said:

People seem to think that each Order gets a big singular Resonance but I've always seen it as a bunch of little resonances. But that doesn't mean that the Surges respond "qualitatively differently" for each Order as @Quantus said, that's just a blurring of lines due to multiple Surges. In theory, Yelig-nar wouldn't be able to blur those lines.

 Im not talking about Resonances when I say they operate differently, Im talking about how the Stormfather specifically told Dalinar that his Surge would work differently than for the Stoneward in his vision.  It's not going to be different in every case (Windrunner and Skybreakers certainly seem to use Gravitation the same) but there are differences between various Orders' expressions of individual surges.

[Kon-Tiki he/him]

I always assumed that was because Bondsmiths Are Weird, but I could very much be wrong about that

[CrazyRioter she/her]

Also that scene is a continuity error because Bondsmiths don't have access to Cohesion (the Surge the Stoneward was using).

[Pathfinder]

2 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

I think this definitely seems to be the case, and further I think that this self-consuming transformation when bonded with Yelig-nar is symbolic of the main theme of Odium, namely that by fueling your hatred with your passion you consume yourself and are left with a void. It's no coincidence I think that both Aseudan and Amaram's chest cavities were hollowed out wrecks, and also that their hearts had seemingly been replaced with the swallowed Gem.

Hatred enflames passion which leads to passion fueled self-consuming acts of hatred which leads to the Void, the whole Odious journey all tied up in a nice visual metaphor.

It would be interesting to re-read the Aseudan and Amaram scenes and see if there is a positive correlation between the rate of gem-ification to the apparent magnitude of their hatred/passion.

If like @Pathfinder surmises, Yelig-nar also consumes the bonded vessel's spirit web, then Yelig-nar will always only be an auxiliary temporary force, unless the transformation is reversible. Though, since Aseudan is dead and wasn't killed directly, it seems likely that the transformation is irreversible and given the extreme physical transformation (kind of similar to soulcaster's turning into the substance they soulcast) it seems likely that once the transformation has reached a specific threshold it is a terminal condition.

That's why I think it would be pretty awesome if the Yelig-nar only consumes the physical vessel. That would opens up 3 of the coolest possibilities in my mind.

1. A Fused like Turash like @Invocation suggests.
2. A Herald like Nale or I think even more likely to succeed Ishar/Tezim
3. A Sleepless.

Any of the above three could handle the destructive side effects of bonding Yelig-nar if it's restricted to damage to the physical vessel, and like I said earlier I think the most interesting case would be Ishar. That fact that one of his divine attributes is guiding might help him to control Yelig-nar without the downside of having his physical form consumed, and possibly if Yelig-nar consumes the spirit web as well, Ishar would be able to circumvent this side effect as well?

The sleepless are ostensible allies of the Radiants, but really, we don't know too much about them other than that Arclo is super creepy and is capable of making short work of two Skybreaker squires. They could probably also withstand being consumed physically and spiritually, and probably have the best chance of disengaging or reversing the bonding process.

 

 

So I re-read the scenes again. The way things progressed is shown below:

Aesudan

1. Kaladin and Elhokar walk in on Aesudan. She appears normal but is acting strange

2. She speaks with them for a little while. Says she controls Yelig-nar

3. Her eyes begin to glow and smoke begins to slow around her

4. We see her later walking down the steps with crystal like carapace covering her

5. Crystals cover her chest cavity

 

Amaram

1. Kaladin arrives to Amaram falling to his knees, realizing he just swallowed something (he made a choking motion)

2. Amaram's eyes glowed red (this is less poignant as his eyes were already glowing red after the Thrill did its thing to him and his people)

3. Amaram becomes wreathed in black smoke. they begin to fight

4. Crystals start breaking through Amaram's armor

5. More description of crystals breaking out of armor, till chest plate gets shattered revealing crystals covering his chest cavity (of interest, yelig-nar also consumes "inorganic" matter. It ate his armor padding. 

 

Makes me wonder with the joke about nightblood, does Yelig-nar kind of work that way? Like if you do not have a way to pull in stormlight or investiture, he will instead feed on you, ultimately killing you? Both Aesudan and Amaram could not draw upon stormlight, so when they used the surges Yelig-nar provided them, he used their essence/body to fuel it? Which would explain why Amaram seemingly burns up faster? That would potentially further support that Yelig-nar consumes as you use him. 

 

edit: Hmmmm if this is true, then maybe Odium really did set Aesudan and Amaram up for failure. He knew they couldn't draw on outside investiture, so it would be only a matter of time for them to use the abilities Yelig-nar provides, and kill themselves. 

2 hours ago, Quantus said:

 Im not talking about Resonances when I say they operate differently, Im talking about how the Stormfather specifically told Dalinar that his Surge would work differently than for the Stoneward in his vision.  It's not going to be different in every case (Windrunner and Skybreakers certainly seem to use Gravitation the same) but there are differences between various Orders' expressions of individual surges.

Yes what the Stormfather said about Dalinar's surge working differently is unrelated to the mistaken identification of cohesion when it should have been tension. So yes, as per the Stormfather, Dalinar's surges should work uniquely as a bondsmith when compared to the same surge being used by another order. 

1 hour ago, Kon-Tiki said:

I always assumed that was because Bondsmiths Are Weird, but I could very much be wrong about that

A recent WoB that I will need to dig to find now states the recharging of stormlight is also a bondsmith thing. Could have to do with spiritual adhesion as well. I theorize that when Dalinar caught the chasmfiend claw in his hands, but somehow kept his shardplate in one piece, was him unconsciously using tension to strengthen it. 

1 hour ago, CrazyRioter said:

Also that scene is a continuity error because Bondsmiths don't have access to Cohesion (the Surge the Stoneward was using).

Yep yep, they have access to Tension. It is Willshapers that share cohesion with Stonewards. 

Edited January 18, 2019 by Pathfinder