Nightblood and Aluminium

[Dancer]

So Brandon has said that burning Aluminium can purge the soul of unwanted investiture. Example of this is Brandon confirming that burning Aluminium can stop the withering of a Shade. This got me thinking, if you were cut by Nightblood and you burnt Aluminium just in time could you stop the absorption and corruption effects of the sword. 

[Quantus he/him]

Interesting Idea.  Id give it a solid Maybe.  On the one hand they're using an Aluminum sheath to contain the power of Nightblood the rest of the time, so the mechanism should work.  On the other hand you are talk about directly opposing Investiture effects, and Nightblood is waaaay more invested than any Allomancy the average Mistborn could use, it would likely require a flair at least, and maybe some Duralumin enhancement.      

[A Secret Corner he/him]

1 hour ago, Quantus said:

Interesting Idea.  Id give it a solid Maybe.  On the one hand they're using an Aluminum sheath to contain the power of Nightblood the rest of the time, so the mechanism should work.  On the other hand you are talk about directly opposing Investiture effects, and Nightblood is waaaay more invested than any Allomancy the average Mistborn could use, it would likely require a flair at least, and maybe some Duralumin enhancement.      

Well from my perspective, it's not a question of investiture. The aluminum just counters it. So far that we've seen, there is no amount of investiture which truly cannot contain, including Nightblood, so I would disagree. Then again, we haven't seen much of this kind of interaction in any meaning, so who knows. Aluminum has only ever been seen to be burnt once in the books, and never been seen to be used to counter other investiture's via its allomantic ability. I think that it would be quite constructive on this subject to see if it is at all possible to Push or Pull on aluminum, especially burning  duralumin and/or using the Bands of Morning.

[Quantus he/him]

2 hours ago, A Secret Corner said:

Well from my perspective, it's not a question of investiture. The aluminum just counters it. So far that we've seen, there is no amount of investiture which truly cannot contain, including Nightblood, so I would disagree. Then again, we haven't seen much of this kind of interaction in any meaning, so who knows. Aluminum has only ever been seen to be burnt once in the books, and never been seen to be used to counter other investiture's via its allomantic ability. I think that it would be quite constructive on this subject to see if it is at all possible to Push or Pull on aluminum, especially burning  duralumin and/or using the Bands of Morning.

Well, we know it is not possible to push or pull on Aluminum, which was one of the the main points behind aluminum bllets in Era 2. But that's not what we are talking about here, because Aluminum metals natural ability to resist all forms of Investiture (Soulcasting, Forgery, Nightblood, etc) is entire distinct from the Allomantic effect that happens when you burn Aluminum.  When Burning, the aluminum is entirely destroyed in the act of creating a conduit to Preservation's Investiture, and the manifest allomantic effect is still an Investiture effect.  It's the same as how Aluminum Metalminds are still Charged objects with Investiture in them, independant of Aluminum's natural and wider utility.  
 

[Dancer]

17 hours ago, Quantus said:

Interesting Idea.  Id give it a solid Maybe.  On the one hand they're using an Aluminum sheath to contain the power of Nightblood the rest of the time, so the mechanism should work.  On the other hand you are talk about directly opposing Investiture effects, and Nightblood is waaaay more invested than any Allomancy the average Mistborn could use, it would likely require a flair at least, and maybe some Duralumin enhancement.      

Would Duralumin do anything in this instance. The one time when Aluminium was used it destroyed all investiture in Vin's body instantly. I don't know if you even could burn Duralumin and Aluminium together since the Aluminium would destroy the Duralumin as well. We just don't know how much investiture per burn that Aluminium can destroy at one time. If its any amount that is in your system then just the normal amount of Aluminium will do. If there is a set amount then yes you would be right and you would need a ridicule amount of Aluminium in your system to stop the effects of Nightblood. 

[Quantus he/him]

4 hours ago, Dancer said:

Would Duralumin do anything in this instance. The one time when Aluminium was used it destroyed all investiture in Vin's body instantly. I don't know if you even could burn Duralumin and Aluminium together since the Aluminium would destroy the Duralumin as well. We just don't know how much investiture per burn that Aluminium can destroy at one time. If its any amount that is in your system then just the normal amount of Aluminium will do. If there is a set amount then yes you would be right and you would need a ridicule amount of Aluminium in your system to stop the effects of Nightblood. 

That's a good question, actually.  I was defaulting to the notion that if they had the Intention to burn them together, they would be able to pull it off.  But easily that may not be the case.

[Dancer]

 

5 minutes ago, Quantus said:

That's a good question, actually.  I was defaulting to the notion that if they had the Intention to burn them together, they would be able to pull it off.  But easily that may not be the case.

Yey, Aluminium is weird. It could go either way. My gut feeling is since Aluminium's ability is to purge the body of all investiture it would destroy the Duralumin. Now if you were able to target the investiture that you want purged then that is a different story.

 

[Chiberty]

I don't think this would work because Nightblood's effect doesn't really involve your spiritweb getting corrupted; it just breaks your spiritweb down into raw investiture and consumes it.

[Dancer]

9 hours ago, ChickenLiberty said:

I don't think this would work because Nightblood's effect doesn't really involve your spiritweb getting corrupted; it just breaks your spiritweb down into raw investiture and consumes it.

Nightblood still has to force his Investiture into your spiritweb to break it down. What Aluminium does is purge your soul of unwanted Investiture so it technically should work against him but I could be wrong.   

[Quantus he/him]

It's also worth noting that he doesnt just break down and destroy your spiritweb, he entirely devours you in all three realms.  

[Scion of the Mists]

8 hours ago, Dancer said:

Nightblood still has to force his Investiture into your spiritweb to break it down. What Aluminium does is purge your soul of unwanted Investiture so it technically should work against him but I could be wrong.   

I don't think that we know how either of those things work at that level of detail.  In general, it's best practice to specify where you are and are not speculating (and link/quote book passages/WoBs for confirmed info).  

[Dancer]

OK, "I THINK" this is how Nightblood works from what I have read in the books. I just don't see how you can change/destroy someones spiritweb without putting either yours or someone else's Investiture into it. That is how I see it right now, I am willing to have my mind changed though.  

[Fezzik]

If my spirit web is like a mirror, Nightblood is the hammer. All he has to do is make contact, and my spiritual, cognitive, and physical selves are destroyed to their constituent particles in a puff of black smoke.</theory>

[Truthless of Shinovar he/him]

There’s still the fact that Nightblood is a sword.... I think he might just slice through you anyways, whether or not you’re burning aluminum

Otherwise, I think just because of aluminum’s properties, it would stop all investiture effects of Nightblood.

[Dancer]

On 8/26/2019 at 9:05 AM, Truthless of Shinovar said:

There’s still the fact that Nightblood is a sword.... I think he might just slice through you anyways, whether or not you’re burning aluminum

Otherwise, I think just because of aluminum’s properties, it would stop all investiture effects of Nightblood.

I wonder how sharp Nightblood is. I mean you would never be able to sharpen it except with an Aluminium and even then it's so heavily invested that it is indestructible so even that wouldn't work. 

[Scion of the Mists]

1 hour ago, Dancer said:

I wonder how sharp Nightblood is. I mean you would never be able to sharpen it except with an Aluminium and even then it's so heavily invested that it is indestructible so even that wouldn't work. 

That's an interesting question.  I don't think that Nightblood gets that dull, simply because he doesn't frequently cut things.  As soon as he nicks someone, they're vaporized immediately.  

[Quantus he/him]

9 hours ago, Scion of the Mists said:

That's an interesting question.  I don't think that Nightblood gets that dull, simply because he doesn't frequently cut things.  As soon as he nicks someone, they're vaporized immediately.  

Hell, at this point Im not 100% convinced it can be called anything so mundane as an edge. Once drawn it starts whooshing black smoke everywhere and vaporizes all matter it touches via mysterious trans-realmic annihilation.  That's sounds a lot like a line-shaped, black-hole style perpendicularity that happens to be anchored to both sides of a metal bar.  I picture less of a wedge of steel under that smoke and more of an open portal being waved around.

On 8/23/2019 at 11:55 AM, Scion of the Mists said:

I don't think that we know how either of those things work at that level of detail.  In general, it's best practice to specify where you are and are not speculating (and link/quote book passages/WoBs for confirmed info).  

I think we can safely say that however it works it is some kind of Investiture effect, or else the aluminum sheath would be no protection at all. 

Edited August 28, 2019 by Quantus

[Karger he/him]

He is also awakened and as such sort of a living thing.  He probably alters himself slightly to better conform to his intent.

[Dancer]

It is an awakened object and we know that those things can be either damaged or destroyed. Do you think that If you balanced Nightblood between two Aluminium anvils and dropped say 10 tonnes of Aluminium on him, would he break.