teknopathetic

He was and he wasn't. He knew something was wrong, and he was working with a corrupted Spren. To Jasnah, he was a traitor, but she overcame that perception. We still don't full understand what the implications of the Truthwatcher Corruption are. Clearly, they were corrupted in the last desolation (or earlier), but to what end? It only seemed to give the humans an advantage. Maybe the sense of nihilism and defeatism was the end goal?

I would like to know if Fused that are killed by Nightblood return to the Everstorm. It would be very useful for the humans to have that sort of threat: "you can attack, but some of you will die forever".

My thought too.

Odium follow the spirit(emotional intent) of the agreement, not the letter, sadly. This would work on Honor, but not him.

I think there is a combination of ideas here. I think the stone around Shinovar doesn't have spren in the stone, so the unmade can't use it, almost like the land is more devoid of power. Also I think they are obeying the original Reservation boundaries set out for them, though not all Shin have done this at all times it seems.

I like that "One is almost certainly a traitor to the others" applied to EVERY GROUP One unmade is a traitor - Sja-anat One Radiant is a traitor - Renarin. -> but not really, and it is the dust bringer in the end. One Singer is a traitor - Venli One Monarch is a traitor - Mr.T One O.G. Bridge 4 is a traitor - Moash and now with the Skybreakers, one Herald is a traitor.

What did that metal sound like to you? I really think the metal pulled the spirit in with hemelurgy, and then the Gem further pulled in the investiture into the perfect storage device. The knife was described as yellow/gold and white - is that atium, or maybe Odium's god metal? Do we think there are UnMade fabrials and Herald fabrials? What would a herald give its user?

Is it just me, or was the Anti-Herald knife a mixture of Hemelurgy and Fabrials? The knife was described as either sounding like Atium or Alluminum, and the knife drew the investiture of the victim into the gemstone. Now, the spike should hold the power, but with gemstones that excel at storing investiture, it seems pretty possible that the gem could act as a better storage device. Any thoughts? Which metal did the knife sound like to you. Aluminum doesn't sound likely as that should just kill the herald, not pull his power toward anything, plus the yellow-white isn't the right colour. Could this metal be an Odium God Metal?

I was thinking that the Girl Who Looked Up the was Herald of the Lightweavers, since she is depicted as silver-haired in the artistry.

We know that Yolen is not the tranquil one halls. Likely many of the humans came from Ashyn- that’s a world in the same solar system as Roshar that was destroyed in a disaster and now the survivors live in floating cities in the sky (think like Venus). Other nationalities in the book claim to come from other worlds as a different wave of refugees. Roshar has a long history of refugee intake.

One thing that blows me away about this is that the story was written by someone of Christian (ish) faith. This story has huge parallels to the doctrine of Original Sin (and other greek/world examples), but the discussion is about how such a sin was necessary and just. I don't know much about the beliefs of Brandon's branch of faith, but this story does not read like a Catholic's (something I am more familiar with) understanding of Original SIn. This story seemed to be the most inspired bit of writing in the series; the two-beat reveal of the story and its telling was also exceptionally well done. I would love to sit down with Brandon and parse out how much of this was the author just telling a story from a believable-world perspective, and how much of this story was his personal interpretations bleeding through I have read quotes of Brandon saying he leans on the liberal side of things, and I am now very curious about where forbidden knowledge sits in his personal understanding of religion and ethics. (I am agnostic, but with philosophy as a devoterie)

It is interesting that Autonomy seem to be giving autonomy to different aspects of herself, or perhaps she is giving deities to other worlds so that the people have protection/options in order to be autonomous from other forces. Maybe her god-seeding isn't as nefarious as we though (and it makes it way less likely that she is the shard assisting Odium, though I suppose some of her aspects could be helping him).

Interesting that 'Cowardice' is capitalized in a fashion that doesn't give us any clues. Cowardice would be a hilarious shard (I know the hiding shard isn't supposed to be something so obviously guessable, but still). Wisdom did stand out to me, but as an Audio-listener I wasn't sure about the capitalization. I wonder how long it will be before we visit the Aethers (since a certain someone was cleaning off aether fluid from a world hopper's vestments). I can't wait to see how they've changed.

Before the shattering there was a lot of investiture placed hither and tither on different worlds, and a lot of that investiture has started to pool and become a little more sentient. Sel is doing this (sort of) on its own now that D&D have been shattered, and Odium isn't too pleased about it.

Cultivation is directed change, where ruin is directionless change. Change can be either good, neutral, or bad, but cultivation will seek to always be improving and strengthening the most worthwhile parts of Roshar. Desolations are actually quite in keeping with her ideals, and it may have been hard for her to fight those desolations outright. As well, when honour was near-death, it may have been difficult not to prune him and take whatever power she could grasp. I think her ideal is much more complicated than we have been told. There is a WOB that honour and cultivation were lovers, and likely that kept the two ideals closer, but as time went on I suspect the two ideals drifted apart. Would honour kill Cultivation in order to defeat Odium? I think not. Would Cultivation kill Honour in order to defeat Odium? I think quite definitely.

I would like to know if Shallan is capable of Forging - she can lie to herself, create a history, and enter the cognitive realm; seems like forging her soul and gaining skills isn't completely out of the question.

I am beginning to wonder off the voidpren are also pressed in the Spren Realm. Odium doesn't like to spinner his power, so it would make sense that he would recruit Spren from the fringes of spren society. We do know that the Spren have 'royal' spren, as well as the fact that some spren go on 'hunts' of other spren - dare I say the spren aren't so perfect themselves?

What Kaladin is doing is basically EXACTLY what the heralds do for humanity after a desolation: teach them how to forge tools and use medicine.

To be fair, Adolin only leaps to that conclusion because 'woman-times' is so frequently used as a side-step by women at the court. Both genders are playing into the narrative. Even after Shallan chides him, she decides to use the excuse.

We have our first mention of pre-everstom Yellow Spren: Shockspren. Hmmmm.

The Spren have been pretty good at creating facsimiles of honour's magic. With the oath pack 'technically' still working, it might be easier than we think for Shallan to switch places with Shalash.

It just seems like the aquifer idea can't be right, since the author went out of his way to cause suspicion of the idea.

I believe Nightblood can project thoughts without being bonded (he guided the crazy-man to come get him in the ocean, and "included" Vivenna with Vasher when Nightblood was talking about Kalads army). Now, in order to communicate mentally with Nightblood you need to be bonded. I am not sure we ever say Vasher mentally communicate with Nightblood though (I just reread it and he usually thinks to himself or talks outloud).

I feel like it SHOULD be Sunmaker, since the book is named after his sword.

"The many wells in Urithiru, however, never ran out. The water level didn’t even drop, despite people constantly drawing from them." My first thought was that the water system is somehow drawing water from the cognitive realm. Mountains/large solids are water in the cognitive realm, and maybe there is someway of siphoning that water? If not, maybe there is a mini-portal?