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I suggested asking Brandon how many more gods Kel gets to punch before everything is said and done. In fact, I believe punching Bavadin will get him on Hoid's good side, so, there is hope there.

I do not know... I have a lot of pity and compassion of Leras, he is the embodiment of the term "Walking Dead", so, while I find the punching of Leras in the face to be funny, I am not certain I completely approve of it. It does serve as the most pure demonstration of Kelsier's Spirit and personality, and as such, it is a beautiful moment. But poor Leras... (I take less pity on him now, that I know that he participated in killing the previous God, but I think of all the Shards, Leras has paid the heaviest penance so far for doing this). Ati, on the other hand... That was one masterful brick joke.

We have two choices: either Sazed knows about Kelsier's conversations with Spook, or he does not. The chain of events makes much more sense if Sazed does know. We have sufficient proof from the Wax and Wayne books that Sazed can both talk to someone spiked (like Ruin does) and hear what they say (like Preservation does). When Spook puts a spike in his ear, he *by all rules we know* establishes a link with Sazed. There are no two ways around it - we saw, on the example of Wax how this works, and we know that this is an essential part of Pathianism. So, if Spook is connected (with a lower-case "c") to Sazed via the spike/earring, and Kelsier appears in front of him, there is only one logical conclusion, based on what we know so far. Kelsier is doing it on Sazed's behalf. He may not be doing Sazed's bidding exactly, but the conversation may have gone as follows: KELSIER: We need to watch after Spook. He needs help. SAZED: Yeah, I know, but I've also got to be in 400 other places at the same time, and I need to go an reanimate all the kandra to boot. KELSIER: Well? SAZED: You know what - the kid trusts you. And I know what you did for him [points to his head, which now contains memories of Kelsier holding Preservation]. Can you, you know... go there and be with him for a while? KELSIER: [doing his best mental impersonation of Mr. Burns] Oh, yeah, sure, if you want me to... I can encourage the kid... Can you make me manifest in the Physical Realm? SAZED: It is done so, my friend. Curtain.

Becoming a Mistborn certainly Connected Kelsier to Preservation. But notice how Vin, who is also a Mistborn cannot take up the power of Preservation until she gets rid of the spike the Connects her to Ruin. So, just being a Mistborn is not sufficient. In case of Kelsier, the barrier is less physical - he is not spiked by Ruin, but it is, arguably, stronger. Kelsier spent a good chunk of his time being essentially an agent of Ruin. His biggest accomplishment - setting up the stage for killing Lord Ruler was the single most devastating blow to Preservation over the entire series. To borrow a sports metaphor, you may really like the striker on the opposing team, and think that he is a really cool person, but as long as he keeps scoring goals against your team, he is not really your best buddy on the field, and you cannot trust him to replace you. Kelsier spent a huge chunk of his life being the striker on the opposing team. An ignorant one, but not an unwilling one. He is directly responsible for much chaos and destruction that takes place. He has not used his Allomantic powers in a way that is consistent with Preservation's Intent. Hence the need to steal a magic McGuffin.

I am on the "Devotion and Dominion are gone for good" bandwagon. The key reason behind it is that Odium won that battle, felt satisfied and left. If there was a straightforward path to recombine the Shards - Odium's not really done much. If there was a straightforward path for one Shardholder to take both Devotion and Dominion, a-la Sazed - then Odium is, frankly, hosed. Sel natives are by far the most overpowered Investiture users in Cosmere we have seen so far, limited only by geography. A combined "double D" Shard (anyone wants to name it?) would probably spell direct and immediate doom to Odium.

I think that you are pretty much on it: bodies disappear because the pool, being a perpendicularity, provides a connection not just to the Cognitive Realm, but, perhaps, also to the Spiritual one as well. Metals are a thing of a Physical world though, so they stay.

I always took that WoB to mean that Sazed can do something to help Marsh stay immortal/lonvliving, but that "something" need not have involved a supply of atium. Sazed should have other ways as well.

I lean towards a similar explanation, rather than the idea that Sazed set up Southern continent to suffer for 10 years because he had this great foresight of the future and wanted KElsier to go there.... I think that taking two Shards and the immediate aftermath of it gave Sazed a sort of PTSD, or at least, put him under a lot of stress. He has suddenly gotten an info dump of Cosmeric proportions, he had to use his powers to undo Rashek's patches, and then he had to deal with Keliser not being dead, and Vin and Elend - actually being dead. He may have lost the opportunity to fix things on South Pole via an act of Shard Awesomeness. Why it took someone ten years to actually start paying attention - I do not know. Hope Brandon reveals it at some point. I take it, we are, by far, not done with Sazed. I also predict a certain degree of South Polers becoming really pissed when they learn the history of the North Pole.

Going back to OP's question: Irich appears to be a native Scadrian to me. We have a viewpoint from him in which he grumbles about things, but one of the things that appears clear is that he is a scientist and had a productive career prior to being approached by the Set. He is a hired gun precisely because he had that career. There might be theories about him worldhopping in his youth, but I strongly doubt that.

Do we have *any reason whatsoever* beyond the scars on his hands, to believe that based on his experiences in the Pits, and the chance encounter with Kelsier, Walin, over the process of the next 10 years or so (12 years, to be more exact) is able to acquire not just the spike in his eye, but also the apparent knowledge of Freuchemy and Allomancy sufficient to save the south polers? Why is this theory any better than a theory that a random Terris Freuchemist escaped the paws of Inquisitors with a spike in his eye, went to the Pits to scar his hands and then made it to the South Pole?

Neither do I. I think it is a distinct possibility, but I also think that it could be a different person.

Kind of, but with a caveat. Leras told Kel that he had not had enough Connection to Preservation to take it up. Kelsier had to steal a magic McGuffin full of Investiture to accomplish this goal, and even at that, he could only "hold the fort" so to speak. Sazed was a person of Preservation throughout the first two books, but according to the Secret History, his actions in book 3 made him Connected to Ruin sufficiently to take up Ruin. Things may be different on, e.g., Nalthis, where everyone walks with a piece of Endowment and can accumulate more. But even there - I think - the level of Connection varies greatly. Some are sufficiently connected to become Returned. Some - are not.

This is not necessarily my own theory, but someone else on the site expressed an idea that Ati was a bit of a revolutionary. This is not such a bad idea. Even beyond that there may be a large number of reasons why a kind and generous person may be able to take up Ruin. A self-destructive person can be kind and generous to others, but cutting veins in the privacy of own bathroom. A kind and generous person may want to take up a Shard responsible for desctruction, because what they want to destroy is an evil thing. Hoid's words simply specify what kind of man Ati was, NOT what his motives were.

First of all, Wax and Wayne books contain some of the best writing he has done to date. Second, these books did not actually do anything for the timeline. If he did not write WaxAnaWayne books, he would not have replaced them with the 80s mistborn series. Rather, he would've written some other books in between stormlight archive.

See, this is one of those cases where rafo actually means that yes, he got to punch someone else. My money is on Bavadin, after which he and Hoid make up.

There actually is a WoB about it, beloved it out not. Someone asked if the horse was from nalthis. Brandon's response was that not everything Wayne is saying needs to be taken at face value.

What mattered was Leras's Intent and Connection. Whatever they were, they were enough for him to become Preservation. Essentially, he may have been motivated by his desire to protect someone or something, and saw taking up a Shard as the only way to do so. That would translate to Preservation.

I smell a question to Brandon brewing: how many more Shardholders does Kelsier get to punch in the course of Cosmere history?

I would compare it to a kid from Phil Pullman's Golden Compass whose daemon was severed. Seems like the same effect.

Like I was saying elsewhere, we are running out of secret societies for Kelsier to found and lead. The other theories suggested that he founded the 17th Shard and/or the Ghostbloods. If one reads Brandon's PS to Secret Histories, one gets a distinct idea that what Kelsier is doing around the time of Wax and Wayne books is about the same as what he was doing around the time he took up Preservation - snooping on people, trying to convince them to do something his way. But here is a very simple thing. Kelsier loves Scadrial. So, "Kelsier = Trell", or "Kelsier is the leader of a group of people plotting something on a completely different planet", or "Kelsier wants to kill Sazed, destroy the planet, and take up every single Shard because he wants to finally be able to kick Hoid's chull", or "Kelsier will be the chief villain in the next book(s)" theories ignore that very simple fact. He may have been a very effective agent of Ruin for a long time. But we got inside his head in Secret History. That should be enough for us to understand that finding a way to save five peoples on the South Pole is totally a Kelsier thing, while stealing Allomancers to breed a Mistborn is not. Yes, Keliser is the effing Chuck Norris of the Cosmere. Tom Waits's Black Wings may as well have been written about him. And after all Shards successfully succumb to whatever clever plan Hoid has, Kelsier may very well be the most powerful entity in Cosmere. But if anything, he is the guy (judging by the pattern) who, if he ever met Trell would try to punch him in the face, not the guy to run Trell's franchise on Scadrial... Please....

This is exactly the point I was trying to make. Based on what we know, I think it is a reasonable assumption that what specific Intent the powers they were taking manifested formed at the moment they stepped into the "ring" and was based on Connection to a specific aspect of Adonalsium (and also was constrained by what the other 15 were taking).

Yep, exactly what I was thinking.

Interesting. The description of masks on the faces match. "Iyatil is a worldhopper" theory appeared to be reasonably sound even before BoM. So, what makes you think otherwise?

White Sand: yes, I have seen that WoB. That lead me on a wild goose chase, but I could not find the appropriate passage. Ais has way too much screen time. Aether: I have seen Ruin referenced in WoBs, but I have not seen the Preservation reference. My understanding of the Aether world