Aliroz-The-Confused

Because Warbreaker has descriptions of such food being prepared, which gives it as association with my dad's cooking (there's a lot of books I associate with the smell of whatever was for dinner on the days I read them, especially if they have descriptions of cooking). And because my grandpa came back from WWII with a love for salsa (a food which he, sadly, did not live to see become popular enough in his region to buy instead of make yourself).

That doesn't make things any better for any of those who are stuck between now and then, between here and there. How many spren are going to die or worse? They're not supposed to suffer like that, or be able to die. What's going to happen to all the innocents? What kind of world does is Oroden going to grow up in? And if we have to wait ten real-life years for the next one, who knows how much more bleak and sad we'll all be then, considering what a horrible decade this has been compared to the previous, and how that one was compared to its previous, and its previous. By the time book ten is written, it might not even be possible to conceive of, much less write, the glorious triumphant ending we all want. I guess I just wanted more truth (as in, that which stays true to itself) and less wind (as in, that which is blown with every gust of wind) in Wind and Truth.

True, that he did. That he did. So what are we left with, in terms of they who cannot be persuaded? A dead herald, and a handful of listeners and their friends? With what feels like fewer than twenty-four pages, all put together? Surrounded by everything and everyone else being... malleable? Forgive me my nervous disposition, but I find it difficult to muster up much hope, here. It seems to me that when next we turn to Roshar, the spren will, in the main, be dead or enslaved or "enlightened". Roshar seems to me to be much less Taln's world, and MUCH less the world of the listeners, and much more the world of Navani Kholin. Ten years between books can only make things worse.

Inter-species dating?!! I don't even approve of dating within the same species! The romances in the Cosmere are gross and icky and have kissing and stuff!

Nalthis will have the cosmere equivalent of salsa, and it will become a comfort food among soldiers returning home from some war before later becoming a more "mainstream" food among the descendants of such.

I return from my exile to inflict upon you my thoughts once again. Wow, this book was almost unbearable. I just might have to skip this one on any rereads, unless I want to read more than 1300 pages dedicated to the central theme that everyone can be persuaded and there is essentially no hope for constancy or integrity. The spren, 'Enlightened' by Sja-anat (especially those poor Oathgate spren). The Sibling, wheedled by Navani into accepting and becoming complicit in the enslavement of spren. The Stormfather, bullied by Dalinar into going along with his ploy for godhood. Yanagawn, naïvely accepting Adolin's friendship when Noura would rather he be the person Azir needs him to be. Szeth, getting endlessly cajoled by Kaladin over hundreds of pages until he breaks down and abandons his entire worldview for that "self-actualization" and "being a person, not a thing" garbage at the very time when the Cosmere needs instruction-following embodiments of ideals rather than humanity. Lift resigning herself to growing older, and her spren convincing her that such will be okay. Queen Fen, caught in a persuade-off between two of the least likable personalities in the Cosmere, doing the only right thing in her situation because any human being would. Little Gav, influenced into becoming something he was never meant to be. Tanavast and later Taravangian telling the power of Honor "quiet, you, what I'm doing counts as your intent". Heck, even Nale and Ishar get in on the "listen to Kaladin, abandon previous thought-patterns" game. It's just a cavalcade of characters HELPING each other SEE NEW POINTS OF VIEW for THEIR OWN GOOD. And ignoring anyone who says "please stop doing this". Where is the stick that is a stick? Where is the unbroken ideal, the remembered tradition, the thing that holds true? Only among the listeners. Jaxlim and hers, and their songs, and their friends. It felt like they had eight pages total, but that bit in the canyons where they sing old songs and new might be more important than hundreds of pages before or after it. If there is any hope it lies within them. They aren't enslaving spren, or working on weapons to kill them. They reject that which is to be rejected, and remember that which is to be remembered. They might just be the ones to inherit the earth. This whole book, we see souls becoming misaligned. Ghostbloods going rogue, honorbearers serving evil, heralds as funhouse-mirror versions of what they ought to be, kingdoms turning traitor against their emperor, Shin's people acting outside of their traditions. And finally, the biggest misalignment of all, the merge of Honor and Odium, the failure of Roshar at its most important purpose.

That was supposed to be my bead of Lerasium, Leras left it to me in the will. Flipping Midius, stealing my inheritance in the one moment when nobody's looking. He'll have to give it back, though, if he ever wants to see his previous flute again. ...or maybe I'm just messing with all of you.

My point is that we have the vocabularly, whether or not we use it, and the Alethi don't, even after all this time. It doesn't add up unless it's intentional worldbuilding or just wrong... but from the rest of your post it does seem to be intentional worldbuilding. @Offer, oh, dang, I must have forgotten that note in Arcanum Unbounded.

Yeah, but given the sheer amount of time the Voidbringers have been around birds, it makes no sense for them not to have diversified the names. The Koala may have been called a "bear" by the first westerners to know of it, but it's not been that many generations since and I have the vocabulary to speak of Marsupials. Something else must be going on here, and the only way this can linguistically make sense is if there genuinely are no non-chicken birds around outside of Shin Kak Nish.

Except for "the humans came to Roshar thousands of years ago", I don't remember any of this in any book. It does makes a lot of sense for Patji to be an aspect of Autonomy, especially given the themes of colonization, indigeneity, and exploitation that The Stormlight Archive and Sixth of the Dusk share. The most significant thematic difference being that the people of First Of The Sun are beginning the process of destroying their world while the Voidbringers of Roshar must face the realization that they already did irrevocably, irredeemably, destroy their world and are essentially cuckoos in the Listener's nest. Even if Aviars get their powers from Patji, that doesn't mean Cultivation wasn't, at some point, there, feeding the birds and slumming around in Autonomy's planet without Autonomy's permission, before leaving for Roshar. Honestly, given how Cultivation and Honor abandoned the Listeners for the Voidbringers, and how Odium forcibly "adopted" the Parshendi, this theory makes a lot of sense and even adds another layer to the deific custody dispute from heck. How horribly fitting it would be for Odium to do unto Cultivation as she did unto Autonomy. Even the idea that the accord was a promise that ought not to have necessarily applied to all Voidbringers is an autonomy-honor dispute very much applicable to any treaty and any interaction between colonizers and indigenous. It would be in character for Honor to see this accord as totally binding and applying to all Voidbringers and all Listeners, from Honor's point of view, such a thing is really no different from a treaty applying to all people of the relevant civilizations regardless of whether each individual agrees to it or not. Honor doesn't have to be reasonable. And, well, there has to be a reason why Roshar has no birds other than chickens, and this would explain it so well. Well done, Vailima.

Kickstarter is a malicious thing; it's devoured two of my favorite storytellers already. They got too much money and now are trapped by their own ambitions and promises in a Sisyphus-and-Stone scenario, and I worry the same is starting to happen here. I suppose the question now is whether Mr. Sanderson is like the protagonist of a Greek Tragedy, in which case his fate is already sealed and any warning would come too late, or whether he's like the protagonist of an anime, in which case any warning will be responded to by a successful accomplishment of the previously impossible. A Moshe-edited, Joshua-screened, traditionally published book that serves as a compendium of random Cosmere lore would be interesting (and we got some of that with Arcanum Unbounded), but if there's one thing we ought to have learned from Rowling, it's that editors, agents, and publishers are crucial and ought not be removed from the process if the readers want good content. Or, in other words, even that would probably fail to get past my increasingly irrational opinions, for many of the same reasons Dawnshard does. It would probably be good for the more reasonable Print Fanatics out there, though.

I feel like Obi-Wan at Mustafar now. WHYYYYYYYYYYY FRUS, WHYYYYY!???!?!?

Edgedancer has been published as part of Arcanum Unbounded, and thus has the same canon status as Secret History. (This posting genuinely isn't an elaborate joke, it's just my, to other people very bizarre, opinion. I was, in all truth, planning not to read Stormlight 5 when it comes out, or any Stormlight after it, because of how much I resented Dawnshard for not being available in print when I wanted to read it (I refuse to have anything to do with e-books or audiobooks), but since my cousin is reading the series I've found myself planning to actually continue with Stormlight because I love talking about it with her).

Enough is enough! I have had it with all of these monkey-flipping Dawnshard theories on this Multi-Fractal forum! First off, Dawnshards aren't real, have never been important in any canon Cosmere book, and aren't going to be important in any canon Cosmere book. This is because Dawnshard isn't canon, which is self-evidently obvious but I'm going to explain it anyway (because you SMART PEOPLE ON THE INTERNET said my theories were unlikely and unsupported-by-evidence-and-logic so I'm insecure about making claims without at least a page or two attempting to justify my thoughts). This is best demonstrated by the fact that Dawnshard, for the longest time, was not published as a physical book, but was only available as an electronic text. You know what else is only available as an electronic text? The Way Of Kings Prime. Which, as you all know, is not canon, and is also garbage and not worth reading (don't worry, I didn't read it). Just because Sanderson wrote it doesn't mean it counts, if Moshe, Joshua, and the publishers don't deem it worthy of the printed page. If the book was worthy like the others, it would have been published from the start. Also, Dawnshard cannot count as existing/mattering/canon because it would ruin the entire Stormlight Archive's basic structure of being ten books (that's the entire basic thing of it, with a world built around tens, and Sanderson promising ten books, it has to be ten books), and Dawnshard sure as heck isn't Stormlight 5. Mistborn was promised as a trilogy of trilogies, and Stormlight was promised as a ten-book series. The Way Of Kings Prime doesn't count in the numbering, it doesn't count as canon, and Dawnshard must be the same. Look, I have faith in Sanderson's abilities, I don't think he's going to screw it up when he has ONE JOB (a ten-book series). Okay, Sanderson screwed up a bit with Mistborn by writing a trilogy that wasn't the second trilogy but saved himself by making it a side-thing that's not part of the proper Mistborn Trilogy Of Trilogies, but then you fans Ati'd that all up and got it republished and marketed as Era Two and as the second trilogy, so you either ruined the WHOLE THING or cheated me out of three books. Still, I stand with the publishers of 2020, no matter what happened in February of this year. In Summary: Dawnshard = not a physical book at release. Way of Kings Prime = not a physical book at release. Therefore, Dawnshard = Way of Kings Prime. Way Of Kings Prime = stupid garbage unworthy of publication which is not canon. Thus, Dawnshard = stupid garbage unworthy of publication which is not canon.

If the Radiants can't manage it before Odium is freed, what makes you think they can manage it after? If Odium gets off of Roshar, then the only noun in the universe to have successfully eternally prevented an evil shard from becoming a multi-system problem will have been Preservation, which, as has been established, is gone from the Cosmere. At that point, I'd trust the Scadrians over the Rosharans, given their respective records of success, failure, and learning-from-failure in such regards (heck, in that situation, I'd trust any system in the Cosmere over the Rosharan system, given that none of them messed up so badly as to cause/not-prevent a shard-level multi-system disaster like that).

I don't think sDNA is a real thing, it's too silly. That would imply sRNA, sMRNA, and all sorts of spiritual proteins and cellular gobbledygook.

I don't think that the different creations can interact like that. Without a shared originator or creator, I don't think that-which-we-commonly-call-the-humans of the separate worlds are truly the same species as one another. In a very real sense, they would be closer to the other species of their same creation than to each other.

Oh, dang, you're right! The significant powers on Roshar are incredibly well-suited to defend against external attack... so the best strategy to weaken that turtle would start while it's still developing in the egg. In fiction, and likely in history, there are fortresses which were never taken by siege or attack, but fell to internal scheming and treachery. These early stages of the next era of the Knights Radiant are absolutely crucial in this regard*... perhaps Gavilar was right to say that Thaidakar was too late. *Not to mention that the stronger the Kholin-aligned side gets, the more difficult it becomes to stop their scholars from innovating and discovering. If, as my cousin predicts (and I agree with her), the next book or two in the Stormlight Archive will contain a/the genocide of the spren, (much of) it will be Navani's fault, and who knows what they'll figure out next... Yeah, things are going to get hairy.

Greetings and salutations!

Lord Ruler > Everything and everyone, except maybe shards. No printer, just fax.

I'm not sure what you mean by that? I guess being able to track the movement of investiture is important to finding and shutting down the routes by which it is transported, but if I'm interpreting "the first investiture ring" right, such a thing seems counter to the end goal of Roshar as an eternal prison (or, if necessary, a tomb) for Odium.

I think that might, to some extent, be one of the fronts to disguise their true intentions.

I return from my slumber beneath the mountain to plague you all with unwanted and unwarranted speculation! (Spoilers up to and including Rhythm of War and the entire lesser Mistborn Trilogy). There's always another secret. The simplest explanation is, for the Cosmere, often unlikely to be the truth. Thus, speculation should tend to the far-fetched, if only for the sake of being interesting. I propose that The Ghostbloods are much more accurately described as a South Scadrian intelligence agency sent to destabilize other words than as a criminal organization seeking a non-metaphorical power monopoly. Furthermore, I propose that their aims are essentially Preservationist in nature, rather than Ruinous (though their methods may be ruinous). With its lamentable corruption into Harmony, the only true legacy of Preservation is Scadrial itself. With the loss of Ruin, the only genuine threat to Scadrial is other worlds, and as in many things, the greatest dangers to a world are discovery and innovation (Anyone who doubts this should consider what happened to the Dinosaurs when the comet hit, or what happened to the comet itself... when worlds collide, worlds collide, and one or both are destroyed. Contact is contamination, contamination is destruction, destruction is ruin). The next greatest danger to the worlds of the Cosmere is the shard Odium, currently quarantined in the Roshar system (to those who doubt that innovation is the greater threat, consider that it was the curious mortal Navani Kholin, rather than the shard Odium or one of its Fused, who discovered how to permanently kill spren. To those who doubt that discovery is the greater threat, consider what the discovery by humans of Roshar and how to get there meant for the native Parshendi, or what would happen if Odium were to discover a way to escape its prison). The Rosharan system represents an undeniable and existential danger to the rest of the Cosmere. Its vast and easily accessible sources of Investiture alone would make it the epicenter of cross-system contamination as Worldhoppers would inevitably seek to exploit it. Such power, for the sake of preserving all else that is, must be controlled, must be seized. Establishing a non-metaphorical power monopoly is the best way to prevent anyone else from uncontrolled, unauthorized, unsafe-in-the-long-run, irresponsible use of investiture. Controlling the Oathgates, Urithiru, and the Perpendicularities is the best way to keep Roshar as the quarantine it ought to be, rather than the crossroads it might become. Odium, regardless of its bearer, is likely to stay contained so long as no clever little monkey figures out the wrong trick... Yeah, so long as J. Kholin and N. Kholin breathe, it's only a matter of time before the "wrong trick" is figured out and Odium is set free. Those of Scadrial, of all people, know what happens when an evil shard is set free from its prison. To prevent more catastrophes such as what happened to Sel, any true follower of Preservation* would find themselves with the same objectives as the Ghostbloods. Add to this Thaidakar's rather hands-off style of leadership, and the tendencies of those-organizations-sent-by-authority-to-destabilize-other-places-in-order-to-serve-the-interests-of-the-homeland, and it stops being a mystery why monsters like Mraize get in positions of influence and power in the Ghostbloods. TLDR; The Ghostbloods aren't an Investiture Cartel, they're the South Scadrial CIA... which is honestly scarier, and probably worse. *as in Preservation, rather than Harmony

Well, that's just really depressing, then. Every time you make a concession to reality, a part of your heart dies, and a bit of your soul fades. Eventually, your compromises and your imperfect methods and the things you had to do to make the world as good as it is will result in the next generation having to oppose you and destroy what you've made to make something better/"better". There's a quote from a movie that has always stuck with me (it's too much of a spoiler for me to say what movie it's from, but the quote is pretty universal). The context is that a horrific act of unjustified violence has been done by associates of Character 1 upon people that Character 2 was supposed to protect, but, because of other "greater good" considerations, Character 2 more or less abandoned -- and when Character 2 calls out Character 1, 1 points out 2's own complicity and claims that what happened was inevitable because: Character 1: We must work in the world, the world is thus. Character 2: No... thus have we made the world. Thus have I made it. What makes the Radiants special in my eyes is that they won't say things like "We must work in the world, the world is thus.", but they will say things like "Honor is dead... but I'll see what I can do.".

That just means that murdering people who use language badly is "doing my brother's work". See, it turns out that Wax's uncle and his hooligans are all jive turkeys, and the Life-Death Brothers aren't having any of it.