Subvisual Haze

As a character there's nowhere really for her to grow. She's the greatest scientist/engineer in all of history as well as an exceptional team leader and diplomat. Her character flaw was that she doubted how perfect she was.

I think there's a parallel with how Dalinar saw Odium during their negotiation vision. We know the power of the tower disrupted Moash's connection to Odium (which is why feelings came back). I think without that link to shield him, Moash somehow pushed too much power through his honorblade and permanently wounded/changed himself in the process.

Ishar's using his powers of connection to force all the other Heralds to trust him.

He's the embodiment of the Rhythm of War, Honor and Passion united.

If you want another event to throw on the "Kaladin is special" pile: A huge focus of this book was development of anti-light techniques with the potential to kill spren or other cognitive entities. Previously spren have been able to be captured, "enlightened" by Sja Anat, or made into deadeyes by a broken Nahel bond. Utterly killing a spren though seemed only possible via Nightblood (and whatever horrors Ishar has been up to). But Kaladin killed a spren using Sylblade back in Oathbringer when they were rescuing Gavinor from the palace! He and Syl seemed surprised, but then the event got pushed to the side and was never brought up again! I think the language about ripping the spren into pieces is purposeful, recalling other shatterings. I think it's also noteworthy that Kal is ticked off here. Despite being connected to Honor, Kaladin can also become incredibly passionate about things (which theoretically is of Odium). It can range from "good" passion in defending his men or holding back that highstorm, to a more vengeful passion shown here and when he has his yellow-red eye glowy berserker state in RoW. Either way, when Kaladin is emotionally keyed up, he seems capable of special things.

He's a self-righteous bully and only offered approval to Kaladin when Kaladin was pursuing the exact path he wanted him to in life. He's a bad father. He's not evil. The world is full of people like him. I actually really enjoyed the resolution of his story. There wasn't an effort to redeem him in our eyes or have him apologize to Kaladin because he's incredibly prideful and unwilling to admit fault. They both more of less just agree to live their own lives, which is probably the best Kaladin could hope from his Father.

The true win condition isn't about winning or losing the duel. It's about getting Dalinar to break his word that there will be a duel. As the closest thing to the holder of Honor's power, Dalinar breaking a vow could have catastrophic consequences on Honor's power binding Odium.

Sure would be convenient if Kaladin swears his 5th right in front of him.

My thoughts were drawn to this death rattle So Odium could just threaten to have his agents murder everyone in his conquered territory unless Dalinar throws the duel? Win or lose Odium maintains control of a large swath of territory.

Could also be related to his bond with Syl being extremely close (particularly now with her own introspective sadness). Or it's anticipating Kaladin taking Jezrien's place in the reformed Oathpact.

I feel like Cultivation's vessel might just want to finally pass beyond. End the war, put the shards in new hands, rejoin Tanavast in the afterlife. From what we've seen Eternal Life is wearisome in the Cosmere. Your soul gets thin, your personality is warped to match the power, you develop peculiar insanities etc.

Yeah, it occurs to me that I may have assumed too much benevolence guiding Cultivation's actions. Just the "Earth Mother" vibe made me assume good intentions. Instead Taravangian might well have been her perfect pawn because he mirrors her ruthless utilitarian mindsight.

I think the loophole is that while Odium cannot directly interfere in the greater cosmere his agents can. His fused are too bound to the system to leave, but he could use other tools to meddle. I think win or lose Odium just switches his focus from war over Roshar to messing with other shards around the cosmere. He has plenty of justification to mess with Scadrield in response to Thaidakar's interference on Roshar. In the timeline Mistborn era 2 follows the first part of the Stormlight Archive, so it would make sense if the mysterious Trell antagonists of Mistborn 2 are Odium's foreign legion.

It's weird that Odium was able to steal a short term memory from Hoid, I more picture coppermind type storage being for longterm memories. Time for Hoid to tattoo "Remember Sammy Jankis" on his arm.

Great catch. It's hard to ignore that 2/3 of Cultivation's chosen are now ascended. Lift becoming the immortal vessel of a shard would be a fulfilment of her wish too.

Alien who likes sticking himself with metal and wants to "repurpose" humans. Lots of Mistborn connecting threads in this book. El Trell

I got the impression that the Ruin we met was purely the shard's intent expressing itself (Ati was little more than a puppet and his original personality was subsumed by the shard's intent).

100% Kelsier. Also explains what Hoid is up to in Bands of Mourning by gifting Wax that memory.

All nuance was sucked out of the character. The book was trying so hard to make me despise him that it felt kind of forced.

I'm glad we placed the most dangerous shard into the hands of an utterly amoral genius. What could possibly go wrong.

Brandon seems to have developed a bit of a sadistic pleasure in piling tragedy and sadness on Kaladin. So it's only natural that Lirin had to openly call Kal a monster.

Oh Cultivation you brilliant fool.

Thanks for translating these! Usually I find it fun to translate these myself, but the text is painfully small in some of the images. Kind of a bummer.

I feel like half of Part 3 could have been cut in editing and it would still feel bloated and meandering.

Each of the 16 shards being diced up into 16 parts is very exciting. I now present my theory on the identity of all 256 shards of Adonalsium: