Borio Singaldi

Sorry to keep you waiting. I suppose you could blame me for it. Hopefully, it won't last too much longer, but no guarantees.

XD Careful, it's rude for me to burst out laughing at a university library. It unfortunately also obliterated everyone else in the area, except for the hornet with the 0.0000000000000000000000000000000000000000001nth of a hat.

39 Clues books. Every time a character died, whether faked or real, it got to me. Then again, I was much younger when I read those books. But I remember outright bawling at a couple particular death scenes. Probably because of how real they felt to me, considering the primarily realistic fiction approach the books took.

At that moment, Vathah was broken. Both mentally and emotionally by the soul-crushing betrayal, and physically by the bricks pounding into him. He collapsed to the ground, weeping as more bricks crashed into him, the ideal moment to swear an Ideal and deus-ex machina the crem out of everything.

Haha, so this purple explosion thing started as an image I downloaded as a fan cover for a fanfiction project I thought about working on for a time: Obliteration; Book Four of the Reckoners Series. I figured a huge, purple explosion would work for it, but once I realized I'm incapable of writing something as audacious as that, I scrapped the story. Before this picture, I simply had the Allomantic-Feruchemical table as my basic, ordinary profile because it was a perfect circular fit. Then I realized that multiple others would probably have one like that (and eventually did), so as to erase confusion and give myself more individuality I sought a new one. Then I saw the purple explosion pic lying around on my computer and thought: PERFECT!

Fjordell Edit: Haha, first post in months.

So we understand how Preservation created the Prophecies using future sight, but HOW did he physically create the written prophecies for the Terris people to even know in the first place? How did he transfer this knowledge to the Terris? Did he use his special knife as a mist spirit and carve the words of the prophecy into a mountainside or something? If that was the case, how would the Terris know it was from their god and not just a random rambling inscription made by one of their own? Did he reach into the minds of broken people who had a strong Connection to them and seed the ideas in there like he did when pushing Kelsier to survive in the Pits of Hathsin? If that was the case, why would the Terris people listen to what seemed to them to be the ramblings of madmen? I just wonder how Preservation gave the Prophecies to humankind.

When this interaction happens between you and a friend you're texting. Me: To be real here, [REDACTED NAME] would probably make the best Shallan. You're still Szeth. Friend: true!! I think [REDACTED NAME] would make a good Jasnah Me: You think so? Yeah, I can see that! Friend: And I see you as Syl Me: My gosh The backstory behind this is that we have been discussing who in our school's theater program should play who in the Stormlight Archive. He's only halfway through reading Way of Kings for the first time. Poor boy doesn't know what he's getting himself into. You also know you're a Sanderfan when you and that same friend call each other Jasnah (his name for me) and Shallan (my name for him). Or alternatively, Gaz and Kaladin, respectively. You also know you're a Sanderfan and a theater person when you fancast Mistborn and the Stormlight Archive with theater kids from your own school instead of celebrities. I cast myself as Kabsal.

@Toaster Retribution, I will forever take pride in taking a part in inspiring your wonderful current username. It really is a very good one. Mine started out as a name for an OC character in a Mistborn fanfic I started writing. The character's real name was Rathil and Firerust was his pseudonym, and I liked the thought of using Firerust as a username on this site more than the character's real name. I never ended up writing that Mistborn fanfic, and I now use the character for a roleplay on this site instead.

You guys, I'm feeling so nervous and excited all at once and just a bit overwhelmed. Big things going on yesterday and tomorrow. So yesterday, my varsity drama class had part of our region-level competition for one-act plays, and our class not only made it to state, but took first overall in region! Apparently, that hasn't happened for our school in years, so we were all ecstatic about it, and I was left exhausted by the overwhelming triumph. Stuff like that really doesn't usually happen with me. Like, I'm depressed quite a lot of the time, but that was an actual day of blissful joy for me. So many things went right that day. And now I'm going to senior prom tomorrow with a really, really, really cute friend of mine who I've been friends with for a quite a while and liked for even longer and I'm both terrified and extremely excited, as it's my last formal dance of my last school year and I'm going with my crush. All in all, I'm feeling quite... ecstatic right now, and I just wanted to share it somewhere. Wish me good luck, I guess? Maybe some good vibes to go with it?

I don't find it all that doubtful. If you count Secret History, the Eleventh Metal, and and the Allomancer Jak story, there already are sixteen stories. Or you could just count Secret History, which puts it at fourteen. And Sanderson had said that he considered writing a Hoid-perspective book detailing what he was up to in the original trilogy, and also perhaps a story set to take place in a 1940s-style Scadrial. 13 main books plus Secret History plus Hoid story plus 1940s story does put us at sixteen. Who knows...

Hey hey heyyy! Is that who I think it is? The one I talk to during first lunch in the library? I'm pretty sure this is, and I can finally say welcome, welcome, welcome to the 17th Shard forums to you. Edit: Make sure to watch out for the cookies! They are not what they may seem...

That's the real problem here, unfortunately.

Perfect State Oathbringer [Obvious OB spoilers, watch out] Bands of Mourning Snapshot

Buy, because that was hilariously surprising to read. Dalinar will accidentally write another book after finishing Oathbringer, then write another one, then another, and eventually become the in-world Brandon Sanderson in his spare time when he isn't leading the Radiants.

Amen to everything he just said. I saw it last night and it was FANTASTIC.

I'm surprised this hasn't been mentioned yet. The scene in the book that had me silently laughing like crazy was the scene in which Dalinar and Lift are in that room alone together, waiting for the viziers to make a decision about coming to Urithiru. They have this awkward little conversation about food that abruptly ends when they bring up the Nightwatcher, and then they just sit across from each other in silence for about ten minutes, awkwardly munching some dried fruit from a bowl. The mundanity of the scene and the imagery it provided were just hilarious to me.

OP, I kind of agree with this. My first Cosmere Theory (and first ever post I made on the site) was in relation to this: a connection between the Evil and Ambition. You know how shades are Cognitive Shadows, right? I think the Evil is the shade/CS of a Splinter of Ambition. A large amount of Investiture given sentience, thus becoming a very large, powerful, and dangerous shade that withers and consumes everything in its path.

To quote myself from a different topic, this is why I personally think the timeskip exists: I mean, we don't know how long Oathbringer will be in-world. Seeing as Dalinar has barely learned to write, it might not even be all that long. Just long enough and concise enough to get his message across. Yeah, and the Shallan/baby thing... no. I just cannot logically believe this is the reason for such a time-skip. The storyline is already convoluted enough as it is (which is not exactly a complaint), and Shallan having a child would just be too much of a contrivance as well as a big addition to the plot.

My Predictions: I wanna go a bit more into detail. I'll be predicting more than just the storyline. The prologue takes place on the night of Gavilar's death, probably through Elhokar's POV. I mean, a single viewpoint chapter from him would be nice, seeing as we never got one before and are obviously never getting that chance again. Also, I wanna know what he was talking to Nale and that other guy about. It had to be important, right? Right. The name of the prologue will be "To [insert verb]", following along with that common SA trope. I read somewhere else a suggestion that it might be "To Answer." Other obvious things I don't need to mention but will anyway: The names of the five parts together undoubtedly form a ketek, the epilogue will be from Wit's POV as he has a philosophical monologue right before one more important thing happens in the Brandon Avalanche, some of our Radiants will advance in their oaths in part four or part five during the Avalanche (I also hope for Shardplate growth), and we'll probably get to know a lot more about the singers in this book, as it's sort of their book. Because of that, I think this book will also give us a clearer understanding of the ten levels of Voidbinding and nine levels of the Fused, which even Oathbringer has only lightly touched on (kind of like how Elantris barely touched on the Dakhor magic, or how the first two Mistborn books were elusive about Hemalurgy, making us wonder how this mysterious evil magic system really works). Other story predictions: Dalinar will finish writing Oathbringer and publish it, Shallan will come to some sort of confrontation with Sja-anat and maybe even a rematch with Re-Shephir, Adolin and Renarin will find out the truth about their mother's death, more on the Ghostbloods like an actual appearance from the enigmatic Thaidakar, more on the Tukar/Emul war like an appearance from Ishar/Tezim, and Vyre killing another Herald and maybe Roshone too. I actually think it might be Ishar who Vyre kills. I also think/hope Dalinar will finally have dealt with the remaining highprinces not loyal to him ('bout time that finally happened, since he's only been trying to unite the highprinces for three books already). Also, we've seen a pattern in the chapter heading images. For each flashback chapter in the Stormlight books, it has shown the symbol of the main character of the book in reverse color order. For Kaladin in TWoK, there's the spear that has a black banner on it in his normal chapters, and a white one in the flashbacks. For Shallan in WoR, it's a white Pattern on a black background with a black Pattern on a white background for her flashbacks. For Dalinar in OB, we see the crest of the Kholin princedom in white with black symbols but black with white symbols in his flashback scenes. I believe that this will not be the case in the fourth book, because the flashbacks will be for Eshonai, who isn't alive now, so why would we need reverse-color chapters? No, I think the flashbacks will just be the normal Eshonai chapter headings (a Parshendi woman silhouette in Shardplate) while modern chapters with Venli will have hers in contrast (a Parshendi woman silhouette looking down at a spren in her hand). I've noticed the books lengths are getting exponentially longer. WoR is about 80 pages longer than TWoK, and OB is about 160 pages longer than WoR, so a loose assumption could be that SA4 will be 240 pages longer than Oathbringer, clocking in at about 1,500 pages, which is longer than Sanderson's all-time favorite novel, Les Miserables (about 1,400 pages). I've actually wonder if it's one of Brandon's life goals to write a book longer than his favorite book. It seems to be going that direction. Last but not least: the name. I think the book title will be in relation to a written work of the listeners or the singers, maybe "Song of Secrets" (likely, but maybe a copout) or "Eila Stele" (maybe too unconventional for a book name).

Yes. Absolutely. (You can never be too cautious.) But thank you, though!

Just gonna get it out of the way that I'm not saying I think the Shard's Intent isn't Odium -- I think it is. Passion could be considered... an interpretation of that Intent, as it is entailed in Odium's actions. Or perhaps it's simply a part of it. But this is a deviation, a flair, a conundrum that may not be worth our time, detracting from the original purpose of this thread. Please ignore what I said regarding that and just pay attention to what I said regarding this integral of perfection theory. (I accidentally posted this a bit later than I meant to, sorry.)

Which is why I say "he revealed himself", rather than "it has been revealed". We obviously need to take his word with a pinch of copper, but there appears to be evidence of truth in that claim. After all, a couple of the Unmade, Splinters of Odium's power, serve to encourage Passion in people. Nergaoul, the Thrill, fills people with a strong desire for action, momentum, even bloodlust. Ashertmarn, Heart of the Revel. encourages strong indulgence, idleness, and excess in people. Different types of emotion other than simple hate brought to an extreme, aka passion. Also, the Fused at the Battle of Thaylen Field seemed very much about Passion, trying to incite the Singers there to action. When one of them questioned what Venli was up to with Timbre, he decided to ignore it because she appeared to show lots of Passion, which was satisfying enough for him. And Odium even speaks of there being much Passion in Thaylen City even when not talking to Dalinar, so it's safe to assume that he didn't just say that to deceive Dalinar. So I would say that you could call him the Shard of Odium or the Shard of Passion, as he is shown to exemplify both, but as of yet, it's not too believable.

...Wow. I never thought my theory would spin into all this. I'm a bit awed by it. Like all theories, I question its authenticity and will say that I don't fully agree with it, but I can see where you're going with it and I really like it. Well done. Maybe instead of it being an infinite cycle of one eternal round, it's meant to happen once. Adonalsium Shatters once, allowing it to happen in order to gain more experience, Dividing itself into the 16 Shards that do their own thing in the cosmere, then ultimately seeks to Unite itself into One again, having experienced all things, and it stays that way without repeating. Maybe the story of the Iriali and the Long Trail could be considered parabolic in that regard, referring not only to their own people, but also indirectly to Adonalsium itself. This wouldn't be the only example of a Rosharan religion containing real-in-world applications -- the Horneaters believe that the Lunu'anaki (Hoid) is the god of mischief and cannot harm anyone, which is pretty much true, and some Thaylens believe in religious superstitions called the Passions, and Odium has revealed himself to pretty much be the Shard of Passion. I know the Iriali actually are following their Long Trail of the Seven Lands, with Roshar being the Fourth, but a connection to Adonalsium seems likely to me. Then again, its authenticity is quesitonable and I can't fully agree with my own theory, but it's going somewhere, I think.

Gotcha.