robardin

Maybe a Fused can't even physically approach the column, much less remain in Urithiru, if the Sibling were up and running. Like, it's more than a Voidlight Surgebinding suppression thing but even a Voidlight cancellation thing (where the Fused perhaps need Voidlight to remain in their host body - Chirri-Chirri killed one simply by sucking out the Light ). We'll just have to find out eh! Now that we've seen some Fused POVs, or at least a view into a Conclave of the Fused through Venli's POV, there are a couple more questions that come to my mind. The construction and founding of Urithiru is still mysterious but we can infer that it was continually in occupation by the Radiants since at least Nohadon's time until the Slumbering, and the Fused have never been able to assault it because of some kind of fabrial installed in it that is still functioning now even with the Sibling "essentially a deadeye". Right? Makes you wonder what the association between the two are. And how Raboniel knows so much about how it works to know that it could be inverted if the Sibling were "slumbering". Evidently the way the suppressor fabrial they made was somehow based on the Sibling/Fused Repeller fabrial from something she learned millenia ago. Why is Urithiru "unhallowed" to the Shin, who in addition to possessing the eight abandoned Honorblades, have evidently have known about it and its location all this time? What is it that "hallows stone" in their eyes anyway? We don't actually know the "victory condition" that Odium is going for here. Remember, ultimately he doesn't really care about destroying humanity or having the singers retake Roshar - they are proxies for him as physical agents. His true aim is to break from his restriction to the Rosharan system by some past combined machination of Honor and Cultivation - after killing both of them, of course. He's restricted but not completely bound - while he can't leave, he isn't hobbled in power the way Preservation managed to do to Ruin, because he was still able to splinter and kill Honor after many Desolations (though it should be noted, after Ahrietiam... Was that a factor?). And yet, by Odium's own statement, the first thing he'd do after being released by Dalinar - if he'd do it - was to "see to Cultivation's death". So while he was able to splinter Honor shortly before the Recreance, such that Honor "was dying" and unable to "support" that generation of Radiants in holding to their oaths, he hasn't been able to do that with Cultivation, but feels he could do so once released. The Honorpact was broken at Ahrietiam and it seems like, with his support, the singers could finally retake Roshar from humankind. But, as Dalinar said, this would not release him from the Rosharan system. When he first turns down Dalinar's offer of a contest of champions, Odium comments, "I need not take on such a risk, for I know that you... will free me." He refers here to engineering Dalinar's moment at Thaylen Fields in the future, which Dalinar is oblivious to. Later, at Thaylen Fields, Dalinar says to Odium, "Killing us won't free you, will it? You could rule us or destroy us, but either way, you'd still be trapped here. ... A contest. Your freedom if you win, our lives if humans win." Odium agrees this time, because he was sure that Dalinar would succumb to the Thrill and fall to become his pawn - and of course, immediately release him ("Be careful what you request... As Bondsmith, you can offer this deal. But is this truly what you wish of me?") He neither refutes or accepts Dalinar's statement - that if he rules or destroys humanity with the singers, he's still locked to Roshar. For all we know, Odium's long game is to use the singers to push Rosharan humanity to the brink, and then to offer a Taravangian like deal to spare the remnant for his release. "Either my singers wipe you out, or you free me, I kill Cultivation and clean up the mess of over-invested spren hanging around here, and leave you alone" (on Ashyn, Braize, or some other world, leaving Roshar to the singers as he's probably promised them). A dying, possibly raving Honor recorded this message for a future Bondsmith: "Vex Odium. Convince him he can lose." But never said how.

It depends on exactly how it was taken Perhaps fully awakening the Sibling would be enough to eject the Fused even if they'd driven out the Radiants from it, and they do so from Shadesmar or something

I meant from RoW thus far.

Nightblood is conspicuously absent from the narrative, period... We had a WoB that Szeth starts SA4 "in prison, by Dalinar's command", but we haven't seen that depicted yet, and we don't even know if that means he is still bearing Nightblood or not. I mean, given his Skybreaker oath, if Dalinar said he should go to prison while surrendering his strange black Blade to Navani for study, wouldn't he do it?

Really? Has Dalinar named "his" champion yet, or has he assumed it is himself personally? "You have agreed to a battle of champions. You must withdraw to prevent this contest from occurring, and so must not meet with Dalinar Kholin again. Otherwise, he can force you to fight." Those were the glowing words in front of Dum-dum Taravangian in his vision of the Diagram that he read out loud, when Odium pulled it up to examine it. (It also had a vision of words that had faded from golden to black, rooted in the name of Renarin Kholin... Cultivation... What have you done?) And if Dalinar won't even let Kaladin fight ordinary combat missions any more due to battle fatigue, why would he name him his Ultimate Champion at this point?

I agree, except that the twist would only even really BE a twist in the first place if you were already immersed in what it means for a Southern Scadrian to be unmasked (plus the off-screen mention by Allik of the hardcore "Hunters") from reading The Bands of Mourning, which doesn't seem to be something Brandon would do at this juncture if ever. Otherwise, for any other readers it'd be like, "HAHA! And Ishnah was Iyatil all along! Who... Wait for it... Removed her mask to pull off the disguise instead of putting one on!" "Okay...?" "Yeah! Didn't think she'd do that, huh? How about THEM apples!" "...What apples?" "EXACTLY!"

"You will follow me, Turash, or I will reclaim that which gives you persistent life." "I'm starting to wonder about that. You don't even reclaim 'persistent life' from Kaydash the Giggler, or Lenia the Pooler of Drool!" "Well, they are still following me. And when you have an agreement with me, --" "Yeah yeah, you keep it in spirit and not merely in word. So you're saying you told them to sit there laughing and drooling?" "Well, I didn't tell them not to do that. But I did tell you to follow Vyre. So do it." "I'd rather drool." "That is too bad, Turash. Simply too bad."

Just think of all the poor "singers" who were awakened from mindless slavery just to become Fused Fodder. I thought it was interesting that there are so many insane Fused, who just sit around staring or giggling. Why are they even coming back into a physical form? Is it a cycle they cannot control? Like, wouldn't Odium be better off "unplugging" them so that the sacrifices of bodies for housing Fused aren't essentially wasted? Or are there more of them than before, because of the very long time that has passed since the last time there was a proper Desolation (the "False Desolation" not featuring any Fused)?

No, I think Lezian has the potential to become comic relief inasmuch as his own stated goal is not to kill anybody else until he kills Kaladin. And I don't think Kaladin's gonna die at his hand, nope. That doesn't mean the overall arc of RoW might not see the Radiants lose Urithiru, or a number of key characters suffer death, defeat, and/or destruction or regression, and Team Odium apparently gain the upper hand. Just that I don't think Lezian's getting satisfaction. How's this for comic relief: while going after Kaladin Lezian is repeatedly killed by Lopen, but he refuses to redirect his attention from Kaladin because of his vow ("You're next, Herdazian!"). Meanwhile Lopen isn't really out to kill Lezian, he repeatedly forgets his appellation, which really infuriates Lezian ("oh, is that you again? The... Umm... Bursar who's out to kill our leader?" "That's PURSUER!"). And at least once, he kills Lezian more or less by accident, without even realizing he was there. Or this. That would re-establish Lezian as a baddie all right. Teft? Skar? Drehy? Sigzil?

Yes, I am wondering about the apparent lack of overt use of Nalan and the Skybreakers (that's good name for a band - write that down) and Vyre with the Honorblade... Have they been fighting and killing Windrunners with the Heavenly Ones? And the comment that Brandon Sanderson made in Reddit (I think it was) about not wanting Team Odium to suffer from "Skeletor Syndrome" could certainly be taken as an ominous sign that Rhythm of War will be like the The Empire Strikes Back with the protagonists getting dealt a few major setbacks.

And he gradually loses his mind (further), becoming more and more reckless and grandiose in his efforts, until he ends up like Inspector Clouseau's boss, Chief Inspector Dreyfus. Just mentioning Lezian developing an eye twitch would be a subtle enough nod. LOL.

Cool, Taravangian has joined the board! Welcome! Eh, I kind of doubt this because surely Elsecallers and Lightweavers of the 100+ past Desolations might have figured this out? Or a Herald? If Jasnah's any example, it's not like the Immortal Words "Life Before Death" somehow forbade them from using Soulcasting to just turn enemies into fire, smoke, or crystal (Jasnah didn't even need to be supercharged to do it - she did it in Kharbranth as a life lesson to Shallan).

Have we seen Regrowth with the Fused? And isn't their Surgebinding done with Voidlight instead of Stormlight? Certainly when Leshwi used a Lashing on Moash when they first "met", she used what reads like Voidlight on him to do so (a "dark light transferred from her to him").

Hmm. I guess I just assumed they had two Surges each like the Radiants.

I don't think the Fused are missing a Surge, I think they're missing a "Brand" vis-a-vis the ten Radiant Orders - like the Radiants, each "Brand" appears to wield two Surges. So if they are missing what would have been their Bondsmith combo, they still have both Bondsmith surges represented in adjacent Brands.

Right. I just went back and re-read the scene in TWoK Ch. 45 where she Soulcast the goblet to blood, and that was the first time she spoke "a truth" to Pattern - before she even saw Pattern as a pattern, instead of a shadowy, symbol-headed figure - when her rather flimsy so-called "truth" was, "I'm terrified." This was right after she'd decided to "begin the process" of summoning a Shardblade (not in so many words, but in re-reading it, that's obviously what she was thinking of and rejecting as forbidden). And as she did so, waiting the "requisite" ten heartbeats, came the message in her mind: What are you? Her response, "I'm terrified", is in no wise enough of a deep, hidden truth about herself to count as an Ideal - in reality, simply acting to summon a Patternblade and responding to her spren's question was the same as admitting a pretty deep bond with it (at least the Third Ideal), and that revived the bond enough to allow her to Soulcast (once again). And a hidden part of her knew that. The second (and so far as I can recall, only other) time Shallan has straight-up Soulcast was to transmute The Wind's Pleasure (into water?) to cause it to sink. To do so, Pattern said to her, "I will intercede... You have given enough [truth]." And later, he repeats, "I wil,l intercede... Translate. You are not ready." Yet he hadn't had to "intercede" for the goblet Soulcasting to blood. That first time, she heard the goblet as a "warm voice" saying, "I will change. Give me what you have." that was different from the "cold whisper" she had heard just a bit earlier asking What are you? But on The Wind's Pleasure, she was enough (re)-advanced as a Lightweaver to know she needed to Soulcast, but not to talk to the spren of objects (that, or convincing the ship, a much larger thing cognitively because people think of it as a "her", would be much harder to do?).

Eh, she could simply be much more natural at or more practiced with Soulcasting than Transportation, the way Shallan hasn't done much Soulcasting. Or it's one of those Surges that come first for the order - the way that Skybreakers can fly as squires with Gravitation after the Second Ideal, but evidently don't "get" to use Division until the Third Ideal. Ooh. A thought just occurred to me. It is odd, isn't it, that Shallan hasn't done any Soulcasting except under extreme duress or as a kind of depth effect to her Lightweaving (literally only twice - transmuting a goblet to blood when frantic to get the "fabrial" to work, and the ship to fire then to save herself from the Ghostbloods on The Wind's Pleasure)? Is that another aspect of her "blockage" of OG Shallan? Like maybe the past version of her that she's suppressing, did a lot more with Soulcasting...

Also that Raboniel gave up being one of the Nine to be... What she is. And what does that mean happened in all those past Desolations (or "Returns")? Somewhere each time, there was a chamber set up with the Nine encased in pillars, for the humans to have find and then to chisel out dead Fused bodies from at some point? Creepy, eh?

"Good luck."

I think there's more to the Sibling being "equivalent" to a deadeye. What is a deadeye? Not just a spren whose Nahel bond was broken, and now walks around the CR while mindlessly tracking whoever's bonded their Physical remains... But a spren who had formed enough of a Nahel bond to manifest in the Physical Realm as a Shardblade, and a big chunk of whose Investiture is still coalesced in that way (as a Blade in the Physical Realm). So what is this mechanism that appears to repel Fused from Urithiru, that "prevents them from attacking there"? Raboniel implies that is related to the "Surge supression fabrial" Kaladin encountered in Hearthstone, which development was inspired by "technology [she] discovered from within [Urithiru] itself thousands of years ago"? It seems to be related to the physical remains of the Sibling, perhaps? Like, that was the Sibling's function while "alive" (or one of them - powering the terraces seems like it may also have been a thing of an "awake" Urithiru), but they are locked in that function while "slumbering" the way a deadeye is a Radiant spren locked into Blade form, sort of like a fabrial? How did Raboniel get access to technology within Urithiru back then, anyway? Or did they just have a spy or traitor within the Radiant ranks? And apparently, being of the Fourth Ideal might allow a Radiant to "push through" the suppression, as she has particular concerns to have the Elsecaller (Jasnah) and the Bondsmith (Dalinar) to be drawn away from Urithiru as part of her plan.

Haha, I joked recently her Fourth Ideal will be accepting the truth about herself that she has been of the Fifth Ideal all along (since 11 years old), and that her Fifth Ideal "truth" was that for her sanity she needed to suppress it all and start over as a new Lightweaver, like a russian doll The combination of tautology and semi-paradoxical recursion would send Pattern over the moon(s). And explain why Pattern is so sure Shallan will eventually kill him. "You do it every time you've reached the Fifth Ideal!"

See if you can photshop in a distant figure walking away in the corner that's Rock.

The "quick spreading plague to the West" is supposed to be the common cold radiating out from the Purelake due to our worldhopping friends of the 17th Shard, isn't it?

I don't think the statement that "What am I? I'm terrified" at Kharbranth constituted an Ideal, it's not deeply personal enough. I would say it was more an admission to herself... That she could do something that deep inside, she knew she was blocking. That said, even if "Shallan" as we know her now, is of the Third Ideal, I'm totally on board with "Shallan" as a LW having reached the Fourth Ideal in the past (and is latently so in the present).

Oh, and Raboniel comments that the humans "have imprisoned some of the Unmade" in gems, while noting how close that is to understanding how to capture Fused in gems as well. Plural. So Dalinar's trick with Nergaoul was not the only time... Lending credence that "Melishi", the Bondsmith of an age past, ended the False Desolation by trapping Ba-Ado-Mishram in a perfect gem, which also broke the singers' Connection to Roshar and made them parshmen (except for the group that had broken free of Odium and refused some kind of bonding with that Unmade). The fact that that False Desolation ended that way, with the shutdown of Urithiru and the Recreance shortly thereafter, cannot be a coincidence...