alder24

Full memories so it would be rusting hard to edit them in the way you propose, just text would be probably easier and doable. There's no "who's walking down the street" in your memory, because it's you, it's your memory, it's you - it's always from your perspective. Memories in a Coppermind are stored in separate units, individually, they aren't seen as one memory because Sazed can have them all indexed and go to a specific memory without accessing any other memory, if he knows where that memory is (and there is WoB below). You can't really blend them together, they are separate from each other. You can tap those two memories at once, but that's a conscious decision of yours, you know they are separate and you would know those are different memories anyway. The biggest trouble would be to combine those memories into one memory, which a Feruchemist probably won't be able to do. So I don't believe that you can edit your memories with just Feruchemy right now, as intent screws you over. But in the far future of Cosmere, in times when machines and fabrials will be used to work on investiture, I think it's reasonable that there would be ways to edit memories like 5D movies, that would be treated as one memory. Why? Because you might be able to break down each memory into bits of investiture and glue them together as you wish. Might is a key word here.

Yes, this is possible. You can either tap so much heat that you will burn people with your touch, or store it to create frostbites on others. You're right that a Firesoul would be mostly immune to the effects of increasing or decreasing their temperature - Feruchemy protects them from that - but there are still some limits. It's possible to store/tap too much heat and hurt yourself in the process, but this is really hard to do, even if you're a brass compounder. This protection seems to be more internal than external - if you want to walk through fire, you should store heat, not tap it. Becoming hotter won't be as helpful as storing heat that is transferred to you by fire (but we don't know if becoming as hot as fire would prevent you from being harmed, it seems reasonable to assume this would happen). One risk which is clear is tapping so much heat that you will melt your brassminds (~930 degrees C), or even much earlier when your clothes would self-ignite (for cotton it's between 200-400 degrees C). Both of those things might harm you, molten brass will for sure harm you and it will most likely prevent you from using your brassmind (while you theoretically can store attributes in molten metals, it will have some effect on investiture, so I imagine it will not end well even for a Firesoul). However there are low limits in Feruchemy, there is only so much attribute you're allowed to store. We don't know what those limits are in the case of brassminds, but they should prevent you from storing too much heat which would harm you. You most definitely can't store all your heat at once and lower your temperature to the absolute 0K, that's for sure. If you also have access to healing, you can extend the upper limits of brass Feruchemy and heal yourself from any self-inflicted damage. On the very hypothetical end of the spectrum, providing infinite investiture, a Fullborn can tap so much heat and mass that he will become a star - however in this hypothetical scenario infinite healing is a must, otherwise he would die waaaay earlier. Still, this suggests that you might be able to tap heat even from molten brassmind and reach much higher temperatures, as long as you have enough healing (a huge amount of healing I must add). But unless you want to melt steel with your bare hands, there is no need for you to go anywhere near brass-melting temperatures. Burns can be caused by just 44 degrees C, 70 degrees C will be immediately destructive to tissue. Stick with those temperatures and save your dignity and clothes.

Hello, welcome to the Shard We actually have an answer from Brandon on where visions occur. Visions are glimpses into the Spiritual Realm, but viewed through the Cognitive Realm (through the mind). They are happening in the Spiritual Realm, the Cognitive Realm gives them a framework and allows people to experience and comprehend them. And we have this hinted by Odium in RoW I-4, where he said visions aren't a place - just like the Spiritual Realm also isn't a place. Everything in Cosmere exists in all three Realms simultaneously. They have a physical body, Cognitive manifestation and a Spiritweb. For objects the Cognitive manifestations appear in the Cognitive Realm as beads on Roshar, for living things those are flames. Things in the Cognitive Realm aren't physical (unless you bring them through a perpendicularity), the Cognitive Realm is the realm of manifested thoughts and ideals. Spiritwebs exists in the Spiritual Realm which is where time and space compound into one and distance has no meaning. And their whole existence is anchored to person's Physical body. When a person dies, their body is separated from their mind and the Cognitive Realm is the "in between land” (because it connects the Physical Realm with the Spiritual one) before their soul fades into the Beyond (which ISN'T the Spiritual Realm, it's the Afterlife in its classical meaning which Brandon won't ever confirm if it exists in the Cosmere or not) . But that's not where Taravangian was when he died - his mind was pulled and stretched earlier by Odium into the Spiritual Realm, while his body stayed in the Physical Realm. Nightblood on the other hand, because of his highly invested nature, pierces all three realms at once and exists in all of them (just like a Shardblade does, that's why it can cut through souls because it's physical in all Realms at once) - that's why Taravangian was able to use it against Odium, as it pierced through the vision Odium created, which was in the Spiritual Realm. By visions aren't a place, they are sent to a mind, thus experienced through a mind, which is a Cognitive aspect of a person. It's already getting complicated and messy to explain how the three Realms can interact with each other, but those interactions can explain everything that's happening. There are no additional realms or layers on top of them and Brandon is clear about it.

Haven't we? And their unnatural liking of massacring people with their axes? They literally can't stop themselves once they start - even Marsh (and Ruin) couldn't stop himself after killing Goradel from turning his body into a mush. And Brandon said, that some inquisitors burn up fast, which I think might suggest that some suffer mentally more than others. It all comes down to how Hemalurgy works. A spike always hurts you. It always cracks your soul. And while normally a spike is filled with investiture and that investiture is filling the crack it created (not perfectly though because it still allows others to enter, unlike cracks filled by Allomancy when people are Snapped), thus mitigating the strain those cracks puts on the soul (and making them more invested), in the case of an aluminum spike, which removes all powers (and investiture) from the spirit web, it literally rips of a huge chunk of the spirit web and leaves the hole empty. The more powers there is, the bigger the portion of the spirit web that's excised, the bigger the hole left in the spirit web. People who are mentally ill have their soul broken in the similar way to what Hemalurgy is doing. The more broken their soul is, the more susceptible to mental instability they are. Because of those cracks, mentally unstable people are easily influenced by Ruin as he can get through them, just like he can get through cracks caused by spikes. Hemalurgy ALWAYS hurts you! Warbreaker spoilers: Cosmere spoilers: As aluminum will become more and more comon and affordable, the impact of people with invested arts will inevitable be lessened - but we also see the emargence of mecahnical way of accessing investiture, like Malwish medallions or Fabrials. They are balancing out aluminum's avaibility. Yes, it would be easier to deal with Metalborn, but there will be 10 times more of them. Like Kelsier used to say, there is a push for every pull. And that's why I'm concerned about aluminum spikes destroying all powers because it threatens to break this balance that's already established. Yes, it's hard to pinpoint a binding point with a spike, but once you do it there is nothing that can be done. There is no counteraction. Nothing that pulls back on the system. It's a weapon greater than even a Shardblade is. And that's a threat. Of course it can be done this way with the balance in mind, one of the simplest solutions is to keep Hemalurgy from becoming a public knowledge (which seems to be inconsistent with TLM ending). The threat of overusing aluminum spikes will be gone simply because there aren't many people that know it can be done. However if a skilled Hemalurgist were to be encountered, we're risking creating a plot hole in the story, if he doesn't use an aluminum spike. It would be such a powerful solution that it won't make any sense not to use it. On the other hand, using it is too simple of a solution. Imagine Wax knowing about it and using it in the very first encounter with Miles on the train in AoL - the book would have ended right then and there with Miles getting aluminum between his ribs and losing god status. And because of those concerns I have, I think it makes more sense from the storytelling perspective that aluminum does not permanently remove all powers. This just creates better potential for action and generates a more thrilling story, which can't be ended with aluminum spikes every time. However, mechanically speaking it makes sense for aluminum spike to work both ways, with a slight edge given to destroying investiture side, because of how Hemalurgy works in general. It indeed is enjoyable

It breaks your soul apart and a broken soul can cause madness. People with all their powers removed would have their spirit web hanging by a thread and be extra susceptible to all kinds of mental instabilities. It would be way worse than just surviving a normal spiking. True, but it's just a waste. I expect more, something unique from a unique metal which should have some interesting applications - more than just destroying spirit webs and leaving people crippled. Aluminum will soon be very common all across Cosmere and if it's so powerful in Hemalurgy, then it takes just a few determined individuals to render the entire Cosmere powerless (or at least the most powerful individuals) - why would you need SWAT team made out of Allomancers when you can have a few guys with spike-guns and aluminum? The solution for every single villain with powers would be "just spike them with aluminum," to the point it might create a plot hole. It would be way too powerful compared to how accessible it will be in the near future. Yes, it's Feruchemy and I'm making a point here that if that's how F-aluminum works, then it's a completely unique metal that doesn't allow for any tapping and blanks everything, unlike all other metals in Feruchemy. And Hemalurgy requires a charge spike to make an effect, but we both agree aluminum can't be charged. Aluminum is always different, it has disruptive properties but it doesn't kill or destroy investiture. In Hemalurgy it might be more aligned with the nature of Hemalurgy and rip spirit webs to pieces - what you're suggesting it's possible - but if not then its properties will simply disrupt inner workings of your spirit web, preventing you from accessing power, but not destroying them. And that leaves us with more potential - if you get a spike with aluminum in your heart, you can't remove it without dying (you can't even use any medallion to heal during that process, because you'll drop dead as soon as the spike is out and you can't tap it while the spike is still in you), if it's just an earring, you're fine. So you still can have permanent effects of the aluminum you're proposing, without all the consequences it would have for the greater Cosmere and the victim's soul.. In the end all we have are speculations and I think both options are equally likely to be true.

Yes, it's a bit wasteful, but you don't have to make a big spike, a small earring will be fine too. Still, it's better to just burn it. Even Brandon admitted it's not that useful in Hemalurgy:

Medallions aren't just metalminds, they are little machines that have a little bit of life force, a bit of identity of their own, that grant you Feruchemical powers. You don't tap the nicrosilmind in a medallion, the machine gives you those powers instead. They are like Honorblades, which are self-aware. All we have are those WoBs, we're left with speculations only. Because medallions are different and more restrictive and because they are little machines with their own identity, I believe a normal use of F-nicrosil allows you to store and tap invested powers, just like any other attribute. Only when used in medallions nicrosilmind will work like a coppermind because you bond them and are given powers via that bond. I think it's more like an artificial soul/spren that just permanently have those powers in their spirit web and that's why it doesn't run out.

That's ONLY in a medallion, which is different and more restrictive than the normal use of F-nicrosil.

Yes, that's option 3, I see it now. That's because in this case it isn't a Hemalurgic spike. You need an intent and a precise injection into a specific binding point, without this aluminum will act just like a normal piece of metal. The one single reason why I'm not so sold on the idea that aluminum spikes destroy all powers in the donor is that this will literally destroy most of their soul, rendering them way worse than a Drab. It will cripple them to the point of possibly breaking their mind and maybe even killing them, even if you drive a spike through a non-lethal binding point - the damage done to the soul would be enormous. That's way too much and it offers little to no practical applications. If you're gonna kill them anyway, just use a normal spike and steal something from them. If F-aluminum works by just blanking the identity, with no tapping, which is reversible as soon as you stop storing in the metalmind, then it's similar to how I envision an aluminum spike to work - it removes your power for as long as you have the spike in you. This offers a lot of potential uses for the spike, with a limited amount of damage done to the soul. This would differentiate an aluminum spike from normal power-stealing spikes and give a reason to use it. Binding points should still matter, you always have to be precise where you insert any spike, otherwise it just won't work, or you risk stealing something else. It should still apply to aluminum, if you place the spike in the wrong spot in a donor, you won't remove any power, if you place it wrongly in a recipient, it won't work as well. But there should be several binding points for it, so you probably can choose where to put it, if you're knowledgeable enough. Lerasium steals only attributes, not powers. You can't steal Allomancy and other invested powers with it, but you can most likely steal everything at once - all strength, senses, mental speed, memories etc. from a donor, trapped in one spike to be granted all at once.

Did they know the truth about Taln? I don't know, there is no mention of it on Coppermind. He is a deity, just like all Heralds are, Stone Shamans revere and respect them, but they have no interest in taking care of "children of god." I don't see much reason for them to take Taln with them - he's the son of god, he's way above them, he doesn't need them. But they have a duty to care for Honorblades, to the point that they are unwilling to return them to Heralds, even if they were to ask for their baldes. Honorblades are more important to them then Herald's wellbeing. As for the Unmade, it's unlikely. In WoK we have Rysn's PoV in Shinovar and everything seems fine there. In OB Shins sent letters to Dalinar and even warned the coalition about early arrival of the Everstorm before the battle of the Thaylen Field. Only somewhere in between OB and RoW did Shins become hostile and all contact was broken, which suggests that's when the Unmade arrived. RoW ch 111:

I don't think so because Noturo had Ishar's Honorblade and Ishar said he killed him, which I think was the truth.

I believe that's how H-aluminum works. It's just an uncharged aluminum spike, placed and left in the proper binding point that prevents you from accessing all of your powers either by destroying them (it's a massive damage to your spirit web, I think that's unlikely), or disrupting them and preventing you from accessing it as long as you have that spike (like primer cube charged with aluminum works - WoB). There is no donor, only a recipient. And it has a lot of uses. Killing isn't always an option. A lawful country doesn't have to have the death penalty, many countries in the world don't allow the execution of criminals, no matter their crime. Removing their powers in the most humane way possible is essential for their proper and safe imprisonment. Stealing their powers isn't a good option as it permanently wounds their Spirit Web and leaves them in the worse then Drab state (WoB1, WoB2). If you have a Mistborn that's 16 spikes which would shred his soul to pieces - that's just making them permanently handicapped. Giving them a single aluminum spike, placed in the point from which removal is deadly, is the best way to deal with this problem. Additionally, I believe that powers aren't permanently removed with this spike, they are gone as long as you have this spike in your body, once you remove it, you once again can access your powers. So if somebody needs to have their powers removed for a limited period of time, then just give them an aluminum earring. You can have a secret criminal underground meeting where because you don't trust each other, you make everyone wear such aluminum earring (SoS prologue would have been avoided this way). You can set up a non-Allomancy zone in the senate building to make sure nobody is using any emotional Allomancy or anything like that. Sure, primer cubes are better, but north don't have Harmonium yet, there is a limited number of aluminum gnats - giving everyone an aluminum earring is just easier, especially that aluminum will soon become really cheap.

The problem I have is how would someone even get to Taln in the first place to swap the blades? A mysterious darkeye man just banged to Kholinar's gates with an "unbounded" Shardblade in his hands, warned everybody about incoming Desolation, then collapsed and when he waked up he claimed to be a Herald. They won't leave him out in the open on the streets, they're gonna put him in the most heavily guarded room in the entire Kholinar - and that indeed happened judging from the secrecy of the mission to transport him and his Shardblade to the Shattered Plains. And we know the swap happened AFTER he showed up at Kholinar because of how both blades were described. The blade held by Taln and the one Dalinar bonded aren't the same, Taln had a long and narrow spikelike blade, while Dalinar bonded with a wide, almost cleaverlike one. Somewhere along the way somebody swapped them. Chana would be unable to get close to Taln to swap blades, even if she had a Deadblade. I think Taln's blade was snatched by Shins. They are the only group of people that collects Honorblades, they have access to Surges and know how to use them to get to Taln, switch his blade and leave unnoticed. They weren't afraid of Szeth losing his blade, because they had means to retrieve it from whatever person were to get it just by using the Surge of Transportation. I think they are the only people having the proper motivation and abilities to swap Taln's Honorblade and not be seen when doing this.

Any piece of information from upcoming releases and pre-released chapters of KoWT are not allowed here, should be marked as a spoiler and put into a spoiler box with a proper warning before it!! This is because there are people who avoid all spoilers and do not wish to know anything about KoWT until they’ll get the book in their hands. The only places where this isn't needed are topics clearly marked as SA5 (either by having [SA5] in the title or in tags), but otherwise until KoWT is released and a subforum for it is made, everything from preview readings needs to be marked as spoilers. Please edit your posts by clicking the three dots menu in the upper right corner of your post, then choose "edit" option, highlight the proper section containing spoilers and click an eye icon in the toolbox above, which will put everything highlighted into a spoiler box. And just like I did in my quote boxes, please add a warning before the box because just placing a spoiler box tells us nothing about its content. Many people, including me, put WoBs in spoiler boxes, therefore someone might think it’s a WoB and get spoiled instead. In the future please avoid even mentioning information from SA5 chapters in topics that don't discuss SA5 and aren't marked as such, even if that information confirms or disproves a theory - just mentioning it in a spoiler box is a spoiler on its own and if the original poster wanted to discuss SA5, he would have marked his topic and discussed this in the first place.

It's hard to say as we don't know how many planets Sig was, not even how many planets Hoid visited. Eventually he will run out of planets to Skip. But he wasn't even on Nalthis because "nice places tended to be easy for the Night Brigade to find" (ch 13). So it seems there are still enough planets for Nomad to jump so that he doesn't have to worry that much about confronting the Night Brigade, or returning to people he knows yet. He still can focus on trying to get a head start on the Night Brigade. But one day he will Skip to a planet he already knows.

It was stated that the Night Brigade has been hunting Nomad for decades, not hundreds of years. The simplest explanation to your question is that on Canticle Nomad was lucky to find both Scadrians and the Cinder King who both had enough investiture to get him out of the planet that fast. Normally he would probably have a much harder time to gather so much needed investiture, thus it would usually take him longer to Skip. While the Night Brigade arrived hours after Nomad did (which was a surprise) they didn't know where Nomad was on the planet, which gives him additional time for hiding. As JustQuestin said, Night Brigade probably wasn't that good at following Nomad's Skips. TSM ch 27: In the epilogue Sig said that he can't afford returning to the planets he already was on, because it would alert the Night Brigade that there are people on this planet that he's close to. He also said that he was only a short time on Canticle, which kind of sounds like that's not how much time he usually spends on a planet. TSM epilogue: Let's try thinking in the opposite way. Using information we have, let's guesstimate how much time on average does Sigzil spend on a single planet before Skipping. Assuming 100 inhabited planets in Cosmere, 1 per star (per Drominad system AU description, 3 inhabited planets are highly unusual, only rivaled by the Rosharan system), knowing that Sigzil visited less planet than Hoid - let's say 80 in total - and lastly assuming he's been running from the Night Brigade for 40 years now, it gives us that on average Sigzil spends around 6 mounts on every planet. This seems a lot, but truthfully I don't think so. Yes, it's not as little as a day or two spent on Canticle, it's still a really short timeframe for Sigzil to find people, hide among them, find enough investiture and escape before the Night Brigade finds him. Planets are massive (Canticle is not), there are a lot of places where a single person like Nomad can hide and disappear among the local population. Every planet can have a population of hundreds of millions or even a few billions of people and that's really a lot of people. And once the Night Brigade finds a planet to where Nomand skipped, their main way of locating Sigzil is by asking the local population about him - which can take a loooooot of time. It's like searching for a needle in a haystack. Taking this into consideration I think half a year per planet isn't that much at all and it's a reasonable guesstimate. TSM epilogue:

That's because Shallan had a great trouble with Soulcasting, even when she tried to learn it in between OB and RoW, she failed and often when she was able to Soulcast something, it wasn't into what she wanted to make. It's not that Shallan ignores it, for some reason she's just bad with it. RoW ch 21: In WoK she soulcasted a goblet into blood - and that was most likely a power from Testament, not Pattern. If Shallan didn't start to summon Testament as a blade, she wouldn't have been able to Soulcast. This suggests that her troubles with Soulcasting are because of Testament and her broken bond. WoK ch 45: And when she was Formless in CR, trying to kill Kalak, she easily soulcasted a door knob with barely any resistance. She attributed it to the fact that it's so easy in CR, RoW ch 93: True. OB ch 120:

Yes, storms work like that, but you've missed what gives them electric charge - friction. It's not pressure, it's friction between particles and molecules that creates the charge difference. Take a ruler and start rubbing it on your clothes, or rub your socks on a carpet and you are making static electricity with it. The same mechanism charges clouds during a thunderstorm. That means that Abrasion can more directly create lighting than Adhesion. Sure, if you want, you can use Adhesion to indirectly create lightning by creating a proper environment - but it doesn't control lightning, it doesn't create lightning. You're just using pressure to make particles rub against each other and create a charge difference, which will cause lightning. That's just making lightning with extra steps. Even Abrasion won't directly create lightning, you’re just changing the way friction works and with that make a better environment for lightning to appear. A Surge that allows you to manipulate electric charge directly is the one Surge that will spawn lightning at will.

That's not true. It's been confirmed by Brandon that Surgebinding is of both Cultivation and Honor. Keep in mind that every Shard can mimic any other magic system in Cosmere and while Honorblades are fully of Honor (which doesn't mean the invested art they were giving access to was fully of Honor), spren, who are of both Cultivation and Honor, mimicked them and give humans a combined invested art. The division between magic systems on Roshar isn't as clear and well defined as it is on Scadrial - you can call each individual Surge a separate magic system, or each order, or the whole thing - it's unlike Metallic Arts where those divisions are very visible. On Roshar it seems that each Surge is leaning towards either Honor or Cultivation (like Progression is of Cultivation, while Gravitation is of Honor) and the same goes for spren. Similar situation is happening on Sel - every magic system on Sel can be categorized as a subset of one Selish magic system, or can be treated as separate system.

And she broke her bond after killing her mother. Yes, this solves this problem. I didn't get this from the original post, it seemed to me that Chana suddenly decided to become a random kid. Killing your parents will ALWAYS be a traumatic experience and make you suffer guilt. She was her mother, Shallan loved her, remembers her fondly. You can't kill your beloved mother and feel nothing, you will feel guilt, no matter the circumstances. Yes, she would. Yes we do know the mechanics of it. The Oathpact is a bond shared by all Heralds. Even though they've broken their oaths, the bond is still Connecting them together. They can feel each other to some extent - they've all felt Jezrien's death. Chana is no different. Illusions don't affect Connections. Illusion won't hide or suppress this Connection they all share. It's just an illusion, nothing else. Even if Chana were to view herself as Shallan, it won't affect this Connection. Killing Jezrien severed his Connection, which felt like a piece of their soul was being ripped out - this isn't something you can hide behind an illusion. OB ch 121: RoW ch 17: RoW ch 79 epigraphs: Meanwhile as Jezrien was dying, Shallan was kissing. That isn't possible if she was Chana. She would have collapsed, just like other Heralds - no illusion can change that. Or he realized that Shallan broke her bonds and he didn't need to send another one. Or he didn't know and his acolyte acted on his own to prove himself. But reading the letter from Mraize, it seems that Nale knew someone from the Davar house was close to bonding a spren, but he incorrectly assumed that was Helaran, not Shallan. OB ch 40: Because she was just a kid, she wasn't in contact for years, she stayed away from them, they might have not recognize her at first, they played it safe to ensure that she isn't a double agent, she wasn't a full Ghostblood, or was simply manipulated by Ghostbloods as a kid, which in my opinion is the most likely explanation. Healing can push ink out of her body - we've seen this with Kaladin when he tried to get his tattoo. I don't know what you mean it doesn't fit thematically. Shallan is revealing more disturbing truths about her and it gets worse and worse with each new one. From :I killed my father" to "I killed my mother too", lastly we have "I killed my spren." "I killed my god and started a new Desolation" is a truth fitting thematically. Each of them breaks Shallan more and more and makes her hate herself, view herself as the worst person imaginable, struggle with her self-worth more and more - those are real problems affecting real people, Shallan rising from the absolute worst, starting to believe that she's strong enough, that she deserve to be happy no matter of her sins is her theme. Only her? Kaladin doesn't count for you? He told him even more stories than he told Shallan, he gave him his flute (!), he visited him in prison, he supported him during Odium's torture and risked his own life (!!) to give Kaladin a few minutes of rest. Hoid respects Dalinar and advises him multiple times, Hoid also has a soft spot for Renarin. They are all treated equally by supportive Hoid. On the other hand Hoid respects and treats them with reverence - that's not how Hoid treats Shallan at all. RoW ch 17: I can't understand why you downplay the fact that Shallan killed her parents, who were a loving family to her in her early childhood. That's not something trivial, that's a very traumatic experience, fully justifying how she feels. Yes we, the audience know that she did it in self-defense, but you the reader don't care about Shallan's mother, you didn't experience your childhood years being embraced by her, cared for by her, laughing and playing with her in the garden - Shallan did. For her it's absolutely the greatest sin imaginable and it's fully understandable why she feels like this. She wants her loving family back, she wants her mother back, she wants to live her happy life once more - she can't, because she had to kill her mother and father. Just because it was in self-defense doesn't mean it was right. Killing your parents is never right. Dalinar never killed any of his relatives, but he was absolutely terrified when he realized that he nearly attacked his brother. When Gavilar was killed, Dalinar felt guilt for years after, because he wasn't there to help his brother. Nothing helped him until he faced Szeth on his own and realized that he wouldn't have helped Gavilar that night, which finally put his guilt to rest. Shallan isn't there yet. That realization is only in front of her - if she takes necessary steps and accepts help from others. WoR ch 88: Radiant is a forshadowing. What purpose did Veil have? To protect Shallan from the truth. The same is with Radiant. Shallan suffers from a real mental disorder and both Veil and Radiant are there to show her overcome it.

How would Chana be able to create an illusion? She was a Herald, not a Radiant, her powers came from her Honorblade, which granted her powers of Abrasion and Division - not Illumination. Chana was a patron of Dustbringers, not Lightweavers. Moreover her blade is still accounted for in Shinovar - the only blades Shins are missing are Jezrien's blade, Nale's blade and Taln's (at least pre WoK). Honorblades granting powers of Illuminations should be still in Shinovar, as Szeth noted that only Nale's blade went missing some time in the distant past. Chana would have no ability to create any illusion. Moreover, how would that explain the behavior of Shallan's brothers and her father? Was Channa not killed in this theory? Did Shallan exist before Chana became her? They know Shallan as Shallan, not Chana. They all remember and referenced multiple times the day Shallan's mother was killed. How can they not react to the fact that their mother suddenly turned into a kid who wasn't there before? Yes, Shallan isn’t a reliable narrator, but it's really hard to explain that Chana suddenly disappeared and in her place they suddenly have a grown up child. And lastly, if Shallan was Chana, she would have felt Jezrien's death, just like Ash and Taln did. Illusions and perception can go a long way, but that won't remove her Connection to the Oathpact. It also seems very unlikely that Kalak wouldn't be able to recognize Chana, even under an illusion. None of this happened. Shallan's ability to take Memories is a resonance of her order - just like Windrunners can have more squires, all Lightweavers have something like that. WoR ch 49 epigraphs: It's not identical, Heralds weren't taught how to store memories, Hoid mentioned to them that it's possible and it would have helped them - but they didn't learn it. every single Herald we've seen is crazy and that means they've never learned to store memories. The ability to store memories removes them completely from your mind and puts them in investiture (Breaths, which Shallan doesn't have). When memories are stored, you can't recall that moment, until you bring them back from investiture. But Shallan was able to remember all Memories she made, she was able to redraw her paintings after losing them (not as good but still). This isn't like how storing memories work. RoW ch 84-89 epigraphs: Mistborn and Warbreaker spoilers: There was a Skybreaker acolyte with Shallan's mother trying to kill Shallan that night. It seems Nale has sent someone to kill her. As we know from Edgedancer, Nale doesn't always do it himself, the entire order was focused on this task. OB ch 40: Kaladin also wasn't hunted down, just like Jasnah and a few others. Nale simply missed them. It happens. Or he didn't have any legal justification to kill them - he needed them to break some law first, he wouldn't kill someone who didn't commit any crime at all. While Shallan did kill her father, she did it in response to him killing her step-mother and beating her brother - it was justice. Plus up until WoK, Shallan was not a Radiant anymore - Nale might have thought that the problem was solved when Shallan broke her Oaths and killed her spren. She's repressing her memories. Just like she repressed her memories about Testament and replaced them with Pattern, she's avoiding thinking about her mother most likely because she knows she was a Heralds. This is nothing new, it's already explained well enough. And being a daughter of a Herald isn't famous enough? It's not about fame, it's probably more about her special Spiritual abilities from the fact that she's a Herald's child. It won't work, Nale is a Skybreaker, bonded with a Highspren and he's as insane as others. Herald's insanity is more than just cracks in their soul - it's about their soul which wasn't made to last that long, plus eons of torture. She had a little help because she was one of the first Radiant with magical powers not seen on Roshar for around 2500 years. Her Surgebinding abilities are the only reason she was able to enter Ghostbloods and "trick" them. Personally I believe that Shallan as a kid was a Ghostbloods - that's why she remembers using a Seon as a kid, that's why Mraize knows so much about her past, that's why he knows she's lying to herself, that's why he calls her little knife and there were a few other things as well. That's easy to explain if you know more about Cognitive Shadows and their nature, which Heralds are. They can change their appearance to some degree. Remember Azure? She's somewhat special and while she isn't a Cognitive Shadow, she's related to them - she can change her look, hair colors, create scars on her face etc. Cognitive Shadows can fully change their appearance and their age too (but they will still look like them). It's all about perception and how they view themselves. OB ch 89: Warbreaker spoilers: Welcome to the Shard No rules were broken, it's fine. Overall it's an interesting theory, you put a lot of good work in it, you've made a few good points that make sense, but I'm very skeptical of it. Shallan always being Chana is very problematic as that would mean all her memories, flashbacks and interactions with her "brothers" (should I say sons?) are lies and made up stories. This would be too much that would have to be thrown into the trash - an entire flashback section of WoR is basically useless now as it's all lies. Yes, Shallan is not to be trusted, there are still lies in her past, we know of it, but the truth is hidden there for us to discover - like Testament. Now that we know about Testament we can reread moments when Shallan was summoning a Shardblade in WoK/WoR and find out which was Pattern and which was Testament as clues are all there, hidden in plain sight. Saying that Shallan was a lie and it was always Chana seems not the way Brandon would write. However I agree, there might be some of Chana inside of Shallan (Radiant), because of the fact that Shallan is her daughter, but not all of her and Chana isn't Shallan, Chana is still out there on Roshar. Chana was 100% killed by Shallan and since then something might have happened to Shallan and Chana and Radiant is manifestation of Chana, or at least she looks like Chana. Warbreaker spoilers:

It's possible, but that requires very special circumstances:

We don't know this. Type 0 - investiture that gained sentience on their own. Type 3 and 4 are dead objects, it doesn't matter if organic or inorganic. The fact that they are organic - thus they were once alive - only makes it easier to Awaken. But you can Awaken stone or metal without sentience as type 3 entities. It doesn't matter who created them, what matters is how they function. Returned are a full sentience attached to a living host. What you want to have is exactly the same thing. There is no need to put it in a new classification, just broadening the already existing one - Type 1 consists of Returned and whatever you call your creation. I see no reason to Awaken individual organs - once sentience is Awaken they will have to have a functioning body, just like most Cognitive Shadows do. Their body is alive. Again, this is not something new. It's the same as Type 4. It's just a different material used. Yes, it should be possible to Awaken cloth or wood to sentience, but they would still be Type 4. It's not metal that makes Nightblood this type of entity, it's the fact that he's sentient in a non-living host. Wood or cloth is dead, not alive. Warbreaker ch 46: Theoretically yes. It should be considered as Type 0 then. No, because its spirit web is gone. Lifeless has its soul replaced by an external Breath, unconnected to what that person used to be. An Avair or a Mistborn Awakened without any sentience would be just a normal Lifeless - Type 2 entity. Giving them their sentience back won't make them like Nightblood, they would be like Returned - Cognitive Shadows. But you have to catch their spirit to do that.

Division is a destructive force. We've seen Malata use it to destroy and turn a table to dust. She didn't repulse or isolate anything, she burned it. It's a force of decay. OB ch 107: Ars Arcanum: Why? The stronger the Connection - the bigger is the force of gravity - the more Stormlight you need to break that Connection. The mass a Skimmer stored might be keyed to gravity, thus tapping it would allow a Skimmer to reintroduce this Connection, nullifying your Lashing. And let's be real, we're far from any potential fight between a Skimmer and a Radiant, introducing a skill just for that seems like a waste. Hypothetically yes, practically no. Once you enter the event horizon you would have to move faster than the speed of light to leave it - that's because its mass curves the spacetime so much that the escape velocity of a black hole is greater than the speed of light. If you somehow isolate yourself from gravity, you should be able to just move out as no acceleration is acting on you anymore. However such ridiculously strong gravity would require an equally ridiculous amount of Stormlight to break that Connection. Spaghettification depends on the size of a black hole. For smaller ones it will happen way outside of their event horizon, for bigger black holes it will happen deep beyond the event horizon. If you're near a black hole your biggest concern won't be spaghettification, but the accretion disk around it - a disc of debris and dust superheated by friction, orbiting around and falling into a black hole, which generates huge amounts of deadly radiation - mainly X-rays. My advice is to not go anywhere near a black hole, even if you have Stormlight and fancy powers Disagree. Reverse Lashing has problems with affecting objects on the ground because they are strongly Connected to the ground. This should still cause you some problems with your type of Lashing. Ars Arcanum: Anyway, it seems plausible that this kind of Lashing would require less Stormlight than a normal Lashing (just like Reverse Lashing), but the use of Stormlight would still change depending on how strong is the Connection you want to sever. I admit, it has some uses, mainly being potentially cheaper than a normal Lashing. But everything you can do with this kind of Lashing can be done by normal Lashing and that's why I see no point in this theory being true, it's just a senseless repetition. Why would Adhesion - the force of binding and pressure - be better for lightning? It's an electric discharge. And why would Division - the force of destruction and decay - prevent a massively destructive lightning from happening? Lightning can reach up to 30,000 K in temperature, it fits more as Division, which burns stuff and can manifest a flame if a Dustbringer wants it (quote above). Division splits chemical bonds between atoms, which are electromagnetic force, lightning is just electricity flowing through the air - which is electromagnetism as well. Lightning is caused by the same phenomena Division can affect. Thus in my opinion, Division would be the best Surge to create lightning.

When Brandon talks about it, he says that "anybody" should be able to burn god metals, but that doesn't clear a lot. We don't know who that "anybody" is. Lerasium making people into a Mistborn is a side effect and an Allomancer burning Lerasium would get something else. This is because when you first burn Lerasium it's not you that's burning it, it's your body that's doing it. If you're an Allomancer and you know what to do, you can get the true power from Lerasium. Lerasium seems to be unique and be burnable by truly anybody in Cosmere (Hoid used it), but only as a side-effect. We don't know if other god metals have similar things going on, though Lerasium isn't the only metal burnable by anyone in Cosmere. I believe that this "anybody" doesn't mean anybody on Scadrial, or in Cosmere, or with proper Connection, it means any Allomancer. And only Allomacers can burn god metals. I believe this because one of the changes Brandon will make in Mistborn movies is that any Allomancer can burn Atium, as he specifically said this is something he wished he'd done from the beginning. Thus in my opinion only Allomancers can burn pure god metals, alloys of god metals can be burned by either a full Mistborn or a Misting of the alloy part (for Atium-electrum alloy it means electrum Misting). It makes a lot of sense as god metals are still metals, you need to be an Allomancer to burn them, because this is what Allomancy is all about and it aligns with the fact that only Seers and Mistborn can burn Atium-electrum alloy. But that's what I think, we don't know for sure what Brandon means by "anybody." TLM spoiler WoB: It's one possibility and there is a WoB supporting that: However recently we've learned that the reason Mistborn can't burn Shardblades and Shardplates is because they are spren, they are alive. You can't burn something that's alive because it's not treated as a metal anymore. And a WoB I've posted above said a Mistborn can burn other pure god metals as well, so it's not about Connection.