tmnsquirtle

To play devil's advocate here for a second, I think it could go either way. Yes, they could be as unreactive as gold, but since we know that harmonium reacts in certain conditions, there's nothing saying that atium isn't explicitly reactive. Also, to get back to the OP for a second: metal will preserve pretty well in dry environments. It's very possible that atium should/would/could rust, but didn't just because the kandra homeland is not terribly wet. I'm no expert in caves, but I have to assume that it's possible to have a cave system with a lot of airflow and not a lot of water.

Well....

The second is far less likely, IMO. I believe we have WoB confirmation that E4 mistborn takes place around the last 5 SA books, so setting up a whole huge conflict arc would leave the cosmere pretty unresolved... Honestly, I think it's more likely that they'll beat Odium in the first 5 books, then have to deal with the consequences of whatever happens in the next. Or maybe fight autonomy, or something. One of the best parts of Sanderson is that no matter how much prediction we do, he's usually a better writer than we are theorizers, so we'll end up with a shocking twist pretty much regardless

I didn't think I could love that man any more, and then he says this. What a beautiful son of a slontze.

Apparently not all metals rust. From wikipedia: I wouldn't be surprised if there was some sort of chemical reaction that involved atium. That being said, I also wouldn't be surprised if there wasn't a way to oxidize it. Godmetals kind of break earth physics.

I actually don't think it would be ultimately profitable to have a child just to take their breath. It's valuable, but I really doubt it's valuable enough to justify the equivalent of thousands of US dollars in expenses in raising the kid. The possible exception - and I say possible because children are really expensive, even for just a few years - is raising them to the age where they can say the words, harvesting the breath, and then killing the child. Of course this is super immoral and I really want to believe that this practice wouldn't happen on Nalthis. But it's also not unlikely that the economics don't work out: (cost of living of child per year) * (~4-5 years until child can give breath) > (market price of a single breath) I definitely agree with the (1). While @Archer's point makes sense, and there would absolutely be conniving greedy people out there who are afraid to give away their 'god given breath, gosh darn it!' I think there's an equal or greater number of people who would be more interested in making the lives of their children/grandchildren better.

@Calderis that's pretty much what I was imagining a cognitive entity would be like. I actually would really like to see a spren or seon forced into the physical via shenanigans, and get a POV chapter from them explaining their disorientation and confusion. It would likely explain a lot of how the cognitive works on a fundamental level. P.S: Congrats on the recent Dragon, btw!

My bad. I suppose I meant in a more theoretical sense. 'Has,' in this case, means 'has the fundamental property of.' Meaning that, in theory, any entity formed in a realm can go (with appropriate perpindicularity/transport/whatever) to a 'lesser realm' without any modifications, but cannot travel 'upwards' (again with the same transport) without some transportation. I'm sure there are counter-examples, but that's what I mean by the fundamental properties. Spren cannot move to the physical realm without some expenditure of energy, or a helper. Kelsier can't get to the physical realm without help. A spiritual being, if one existed, wouldn't be able to manifest in the cognitive realm without some weird shard involvement.

For what it's worth, they probably could: That being said I'm not really sure if they can give all their power. For example, let's suppose the new host is unwilling to accept the power, for the sake of the argument. Would the old vessel be able to just shove 100% of the power at the new host until they ascended? Would our old vessel be able to purposefully give more like 50% of the power, before the new host finally caught up in investiture density and started resisting? Would he not be able to give any of it at all? I don't see Sanderson answering any of these questions in the novels anytime soon, unless we end up with a hero with a 'I don't deserve this' complex somehow ascending.

I just had a thought. The spiritual realm is the most basic/fundamental. Because we don't know a lot about it, other than the fact that space/time don't exist there, this is the easiest mental leap to make IMO. The cognitive realm is emergent from the spiritual, bringing about the concepts of time and space. Of course, these would be expressed somehow via investiture. I'm not actually 100% sold that it goes in this order (spiritual -> cognitive -> physical), but for the purposes of this idea it has to. Note that the cognitive realm 'contains' everything the spiritual has, but with more informational complexity: sapience? Check. Investiture? Check. The physical realm is emergent from the cognitive. It brings about the concepts of mass and energy. As far as we know, everything in the cognitive realm is made out of investiture, unless you visit from the physical (at which point, who really knows). But, the physical realm is home to non-investiture constructs, which are presumably unique to the physical realm regardless. So, it seems to follow that the structure of the realms can be figured by stacking them in order of increasing complexity: Spiritual, where the basic energy (investiture) of the universe comes from. Cognitive, where that energy is structured into concepts, places, and times. Physical, where those concepts and places are given actual form.

This game was my childhood. Props for the neat idea! Maybe you can integrate some ideas out of Super Mario Odyssey and have a resource for costume changes. Like soul stamps that would work really well on Sel, or lightweaver 'coins' that you have to collect to maintain the benefits.

This might be similar to what autonomy does with avatars.

I wonder if the stormfather would remain sapient if this happened. Since he is essentially just sentient investiture, it's entirely possible his consciousness could get broken down and absorbed by the newly reformed shard. Although it's equally likely that he'll stick around as a grumpy shoulder angel if Dalinar does end up ascending, since the Nahel bond essentially just makes their souls into a single soul with two minds.

I read it as Syl-Odium. Having not seen attack on titan, I was extremely confused for a second there.

True! It's easy to forget about conventional astronomy when most research is done via the use of magic.

Maybe there's a device we don't know about that can exist in the cognitive, and project slightly into the physical. I'm imagining something like a spren, or an elsecaller, that can exist in both realms, but only a tiny bit of it can be pushed through. That might be enough to accurately record some data about the physical realm version of a cognitive realm area.

Yeah, but even that is considered less proper IIRC. Jasnah wearing shardplate combines a bunch of impropriety: -Extremely highly ranked lighteyes (also, royalty - making her somewhat of a figurehead, even if she doesn't care about that, so people will gossip regardless) -The action of using plate, while not explicitly masculine, is culturally connected to war. So it probably carries some masculine implications with it. -Using a glove instead of a sleeve is considered a lower class way to dress. Jasnah won't care about any of this, but I'm interested to see how/if sanderson addresses the cultural issues.

That's not quite how breath works. You don't really breathe the colors in or out, per se - the 'enchanting' drains color from around you as part of a cost of the action. After that it would just look like a normally inanimate object acting, well, animate.

Also, didn't white sand take place a loooooong time before mistborn E1?

This might be one of my biggest questions about the current cosmere. Also something to add to the list (SH spoilers):

I wonder if Larkins have gemhearts.

My hunch on this topic is that most immortals will probably fall into the camp of "seeks power and wealth, rather than pleasures of the flesh" if only because the ways to become immortal have generally required something weird like that. But of course there would be exceptions.

That's an interesting thought, actually. Will the shardplate gauntlets count as appropriately conservative clothing for radiants? Or will it be scandalous since you can see their fingers?

Not quite.

Neat idea, but we haven't seen enough of feruchemic chromium to make a solid judgement imo. More likely, chromium stores capital-f Fortune which is usually used to see the future and similar.