Wit Beyond Measure

This I think is a big clue into why the Shadesmar economy runs on stormlight, shows that Shadesmar has ambient moisture (which is a little strange, but that's the only way you can condense water) a little more source material is in order before we get into the serious economics. When Ico says "manifest souls," I think he means "soulcast." Ico seems to need the Stormlight to partially soulcast the glass bead (the soul) of ice into actual ice (much the same way that Shallan touched beads and they turned into the objects that the souls - the beads - were representing), though Ico's ice stays inside the sphere, perhaps since he's not a true soulcaster. Humans can eventually drink the water condensing on the outside of the bead of ice, though spren do not seem to need water to survive. I doubt the demand for water is significant in Shadesmar. However, if spren can use soulcasters to soulcast any of the many objects in the glass seas, yeah, I can see how that would be valuable! They could just soulcast themselves up some merchandise whenever they wanted. Without storms in Shadesmar, replenishing Stormlight is incredibly difficult to acquire since it probably has to be imported from the Physical Realm. Supply and demand. Stormlight becomes the commodity in Shadesmar. What I also find interesting about the quote is that I would have thought of Shallan and Jasnah as our two primary soulcasters. But Ico mentions creationspren like Wyndle, implying that Lift could be a soulcaster. Huh. Maybe it is just Wyndle and not Lift. So that explains why the Silver Kingdoms were the Silver Kingdoms pre-Recreance. The Free Trade Agreement between Shadesmar spren and Roshar Radiants likely drove silver prices way up, making silver the commodicity on Roshar. Yes, I do think that is why manifesting souls in Shadesmar is so dangerous. I'm not sure what happens in the physical realm, but it can't be good. What if you tried that with people, right? Is that what happens to Jasnah in her prologue: snatched into Shadesmar from Shadesmar?

The Four Color Theorem: Wit sets up four colors at the beginning of the story, before the big reveal. Like all of Wit's eerily poignant tales, Mishim is a metaphor. And Tsa, and Nomon, and Salas. We have three moons of green, blue, and violet. And then we have Queen Tsa, whose tower is white and who turns the moon white when she ascends. Implied: the moons are gods watching over men. The three moons represent three gods or three god-like immortals while the queen represents mortals - or a single mortal. Violet – Most commonly associated with Voidlight, Odium's Investiture. So Salas might be Voidlight or the guardian of Voidlight, which is currently BAM but used to be Odium. Green – The color of growth and the Nightwatcher and so probably the color of Cultivation's Investiture. So Mishim might be Growlight, if there is such a thing, or whatever Cultivation's Investiture is. Or she could be the guardian of this Investiture, so the Nightwatcher or Cultivation herself. Blue – The color of honorspren, which are splinters of the Stormfather, guardian of Honor's Investiture. Honor's Investiture is very likely the largest Investiture on Roshar, especially before Honor died, and so the largest of the three moons is a good fit for this Investiture. So Nomon, by process of elimination and perhaps tenuous connection, might be Stormlight (Honor's Investiture) or the Stormfather or Honor himself. White – Tsa's color in the story both as the white pillar and then the white moon, as she switches spots with Mishim. I have no idea who Tsa represents! She is clearly clever and sly and ever-so-cunning. She outconned Mishim! Does Tsa represent humanity? Does Tsa represent the Natanatans? Does Tsa represent the Heralds? Or is Tsa just Tsa? I doubt that last one but it could be. (And then using only these four colors to represent contiguous countries, you could create a planar map of Roshar, or any land really, where no countries of the same color touch. --Pattern) Proof: See Books 4 and 5 of the Stormlight Archive. Q.E.D. Err, no. Not at all. I'm throwing out ideas that might be true. I'd love to hear other ideas. And that's where you come in! Who do those baby blue god babies represent? The brilliance of Wit is how he tells tales so fanciful they cannot possibly be true, then he tells us that they cannot possibly be true, and then of course they are true. He buries the truth by changing the characters and the settings. And we think, oh, that's so beautiful but could never happen! And then when it does happen, the poignancy of both the real and metaphorical stories burns in our minds forever. The Girl Who Looked Up (the humans) found that we were the monsters (Voidbringers). When the Wandersail found the Uvaran emperor (Honor) dead, all those years, the murders the Uvarans (Radiants) committed of the peaceful people (Parshendi) were no longer the emperor's responsibility but their own. Wit's punchlines - the ends of his tales - are often if not always true. Here, we end with the Aimians birthed (metaphorically) on Roshar. When the mortals swapped places with the Green Goddess and then swapped back, they brought the Aimians back with them to Roshar. (Or at least that's my big theory.) How? The celestial sky might a metaphor for either the Spiritual or Cognitive Realm, which I think is one way or the only way worldhoppers travel. If humans in the Physical Realm swapped places with Cultivation (or the Nightwatcher) in the Cognitive or Spiritual Realm, they could contrive to bring the Aimians through, with a little help from their new BFF Honor. Everything I've said is highly theoretical. Again, I'd love to hear your insights, interpretations of, and metaphors for this tale! Much if not most of what I've said was first said by others, of course! I've mooned over many of the moon musings, but this thread is particularly my favorite (not because I follow the premise but because the ideas and presentation are remarkable!):

Woohoo! Thank you, all. Through your amazing insights and analysis and related ideas, as well as a quote in another thread, I've found my answer to the question that spawned the discussion. This certainly may not be your answer, and my answer may even change, but I feel like it is a decent theory, at least. So.... Shallan: Simply Psycho or Seriously Corrupted? Yes. Say what? Yes, Shallan is simply psycho, as @insert_anagram_here brilliantly shows. We should never have expected otherwise, really, of this ferocious child killer posing successfully as a precocious, naive babe. She killed her mama and her mama's lover in what must have been a violent and bloody struggle for survival. And then Daddy sang her a little lullaby and it was all better. (Umm, not.) And then she strangled Daddy with the pretty little necklace he bought her while singing him back that same sweet lullaby, putting him to sleep. Forever. And then Pattern tells her over and over and over that she has to confess and own her truths. This is really Psych 101 since denial is the first or second stage of grief. You can never get over something and heal if you don't admit it happened in the first place. Shallan pointedly ignores Pattern's pleas. And so the wounds fester. And fester. And fester. Wit tells her that Shallan must make her own self stronger in order to overcome her personality fragmentation. Shallan builds these fake personalities on top of herself like some inverted cheerleading pyramid with only her true self at the bottom, supporting all of the fake Shallan's. Instead of following Wit's advice to strengthen her true self, though, she opts to strengthen the top of the pyramid instead, with the bottom support of the entire pyramid remaining terribly weak. Of course it will all come tumbling down! D'uh. This is Physics 101. And yet, is that the end of the story? Yes, Shallan is also seriously corrupted. In much the same way that Nan Balat's sociopathy is magically enhanced by certain forces, plural, we see Shallan's psychopathy being magically enhanced by forces, as well, at least IMO. Yes, we can start to see the cracks in Shallan in WoK and WoR, and we suspect that they will be growing. However, Shallan's decline unexpectedly accelerates (slip-sliding faster than Lift in a buffet line) during the tower scenes when influenced by the Midnight Mother, and again in Kholinar in the presence of three Unmade, and again during the Thaylen City battle with multiple Unmade. These three points seem to be, by far, Shallan at her weakest. Is this timing a coincidence? I think not. Several or even all Unmade could be corrupting Shallan, not just Sja-anat. Sja-anat will still be terribly special to Shallan, though, for all of the magnificently articulated reasons @hoiditthroughthegrapevine gives, but she is not the only corrupting influence, it seems.

Ah, yes. She was much like an envoy, too. Perhaps Sja-anat or some powerful Unmade was able to imbue these spren with sapience.

Yeah, I don't know. It would be logical to assume that Fused spren can think as long as they're not too insane because they are Fused (bonded) to the ancient souls even without a host. But I didn't think Ulim was a Fused, so I have no idea how an unbonded spren would be as cognizant as Ulim is. The yellow one is Timbre? Timbre gets more and more cognizant as she forms the Nahel bond with Venli. She was in the process of forming the Nahel bond with Eshonai before Eshonai died. So just like Syl grows more and more aware before Kal speaks his first oaths, so does Timbre. The Nahel bond usually forms outside of the gemheart since humans don't have gemhearts, and can only be formed by Radiant spren.

Of total Parshendi forms, I suspect there are around a hundred! The Listener Song of Listing has at least 279 stanzas. We have seen 20 of these stanzas giving 12 different forms. So I think there may be a hundred forms, including all of the void ones. I suspect that all Voidspren are regular spren who have been corrupted, with most of these spren being fused with ancient Listener souls (all called the Fused, at least).

Wonder Spren Powers, Activate! Shape of ... a Shardplate! Seriously, it is a brilliant idea. That's probably why all of the windspren kept swirling around Kaladin, right?

Absolutely! Although, a small part of me does wonder if Truthwatchers weren't always fortune tellers. After all, a true fortune teller actually watches for the truth, right? Everyone always says that predicting the future is of Odium, but we watch Honor do it in Dalinar's visions. And then Honor says he's not nearly as good at seeing the future as Cultivation: And then we also know that the Truthwatchers were very secretive of their Order. The crystal panes Renarin uses to tell the future in seem much like the crystal panes that Wyndle makes. Of course, we never see the future in Wyndle. I count this theory as plausible though perhaps unlikely.

Love, love, love! Thank you, @hoiditthroughthegrapevine. I appreciate the entire post, especially the parts explaining more about Identity and Connection. Awesome! I also believe dullform is achieved through not bonding with spren, but I believe that this makes Parshendi almost as dull as parshmen because the spren Gemheart bond enhances Identity and Connection. I'm not sure if that makes sense, but if you go to the WoB and search symbiotic, you'll find many instances of Brandon saying the Gemheart Bond is a symbiotic relationship between spren and host. I think the benefit to the host is enhanced Identity and Connection. So dullform Parshendi have Identity and Connection but not much more than parshmen until they bond a spren, or at least that's how I view the differences. The spren Gemheart bond also may enhance every host's Connection and Identity, where we see the Santhid intelligently seeing Shallan and emotionally responding to her. It seems like Shallan was also surprised by the depth of the chasmfiend. Certainly the Rhyshadium show more intellect and emotion, as well. And the greatshell seemed quite fond of Rhys to give her a larkin. Yes, the CAPS-LOCK is more reminiscent of powerful beings like the Stormfather. However, I am also wondering about Eshonai's inner voice (or inner screams, really), the one she suppressed after gaining stormform. I had wondered at one point if that voice wasn't Timbre, but this quote makes it obvious that Timbre is still external and the rhythms are internal. I couldn't find the reference, but weren't we told at one point that the Parshendi could only do one surge each instead of two? And now we have this Voidbinding chart where all of the Voidbinders have two surges, clearly. I don't know that we've seen evidence of a Fused Parshendi who has more than one surge, have we? Perhaps Sja-anat's (recently?) manifested abilities to corrupt Radiant spren have led to these new and more powerful Voidbinders that the chart shows? I'm not sure - just speculating. I also am loving @Calderis's insights. I don't believe Odium is on Roshar quite yet, though, and perhaps I have mistaken your meaning. Seems like Odium can show up on Roshar only during Everstorms, and I don't think he's fully there even then. Or at least that is my impression. Thank you!

Ooo, yes! Odium, the bringer of the emotional void! You know, I think Odium might be stripping both Parshendi and humans of their Identity in order to be able to plant his corrupted spren inside them. In fact, the corrupted spren seem to already be fused (yes, as in Fused) with the Identity of the ancient, crazy Parshendi, which is why Odium must first create the void before he can impregnate them with his Voidspren. (I don't fully understand Identity yet, so a better term might be souls or spirits.) So the spirits of dead singers and these ghostly (corrupted?) spren have been fused together to form these Thaylen City Fused, almost all of whom bond with Amaram's army. Again, we see that the Fused (capital) are a fusing of hostile (corrupted?) spren and spirit. Hence the name, obviously. But in order for the Fused, containing both spren and spirit, to bond with a person or Parshendi, that person's spirit (Identity?) needs to first be removed to make room for the new spirit. We see this when the Fused spren tries bonding with Venli and she resists: So, Venli's voice is in quotes. The Fused spren quotes are italicized. Whose voice is the CAPS-LOCK one, the warm, paternal, kind voice? Is that Venli's Identity? Or her soul? Here is where Venli confronts the Fused Formerly Known as Demli: Demli is "dead" because his Identity or spirit has been removed in order to make room for the new spirit, right? And so Odium being the emotional Voidbringer is perfect for removing Identity (or spirits?) to make room for the Fuzed (fusing both spren and spirit). Humans have to be seriously coerced into giving up their spirits, though, which is why he brought The Thrill along.

Thanks, @RShara! I appreciate it. I certainly don't have all of the answers. Brandon does say the parshmen have evolved to lose their ability to change forms, so perhaps if humans kept taking gemhearts of Parshendi children long enough, evolution could happen. Not being the author, I'm not exactly sure how the magic works in the first place, so I wouldn't know how one would do without it or what it was connected to. ******************* Continually mulling these ideas over, I've put together some new pieces from the Words of Brandon. First, Brandon says that the Parshendi gods "are closer to what the humans would call 'Heralds.'" Heralds are humans who have been touched and somewhat transformed by Honor. I'm assuming that the correlator for Parshendi would be Fused, who are Parshendi who have been touched and somewhat transformed by Odium. And now for the main WoB quote: So the Everstorm changed the parshmen into Parshendi (or at least more Parshendi-like), with Brandon saying that a biological change was needed to make this happen. Brandon says that the clue to how the parshmen were transformed can be found in the prologue with Gavilar and Eshonai. This scene is actually exactly where I had the epiphone that spawned this thread. The prologue gives us the following: Gavilar shows Eshonai the fabrial: "Captive like in a gemheart, she thought, attuning Awe. They’ve built devices that mimic how we apply the forms?" Gavilar: "I've discovered how to bring your gods [the Fused] back." Gavilar: “Our enslaved parshmen were once like you. Then we somehow robbed them of their ability to undergo the transformation.” Parshmen have been robbed of the ability to apply forms, where Eshonai just said that their ability to apply forms comes from gemhearts. Gavilar: "We did it [robbed them of their ability to transform] by capturing a spren. An ancient, crucial spren.” A Fused spren captured in a gemheart, where the Fused Parshendi would have Fused spren captured inside their own gemhearts, and then these Fused were robbed of their ability to transform, and their ability to transform comes from their gemhearts. Stormlight Archive: So Identity is spiritual but it can be stored in something physical: a physical vessel. On Scandria, that physical vessel is metal. On Roshar, what vessel do we know of that can hold Investiture similar to feruchemy? Would not the Rosharian equivalent be gemhearts? Don't gemhearts hold Investiture (Stormlight and Voidlight) the same way that metal does?

I couldn't find any instances of "blue smoke" that relate to Kaladin, unfortunately. When combing through WoK searching "blue," I did see several instances when Kal's hand glowed blue, but in each instance it was either clear or at least implied that Kal was holding a sphere, perhaps a sapphire one. There might have been something I missed (skimmed because there is a lot of blue, of course) or something in the other two books. I love that the gods match the moon colors in Wit's story, but I do think that the story itself needs to make sense when we match the gods up properly. Tsa has a white light associated with her since the moon becomes white. It would make sense that Odium would have tricked a god into something, but would he have had a child with a god? Could the white actually represent the people? Did the people trick Cultivation in order to get with Honor and form an alliance with Honor? Resulting in the birth of the Heralds? Sorry, that would put Odium back as the violet light. Perhaps there is a way to make the story make sense with Odium as the white light? And then who is the violet light? Just BAM? Thank you!

I wonder if decayform isn't what Amaram was using in the end, after his spherical transformation: As if the stone itself decayed, right? Decayform. And yet Taln is the Herald of War, so I almost think warform would be the better match for the Stonewards. Decayform must fit somewhere, though. I'm all about the Dustbringers bringing the storm and matching stormform. I believe that the Dustbrings brought the dust storm we see in Dalinar's vision where at the end of the dust storm he looks down and sees the void: my Dustbringers-are-the-real-Voidbringers theory. I love and agree that nightform matches the Truthwatchers, especially with their prophetic description in the Listener Song of Listing! Smokeform seems more like the spymasters (It spies; it lies; for hiding and slipping between men) and so I would match them with Lightweavers instead of Skybreakers. The Listener song actually has two stanzas on smokeform, saying that it is of the Unmade. I'm thinking Sja-anat!!! And, as @hoiditthroughthegrapevine has recently said, Sja-anat seems to be the mirror-image (how perfect is that?!) of Shallan.

Thank you, @hoiditthroughthegrapevine and everyone responding! I was quite hesitant to post when I wasn't sure what to conclude about Shallan. I am still somewhat unsure but so greatly enlightened by all of the responses giving such brilliant insights into Shallan's history, current state of mind, and the setup for her future trajectory. Explaining Sja-anat as the mirror image of Shallan rather than possessing her is a terrific analogy. I love it!

There are many instances of blue Stormlight mentioned in WoK, such as this one, but all might be from sapphires. All of this has gotten me thinking about eye color, as well. Ash's eyes, for which she is famous, are a violet so pale they are almost white. Taln's are dark. But don't the rest have light blue eyes? Light eyes, for sure. I don't know if they are blue.

Eek! I think I'm in love with these additions! I was trying ever so hard to make sense of all of the glyphs, and you've done a brilliant job. I'm not sure if the glyphs had a key in the book or not, but I was struggling hard. Now that they are identified, I can't help but notice how the Void glyphs for the orders and the surges resemble and yet are fundamentally different from the Surgebinder glyphs for orders and surges, https://coppermind.net/wiki/File:TWoK_Front_Endsheet.jpg. Could the differences be because the orders and surges are corrupted with corrupt spren?

Oh, no. I didn't take it that way! I realize I had come across more aggressively than I intended and so wanted to reaffirm that this is a theory and that I could be wrong, as always. I am sad that others are not fond of this idea but am not yet ready to give it up. This idea really is perhaps my very favorite Stormlight theory and definitely has the least positive reception. As to why I think it must be physical, it just makes so much sense and explains so many answers in my head, like 42: the answer to life, the universe, and everything. Here is a little bit of evidence to support the physical connection, though.

And so I completely understand and respect your different perspective. Thank you.

What I'm claiming to be true is not absolute at all, which is why I've labeled the thread as a theory. That said, I do think there is evidence, just not definitive evidence, that parshmen do not have gemhearts. I do believe there is more evidence that parshmen do not have gemhearts than that they do, and I've already given the many quotes I believe that supports this: we know gemhearts are essential for changing forms and we know parshmen could not change forms. I've made a leap to assume that this is because parshmen do not have the one tool that we know is essential to changing forms. I could be wrong, yes.

Thanks, @Varion! I appreciate your input. I'm not sure what a corrupted person would look like, though Shallan quotes Hessi as saying that there were stories of the Unmade corrupting people (Page 756 of OB). The context being all about Sja-anat, I assumed Shallan meant Sja specifically when saying "the Unmade" but perhaps she meant "one of the Unmade." I really am uncertain when it comes to Shallan and Sja-anat. Storms, I am intrigued and confused! I tend to expect a combination of 4 and 5, but it could be any of the possibilities you've mentioned. For the one traitor to the others, I thought that would be the Dustbringers being traitors to Knights Radiant and humanity, since I think Dustbringers might be the real Voidbringers. If not Dustbringers, I would think Sja-anat would be the best known candidate.

Oh, yes. Your book quote is how I knew that dullform are Parshendi who have no spren: There seem to be two outcomes possible: either Venli bonds the new spren or she won't. Going out in the storm will release the previous spren, and so without bonding, Venli would be left with no spren bond and thus in dullform. Because the parshmen have no gemhearts to hold spren, they cannot form any bonds but they are exactly like dullform in every other way. Note that "slaveform" does not exist in canon, to my knowledge, probably because the parshmen slaves have no forms and cannot have forms.

Awesome sauce! Thanks, greatly! I suspect I am missing some beautiful pictures, sadly, but I wouldn't trade the searchability of Kindle for them. Maybe I should get some posters, especially the ones of the Oathbringer gods I think I'm also missing.

I've barely scratched the surface, but I'm enjoying things so far! I do have a couple of burning questions: 1.) How do we know the things I've bolded from your post? Do you recall a source and an approximate location? 2.) Is this chart in the books? Which one and where? I'm having a hard time finding this in my Kindle version. Thanks!

This is a great book quote. I think that the pieces of their souls that got ripped away and that allowed them their abilities to change forms were their gemhearts. We see evidence of that fact since Eshonai says, in the OB prologue, that trapping spren in gemhearts is their secret to changing forms. Note how the quote above talks about changing forms in general whereas the following quote talks very specifically about only forms of power. I interpret "parsh" and "parsh people" to be both Parshendi and parshmen. The Parshendi could take on Stormform to transform into most of their forms (except forms of power) without Voidlight. The Parshendi couldn't transform into true forms of power until they brought the Everstorm, which eventually brought the Fused, and now we know why! This quote implies that the Everstorm is of BAM and so must bring the Voidlight necessary to bond Voidspren and take on forms of power. BAM fuels the Everstorms in the same way that the Stormfather fuels the highstorms. Brilliant! So BAM is to Odium as the Stormfather is to Honor: BAM is a really big splinter of Odium. I can now better understand why BAM is associated with Voidlight and necessary for all parsh to transform into forms of power, just as the quote says. But we have absolutely no reason, to my knowledge, to suspect that BAM has anything to do with other Parshendi forms that existed well before the Everstorm and that require Stormlight instead of Voidlight. BAM does not explain why parshmen cannot take on regular Parshendi forms like Workform, Warform, or Mateform. The only essential element to Parshendi forms we know of is the gemheart, though I suspect that Stormlight is also necessary since the Parshendi always went out into the highstorms in order to transform. Both "Connection" and "Connected" with a capital C imply the gemheart connection: the tool that allows spren and Voidspren (of Odium and possibly of BAM) to connect with the parsh.

@RShara Do you think the Parshendi do not have gemhearts? Or do you believe that the parshmen do have gemhearts? We have a great deal of evidence that Parshendi do have gemhearts and that the Parshendi's gemhearts are the key that allows them to bond their spren and change forms: So it seems clear to me from both of these quotes that Parshendi have gemhearts and that these gemhearts are what allows them to bond spren. From this quote, it seems clear to me that bonding the spren through the gemheart is the key that allows Parshendi to take different forms. If the parshmen are Parshendi who have been robbed of their ability to change Parshendi forms, and if the Parshendi ability to change into different forms comes from capturing a spren in a gemheart, then it seems completely logical that parshmen do not have gemhearts. If the parshmen do have gemhearts, why can't they transform like the Parshendi? If the major difference between Parshendi and parshmen is the gemheart, and if the gemheart gives Parshendi the ability to bond with spren and change forms, including Voidspren and forms of power like the Fused, then what could Gavilar be talking about robbing the parshmen of other than gemhearts that would take away their abilities to transform? ******** Here is a great quote supporting gemhearts as the reason Parshendi view their bodies as sacred and personal.