Child of Hodor

According to Brandon it is. https://wob.coppermind.net/events/360/#e10799

How about this: Taravangian appoints a baby as champion. It's to the death so it will go until one of them dies and Dalinar won't kill the baby. The baby is significantly younger than Dalinar so he'll die of old age first. This would fulfill the death rattle of a person thinking about killing a baby to save the world and fits into the argument Taravangian and Dalinar had where Taravangian was willing to execute innocent men to protect the kingdom and Dalinar was not. Taravangian is counting on Dalinar not killing the baby. BUT! Ishar almost stole Dalinar's status as Odium's opponent using Bondsmith powers. Dalinar can take the status of champion from the baby, give it to someone else and kill them instead. Either someone else or to himself and he kills himself and it's a draw with Odium stuck in the system. OR Double-switcheroo: Dalinar takes the status of Odium's champion and gives the baby status as Dalinar's champion. Dalinar kills himself baby wins, Taravangian loses.

@ScadrianTank I agree, BAM specializes in Connection and Kelsier can’t leave his system due to Connection. He hopes she can change that. Hopefully Kelsier doesn’t accidentally rip his mind out trying to free himself.

In the chapter where Amaram decides to kill Kaladin’s men and take the shards Amaram mentions how he’s given it a lot thought and decided “Restares is right”. Amaram did the deed, but it was Kalak’s idea and he nudged Amaram in that direction. Will Kaladin remember that detail and confront Kalak or is there not enough time in the final 10 days while he’s playing Freud to Ishar?

Came here to mention Design and Wit. Also when Design pulls out the flute Kaladin: “You found it?!” Wit: “This is a dream, idiot. It’s not real.” The Zahel chapter was very funny. “That’s because Wit’s an a******”” Chiri-Chiri describing the wet mouth sounds the soft ones make. Kalak was surprisingly funny. When he asks the Honorspren: “What do you think? Hold on; I don’t care what you think. Here I am years after joining you and you still haven’t found a way to get me off this cursed world.” Design: “Did you miss the ‘End’ at the end?”

The “you can’t kill a storm” being repeated over and over in this book makes me think someone will try to do just that with either the Everstorm or the Stormfather. If El cans develop anti-Stormlight and use it against Dalinar’s spren before the contest that would be a huge blow to his chances. The Everstorm needs to be dealt with somehow.

El can be both. He’s a scholar but the Pursuer is very afraid of him in a way he was not afraid of Raboniel or the Nine. Raboniel is a scholar who was kicked out of the Nine for planning a genocide. As the Stormfather points out. Ishar was a priest, but thousands of year of war made him a buff warrior. Although El was punished for not wanting to wipe out humanity. Which would be a point against him doing a lot of killing.

Really looking forward to Kaladin becoming Patch Adams and healing this guy ... in 10 days. Why does Ishar want to bring Spren fully into the physical realm unbonded and not in blade form? What’s he trying to accomplish? Is this more of his “no proto-surgebinders” crusade? Nale was killing the humans that bond, Ishar is trying to bring spren into the physical realm in a new way so that can’t bond anyone? It’s well over a year late for that. Maybe he has some new terrible plan that involves moving between realms in a new way.

His complete refusal to be happy for his son is awful. He slumps in disappointment when Kaladin summons Syl and says he’s a Radiant. Your son who you thought was dead is actually alive and he literally flew here to help your town and he’s a magic man now. Why are you so upset?

I’d expect Endowment to be the one to do it, but you never know.

But we were in his head for this and he was genuinely surprised and frightened. It’s possible he left certain memories in his breath and kept other in his mind intentionally, but wasn’t expecting a new Odium. Still if he is planning for Rayse why would Wit think Rayse would want his memories? Rayse was alive pre-Shattering and has been a Shard for a long time and is full himself. Why would he care what Hoid thinks or has been up to? The memories are only of great benefit to Taravangian who is a new shard and was not very Cosmere aware prior to that. What tips Hoid off is Taravangian wanting to know what Wit thinks. Rayse would never do that. If Hoid is expecting Rayse he is very lucky. If Rayse bothered to look at his stored memories he’d probably delete them all out of spite. Taravangian just wanted to preserve his secret.

Lol at the title. I don’t think he foresaw it. I think he thought the contract protected him and the Breaths inside him, it didn’t. He met with Odium 1,000 years and apparently Odium didn’t think to try it then. Hoid typically hides from Shards. I don’t think anyone did this to him before. It seems like he changed a memory though. The way Hoid remembers Design and the altered Windspren interact is different from what we saw at the beginning of the epilogue. Maybe he’s just disorientated from having other memories destroyed. Scadrial is a special case because Ruin and Preservation created the planet together so each can do certain things the other can’t. It didn’t have to do with their intent.

It sounds like no Honorspren have ever gone into his shack to see what he’s up to. My guess is he’s not even there most of the time. He pops into the shack and emerges to check something then leaves. He pretends he’s living there because openly magically transporting in and out of the fortress would alarm the Honorspren. Did the Spren dub him 16 because he’s currently the 16th human guest in order of arrival or is that the name he gave?

I've seen a lot of people in different threads mention things they got right and wrong in their predictions for this book. I thought it would be fun to make thread where we can pat ourselves on the back or make fun of ourselves for what we got right and wrong. This can be either pre-RoW or based on the preview chapters. -I was right about Kelek being Restares. Hiding in a fortress seems like a Kelek thing and there seemed to be something special about him. -I was right about who Navani's critic was. - I was almost right about Hoid being Mraize's informant. Instead, it seems someone spied on Hoid and got the info that way. Or that's what Hoid says happened ... _ @Karger was proven mostly right with his theory that Nale's spren lead the Singers to Szeth. (In OB we learned a voice speaking to the Rhythms led them to him). Instead Nale told Ulim who it turns out can use the Rhythms after all, he just rarely does. I went with Yelig-Nar and was way off. - As far as I am aware no one was right about what's in the gem Gavilar gave Szeth. If someone did guess this please take credit, that's impressive. - Unfortunately, (because I don't love this) a lot of people were right about who led the Ghostbloods. Stupid Kelsier, stay out Stormlight! Here are some people who were right or were very close hidden for length: Please pat yourselves on the back, you've earned it!

Don't we though? After Oathbringer we knew Surges + Dawnshards = UH OH!!! We learned in OB Honor raved to the radiants that their powers coupled with Dawnshards destroyed Ashyn and would destroy Roshar. We learned in RoW that before the Recreance happened the Sibling was fed up with humanity and banished them from Urithiru. After the Sibling "withdrew" but before the Recreance the Radiants performed a strike on Ba-Ado-Mishram trying to capture her. It worked and an unintended side-effect was the Singers were magically lobotomized. Radiants were horrified by this result, their Tower had kicked them out, their god raved that they were going to destroy Roshar like they did Ashyn, so they gave up their powers. This book confirmed a popular theory that the radiant spren were in on the Recreance it was not done against their will. This book confirmed Ba-Ado-Mishram was trapped. We have a good idea how since we saw an Unmade get trapped in OB. It was probably harder than trapping the Thrill since Ba-Ado-Mishram isn't dumb, but they probably had Melishi the Sibling bondsmith trap her in a perfect gem. She was bonded to all those Singers and when that connection was broken their spiritwebs were broken in a way that hurt their cognitive abilities. Similar to what happened to the Spren when their connection to their Radiants was severed.

I think Odium deleted other memories beyond just the conversation. He saw all the memories Hoid stored in his Breaths so now Odium has that knowledge. Then he strategically deleted and maybe altered some so he can use that to his advantage. At the end of the chapter Hoid remembers Design chasing corrupted windspren away, but that’s not what actually happened earlier in the chapter. Odium changed some memories.

I recently started a topic on why I think Bavadin might get involved in the back 5. I do think Odium will play role through all 10 books though. I don't think Taravangian will last past book 5. He has serious grudges with Szeth and Dalinar. Those are the most interesting relationships he has, he should be killed (again) in the front 5 while those two are still main characters. I had a thought about what happens to Odium at the end of the front 5. Dalinar is deeply connected to Odium, he always has been. Odium comments in RoW on how connected they are when he pulls Dalinar into a vision outside of the Everstorm. When Dalinar visted the Valley the Nightwatcher called him "Child of Odium". In that same visit Cultivation took a piece of him saying something to the effect of "it will benefit me to have a piece of you". Dalinar is very Connected to Odium, Cultivation took a chunk of Dalinar for herself this presumably gives her some Connection to Odium. Could the two of them pull Odium apart and both absorb a piece? If Dalinar can Ascend to be the Vessel of a remnant of Honor then a Shard vessel could become the Vessel for a chunk of another Shard. The front 5 could end with 3 Shards held by two vessels (Honor + Piece of Odium) and (Cultivation + Piece of Odium). This ends the immediate conflict, there is peace for the moment because Odium is no longer devoid of context and is split between other Shards, but this alters the existing Shards in way that might become a problem in say 10 - 15 years. Plus other Shards might have issue with this new situation and come for a visit.

Rayse + Odium since Odium is trying to escape Rayse during RoW (the light that seems to be trying to escape his skin) and talks to Tarvangian after rayse dies asking Mr. T to take Odium and telling him he’s perfect. In an epigraph Sazed says the power develops a mind of its own if it’s not controlled well by the vessel which seems to be the case here. Rayse doesn’t acknowledge that he’s Odium he says “they call me Odium” while Mr. T tells Wit “I am Odium”. Could be a Dawnshard thing though. Passion isn’t a command, but Rayse insisting he’s Passion might be because he also held/was the emotion-related Dawnshard whatever that is called.

In WoK epigraphs Hoid mentions he has a grudge against Bavadin and Rayse. This doesn’t necessarily mean Bavadin and Rayse were friends, siblings or father - daughter, but what if it does? Rayse was killed and Bavadin will surely notice. She holds the Autonomy, the Shard with most freedom to act and the OB epigraph letter from her indicates she can instill prejudices in her avatar. She mentions modifying the young avatar Hoid previously contacted so that the avatar hates Hoid. I kind of doubt new Odium will last past book 5. From a writerly perspective it feels like Taravangian should be dealt with while Szeth and Dalinar are main characters. But even so, Cultivation and the people of Roshar are responsible for Rayse’s death too. In the OB letter her avatar says Hoid shouldn’t rely on past relationships. This could mean Bavadin isn’t as attached to her old friends and family, including Odium. Even so, this book was Diehard: Urithiru in the back 5 we might see Die Hard With A Vengeance. Speaking of that movie:

Certainly is in Stormlight now that we know Szeth’s dad is dead. Mistborn spoilers: Speaking of, a decent number of main characters have killed their wives. Cosmere spoilers:

Hahahaha Dont give it to anyone and tell them to experiment on it, Spensa! Thanks for alerting me to this, I missed the email.

It’s the research journal Navani and Raboniel create together during the tower occupation. It was written by both Navani and Raboniel writing notes for themselves and each other. They discovered the Rhythm of War (Odium + Honor) together and then discovered how to kill “gods”. Raboniel would know El and must have mentioned him in one of her entries. Navani doesn’t know who El is so she must have written the entry asking who he is.

I believe Raboniel speculates it’s because he’s close to the 4th ideal, so he has more resistance than the rest, but not enough to be immune.

Cultivation (Koravari, Koravellium Avast, hidden dragon) wanted Rayse dead for obvious reasons: he killed her husband and was trying to kill her. She accomplished that and seems pleased with his successor considering she set this whole thing up and then offers to teach the newly ascended Odium. What does she want now? She wants to cultivate obviously, but does she still want to be in the Rosharan system? According to Wyndle she is not a big fan of humans anymore. She has probably soured on Singer as well. Is she setting up Taravangian or is she genuinely pleased with him as Odium and will leave him alone if he leaves her alone? (He won’t) It’s not clear if she cares what Odium does as long as he does it elsewhere. That’s how most of the other Shards feel “hey as long as he’s busy elsewhere it’s not my problem”. All the focus will be on the contest of champions. But will Cultivation put her green thumb on the scale?

I’m imagining Taravangian training himself in using his new Shard powers in preparation for the clash with Dalinar and cracking myself up. Him training like a boxer would a la his namesake Mr. T. A training montage set to Eye of the Tiger with Taravangian jumping rope and punching bags with a hoodie and sweatpants on. Eye of the Tiger has some very Odium appropriate lyrics too: “Went the distance now I’m back on my feet.” He died, but he’s back baby! “So many times it happens to fast, you trade your Passion for glory” “It’s the Eye of the Tiger It’s the Thrill of the fight. Standing up to the challenge of our rival” Dalinar has been his rival all series and Dalinar did issue the challenge to Odium first. “They stack the odds still we take to the street” As Wit gloats about to Odium the agreement is stacked against Odium. He’s stuck in the system no matter what, but Mr. T is determined to find a way. ”Went the distance now I’m not gonna stop” Now he can save them all ...