Child of Hodor

Well well well well well well well look what we have here ... Spoilers for something this site put on it's front page It does not match the description of the fortress. Dalinar does not describe a 2001 Space Odyssey monolith. But it's proof there are large obsidian-like structures in Shadesmar.

That would be very funny. He is all sunshine and rainbows personality wise My head canon is Nightblood would look more like a living thing. In his conversation with Szeth he thinks of himself as a potential person. Plus he's so powerful and is sapient. We don't know if Azure's blade could talk to her, but it was certainly far less powerful than Nightblood.

What an ambitious crossover, first Brandon finishes the Wheel of Time, now he is incorporating Arthur C. Clarke's Space Odyssey series. I do like the nod though. In 2001 A Space Odyssey the monoliths increase people's intelligence and this black monolith is in the Cognitive Realm, the land of thoughts.

Brandon is getting too ambitious trying to fit Arthur C Clarke's Space Odyssey series into the Cosmere.. Also, that is definitely Adolin based on the other covers. Zahel would never dress that nice.

This makes sense. From a meta-perspective I expect it to be something that Shallan and Adolin can solve and fighting a squad or small army of Fused isn’t one. My guess is there is a Herald there being a bad influence or some other influence has convinced the leaders of the Honorspren hold their people back. Shallan will have to do some convincing and deal with a Herald or Unmade or some such.

TL;DR Dalinar sees an all-Obsidian fortress in the purelake during a vision, one that no one knows about now. The ground in Shadesmar look Obsidian. In OB Shallan "pulls" a wall from the physical realm into the cognitive realm. Could this fortress be the reverse? It was pulled from Shadesmar and it's gone now because it transitioned back. Dalinar has a Vision where he sees a large fortress made out of what looks like obisidan. He says it must no longer exist otherwise it would be famous. Later in WoR Shallan escapes the ship, by slipping partially into shadesmar. In OB Adolin observes the ground in Shadesmar as Obsidian-like During the fight with the Fused in Shadesmar, Shallan summons a wall from the physical realm into Shadesmar to block a Fused. With all that established, what if the obsidian fortress Dalinar saw is the reverse? It was built in Shadesmar, maybe by spren and the Radiants pulled it into the physical realm using a technique similar to what Shallan did. It's probably much harder to do, like traveling out of Shadesmar into the physical was much harder for Jasnah. The reason no trace of it is known now is it reverted to Shadesmar at some point. It could have been completed destroyed in a desolation. I don't think Purelake erosion is going to erode all trace of it by itself even over thousands of years. There's nothing in the rule book that says a dog can't play basketball, er, I mean nothing says you can't pull buildings from Shadesmar!

The Singers were on Roshar with Honor and Cultivation before the humans and Odium showed up. The Fused would have experienced some of that before everyone switched sides. I think this behavior is due to fighting Windrunners over the millennia as much as anything. The Windrunners have rubbed off on them.

The time between when he needs to finish his first draft (this month) and when he says he wants it released (October) is so short I don't think they'll have time to release much.

I read Oathbringer over maybe three weeknights. I had already read the first 32 chapters as sample chapters. So really parts 2 - 5. I was also listening to it on audiobook while commuting to work and at the gym. I remember consuming it whenever I wasn't at work. I recently reread WoK and WoR and I read them over about a week or more each. I was looking to make new connections and highlighting things. I was also off work because of surgery so I had plenty of time.

That sums it up nicely. If we see non-flashback Gavilar in books 4 or 5 it will probably be in one of those weird dreams Dalinar has. In WoR Ch. 89 Dalinar dreams of Gavilar as a child, hears in him in the next room laughing.

They are mentioned when Dalinar sees Highprince Hatham in Way of Kings Ch. 54 Gibletish

He's put himself in a real pickle, being unwilling to pick up any of the other Shards. He'll always have to keep an eye on the remnants. Even if no one picks them up they could reform and develop an intelligence of their own. https://wob.coppermind.net/events/181/#e3776

Sas Nahn - Amaram can't understand why Kaladin wouldn't want the shards. Inconceivable to him that someone would reject greater power. Interludes - Introduction to Shallash destroying art and a primer on how the Old Magic works. "Who are you?" ... "Death" I think Dalinar and Kaladin have a similar exchange regarding what Szeth is in WoR. Ch. 52 A lot of shardblades and plate abandoned here and this isn't nearly all of them. Only a small fraction are still being used in modern times. Who is keeping those? Ch. 54 "Adonalsium" ... "pull him apart emotion by emotion" Ch. 55 Rock, revealing he was trained as a soldier as a 4th son, insists he's 3rd son and a cook. Apart from Rock lying here, it's a weird caste system they have. Birth order assigning jobs so specifically. But, Horneaters are descended, in part, from Singers who can switch forms to suite a task. Singers of old may have been like "you take workform, you take warform, you take scholar form" etc. to their offspring. If one died, one of the others would take a different form to step in to perform whatever task was needed. Ch. 65 What a terrible thing to do! "Roshar had been united, once. Had that included the Parsheni?" it's going to need to in order to thwart Odium! Ch. 66 Dalinar's internal farewell to Renarin when he thinks he won't see him again is touching.

To add to that, Adonalsium has been referred to by Brandon as "he" in writing. Adonalsium was a guy being a dude, confirmed. Then he got killed. The question is paraphrased, but the answer is written down and photographed.

Yeah, I really want to see the U.S. cover. Just to see it really. I don't expect it to reveal a ton about the plot. I'm tired of looking at that generic Stormlight 4 placeholder they use.

I think 7 because he skipped some Shallan stuff in his reading of 7 & 8. Plus we need those epigraphs

It's a super cute use of his powers. Love Renarin. I'm glad he's gets some active use out of Illumination. We'd only seen him get futuresight linked with seizure-like episodes that he couldn't control. Yeah, I'm curious as to how this thing works. I've read the thread where everyone tries to break it down, but we don't have enough info yet. Brandon said on reddit there will be an in-depth breakdown in the book. https://www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/91154-the-conundrum-of-conjoiners-an-analysis-of-navanis-airship/ Yeah, he's close enough. Can he create a perpendicularity and travel through it to Shadesmar to talk to the Oathgate spren?

That barge is incredibly heavy. Good to get confirmation that normal Truthwatcher Illumination works similar to how Shallan's works. I believe giving the illusions sound was a Lightweaver only quirk, but at least they are similar. I think Veil will lose the vote 2 against 1 to murder Ialai. Might kill her if a battle breaks out though. The Fused aren't on the same page, similar to the orders of radiants I guess. Surprising to see though. Good for Leshwi. No wonder this war has been fought to a stalemate with the Windrunners and Heavenly Ones essentially sparing one-on-one until someone gets hurt and saying "good game" afterwards.

I do like that idea, they are slumbering as is Urithiru. It’s not dead, the air pressure seems modified to benefit humanity, something is still maintaining it.

I have no place to put this bad thing I thought of so I made one. Feel free to add your own. Why are they called the Fused? Because they (Re)Fused to stay dead.

@QuantusThis is an angle on it I had not thought of. They get two surges combined in one or aspects of two surges working together in one. Maybe that's why they are called the Fused . I would think they'd all get one because they are accessing through one shard, while the KR are accessing through two by saying oaths (Honor) and saying those oaths in a progression over time (Cultivation). However, the Honorblades come straight from Honor's "soul" and give two surges each to whoever bonds them. Plus in the RoW interlude from the newsletter (hiding in case people haven't read it): There are some WoBs about how radiant orders powers can work a bit different from the orders they share a surge with. https://wob.coppermind.net/events/161/#e6916 https://wob.coppermind.net/events/100/#e3625 We know KR have a resonance unique to each order. The two surges resonating with each other to give a unique passive trait (more squires, photographic memory etc.) I guess my point is there are themes along the lines of two surges working together, just not to this extreme yet. @Gilphon Swayed me away from soulcasting being involved both for meta reasons he listed and that it is so hard to recreate a functioning body. https://www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/91146-whats-that-fused-doing/?do=findComment&comment=1028358 I like the two-in-one idea a lot, but I think I'm still in the camp of it's a way of using Transportation we hadn't seen before.

I haven’t seen it. That’s a good thought. It wouldn’t be someone in Dalinar’s immediate family, but someone close to one of them. Shallan’s brothers are very messed up and there are a bunch of them. It only takes one. I think she's gathering info for Dalinar more than Mraize. Mraize has decided he wants SoH gone and tasked Shallan with that. Shallan is Mraize's "little knife". Dalinar wants her to figure out what they are up to and arrest them or whatever. Both want them gone, Dalinar wants to know their schemes.

This theory could be right. My issue with it is I don't know whether Re-Shephir is really smarter than the no hyphen ones. She mimics what she observes and she recognized Shallan had the same power as one who trapped her long ago. She can't talk as far as we know and doesn't seem that smart. Shallan compares her to an axehound. At the end of Oathbringer, Dalinar thanks the Thrill for making him strong when he needed it and the Thrill reacts positively, like it understood. Or understood the emotion like an axehound might. In my mind I've divided them into the person sized ones that can talk: Sja-Anat, Yelig-nar (he can talk according to Hessi's Mythica). And the giant inhuman shaped ones that can't talk (Nergaoul, Re-Shephir).

I only know it because Brandon said that's who it is supposed to be. https://wob.coppermind.net/events/361/#e11422 You can't really see Eshonai well at all and Dalinar has the wrong colored cloak. The storm on the left side looks gorgeous though.

Shallan or Veni. They are the only two front 5 flashback characters who haven't been on one. WoK: Dalinar and Eshonai saluting across the chasm. WoR: Kaladin and Szeth OB: Jasnah (photobombed by a Thunderclast) So far the cover has been from a big battle at the end. I'm going to guess Venli at Urithiru or Shallan at Lasting Integrity or Sterling Reputation or Perfect Attendance, one of those awful sounding Honorspren cities.