ChickenBonanza

i do not think i see Breaths the same way, i think. to me, Breath is as ‘dead’ as any Investiture can get, really. probably not a good way to describe it. (where did the idea of Breath having their own seperate Identity/Connections/Intent come from? i do not think i have seen the same)

Breaths usually possess the Identity of the bearer, and i can only recall Breaths obtaining sapience under the condition where other Investitures could do the same—like being in high concentration while unattached to a ruling mind, as Nightblood. Nightblood does have a more developed personality compared to other examples, which very easily could be do to Breaths being ‘the power of life’, according to Vasher, but all Investiture can be called the power of life, really, so who knows how engrained life is in Breaths compared to others, when we have so little examples of other Investiture-types in Awakened objects, to know whether certain BioChromatic laws apply

in regards to Nalthians and Drabness, i never got the impression that giving away a Breath causes spiritual damage in a strict sense. i’ve seen it more as going from something like 1.5x the spiritual norm to 0.5x the spiritual norm. and, as Investiture is the power of life, is just a generally unhealthy thing to do. (if you don’t have a soul, it means Yelig-nar ate you and you’re dead, more soul=more life=more food for my main man)

besides, Breaths are made to be given away, right? surely Endowment’s Intent would prevent such things? (differing Intents might, theoretically, make Honor-derived Spren more susceptible to any theoretical damage from the breaking of a Connection, if Intent matters in such a case, but that’s neither here nor there)

there was somethin else i was gonna mention but i forgot it

I mean- breaths typically have the identy of their origin, not necessarily their bearer. They have a will, essepilly in large amounts- any holder is influenced by their breath, and what they want.

We also see the breaths that made up nightblood interpreted and decided it's command- requiring some form of agency.

So the breaths have an intent and, almost.... opinions? That feels more alive than most investiture we've seen; at least more complex in it's intent than stormlight.


I mean they are removing their life energy. That is, by definition, damage. It's probably a cleaner cut than some things, because it is made to be removed, but to say it's not damaging is just... weird.

reading those doesn’t elicit too concrete a feeling about Breaths will, to me. there is something a little extra, of course, but not exactly what I would describe as a symbiote, per se. the Breaths Vahr received were all then-on keyed to his Identity, but the theoretical maintaining of the ‘will’ of the gifter is interesting. although i wonder whether it is because Breath remembers the Intent by which it was given, or because Vahr strengthened his own inclinations by virtue of being Spiritually stronger. (edit: they do, me am literate and read more. they are noted to be, however, not ‘terribly individual’ on their own, which points me towards a view of general ‘homogeneity’. my instinct is to say that Breaths do not have a will in that they ‘want’ anything or have opinions, just a small directional influence akin to how having a touch of Odium in your soul might make the passions burn hotter)

rewrite edit: any Awakened object, in my view, has to interpret Command and Intent, by the nature of being an Awakened object. i see Awakening as the assembling of an ad-hoc soul within an object, a spiritual machine meant to carry out a directive. when you Command Breaths to Awaken, you create a new semi-sentient entity. the question is, did that sentience exist before the object was Awakened, within Breath, or does it arise afterwards? my instinct is to say the latter. those words could indeed imply the former, especially the one about Vahr, but it could also be something more akin to the mental effects of holding Stormlight or Voidlight

we got a definitional difference about damage, i think. to me, a Drab soul doesn’t have anything to heal or any crippling problems, they just got less of it. like permanently giving away a bunch of your blood that for some reason you can’t make more of. you can function, but everything is worse. (which, yeah, one can call that damage, it is just that definition doesn’t fit my impression. to me, the ‘cut’ is so ‘clean’, that it is weird to call it damage. however, an individual’s consideration on the nature of a status doesn’t change the effects of the status. being a Drab is bad, it’s ‘damaging’, and as such can very appropriately be called damage.) edit: another comparison i might add is that I see them like a Feruchemist who is actively storing an attribute, ‘merely’ diminished. (albeit without dramatic physical changes seen in physical Feruchemy.)