CtrlAltDepressed

This is not true. It is stated that Taravangian removed him from the sheath in addition to a mention of Szeth resheathing it when the deed was done. I am at work so cant find the source at this exact moment.... The problem is not that Rayse wasnt there physically. Nightblood was in the physical realm the entire time, even though he manifested in the vision. Nightblood always sucks peoples souls up, and spits it in the physical. Why would this be any different?

Nightblood ALWAYS cuts on all three realms and leaks into the physical. Why would this situation be the only time he leaks into the SR / Demense?

Agreed. I can accept all the things said about Nightblood, but this is still an inconsistency to me. They explained above that Nightblood would have released the smoke from rayse into the spiritual realm, but that doesnt really make sense considering he ALWAYS cuts on all three realms. Just because Rayse pulled Taravangian into the spiritual realm, there was still a physical representation of Nightblood and Taravangian (proven by him feeling Szeth stab him while in the SP with odium). An explosion of black smoke / liquid investiture of that amount would have at the VERY least been something that Szeth would have noticed. Realistically that amount of investiture leaking could create a perpendicularity. We know those are not shard dependent, but investiture dependent. We see in MB 2 that Marasi is able to close a perpendicularity with a couple allomancers (which we know does not use as much investiture as other systems), so perpendicularity's cant have that much investiture compared to the amount that we have been told Nightblood contains. He has way way more than the bands, and I feel like the bands were close to perpendicularity levels of investiture. The perpendicularity point also comes into play for the 'recycling' aspect. Perpendicularity's leak investiture back into the spiritual realm, but they are still physcial embodiments of tears in the realm, where that recycling takes place (all three realms are together, easier to exchange investiture). It is interesting that Nightblood manifested as a sword in the spiritual realm. I mean, of course he does because he cuts on all three realms, but Brandon has been cagey about what he looks like in CR. It makes sense that one would be different of the three considering his unique creation, but if he looks like a sword in spiritual, why wouldnt he in cognitive?

Not to be pedantic but this doesnt say that stormlight expended as surgebinding or lost to exhaling goes back to the spiritual realm. I am open to that possibility but this seems to indicate that happens primarily with people moving back and forth through birth and death. So you would posit that wielding a full nightblood, he would still convert what he touches into black smoke, but he would not be consuming investiture from the wielder? Is there consensus on this? I know there is some connection between Midnight Spores, Midnight Mother, and Nightblood - is Nightblood corrupting what he consumes into whatever Midnight Essence is, or is Midnight Essence itself a corruption? Very interesting point about it not being Red. Yes, for sure, thank you! Im not convinced this is exactly how things are working but this explanation scratches that itch for the time being haha.

Thank you for the clarification. Is it ok to still put things in tags? I dont want to accidentally spoil something or break a rule. I dont think you've fully explained this part (sorry it was in an edit). Szeth keeps NB in the sheath unless he is using him - how would NB have had time to leak (almost) a vessels worth of investiture. Your point about the unmade being more invested than a vessel - sure - but those are both still SUPER invested entities by normal people standards (what NB mostly eats). In addition, there is something to the fact that Nightblood was not just consuming Rayse, he was consuming (tiny tiny tiny) parts of the shard Odium through Rayse's Connection. This was hands down the most investiture we've seen Nightblood consume at one time. As far as Rayse not being as Invested as Unmade due to storage in a gemstone - we see in the passage that you quoted that Szeth used many gemstones worth of stormlight to fuel Nightblood for a couple of seconds - and it kept eating. I think the gemstone thing is not a true measure of capacity of the gemstone but more a function of the physical structure of a gemstone (crystal structure doesnt have gaps for things to escape). So starting from that point - is Nightblood going to be very very very close to satiated for a long time since Szeth isnt letting him leak? If he does start consuming szeth when wielded, it should take minimal stormlight for szeth to wield him since Nightblood is at 100%. Like, all of the things you have said work on their own. But you still havent showed me how the amount he can store total, the amount he leaks, and the amount he consumes (exponential) can work all together. He cant consume it exponentially in this scenario if he is that close to full. See what im getting at? If this IS the case, we should / need to see some different behavior from Nightblood in SA5. Either he wont consume exponentially when drawn after this event, or this understanding of Nightblood is flawed. Sauce?

OK im going to try again. Thank you to @alder24 @Treamayne for contributing, I have learned quite a bit through this thread. However, we haven't really touched on the true point of confusion here. The specific details of Nightbloods leakage and consumption just arent adding up. We have been bringing up other details (endowments involvement, moment of creation, shasharra, etc) to help explain but I think they moved us past our original intent (hah). So with how you all are explaining that Nightblood works - there is a cap on the amount of BEU's that the sword can hold in total. Since Nightblood is 'almost' to fully full, the sword is supersaturated in Investiture and therefore leaks a black smoke that is overflowing corrupted investiture from what he has consumed. Lets look at ROW spoilers: We will call this an 'infinite investiture' situation where Nightblood can consume as much as he wants. ROW is approximately one year later in world, and in that we see ROW spoilers: We see when OB spoilers: Continued OB and ROW: We see all the time in the cosmere that when investiture is condensed into one area, freaky stuff starts to happen. That amount of released investiture into Roshar in a year should have serious consequences for the surrounding area, especially considering that it is corrupted investiture. But no ROW: EDIT: This is what i was originially getting at, apologies for not being very clear.

This exactly. Obviously we havent been given hard numbers on any of these things, but Nightblood has more investiture than bands of mourning by a lot. We see them almost drain the bands in one event. He has more Investiture than Susebron with 50,000+ breaths. Either Shasharra had hundreds of thousands of breaths when killed or her dying specifically is why Nightblood leaks. I have always understood the consumption of Nightblood to be two pronged. Obviously Nightblood consumes the investiture of whatever he touches, however that doesnt mean its all the same consumption. What I mean by that is Nightblood is consuming the investiture of the wielder to FUEL the consuming of whatever he is wielded against. These have always seemed like two separate mechanisms. This can be see from this If nightblood was 'full' and therefore was leaving behind the smoke since he couldnt consume it - why is he still feeding off vasher? In addition, we dont have anything that says he wont consume you when he is full. There is the WOB that i cannot find where he talks about if you are .001% of 100% then the moment that there is any gone you are going to be consumed. This does not work. Like mathematically. How can he have a defined upper limit, yet eat more and more the more that you use him? That doesnt make any sense. Theoretically if Vasher had one million breaths vs one hundred million breaths, the amount of maximum time that he can wield nightblood should be the same, since the consumption grows exponentially. Again - Shasharras death must have severely modified how nightblood works. There is no way that she could have wielded him for an entire battle without him operating differently. Like even if she had 1 billion breaths, his exponential consumption should severely limit the amount of time you can wield him. For instance: This scenario: Nightblood is already full / Breath Per Second = BPS If you have 10,000 breaths, and lets just say Nightblood consumes them at 1 BPS with an acceleration of 1 BPS - meaning that the first second he will consume 1 breath, next second 2 breaths, etc. That would mean that Nightblood would also need to leak at 1 BPS with an acceleration of 1 BPS - or else you could wield him for hours and hours off of 10,000 breaths. This is not the case - the leakage is never described as more or less - like it is with stormlight. Is that making any sense at all? I think my theory of him using the wielders investiture to fuel consuming the investiture he strikes allows this all the work.

This is more what I was getting at. All of the details of this sword do not line up. All that WOB confirms is that the investiture is not lost. It does not say that the investiture in Nightblood is recycled. Stuff that leaks off would be recycled, but we have nothing telling us that the investiture in the sword goes back to the spiritual realm. This is EXTREMELY important. This cant all be the case. The sword grew in power over time and is second only to shards. Lets consider that for a moment. There must be something special to Nightblood if he, as a steel sword, can hold more investiture than ANYTHING else besides the source of that investiture itself. Are you trying to say any steel sword can hold that much? The sword has more investiture than: Tress spoilers: MB2 spoilers: Warbreaker: It kind of doesnt matter how many breaths shasharra had when she was killed. These details dont line up. Yes, Nightblood leaks investiture because he is supersaturated. However, that doesnt explain the supersaturation. His power has only grown over time. And we know that there were periods (perhaps decades) where Nightblood didnt consume anything and yet he is still one of the most invested things that exists. The leaking starting with Shasharra would not have been a supersaturation, as indeed, we know that Nightblood will continue to get stronger and stronger. The leaking starting at that event must have broken / changed the sword to consume investiture like it does. This would explain why the sheath timeline is messy, and also how shasharra would have been able to wield the sword for so long. My interpretation of nightblood has always been that he is a black hole and the smoke he leaks is similar to hawking radiation. Nightblood contains so much investiture that bits and pieces break off and leak. However, hawking radiation is so minimal with black holes, that they will functionally never be completely radiated. What I mean is that Nightblood contains so much investiture that it is impossible for him to leak it all out. Just like when we interact with shards. There is investiture leaking and spilling everywhere constantly. But that doesnt change the investiture of the shard whatsoever. Now, Nightblood is no shard but if we think about the amount of investiture that he has consumed it doesnt make sense that the leaking would have any effect on his investiture level. Even just the investiture from closing honors perpendicularity once, the smoke excretion does not increase, and it should based on your theory. OB spoilers: Your interpretation seems to believe that Nightbloods level of investiture is in flux (higher, lower) rather than only going up. And that seems impossible given that he is the most invested thing other than shards. It would also indicate that you could 'starve' Nightblood by leaving him alone for long enough. Which really does not seem like the case.

Not super clear on the timeline here, Nightblood predates the father machine, yes? How does this reconcile with what you said about Endowments involvment? Are we to believe Endowment is also helping Yesteel make more nightbloods, or is this a misspeak by brandon and he means swords like vivennas? Again these details just arent lining up. On their own, in a silo, I agree with everything that you've said. But one of these things has to give. Either Yesteel cannot create new nightbloods and he meant swords like vivennas (which admittedly would still be a huge game changer to nalthian war). Or Endowment wasnt involved (not likely). I dont really subscribe to this idea of invoking another shards investiture like that. I dont remember seeing any sort of evidence of that and it seems unlikely to be the case. If it worked like this, Nalthians would have invoked other shards investiture all the time. I dont see how youre making the connection that by investing nightblood with endowments investiture, it somehow starts corrupting only new investiture into ruins? How does that make sense? Any time someone commands an awakening in the heat of an emotion (like a battle, etc) are they invoking odiums investiture? In addition to that, corrupted investiture shouldnt result in ruins investiture, if that makes any sense? what i mean by that is, since nightblood is corrupting the investiture he consumes, there must be some mechanism / other investiture ALREADY inside nightblood to create that corruption. Shasharra used it the first time in Twilight falls and it starts leaking. Ok - why does it start leaking here? It was invested with Endowments investiture and was consuming nalthians. Why would there be a corruption there? It only really makes sense that the corruption would have started from the beginning due to the awakening process / whatever makes him consume investiture in the first place.

Brandon Sanderson Anyway, Nightblood is named for the smoke he leaks, and he originally had a different name when he was created. Vasher himself dubbed the sword Nightblood after he had used it to kill the woman he loved. The blackness that leaks out is actually corrupted and consumed Breaths, the ones that Nightblood leeches off anyone who draws him. This would seem to indicate to me that Nightblood was leaking from the moment of his creation. I would argue that the 1000 he started off with would be part of consumed breaths. Yes, how is his creation any different? The wob doesnt say that Ruin's investiture is involved in the creation. It states that Nightblood contains Ruin's investiture. I think thats an important distinction. That indicates to me that he has eaten someone or something that had Ruin's investiture. And yes, I know, that shards investiture permeates the entire cosmere, but he specifically says Does Nightblood contain any of Ruin's Investiture? Like, not atium, but... Yes, technically; and I'm not wiggling around that, because technically, location in the Cosmere and who belongs to what gets really weird, right? Because Ruin's Investiture is everywhere--but I'm not talking that way. I'm talking the way you actually mean it. to rule out the whole 'Ruin is technically everywhere' argument. What are your thoughts on her involvement? Im not sure how Endowment being involved could NOT be huge. Like, even if it was JUST her returning specific people / person because she knew they would make Nightblood, that is still effectively Endowment orchestrating the creation of Nightblood. I am open to that possibility but that wob does not state that you cant awaken with it. This would imply that creating another Nightblood is as easy as using 'destroy' in your command. I really dont think this is the case because in the most recent spoiler stream, he mentioned that he doesnt know if they COULD even make another Nightblood if they wanted to. This also doesnt factor in the Endowment of it all. Source below: LeFlshe At Dragonsteel this year, you confirmed that Nightblood is not a Dawnshard. However, its abilities seem to be far greater than that of Vivenna’s blade, presumably made with the same method. This disparity may be due to the person who originally Awakened the swords and leads one to believe that Nightblood, despite not being the Dawnshard, had a Dawnshard involved in its creation. Therefore, is Shashara, the person who Awakened Nightblood, a Dawnshard? Brandon Sanderson Excellent questions. You’ve got one faulty premise: Vivenna’s sword was intentionally designed differently to not get another Nightblood. So let’s keep that in mind. That said, I don’t know that they could make another Nightblood if they wanted to. But she definitely did not want to, and there’s a different process that they use nowadays for safer swords. This would also imply that the creation of Nightblood was not a normal awakening process. It cant be as simple as using 'destroy' in your command. Destroy encompasses alot of the shards. Odium is very keen on destruction, Cultivation is known for pruning, and Autonomy is on a campaign to conquer worlds with 'weak' shards. Just as a lot of the shards embody 'change' or 'peace' (or whatever hoids dawnshard is called).

Hello again my lovely fellow theorists, **FULL COSMERE SPOILERS AHEAD** Today I would like to talk about our favorite sword, Nightblood. My friend and I talk about the cosmere pretty much every day at work, and at least 80% of the conversations revolve around Nightblood (surprise surprise). There are simultaneously a lot of details regarding his nature / creation, and also none at all. We have talked through the details a million different ways, and cant seem to make it make sense. OK here goes. What we know: Vasher tells us that Nightblood was created with 1000 breaths and the 'normal' Nalthian awakening process. He was a regular steel sword that was not a dawnshard, metalmind, or hemalurgic spike. When he was created, he immediately turned completely black and started leaking black smoke downwards. In recent years, Brandon has confirmed that Endowment was involved in the creation of Nightblood, beyond the 'normal' use of her investiture to awaken things. To what extent we have no idea, but she had something to do with the process. Regarding the black smoke. Brandon has told us that Nightblood leaks black smoke because the physical sword is oversaturated with investiture, so it leaks out. This leak is akin to the leaking of Stormlight from radiants / shardblades, or the leaking of dor from Elantrians. This should not be the case with 1000 normal breaths. In warbreaker, we see vivenna put 3500(?) breaths into a scarf and it does not leak at all. So, how is Nightblood different? Our current theory is that divine breath was involved somehow. That Endowment gave Nightblood a divine breath in addition to the 1000 Shasharra gave, bringing the total to about 3000 breaths (1 divine is 5th heightening). That number still seems low. Another less likely theory is that Shasharra used 1000 divine breaths to make him, which would be about 2 million breaths. That would make more sense for Nightbloods nature. However, I think Vasher would definitely have been able to tell the difference between several thousand and several million breaths. One other fun tidbit: Ruin's investiture is in Nightblood, and combining that with the wob that states Nightblood has been to more than two planets (nalthis, roshar), we can be fairly confident Nightblood has been to Scadrial. Not necessarily relevant to his creation but an interesting note. Thoughts?

That isnt really decision making. That is action / reaction. Results based on conditions arent decisions being made, they are results of actions taken. There isnt a middle man sentience that is deciding wether its AND / NOR / etc it just IS an AND / NOR / etc gate.

So would you classify that machine as Awakened, or a machine with Awakened parts? (part fabrial, part awakened wires) On that note, at what point is something considered awakened? The definition on coppermind is "using Investiture and Commands to grant objects sentience, regardless of the source of Investiture used, though Breath is still one of the main methods used." but that doesnt really nail down when something is Awakened. For instance, if someone poured stormlight into a machine on Roshar (with no Breath involved at all) and it responded to vocal commands, is that machine now awakened? What if the commands are typed in and the machine responds to them how our computers do - action / reaction. What I mean by that is, when you type a key, the computer isnt deciding wether to put the character in or not, by pressing the key you are causing electricity to flow in specific paths that results in a character on a screen. Would that still be awakened? This action / reaction is how fabrials work. ROW Spoilers: To me Awakening needs the object to make decisions. So the wires in this example would be awakened, but the entire machine is NOT, due to what ive described above. Perhaps this classification is unnecessary.

I argued that there is a distinction between a system using an awakened object and an awakened object. For instance (Secret Projects spoilers): I think fabrials are something different. I think they have the potential to be awakened, but that is not really what fabrials are. They are action / reaction rather than responding to a Command. Stormlight spoilers:

Wasnt the oathpact just between Honor and the Heralds, odium being trapped is a seperate event / oath??

Agreed. On the note of the anti-stormlight sphere, that would partially explain why Odium was so interested in him. He could have had the knowledge Raboniel found much earlier if Gav hadnt been killed.

I interpreted this as their internal perception. It is exactly like Kaladins slave brand on his forehead. Since he sees that of himself, it stays. Since Honor did not see what he did as breaking the agreement, he wasnt weakened. If he had believed that to be the case, he wouldve been weakened. That is more than likely how Odium was able to kill him in the end. I dont know which oath Honor broke, but thats my interpretation. Perhaps Odium convinced him that it was wrong to settle with cultivation and that is what ultimately did him in. I can only see this being applicable if Taravangian is actually convinced of their argument. It must be an internal perception to create the crack for another Shard to exploit. Otherwise, he wouldve done to Cultivation what he did to Honor.

thats a very good point

If im following the general sentiment of what youve put here (great stuff btw), you would be in the camp that thinks SA5 is going to end with Odium 'winning'? I would agree with that if so. MASSIVE future cosmere spoilers:

Because he is trying to reasonably impersonate a splinter of Honor is my best guess to be honest. Gavilar conquered his kingdom right alongside Dalinar, and was no stranger to the thrill. He was cosmere aware to an extent, knew an abnormal amount of details about the oathpact, was in possession of an anti-stormlight sphere, and was actively searching for an unmade. Navani and Aesudon both note he had been studying these things for many years, if i remember correctly since he conquered Alethkar and ' settled down. All this makes me think he could have had a strong Connection to Odium. This makes me think Rodium was not considering a contest of champions in his overall strategy. We know Rodium wanted off Roshar as soon as possible, but we dont know Todiums overall plans. There is implication he plans to rule the cosmere as Rodium did, but the mamner in which he does that could be entirely different. What I mean by that is something like Rodium was hyper focused on breaking out of whatever is trapping him there (presumably doesnt want to leave a huge chunk of investiture), however Todium, in his heightened Ascension power, can see more clearly, and has more long term plans than just shattering every other shard (although that is probably part of the plan). I could see Dalinar breaking the oath of champions due to it being his dead brother. If Gavilar played as if he was unwilling or tortured (maybe he actually is) Dalinar might not be able to kill him without breaking his bondsmith oaths, thus Todium wins either way. Could be a powerup from Odium specifically for the contest to make it more even? Alethi duels traditionally are between full shardbearers.

Arent the Heralds and Fused already considered cognitive shadows? The vision of the champion and nine shadows would seem to suggest he will be something new, considering he has shardplate and we havent seen that on a fused yet.

Hello Fellow Theorists, **SPOILERS FOR EVERYTHING STORMLIGHT INCLUDING PROLOGUE** I have a theory about who Odiums champion will be in SA5 - Gavilar. Now, hear me out. We see in the prologue that Gavilar is interacting with the 'stormfather'. My friend and I are both in agreement that is NOT the stormfather, simply based on the fact that the character in the prologue is nothing like the character bonded to Dalinar. We can be very confident Dals is the true stormfather given that he opens Honors perpendicularity. So, who is the fake stormfather? We believe it is Odium, or a servant of Odium, 'helping' Gavilar find the words to become a Herald. However, Szeth had other plans and ends Gavilars quest to be a Herald prematurely. I believe it is Odium due to when Gavilar says 'I NEED this' and 'stormfather' says 'Those are almost the words.' which implies to me that the correct words were 'I WANT this', playing into the weird permissions restrictions of shards as well as Odium viewing himself as Passion. My thought is this, assuming that was Odium (by that I mean him or his forces) then Gavilar would have had a decently strong Connection to Odium. We have seen that when a shard is Connected to someone, they can interject themselves at the time of death before the spirit fully moves to the Beyond. Im proposing that due to this Connection, Odium caught Gavilar before he was dead dead and convinced / tricked him into becoming a fused. Further evidence of this can be seen when Todium ascends, he mentions that he can see the contingencies that Rodium had put into place and knows how he is going to use them. I think Rodium was keeping fused Gavilar in his back pocket in the event that he did have to do the contest of champions, since that was not his first choice. I dont have much actual evidence for this, but I think that scene would be SO COOL. We know Dalinar has chosen himself....he shows up to the fighting ground, and his 'dead' brother is there to fight him for the fate of Roshar. That would play into the character arcs of Navani, Dalinar, and Jasnah. Each of these characters had many things left unsaid to Gavilar, and this would be the perfect opportunity to further explore those relationships. Especially since Navani spent so much time in Rhythm figuring out how to kill fused for good. Let me know what you all think!

I think I saw it on here but that may not be true.

I like this. I would be content with contradictory in universe explanations if we get more fleshed out lore for each belief system. As this comment points out I enjoy learning about variations in beliefs like this and will love whatever Brandon gives us, but I really hope some of those belief systems are Adonalsium and Aether centric. We know of at least one that worships Ado - I want all of their lore! I will always wonder what the truth is and will enjoy forming my own opinion once we get some more stuff on this. I like that Iri theory. What do you think of the theory that they are collectively Wisdom who splintered themselves into an entire peoples? The 'knew everything but had experienced nothing' could be talking about the inherent knowledge of the shard. Would be quite the massacre in certain definitions if the 'reformed into one' thing is accurate. To your hoid point, it seems like hoid is regretful of the shattering (at least his own involvement) which I think implies the shards are worse, though you are right that doesnt sound like omni-everything God definitions.

Thank you all for your comments. Its been hard for me to nail down specifically what has bothered me so much about this and your words have helped a lot. When I first read Mistborn I had no idea there were shards or ado or who hoid was or anything like that. When I finished era 1, and learned about Pres / Ruin my mind was blown because we got little details throughout the books that showed they were there and in the end we get a ton of details about how they work and their history. The moment of learning that Ado was God and Ado was killed and split into 16 pieces was incredible because that's not a story I had ever heard before. I grew up Catholic, and to Catholicism God could never die. He is omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent and that's not something that can die, right? So for Brandon to write a story where a God like that dies was inherently so fascinating to me. We get so many juicy details on all the magic systems and other 'technical' details and I just didn't expect the line to be drawn here, I think. Its completely fair and his reasoning is good but it will always be frustrating to me that this answer is ambiguous. It makes me think that we wont get answers to other huge questions like where the Dawnshards came from, where the aethers came from, or get many details about the shattering as I feel that would need to discuss Ado's nature at least to some degree. Im sure he can write it where that doesnt come up, like hoid is young and doesnt really care or understand whats really going on or something like that but we get so many details about magic systems and shard interactions and such that I guess I always expected to get the same details about the shattering, ado, dawnshards, and aethers eventually. I know that I will love whatever we are given so I just need to put this frustration away. By this we can tell that all Shards DO represent cosmic forces and natural laws. Ruin isn't just "a God's desire to destroy" it's the source, if you will, of entropy throughout the Universe. (I'm STILL not clear on if the Cosmere is a "cluster" sized universe, or simply a "cluster" within a larger universe, and WoB's don't really clear that up for me haha) I had not seen this before, and honestly raises more questions to be honest. It is said the dawnshards were used to create everything. If 'everything' is the cosmere and the cosmere is all there is, then he mustve created the dawnshards, right? or the universe is bigger than the cosmere and they are external, but Ado used them to make roshar / cosmere. If 'everything' is the rosharan system then ado used the dawnshards to make that system, but not the rest of the cosmere? The part about cluster sized universe or cluster in larger universe - AGREED. I still do not know. That alone would clear a lot of this up, I think.