Swimmingly

I believe it's just called the Horneater Peaks.

Hope you're feeling better, BT! Korb touched the hilt of his sword, startling slightly as the entire night lit into patches of colour and grey before him. Legion of gods, but still wasn't used to that. The players were illuminated, grey figures slinking through the shadows, hunting one another. On the rooftops, about a dozen crossbowmen crouched behind chimneys or lay down in the shadows, trying to keep out of sight. Vhalin was picking them off with his sling, but they were learning, keeping down while the ranger's sling blurred in a deadly arc. When the wall of the inn burst outwards, showering shards of ice, wood, and ember over the street, with two brawling figures within, Korb stumbled backwards and fell. Every ache in his body, from the bruises on his back to the swelling on his face, blossomed as he jarred the cobbles roughly, and Korb let out a soft, pathetic whimper. He wasn't used to pain. Bent stood over him, looking vaguely concerned and more than slightly ridiculous in his freshly tailored nobleman's jacket and blood-soaked, bandaged chest. "You all right, then?" he asked. Korb raised an eyebrow, immediately regretting it; the barkeeper had blacked his eye very effectively. "Are you going to help me up, Bent? It's generally considered polite." Bent shrugged with that easy, fluid motion, massive shoulders rippling under the jacket. He held out a bearlike palm and hoisted Korb to his feet with a quick jerk."Here ye go, sir," he said. The irony in his voice was so well hidden, it was barely there. Korb clamped his jaws shut to avoid another whimper. It squealed out anyway, the noise like a kicked pig. He wondered what Bent thought of him. He thinks you're an idiot noble down on his luck and deep in his cups, the voice said. It was probably right. But Korb had something most nobles didn't. No common sense whatsoever. And that is why Korb gestured Bent to follow in his velvet jacket as he scuttled across the alleyway to the door set in the other side; it lead into a cobbler's shop. Korb knockef sharply, giving it a few whacks with the end of his cane for good measure. After a few seconds, the door opened a bare inch - the man must have been watching the fight through the window. "What do you want?" a thin voice asked. Korb reached into his trouser pocket, drawing out a silver coin - a corathen and balancing it on the point of one finger. "We're just passing through, friend, and we'd like the privilege of passing through your establishment." The cobbler considered the coin for a moment, then spoke. "Two coracles per person." Korb thought about haggling, then shrugged and nodded. He counted out four coracles from a pocket and handed them over. "Four?" Marie said crossly, behind him. "What am I, the dog?" Korb cocked his head. "You want to come, Marie? You wouldn't rather go back to the cellar? It looks like the fire's gone out in the inn." "It gonna be dangerous?" Korb shrugged, trying to emulate Bent's movement. That man had a good shrug. "It well could be." Marie grinned, and gestured with the black serrated dagger she held in her right hand. It was nearly the length of a short sword, with a sharp, cutting edge and a jagged, duller one. She must have found it on the orc Vhalin had killed. "Then I'm ready, ain't I?" For the first time, her voice carried more than scorn and brusqueness. Korb shivered. Then he handed over another two coins. It couldn't hurt. ---- Korb had to take his hand off the hilt of his cane to climb out the window, and it made every muscle in his body ache, but running kept his legs strong and it was only a short clamber. The cane dangled from a piece of cord he'd bought off the cobbler inside, tied to his belt, and it knocked against his leg as he hoisted himself onto the roof. Gods, but it seemed dark already without the cane to help. Korb stood up and touched the cane, sending the shadows in the night fleeing into a shade of grey. His vision at a distance crystallized as well, giving him the sense of small details even a long ways away. He had intended to come up here partly to watch the fight from a safe place and partly to warn the others if he saw a crossbowman taking a shot, but Vhalin - perhaps with help - had taken care of them one way or another by the time Korb got into position. Down below, Vhalin and Zakk spoke, the former fidgeting uncomfortably. Behind, Bent heaved himself over, then bent to give Marie a hand. Korb ignored them and let his new vision carry his gaze over the city. He could see the fine estates growing wines on the edge of the desert, and the citadel set into the small, humpbacked mountain three kilometres into the sands. He saw the lizard slums and the nicer neighbourhoods, laid out like patchwork. And then he saw the blazing ships and huge, hulking war galleys in the harbour. He saw the streams of orcs, men, and darker things pouring off the boats to burn the Docks and clash with the guard. He saw the Silarni armies marching through the streets, and the ballistae that scorched them, the magic that flew between the invading navy and the shore like a roll of thunder. Whoever was hunting them hadn't sent a few dozen men and orcs. They'd sent an army. Korb turned slowly around. Marie smiled as she adjusted her grip on the dagger, grin like a white enamel mask. "I don't think I'll be working' as a barmaid much longer," she said.

A traumatic backstory.

We are fairly certain that she went to the Nightwatcher to get those abilities; her curse is as yet unknown, though it may have something to do with malnutrition. Darkness seems to be the Herald Nale, and seems to be at the head of the Order of the Skybreakers.

Plus the fact that he can correct shots using Steelpushing after he has fired, and has blue lines to sight along, and has something like 20 years of experience.

Hoid playing the storyteller for Siri, in the name and guise of Dust

Well, they basically have infinite clockwork power to run off of, what with the rune-of-rending winding mechanisms.

Awaken a carved human arm to crank a gearwork engine powering your car.

So...nuclear fusion mages? This sounds fun. I'd imagine that more mundane atomic chemistry, or at least the closest equivalent possible given the technology level, should be fairly advanced in this world, with properties of metals held as state secrets. And this sounds like it could get pretty badass in battle - imagine shifting entire swathes of oxygen in the air around your enemies into fluorine. In fact I'd suggest that you constrain it only to the elements to either side, because then the most skilled would be those who could keep a cascade of elements across the periodic table contained without it exploding - and it adds an element of risk. Any elemental property in between is going to show for a second, so, for example, it's a good idea not to linger on chlorine too long or it's going to spill out and scorch your lungs. It would also create a kind of alchemical chemistry where there's a manipulator controlling the reaction with brute force.

Of course, this is only if you want something science-like - mystical magic works great, for example grammarie or Naming from the Kingkiller Chronicles. The universe still contains very scientific magics, but there's an element of mystery as well. Don't tie yourself too closely to physical laws, is what I'm saying.

Probably partly actual medicine as well.

Oh god.

Remember, Breath in itself is a social symbol. It's a goal to be achieved in itself, especially considering the effective immortality that can be achieved with enough of it.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but you continue to assume that you will not be driven to madness, that your child won't, or that you will make bad decisions. When the entire world is an extension of yourself, what happens when your finger slips, for lack of a better analogy? What happens when you don't have the right information? What happens if you simply are not good at psychologically managing half the population finely? Who would you leave in control when you died? What is the point of a world without free will? Does the survival of a species justify the effective destruction of its sapience? What about if it doesn't need saving? Because your arguments so far revolve around the hypothetical that you need to save the world from itself by assuming ultimate, sadistic control. So, what if you're wrong?

I thought Vivenna's Royal Locks granted her an instinct for Awakening, due to the fragment of a Divine Breath in her?

If I had to guess, I'd say nose-flutes, poetry, and drums that become beer mugs when you flip them over.

Probably 2048?

Read Mistborn

I'd say, start with a visit to Value Village. Find a big black raincoat, preferably with a dark colour on both sides. Aquire a cutting implement, and go to town on the bottom back edge. Fold, sew, and cut off the arms. Make a strap to go about your shoulders. Bring a fan, tilt it upwards, and crouch dramatically at the event. That's just my two cents, anyway. Optionally, you could get more material, maybe dark grey for variety, slice it up, and sew it into the mass of tassels at the bottom of the rainjacket under the fabric.

Not to mention the fact that, say, you could be taken out by drone, sniper, missile, natural disaster, freak accident, your child turning against you, a single person immune to your puppetry, a trained animal, a trap set before hand, controlling so many people that you accidently order them to do something stupid like dump a load of flammable chemicals just in front of the intake for a nuclear power plant, disease, stress breaking your mind like a frail twig and making you go mad, any of the above happening to your child, suicide, others arising with similar abilities, etc. Any of this, including, as has been said earlier, your natural death, does exactly as was described in the previous post. However, in a world where your child becomes Gaia's Puppetmaster, consider the last of my points: What if there are others? Suddenly, you do not have an absolute ruler instilling order in the world. You have a pantheon of angry gods throwing armies against eachother to attain ultimate power; basically the world of the Buggers before the unification in the Card's Enderverse. So, I argue that the prior arguments offered by Observer can be simplified: If I had all the power in the world, I'd do it right, this time. Your arguments could be applied as well to, say, overwhelming military force and a religion-like leader worship, as is applied in North Korea. However, North Korea does not rule the world because other countries possess more force. There is a force to counter them. So, if we assume that this is a single puppet master world, then this could work, and make the world a temporarily better place, longer term if puppetry on an unconscious level of the entire world was achieved, so the principles driving them were themselves changed. However, barring that, any situation would be setting itself up for a dystopian fall of civilisation, even assuming absolute power did not corrupt absolutely, when it ended. That is the best case scenario for a puppetry based large-scale power grab. After all, people would still be around.

The name's Swimmingly, by the way, and yeah, that's a good idea. Again, Welcome! Oh, and watch out for spikes, by the way.

Not to mention religious and personal reasons - being a Drab carries a stigma, and the Lifeless Command is not exactly common knowledge. Toss in the fact that your social status rises pretty much based on the number of Breaths you have, and you drive up the cost of Breath even further. Once you get to things like Awakened swords or Lifeless armies, which all cost upwards of a thousand Breath and remove that much from the market permanently without providing much non-military market stimulus (labour or social status), well, it's hard to estimate to say the least.

Think a heist story, if the thing they're trying to steal is control of a thousand-year old dictatorial empire with armies, assassination, magic, and all that good stuff. That's the first book. It gets more epic (in both the literary and awesomeness sense) from there. Also, welcome to the forums! I recommend keeping alert for Mistborn spoilers while surfing here, though, because a lot of the plot there depends on twists, and you wouldn't want to ruin those! Have an introductory upvote and please enjoy yourself!

Personally, I ship SylxADHD.

Of course noone talks about it. What would they have to compare it to? Shin instruments?