Pattern

6 hours ago, genesisv1 said:

It could be that it indeed does have a segment for Kholinar in the 'Circle of memories' as we don't know 100% how the Fabrial works, if it actually transports the entire room and contents, (maybe swapping it with the room in Urithiru?) then it would require a segment for every Oathgate to function correctly, including it's starting location.

You are totally right, I forgot about the whole plateau of Stormseat vanishing in WoR. To get it back to its position, it needs the "home-button", so 11 it is.

Spot on. The "lamp" in Kholinar is no anomaly, it's just misinterpreted by Vorin religion. Tranquiline Halls "lamp" = Urithiru "lamp". Actually "lamp" here is something like "fabrial gemstone-holder". The ten other positions stand for each Silver Kingdom, though I'd have to read the passages again, With ten Kingdoms plus Urithiru, each Oathgate just needs ten positions, transportation on "self" would be useless. Or just decorative.

It doesn't only make sense in your mind. Nice explanation! Perhaps we can get the sound of some Alethi after all. If it developed phonetically, what similarities to the Thaylen script with a common origin hint to, someone way more able at linguistics than me could crack it.

Harakeke, I have trust in you !

4 hours ago, Spoolofwhool said:

Dysian Aimians is the name of their race. They're the ones writing the blurbs on the back of the books. 

Quite sharp answer, on the point:

Rereading Arclos wording is quite ominous and reminded me of the blurb on WoK: "We watch the others. The assassin. The surgeon. The liar. The highprince. But not you."

Axies is a Siah Aimian, the ones with blue nails and crystalline deep blue eyes, who can change their appearance (including writings on the skin). Arclo: "I can pass for human almost as well as a Siah can these days,..." - Siah Aimians still cast shadows in the wrong way, see Axies interlude in WoK.

Dysian Aimians are mentioned first by Wit to Dalinar in WoK: "I wonder if you could do that to a man. Pull him apart, emoton by emotion, bit by bit, bloody chunk by bloody chunk. Then combine them back together into something else, like a Dysian Aimian."

I don't know if there is more about them in WoR, since I have only the hardcover version (e-books are so much easier to search). Until Oathbringer is available, another reread of WoR will be possible, though.

Now the question is: Are all sleepless Dysian Aimians, or are there other kinds?

Arclo the sleepless it is. Aimian seems to fit since he speaks of "old Axies". Though it wasn't obvious to me that they are hive beings.

Back to the Skybreakers: In the Postscript, Brandon mentions that at least Nalan was working against the return of radiants for centuries: 

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By the time we see him again in that book, the Herald Nale will have accepted that his work of man centuries (watching and making sure the Radiants don't return) is no longer relevant.

So why surround himself just recently with apprentices and not all the time? There must have been the odd surgebinder once in a while, even if the appearance has multiplied only recently. Otherwise I can not imagine him staying focussed so long on that task. The economic way would have been to take the people attracting Highspren as apprentices to build a network of spies. Even as Herald there is no way he would have found every upcoming surgebinder on Roshar.

Together with the other hints, I think we can be fairly certain that the Skybreakers existed all the time in hiding and took up the task on or shortly afte the Day of Recreance.

My point in mentioning Helaran was not necessarily the shardblade, but the fact that he went on a quest to find the order of Skybreakers. There must have been rumours or legends in rural Vedenar which had some seed of truth in them. On that quest he found a group mighty enough to provide a shardblade - probably not a dead Highspren. Nalan wouldn't have issues using dead spren of another type. He also gives Nightblood to Szeth who hasn't attracted a spren yet. (perhaps the afterimage in Edgedancer hints to a new spren?) So it wouldn't be out of character to give Helaran a dead shardblade until he found himself a spren. There are enough shardblades not accounted for...

One more fact I wasn't aware of before Edgedancer: There are hive-beings on Roshar. (Lets call it the cremling-man for now, at least until i finish my reread or someone corrects me. Was just foreshadowed by strange behaving, nearly clever cremlings.

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Still unconfirmed really. My opinion is that Nale started recruiting them several years ago when the signs of a Desolation began to appear. so it doesn't mean that they have existed since the FinalDesolation. 

Nale recruiting on one hand and killing upcoming Surgebinders for feeble reasons out of fear that they might trigger a desolation on the other hand doesn't add up for me. Also, Helaran goes quite early in Shallans flashbacks on his search for the Skybreakers. This could be just a "fake" organization, or the real thing. So It is most likely that the Skybreakers existed all the time.

Another fact:

Skybreakers are the order that did not disband at the Day of Recreance:

Initiate of Skybreakers in Edgedancer says: "I mean, shouldn't we want them to return, so we won't be the only order of Knights Radiant?" Being guided by Nalan would imply that the Skybreakers existed all along.

Somewhere in this thread I read about the analogy between Glyphs/Thaylen and Chinese/Korean. On some Youtube-Video I saw Brandon mentioning the invention of Korean script and its advantages of being much easier than Chinese. The essence of it is, that Chinese has a symbol for a syllable/word and cannot be read phonetically, while the Korean script is phonetically and can be learned quickly. I don't remember if that video was of a book signing or one of Brandons BYU lectures and I only have the rough ideas in mind. The "easy" Thaylen script is deciphered, whereas Glyphs might have different symbols for words, which are not phonetical. So the shape of the "bridge" glyph wouldn't give us a hint of the Alethi pronounciation of the Alethi word for "bridge".

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I pointed this out a bit earlier, but long-range shard weapons might not actually work due to the range limitations of the Nahel Bond. A Knight Radiant loses their powers if their spren is not nearby, and since the spren turning into a shardblade is due to Nahel Bond, chances are that the spren will disappear as well if it goes too far away. 

Where does that information come from? Until now I haven't seen an indication that physical closeness matters. Perhaps Syl's fear to lose herself while going away from Kaladin in WoK might be a hint, but that was before Kaladin even spoke the First Ideal. Shallan can attach illusions on Pattern and let him move around, without losing the Nahel bond (I think of the scene where Shallan hides in a building and Pattern approaches the tree outside).

My first idea reading about Ishar lying to Nale was: There is the traitor from the epigraphs of WoR. As my understanding is, the Oathpact had as a result - unknown wether intended or not - that Odium was bound to the Greater Rosharan system. He was always able to move in the system as soon as the Heralds in Damnation broke and were sent back to Roshar. This time, Taln breaks at the end of WoK and the voidspren come right after. Or the other way around, since Venli seems to be experimenting with Voidspren for longer than she admitted to Eshonai and Hoid has the impression that Taln is too late this time. So I don't think the appearance of Surgebinders leads to a desolation, but the appearance of Voidspren on Roshar. In the past, the Orders existed between desolations, so their existence didn't trigger the next desolation immediately. Don't forget, Odiums influence can be felt in the whole system. For example, the Unmade, splinters of Odium, are still on Roshar between desolations / after the last desolation: The Thrill already exists in Dalinar flashbacks (ok, thats not canon, yet) and is caused by Nergaoul, a Splinter of Odium. I understand this happens way before Gavilars' murder and the first appearance of Surgebinders (6 to 7 years before the start of the main timeline of WoK). Also, Szeth was made Truthless because he warned of an upcoming desolation - before he was given the Honorblade to kill with. Though it is still a bit unclear what is cause and what is implication, I tend to favour the appearance of Surgebinders being a reaction to an upcoming desolation. I side with genius Taravangian here: "The Desolation needs no usher. It can and it will sit where it wishes and the signs are obvious, that the spren anticipate it doing so soon." - WoR p.998-

Ishar denying the fact that the desolation is already there can have many reasons. Mental instability might be one of those, and is supported by the fact that the other Heralds also seem to have mental issues: Taln is understandably traumatized by 4500 years of torture, so he cannot be compared to the other Heralds. But Shallash destroying art (or just pictures and statues of her?) and Nale killing for feeble reasons without any compassion are examples, that longevity far above the usual lifespan seems to play games with your mind (Heralds seem to have lived all the time, without time dilation effects and other stuff, as opposed to Worldhoppers). So perhaps Ishar doesn't want a desolation very very badly and so refuses to see the signs.

I don't think that is the case: "One is almost certainly a traitor to the others." - WoR p.1027- The repeated reassurance that there are no new Voidbringers is manipulating Nalan to kill new developing Surgebinders, thus playing directly into the hands of Odium. It is too clever and directed to be the result of a mere denial of undesired facts. That scheme targets the only order of Radiants who didn't abandon their oaths. Also Ishars argument, that without the regulation of Honor, Surgebinders might usher a desolation, is not valid: Desolations also happened with Honors regulation, or better said, ALL desolations until now happened with Honor alive. Either way, the spren regulate as Splinters of Honor, they mainly still have the shards intent. Talenel holding up in Damnation is the reason for the long absence of desolations. Perhaps they can happen, as soon as the first Herald breaks, so strongwilled Talenel could hold them back way longer than the 10 Heralds together. (Question for Brandon: Did Ishar often break first in Damnation?). Ishar seems to have proposed the abandoning of the Oath Pact. The Oath Pact was what bound Odium to the Greater Roshar system, so the abandonment is in Odiums interest. That Talenel alone hold out much longer than all Heralds together would have been an undesired side effect. Most of this is speculation, of course, since the narrators could be unreliable. I am fairly convinced though, that Ishar is the mentioned traitor to the others.

PS: I like contradicting myself.  So what if my thoughts are wrong and Ishar was right all the time? Then we might have a candidate for the secret that destroyed the Knights Radiant: Deep Understanding of Surgebinding (possible only with all oaths) can lead to events that have a desolation as a consequence. So the Day of Recreance might have been an attempt to stop desolations forever. The question tough is, how much time lay between the Last Desolation and the Day of Recreance. If that is millennia, there is no reason to believe that the mere existence of Surgebinders causes a desolation. So, perhaps Honor was dying at the Day of Recreance and without him, the mere existence of Surgebinders would cause a desolation. That also doesn't fit together, since the Skybreakers didn't disband, they went into hiding. So there were still Surgebinders existing without causing a desolation while Honor was dead. So Ishar was probably not right: Why should Skybreakers be different from the other orders?

1st: The shardfork made me laugh out loud!

2nd: Material of shard-stuff: Wyndle states the material has to be metal, so a bowstring made of metal (like metal guitar strings) might work or not. More I want to hint to a statement from Mistborn: Secret History:

In analogy it is not so surprising that a condensed form of a spren (self-aware Splinters) are Connected to metals.

All that red reminds me a lot of voidspren in WoR. Taln's scar are stars /red dots of light. The Rip sounded more like an extended object/entity. Might Odium have taken a little trip to Scadrial, being stopped by Harmony at the time?

Having read "The Bands of Mourning" now, that question is answered. Obviously I gave Sazed too much credit in repairing Scadrial at the end of Era 1. Seems he didn't know about the people in the south at that time at all.

You mentioned people left at the south pole by the Lord Ruler.

To me, the Diagram seem like an intricate plan with contingencies to become king of everything. Unification seems somewhat similar to Dalinars aims.

Having the Palanaeum in Kharbranth, Mr. T would have been able to aquire lots of information during his not so short life, which he processed during his day of brilliance. Nonetheless the Diagram does not predict the future. Mr T works proactively to make the events happen the Diagram "predicts".

He started using Moelach(or Nergaoul?)  via death rattles to gather more information, because the diagram became too imprecise. I am really excited about in which book of the series the Diagram runs wild. I expect it to happen like it happens with every weather forecast. 5 days might be ok, but 14 days...well I could also look into my coffee and predict something instead.

And Jasnah is back - with information from Shadesmar. This is not to be ignored. Would be nice to know, where on Mr. T's intelligence chart Jasnah would be positioned...

1. He is a 3rd level radiant while Szeth is getting his abilities from an honorblade. As such, Kaladin gets more efficient use of his stormlight.

I am not sure if you can rank the Radiants from the number of oaths they have spoken, since lightweavers only say the First Words, common to all orders.

The third oath could have been the last for a windrunner. Actually, I don't have WoK at hand now to look it up.

Though, Kaladin seems to be attracting more windspren in this fight, so he might end up bonding more than one spren.

I was wondering, whether Mr. T knows what his brilliant self has written there or not. Obviously his assistants just have written down the encoded passage.

And the secret, could it just be

"One is almost certaily a traitor to the others"?

About spren is gemstones: It is in WoK, Navanis Notebook. Since Harakeke translated it, here the link.

So it is absolutely possible, that Gavilars sphere contains some spren. Whether its a specific voidspren or some

other kind of evil spren (where is written, that the Unmade are voidish?) I don't know.

The other thing is: Enslaved spren in gemstones are used in fabrials, so they have an outward effect, e.g. transform stormlight to heat in heater-fabrials.

If there is a voidspren in Gavilar's sphere, does it also have an effect? Something like sucking away stormlight, like the animal in the Lift interlude....

There I was some hours at work and you've done it. Nice solution! We were so close on the first day, indeed.

But nobody got the Idea of counting letters in pattern one. So that was a really new input.

Thanks to all participating, though seeing it done when coming home hurts ;-)

At least I can throw away my papers drawn patterns from the Code.

Yes, and what is the secret??

Well, I am still disturbed about the fact that the code could be much easier broken, if it would have been given to us in Vorin numerals, the numerals probably used in the diagram. They would yield a unique parsing.

So the hint "The key is in the book" does not neccessarily point to WoR, though it's probable.

For all you new to the thread: Here is a summary of what has been done until page 15 of the thread.

Now the thread is exploding and today I have no time for another summary. So if someone else wants to summarize

from page 16 to 20, I would appreciae it a lot ;-)

Interesting! Though wouldn't that interpretation translate to "LiN KoK NiL"?

I assumed that is the single glyph contraction "iN oL -K | -K oL iN", (alternately | Ko Li N-) and that the glyphpair KoKh LiNiL is what we see in the Tower & Crown chapter heading emblem.

My opinion to Khokh Linil: Both glyphs could have been identified correctly by Argent.

Glyphs are symmetric. So what do you do, when you want to build one glyph from a glyphpair with to different glyphs? You move one glyph into the symmetry axis of the other. Preferably the first Glyph should be in the middle. If you read from left to right, you take the middle and go to right. If you prefer reading right to left (like arabic) you start again in the middle and go to left. Therefore you get the same word.

Now I see, that the same works for Aladar glyph. Though I would read it AlaTar based on Thaylen symbols. But since there are probably vowel variations of consonants...

So now back to Ch84 Code...I stray again.

Ok, Code has been broken while I was absent. So now I can concentrate more on glyph stuff.

BTW, while looking for hints for the code in WoK, I stumbled over the fact, that Shallan can speak, read and write Thaylen, but cannot read Selay. So perhaps there will be another language...

Also in Shallan's application interview with Jasnah it got obvious that there are major, minor and topical glyphs - which can be written calligraphically - but you've already got that. 

Ok, so I'll see what I can do with the paragraph that has the wherewherewherewhere in it and the SetOff...etc. in it. I still think that one, at least by format and content, seems pertinent in that it's odd

 Format is different in hard copy.

They will come you cannot stop their oaths:  Knights Radiant will return. No possibility to stop every candidate from speaking the words

 look for those who survive when they should not : Kaladin (Fight against shardbearer, bridgeruns, highstorm, etc, etc), Shallan (shipwreck,

): Surgebinders survive when normal people would not.

It's less the stuff in those epigraphs than missing things. Taravangian won't encode something he has written on other places in plaintext.

At the moment I am trying some Vigenere chiffres with different keys. The greatest uncertainty however is still the parsing of the Code. Well, and the fact that we don't know what kind of encryption we have to deal with.

Although...I don't think it's Vigenere. Most passwords would destroy the symmetry of the code. On the other hand, the symmetry could  be an artifact of our imagination - we simply see ghosts after hours and hours of code-watching...

The glyphs on Elhokars sword are tiny. I hope Harakeke can do something with them.

Edit: Yes he can ;-)

Well, Renarin writing all zeros is quite funny. If he used Vorin numerals, he just makes dots on the wall...

Ok, I have tried do build patterns from the code. I used Vorin numerals to see if there evolves a symmetry.

I cannot find one, it's definitely not a map of the Shatterd Plains. Perhaps someone else sees more...