A new vessel for Ambition

[Aaronator17]

So an incredible thought just occurred to me. What if Kelsier were to take up to power of Ambition?

Yes Ambition was mortally wounded and Splintered, but we don't know if this Splintering was done in a 'permanent' way that Odium seems to be able to do. If Ambition fled after their battle with Odium and the power was splintered some other way, that power could coalesce later and be taken up by someone else. Kelsier is already a Sliver, and has been the vessel of a Shard before (albeit temporarily). He also is very interested in understanding more about the Cosmere as a whole since his introduction to the extended universe in Secret History. 

If the power of Ambition were to be brought together again, Kelsier would be the perfect vessel for it, i think the Intent fits his nature almost perfectly, and would put him in an incredible position to not only learn about the Cosmere, but to meddle as he is so fond of doing.

What do we all think?

[AeonaRin she/her]

Considering he would have troubles even leaving Scadrial because of his connection to it and that he would have to figure out how to mend pieces of a splintered Shard back together, I'd say it's unlikely. 

[ZenBossanova]

I wouldn't rule out Kelsier leaving Scadrial. It would be very difficult, of course, but he did manage

Spoiler

to kill an emperor and be only mostly dead. 

I don't think the question is, can he get there. The better question is, what can you do to a shattered shard? How hard is it to unshatter it? I don't think we have any examples of shards being unshattered. Preservation and Ruin don't count, but they are close. 

[Thanatos]

Plus he needs Connection to Ambition.

The only reason he could take up Preservation was the Elantian device. So he'd need another one of thoughs as well as a body to connect him to all three realms. As Brandon said his pretty much a spren. (Preservation sprenlike i reckon)

Plus i theorize that the only one who can put a shattered shard back is Sazed given his more powerful and aware than the others. Once who does this Autonomy will kill another shard and pick it up and head to Sel

Edited March 31, 2017 by Thanatos

[Aaronator17]

26 minutes ago, ZenBossanova said:

I don't think we have any examples of shards being unshattered. Preservation and Ruin don't count, but they are close

We don't have examples but there is a WoB that shattering is not permanent (though I think what happened to Devotion and Dominion prevents anyone from taking up their shards easily). 

I feel like there should be more to Kelsier's story. Even after (presumably) acquiring a new body, as a Cognitive shadow and a Sliver, he could repeatedly use the same method to keep returning to 'life' in the physical realm, at least until he decides that he has done everything that he wants to do and moves Beyond. 

We don't know where Ambition finally shattered, but Threnody neighbours Scadrial in the Cognitive Realm and I think a wounded Ambition couldn't have gotten far. That to me says it may not be as difficult as one might think for someone from Scadrial to reach where Ambition's power might still lie.

[ZenBossanova]

29 minutes ago, Aaronator17 said:

We don't have examples but there is a WoB that shattering is not permanent (though I think what happened to Devotion and Dominion prevents anyone from taking up their shards easily). 

Really? I have not seen that one. I would love to see that, if you can remember where it is. 

30 minutes ago, Aaronator17 said:

I feel like there should be more to Kelsier's story. Even after (presumably) acquiring a new body, as a Cognitive shadow and a Sliver, he could repeatedly use the same method to keep returning to 'life' in the physical realm, at least until he decides that he has done everything that he wants to do and moves Beyond.

Secret History was nice, but without more Kelsier, it is a bit of a waste. I am beginning to strongly suspect you are right, we will see more Kelsier.

Spoiler

You don't become enemies with Hoid, while being a good guy, and then have your story just end!

 

[ZenBossanova]

Spoiler

MASON WHEELER

You've said that Splintering a shard is essentially the same thing as the shattering of Adonalsium, repeated on a smaller scale.

BRANDON SANDERSON

Yeah.

MASON WHEELER

And a while ago, someone asked you if Splintering was permanent or reversible, and you said that it can be reversed.

BRANDON SANDERSON

Yeah.

Spoiler

LITTLE WILSON

You mentioned that "half-ish" of the existing Shards are whole at the time of Shadows of Self. Is that counting splinters?

BRANDON SANDERSON

No. Splintered is one of the ways they are not considered whole. (He's thinking about Dominion and Devotion and says that's the opposite of whole)

LITTLE WILSON

I was thinking about shattered versus splintered, and going with shattered with Devotion and Dominion. And then splintered would be Honor separating a piece of himself to create the spren (pre-Shattering).

BRANDON SANDERSON

On Scadrial, Ruin and Preservation did the same thing. Their bodies are part of the world. Things on the spiritual realm don't matter where they are in relation to each other. All those spren are still Honor, when he was alive. Does that make sense? Yes, they're splinters of Honor, but they're still Honor. It's not like he's diminished, because his whole essence is the world. There's no diminishing that. So we're talking about the fracturing of the mind and killing of the Shard. That's the distinction between whole and not whole.    emphasis mine

These WoB are suggestive. 

[Calderis he/him]

I love it. And I think it's not very far fetched. 

1. (BoM spoiler)

Spoiler

The memory Wax views and everything we hear about "Sovereign" makes it seem like good ol' Kel is definitely out of the Cognitive Realm and back to meddling in the physical. This means he should have no problem leaving Scadrial. 

2. If Kel was too aligned with Ruin to be able to pick up Preservation, when every Scadrian has more Preservation than Ruin by the nature of their creation, then we obviously have no clue what would constitute the needed connection to a Shard. 

On that second point: I think it's going to be more based off a person's nature and mindset than anything else. My main argument for this thought is Sazed. Vin had been primed for the power as a kind of chosen one and then by touching the well, but Sazed... You could argue about the prophecy, but in his life we never see anything to prep him for becoming Harmony beyond circumstances.

Look at what he did with his life though. He worked tirelessly to preserve the worlds ancient religions. His life was dedicated to that connection with Preservation. Then in his depression he picked all of that apart to the point where he felt it was all hollow and useless. Connection to ruin. If he hadn't been through everything we saw in the books and had the emotional weight of all of that... I think he would have only been able to pick up Preservation.

Under that thought process... If Kelsier can't pick up Ambition, then no one can. 

Edited March 31, 2017 by Calderis

[Thanatos]

Theres a WoB that says when Kel leaves Scadrial his basically a spren.

Quote

FirstSelector: So if I’m a Surgebinder and I have my own Cognitive entity with me, can I go off-world with that and [have] everything continue to work in exactly the same way? Because we’ve seen Cognitive entities that--

Brandon: So...taking a Cognitive entity off-world is hard. So, Surgebinding, if you can find out how to make it happen, remember, the Investiture is keyed to Connection. This is why Kelsier is--Oh, sorry, spoilers! When a certain somebody [laughter] getting off Scadrial, because he basically was a spren by that point so…[laughter] So, yeah Surgebinding would work off planet, but you’d have to get the spren off first. It’s hard to do. Well, Cosmere-wide it’s not hard hard...You could learn how.

 

Edited March 31, 2017 by Thanatos

[ZenBossanova]

Ok, so he was a spren at that point, but since then he has gained a body. Is he still a spren? Did he learn off-world how to gain a body? 

[Aaronator17]

I think he's something closer to a Returned or a Herald at this point, a Cognitive shadow connected to a Physical body. We know that it is possible for Returned to Worldhop so I can't see any reason why Kelsier - with a perpendicularity - couldn't do the same. The way he achieved this I believe is through Hemalurgy, not through any methods used off-Scadrial.

[ZenBossanova]

10 minutes ago, Aaronator17 said:

I think he's something closer to a Returned or a Herald at this point, a Cognitive shadow connected to a Physical body. We know that it is possible for Returned to Worldhop so I can't see any reason why Kelsier - with a perpendicularity - couldn't do the same. The way he achieved this I believe is through Hemalurgy, not through any methods used off-Scadrial.

I would have initially assumed he did it on Scadrial too, but Brandon mentions Kelsier leaving Scadrial as a spren. Of course, he may have returned to Scadrial to reincarnate. 

A good question would be, how well known is Hemalurgy besides Scadrial? 

[Calderis he/him]

11 minutes ago, ZenBossanova said:

I would have initially assumed he did it on Scadrial too, but Brandon mentions Kelsier leaving Scadrial as a spren. Of course, he may have returned to Scadrial to reincarnate. 

A good question would be, how well known is Hemalurgy besides Scadrial? 

I took that WoB as referring to this line from secret history when Kelsier was headed toward the Ire fortress. 

"As he got farther from the shore, he felt a tugging at his soul. A manifestation of his ties to the world he’d left behind. He knew, without having to experiment, that this tug would ultimately grow strong enough that he wouldn’t be able continue outward."

I thought he was just talking about the difficulty for a Cognitive entity "basically a spren" leaving.

Kelsier was aware that he couldn't leave as is, and was aware of and willing to use Hemalurgy with Spook to rectify the situation. I wouldn't doubt that he has left Scadrial at this point, but I doubt he did before regaining a physical form. He was focused and motivated, which with Kel means it gets done even when it shouldn't be possible. 

[Oversleep]

While it's true Returned can worldhop it doesn't mean that's easy. On cosmere scale of hardness it's probably not very difficult but there are some obstacles.

[Yata he/him]

Kelsier Will have multiple problems to Ascend to Ambition:

- He is a Cognitive's Shadow so a bad Vessel.

- He is tied to Scadrial and Harmony, he could overcomed this issue but still It could work aganist him in the elegibility to Vesselhood.

- Ambition is splintered and we (and maybe the Cosmere's people) don't know where his/her Power is.

- If Ambition's remains are in Open space...noone could reach them through the Cognitive and you Need to physical Travel there to operate on them

[Thanatos]

It could be Kel left Scadrial prior to gaining a new body.

As the WoB does not state the timeline. So if.. stress if, if he left Scadrial prior to Alloy of Law, then gain a physical body through Hemalurgy and came back.... then you could say he was Spren like when he first left Scadrial. 

Also in SH when he was leaving Scadrial it was not intuition that he could not leave, but the pull back to Scadrial. 

The castle of Elantians was at his limit at that time. 

Edited March 31, 2017 by Thanatos

[Yata he/him]

39 minutes ago, Thanatos said:

The castle of Elantians was at his limit at that time. 

Ire's Fortress was still inside Scadrial's Cognitive Realm and as you said Kel pushed himself ti reach It while the Scadrial's pull becomes stronger as he go farther

Edited March 31, 2017 by Yata

[Thanatos]

I agree at the time this was kels limit to travel. Then the Elantians came back to Scadrial to get the shard Preservation.

[Thanatos]

1 hour ago, Yata said:

Ire's Fortress was still inside Scadrial's Cognitive Realm and as you said Kel pushed himself ti reach It while the Scadrial's pull becomes stronger as he go farther

Ok thats how to quote!! Learn something every day 

[What's a Seawolf?]

As Kelsier is my favorite character, I would LOVE if something like this happened.

If he doesn't pick up some kind of Survival Shard (whatever it turns out to be) or a shard called Hope (I am hope,) Ambition would fit him rather nicely.

As others have mentioned there are a decent amount of obstacles to him doing so, but if we took ourselves back to 200X, whenever it was that Mistborn came out, we would have said the same thing about his coming back from the dead

There's so much about the Cosmere we don't know yet.  But it certainly seems Kelsier is shaping up to be a major player (not that he hasn't been already, but I mean on an even larger Cosmere wide scale.)  Picking up a shard certainly fits.  (Though I would fear for him losing his personality and charm in the long run with a shard.)

[AeonaRin she/her]

Even if he got a new body and would be able to leave Scadrial, I still doubt he would find Ambition splinters and un-splinter it. I mean, someone might do that, but I don't get why Kelsier is your choice. 

Edited March 31, 2017 by strumienpola

[The One Who Connects he/him]

11 minutes ago, strumienpola said:

someone might do that, but I don't get why Kelsier is your choice. 

I don't see why he would try and do that either, but he is brazen enough to actually do it and stubborn enough to not give up when others would. The OP is equating perfect fit with the one who will try it, when they often aren't. Sazed, as good of a fit as he was for Harmony, basically decided last minute to take up the power. The IRE were the ones going for it, and they were hardly good choices.

That said, if we could think of a valid reason to motivate Kelsier into trying to reform Ambition...

[What's a Seawolf?]

2 hours ago, The One Who Connects said:

I don't see why he would try and do that either, but he is brazen enough to actually do it and stubborn enough to not give up when others would. The OP is equating perfect fit with the one who will try it, when they often aren't. Sazed, as good of a fit as he was for Harmony, basically decided last minute to take up the power. The IRE were the ones going for it, and they were hardly good choices.

That said, if we could think of a valid reason to motivate Kelsier into trying to reform Ambition...

Couldn't you say it's well within his character to do so?

This is someone who plotted the downfall and death of an immortal god emperor, died but refused to actually die, then helped with the plotting and death of the actually immortal god.  Everything he does, from the grandiose plans to the simple message of 'survive' can be described as ambitious.

It terms of the actual reasoning for going out and doing it, I would say he's Kelsier.  He's recently discovered there's a whole new world(s) out there full of superpowered people and even more superpowered people.  Whatever plan he concocts, whoever he's going to get in his mind to save, he's going to need power to accomplish his goals.  Heck, I could see him witnessing Odium, Autonomy or some other Cosmere Shardic big bad and going all lord ruler rebellion on them.  But he would know he would need shardic level powers to give him and his supporters the best chance.

He certainly has the ambition to pull it off

And I'm not arguing against the fact there would be many hurdles to such a feet, but as I mentioned above, there's still so much we don't know.

[Aaronator17]

2 hours ago, strumienpola said:

I mean, someone might do that, but I don't get why Kelsier is your choice

For quite a number of reasons actually. 

First, as a Cognitive Shadow and a Sliver who knows how to inhabit and take over a Physical body (not  technically confirmed but heavily implied), Kelsier is not bound by time the same way others are on Scadrial. Even Marsh will eventually run out of Atium, and when he goes and dies he won't be able to stay in the Cognitive Realm indefinitely like Kelsier can. 

This brings me to my next point, that Kelsier as a Sliver has already held the power of a Shard, and I believe this has 'primed' him to take up another shard. 

Sure, we don't know how anyone could reform a Shattered shard, but Kelsier has the time to figure it out. He is also fascinated by the Cosmere, and wants to discover more about it. Maybe fascinated is the wrong word. More like; he realised how small he really was in the universe and how much he didn't know, and wants to not feel like that again. 

Also, assuming a Connection to Ambition is required, maybe an Ire-like device is needed, maybe it isn't? We honestly don't know, but Kelsier fits the bill like almost nobody else does, and I think it's not only an awesome way to continue Kelsier's story, but (to me) it's a very believable one. 

Edited March 31, 2017 by Aaronator17
Spelling

[Calderis he/him]

Kelsier set himself up as a messiah, and sacrificed himself to become this God figure. All to instigate an uprising of the common people to overthrow someone with literal godlike powers. 

That was his back-up plan. 

56 minutes ago, Aaronator17 said:

Sure, we don't know how anyone could reform a Shattered shard, but Kelsier has the time to figure it out. He is also fascinated by the Cosmere, and wants to discover more about it. Maybe fascinated is the wrong word. More like; he realised how small he really was in the universe and how much he didn't know, and wants to not feel like that again. 

That's definitely part of it. He doesn't want to feel small and powerless and ignorant, but that's not all. He's also a con man at heart. He thrives not on just a thirst for power, but the manipulation game. He loves out smarting people. He worked his way up through the Luthadel elite, and when he couldn't aim higher he tried to outsmart a literal (to their knowledge) God. After that failed, he came back, thought about it, and succeeded on the second attempt.

His nature demands that, having learned that there is this larger world with bigger players he needs to know. Kelsier is why we say "there's always another secret" because look at his operations, and even more his motivations. The pursuit of, and ability to hold secrets that no one else has is what he does. Who he is.

That need to know is in itself Ambitious. He will chase power, not out of thirst for the power itself, but because to play the game, he needs to know more than those around him. At the end of Secret History he's learned just how ignorant he has always been. He's going to correct that by any means necessary, because face it. He doesn't need to be the most powerful, but he does need the knowledge to outsmart those who are. 

Edited March 31, 2017 by Calderis