Lightsong the Lucky

[Quantus he/him]

I had the opportunity to listen to the Graphic Audio of Warbreaker recently (HIGHLY recommend them, if you have the chance, the full cast and production is a wonderful experience), and I noticed something about Lightsong that stood out but was never really addressed:  Lightsong is unwholesomely Lucky.  At one point Lightsong is playing a game called Tarachin  with the other Gods, a game described as "one of the most difficult games in the world" because it required both great physical ability as well as layered strategy.  Lightsong, being awesome, never bothered to learn the rules and instead just likes to choose and throw the balls randomly, yet he always manages to do better than the avid players. 

 

So there he is, musing about how the different Gods get slightly different forms, how they all seem to get more or less the same Godlike physique but unfortunately there's no guarantee of any increased intelligence.  Meanwhile he's throwing balls over his shoulder and winning at a game he doesnt understand all the while wishing he knew enough to be able to loose on purpose. 

 

Here's the thing, we know that the Returned's physical attributes get way more Fluid, reflecting more of what they Believe they should be rather than their inborn reality (and this can be consciously manipulated with training).  Most got Young and Huge and Physically Impressive, at least one got Old and Wise because she believed in that godly image.  But Lightsong never really believed in his own Divinity, and I think that deep down he believed that all the Returned were just People Who Got Lucky.  In light of his performance on the Tarachin Field, I think Lightsong was actually Augmenting his Fortune attribute.  And if Returned are indeed influencing their spiritual Attributes as well as physical, there's every possibility that they could learn to consciously manipulate those attributes the same way Vasher (or the Royal locks line) can willfully control the physical portions of their Spirit-web.  Given how the Breaths work by sort of merging with (or overlaying on) the Spiritweb, it would make logical sense that it would be positioned to subtly manipulate it, and Breaths respond to Intent/Commands directly more than a lot of Investiture types.   

Edited October 30, 2018 by Quantus
grammar...

[teknopathetic he/him]

Awesome Theory. I always thought there was something interesting going on with Lightsong. He also managed to always be in the right place, where as Blushweaver didn't have that luck in place.

Awakening is such a new art (we presume) that likely there hasn't been much research into spiritual awakening. Could you command something to "be lucky" or "age quickly"? Could a high heightening internally command themselves to be lucky, or see the future, or slow down time? Very interesting, indeed.  

Edited October 30, 2018 by teknopathetic

[HSuperLee]

4 hours ago, teknopathetic said:

Awesome Theory. I always thought there was something interesting going on with Lightsong. He also managed to always be in the right place, where as Blushweaver didn't have that luck in place.

Awakening is such a new art (we presume) that likely there hasn't been much research into spiritual awakening. COuld you command something to "be lucky" or "age quickly"? COuld a high heightening internally command themselves to be lucky, or see the future, or slow down time? Very interesting, indeed.  

Much like with any science question, the answer tends to be true if you input enough energy. Now, in this case, that just means that technically, if you stick enough investiture into an object, it will eventually form a perpendicular, and then it theoretically has access to the spiritual realm. 

Now whether or not it can be done with any reasonable (I say reasonable) amount of breath? Maybe. We've seen that breath seems to mostly be congitive, so that makes me somewhat hesitiant to support it giving spiritual aspects. That said, Nightblood was created with a plausible amount of biochroma, and if his spiritual aspects wasn't changed during his creation, I don't know what happened. So really, I'd say maybe to awakening spiritual aspects, but the only example we have seems to take an absolute ton of breaths.