Ashfalls

[Chaos]

This is new territory right here. Why do the ashfalls occur? What purpose do they serve? Why would the Lord Ruler bring out ash if it didn't have a purpose?

I feel that the ash is important for those reasons, but most of all: Brandon named the Ashmounts. Proper nouns are always important.

So, let's get some ash theories going!

[Comatose]

i've been waiting for this ever since I read the amazon description.

The Ashmount's are Violent volcanoes, which spray up ash and can cause earthquakes sometimes.  I don't think they were around before the acension, seeing as how there was no mention of Ash falling from the sky before and everything was still green.  The way I originally pictured it is that the Lord Ruler Picked up the land aroudn the well of acension,  and moved it to where Luthadel is now, and when he "set it down," for lack of better wording (placed it there?) the ashmounts were created as a result, but I think they can also be affected by ruin.

A point of interest, it says often in the book that the ashmounts are getting violent lately, is there a trend there?  At what parts are the ashmounts acting up, and is it always during the day?  Just some questions to ponder.

[Andrew the Great]

I myself have always thought that the ashmounts were an accident caused by the Lord Ruler when he was using the power from the well. I suppose they could have been anything, though....

[Comatose]

The Ashmounts form pretty much a perfect circle around luthadel, which is where the well is, they are definately linked (at least in my mind), and in the description for the third book it says they are getting more active and causing earthquakes, which lead me to think Ruin is controlling them as well.

[Vintage]

I agree with Comatose. The Ashmounts are actual volcanoes at work. Ash spitting out all the time and sent up in the air all around. I also believe they were created by TLR in conjunction with Ruin, the only source he really touched, for the ultimate destruction of the world.

Ashfalls are constant, day and night, but at night with the advent of the mist, they mix with it allowing people to see the movement of the mist. Movement without wind. There was never any mention of wind during night. I do not see any specific reason for it. Ashfalls would be natural subsequent to volcanic action. The action reaction thing that Brandon loves.

[Andrew the Great]

This makes sense, but the fact of the Lord Ruler allying himself with Ruin does not. Why would he ally himself with someone who wants to destroy the world? After coming to power, Ruin would be his enemy, as it wants to bring Ruin and Chaos. Instead, the Lord Ruler would more naturally ally with preservation, who would help maintain his throne. True, Ruin would more likely ally with him in the first place (He did pretty much completely remake the surface of the earth, and preservation implies resistance to change), but who wants to be stuck with an ally who's going to spend the next thousand years plotting your destruction?

So really, the most logical idea is that the Lord Ruler just used the power at the Well of Ascension, be it Ruin or Preservation (though most likely Ruin) and forced it to do something. However, if we are going to assume that the Ashmounts are intentional creations, then we also need to find the reasoning behind the intent. You don't just randomly decide to throw up a couple of active volcanoes in a perfect circle.

Perhaps, he predicted the effect the ash would have on morale, and used it to control the skaa? He may have just been trying to change the world completely so that people would not remember the "old days," and would be less likely to rebel. This tactic has been used before by new governments coming to power that felt the people wouldn't really like them (particularly in France, but I guess it's because those French tended to go through governments pretty quickly).

So yes, these are my thoughts on the matter.

[Comatose]

Could he use the volcanoes or ash in making metals somehow?  He bases his empire on metal, maybe that's why he did it.
And are the ashmounts tied to the caves that kelsier says are foudn throughout the empire, inlcuding the pits of hathsin.

[Andrew the Great]

This is entirely possible. He may have been trying to get the volcanoes to spew up metals from underground, which makes a lot more sense than anything else we've come up with so far. Excellent Suggestion!

[Wigginns]

I myself have always thought that the ashmounts were an accident caused by the Lord Ruler when he was using the power from the well. I suppose they could have been anything, though....

I think that they are bad side effects of the Lord Ruler's creation period.  He focused so much on the Kandra and the Koloss I think he let the ashmounts (that were possibly there before but as normal dormant volcanos) get out of hand without realizing it.

[Andrew the Great]

I always thought this at first, but the more I think about it, the more it makes sense to me that they are intentional. I don't know why, I'm just trusting my instincts on this one.

[Vintage]

You forget only one thing. I do not think TLR chose an ally. It looks to me that it took control of him more than he thought - see the topic of sympathy toward the Lord Ruler. The association doesn't come freely. When TLR touched the power of the well, he touched Ruin OR Preservation (most likely Ruin when you see the mess he did).

For the creator of the Inquisitors, TLR was seriously lacking confidence in them. He had to be pushed against a wall when discovering that his Head priest had a child from a skaa - eventhough, and it is not repeated too often, the inquisitors were encouraging the priest to have relations with skaa women - just to trap them of course. TLR did not trust Ruin (I presume that we agree that the Inquisitors cannot be of Preservation), but had no choice.

No truly, like Comatose said, I don't see any other reason for the Ashfalls then a consequence of a miscalculation. When he hid the Well, he must have pushed (strongly, of course) and created the Ashmounts.

[Chaos]

I agree with Comatose. The Ashmounts are actual volcanoes at work. Ash spitting out all the time and sent up in the air all around. I also believe they were created by TLR in conjunction with Ruin, the only source he really touched, for the ultimate destruction of the world.

Ashfalls are constant, day and night, but at night with the advent of the mist, they mix with it allowing people to see the movement of the mist. Movement without wind. There was never any mention of wind during night. I do not see any specific reason for it. Ashfalls would be natural subsequent to volcanic action. The action reaction thing that Brandon loves.

In the Ruin and Preservation thread, this was talked about. It was said that the Lord Ruler is more of a force of Preservation to the extreme, which stagnated the world. He didn't want to destroy it, but keep it alive. The Lord Ruler was doing something to keep the Deepness/Ruin at bay. All of those ideas point to a force of Preservation at the Well.

Of course, there is also that thing called Ruin which we KNOW was locked inside the Well, so there is definitely some debate to be had on the matter.

Also, I believe that the Ashmounts are intentional, simply because Brandon named them. They are named, and thus important. Right? ...

[AvalonDreamer]

hearkening back to my 'Everything occurring in pairs' theory, is it possible that the Ashfalls are Ruin's reaction to the Mists, or vice versa? I could see why TLR would make the Ashmounts, to cause people to cluster into cities and plantations, which makes ruling considerably easier. Also drawing a bit from 1984, it's  possible that he wanted to use them to psychologically oppress them, greying out the skys and banishing the sunlight (essentially generating seasonal affected disorder in the whole population year-round).

[Ogge]

Wouldnt it become very cold when the sun is blocked by ashfall all the time?

BTW is there a map of the world available online somewere? I'm at work...

[AvalonDreamer]

Well, I may have misstated that... not black out so much as obscure. We know it made the plants turn rather unpleasant colors, and there is something just not uplifting about a blazing red sun...