Author Topic: **SPOILERS! The Shards of Adonalsium  (Read 70587 times)

Chaos

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Re: **SPOILERS! The Shards of Adonalsium
« Reply #165 on: July 14, 2009, 08:40:29 AM »
In the MB3 Spoiler thread, Brandon said both Preservation and Ruin can fuel Feruchemy if they wanted to, it would just require more energy than gods are usually willing to use.
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Re: **SPOILERS! The Shards of Adonalsium
« Reply #166 on: July 14, 2009, 09:16:15 AM »
I should rephrase myself then. I don't think Feruchemy stems from either of them.
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Re: **SPOILERS! The Shards of Adonalsium
« Reply #167 on: July 14, 2009, 02:08:34 PM »
I just want to add something that is learned from Scribbler. I don't know if it applies in the Shardworlds, but it might make sense.

One of the rules of magic in Scribbler is that you have to know what the symbol does before the symbol actually works. In Warbreaker, Vasher says that you have to 'use your mind like a muscle' in order to Awaken. It's hard to use your mind like a muscle, if it has no idea what it's going to do. This could explain why Breaths weren't discovered until the First Awakened, when they learned that something was going on. Also the Tears of Edglie(sp?) probably have something to do with it.

Also, the fact that Endowment is a Shard means that the religions aren't always correct. Sometimes they're dead wrong. This means that Domi/Jaddeth don't have to be a shard. They might be, but I don't think so.

Also, Yes Chaos, thanks for joining  ;)
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Re: **SPOILERS! The Shards of Adonalsium
« Reply #168 on: July 14, 2009, 06:19:34 PM »
I figured maybe the shards on Opelon were Love and Obedience or something similar because the two gods we hear about in Elantris rely on love and obedience respectively.
This is a good theory too. Both of those would make excellent shard names.

I am not sure that Domi and Jaddeth are actual entities. Mistborn showed us that the people in his worlds can follow a ton of different religions that have some truth without being, in essence, the truth.
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Re: **SPOILERS! The Shards of Adonalsium
« Reply #169 on: July 14, 2009, 06:57:13 PM »
True. It just reminded me of Mistborn a lot.
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Andrew the Great

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Re: **SPOILERS! The Shards of Adonalsium
« Reply #170 on: July 14, 2009, 07:30:55 PM »
Chaos made an epic post again! Yay! Well, in celebration, I shall make my own epic post compiling all of my own thoughts. It's nice to be back to theorizing. And I think we may finally have enough to go on that we can do some decent theorizing. So I'll be back later with a lengthy post of my own.
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Chaos

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Re: **SPOILERS! The Shards of Adonalsium
« Reply #171 on: July 14, 2009, 07:44:52 PM »
Chaos made an epic post again! Yay! Well, in celebration, I shall make my own epic post compiling all of my own thoughts. It's nice to be back to theorizing. And I think we may finally have enough to go on that we can do some decent theorizing. So I'll be back later with a lengthy post of my own.

Sounds great!

I figured maybe the shards on Opelon were Love and Obedience or something similar because the two gods we hear about in Elantris rely on love and obedience respectively.
This is a good theory too. Both of those would make excellent shard names.

I am not sure that Domi and Jaddeth are actual entities. Mistborn showed us that the people in his worlds can follow a ton of different religions that have some truth without being, in essence, the truth.

I'm not sure either. However, we certainly don't have all four missing Shards yet, so anything is possible.
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Andrew the Great

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Re: **SPOILERS! The Shards of Adonalsium
« Reply #172 on: July 14, 2009, 09:43:27 PM »
I promised a reply, and I've never been one for dramatic introductions (which is part of the reason, I suspect, that Chaos defeated me for the position of Hero of Ages), so here it is.

 Now, for the sake of cohesion, I shall list the shards that I believe we know of.

1. Ruin
2. Preservation
3. Endowment
4. Hoid
5. The Dor (Possibly linked to the Pool)
6. (Possibly) The Pool
7. (Possibly) Whatever Jaddeth is / the force behind the Dakhor monks.

Ruin and Preservation I'm going to ignore, since we know quite a bit about them and are discussing the OTHER shards we know of.

Endowment

 So.  I wanted to begin with this quote.

Quote from: Warbreaker, pg 568, Hardcover edition (obviously)
He turned to the side. Blushweaver’s body lay red and bloodied. He’d seen
that it in a vision. In the vague shadows of morning memory, he’d thought
that the image had been of her blushing, but now he remembered. He looked
to the side. Llarimar, eyes closed as if asleep—that image had been in his
dream as well. Lightsong realized the man had them shut as he wept.

The God King in prison. Lightsong had seen that too. But above it all,
he remembered standing on the other side of a brilliant, colorful wave of
light, looking down at the world from the other side. And seeing everything
he loved dissolve into the destruction of war. A war greater than any the
world had known, a war more deadly—even—than the Manywar.
He remembered the other side. And he remembered a voice, calm and
comforting, offering him an opportunity.

To Return.


By the Colors . . . Lightsong thought, standing up as the priests forced the
God King to his knees. I am a god.

Lightsong stepped forward, moving up to the bars of his cage. He saw
pain and tears in the God King’s face and somehow understood them. The
man did love Siri. Lightsong had seen the same thing in the queen’s eyes.
She had somehow come to care for the man who was to oppress her.

“You are my king,” Lightsong whispered. “And lord of the gods.”

The Pahn Kahl men forced the God King facedown on the stones. One
of the priests raised a sword. The God King’s arm jutted out, his hand toward
Lightsong.

I have seen the void, he thought. And I came back.

Emphasis mine.

As you can see, Lightsong does not actually talk with the voice here. He remembers that he did talk with the voice. He doesn't even repeat the conversation. As such, I do not think that we can count this as having interacted directly with a shard. Even if we did hear the voices, Lightsong is having a flashback. I'm not sure we can count a memory as direct interaction either. Either way, Endowment is NOT, as chaos has suggested, one of the Shards of Adonalsium who we have interacted with directly.

That leaves Endowment, using Chaos' numbering system, to fill either space 3 or 4. I would say probably 3, as Awakening and the Returned seem to be more manifestations of Endowment's Power rather than its Influence.

So, we right now have:
1) Unknown
2) Unknown
3)Endowment
4)Unknown

Hoid

I, too, remember someone authoritative saying that Hoid was bound to a shard. As such, that would make him the Cognitive part of that shard, the sentient part.

Now, Chaos mentioned something about the person eventually beginning to become like the shard they control. For instance, in HoA, Vin talks to Ruin. Now, I would like to point out that through all of this, Vin remains very much .... well, Vin. She doesn't change. Ati, however, talks as though he has been Ruin since Ruin and Preservation created Mankind. So, either a) Ati really is the original cognitive manifestation of Ruin, and was there when Ruin and Preservation created Mankind, or b) Ati thinks that he was there, but actually wasn't. He's become so much the personality of the force (Ruin) behind the shard that he just kind of morphs to it. He's deceived himself into believing that he helped create mankind.

Quote from: Chaos
Compared with the original Shards, Midus (or is it Midius? I don't remember the Liar prologue) held onto his Shard a rather short time. He could retain his consciousness fairly effectively.

IIRC, in the Hoid thread it was recently proposed (and confirmed, though not by Brandon) that Hoid is in fact Midius from Dragonsteel. As such, I'd imagine that this solves the problem of Hoid being able to retain his personality. Quite simply if we go by the theory that the shards don't affect the personality of the person controlling them, then Hoid is fine. If we go by the theory that the Shards do affect that person's personality, then we can just assume that the Shard that Hoid controls is similar to what he's doing (the shard of randomly appearing everywhere?). The one theory I can think of that I like, which I probably read somewhere on here but don't remember who to give credit to, is that the shard that Hoid is bound to is the core of the original Adonalsium, and as such, would want to do what Hoid is doing. Planet hopping to all of the worlds where there are shards, maybe seeing if there was a way to reunite the shards, interfering with some shards and helping others, etc. It makes sense to me.

Anyway, the point is that Hoid is bound to a shard, and we have directly interacted with him. As Such, using Chaos' numbering system, we have:

1) Hoid
2) Unknown
3) Endowment
4) Unknown

So we now know half of them. This is where it gets a little messy.

The Dor and/or The Pool

There are two possilibities here, the Dor and the Pool being one Shard, which Ookla has named Release, or the Dor and the Pool being Two shards.

At first, I'm going to operate under the assumption that there are 2 shards here. If we go under the assertion that the Dor is mindless, and is waiting to be used (like I think Raoden suggests some time in Elantris, not really sure, correct me if I'm wrong), then we can also assume that either A) the sentient part of the Dor is gone, making it like Preservation was through most of the Mistborn books, or B) that the Sentient part of the Dor left, making it and excellent candidate for #4. However, because of another possibility I don't think either of these likely. More on this later.

Still assuming the the Dor and the pool are two seperate shards leaves us with another problem. The only thing that we really know about the power of the pool is that it provides rest for Elantrians (who are an integral part of the system with the Dor, nonetheless). We really don't have anything else to go on for this shard.

It's much easier to say that the Dor and the Pool are the same shard. We can say that the shard is called Release. It causes the Shaod to take men and transform them into Elantrians, who have the ability to Release the power of the dor (presumably from the shard, Release). It then takes the Elantrians, when they have grown tired of life/want to die, and gives them their final Release from life, putting them at peace. This makes sense.

In answer to the problem Chaos mentioned, where it seems like the pool goes counter to what would be productive to the dor by offering to give Raoden rest, I say that the instinct of the shard is Release, and even if Raoden would have been able to release the Dor more fully by not being in the pool, the Shard's instinct would still be to Release Raoden, and allow him peace. Even though it seems counter productive, it still makes sense. Kind of like Preservation making more allomancers with the mist-sickness in HoA. People died, and didn't actually know that they were being made into allomancers. Seems like it would help Ruin, yet it actually worked out in the end. 

This also leaves us with another shard that we have directly interacted with, and gives us this:
1) Hoid
2) Release
3) Endowment
4) Unknown
And finally, we have

Jaddeth

Yes, I know that we don't even know that Jaddeth is a real entity. We do, however, know that the monks of Dakhor use a power that is not (so far as we know) related to Aon Dor. I propose that their magic system stems from another Shard on the Elantris world, which we will hear about in the Elantris sequel Brandon may or may not be writing. For the sake of easiness/convenience, I'm going to call this shard Jaddeth. And it conveniently fills in the missing hole in our chart. After all, by the insistance of the Fjordell or however you spell it, Jaddeth is sleeping. Or perhaps, missing from the world? Left it? It could be that Jaddeth was there and the Fjordell worship him. Jaddeth has since left. If this is the case, it could also be that the Dakhor monks are using the powers of Release (which would be a little weird), since Jaddeth is not there. That's an interesting question. Does the shard have to be on the world a magic user is on for that magic system to work. IE, in a future mistborn book, a mistborn travels to the world where Elantris is via space travel. He/she finds that he/she cannot use allomancy because preservation is not present on that world. See what I mean? Or does it matter? Maybe the magic system works everywhere. hmmm.

EDIT: I forgot to add that it also makes sense that Jaddeth left because we haven't seen his power, we've seen his influence. All of the Fjordell have been influenced by him. All the followers of that one religion that escapes me, Shu-Whatever.

Anyway, for kicks and giggles, I'm going to put Jaddeth in the 4th slot, since we really don't have any better options. I'm by no means sold on this, but I don't have any better suggestions. So:

1) Hoid
2) Release
3) Endowment
4) Jaddeth

That's my theory at the moment. I really don't have much else to offer on the matter until I see some critiques of this. So there. Yes.

EDIT: 1683 words according to word count in word. The word "Word" appears far too much in that sentence. Anyway.
« Last Edit: July 14, 2009, 10:00:50 PM by Andrew the Great »
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Aranfan

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Re: **SPOILERS! The Shards of Adonalsium
« Reply #173 on: July 14, 2009, 10:07:03 PM »
I like most of your post Andrew, but I have to disagree on Jaddeth.  IIRC, When Dilaf took down Raoden's disguise, Raoden felt someone accessing the Dor.  I still think that my Warbreaker idea is the best.


Also, regarding Ati and humanity, why can't Humanity have been somewhere else first, and then the Shards went around putting people on random planets for whatever inscrutable deific reason?

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Re: **SPOILERS! The Shards of Adonalsium
« Reply #174 on: July 14, 2009, 10:14:03 PM »
Well Ati talks for a while about Ruin and Preservation had to work together to create. I assumed he meant humans, since the creations that Ruin is trying to destroy are humans, and they are also what Ruin was attempting to preserve.

If Raoden felt Dilaf accessing the Dor, that actually fits my second idea even better. If Jaddeth isn't on the world, and the Dakhor monks are using the Dor to power their magic. Then we are left seeing jaddeth's influence (the religion of the Fjordell) but not his power.
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Chaos

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Re: **SPOILERS! The Shards of Adonalsium
« Reply #175 on: July 14, 2009, 10:18:48 PM »
Andrew, I like your theory much better than mine. "Release" works Oh So Well for the Dor and the Pool I like it far too much to not use.

Okay, Endowment could be #3. It is, at the very least, a very tough call. I'll buy it.

I'll buy the whole list, in fact. Works perfectly, and fits Hoid in. I like it.

Quote
Now, Chaos mentioned something about the person eventually beginning to become like the shard they control. For instance, in HoA, Vin talks to Ruin. Now, I would like to point out that through all of this, Vin remains very much .... well, Vin. She doesn't change. Ati, however, talks as though he has been Ruin since Ruin and Preservation created Mankind. So, either a) Ati really is the original cognitive manifestation of Ruin, and was there when Ruin and Preservation created Mankind, or b) Ati thinks that he was there, but actually wasn't. He's become so much the personality of the force (Ruin) behind the shard that he just kind of morphs to it. He's deceived himself into believing that he helped create mankind.

My thought was that Vin hadn't controlled Preservation long enough for her personality to be changed. It would probably take hundreds, maybe thousands of years for it to happen. It's just an idea.
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Andrew the Great

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Re: **SPOILERS! The Shards of Adonalsium
« Reply #176 on: July 14, 2009, 10:30:40 PM »
It's an idea that I quite like, actually. It makes sense that as a person is controlling a force, their personality just kind of.... merges with that force. And it would definitely take time. However, for that to work with hoid, he has to be controlling a shard that fits his personality. Hence the idea with the core of the original adonalsium.

And my theory is basically the same as yours, with a few modifications. I'm not about to take the credit. I just took what other people were already saying and stuck it together.
« Last Edit: July 14, 2009, 10:33:44 PM by Andrew the Great »
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Chaos

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Re: **SPOILERS! The Shards of Adonalsium
« Reply #177 on: July 14, 2009, 10:38:15 PM »
If you switched Release and Endowment around, you'd have basically made what I had been intending for my theory, before I got horribly, horribly sidetracked with the Pool. You know very well, Andrew, that my "theories" are often just me thinking through a problem. Probability for being sidetracked = very high.
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Andrew the Great

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Re: **SPOILERS! The Shards of Adonalsium
« Reply #178 on: July 14, 2009, 10:47:27 PM »
If you follow my post, you'll see the same thing. I'd originally intended the whole thing with Jaddeth to be just the Dakhor monks using his power, but I saw while typing that it fits better for them to use the Dor and have Jaddeth be gone. I just randomly jot down thoughts and call it a theory. That's why its long, not really because it has to be.
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Re: **SPOILERS! The Shards of Adonalsium
« Reply #179 on: July 15, 2009, 05:06:30 PM »
It was Ben (Tage) who confirmed the two things you said were confirmed by someone but couldn't remember who. Also, he said that if you've read Dragonsteel (the one at the BYU Library) you should be able to figure out who Hoid is in it. If you read that you should also be able to figure out what his shard does.

(Though Brandon said in the B&N thread that nothing in the unpublished books, where all those pieces of information come from, is canonized. It's all subject to change at a later date when Brandon gets around to revising those books for publication. In fact, a great deal of it has already changed. Some of Dragonsteel has been lifted into Way of Kings.)
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