Timewaster's Guide Archive

.....No other mystery in the book - not the missing two metals, not contents of Sazed's "bible" he leaves to Spook) - nothing - is as mysterious to me and interesting that the HUMAN bodies that died when the opposing gods died.

I haven't heard much from Brandon (I read every post of his in this thread) other that RAFO, but if he was so inclined to give any sort of public hint on this I would be very appreciative.  Not the full answers, but some response to these theories...

All that I can think is that Ruin and Preservation (the physical embodiments that we saw when they died) where powerful Hemalurgist / Allomatic / Feruchemists in the past that were terrible rivals and split the powers of the natural universe in competition with each other and were dearly depressed / shocked when they realized they were equals in power and that their battle wasn't over.  What followed was a eons length battle (Way, way, way before Rashek's time, hundreds of thousand or millions of years) in which these two former humans battled in near stalemate until Preservation (whatever his original human name was) came up with a plan to eventually defeat Ruin.  

This first theory is discredited some because Preservation is told to have desired to create humans, and Ruin agreed in their bargain, but why are they both human when they die?

Given these thoughts, the other possibility is that Ruin and Preservation have been through this battle many times before - where there was no Hero of Ages to take the power of both and combine them as Sazed eventually did - and have embodied themselves in at least one, and perhaps many human hosts as Vin did so briefly.

Initially, Ruin and Preservation WERE natural entities and through their battles, one or more humans took over their conscience minds as they became weak (as Preservation did in these books, and as Ruin presumably had in the past) and took the power for themselves.  Therefore the black haired and red hair guys that died might have been spectacular humans in the past that took over the power of Ruin and Preservation through highs and lows of the battles of these two powers had in the past.

That is until Sazed finally was able to become the Hero of the Ages and fuse both powers back together.

All in all... I am sure I will be told to RAFO... but I would like to see if Brandon would be willing to describe at least a little of why these two forces (Ruin and Preservation) who were told to have created humans.. also have human form themselves.

Nero

Hey Nero,
You are thinking along the lines of what I posted a page or so back.  I feel better knowing that someone else could imaging that too.  

It would be cool if Brandon was able to give us more backstory on Ati/Ruin and Leras/Preservation, but I think that will not be until the unfolding of the future trilogies.

Wielder,
Like I said I know there are plenty of holes in my theory.
Thank you for responding.

Firstly, I do think there is a cycle of sorts, but to say its a WoT type thing, every 1000 years, I highly doubt that.  I do agree that Ati and Leras were once people like Vin.  That they each somehow tapped into the power of the Shards of Preservation and Ruin, and became part of that power.

One of my main problems with the whole WoT thing is that, besides that fact from seeing Brandon's interviews, that he would not do something as to reuse the idea of the Wheel, being that this Trilogy was supposed to be the opposite of many big epic fantasy stories.  So far Brandon's always tried to do something not seen before.

Yes a Cycle of sorts true. 
I do agree with you that Brandon is doing work that others have not, so I don't believe he would have reused the idea from RJ.   
Cycles have been theorized long before RJ used it in The Wheel of Time.

Besides that point, there is the problem of the prophecies themselves.  If what the trilogy depicts happens over and over, we would assume someone like Sazed would gather both powers each time.  However, how would he lose it, if he has both.  The only thing that can oppose either power, is the other power.  If they are acting as one, they cannot go against each other.   As in one person controlling them, not working together as they did when Ruin decided he wanted more.

I Think that if there were any cycles that Sazed broke those cycles when he collected both powers into himself. 

And actually Ruin did have a body that fell out of the sky along with Vin.  It was only mentioned once.  I believe it mentioned something about a prominent nose.  And I believe it was a male figure, so in this instance, yes Ruin would be a 'He'.

If I remember correctly the body your are describing was the body of Preservation when it finally died after assisting Eland when he went off on his own while Vin was captured.....I don't have the book with me right now so I cannot look it up.

Also, Vin as Preservation did not "win".  It was a draw.  They both were equal in power, so they both died, that being how Sazed could get both.  If you want to say Vin won because Ruin did not, well then yes.  To me, if Vin had won, she would have still been alive, instead of plummeting from the sky.

The way I am thinking of Vin winning is that she did not let stand the stalemate of equal powers of Preservation and Ruin.  She chose to attack him and destroyed him and herself.  She sacraficed herself for the greater good of humanity. 

I do like your idea of the Shards eventually coming together.  My only problem with that is that it would leave all the respective books words (magic) powerless, and so far all his books magic systems revolve around these systems.  So, if this is to ever happen, it will not be for a long time.

Oh yes, if that would be the case of the various world's shards needing to come together and then those combined shards (Sazed) needing to come together to reform Adonalsium it would indeed be a long time down the road.

If this was even remotely the case I would image Brandon needing to write various trilogies for each of the, oh lets say, 8 worlds (2 shards per world to get to the magical 16 that runs throughout the space time continuim) for the pairs of shards to combine.
 
Then there would need to be another set of trilogies (at the minimum) to deal with the combined 8 "Sazed" shards to battle and combine with the end chapter being Adonalsium waking after the reforming of his body.

And while I'm thinking BIG here.......

Adonalsium is just 1 of 16 beings that ARE 16 different "universes" living on another plane of existance.......

and then books about them.....

and...and....and.....

Oh Oh

I Remembered what I wanted to ask/Say.


Somewhere in this thread Brandon said/inferred that for a time Kelsier held Preservation’s power after preservation died before it went to Vin.

I don’t remember seeing that in the book.  I know Brandon has done some misdirection in subtlely saying some things so I may have missed it.  Can someone point me to where it was presented to the reader?



Now my big speculation.  Follow me if you can and let me know if it makes any sense.  (Brandon??)

I have a theory about Ruin, Preservation, the body that fell out of the mist when “preservation” died, the prophesies and the WoT (yes I did say WoT) and how they all come together.  There are holes in my theory, but maybe it will make some sense.  And maybe someone can take my theory, fill in some holes and bring it together a little better since I have not read all of Brandon’s works.  I have only read Elantris and the Mistborn books.

I think that “Ruin” and “Preservation” are the names of positions and that this whole 1000 year cycle (0r however many year cycle) of the prophesies are along the lines of the Wheel of Time and the Dragon reborn fighting the Dark One.  Preservation being like the Dragon and Ruin being like the Dark One.

Laras may have been the original “Preservation” but that he may have perished along the way during one of the cycles of the wheel of time in this universe.  Someone like Vin came along and took Laras’s place when he died.  And this would role along the cycle until the next person took over “Preservation”.  Ruin remaining as the same entity as the original Ati (like the Dark One has always been the same “person” while the Dragon keeps being reborn as another person).  At the end of each cycle “Ruin's" prison gets renewed.

The body that fell out of the mist could have been just the latest “Preservation” just like Vin became “Preservation”.  In past cycles the person that took over “Preservation” would have decided to continue the stalemate and then there would be another 1000 year (or 2000 year) cycle.  

But this time Ruin was able to go farther than he ever did in the past and broke the cycle by tricking Vin into releasing him from his prison.  This would be similar to the final battle in WoT.  Ruin destroying the World is like the Dark One breaking out of his prison and recreating the world/universe in his own image.  Vin was the final “preservation” (Dragon) that was able to FINALLY defeat “Ruin” (Dark One) by colliding with him and killing each other.
  
Balance…destruction and creation coming together.  


Vin’s body fell out of the Mists along with Ruin's body.  Both Ruin and Preservation's powers then collected into Sazed.  Sazed later placed Vin's body with Eland's body. edited to denote that Ruin's body did fall out of the Air.

We come to the final battle and Vin “Preservation” won.
 
The combined powers of “Ruin” and “Preservation” being released at the same time were able to be combined in Sazed.  They are “shards” of Adonalsium (broken pieces of a whole) and have been able to come back together.  

In the ultimate scheme of the great question and answer of the universe I think all of the shards that were created when Adonalsium broke apart need to come back together as one body to reform Adonalsium.
Down the line Sazed (Laras-Ati or Ati-Laras) will need to combine with all of the other Shards to re-create Adonalsium.

Maybe, just maybe, the “Big Bang” that created the universe, was caused by (or actually caused) Adonalsium coming apart into the shards.

This is just my 2 cents…….uhm 2 dollars?


Edited to denote that Ruin's body did indeed fall from the air.  I don't know how I blanked on that.  Heck that was Ruin's powers came from to go into Sazed.

You could always ask them to order them in. Takes a couple days, but they love doing that.

I couldn't find Elantris, Mistborn 1 or 2 on the Sci-fi/fantasy shelf.  I went to the B&N self help compter and looked up Mistborn.  It said "Click to order".  So I took it that they were out of stock in the store and I'd have to order it.  I didn't want to wait at the time so I decided to look in the computer to see if they had Elantris. 
The computer locked!  ARGH!!!
I went and located another computer discovered that they did have Elantris (Yippy!!!) in "General Fiction".
I found where it was supposed to be on the shelf and it was missing.
Since I was on my lunch break and already had the cookbook my wife wanted for X-Mas I decided to try another time at another book store (Borders is just down the street from the B&N) or possibly just order from Amazon from home.