Ambition died in the Rosharan system

[silver-the-ridgerunner he/him]

Theory: After Ambition was wounded in the Threnodite System by Odium and Mercy, she fled to another point in space. This point either was, or became, the Rosharan system. Here, Ambition was killed. Her death created the Barrier Storm in the Cognitive Realm around the planet Braize. This storm was later Invested by Odium to create the proto-Everstorm that was pulled through into the Physical on Roshar at the Battle of Narak. Ambition's death also created a wound in the Spiritual Realm in the Rosharan System similar to that which exists on Threnody. This is the reason there are spren on Roshar.

Datapoints:

I group this into two categories, Spren and Storms.

SPREN:

From Shadows for Silence in the Forest of Hell, we know that the wounding of Ambition in the Threnodite System created Shades: cognitive beings which manifest in the Physical Realm. 

We do not see similar manifestations in the Mistborn novels or the White Sand graphic novels. We know there are no Splintered Shards in the Scadrian or Taldain systems at the time these stories are set. 

We see similar manifestations in Elantris and Emperor's Soul (Seons and Skaze). We know there are Splintered Shards in the Selish system at this time.

We see similar manifestations in The Stormlight Archive (spren on Roshar) (and voidspren on Braize).

STORMS:

From Khriss's statements in Arcanum Unbounded, we know that the Dor around Sel is a whorl of free Investiture created when Odium Splintered Dominion and Devotion there. 

From statements from Nazh and Hoid, we know that travel to/from Sel through the Cognitive Realm is very difficult and dangerous due to the presence there of the Dor. 

From statements by Nazh, we know that that travel to/from Braize through the Cognitive Realm was difficult due to the presence of this Barrier Storm.

A possible chronology:

1) The Shattering of Adonalsium.

2) Odium and Mercy clash with Ambition in the Threnodite System. Ambition is wounded.

3) Odium (and possibly others) clash with Ambition in the Rosharan system. Ambition is killed, creating the Barrier Storm, and spren.

4) Odium goes to the Selish system. He clashes with Dominion and Devotion. They are both killed, creating the Dor.

5) Odium returns to the Rosharan system, and begins whispering in the ears of the Ashynites. 

6) The Ashynites devastate their planet using Dawnshards. They are taken in as refugees by Honor and Cultivation on Roshar. Their God, Odium, comes with them.

7) Honor, Cultivation, and Odium make a deal that they think will allow them to live in harmony on Roshar. This is the Oathpact.

8) Odium intentionally goes against the Oathpact, triggering its punishment prohibitions. He is exiled to Braize, on the far side of the Barrier Storm. The cycle of Desolations begins.

9) Honor is Splintered. 

10) Honor's Cognitive Shadow is bound to the spren of the Highstorm.

11) Several millennia pass.

12) Odium invests a not-insignificant amount of Investiture into the Barrier Storm, creating the proto-Everstorm in the Cognitive Realm. This process takes several centuries.

13) Finally, the Everstorm is pulled through into the Physical Realm on Roshar, creating a direct passage between Braize and Roshar.

Questions:

A] Why is this wrong?

B] Were other Shards involved in the death of Ambition? Did Mercy join Odium for the final clash? Did Ambition? Did Endowment (who we know is relatively new to the Nalthian system)? Indeed... were Honor and/or Cultivation in on the kill?

C] Did the death of Aona and Skai occur before the initial conflict with Uli Da in the Threnodite system; after this initial conflict but before the final conflict in the Rosharan system; or after the Rosharan conflict?

D] When on this timeline did Honor and/or Cultivation arrive on Roshar?

E] When was Odium's first contact with the humans on Ashyn?

[Frustration he/him]

Quote

	"That said, the most worrying thing I discovered in this was the wound upon the Spiritual Realm where Ambition, Mercy, and Odium clashed—and Ambition was destroyed. The effects on the planet Threnody have been … disturbing." -RoW epigraph for chapter 27

Ambition was killed around Threondy

[silver-the-ridgerunner he/him]

19 minutes ago, Frustration said:

Ambition was killed around Threondy

I was drawing from the Coppermind article on Ambition: "Odium gained the upper hand and mortally wounded Ambition by tearing off chunks of her power, which altered the people of Threnody as well as the planets in the system. Ambition managed to escape the system, but she was killed and Splintered in another location despite fighting back." (emphasis mine.) And this statement cites Khriss from Arcanum Unbounded as well as certain WoBs. 

On its face, this seems to be at odds with the epigraph (presumably from Harmony) that you quote. And that wouldn't be unprecented - the Coppermind is not canon, and even within the Cosmere, Khriss is not infallible. (Although neither is Harmony. Ugh, my kingdom for a reliable narrator in the Cosmere!).

And yet, I think these two things can both be true. Specifically, Harmony's epigraph can be read in two different ways, neither of which contradict the Coppermind.

One, Ambition was 'destroyed' when she lost a significant chunk of her power, which was in the Threnodite system; she was not fully Splintered until later.

Two, the m-dash in the epigraph denotes the serial - i.e. there is a wound upon the Spiritual realm where Ambition clashed with the other shards [Threnody], and another wound upon the spiritual realm where Ambition was destroyed. This would seem to rely on very tricksy language-use... but might be something Brandon would employ, if he wanted to continue hiding that Ambition was killed in the Rosharan system.

Edited May 17, 2022 by silver-the-ridgerunner

[Treamayne]

Uh . . .  Highstorms and most Spren predate the Shattering.

WoB

 

Quote

BipedSnowman

Does this [map of Roshar] look like a storm to anyone else?

Brandon Sanderson

I was searching for something that at once felt organic, but would hint at a pattern. (Much like cymatic patterns, as referenced in the first book.) Fractals and mathematical functions became my go-to place to hunt, as I like the blend of structure and spontaneity they can sometimes exhibit. The slice of the Julia Set was the one that stuck with me as feeling perfect for Roshar. As the continent was specifically grown by Adonalsium, you now know the seed that was used in-world to create it.

The fact that it looked like a swirling cloud is part of this all--but also part of the connection between natural patterns and the underlying math, which is a primary theme of the Stormlight books. So yes, it SHOULD look like a storm--but for deeper reasons than you might assume.

 

Quote

NotOJebus

As the continent was specifically grown by Adonalsium WHAT????!!!

Brandon Sanderson

Roshar predates the Shattering. I've spoken of this before, haven't I?

NotOJebus

Maybe somewhere before, and obviously most planets existed before the shattering (Planets are pretty old) but I don't think you've ever mentioned Roshar (the continent) being specifically grown by Adonalsium.

Is this a normal thing that Adonalsium did or was Roshar special to him in some way?

A quick search reveals that you have mentioned that Roshar was named Roshar before the Shattering but nothing mentioned about it being grown by Adonalsium. It makes sense though, that shape is obviously not natural.

Brandon Sanderson

There are many things that are unique about Roshar, but it wasn't the only world created in this way.

 

Quote

Questioner

This whole talk of both Roshar and the highstorms, I'm glad that you said they predate the Shattering. There are some people on 17th Shard, myself included, that firmly believe the entire continent is crem that's accumulated, one highstorm at a time.

Brandon Sanderson

Good. Let me actually squish that one a little bit because there are mineral deposits that have been mentioned that you have to mine. And crem-- There is actual ferrous iron that you can smelt on Roshar, you have to know how to get to it and things like that, and there are actual gemstone mines and things like that. Much harder to get to and Soulcasting is a stopgap that has helped with this a lot, but there are actual deposits and things like that.

 

Quote

Questioner

You mentioned the ecology on Roshar, and also you mentioned that mostly the non-sentient spren predate the Shattering of Adonalsium. So my question is about the evolution of life on Roshar, and how essential the highstorms are to life on Roshar, how the plants evolved, so can we assume that life that is dependent on the highstorms predates the Shattering of Adonalsium?

Brandon Sanderson

Um… You--

Questioner

Can we correctly assume?

Brandon Sanderson

--yeah, *laughter* I'll tell you this. The highstorms predate, and there was a lot of natural evolution on Roshar, resulting in a lot of what we have there.

 

Edited May 17, 2022 by Treamayne
Formatting

[mathiau he/him]

1 hour ago, silver-the-ridgerunner said:

2) Odium and Mercy clash with Ambition in the Threnodite System. Ambition is wounded.

4) Odium goes to the Selish system. He clashes with Dominion and Devotion. They are both killed, creating the Dor.

Odium found Dom and Dev before he found Ambition

1 hour ago, silver-the-ridgerunner said:

We do not see similar manifestations in the Mistborn novels or the White Sand graphic novels. We know there are no Splintered Shards in the Scadrian or Taldain systems at the time these stories are set. 

You are right about that part

Quote

sufficientlyadvanced

It says that it's dangerous to travel to Shadesmar on Sel. Why?

Brandon Sanderson

It has to do with the Dor and the lack of an entity controlling much of the power Odium left in his wake on Sel.

Phantine

Woah, that's interesting. I had no idea Odium left little bits of his power on Sel... I guess it kinda makes sense for evil monks to be powered by pure hate, though.

Brandon Sanderson

Odium did not leave his power behind, one should note. He left several other powers which are now, to a large extent, mindless...

Windrunner

If you wouldn't mind answering, does Roshar have a similar problem, with Honor being Splintered?

Brandon Sanderson

No, Roshar does not have the same problem. There are some differences going on. (One reason being that the spren are far more extensive on Roshar, and provide something of a "release valve." The seons and the skaze on Sel are not numerous enough to fulfill a similar function. Though, of course, that's only one part of the puzzle. Raw power is dangerous.

It's one reason everyone should be thankful Kelsier was around on Scadrial.

General Reddit 2013 (March 11, 2013)

[cometaryorbit]

The Oathpact was between the Heralds and Honor, the Heralds offering themselves to imprison the Fused, so Odium couldn't have broken it - he was never a party to it in the first place.

The Stormfather says that the Heralds bound the Fused as Odium is bound by Honor and Cultivation, so it appears that Odium was imprisoned first and the Oathpact was established later (modeled on that?).

 

1 hour ago, silver-the-ridgerunner said:

One, Ambition was 'destroyed' when she lost a significant chunk of her power, which was in the Threnodite system; she was not fully Splintered until later.

That's how I read it - the act which destroyed Ambition occurred there, though the Shard didn't completely fall apart until later, elsewhere.

I think it's probably like how Preservation/Leras describes himself as being dead in Mistborn: Secret History during the time of WoA, though he doesn't 100% die until later, in HoA, when he talks to Elend and then his body falls into the ash. Or Honor/Tanavast's drawn-out death around the time of the False Desolation/Recreance: he kind of lost his mind before being 100% dead.

Edited May 17, 2022 by cometaryorbit
trimmed quote; Leras death timeline

[Weltall]

1 hour ago, silver-the-ridgerunner said:

B] Were other Shards involved in the death of Ambition? Did Mercy join Odium for the final clash? Did Ambition? Did Endowment (who we know is relatively new to the Nalthian system)? Indeed... were Honor and/or Cultivation in on the kill?

C] Did the death of Aona and Skai occur before the initial conflict with Uli Da in the Threnodite system; after this initial conflict but before the final conflict in the Rosharan system; or after the Rosharan conflict?

D] When on this timeline did Honor and/or Cultivation arrive on Roshar?

E] When was Odium's first contact with the humans on Ashyn?

- All we know is that Mercy 'worries' Harmony, which isn't exactly a ringing endorsement but it doesn't necessarily mean they were working with Odium. Right now the only Shard that's confirmed to have been doing that is Autonomy, since Brandon has mentioned that Odium's hypothetical next target would have been a double-cross on her. All indications are that Honor and Cultivation have been settled on Roshar for pretty much the whole of the relevant timeframe and Endowment is not only opposed to Odium but seems to really hate the idea of Shards getting involved in each others' business so the odds of her having anything to do with a clash between them is slim.

- Per WoB, Ambition was first on Odium's Hit List but he couldn't find her until after encountering D&D. Since the death of a Shard can be a protracted affair it's theoretically possible that he could go after one Shard and effectively 'kill' it, then go after another before the first one is finally dead, but we know that can't be the case with D&D because Odium took active steps that resulted in the creation of the Dor. That means he had to do the entire thing in one go, lest the power find a new Vessel while he wasn't there to monitor it.

As a sidebar to this, note that the Dor's 'Investiture plasma storm' was created by a Shard actively stuffing a bunch of Investiture into the Cognitive Realm where it doesn't belong, and it renders Sel's subastral lethally dangerous. Braize is definitely unpleasant if you're a Herald but there's no indication that it has or at any point had the kind of Sel-like standing tempest that would have ripped all the Fused to shreds.

- All indications are that they settled on Roshar shortly after the Shattering. We know they were the gods of the singers before humanity arrived and  given that the first Shards that Odium killed had already had time to settle on a world and heavily Invest, it's likely that the same is true of H&C and most of the rest of the 'settled' ones. We know that we're looking at a timeline of roughly ten thousand years from the Shattering to the 'present', reinforced when Brandon says Scadrial is about that old. Aharietiam happened right in the middle of that span based on the length of Rosharan years vs our years, the Desolations were going on for some length of time before the big one and at first centuries passed between them, so we can push back the earliest possible date of Odium's arrival by a thousand years at least, maybe two depending on how long the cycle of Desolations actually lasted.

- Apparently just before the cataclysm, since we're told that Ishar was the first person who Odium tricked into messing around with the Surges. That means that a whole lot of things happened in the span of a generation or two. Like I said above, Odium's first contact with the Rosharan System happened some six to seven thousand years before the present.

Edited May 17, 2022 by Weltall

[cometaryorbit]

13 minutes ago, Weltall said:

 Like I said above, Odium's first contact with the Rosharan System happened some six to seven thousand years before the present.

Per RoW, the Fused are about 7000 (Rosharan) years old, or about 7700 Earth years, and Odium was dealing with Ashyn humans before he created the Fused.

So likely more like 8000 Earth years, meaning about 2000 years between the Shattering and Odium's arrival.

EDIT: Aharietiam was about 4500 Rosharan years before Stormlight arc 1, and the Fused are about 7000 Rosharan years old. So the period of Desolations would have lasted about 2500 Rosharan years ... about 2750 Earth years.

Edited May 17, 2022 by cometaryorbit

[Weltall]

5 minutes ago, cometaryorbit said:

Per RoW, the Fused are about 7000 (Rosharan) years old

Thanks for the reminder, I forgot that we were given that figure. That really helps nail the timing down.

[cometaryorbit]

Now I am wondering about the timing and means of human spread through the Cosmere.

We know Scadrial was created with its people by Preservation and Ruin, therefore post-Shattering, and that Rosharan humanity came from Ashyn presumably a bit more than 7000 Rosharan years ago (and the Iriali apparently arrived later).

But were planets other than Yolen inhabited by humans pre-Shattering? Threnody was apparently already inhabited before Ambition was killed, and that planet didn't have a resident Shard to create humans there... But was there worldhopping on the scale needed to settle a new planet that early? Ishar is stated to have discovered how to travel between worlds, so it wasn't known at least on Ashyn...

Are people on Sel, Nalthis, etc. direct descendants of Yolish humans, or creations by their resident Shards based on Yolish humans as a model?

[mathiau he/him]

46 minutes ago, cometaryorbit said:

Now I am wondering about the timing and means of human spread through the Cosmere.

We know Scadrial was created with its people by Preservation and Ruin, therefore post-Shattering, and that Rosharan humanity came from Ashyn presumably a bit more than 7000 Rosharan years ago (and the Iriali apparently arrived later).

But were planets other than Yolen inhabited by humans pre-Shattering? Threnody was apparently already inhabited before Ambition was killed, and that planet didn't have a resident Shard to create humans there... But was there worldhopping on the scale needed to settle a new planet that early? Ishar is stated to have discovered how to travel between worlds, so it wasn't known at least on Ashyn...

Are people on Sel, Nalthis, etc. direct descendants of Yolish humans, or creations by their resident Shards based on Yolish humans as a model?

According to Khriss

Quote

"[Scadrial] is one of only two places in the cosmere where humankind does not predate the arrival of Shards."

Arcanum Unbounded

Which technically doesn't mean there were humans on every planet before the Shattering but heavily implies some humans had left before that

Quote

Ishar is stated to have discovered how to travel between worlds, so it wasn't known at least on Ashyn...

3 000 years is a long time, definitely enough to forget some important informations. Especially if Ashyn didn't have a stable perpendicularity

Side note, do we know whether big A had perpendicularities and whether they survived his death?

Edited May 17, 2022 by mathiau

[Weltall]

30 minutes ago, mathiau said:

Side note, do we know whether big A had perpendicularities and whether they survived his death?

I haven't found any WoBs directly on point but we know that a perpendicularity can survive the death of a Shard (the pool associated with Devotion near Elantris, for example) and they occur naturally where there's a major concentration of Investiture so it's quite likely that perpendicularities could have existed pre-Shattering and persisted afterwards. For all we know, Patji's Eye was there before Autonomy even realized the world was Connected to her;

We also have a WoB that despite the lack of a Shard in residence, there's something similar to a perpendicularity on Yolen. Something like that could have been caused by the Shattering itself or the consequence of having all sixteen Shards there at once right afterwards (if you want a concentration of Investiture, you can't get much more than that) but it could just as easily predate it.

[mathiau he/him]

1 hour ago, Weltall said:

For all we know, Patji's Eye was there before Autonomy even realized the world was Connected to her;

Actually, we know Patli's Eye is not linked to any Shard

Quote

We also have a WoB that despite the lack of a Shard in residence, there's something similar to a perpendicularity on Yolen. Something like that could have been caused by the Shattering itself or the consequence of having all sixteen Shards there at once right afterwards (if you want a concentration of Investiture, you can't get much more than that) but it could just as easily predate it.

Interesting

[cometaryorbit]

3 hours ago, mathiau said:

According to Khriss

Which technically doesn't mean there were humans on every planet before the Shattering but heavily implies some humans had left before that

Hmm, if that means only two planets were settled after the Shattering, Roshar would have to be the other one, so all non-Scadrian humans would have to be Yolen descended.

I guess I originally read that as only two "de novo" creations of humans by Shards post-Shattering, not including interplanetary migrations.

And, that says "places" not "planets" so what about Silverlight? Was it pre Shattering? Maybe it does mean de novo creations.

 

3 hours ago, mathiau said:

3 000 years is a long time, definitely enough to forget some important informations. Especially if Ashyn didn't have a stable perpendicularity

Sure, but if dozens of planets were settled from Yolen, that knowledge must have been *relatively* available.  I suppose that Ashyn could have been a cut-off "lost colony", but widespread knowledge of worldhopping would suggest IMO more interplanetary contact in early eras than we see evidence of.

EDIT: also, probably not 3000 years. If the Shattering was 10,000 years ago and the Fused originated 7,700 years (=7,000 Rosharan years) that's 2,300 years,  minus however long from the Shattering to settlement of Ashyn, minus the time it took to discover interplanetary travel, blow up Ashyn, travel to Roshar, make a deal with the Singers, expand beyond Shinovar, and kill the soon-to-be Fused in the first war.

There's something iffy about that timeline imo; the Heralds apparently weren't Heralds until the Fused appeared, but a refugee population expanding enough to feel that Shinovar (which is huge!) isn't enough, and try to claim *much less hospitable* lands, sounds like more than one generation.

Edited May 17, 2022 by cometaryorbit

[Treamayne]

2 hours ago, cometaryorbit said:

There's something iffy about that timeline imo; the Heralds apparently weren't Heralds until the Fused appeared, but a refugee population expanding enough to feel that Shinovar (which is huge!) isn't enough, and try to claim *much less hospitable* lands, sounds like more than one generation.

If this is the case, then the Heralds would have had to have found some way to extend their life (slow aging or some other means) since they (except possibly Ash) were in the migration from Ashyn to Roshar.

 

Quote

Willshaper Wallar

...Were the Heralds alive for the human exodus from Ashyn?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. They were not Heralds then, but they all made that trip. I believe. My timeline-- You can't nail me down on that one, because it's possible that Ash was born after, but I don't think so.

 

Edited May 18, 2022 by Treamayne

[cometaryorbit]

17 hours ago, Treamayne said:

If this is the case, then the Heralds would have had to have found some way to extend their life (slow aging or some other means) since they (except possibly Ash) were in the migration from Ashyn to Roshar.

 

 

That's what I mean by "the timeline is iffy". If Ash was born around the time of the exodus (either just before or just after) then she stopped aging, what, 30-ish years later?

But the problem with that is, how did the humans go from a refugee population to able to win the initial war against a supercontinent wide species (it seems that the Fused are souls of those who lost and sought revenge; if the Singers had won initially there never would have been a Desolation cycle) in one generation?

[Treamayne]

2 minutes ago, cometaryorbit said:

how did the humans go from a refugee population to able to win the initial war against a supercontinent wide species

Exactly. But there are unknowns and assumptions here too. How big was the "refugee population," since it seems implied that it was most of the population of Ashyn (though some must have remained, or they wouldn't have developed their new society with the Floating Cities). 

Combine a population much greater than the current Shin population with a prediliction for war and combat that the Dawnsingers might not have had, and its possible that over the first decade the humans had already started trying to populate outside of modern Shinovar. Also, we don't know that the first/early wars were against all Dawnsingers everywhere. If Urithuru and Oathgates didn't exist, and travel was resticted each time a Human population settled a new area - then fought for the terrirtory - it could have been a localized war rather than a full-scale continent wide war.

There's just too much unkown to draw conclusions, so we are left with speculation. 

[cometaryorbit]

Sure, there's a lot of speculation, but a large* population has its own problems, not just transport, but unless all their infrastructure could be transferred with them they probably wouldn't survive; and a large warlike population with their infrastructure wouldn't be described as "begging" - the implication of the Eila Stele is that the humans looked helpless at first.

*we don't know the population of modern Shinovar, but given its size and human-friendly ecosystem, and very long history of settlement (and lack of Black Death style epidemics on Roshar) it must be at least in the tens of millions, maybe even as high as 100 million depending on the type of agriculture.

 

Edited May 18, 2022 by cometaryorbit