Ars Arcanum Era 2 Missing Metal

[Ariel43x]

Upon reading The Lost Metal I’ve realized that in all Era 2 books, Malatium (the eleventh metal) is not in the ars arcanum. It is in Well of Ascension and Hero of Ages. It was a very important metal, helping Vin figure how to kill TLR. So why in era 2 would a know burnable metal be left out of the ars arcanum?

[Treamayne]

Welcome to the Forums

9 hours ago, Ariel43x said:

Upon reading The Lost Metal I’ve realized that in all Era 2 books, Malatium (the eleventh metal) is not in the Ars Arcanum. It is in Well of Ascension and Hero of Ages. It was a very important metal, helping Vin figure how to kill TLR. So why in era 2 would a know burnable metal be left out of the Ars Arcanum?

By the nature of the questions, I'm guessing you are not yet familiar with some of the effects Preservation had when setting up his Chessmaster Gambit. Have you read all of Era 2 (including The Lost Metal) in case this question delves into spoiler territory?

Without going that far, please note that what the Scadrians refer to as Atium in Era 1 is not pure Atium (which, as a GodMetal, anybody should be able to burn, not just Mistborn and specific Mistings). WoBs:

Spoiler

Quote

Kingsdaughter613

Primary question: Peter recently said something about atium in Era 1 actually being an atium-electrum alloy. Is this accurate?

Brandon Sanderson

This is accurate, yes.

You could, by the way, just continue to call it atium. That's what they think atium is in-world. It's very slightly tainted.

Kingsdaughter613

Secondary questions: If the above is yes, did Kelsier get malatium by separating the atium and gold from the silver in nalatium? If so, do atium and gold have similar melting points?

Brandon Sanderson

That's more of a RAFO in that I'm not sure I want to canonize any of that right now.

Quote

/u/AAKS_

My understanding is that Brandon thinks it is a plothole that Lerasium can be burned by Scadrian (regardless of if they are mistings/mistborn) but Atium can't.

His solution is to retcon the Pits to naturally produce an Atium/Electrum alloy, presumably by the design of Preservation. Therefore we don't know what pure Atium looks like or does when used in any magic.

Peter Ahlstrom

We do know what it does. It’s on the Allomancy poster, and the effect appeared one time at the end of Hero of Ages.

LewsTherinTelescope

Interesting. Do you know if he had already conceived the retcon by the time the poster was written, or if that line about pure atium just turned out to fit really well retroactively?

Peter Ahlstrom

The retcon is way older than a lot of people assume.

LewsTherinTelescope

Does this mean he had it in mind by the time Hero of Ages released (since the first public version of the poster dates to 2008), or just that it's old but not sure exactly how old?

Peter Ahlstrom

Remember that what's in the books is filtered through the understanding of the characters. So even if Brandon planned it from the beginning, if the characters didn't know about it, it's not going to come out in the book.

And see this thread reply from 2009.

 

So, basically what happened was that Preservation, to prepare his Gambit, replaced Cadmium and Bendalloy (since Scadrial had not discovered these metals yet, and he needed to replace Temporal Metals) on the Allomantic Table with his Atium alloy (Atium/Electrum) and Malatium (Era 1 Atium alloyed with Gold) to enable it's use as you see in the books.

When Sazed ascended to Harmony, he restored the original metals (regaining the lost part of Ruin that was trapped in the false alloy produced by the Pits of Hathsin) which is why there are no Mistings for those metals any more. Note: an "Atium Misting" was never actually a Misting for Era 1 Atium - but actually an Electrum Misting which was able to burn Era 1 Atium because of its Electrum Content.

Spoiler

Xais56

Brandon has said that everyone ought to be able to burn Atium, like they can all burn Lerasium, and the fact that they can't was an oversight on his part that he would've done different in hindsight.

Maybe now he's had an in-universe reason to re-write the laws of allomancy it's back to his intended concept; Mistborn burn all 16 base metals, mistings burn one base metal, non-allomancers can only burn godmetal.

Peter Ahlstrom

My explanation for this is that Preservation somehow caused all naturally occurring atium to form as an alloy of atium and electrum. The atium Mistings were actually electrum Mistings.

Hope that helps.

Edited June 1, 2023 by Treamayne
SPAG

[Ariel43x]

10 hours ago, Treamayne said:

Welcome to the Forums

By the nature of the questions, I'm guessing you are not yet familiar with some of the effects Preservation had when setting up his Chessmaster Gambit. Have you read all of Era 2 (including The Lost Metal) in case this question delves into spoiler territory?

Without going that far, please note that what the Scadrians refer to as Atium in Era 1 is not pure Atium (which, as a GodMetal, anybody should be able to burn, not just Mistborn and specific Mistings). WoBs:

  Reveal hidden contents

 

So, basically what happened was that Preservation, to prepare his Gambit, replaced Cadmium and Bendalloy (since Scadrial had not discovered these metals yet, and he needed to replace Temporal Metals) on the Allomantic Table with his Atium alloy (Atium/Electrum) and Malatium (Era 1 Atium alloyed with Gold) to enable it's use as you see in the books.

When Sazed ascended to Harmony, he restored the original metals (regaining the lost part of Ruin that was trapped in the false alloy produced by the Pits of Hathsin) which is why there are no Mistings for those metals any more. Note: an "Atium Misting" was never actually a Misting for Era 1 Atium - but actually an Electrum Misting which was able to burn Era 1 Atium because of its Electrum Content.

  Reveal hidden contents

Xais56

Brandon has said that everyone ought to be able to burn Atium, like they can all burn Lerasium, and the fact that they can't was an oversight on his part that he would've done different in hindsight.

Maybe now he's had an in-universe reason to re-write the laws of allomancy it's back to his intended concept; Mistborn burn all 16 base metals, mistings burn one base metal, non-allomancers can only burn godmetal.

Peter Ahlstrom

My explanation for this is that Preservation somehow caused all naturally occurring atium to form as an alloy of atium and electrum. The atium Mistings were actually electrum Mistings.

Hope that helps.

Thank you very much that does help! I am not finished the The Lost Metal yet but that cleared everything up for me! I appreciate it! 

[IlstrawberrySeed]

@Ariel43x, Do note that the "replacement of metals" was not in the magic system, but rather who the mists snapped, if there was any replacement at all. If "atium mistings" were electrum mistings, then no replacement was had. If they aren't, the mist simply snapped other mistings - if a mistborn somehow got the cadmium or bendalloy, they could have burned it.

[Firesong she/her]

Another factor in this, is that they wouldn't really be able to access Malatium at all. It was only made a few times (as far as we know), and it inherently required atium, something they completely and utterly lost access too after the Catacendre (and already basically lost access too after the destruction of the Pits of Hathsin). So, it isn't exactly something they can easily access, nor was it a pure God Metal. Which is another reason for it vanishing from tables.