Whose shades are they?

[ΨιτιsτηεΒέsτ Male]

13 minutes ago, Firesong said:

I do wonder what Sja-Anat has to do with Ambition, Brandon purposely avoided the question when asked, and only answered once they didn't let him weasel his way out, and basically was like " You are theorizing in a very interesting direction. RAFO!"

Which Wob(s) are these?

[Treamayne]

41 minutes ago, WitIsThe Best said:

Which Wob(s) are these?

Probably this one:

Spoiler

Red the Windrunner (paraphrased)

We have now seen Midnight Essence on Lumar and as part of the Unmade on Roshar, should we assume that all the other Unmade have connections to Odium’s other conquests like maybe Sja-Anat and Ambition?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

Midnight Essence is more like Lightweaving in that multiple magic systems will reach the same conclusion. When something is done to the magic to corrupt it, it becomes like Midnight Essence. So while there are similarities between the two and they work the same they may not have the same point of origin.

Red the Windrunner (paraphrased)

So there is no meaningful connection between Sja-Anat and Ambition?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

You weren’t going to let me off the hook. You are theorizing in a very interesting direction. RAFO!

But it's all paraphrase and when he has previously used "very interesting direction" (or similar) it has usually meant something like "part is close, part is off."

Examples:

Spoiler

Quote

MiToRo94

Honor has Stormlight and Odium has Voidlight, is there a Cultivationlight? If so, can an Invested person use it as a third magic on Roshar or is a boon/curse the only magic of Cultivation/Nightwatcher?

Brandon Sanderson

There is more! I'll just say that, the rest is Read And Find Out. You are theorizing in an accurate direction.

We now know they were right about Lifelight, wrong about it only being used as a third magic or only Nightwatcher, since Lift uses Lifelight.

Quote

Sirce Luckwielder (paraphrased)

So each anti-investiture is like its world's investiture, but can't be effected by it. So aluminum can't be affected and destroys Allomancy, ralkalest can't be Soulstamped, Shardblades are blunted by that one thing. Is the black filled sphere that Galivar gives to Szeth the anti-investiture to Stormlight?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

When I asked this, he became much more tight-lipped and said that was an interesting theory and that I would learn more in book three.

We now know that it was Anti-Voidlight. So it was an "anti-investiture," just not anti-stormlight.

non-Cosmere:

Quote

Questioner

Megan's weakness was fire, she overcame it. David's weakens was water, I feel he overcame it when shooting at the window. So my conspiracy theory is that he didn't have to take power from Calamity because he overcame his weakness or he was never experiencing the negative aspects of being an Epic *audio obscured*

Brandon Sanderson

You are getting warmer... You're theorizing is wise and you'll just have to see where it goes.

We now know that his weakness was water, but not really because it was induced; and the key wasn't just facing teh weakness but taking ownership of the abilities. 

 

 

[Firesong she/her]

1 hour ago, Treamayne said:

Probably this one:

  Hide contents

Red the Windrunner (paraphrased)

We have now seen Midnight Essence on Lumar and as part of the Unmade on Roshar, should we assume that all the other Unmade have connections to Odium’s other conquests like maybe Sja-Anat and Ambition?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

Midnight Essence is more like Lightweaving in that multiple magic systems will reach the same conclusion. When something is done to the magic to corrupt it, it becomes like Midnight Essence. So while there are similarities between the two and they work the same they may not have the same point of origin.

Red the Windrunner (paraphrased)

So there is no meaningful connection between Sja-Anat and Ambition?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

You weren’t going to let me off the hook. You are theorizing in a very interesting direction. RAFO!

But it's all paraphrase and when he has previously used "very interesting direction" (or similar) it has usually meant something like "part is close, part is off."

Examples:

  Hide contents

We now know they were right about Lifelight, wrong about it only being used as a third magic or only Nightwatcher, since Lift uses Lifelight.

We now know that it was Anti-Voidlight. So it was an "anti-investiture," just not anti-stormlight.

non-Cosmere:

We now know that his weakness was water, but not really because it was induced; and the key wasn't just facing teh weakness but taking ownership of the abilities. 

 

 

Spoiler

I do find Brandon's massive "oh crap" moment when asked if the sphere was anti-Investiture to be very funny. He probably also laughed a bit internally about just how close it was despite being based on completely false premises. (sorry for the profanity, I was not aware that wasn't allowed as he uses that word in his books, have replaced it. Also annoying that it doesn't say who edited it so I am not able to apologize to them. Ah, it was a bot, and it just assumed I was trying to avoid rules as it is a dumb bot that doesn't take into account that people are not all identical. I just censor my own profanity, it wasn't any attempt to circumvent any rules. If anyone didn't see it, I just used another word that means crap, thought it was okay as, again, Brandon himself uses it in his books.)

And yeah, I know he tends to play around with words and be vague on purpose. But I do at least feel this implies there is some sort of meaningful connection between them. We just have no clue what kind of connection that is. 

 

Edited August 8, 2023 by Firesong

[Treamayne]

11 minutes ago, Firesong said:

  Hide contents

And yeah, I know he tends to play around with words and be vague on purpose. But I do at least feel this implies there is some sort of meaningful connection between them. We just have no clue what kind of connection that is. 

 

Roshar, Scadrial Spoilers

Spoiler

I think it's that there is a similar mechanism in place, but not a specific connection between that Unmade and that Shard. At least until we have more data. Like when asked if Vstim's warning fabrial was related to A-Bronze. . . 

. . . and the connection was that different mechanisms were achieving similar(related) results - not that the Heliodor Fabrial was using Allomancy. 

 

[Config2]

Spoiler

Between this WOB and the discussion someone had on Mercy a while back, and Nightblood bleeding black smoke (i.e. Ruin) I think there is some funkiness going on with how we've been led to believe the shards work. 

The shards are huge concepts: Harmony, Ruin, Mercy, Ambition, Cultivation. They're literally pieces of god. And we've seen many times that just having a shard not be located physically or cognitively around a planet doesn't mean that they don't have a connection there. It's probable that a shard can be connected all over the Cosmere without the vessel consciously doing anything to do that.

In Sja-Anat's case, I think it's much more likely that Sja-Anat is a splinter of Ambition that got stuck in Odium after they clashed/when he splinter them. If that's the case, then the inverse is probably true as well: bits of Odium got stuck where Ambition and he clashed. The shades are probably a result of both of their investitures mixing. They could also be a three-way mix of Odium, Mercy, and Ambition. I always forget that Mercy was there.

In terms of whose shades they are, they're probably mostly human:

Timepoint 1: Shortly after shattering. Ambition is hanging out in the system, making a magic system fueled by shades created during rituals. There are humans on both continents, but only the ones on the Forest Continent are using the magic system. We know this happens: 

Timepoint 2: Ambition and Odium clash, and Ambition leaves the system, with big chunks of both shards (and Mercy's shard) being left in the system. With Ambition gone, the magic system changes, and shades become mindless killing machines. They depopulate the forests, turning everything predatory into more shades. A couple of things from Odium's forces are left behind and get turned into shades (the Deepest Ones, probably not human).

Timepoint 3: Forescouts head over to the Forests to check it out, discover the shades.

Timepoint 4: Evil arrives (probably an Aether) and destroys the Homeland, people flee to the Forests.

Worth noting that there are animals in the Forests, just no predators.

[+Oltux72 he/him]

On 11.8.2023 at 8:55 PM, Config2 said:

Timepoint 1: Shortly after shattering. Ambition is hanging out in the system, making a magic system fueled by shades created during rituals. There are humans on both continents, but only the ones on the Forest Continent are using the magic system. We know this happens: 

Timepoint 2: Ambition and Odium clash, and Ambition leaves the system, with big chunks of both shards (and Mercy's shard) being left in the system. With Ambition gone, the magic system changes, and shades become mindless killing machines. They depopulate the forests, turning everything predatory into more shades. A couple of things from Odium's forces are left behind and get turned into shades (the Deepest Ones, probably not human).

 

(Scadrial)

Spoiler

The problem is Secret History, in which Threnody is still using Cognitive Shadows as a weapon in interstellar politics. That must be far later than Ambition's death.