Found 22 entries in 0.080 seconds.
Melhay
In Mistborn: There was mention of a man named Adonalsium. We were wondering if this man may have been Preservation, who "died" before Vin took over. Is that who he was or was he someone else?
Brandon Sanderson
The man who died before Vin took over was named Leras. (I've occasionally written it as Laras. I've said the names in my head for years, but I'm only now writing them down as people ask me on forums.) Leras, like Ati (aka Ruin), were NOT Adonalsium. (Sorry about the typo on that one in Mistborn 3. I wrote it down on the manuscript, and it didn't get put in quite right. We'll get it fixed.)
Adonalsium was something or someone else. You will find out more. There are clues in Warbreaker and The Way of Kings.
Farnsworth
Why did Ruin and Preservation decide to break the agreement and both go to Scadrial?
Brandon Sanderson
RAFO
Brandon Sanderson
"Something in the form of that which we'd seen before."
There's one other cool item to note in this chapter. If you read Ruin's words carefully, he admits that he has indeed seen human life somewhere before. This means that there is life on other planets in this cosmology, and that Ruin and (presumably) Preservation have experience with those other planets.
Another building block for the larger story.
Brandon Sanderson
Chapter Eighty-One - Part One
Prophecy
I wasn't certain how I wanted to treat prophecy in this book. On one hand, it's a staple of fantasy books—and my goal in this series was to take the fantasy staples and turn them upon their heads in a way that hadn't been done before. That meant I needed to include and use them, and so I did. In book two, the prophecies turned out to be false, and Ruin used them to trick Vin into releasing him.
However, the fact that he twisted the prophecies left me with the implication that they had once been true. What does that mean, though? If you look at prophecies in our own religions, very few of them are used like fantasy prophecies. In fantasy novels, it seems like prophecies are intentionally obscure, abstract things intended to confuse people and act as some kind of twisted guidebook for the hero to live his life. Yet, in modern religion—specifically Judaism and Christianity—prophecy is more general. Prophecy in these religions means things like "in the end, the faithful will win." They're general or symbolic. Of more use to the population as a whole, rather than applying to one distinct individual.
Sazed and Tindwyl have a great discussion about this in book two. Regardless, I make use of the prophecies here in the final book. As far as I'm concerned, they were given to the original Terris people by Preservation as a means of maintaining hope. They were a promise—a hero will come; that hero will protect you. Have faith.
WeiryWriter
Could you explain a little more about Cognitive Shadows? When you first mentioned the name and gave the examples of Kelsier and the Shades from Threnody you kind of gave the impression that they were kind of like ghosts. But this past December at the Orem signing you mentioned that the Stormfather and the mist were also Cognitive Shadows. The first makes sense to me, I had an [entire theory about that (although I argued he was specifically Tanavast’s and not Honor’s). The second however really doesn’t make sense to me, unless it was actually the mist spirit that is the shadow and that got missed in the report (it wasn’t verbatim), but even still Preservation is still alive at that point so how can he have a “ghost”? (Unless him sacrificing his mind to form Ruin’s prison counts as “death” in this situation?)
Brandon Sanderson
On the first question, I did not say the mists themselves were a Cognitive Shadow. That must have been a misunderstanding. The Stormfather totally is, though. Cognitive Shadows are basically ghosts, which can take a lot of different forms in the Cosmere, but follow general rules.
WeiryWriter
Is the mist /spirit/ a Cognitive Shadow then?
Brandon Sanderson
The mist spirit is a little more complicated than that. That was actually Leras, kind of. He was in the process of dying. But other things are involved there that, unfortunately, must be RAFOd.
Brandon Sanderson
Chapter Seventy-Nine
The Mists Chose Someone
There's a lot more going on behind the scenes than even the author of these epigraphs knows. Reasons why Vin was chosen, and why the power of Preservation needed a new mind to control it.
The author is right in that Preservation did need someone to control its power, and it did seek for a host in which to invest itself. It began this search with what mind it had left about sixteen years before the return of the power to the Well of Ascension, just as it began a search for a new host before the return of the power the previous time.
Unfortunately, just as Ruin took control and manipulated Alendi, he took control and manipulated Vin.
Questioner
In the original Mistborn series, when Leras plans the 1 in 16 Snapping, was he not aware of chromium and nicrosil? Or--
Brandon Sanderson
He was aware that they would not be aware of and were not aware of it. He was using the kind of vague ability in some of the cosmere magics to read possibilities on the future. He was also already not completely there when he was building this.
Diego98
(paraphrased)
Would Leras recognize Vax or is it just like some Ati backstory??
Brandon Sanderson
(paraphrased)
Yeah, he would recognize Vax.
FirstRainbowRose
I just wanted to add in my two cents and say it was absolutely brilliant... and I think I'm starting to be able to breath again (crying that much hurts)...I also really loved that there's an "cameo" for Kelsier at the end... that made me really happy to see.
Brandon Sanderson
Glad you liked the book, Rainbow!
You may want to note that the moment Preservation dropped out and let the last of his consciousness die, someone was waiting in the Cognitive Realm to seize the power and hold on for a short period until Vin could take it up more fully. You'll find him using it to whisper in moments of great stress in the book, to one person in specific in two places. (I'll bet someone on here has already found them.)
He never could just let things well enough alone....
Brandon Sanderson
Chapter Fifty-Nine
Nothing is worse than trying so hard to do the right thing, then discovering that it was the worst thing you could have done.
I wrote this final chapter to be a slight upswing in the plot so that we wouldn't end on such a sour note. No, I didn't kill Elend. I sure wanted you to think that I would, but I never planned to. I had always intended them to discover where the first Mistborn had come from when they reached the Well of Ascension, and this bead of metal is very important to the cosmology of Scadrial and, indeed, the entire overarching story of my books as a whole .
Elend was intended to become Mistborn from the very early stages of this book's development. So, I figured I ought to do something to him that would make him NEED to be Mistborn. Why did I want to make Elend Mistborn? I know it bothered some readers. I felt I'd explored his character as well I could in this book, and I needed something to upset the balance–tenuous as it is–that he'd arrived at here. He's not going to replace Vin–you'll see in the next book that Elend as a Mistborn doesn't change as much as you might think. But it does put him in new situations, and those situations allow him to progress as a character in the way I felt he needed to.
Anyway, this will make for a very interesting book three. Also, the mist spirit–now, maybe, you can see a little of what it was trying to do. It was struggling to find a way to get Vin to NOT go to the Well of Ascension. Giving hints to Sazed, scaring her, threatening Elend, pointing in the opposite direction. However, it is rather hampered in what it can do, as we'll find in the next book.
Xyrd
(paraphrased)
Was Leras bonded to a being in the Cognitive Realm?
Brandon Sanderson
(paraphrased)
You mean like a Nahel bond?
Xyrd
(paraphrased)
Yes, or a similar mechanism.
Brandon Sanderson
(paraphrased)
Well, you have to remember that Shards interact with the realms in a different way, so...
Xyrd
(paraphrased)
Well, I more mean before Leras became a Vessel.
Brandon Sanderson
(paraphrased)
Anything before then is RAFO.
drabgod
When a Returned who has lots of extra Breath gives them away without suppressing his Divine Breath, does the Divine Breath stick to the regular Breath as they are transferred to the receiver? Will the receiver find himself suddenly possessing a Divine Breath? Or does it still vanish after healing the receiver?
Brandon Sanderson
Divine Breaths don't work quite like others. However, losing one is kind of a "Last resort." You'll give away all the others first, and then, if you push you can give it away as well. It never sticks around and makes the person you choose returned.
drabgod
Could you use it to heal Preservation's mind? (potentially with the Well)
Brandon Sanderson
Depends on what you mean by "Preservation's Mind." Do you mean Leras? During the events of Well/HoA he's WELL beyond the help of such a small bit of investiture, as available in a single Divine Breath. With the help of the Well itself? That's more realistic, but the real reason that he was suffering from such degradation was due to persistent attacks by Ruin.
Questioner
So, in Secret History, Fuzz mentions a weapon that he buried? Is that the atium, or is that something else?
Brandon Sanderson
*hums* Go ahead Joel. *Joel holds up RAFO sign*
Boogalyhu34
Is the mist creature, that was seen through out the second Mistborn book, Preservation/the mists version of the Stormfather, which seems to be related to Honor/Highstorms.
Brandon Sanderson
You are on the right track.
Boogalyhu34
The aforementioned mist being was called a "shadow of self" in one of the original 3 MB books. Does this have anything to do with a book of the same name? The Stormfather also called himself a "shadow" of what Honor was, does this support my above theory?
Brandon Sanderson
The Stormfather would use the same language.
Brandon Sanderson
The Number Sixteen
I worry that having Vin make this connection is one of the more forced events in the book. She'd just finished telling everyone that she wasn't a scholar, and now she discovers a pattern of numbers hidden in the statistics of how people fall sick? My original intention for this was to have her be in a mind-set where she was looking for natural rules—because of her earlier discussion of Ruin and his rules—which then allowed her to see this pattern.
Rereading it, I'm not 100% pleased with it, but it's too late to make a change. I'd probably rewrite it so that Noorden or Elend make the connection, then let Vin connect that to what she's been thinking about. That would have been a much more natural progression.
Note that here, Vin misunderstands what these numbers mean. She's looking for rules that bind Ruin. What she finds is not that, but instead a clue left by Preservation. Numbers are understandable to people regardless of language, and so Preservation decided to leave some clues for people to discover that would hopefully lead them to follow the plans he'd set in motion. In my prewriting, I'd intended there to be more hard facts to be discovered in the workings of the universe—numbers hidden in mathematical statistics that said rational things, like the boiling point of water or the like. All as a means of Preservation hinting to humankind that there was a plan for them.
In the end, this didn't work out. I decided it would be overly complicated and that it would just be too technical to work in this particular novel. The only remnant of that plot arc became the number sixteen that Preservation embedded into the way the mistsickness works, intending it to give a clue about what the mists are doing to people. "You now are Allomancers!" is what this was supposed to scream. Unfortunately, the Lord Ruler's obfuscation of Allomancy—and the number of metals in it—left this clue to fall flat.
Questioner
In Secret History, Fuzz mentions having buried something. That's the atium, right?
Brandon Sanderson
RAFO.
Questioner
So, I was just thinking, if it's something of greater import, I'll just leave it to that it's not the atium. But it's something else, I think. But, I was just thinking, if he wanted to hide something, he could build a planet around it? Because he built a planet. I'm guessing, if I asked a question about that...
Brandon Sanderson
You would get RAFOd. Excellent question.
ParshendiOfRhuidean
Were Ati and Leras lovers?
Brandon Sanderson
RAFO.
Questioner
Cephandrius is kinda like a bard. And Tanavast is almost a Paladin. And Ati we're thinking like a priest or cleric?
Brandon Sanderson
You're starting to stretch. You can definitely put Hoid into a bard category.
Questioner
And then our final one was Preservation. Is he almost like a rogue or thief type person? Because he gives off that kind of vibe.
Brandon Sanderson
I'll RAFO it. You're going to have to wait on those until I write them out.
Questioner
Preservation says, "Oh Senna, how I've failed you?" My question is, is he saying as an "Oh deity?" or is he saying this as "Oh my old...?"
Brandon Sanderson
Yes, it's more the second.
FirstSelector
Here's a Dragonsteel question. If I were to wave Leras' knife over a candle, would it light?
Brandon Sanderson
...We'll RAFO that.
Did Sazed do anything with the bodies of Ati and Leras after he Ascended?
No, I'm afraid not. Those might have been useful to have around, though.
Brandon Sanderson
A Couple of Small Notes
Yes, Demoux survives, as I promised to Micah. Also, Ruin—like Preservation—dropped a body when he died. This is important, but I can't give you a decent explanation of why that is at the moment.
