My pet theory is that Harmony-created cognitive shadows would either be the best at not succumbing to their shard's intent or turn completely insane because of the way Ruin and Preservation interact within.
Ideally, Harmony would create a Cognitive Shadow whose body is preserved in one state but can be altered if the person choses (like, maybe they want a piercing, or a tattoo, which arguably is Ruining the original version of their body, but the Preservation would keep the piercing/tattoo looking new like the day it was made). And Preservation and Ruin together allow for change, which means the personality of the Congnitive shadow would be able to change, rather than being subservient to a specific intend. On the other hand, it's comletely possible for a Harmony cognitive shadow to suffer from a mini version of the Harmony/Discord/Dark Twin struggle Sazed's experiencing.
I finished reading Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell. Good story... Cool magic... Cosmere nonsense...
Thanks to BFF for this observation: Shades are magic ghost vampires. They are kind of nocturnal. They are attracted to sudden movement and will chase it down (what a predator-like thing to do!). They are attracted to blood. They can be repelled by silver! If only I could find how they are enraged by the start of a fire, but not an ongoing or spreading fire, this analysis would be perfect.
(confused questios about Threnody & Cosmere below)
I really don't get how Threnody fits into the Cosmere. Shades everywhere? And silver is special? Silver, the allomantically inert metal?
How were there Shades (cognitive shadows) on Threnody before a great Shard-vs-Shard battle happened there? And how are there new Shades being made when there isn't an accessible system of Investiture? Besides all that, why do Cognitive Shadows on Threnody have such a strong presence in the Physical Realm?
Why are the Shades all so violent?
Why don't the Shades on Threnody fade away?
How does silver, of all metals, resist the Shades and heal damages done by Shades?
Why do Silver weapons cutting Shades act like Shardblades cutting flesh? (Slight tugging feeling, fuzzing)
Shades turning from safe-white to danger-black: does it have anything to do with the Shards Preservation and Ruin and their signature colors?
Shades' eyes turning from green to red: does this have any relation to Shard colors of Cultivation and Odium?
The homeland being destroyed because of the inexplicable "evil": was this like Elantris's fall, the Reod?
What is the "morbid origin" of the unstable Perpendicularity on Threnody?
Why are Shades attracted to / enraged by quick movement? What do they sense, exactly?
Why are Shades more docile in the daytime? Is the sunlight calming to them, or does it blind them?
Why are Shades enraged by the spilling of another's blood? Also, are there no mosquitos on Threnody?
Why are Shades enraged by the starting of fire? How do they manage in a lightning storm?
Hey uhh, has anyone got theories about El the Fused in the ROW epilogue? Wild thought, but what if El is short for Elithanathile (Tanavast) and the title he lost was "He Who Transforms"? Correct me if I'm wrong, but I couldn't find anything that explicitly said that the vessel had died when the shard Honour was splintered, and Fused are cognitive shadows stamped onto a body so it's not like, the stupidest idea right?
uhhh thanks tumblr user itsjustviolet for scaring the everloving shit out of me right before i go to bed /j. also that is hecking TERRIFYING. this could be possible, but there’s a couple of unexplained things if this is true: lezian tells el that a human stole his title. as far as we know, the only title bestowed upon humans by the fused are He Who Quiets (>:( moash) and Voice of Lights ( ;__; navani). But yeah it’s super yikes that the names and the cognitive shadow shit and the “He Who ___” title line up 😬😬😬. And this wouldn’t be the first ‘haha lol ur gods are evil now have fun you bastards’ Sanderson has pulled (see: Heralds). Also, a vaguely related side tangent, He Who Transforms actually makes me go 🤔🤔🤔 bc I get Cultivation vibes from that. It’s possible that this is one of the cases where Vorin mythology is off the mark & inaccurate and has over time incorporated part of Cultivation’s original powers into the version of the Almighty (Honor) that they believe in, especially because it seems the ardentia isn’t aware of Cultivation.
Does everyone who dies on Threnody become a shade?
So relevant facts of the Cosmere/Threnody:
The Shades of the Forests of Hell are hostile cognitive shadows
They can be fought off by silver, but unclear if they’re killed when struck by silver or just chased away
Cognitive shadows are formed when someone dies while holding a LOT of Investiture
There are currently no Shards in the Threnodite system but Ambition once inhabited it
The lack of a Shard, there is no activie Investiture humans on Threnody can use
Humans and Shades both existed on Threnody before Odium, Mercy, and Ambition had their epic battle there
So how did shades come to exist if humans on Threnody can’t hold Investiture?
Does everyone on Threnody have latent Investiture that they can’t access before they don’t have a Shard? Does their unused Investiture doom them to spend death as these half formed cognitive shadows?
Or maybe the lack of a Shard mean that the threshold quantity of Investiture required to become a cognitive shadow is really low? So even a tiny bit of Investiture (such as what shades use to wither someone to death) is enough? This would mean that you’d only become a shade if you died at the hands of a shade (assuming Threnodites don’t have any of their own Investiture)
Thinking about Investiture and Cognitive shadows in the Cosmere and something occurred to me:
Do Aviars become Cognitive Shadows when they die?
First of the Sun and the Aviar utilize parasitic investiture, so as long as the birds eat the worms, the birds are magic
But dying with lots of investiture allows someone to return as a cognitive shadow. Barring some obscure de-worming process, the Aviar will always be invested when they die
This isn’t a spoiler, just some info about the Cosmere: The stormfather is what’s called a Cognitive Shadow. Have you read Mistborn: A Secret History? I recommend doing so, it elaborates on the concept and puts Realmatic theory into a lot of in word context.
Yeah, I have--there’s a full liveblog of it somewhere back in my blog under “#mistborn liveblog”, I screamed the entire time while reading it. I know that Stormy’s a cognitive shadow, yeah, although something I’ve said might not reflect that. I kind of word vomit out my liveblogs and sometimes I forget crucial information until after I post them--and the last one went out at like midnight, so I wasn’t firing on all cylinders. My bad. Thanks!!
