Knock-knock! Someone's at the "Dor!" I'm so sorry.
Hi Internet! I'm Steve and this is RAFO.
Elantris: Brandon Sanderson's first published novel and the worlds
introduction to the Cosmere. Elantris was the first time we saw a Sanderson-type
magic system - the first four times technically -
Ish. There's a lot going on on Sel in terms of investiture, so in order to keep
things straight we're going to talk first about how people use the magic and
then we'll talk about why it's accessed that way. There are six systems of
investiture that we've seen so far on Sel, and they all have to do with shapes.
Aon Dor - the headlight system of Elantris used by the Elantrians and
easily the one we know most about - glowy runes drawn in the air; Chay Shan the
Jindoese magic Taichi; the system used by the Dakhor monks of Fjorden, where the
user's bones are twisted into the required shapes; the potions made by
Forton, a native of the conquered nation of Hrovell; Forgery - the stamp based system
seen an Emperor's Soul used to change the history of objects; and Bloodsealing -
also a stamp based system but utilizing blood as an ink to a different effect.
Though they appear disparate, there are certain elements that all of these
systems share. The investiture on Sel, the power that fuels all these magics, is
known as the Dor, and every system on the planet uses this same source. With
each of these investiture access is dependent on the use of proper shapes or
forms, which if done incorrectly or without the proper intent things don't
work right. It's like how every country on earth uses electricity to power their
blenders, but all the plugs are different shapes. Additionally, in order to use any
of these systems you have to be born - or at least have a spiritual connection - to
the country or region where it's used, and the magic gets weaker the further
away you are. Elantrians only come from Arelon; Forgers must be from MaiPon, and
Forton's the only person we've heard of from Hrovel,l so he's definitely got that
going for him. Another impressive thing about all these magic systems is how
crazy specific you can be with what you want to do. Brenden refers to them as
programming-based. It's not limited just to single symbols; rather, practitioners
can create complicated structures and equations in order
to accomplish really complex objectives. Apart from all these commonalities the
access and application of each of these systems varies immensely. To begin:
Aon Dor: the magic the Elantrians in Arelon. Only those taken by the Shaod
and turned into Elantrians can actually draw Aons and channel the Dor. To anyone
else it'd just be writing cursive in the air. For an Elantrian though, writing the
Aon for light will actually produce light, the Aon for silence may absorb sound,
and the Aon for sight basically summons magical binoculars. The fundamental shape
for every Aon is appropriately Aon Aon. Every other Aon uses that as its base.
Imagine if the Roman alphabet used the letter A as a base for everything else.
It'd be like A, B, C, no that looks like a K... Point proven. The interesting thing is
that these symbols weren't created by the Elantrians. No one made up Aon Eto
to represent the body, Aon Mai to represent honor, and Aon Seo to symbolize loyalty.
These Aons were actually discovered, not created. In fact that's
mostly what ancient Elantrian scholars did: fiddled around with squiggly
lines until something cool happened. Imagine accidentally discovering the Aon
for fire, or, like, soup. This is because the Dor - the investiture that powers all
Selish magics - has certain frequencies and pulse lengths that, if the conduit is
correct, will allow it to enter the world as channeled by the shape of that
conduit. Kind of like those weird play-doh extruder things. Chaining Aons
together further focuses that power, allowing for incredibly complex effects.
However if the shape isn't right then nothing happens: square peg round hole.
Chay Shan: the magical Taichi of the Jindo people south of Arelon. It's
described as a meditative martial art meant to focus your mind and body before
battle, however we see that it also has direct combat application. The limbs of
the user move in dance-like circular patterns, slowly gaining speed, while
appearing to strain against an unseen force. These motions create similar
conduits to Aons and allow access to the Dor, which can be seen by a dim glow
in the wake of the movements, and give the user increased power and strength.
There may be more application of Chay Chan, but we haven't seen it yet. Little
is known about the system used by the Dakhor monks of Fjorden to access the
Dor, even less about how they do it. What we do know is that the Dakhor
monastery is not a friendly place. It has a reputation for extreme violence,
even in a religious system where monasteries trained warriors spies and
assassins. Those who enter the Dakhor monastery may not come back out, and if
they do, often they're fundamentally changed. Gaining access to investiture
through Dakhor either requires or causes a twisting of the soul. The forms used to
access the Dor are the twisted and reshaped bones of its users, often not
dramatic enough to see under a robe, but their skin is stretched over growths and
ridges in the shape of ancient Fjordal characters. These can grant the user
increased strength and durability, speed, magic resistance, changes an appearance,
and if a human life is expended can even allow for teleportation. Forton's potions:
there's a dude named Forton and he makes potions. That's basically all we got.
Forton is from the country of Hrovell in the Southeast region of the Fjordal
empire, and somehow using the magic system of that region is able to make
potions that produce spectacular effects, antidotes for incurable poisons, among
other things. Whether he uses plants of specific shapes, techniques for stirring,
crafting, or storing his concoctions, or some other approach to invest his
potions, we don't know. One interesting thing to note is that these potions
appear not to lose their power the further they get from their associated
region, or else Forton is just really stinking good at figuring in that drop
off rate. Forgery is the headlining magic system in the Emperor's Soul. While not as
visually striking as drawing glowing symbols in the air, the applications of
Forgery and the realmatics behind it are fascinating. Forgers can change the
history of objects by carving instructions for a plausible alternative
into a stamp and stamping it to the object. These stamps must be carved by a
Forger who has to be of MaiPonese descent, though anyone, including
non-Forgers can do the stamping, which leaves a slight indentation in the surface of
the object. These stamps can be applied to almost anything - including, somehow,
liquids - and their effects can range from the mundane to the fantastical. From
fixing a broken chair to rewriting a person's entire life story. The ink used
must be fresh, from a living source, and the higher the order of the creature
used to produce it the more effective it will be in getting the stamp to take.
Plant-based inks are less effective than animal inks, with squid ink being
among the best. This may be related to the life-giving nature of investiture:
the more sentient a creature is, the more natural investiture contained within its
soul. It's plausible that because of humanity's comparably large amount of
natural investiture, human blood would be an incredibly effective soulstamp ink.
Speaking of: Bloodsealing - the creepy cousin of Forgery, originating from the
swampy Dzhamar region of the Rose Empire. All Dzhamarians are almost albino in
appearance, with pale, milky white skin and hair, as well as red eyes. This may be
an effect of the Dor interacting with the people of that region, changing the
entire race in a similar way to the Elantrians. Or it doesn't have anything
to do with investiture at all and Brandon just made an entire country of
albinos for kicks. Bloodsealers use stamps similar to
Forgers but rather than changing the past of an object, they impos
restrictions on an individual's present. We've seen two applications of Bloodsealing:
Warding - keeping a subject imprisoned using that person's blood as
a stamp, and in the creation of Skeletals - reanimated pokey skeletons that can
chase people and follow other simple commands. Find this person; stab that guy;
do this laundry! These creations are often compared to the Lifeless in Warbreaker,
which will probably be my next video, but they differ in several
important ways. Most of these are functional and deal
with amounts and sources of investiture. They're on different planets; they pull
from different sources; they do different things.
However, when Lifeless are Awakened and given a command, they function fairly
autonomously. Alternatively, a Bloodsealer's Skeletals seem to share some sort
of mental connection with their creator, or else somebody wouldn't be crying in a
closet on Day 99. Now if you haven't finished Elantris, stop the video now!
A main part of Elantris is the discovery of why Aon Dor works, or
doesn't work, the way that it does, or doesn't, which is exactly what we're
going to talk about now, so if you don't want that spoiled, you'll have to Read And Find Out.
Kay! So we already mentioned how all of the magic systems on Sel
pull power from the same source - the Dor - and are accessed, depending on where you
are, by certain shapes. In all the ones that we know about, these shapes
correspond to the geography of the associated region. Aon Aon, the basic
shape the entire Elantrian alphabet is
based on the map of Arilon. Shai tells us in Emperor's Soul that the map of MaiPon
is contained in every Soulstamp. Presumably the circular movements of
Chay Shan reflect certain mountain or river formations. The ancient Fjordal
characters on the bones of Dakhor monks likely mirror the coast of that
nation. And the map of Dzhamar must be shaped like an eye. No idea what Forton's
up to. In order to understand why all this is, we have to jump back in the
history of the Cosmere. After Adonalsium was shattered, the 16 shards of Adonalsium
spread throughout their galaxy, with Aona - the Shard of Devotion, and
Skai - the Shard of Dominion, settling down together on Sel. Rayse - the holder of the
Shard Odium, after being unable to find Ambition, visited Sel and killed Aona
and Skai, splintering their respective Shards. In order to prevent anyone from
taking up those shards, Odium stuffed them into the Cognitive Realm, where they
became a whirling plasma vortex of death. So now there's a bunch of raw
investiture stuck in the Cognitive Realm with no way to get out. We learn an Elantris
that the Dor has certain "frequencies and pulse lengths" that only
allow it to be channeled through specific shapes. We're not quite sure how
this works, but I figure that because the Cognitive Realm actually has
locations - like a negative impression of the Physical Realm - the Dor sort of
takes the shape of the landscape wherever it is. Like a giant magnetic
storm, this conforming to the topography would create charges of investiture
raging in fixed shapes, certain harmonics that would coincide with physical
regions, with those simplified shapes acting as keys to allow it to exit the
Cognitive Realm. But because the landscape is different wherever you are
on the planet, those keys to access the Dor would have to be different
depending on the region. This is also why the Reod caused the magic of
Elantris to stop working. It's not that the map was no longer accurate, but when
the chasm was opened in the south of Arelon, the cognitive representation of
the landscape was changed as well, which would have naturally altered the shape,
and therefore the investitural... investital... investitial?
charge of the Dor in that region. The old key no longer matched the new harmonic or
frequency of the investiture, so the Dor was no longer able to flow through.
That's probably why Hoid wanted the Moon Scepter of MaiPon - which is based on the
Chinese Ruyi scepters - which Brandon has said sort of works like a Rosetta Stone
between the different magic systems on Sel. If you know the regional key that
allows investiture access, hacking a non-native system in that region would
be significantly easier. That does raise a question as to whether the placement
of the different base symbols would be the same for different regions. Like, if
you were able to figure out how to use Aon Dor in MaiPon, would the modified Aon
for protection - Aon Edo - still be two diagonally mirrored shapes, or would
changing the key effectively change the entire programming language? Also, would
it be possible to make a super Aon; one symbol for the entire planet of Sel
rather than the smaller regional ones? I've tried to fit the map of Opelon
into the symbol for the planet, but haven't figured it out yet.
This way? Maybe this way? Stupid "severe deficiencies"! We are set to have an
Elantris sequel eventually - before Era Three of Mistborn, probably after
Stormlight Five is written - set ten years later, which should go more into the
machinations of Fjorden and the workings of Dakhor. In the meantime you can keep
exploring the Cosmere by checking out some of my other videos. My next one will
be on the magic of Warbreaker and the importance of Intent, so please subscribe
to know as soon as it comes out; should be in the next couple of weeks. I get the
feeling that learning more about Sel and the Dor will give us a lot more
knowledge about how investiture works throughout the Cosmere, so until we get
more Elantris, we're all going to have to Wait And Find Out.
Or someone come up with a good question to ask Brandon at a signing.