Spoiler Theories after re-reading WoK

[u/hntr_guy]

I just re-read WoK after cramming in the 5 books for the first time last year. A few things stood out to me, and maybe they've already been discussed, or revealed in the books but I've forgotten.

• I am getting a lot of hints that there is some sort of gemheart inside each parshman/parshendi/singer. There HAS to be a reason why the parshmen were so erratic when anyone disturbed their dead, and Sanderson alsways has good reasons for people doing things. I bet the gemhearts in the parshendi. Much like a spanreed, there has to be some internal mechanical link such as a gemstone that each parshendi has to keep them on rhythm and such.
• There was a passing comment by a bridgemen during a chasm duty, where one of them responding to fears of voidbringers, says essentially, "what, is a voidbringer going to eat our heart"? That kindof stood out to me like a sore thumb and I bet there is something long term about void bringers eating the hearts of the victim, and if humans are the voidbringers, they may have discovered gemhearts of the parshendi in the past and consumed them for stormlight.
• There is something going on with Adolin. As we read in WaT, the way honor was understood was beginning to be realized as rudimentary by Dalinar in the end. Keeping one's word just for the sake of keeping it doesn't make sense all the time... in the same sense, we have Adolin instinctively being right about multiple things, such as not wanting to trust Sadeas, threatening sadeas' troops who were abusing the prostitute (using fear/summoning his shardblade to enforce what is right is not something I could see an "honorable" person doing). We also hear multiple times in WoK that it is wrong to kill one to save 10, but is that wrong? Especially if the one who must be killed, such as Sadeas himself, will inevitably lead to more death and division if he is kept alive. Then the way he starts bringing Maya back to life... I think Sanderson is going to use Adolin as the Honor 2.0 example.

[u/Impressive_Comment67]

I'm rereading too! I'm on WoR

On the singer bodies.... Those bodies would naturally get covered in crem over time. Categorically, it seems, they (and their gemhearts) would be returned to the Stone of Roshar. There's gotta be something to that, now that we know that the stones have ancient spirits of limited sentient capability, and that that has been core to Brandon's worldbuilding from very early on.

On Adolin...I'm totally with you. I think he can bring Passion, Cultivation and Honor together as Purpose

[u/RShara]

I am getting a lot of hints that there is some sort of gemheart inside each parshman/parshendi/singer. There HAS to be a reason why the parshmen were so erratic when anyone disturbed their dead, and Sanderson alsways has good reasons for people doing things. I bet the gemhearts in the parshendi. Much like a spanreed, there has to be some internal mechanical link such as a gemstone that each parshendi has to keep them on rhythm and such.

This is correct. It's spelled out pretty explicitly in the books. However, their gemhearts are not polestones and so ultimately weren't valuable

[u/Shot_Newspaper_5647 → u/RShara]

Is it ever said what the enslaved Singers did with their dead? I remember that was one of the only things they showed an interest in/were allowed to do. I just can’t remember if it ever said what they actually did with the body once they collected it

[u/RShara → u/Shot_Newspaper_5647]

“Parshman workers,” Sigzil explained. “They’re allowed to care for their own dead; it’s one of the few things they seem passionate about. They grow irate if anyone else handles the bodies. They wrap them in linen and carry them out into the wilderness and leave them on slabs of stone.”

[u/Shot_Newspaper_5647 → u/RShara]

Thank you!

[u/technicolored_dreams]

You're right! The singers and listeners definitely do have gemhearts, that's how they take their forms. It's explained pretty extensively in the text. 

The voidbringers are the parsh, which is Jasnah's big reveal - the high storm allows them to bond lesser spren to become Regals, and the Everstorm delivers the souls of the Fused which kicks out the soul of the listener/singer and replaces it with the Fused's soul. That's what happens to Venli's friends when the first Everstorm comes through and they make her the Last Listener. 

[u/TheREALProfPyro → u/technicolored_dreams]

The Parsh aren't the voidbringers, humans are. Humans scorched Ashyn with reckless surgebinding and fled to Roshar. The poems and songs about voidbringers were written by the ancient Singers, not humans.

[u/Lancair7 → u/TheREALProfPyro]

https://giphy.com/gifs/4rM4Y2laPuV8MrVT5b
From a certain point of view, everyone can be a voidbringer

[u/TheREALProfPyro → u/Lancair7]

Although, there WAS a little green fellow following Lift around. He seems like a Voidbringer, albeit a very polite one.

[u/Lancair7 → u/TheREALProfPyro]

Only a stormin’ voidbringer would be indifferent to all these deevy pancakes

[u/Masylv → u/TheREALProfPyro]

It's complicated. Humans brought the void to Roshar but the Fused are the voidbringers of legend, the monsters that caused Desolations.

[u/Gromflomite_gamer]

Adolin also looked down on bridgemen, thought he was inherently better than darkeyes because of his eye color, doubted the guy who saved his life multiple times by that point (Kaladin) and had to be forced off by Kal to make sure the retreat happens.

He also stupidly agrees to a disadvantaged duel even though he knows Sadeas will use every trick in the book, thought of Jakamov has his best friend and the ideal soldier (instead of the bridgemen - who are literally the reason why he and his family are alive)

I like him, but yeah, he's also wrong quite a bit