The Second Apocalypse
Earwa => The Prince of Nothing => The Almanac: PON Edition => Topic started by: Madness on January 11, 2016, 07:52:54 pm
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As yesterday kicked off the arbitrary second portion (of which, according to one version of Camlost's timeline, TWP only has three parts) and the Slog is only very slowly slogging along, I thought I'd make the next thread, if only to goad others into posting their thoughts.
Cheers, friends.
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Chapter 9, at the very end Kellhus enters the probability trance and this is his revelation. Seems to me he has predicted how to seize control of the Holy War by going on the Circumfix.
Possible worlds blew through him, fanning and branching into a canopy of glimpses … Nameless Schoolmen climbing a steep, gravelly beach. A nipple pinched between fingers. A gasping climax. A severed head thrust against the burning sun. Apparitions marching out of morning mist. A dead wife. Kellhus exhaled, then breathed deep the bittersweet pinch of cedar, earth, and war. There was revelation.
Even this assumes Cnaüir will kill Sarcellus, and Serwe's death.
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I will have a much more detailed and elaborate post when the slog reaches TTT, but I found this quote very interesting.
Chapter 9
It appears,” he said in a fierce voice that wouldn’t carry, “that you aren’t the only casualty of this spy’s sorcery, Martemus … When you kill this Warrior-Prophet, you’ll be avenging many, very many.
Considering that Conphas believes himself a god, or rather to be so much more than everyone, he might be above many in recognizing Viramsata. He isn't fooled by Kellhus and Kellhus recognizes this. Kellhus believes it's his giant ego that keeps him from falling into Kellhus's attempts to control him. Which is true, but I believe that Conphas's conviction in his self is part of that also.
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Chapter 9:
Only this part really struck me:
Nameless Schoolmen climbing a steep, gravelly beach. A nipple pinched between fingers. A gasping climax. A severed head thrust against the burning sun. Apparitions marching out of morning mist.
A dead wife.
Kellhus exhaled, then breathed deep the bittersweet pinch of cedar, earth, and war.
There was revelation.
Some strong forshadowing here. Thoughts on what each represents?
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Nipples and climax= Esmenet
Severed head= Cnaüir/Sarcellus
Apparitions out the mist= Inrithi at Caraskand
Dead wife= Serwe on Circumfix
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Nipples and climax= Esmenet
Severed head= Cnaüir/Sarcellus
Apparitions out the mist= Inrithi at Caraskand
Dead wife= Serwe on Circumfix
Pretty much in line with that I was thinking. Except I can't place the Schoolmen, my memory is failing me here...
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Cishaurim at battle of Anwurat?
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Cishaurim at battle of Anwurat?
Ah, yes, not the Cishaurim, but the Scarlet Spires there, ok, got it now...
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On this reeread, I see those as closer to the time of the second march.
Schoolmen - Eleazarus mentions he was forced to deploy schoolmen at Anwurat to appease Proyas after taking Achamian. The text may have referenced them climbing a beach.
Nipples/Climax - possibly Serwe with the skinspy, knowing the Consult would inevitably come
Severed Head - I thought Cnaiur/Sarcellus as well but it's mentioned after the Battle of Anwurat, Gotian held Skaurus' head for all to see.
Apparitions - The Inrithi coming out of the Carathay
Dead wife - the Circumfix.
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Schoolman/beach - Akka post battle with Ciphrang? Though i dont think that beach was gravelly, and it says men, not man.
Apparitions/Mist - Was there mist on the day of Shimeh? I'd say mist/dust, Fanim coming out of the walls in Shimeh, or Cish fighting in the air above the city as he mauls them.
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Nice find, MSJ. I never realized it before, but this more or less shows that Kellhus' probability trance couldn't see past the crucifixion. Which is what Moe later claims but as with all things Moe, I've always been skeptical.
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On this reeread, I see those as closer to the time of the second march.
Schoolmen - Eleazarus mentions he was forced to deploy schoolmen at Anwurat to appease Proyas after taking Achamian. The text may have referenced them climbing a beach.
Nipples/Climax - possibly Serwe with the skinspy, knowing the Consult would inevitably come
Severed Head - I thought Cnaiur/Sarcellus as well but it's mentioned after the Battle of Anwurat, Gotian held Skaurus' head for all to see.
Apparitions - The Inrithi coming out of the Carathay
Dead wife - the Circumfix.
I think you hit the nail on the head Bolivar.
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Just finished chapter 10:
What do you guys think of Serwë laying with Akka. I think in the first read, I was lured into the idea that it really was a dream. But it wasn't:
She flushed at the memory of the sorcerer between her legs, but then reminded herself that it wasn’t Achamian whom she remembered, it was Kellhus …
I think what happened was that Kellhus sent her to Akka and what she sees is Kellhus, because he tells her this would be what she would see:
“It is you!” she hissed, sobbing, staring desperately into his eyes. “I can see you. I can see!”
All of it a plan to walk Akka down the path of relinquishing the Gnosis. Are we to take it as a coincidence that Kellhus reveals he is one of the Few the very next day? No, this was calculated, all part of the plan.
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In a few chapters Esement remarks about Akka sleeping with Serwe. In the scene you just quoted, Akka thinks Esme is staring at them through his tent. Either she seen it, or Kellhus plants the memory as part of ensaring her, or she comes to believe it when Akka confesses about it. Knowing Kellhus it's a five for one type deal, the Shortest Path and all that.
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In a few chapters Esement remarks about Akka sleeping with Serwe. In the scene you just quoted, Akka thinks Esme is staring at them through his tent. Either she seen it, or Kellhus plants the memory as part of ensaring her, or she comes to believe it when Akka confesses about it. Knowing Kellhus it's a five for one type deal, the Shortest Path and all that.
Yeah, it sows doubt and guilt into Akka. It also puts a seed of doubt into Esmenet's relationship with Akka. It increases Serwë's devotion to him. I feel certain that Esmenet did see them.
Kellhus did see past Serwë's death and this is the set up here, the start of the plan that will see Akka lose it all.
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So, 3 for 1, but you obviously got what I meant. And, I think your right, it seems to be proof that Kellhus thought past the Circumfix. Which I was thinking along the lines of profgrape, I thought that revelation was proof that he didn't see past the Circumfix. Good point, H.
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So, 3 for 1, but you obviously got what I meant. And, I think your right, it seems to be proof that Kellhus thought past the Circumfix. Which I was thinking along the lines of profgrape, I thought that revelation was proof that he didn't see past the Circumfix. Good point, H.
Well, in that moment, I think he sees up to it. Perhaps not yet past it, but he is actively plying the Gnosis from Akka:
The Mandate couldn’t be involved, Kellhus knew, not until he possessed power enough to parley with them as equals.
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He must feel shame.
“Something troubles you?” Achamian asked, leaning against his knees. He turned to spit over the summit’s edge.
“Serwë …” Kellhus said with an air of admission. “Tell me, would you think her capable of being …” He feigned a nervous swallow.
Achamian looked away to the hazy landscape, but not before Kellhus glimpsed a fleeting expression of terror. Palms turning upward, nervous stroke of his beard, flaring heart rate …
“Being what?” the sorcerer asked with sham disinterest.
Of all the souls Kellhus had mastered, few had proven as useful as Serwë. Lust and shame were ever the shortest paths to the hearts of world-born men. Ever since he’d sent her to Achamian the sorcerer had compensated for his half-remembered trespass in innumerable subtle ways. The old Conriyan proverb was true: no friend was more generous than the one who has seduced your wife …
Is the rumor of the Gnostic texts Kellhus doing? I don't believe he realized that the Scarlet Spires would capture him, but I do think he sent him, in order to separate him from Esmenet.
Chapter 14:
“What have I done?” she bawled. “What have I done to displease you?”
A haloed hand struck her, and she slammed against the carpets.
So, she sees the haloed hands even on the skin-spy, which pretty much confirms that they are, in a sense, "user-generated."
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So, 3 for 1, but you obviously got what I meant. And, I think your right, it seems to be proof that Kellhus thought past the Circumfix. Which I was thinking along the lines of profgrape, I thought that revelation was proof that he didn't see past the Circumfix. Good point, H.
Well, in that moment, I think he sees up to it. Perhaps not yet past it, but he is actively plying the Gnosis from Akka:
The Mandate couldn’t be involved, Kellhus knew, not until he possessed power enough to parley with them as equals.
...
He must feel shame.
“Something troubles you?” Achamian asked, leaning against his knees. He turned to spit over the summit’s edge.
“Serwë …” Kellhus said with an air of admission. “Tell me, would you think her capable of being …” He feigned a nervous swallow.
Achamian looked away to the hazy landscape, but not before Kellhus glimpsed a fleeting expression of terror. Palms turning upward, nervous stroke of his beard, flaring heart rate …
“Being what?” the sorcerer asked with sham disinterest.
Of all the souls Kellhus had mastered, few had proven as useful as Serwë. Lust and shame were ever the shortest paths to the hearts of world-born men. Ever since he’d sent her to Achamian the sorcerer had compensated for his half-remembered trespass in innumerable subtle ways. The old Conriyan proverb was true: no friend was more generous than the one who has seduced your wife …
Is the rumor of the Gnostic texts Kellhus doing? I don't believe he realized that the Scarlet Spires would capture him, but I do think he sent him, in order to separate him from Esmenet.
Chapter 14:
“What have I done?” she bawled. “What have I done to displease you?”
A haloed hand struck her, and she slammed against the carpets.
So, she sees the haloed hands even on the skin-spy, which pretty much confirms that they are, in a sense, "user-generated."
The Scarlet Spires sent someone to Xinemus with rumor of the Gnostic texts. Xinemus told Akka about them so he could be rid of him for awhile because Akka was testing Xin's faith, so to say. I don't believe Kellhus had anything to do with it actually. Who else would he learn the Gnosis from?
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The Scarlet Spires sent someone to Xinemus with rumor of the Gnostic texts. Xinemus told Akka about them so he could be rid of him for awhile because Akka was testing Xin's faith, so to say. I don't believe Kellhus had anything to do with it actually. Who else would he learn the Gnosis from?
OK, I went too far down the rabbit hole and missed that, haha.
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Chapter 15:
A bird the size of a raven alighted upon his knee—a bird like any raven save for its white head.
For some reason, I always pictured the synthese as much bigger. I seem to have missed this line before.
Chapter 16:
Without the guidance of the Nonmen Quya, the Anagogic Schools of the Three Seas had never learned how to surpass what were called the Analogies. All their sorcery, no matter how powerful or ingenious, arose through the power of arcane associations, through the resonances between words and concrete events. They required detours—dragons, lightnings, suns—to burn the world. They could not, like Achamian, conjure the essence of these things, the Burning itself. They knew nothing of the Abstractions.
Where they were poets, he was a philosopher. They were mere bronze to his iron, and he would show them.
Probably the most straight-forward explanation of sorcery in the series.
If Serwë said she cried for Achamian, Esmenet would wonder why. Had they been lovers for more than one night?
More proof, Esmenet did see Akka with Serwë that night they lay together, meaning Akka did in fact see her.
Why did you lie with Akka? Why?
I had entertained, momentarily, that Esmenet was told by Kellhus perhaps, or mislead by him, in allowing Serwë to be with Akka. This line proves that this is not the case.
Chapter 17:
“Exemplary defectives … Specimens. We retain them for purposes of education.” The Pragma simulated a smile. “For students such as you, Kellhus.”
If the Consult (well, wait, lets go back further, the Incoroi) are damned, at least in part for their amoral "scientific" pursuits (read: the Tekne) then it would stand to reason that the Dunyain (and so Kellhus) would suffer a similar fate for reasons such as the above.
How interesting, in a way, that the chapter then ends with the revelation of Mimara's being sold by Esmenet. Perhaps a coincidence, or perhaps not that we would be shown the damnation of the Dunyain and told of what may be the savior of this, Mimara.
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Chapter 9, at the very end Kellhus enters the probability trance and this is his revelation. Seems to me he has predicted how to seize control of the Holy War by going on the Circumfix.
Possible worlds blew through him, fanning and branching into a canopy of glimpses … Nameless Schoolmen climbing a steep, gravelly beach. A nipple pinched between fingers. A gasping climax. A severed head thrust against the burning sun. Apparitions marching out of morning mist. A dead wife. Kellhus exhaled, then breathed deep the bittersweet pinch of cedar, earth, and war. There was revelation.
Even this assumes Cnaüir will kill Sarcellus, and Serwe's death.
Ha you already picked this passage out too :)
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Yeah it really sticks out when you know whats happening. It's a 'prediction' wrought from the probability trance.
Schoolmen and a rocky beach is still unclear to me. Maybe the spires walking from the rubble of the library?
The climax, esmi, the head is Sarcellus, apparations are the holy war, dead wife is serwe.
He might not see how dire his situation might be on the circumfix, but hes at least planning for much of what we end up seeing.
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This might have been in the first march, but Akka sees the no god in his dreams, mentions that the sarcaphagus is sheathed in choric scipt.
Also, Somnabulist, the scene with Akka and esmi overlooking the holy war from afar. I think it would make a great subject for one of your zoomed out panorama pieces ;)
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We collectively figured that the Schoolmen are the Spires at the Battle of Anwurat, where they lay a trap on the beaches.
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Akka's reflections walking to the Library, mentions he and his male cell mate were lovers for a time.
Is this the only direct mention of Akka taking male partners?
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It's in the appendix as well. I think it's part of an aborted effort on bakkers part to have male sexual desire be plastic in his world, but he may have been editorially talked off a ledge that monumentally stupid just as he was talked off the ledge of implementing racial spiritual inferiority.
Making male sexual desire plastic akin to female sexual desire is stupid within the context of the series content because if male sexual desire is plastic then cnaiurs sexual desire for moenghus is immediately assumed by readers to be manufactured rather than originating from cnaiur being homosexual.
This is a profoundly bad approach because there is such a history of discrimination against homosexuals based on the belief that homosexuals are created when they are abused and groomed by an older male. Basically such an approach is stepping into a fucking nightmare land mine and would undermine one of Scott's best creations by turning cnaiur into a martyr/cause/protest point for readers.
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The entry in the glossary is under the name of that guy, and just says they were lovers for a time, so in my mind is basically the same entry.
I did get that vibe a bit seeing that entry, which j had forgotten completely, and thinking about the series as a whole. Plenty of sexual tension and encounters between males that make sense through the lens you've described.
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Ah, The Library. What a great scene. It's too bad we never see a concert of mandati. Clearly when welded together, the combined song is stronger than the sum of its parts. It's why before the singing begins, Akka obliterates one, and during the SS concert he only manages 1 more.
I think it strange the SS went through the trouble to capture akka. They want to ply him for information about the skin spy... that doesn't seem worth burning the library to ash and losing, presumably, two high ranking schoolmen .
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Ah, The Library. What a great scene. It's too bad we never see a concert of mandati. Clearly when welded together, the combined song is stronger than the sum of its parts. It's why before the singing begins, Akka obliterates one, and during the SS concert he only manages 1 more.
I think it strange the SS went through the trouble to capture akka. They want to ply him for information about the skin spy... that doesn't seem worth burning the library to ash and losing, presumably, two high ranking schoolmen .
Like most people though, I think they severely underestimate Akka. In their defense though, I don't think they could have anticipated the wrathi doll. Still, underestimate him they do and so I'm sure they felt the risk was pretty minimal. I doubt if any of them really considered just how overwhelmingly strong the Gnosis is. I think they knew intellectually, but experiancing it is far different. Like being told a boiling pot is hot and placing your hand on it.
I do wonder, having typed this out, if the wrathi doll trick is how Seswatha escaped the Wall at Dagliash?
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Iyokus sees the risk of trying to take a Mandate Schoolman. Eleazaras overrules him, however, partially for the opportunity (as stated above) to interrogate him about the skin-spy, but also because he sees an opportunity to steal the Gnosis -- to Eleazaras, it was a risk worth taking.
Still, what ended up happening at the Library was far worse than even Iyokus expected. When he realizes that Akka has escaped, he thinks:
...Eleazaras had left him only six Schoolmen, three of them sorcerors of rank, and some two hundred and fifty Javreh. Worse yet, they were scattered throughout the compound. Once he might have thought this would be more than enough to manage a Mandate sorcerer, but after the fury of the Sareotic Library he was no longer sure... Even had they been prepared."
Shit, I didn't expect Akka to be as badass as he turned out to be. And that continues on in future books.
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Yeah maybe it had been a number of years since a hostile abduction of a mandati, and they just couldn't fully understand the consequences. They had grown bold in their arrogance and undisputed place at the top of the schoolmen hierarchy. We see this in TTT when they are getting wrecked by the primaries. Too much self confidence leading to disaster.
Iyokus was certainly over matched at that point. Considering jt took all those men to subdue him, 3 is just paltry . Clearly in the event of his escape he was not going to get re captured.
Like you said, they underestimated him twice, each time a disaster. Iyokus learned, Eli did not.. the second time they lost the sorcerers of rank, a contingent of javreh, and inevitably a handful of trinkets.
Still would love to have seen a concert of gnosis users. The concert of ss made a flaming tornado and multi headed dragons, I imagine the geometries and abstractions created by a gnostic concert would be mind bending. Theorems of layed magic simple too complex for one mind to complete.
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Still would love to have seen a concert of gnosis users. The concert of ss made a flaming tornado and multi headed dragons, I imagine the geometries and abstractions created by a gnostic concert would be mind bending. Theorems of layed magic simple too complex for one mind to complete.
Definitely! Hoping to see some of that as the Ordeal starts fighting other sorcerers, Quya Erratics and Mangaecca.
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Still would love to have seen a concert of gnosis users. The concert of ss made a flaming tornado and multi headed dragons, I imagine the geometries and abstractions created by a gnostic concert would be mind bending. Theorems of layed magic simple too complex for one mind to complete.
Definitely! Hoping to see some of that as the Ordeal starts fighting other sorcerers, Quya Erratics and Mangaecca.
Don't forget that the Siqu are still alive and are, presumably, somewhat Intact. Some might possibly have been practicing the Gnosis since it's inception.
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I'm sure the Swayali make a lovely choir.
Or an Anasurimbor metagnostic concert - a little family sing-along to burn the world to cinders.
But maybe thats outside the scope of this subforum ;).
Akka on the floor of the ruined library, laying on his back screaming wards, facing a firestorm, the world aflame with dragon heads and flaming sparrows, everything burning... A great scene for drawing methinks.
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The Spires are desperate for information after finding out Skaeos is a "cish" spy and Akka "knows" him. Plus the Mandate have entered the game killing informants and slicing off their faces.
Of course none of this is true, but it's the goad to kidnap Akka.
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Small tidbit from Chapter 15, conversation between the thing-named-Sarcellus and the Synthese:
Sarcellus became very still. "I play no game. This man is Dunyain. That's what the Scylvendi calls him. She said there's no doubt."
"But there's no order called 'Dunyain' in Atrithau."
"No. But then we know that he's not a prince of Atrithau."
The Old Name paused, as though to cycle large human thoughts through a small bird intellect.
"Human thoughts" means this Synthese isn't a vessel for Aurang or Aurax and instead, another human member of the Consult, maybe Shae, maybe someone who's yet to appear on-screen.
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Interesting find. I like to think it's a metaphor though and that Aurang was the only skin-tight handler during the First Holy War.
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