Recent entries

Puppet Master

Hey! Why'd you name yourself UwU?

Will Wight

I did not. That did not happen. However, the name Uru came from--a lot of people thought it came from the Myst games because one of the Mist games is Uru, and it actually didn't. I mean I played Myst but I'm not a huge Mist fan. It was really I was looking for a short, simple, easy-to-spell username that I could use, and it was in middle school I think. And what I liked about Uru was all three of the letters in it are words. So you are you. That said, it has no meaning. I didn't intend that as a statement: you are you. But it just you know--its all three letters are words and it's easy to spell, spelled the same forwards and backwards, and I thought it sounded kinda cool. So, there it is.

Fun fact about the username is I actually wrote a brief scene kinda like an almost-fanfiction thing, but it's about an original character Uru who, in a polytheistic pantheon, was this wizard who was kind of a go-between between the gods because the gods can't act directly. So he was sort of a mercenary wizard that got hired by the different gods in order to work for one god against another just for hire. So, I thought that was a neat concept. I might revisit it someday. I've still got the scene.

Reality Spasm

We've seen a couple different techniques involving shadow, but what kind of alterations does shadow madra cause in other aspects?

Will Wight

Shadow Madra is difficult to detect. It's kind of subtle, so it's got kind of a veiling effect, so it hides things like you would expect shadow to. And shadow also affects the spirit more than a lot other aspects do. It's kind of insidious, it seeps into you. And so, it's not real great for dealing physical damage, to use a video game term. So, it doesn't really hurt you that much; it's not good for breaking boulders. But, it is pretty good for shredding peoples souls and scripts and whatever.

Questioner

Has it been cleared up why Lindon didn't take more water from the Life Well, I believe is the deaging one, because apparently he had extra empty vials.

Will Wight

That's referenced in Underlord a little bit. So, I go into that a little. But, the bottom line is that he just didn't see an application for advancement so he didn't think of it as very important, so he just didn't prioritize it. And then, he also didn't expect the fight with Harmony to culminate in the destruction of the world, because he wasn't aware that he was in a book. So, he thought he was going to have time to go back.

Lil' Blue

How prevalent is illiteracy on Cradle?

Will Wight

That just depends very wildly on where you are. So, in the Ninecloud court everyone is literate. Out in the back end of nowhere, in the desolate wilds of the Blackflame empire, lots of illiteracy.

EtherealSpark

Will we ever see Jai Long and his sister again?

Will Wight

Yes.

Questioner

In one of the short stories you had Northstrider fighting Alin. And one of the thoughts that we read from Northstrider was mentioning about how weak one of the Abidan was that contacted him. Does that mean, I guess theoretically, that Northstrider would be able to kill them if he fought them. 

Will Wight

Yeah. Northstrider could beat some of the weaker or less combat focused lower level Abidan. Absolutely. Suriel would, you know juggle him like a ball.

Arch

Remnants. They grow in intelligence and insight when they rank up, don't they?

Will Wight

They often do. Yes.

Arch

And is it possible for a Remnant to touch the Way and become a Monarch or ascend or anything like that?

Will Wight

Yes, it is possible, so Remnants can cultivate, basically. They can advance to the point where they can develop their body--their bodies become more and more real as well as more and more intelligent and advanced. Therefore, by the higher levels they're almost no different from sacred artists. There actually is one Monarch alive on Cradle right now who was a Remnant.

TransEmo

What is the madra type of the Wei testing bowl?

Will Wight

Pure. It's pure madra scripted to behave in a certain way. But, it's really just scripted to enhance the normal reactions that pure madra would have to their spirits. 

Questioner 2

Where would they get that much pure madra?

Will Wight

Kids.

Decadakon

After learning a path, could you work backwards and get a new iron body and, like, purify your core?

Will Wight

Technically, you could. That is something that absolutely could happen. It would be incredibly inefficient and expensive. More expensive if its less, you know, one or the other. But, ya, you could definitely do that. You can undo the effects of an iron body, it's just difficult and expensive. You can definitely purify your core, it's just difficult and expensive. And you can retrain, it's just difficult and expensive.

Questioner

Do you think you'd be interested in making a series about that once you are finished with one of your other projects? Or is like not really a thing anymore and you are planning on focusing on the single iterations with greater Way level conflict being more of an overarching plot instead of, like, a specific series.

Will Wight

I could still do an Abidan series. Its gonna be a long time before I do though and so its hard for me to say what I'm gonna do because it gonna be a while.

Questioner

Its far enough in the future?

Will Wight

Ya. It's just difficult for me. Who knows ideas I'll have in the next few years. Maybe I'll want to do an Avengers type series where it all comes together. But, maybe I won't.

Lil' Blue

How would Gadrael kill someone, because he sucks at everything but barriers?

Will Wight

So, what he could do is he could isolate them from air. Or from whatever force they need to live and keep them there. He could probably cut them in half with a barrier depending on their power set and where they are. 

Lil' Blue

Like that Waygate guy from Wheel of Time?

Will Wight

Ya. Exactly. Or he could just, you know, seal them deep into the bowels of the earth and its like, well, I can't kill em, but they can't affect me ever again and now they're gonna go insane.

Dheginsea

Can I just say that Gadrael is my favorite Abidan because he's good at exactly one thing, but he's the best ever at it. The kind of crippling overspecialization that loops right back around to being perfectly usable because its just that ridiculously specialized. 

Will Wight

Yep. That's exactly him. I'm glad. Ya, he was a lot more prominent in a, there's a series, a series that I originally planned to use the Abidan for, which was an Abidan focused series, before I ever thought of Cradle. He was a lot more prominent. He was kind of the antagonist in book 1. So, he was sort of the guy who is all about the rules and all about what it means to be an Abidan and all about the code and all about all of this stuff. And then the main characters are, of course, breaking the rules left and right, and so he's all against them and he's trying to them kicked out, he's trying to get them whatever. And at the end, he's in a position where he has to decide. Where the main characters are like 'who's in charge of our case? Oh crap, it's Gadrael, he's gonna kick us out. He hates us.' He instead completely takes their side, defends them, beats the crap out of the other guys using only his seals and everything. And he totally takes their side and they're like 'why the heck would you do that?' and he was like "I don't know. What are you saying? You upheld the rules at the end. You did this, you upheld the spirit of the rules and protected us and you protected people and that's what I'm all about. I still hate you." And I like that character, of somebody who is just absolutely obsessed with his one thing he is good at. And that informs his philosophy, and it informs his personality and it informs his loyalties and it informs all that. I like him as a character and I'd like to get to use him more in the future. But, previously the series I had originally intended was just like entirely a judge series.

Questioner

Cradle 7 Title?

Will Wight

We do know what Cradle 7 is called, I have a title. It's at the back of Underlord

A_Moniker

Who is the highest ranking non-combat focused Sacred Artist on Cradle?

Will Wight

One of the seven monarchs right now is Emriss Silentborn, and she is a monarch, who was a remnant for a long time. and it is largely thanks to her that most of the people on Cradle speak the same language or a variant of the same language. So what she does, she goes around- she is a dream artist- and she goes around spontaneously educating people. She wanders around, primarily one continent and she really does go around giving people the gift of language and making sure language doesn't drift too far. And also giving people educations so that people who are in isolated areas don't stay isolated for long. Cradle is very big so often by the time she gets back to an area the culture and language have drifted again, and she really goes around giving people the gift of language, and making sure that language doesn't drift to far. Also just giving people educations, so that people who are in isolated areas don't stay isolated for long. Cradle's really big, so by the time she gets back to an area, often, the language and culture drifted again.

MountainKing

Are there any iron bodies that can affect the soul?

Will Wight

Yes, there absolutely are. So there will be iron bodies that will be more resistant to spiritual attacks. So an attack of madra will do more than an aura technique, and there will be some that would interact with aura differently, that's a potential iron body. There could be iron bodies that effect the processing of madra, but that gets kind of weird, because at that point it overlaps with a change in your cycling. So that's really the domain of the Jade cycling technique.

MountainKing

Last week, we were discussing if Elder Whisper was a Highgold or a Truegold, so is he a truegold?

Will Wight

I cannot confirm that. That's a spoiler.

Decadakon

Is lightning madra a derivative of storm madra or are they seperate?

Will Wight

They're the same thing.

Lil' Blue

Does that mean Gadrael's barriers are penetrable or is it something else?

Will Wight

I have difficulty answering that question without spoilers

hosoke

Paraphrased: Are the references to the Unknown Wanderer intentional referencing Valin or is that misdirection?

Will Wight

It is not unintentional.

dyring

How old is Malice? How often does she give birth?

Will Wight

Malice is 4-500 years old. That’s a kid every ~4 years.

Entropy

So, is Yerin's Blood Shadow going to be called Big Red? Or Clifford because she woofed?

Will Wight

I didn't make the Clifford connection. I literally did call it Big Red, though. One of the first-draft bloopers was a Big Red gum joke.