[Werthead]

Someone asked me on another forum to explain the Jade Statue storyline in the novels.

I came up with the following:

Quote

As far as I can make out, the jade statues contain the souls of the Crippled God's followers from his home dimension before he got pulled down onto the Malazan world by the anti-Kallor mages. Presumably a few of them crashed on the Malazan world in the area of Otataral Island and were buried. Maybe this is what caused Burn's Sleep or something? I have no idea.

Then one of the statues got activated or woken up by Heboric and then Fener crash-landed nearby and INEXPLICABLE MALAZAN CRAZY SHIT WTFNESS took place in The Bonehunters and more of these jade statues appeared IN SPACE and hurtled towards the planet but because Heboric was nearby the buried statues FIRED GIANT LASERS INTO SPACE which vapourised the new statues apart from a couple which instead CRASHED INTO THE MOON, causing a delayed reaction which

Spoiler

caused the Moon to EXPLODE during TTH (for no reason other than to inject a dose of AWESOME SKY PYROTECHNICS for the backdrop to Anomander Rake doing some badass stuff).

Seriously, Erikson and Esslemont must have come up with the jade statue stuff whilst very, very high and having just pulled a 48-hour Final Fantasy marathon.

It occurred to me this was somewhat lacking in logical coherence.

So has anyone got any ideas on how the whole Jade Statue thing works, how Fener got yanked out of the sky and how the Otataral affected them? Preferably with reference to the reappearance of the things in RotCG, because I am totally stumped on it.

This post has been edited by Werthead: 29 September 2008 - 01:29 AM

[Cougar]

It seems that the Otataral was a reaction to the statues entering the earth and releasing vast amount of magic. if we assume that magic is part of the life force or essence of everything then when too much is released it seems that it can destroy the magic inherent in things, therefore is becomes deadening or inert I guess.

[Excellence]

 Cougar, on Sep 29 2008, 12:25 PM, said:

It seems that the Otataral was a reaction to the statues entering the earth and releasing vast amount of magic. if we assume that magic is part of the life force or essence of everything then when too much is released it seems that it can destroy the magic inherent in things, therefore is becomes deadening or inert I guess.

Didn't the Fall cause explosive release that the world now calls otataral material?

[Epiph]

 Excellence, on Oct 4 2008, 06:52 PM, said:

 Cougar, on Sep 29 2008, 12:25 PM, said:

It seems that the Otataral was a reaction to the statues entering the earth and releasing vast amount of magic. if we assume that magic is part of the life force or essence of everything then when too much is released it seems that it can destroy the magic inherent in things, therefore is becomes deadening or inert I guess.

Didn't the Fall cause explosive release that the world now calls otataral material?

That's one theory, but doesn't explain

Spoiler

the magic deadened valley on Letheras where the Imass did their ritual

in Reaper's Gale.

[Excellence]

Nonrelated, I suspect. I'd have to reread those pages again to comment further.

[D'rek]

In HoC, L'oric and Heboric have a little heart-to-heart about this stuff in Heboric's tent. Heboric mentions a scholar who theorized that Otataral was created when massive amount of sorcery were used in one place, possibly in a particular way. A lot of people believe this is the true basis of Otataral, as it accounts for several things:

-Otataral island created by the sorcery of the jade statues landing
-A reference from Crust about a lot of otataral coming from the last time he had seen a lot of sorcery (this being a reference perhaps to the invasion of Kartool)
-The Laederon plateau's blood-oil resulting from whatever sorcery was used in the battle with the T'lan Imass, FA and Icarium (and Jaghut?) that took place there long ago

Spoiler

-The magically dead areas of Lether resulting from the magic of the Ritual of Tellann

-and more!

That would be the relation to Otataral if that Otataral-theory is to be believed. Or... not.

Getting back the Jade Statues, I find it hard to believe that the souls within could be followers of the CG, as not only do they proclaim that they are from different worlds, but one of them says that in her world they either abandoned the concept of gods or killed all their gods (can't remember which)

[Excellence]

Consider this . . .

Treach in Memories of Ice, dying on the plain he fought some dinos on, recollects how they tore a warrent apart on a "distant continent". As part of Dessibelackis's ritual to ascended -- that backfired and caused the First Empire to all become soletaken and worse, brining the Imass upon them. The explosion of power cooled into something that "resisted magic" in the area.

Distant continent . . .

That was Seven Cities. Treach was currently on Genabackis.

Or could it be that Awl'dan plain after all, where magic was dead?

[dktorode]

Begs to wonder where the Otatoral dragon fits in then?

[Lisheo]

The Awl'dan plain was caused by the Tellan Ritual, the Shamans of the Antlers were damaged T'lan.
7C, well, where did Dessimbelackis activate his Ritual? Otataral Island, maybe, but perhaps somewhere else.
The Otataral Dragon just doesnt seem to fit in with what we know, I mean, its a creature aspected to the complete absence of sorcery and magic power, but eleint are beings of sorcery...
I wonder if a warren was destroyed/drained and the Dragon originally aspected to it became aspected to otataral?

[Traveller]

I think that Dragons are separate from the warrens, and warren magic, so an otataral dragon isn't that much of an oddity. Eleint blood seems to be a sort of
*TTH spoiler*

Spoiler

parallel to K'ruls blood. The dragon blood can pass/sink through the warrens, suggesting that it's a different form altogether. There are also more than a couple of examples of spirits being trapped within it, and the place Nimander gets taken to when he meets the builder is built on/in dragon blood. And Gothos is less than pleased at the thought of an Azath appearing within it, for some reason. 'Dragons don't play games.'

Just a thought.

[Aptorian]

Oh so many different topics in one thread. I'll take the jadestatues last.

The magically dead areas of the world, like the one the chain of dogs pass and the one on Lether, have nothing to with the creation of ottataral, in fact I believe they may be the very oposite of the unleashing of magic powerfull enough to make the stuff. The dead areas are created because the rituals of the T'lan Imass that took place in unison at diffent locations across the world, were so powerfull that they used up all the magic available, including Burns lifeforce... so to speak. There's a direct connection between the warrens, magic and the earth. Magic is rooted in Burns flesh. That's why all the warrens are going to die if the CGs poison kills Burn.

The clashing between Treach, the other first heroes and what ever else, is not the event that caused the "D'ivers Cataclysm" or "The ritual of the beasts" as someone so poetically put it. There's several different events recolected from the first empire. You have to remember that the empire may have existed for as llong as 30.000 years. Dessimbelackis was supposedly long gone by the time of the Ritual and the fall of the empire.

The O-dragon has to be the natural opposite to magical dragons, an anti-magical dragon. I've sort of settled for the dragon simply being a necessary constant in the order of the Holds or Houses.

Now about those Jadestatues.

It's interesting, the way you put it Werthead, it sounds like the Statues have arrived in waves. I've always imagined that the statues arriving was a constant flow. A couple of them arriving every x amount of years. But it may be that the statues were onced launched and most of them landed at the place that became O-island, then more were launched just recently. That sort of suggestes that there's an organised structure in these arrivals and the statues are not just a frantic pilgrimage for millions of CGs followers. It also means that there may be a connection between their journey and the CGs activity. FOr example maybe all the O-island statues came just after the fall of the crippled god, then now, with the rising power of the CG, the people of the CGs dimensions sense their gods presence and they sent a new party.

It sort of annoys me that Erikson hasn't made anything more out of their presence.

This post has been edited by Aptorian: 15 October 2008 - 12:52 PM

[Rath'Thrash]

Quote

Spoiler

caused the Moon to EXPLODE during TTH (for no reason other than to inject a dose of AWESOME SKY PYROTECHNICS for the backdrop to Anomander Rake doing some badass stuff).

\

Spoiler

Maybe the moon exploding has something to do with the Edur myth surrounding Father Shadow and how he was imprisoned in the moon (if i'm even getting this right), and that of course would tie in with Mother Dark "clearing the water" at the end of TtH?

The big problem with that theory is who's to know whether the Eudr version of the dark/light/shadow pantheon is even correct, or the more widely accepted Andii version (mother dark, etc. etc.)? According to the Edur, it goes Father Shadow, and Brothers Light and Dark, if I remember correctly. I donno, that's the first thought that came to my head when I read this. Silly Tiste and their conflicting mythologies...

[Cougar]

 Aptorian, on Oct 15 2008, 01:52 PM, said:

It sort of annoys me that Erikson hasn't made anything more out of their presence.

Hey Apt, it could be nothing but for a while Mal had a section of prose in his sig which said something to the effect of "blah, blah, blah...see me weep tears of jade..." he didn't say where it came from and it's gone now but since at the time he was reading the proof of part 1 of DoD I reckon there might be some clarification forthcoming soon.

[Aptorian]

Oh there's definently something coming up.

In the prologue of TTH it's

Spoiler

raining jade inside Hoods warren, which was very curious

[Jude]

was it?! HOLY dont remember that! could you remind me when that happens?

[Aptorian]

The prologue.

[Almar mae' Ka'zole]

Dam now im gonna have to reread the whole book. The O dragon is like Aptorian said an awsner to every toher dragon. And it was imprisoned by other dragons. Who knows but maybe at some point it was free and flying around killing shit, maybe even a part of the warrens that no longer exist or something?