[Sinisdar Toste]

i agree with the Menhired One. everything about that passage stinks of the truth. i mean, who ever heard of something that began but never ended? i'm almost tempted to say that the kchain helped the malaverse by this logical imposition

[dawnkiller]

Quote

This is a very interesting passage. It confirms your crazy theory, which I suppose means you can't really call it crazy any more.

Wow, thanks for finding that one -- I remember the scene, but it's been a long time since the MT re-read, and those details completely evacuated my frontal lobe. I'm going to quote a little bit of the convo preceding my earlier RG quote, since it seems tangentally connected to the elemental thing:

Quote

'The Tiste are the first children. The very first. Ours were the first cities, the first civlizations. Rising here, in realms such as this one [Kurald Galain]. As Clip has said, elemental.'

'Then what of the Elder gods?' Seren Pedac demanded.

Neither Clip nor Silchas Ruin replied, and the silence stretched, until Undinaas snorted a laugh. 'Unwelcome relatives. Pushed into closets. Bar the door, ignore the knocking and let's hope they move on. It's ever the problem with all these creation stories. "We're the first, isn't it obvious? Those others? Ignore them. Imposters, interlopers, and worse! Look at us, after all! Dark, Light, and the gloom in between! Could anyone be purer, more elemental, than that?" The answer, of course, is yes. Let's take an example, shall we?'

'Nothing preceded Darkness,' said Clip, irritation sharpening his pronouncement.

Undinaas shrugged. 'That seems a reasonable enough assertion. But then, is it? After all, Darkness is not just absence of light, is it? Can you have a negative definition like that? But maybe Clip wasn't being nearly so offhand as he sounded just there. "Nothing preceded Darkness." Nothing indeed. True absence, then, of anything. Even Darkness. But wait, where does Chaos fit in? Was that Nothing truly empty, or was it filled with chaos? Was Darkness the imposition of order on chaos? Was it the only imposition of order on chaos? That sounds presumptuous . . . But chaos also produced Fire. It must have, for without Fire there is no Light. One might also say that without Light there is no Dark, and without both there is no Shadow. But Fire needs fuel to burn, so we would need matter of some kind - solids - born of Earth. And Fire needs air, so--'
--RG p.616

I also noticed a very early reference to the terminus of time in MT's tile-casting on p.206 - 'We stand upon Dolmen, and all is as it should be. To live is to wage war against the Abyss. In our growth we find conquest, in our stagnation we find ourselves under seige, and in our dying our last defences are assailed. These are the truths of the Beast Hold. Blade and Knuckles, the war we cannot escape.' (Erikson, you sneaky bastard...)

Stream of consciousness aside: We know Knuckles very much resembles a Forkul Assail and is Kilmandros' son (his desc on RG p.638 makes the FA resemblence very clear), even though the FA themselves are said to be represented by the Errant, probably due to all the killings. Axe is Eres. The White Crow is the Tiste (Andii) presence (RG p.495: "The tiles possess an aspect of Darkness, sir, although only the oldest texts make note of it. Of the Fulcra, sir. The White Crow."). We still don't know who, if anyone, is Blade, but could this one be KCCM-related? We know they were ancestral rivals to the Awl, to the point where the Awl had to develop those blade-whips simply to deal with them before they withdrew to other lands. My brain bounced to the black-armored short-tail in the prologue, though no weapon was noted on that one -- still, because so many other non-human influences exist in the Holds, I find it impossible that the KCCM would be omitted.

Anyway, back to the original -- I think we're getting close to finding some essential truth regarding the elements/magic here . . . the Tiste and the various Kurald warrens seem, as they said, "elemental," whereas the KCCM magics seem more to do with physics. The interplay of those two . . . I think Undinaas is right. Something more physical than Darkness alone was needed, and I find it likely that's where the Eleint and KCCM came into things. Thus, Darkness not being the "only" imposition on Chaos. While I'm also inclined to believe that the women's truth Fear related is very close to the truth (re: Stabandari's little betrayal habit), it's probably still biased by anger and misunderstanding -- of everyone, it seems, Silchas Ruin is the only one we know treated with the KCCM during the wars, and he hardly had time to pass anything on.

(Man, I just spent an hour I should have been lettering confirming those quotes and hammering my brain into something intelligible. Now watch DoD be released and my sacrifice revealed to be in vain . . .)

This post has been edited by dawnkiller: 01 May 2009 - 01:12 AM

[Blacksox]

Aptorian, on Mar 25 2009, 10:40 PM, said:

I think there's another empire. Not the KCCM one.

It made me wonder by the way. The KCCMs fear a war comming, someone wanting to destroy them. I wonder if this is the Malazans or it's some other, possibly CG controlled, empire.

It would be interesting if it turns out that the KCCM aren't the bad guys in this story, but in fact the heroes, and humans are the evil ones.

But really 4-5 meter tall sword wielding lizards, holy crap this book is going to be awesome.

The short tails that QB and Kalam find in the warren are most likely coming to slay the KCCM.

This post has been edited by Blacksox: 06 May 2009 - 08:16 AM

[Assail]

There was a lot of direct quotes stating that the Matron was insane. Could this be some crazy perceived threat? Then again, there has been short tail appearances.

This post has been edited by Assail: 07 May 2009 - 04:25 AM

[MTS]

The Matron may be insane, but she's still cognizant of the world around her, and is fairly lucid - she has an intelligible conversation with what'sherface. I think it's paranoia and being the last Matron that has drove her a little bit bonkers. Plus, I don't think it's a perceived threat; it's too much of an anti-climax that the Matron is trying to build an unbeatable K'Chain army only for there to be no threat at all (except maybe happenings in Kolanse and the BH, but really, what can they do against the Ve'Gath and Shi'Gal?). There will be something gunning for the K'Chain Che'Malle. The CG hoping to harness the Matron's power, or the Nah'Ruk, or Tavore, or the "bone-skinned" and the "fathers" in Kolanse, maybe. Whether it's all or nothing remains to be seen. Personally, I think it has something to do with the Nah'Ruk. Seems logical. They had a civil war. They supposedly wiped each other out. Now both of them are back, doin' crazy shit. It'll probably turn out that the war never ended, but that the K'Chain left Wu in their war, and are now back for some reason.

[dawnkiller]

Fun note from tBH (having just started a re-read) -- Ampelas, for whom the KCCM city is apparently named, was also a shaper of the blood -- specifically, Kurald Emurlain. He also told Cotillion of Shadow: 'A sundered realm is the weakest realm of them all! Why do you think the Crippled God is working through it?' (p54).

We know that the CG, at least pre-RG (where Hannan Mosag began to find untainted Shadow again), had infected KE and was manipulating the Edur through it, and also that KCCM Matrons seem to hold the entire hive's magic. Don't know how deep this kind of connection runs -- KCCM to the channels of Tiste/human accessible magic and KCCM to the dragons themselves -- but she might have a reason to be going a little crazy.

[D'rek]

Yum crazy theories. Allow me to add craziness. The KCCM end-of-existance spell? Well, in a way you could say it was ensuring the "death" of the universe. The Jaghut war on death? It wasn't about individual deaths, nor the concept, they were warring to try and avert the death of the entire universe by reversing the KCCM spell or whatnot. Yup!

[Powder]

Am I the only one who dislikes the KCCM? They are like the flood in the Halo game series to me, the game is fun and great and everything is enjoyable then all the sudden the Devs drop this gay world devouring race on you. You have to pause your disdain for other factions and focus on this new bigger threat. Seriously every time I read about the KCCM I think of that art piece on the main page, with a T-rex going 'TOOT TOOT' in a skykeep. I like this series, ALOT, but i could do without ZOMG PSYCHIC DINOSAURS WITH SWORD HANDS AND PHYSICS BENDING MAGIKS LOL.

[dawnkiller]

Powder, on May 7 2009, 12:52 PM, said:

Am I the only one who dislikes the KCCM? They are like the flood in the Halo game series to me, the game is fun and great and everything is enjoyable then all the sudden the Devs drop this gay world devouring race on you. You have to pause your disdain for other factions and focus on this new bigger threat. Seriously every time I read about the KCCM I think of that art piece on the main page, with a T-rex going 'TOOT TOOT' in a skykeep. I like this series, ALOT, but i could do without ZOMG PSYCHIC DINOSAURS WITH SWORD HANDS AND PHYSICS BENDING MAGIKS LOL.

I'd be annoyed if something like this just came out of nowhere, but I think they were referenced even as far back as GotM, so I'm kind of interested to see what we find out -- they're basically the last founding race that's unaccounted for, and as the most alien, they appear to have the fewest unbiased historical accounts. I didn't originally like the Tiste much, either, but I felt better about them after we got focus on them in MT and TtH. The KCCM seemed Super Kewl and Unbeatable in RG, where I believe they were called "the demons of this world," but the DoD prologue has already reduced their godlike status IMO -- sure, they wreaked massive damage and survived, but now we know Gunth Mach and the K'ell hunter were also badly injured and returned home half-dead. I think familiarity is going to reduce the ZOMG level inherent to their stabby nature.

(I also kinda doubt that the KCCM as a whole are going to end up as opponents, anyway -- even with "tainted" races like the Edur, SE is pretty good about giving us a few examples that aren't taken in by the propaganda.)

[Dolorous Menhir]

D'rek, on May 7 2009, 02:58 PM, said:

Yum crazy theories. Allow me to add craziness. The KCCM end-of-existance spell? Well, in a way you could say it was ensuring the "death" of the universe. The Jaghut war on death? It wasn't about individual deaths, nor the concept, they were warring to try and avert the death of the entire universe by reversing the KCCM spell or whatnot. Yup!

I think the Jaghut war on death would have come before the Tiste Invasions prompted the KCCM deathspell. I don't think they are related.

[Ammanas]

You know, in the vein of time honored psych tests, the first word that popped into my head when I read about the desert wanderer is Dessimbelackis. OR

Maybe Icarium is now housing the seven souls of Dessimbelackis or his fragments or whatever. That's scary but it would be interesting.

This post has been edited by Ammanas: 08 May 2009 - 12:48 AM

[D'rek]

Dolorous Menhir, on May 7 2009, 05:57 PM, said:

D'rek, on May 7 2009, 02:58 PM, said:

Yum crazy theories. Allow me to add craziness. The KCCM end-of-existance spell? Well, in a way you could say it was ensuring the "death" of the universe. The Jaghut war on death? It wasn't about individual deaths, nor the concept, they were warring to try and avert the death of the entire universe by reversing the KCCM spell or whatnot. Yup!

I think the Jaghut war on death would have come before the Tiste Invasions prompted the KCCM deathspell. I don't think they are related.

The timeline's not important, remember?

[amphibian]

Ammanas, on May 7 2009, 08:02 PM, said:

You know, in the vein of time honored psych tests, the first word that popped into my head when I read about the desert wanderer is Dessimbelackis. OR

Maybe Icarium is now housing the seven souls of Dessimbelackis or his fragments or whatever. That's scary but it would be interesting.

Dessimbelactoseintolerant went into the Deragoth - who are now all dead. I think.

[MTS]

The Deragoth aren't all dead. I think there are still 4 or 5 still left alive. Also, my memory is a bit fuzzy, but didn't they take Dejim Nebrahl away to their "master" once they had a showdown in the Temple of Poliel in G'danisban?

[Assail]

Mappo's Travelling Sack, on May 7 2009, 09:47 PM, said:

The Deragoth aren't all dead. I think there are still 4 or 5 still left alive. Also, my memory is a bit fuzzy, but didn't they take Dejim Nebrahl away to their "master" once they had a showdown in the Temple of Poliel in G'danisban?

I thought they threw Nebrahl onto the ground in the temple then bailed. I can't remember.

[Urizen]

Assail, on May 8 2009, 04:57 AM, said:

Mappo's Travelling Sack, on May 7 2009, 09:47 PM, said:

The Deragoth aren't all dead. I think there are still 4 or 5 still left alive. Also, my memory is a bit fuzzy, but didn't they take Dejim Nebrahl away to their "master" once they had a showdown in the Temple of Poliel in G'danisban?

I thought they threw Nebrahl onto the ground in the temple then bailed. I can't remember.

It was the Hounds of Shadow that dumped Nebrahl with Poliel then bailed just before the Deregoth came along and tore both Poliel and Nebrahl to peices.

[amphibian]

Urizen, on May 8 2009, 04:39 AM, said:

It was the Hounds of Shadow that dumped Nebrahl with Poliel then bailed just before the Deregoth came along and tore both Poliel and Nebrahl to peices.

Poliel died when Paran threw the shard of otataral into her hand.

The Deragoth killed the last of Dejim Nebrahl and then Apsalar came by and cleaned them up. I can't remember if any survived that and then got killed or just survived that. I need to do a re-read this summer of all the books again.

[Aptorian]

amphibian, on May 8 2009, 08:33 PM, said:

Urizen, on May 8 2009, 04:39 AM, said:

It was the Hounds of Shadow that dumped Nebrahl with Poliel then bailed just before the Deregoth came along and tore both Poliel and Nebrahl to peices.

Poliel died when Paran threw the shard of otataral into her hand.

The Deragoth killed the last of Dejim Nebrahl and then Apsalar came by and cleaned them up. I can't remember if any survived that and then got killed or just survived that. I need to do a re-read this summer of all the books again.

No, the piece of Ottataral crippled Poleil. Probably making her unable to access her own power. Then the Hounds tore her to pieces.

I would have loved to have seen her pull out the Ottataral shard, and being all "Fuck this shit, I don't need god powers, I'm a Forkrul Motherfucking Assail, bitches!" and then proceeded to kick the hounds collected asses. But that didn't happen

[foolio]

I stand in awe of dawnkiller's mad-crazy theory skills.

[foolio]

Quote

Am I the only one who dislikes the KCCM? They are like the flood in the Halo game series to me, the game is fun and great and everything is enjoyable then all the sudden the Devs drop this gay world devouring race on you. You have to pause your disdain for other factions and focus on this new bigger threat. Seriously every time I read about the KCCM I think of that art piece on the main page, with a T-rex going 'TOOT TOOT' in a skykeep. I like this series, ALOT, but i could do without ZOMG PSYCHIC DINOSAURS WITH SWORD HANDS AND PHYSICS BENDING MAGIKS LOL.

It will bother me if it is horribly inconsistent. I am bit hazy but the Andi and Edur did beat many hives of KCCM correct. It will bother me if AmpelasRoot's lone Hive just absolutely fucks everybody up. I am a little scared this will happen because of the prologue with the super flying assasins, and the spamming of warriors, and by stating that the bad asses from MOI were just scouts. I mean, the KCCM were beaten by the Andi and Edur, right?
I could be wrong, I usually am...