Spirit Walker - Spoilers - Chapters 1 through part of 14

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boballab
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Re: Spirit Walker - Spoilers

Post by boballab »

Yes alot of my outlook there is based on conjecture but it seems to tie in rather well. As to the Loremasters being a good source of info, i'm just applying how governments work. There is what everyone knows, common knoweledge. Then you have what only people that have some knowledge through either education, or position. Finally you have what is held secret by the upper most level of government. I find it interesting that the Arcans have a higher literancy rate then the Humans. Why would scientists, historians, people of learning and education want to keep their people uneducated? Simple the less the common people know the easier to rule and Knowledge is a form of power. This makes it easy for the Loremasters to be the source of any advancement for the humans due to what they know. Remember there is 10 Kingdoms that were fighting each other until the Loremasters somehow convinced them to let them take over. People that run Kingdoms don't usually let someone else take over without a fight, but this time they did. The only thing that the Loremasters at that time had going for them was Knoweledge. An example of the Loremasters knoweledge and how they are doling it out is Banking. The Loremasters took over 600 years ago but it wasn't until recently that they installed a banking system, A banking system that they run. The Loremasters control the economy through banking, they control the Black Crystal distribution (death magic) which gives them a hold over the military. The Loremasters have the access to ancient knoweledge which to me is what allowed them to take over Noraam without using force, we just have to wait and see how much access the upper level of the Loremasters have. I believe we will get a hint of what the Loremasters know when the Spirits reveal why they recalled all Shamans.

Bottom Line the Loremasters are not only trying to enslave all Arcans but also keeping their own people in a type of slavery. Med-evel serfdom, with the Serfs beholden to the Loremasters instead of the King. Some people are coming to realize this as seen by the amount of humans that are moving west and south of arcan lands. Oh I also wouldn't be suprised if the Loremasters know about Haven. The ordinary people of Noraam have been hearing tales from prospectors and Mountain men about a Arcan city. The Loremasters would have to know that Arcans are escaping to somewhere. I wouldn't put it past them to send some expeditions out there just to see what happens.

P.S. That was evil Fel teasing us with some of our guesses about what Kyven might be able to do, in his musings. Since you never had the Shadowfox pop up once that chapter, we can only keep guessing and what he mused might be only a false lead. The only thing concrete out of that whole thing is the inference that Kyven would like to switch between Human and Arcan.
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Re: Spirit Walker - Spoilers

Post by Elsh »

boballab wrote: I find it interesting that the Arcans have a higher literancy rate then the Humans. Why would scientists, historians, people of learning and education want to keep their people uneducated? Simple the less the common people know the easier to rule and Knowledge is a form of power. This makes it easy for the Loremasters to be the source of any advancement for the humans due to what they know.
An alternate explanation for this is that the two civilizations live in completely different circumstances. The arcans have access to great hunting grounds and enough sense to not deplete their source of meat. The arcans also have a limitless source of crystals with which to make alchemical devices to improve their ability to farm and grow cattle/food. They also have shaman that can solve anything they don't need a dedicated alchemical device for. On top of all this, they are arcans, they can work harder, longer and faster than humans. They don't need to work for money or worry about getting by. I don't think Arcans have as hard a time getting by as humans which provides them with a lot more time to dedicate to other things.

Think about it, if a Human gets injured he might die, spend weeks in bed, go poor paying for medications, spend his life without a limb unable to work or blow all the family's assets on a green crystal large enough to be healed. If an arcan gets injured, the shaman patches him up in a day or two and even gives him a bit of wisdom in the process. There is simply much less wasted time, energy and resources in their society, thus its more productive.

I think there is some credibility to the idea that the loremasters are hiding information from the general populace, but I'm still having trouble imagining them to be that organized. Their control of black crystals isn't very meaningful since shock rods and fire tubes are a weapon of choice anyway and the loremasters aren't large enough in numbers to defeat any sustained attack from the people. You might be right though, I'm just not much of a conspiracy theorist where this book is concerned.
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Re: Spirit Walker - Spoilers

Post by boballab »

Tallspan taught the young children every day while the parents were busy, teaching them their heritage, and to Kyven’s surprise, teaching them how to read and write. Every Arcan and human in the village older than six knew how to read and write, which was a literacy rate that far, far exceeded the human lands. In the human lands, barely one in fifty could read and write.

“Why is it so important?”

"Because our lives are not as long as humans, and we are fully grown and working before human children are barely a quarter grown, we have less time to find wisdom,” he explained easily. “There is much to be learned in books, Kyven. How will our children know their history if they can’t read, since we write our history down? That’s one of my jobs, brother. I’m the village historian. I keep the village history, everything noteworthy is written down.”
The Answer to why the Arcans have such a High literacy rate is explained by Tallspan but it also gives you a clue to what the Loremasters are doing. The Loremasters have the access to the books at their college why not teach everyone to read? So people can not get to the knowledge. The people then become dependent on the Loremasters. Kyven only knows how to read and write because he is a crystal cutter, the second hardest profession in Noraam only behind Alchemy. The loremasters need cut crystals and crystal devices so teach those people only enough to do what the Loremasters need to do those jobs. This is how the Catholic church gained so much power in the middle ages and remember that power led to the Inquistion and the crusades. A Grp of people that started out being killed and oppressed for their beliefs end up killing and oppressing other people for their beliefs all due to the influence of their power. Remember even in our own societies people with the better educations usually end up in the positions of power especially in third world countries. Most atrocities that occur under third world dictatorships are done by the educated few against the uneducted masses.
“Black crystals are regulated by the Loremasters,” he answered. “Send for a Loremaster and show it to him. The Loremaster will buy it from you. Do not show it to anyone else.”
Black crystals were for war, full of negative energy that created injuries that almost always killed. They were fairly rare, and any miner that found one would have a hard time smuggling it past the Loremasters to sell to anyone other than the army.
He looked at that device and shuddered. If it used a black crystal, then—well, him targeting that device probably saved the lives of all the Arcans. There was little doubt in his mind that it would have killed them all.
Look at it this way: Shockrods=rifles, Black Crystal devices = WMD's. Now just like in our world yes the military has rifles but so do ordinary citzens with basically limited control over them. Now just like in our world you don't find too many people with WMD's in their garage. Also just like how Uranium and Plutonium are controlled substances needed to make nukes, think of the black crystals in the same vein which the Loremasters control.
Shockrods kill 1 person per use. Black Crystal devices kill many, many people per use.

The Loremasters basically have all the power: Knowledge (they control what gets out), Economic (They control the making and banking of money), Military (They control the crystals that are used in their version of WMD's). Now after 600 years the ones that founded the Loremasters are dead and others have taken over leadership. 600 years ago the orginal Loremasters might have had a plan that wasn't that bad, but the people that took over after them once they realized what kind of power they had and went a different route. Power corrupts and the Loremaster Leadership have the most power in Noraam.

I believe the next couple of chapters will fill in many of the blanks and give us a better sense of direction this story is going. Fel has gotten the basic relations and background knoweledge on the board, now its just a matter of seing what direction he takes it in.
Last edited by boballab on Wed May 07, 2008 5:55 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Spirit Walker - Spoilers

Post by Elsh »

The more noticeable thing about that quote from Tallspan, is not just the reasoning for why they do it, Its the fact that they can do it. They have the time, energy and resources to sit around and learn to read and write and make use of those activities. While humans trudge around in mines like animals in search of crystals and die meaningless deaths, the arcans enjoy a possibly Utopian society free of wasteful activity. They can afford to feed themselves and live, without slaves and without forcing their kids to work away, that's a major technological achievement. Even today, American children are off from school during the time that they would have been most needed on the family farm.

I don't see the connections between the Loremasters and literacy, Kyven can read and he wasn't taught by a Loremaster. I never saw anything that alluded to reading ability originating with the Loremasters, or books being regulated or held by the Loremasters, or books/paper being prohibitively expensive (Though this specific point might be an issue, I'll scan back and see if Fel says anything about it.) Everyday in Kyven's world children are learning to read and I don't see how the Loremasters regulate that in any way. They don't encourage it actively, but I don't see anything to imply that they establish structures that hinder a person's ability to do this. Humans can't read because teachers need to be paid and most people don't value reading and writing enough or don't have the resources to hire a teacher for their kids. Loremasters don't give reading lessons because they want to do something other than mind over a bunch of kids all day, they want to resurrect the greatness that was once their society. I can completely see a case for saying that the Loremasters could do more to help people acquire skills, but I don't see a case for saying that they are actively trying to hold humanity in a state of idiocy to meet their own needs.

I guess at the end of the day, I just can't equate the Loremasters with an organization as massive and powerful as the Catholic church during the middle ages. At a minimum the message of control over all of society hasn't filtered down to Danna's level.
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boballab
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Re: Spirit Walker - Spoilers

Post by boballab »

to my view you are looking at it backwards. The loremasters are the governing body of Noraam as a whole and if they tell the people they have to send all their childeren to school then the the kids would be forced into schools. this is similar to what happened in the US. At the beging of the US school was not mandatory. As time went on the governments, first local and state then followed by federal made it mandatory, to get a basic education. So that brings us back to why are the Loremasters (who are scientists, historians and scholars) keeping the general populace uneducated? Also back in the middle ages the Catholic church did restrict the flow of information. The only schools at that time were run by the catholic church and the people that did teach the kids were the local clergy. It wasn't until the Renaissance and the Reformation that the teachings of the Catholic Church was questioned and the churches power was reduced by secular Kings. The answer to why you keep people from an education is simple and direct. The less educated you are the less you will question the order of things. Kyven was part of a Med-eval guild system. Guilds only form with the blessing of the ruling body or they will get stamped out. Despotic governments do not let any organization outside of what they control and the Loremasters are very organized. The Loreguard answers to the Loremasters, the Regional kings answer to the Loremasters, The Guilds anwer to the Loremasters and there is a low ranking Loremaster in every village. Switch Loremaster for Soviet and it all becomes clear. The Loremasters work on the Soviet system including having political officers everywhere.
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Re: Spirit Walker - Spoilers

Post by ANTIcarrot »

boballab wrote:I find it interesting that the Arcans have a higher literancy rate then the Humans. Why would scientists, historians, people of learning and education want to keep their people uneducated?
I think you're underestimating the difficulty of setting up a system of national education. Scientists like Newton up until Darwin lived in a world full of illiterate people. This wasn't because they were evil men who wanted the world to be ignorant, but because most people in a semi-industrial economy won't get a significant benefit from reading, and they need their children to earn money to pay the landlord.

The arcans get around that because there is no landlord to pay and because they need to. In addition to their short lifespans the human lands pose a ever present threat; which might require sudden intelligent action.
People that run Kingdoms don't usually let someone else take over without a fight, but this time they did.
The loremasters seem more of a private security firm than a government. The locals make the rules, the loremasters are just there to backup whatever the rules are. A bit like NATO. Which is probably how they expanded. "Join NATO and you can buy our technology!"
Bottom Line the Loremasters are not only trying to enslave all Arcans but also keeping their own people in a type of slavery.
The small educated (and rightous) minority ruling over the dumb majority (cattle) is a reoccurring theme in Fel's work. Jason the super-telepath lording it over the fey and humans for example. Or the wikunni lording their tech over the dim and backward human nations.
I wouldn't put it past [the loremasters] to send some expeditions out there just to see what happens.
I wouldn't put it past them to do so with magical means. Wizards, remember? :)
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Re: Spirit Walker - Spoilers

Post by Elsh »

Quick Fel is online, get your questions in NOW!!!

Hey, not sure if you've seen this question so far but how long do you expect this book to go?

Any idea how many more books or chapters?
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Re: Spirit Walker - Spoilers

Post by boballab »

Elsh wrote:Quick Fel is online, get your questions in NOW!!!

Hey, not sure if you've seen this question so far but how long do you expect this book to go?

Any idea how many more books or chapters?

I don't see it having more then 25 chapters. Fel has the pieces in place, he gave us the background info on the world. It is now down to just finding out what the Spirits want and having Kyven do it and I don't see it being a grand adventure like Tarrin more like what Json had to do in Subjugation.
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Re: Spirit Walker - Spoilers

Post by Elsh »

What if they ask Kyven to find, steal and bring back the firestaff. Then they betray him and the shadow fox spirit becomes a God and he has to fight the shadow fox spirit and save his world?

I think that would take more than 25 chapters :-P
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Re: Spirit Walker - Spoilers

Post by Fel »

Elsh wrote:What if they ask Kyven to find, steal and bring back the firestaff. Then they betray him and the shadow fox spirit becomes a God and he has to fight the shadow fox spirit and save his world?

I think that would take more than 25 chapters :-P
*THWAP!*

Bad Elsh! You just gave away the hidden easter egg ending!
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Re: Spirit Walker - Spoilers

Post by boballab »

Elsh wrote:What if they ask Kyven to find, steal and bring back the firestaff. Then they betray him and the shadow fox spirit becomes a God and he has to fight the shadow fox spirit and save his world?

I think that would take more than 25 chapters :-P
I don't see the spirits taking it but to use it as a way to lure Tarrin into that world to retrieve it I can see. We all know what would happen to the Loremasters if they tried to coller him thinking he was an Arcan. The Loremasters think Shaman are bad juju hah.
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Re: Spirit Walker - Spoilers

Post by hoppy »

boballab wrote:
Elsh wrote:Quick Fel is online, get your questions in NOW!!!

Hey, not sure if you've seen this question so far but how long do you expect this book to go?

Any idea how many more books or chapters?

I don't see it having more then 25 chapters. Fel has the pieces in place, he gave us the background info on the world. It is now down to just finding out what the Spirits want and having Kyven do it and I don't see it being a grand adventure like Tarrin more like what Json had to do in Subjugation.
Except that Spirit Walker seems more organized than subjugation. I liked subjugation but some of Jason's decisions seem rather counter intuitive to me.
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Re: Spirit Walker - Spoilers

Post by boballab »

The difference between Subjugation and Spirit is that in Subjugation Jason is fed clues and left to figure things out on his own and in his own time, in Spirit Kyven is told what to do and where to go. The Kimdori, once Miarri saw him on earth, and they knew his goal planned everything out for him how to get Trillane off earth and tried to gently guide him in that direction. In Spirit Kyven has been driven by the Shadowfox towards his goal. The best example of this was where Miarri told Jason to find out why the humans were telepathic and let Jason wander off and do what he wanted, Kyven isn't given that choice he is told where to go and what to do by the Shadowfox. This makes it seem like its more organized in Spirit. Remember The Kimdori only advise they never tell what to do, for that is not the Kimdori way not even for the Karinne's so Jason could take their advice or leave it as he so choose. He put off finding out why humans have telepathy because he didn't think it would help him against Trillane, until it smacked him in the face. Remember the Kimdori knew about the biological agent on Moridon, they knew he had Kimdori DNA and be vulnerable to it, but Kiaari didn't warn him before hand. That was Fel saying without saying the Kimdori wanted him to really start pursuing the Telepathy angle, because after that it sort of smacked him in the face that he really couldn't be 100% human. That was why it wanders around a bit. In Spirit the Shadowfox is dragging Kyven by the scruff of the neck from place to place and he has no chance but to do what she wants.
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Re: Spirit Walker - Spoilers

Post by Sage4Eros »

Some random thoughts sparked by Chap 13:

1. Kyven daydreaming about what he could accomplish if he could shift back & forth to/from Human/Arcan at will. Others brought up the possibility in the spoilers thread & I didn't feel like Fel was going there, but looks like I was probably wrong.

2. Still looking for "Shadowfox powers" (as opposed to shaman magic). The references in both the book and the spoiler thread imply that there are some REALLY cool tricks he is going to learn, and for some reason I am much more curious about the "shadow powers" than the "real magic". Probably because the "shadow powers" are unique, were-as there are lots of shaman and alchemical devices.

3. Love how Fel throws in funny scenes (Chickenpox/drinking sickness & Patches "forgiving" him for once being human).

4. For some reason the internal dialog of Danana about Kyven's green eyes made the phrase "green eyed monster" get stuck in my head...

5. Now that Fel has a new Gaming Machine I am dreading his rediscovery of games!!!
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Re: Spirit Walker - Spoilers

Post by boballab »

Sage4Eros wrote:Some random thoughts sparked by Chap 13:

1. Kyven daydreaming about what he could accomplish if he could shift back & forth to/from Human/Arcan at will. Others brought up the possibility in the spoilers thread & I didn't feel like Fel was going there, but looks like I was probably wrong.
Or thats just Fel at his Evil best tweaking our noses about what we guessed and not going to do it.
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