IMPORTANT NOTE TO THEORIST: If you want your theory posted, your theory must meet the following minimum requirements: it must be more than five paragraphs in length, take a stance on one side or another of an issue, support the stance with quotes or summary information from the books, and defend the position against known counter points to the theory. We will not post questions or ideas, 99% of the time.<br><br>While rereading Knife of Dreams, I came across a comment casually thrown in that caught my eye. <br><br>Rand says, pg. 413 "'It doesn't matter where they went,' Rand said absently. His attention was focused on Lews Therin. The madman, the bloody voice in his head, drew a little deeper on the Power. Let go, man. 'Shadowspawn can't survive passing through a gateway.'"<br><br>Now, this is obviously information garnered from Lews Therin as it has never been mentioned before, and he has in earlier books lamented on the worry of an army of Trollocs appearing from nowhere. We heard earlier mention of it in early books from Moiraine, when she said she didn't think that even one of the Forsaken could move so many Trollocs at once. At first we thought it was true, but then we realized it was just her own flawed knowledge. After that, the issue was dropped because we thought we'd solved it, however we never really thought of why the Forsaken didn't just move in 10,000 Trollocs and waste the Two Rivers in one fell swoop.<br><br>Regardless, the issue here is what is it about gateways that kills Shadowspawn? In discussion with my roommate who happens to study the WoT as avidly as I do, I have heard some points that I'd like to address before I bring up my solution.<br><br>1. The One Power is neither good nor evil. The One Power does not attack evil, nor does it decide that it doesn't like Shadowspawn.<br><br>- The One Power is a means to an end, not an end in and of itself. It is not thinking, nor is it a device of the Creator. It has been established that the One Power is the driving force behind the Wheel, but that it is simply that, a force.<br><br>2. Evil creatures and other things directly tied to the Shadow can pass through Gateways with relative ease, and no damage, fatal or otherwise, so long as they aren't artificial constructs.<br><br>- In books 1 and 3, we see Ishamael, who obviously has been using gateways as a method of travel with a black cord around him that ties him to the Dark One. In book 4, we directly see Asmodean using gateways to travel while he is still connected to the Dark One. The black cord isn't severed by gateway travel. It is safe to say that the Forsaken are just about as bad as you can possibly be, and still be a human. Even when Ishamael was corrupted in books 1-3, he was unaffected.<br><br>3. Gateways are essentially 1-dimensional constructs in which you are no longer a part of the pattern.<br><br>- I fully expect this to be the most contested part of my theory. In both the male and female versions of Traveling, you can see a point that is not exactly the pattern. Just a construct of the One Power. For males, you bore a hole through the Pattern, from one point to another to reach it. However, even doing that, you have a 1-dimensional point that connects the two parts of the Pattern. For females, you make two points so similar that they're the essentially the same, connected by the gateway. For this, it is more like a limit. You can't make them exactly the same, but you can make two equations approach 1, so that they're effectively the same at 1, but it'll never quite reach there. Now, if you have a 1-dimensional construct connect the two equations, you've just made a female gateway.<br><br>4. Myrdraal aren't fully part of the pattern. The wind passes through them, they cast no shadow, they are able to flit along the pattern in a way inconceivable to anybody. <br><br>- Aginor himself killed thousands trying to learn how they did it. The theory is that they are corrupted by their association to the Dark One. The thread representing their life in the pattern is twisted and corrupted. It is also fairly widely accepted that Mydraal are the humans who would have been channelers had they not been born to Trolloc stock. Thus, what holds true for Mydraal's basic existence, holds true for Trollocs as well. <br><br>Based on that, we can establish that the threads of shadowspawn aren't truly a part of the Pattern. They aren't properly part of the Pattern, and thus, once removed from it, even for a moment, along say, a 1-dimensional plane, they are no longer alive. Even though they reenter the Pattern almost instantaneously, they were removed for a period of time, and thus can't be reintegrated with the Pattern properly, as a normal thread can.<br><br>