WARNING: This article contains major spoilers for the Stormlight Archive through the end of Wind and Truth, as well as the rest of the Cosmere series.Brandon Sanderson's Sanderson's Cosmere multiverse.

Unfortunately, eager Stormlight fans will have a long wait while they worry about the fate of the intrepid Knights Radiant, as Sanderson is taking a break from writing the Archives so that he can complete the next set of Mistborn novels – a six-year-plus wait. That's a lot of time to stew and do what Cosmere fans do best: pick at the various threads woven through Sanderson's other novels to try and get an understanding of the bigger picture. And with that in mind, I have a theory as to what that picture may look like once the Stormlight Archive resumes.

I'm Convinced Shallan Will Age More Than 10 Years During The Stormlight Archive's Time Jump

Shallan Davar Is Not The Kind Of Person To Wait Around For Things To Get Easier

One of the biggest concerns as to the ending of Wind and Truth is the fact that the world of Roshar has been stuck in time relative to the rest of the Cosmere, thanks to the instability caused by Taravangian, the vessel of Odium, also taking up the Shard of Honor and combining them, becoming a new entity: Retribution. Sanderson has said his plan is that when the Stormlight Archive resumes, ten years will have ed on Roshar, but for the rest of the Cosmere outside the time bubble, seven or eight decades will have elapsed.

I doubt Shallan is going to spend the next decade just sitting on her hands…

Fan-favorite character Shallan Davar was trapped in Roshar's subastral Cognitive Realm, known as Shadesmar, at the end of Wind and Truth. The creation of Retribution had sucked away the Stormlight in Shadesmar, closing the Perpendicularities that allowed travel between the Cognitive and Physical realms, seemingly forever – or at least until the time dilation ends. While Shadesmar may be affected to some degree by the time dilation that has the physical Roshar trapped, I doubt Shallan is going to spend the next decade just sitting on her hands there. She and her alters are all far too proactive for that.

The Cosmere is split into three relatively parallel dimensions: the Physical Realm, which is what we think of as the "real world," the Cognitive Realm, which is a realm powered by thought and projections of minds, and the Spiritual Realm, a network of Investiture that connects all things and transcends the very concept of individual form. "Shadesmar" is both the name of the area of the Cognitive Realm that reflects Roshar and also used as a general shorthand for the Cognitive Realm as a whole

Instead, Shallan's use of her new Elantrian seon, Ala, shows that she's going to use every tool at her disposal to try and her loved ones on Rosha. If that doesn't work, I think she'll risk exposing herself to time dilation by becoming a worldhopper, even if it means she ages much more than the ten years Adolin and the others will as she works to return home.

Why Shallan Could Become A Worldhopper In The Stormlight Archive Book 6

With Her Ghostblood Foes Vanquished, Shallan Has The Entire Cosmere At Her Fingertips

If Shallan can't quickly find a way to reactivate one of Roshar's two Perpendicularities to return home, it seems likely she will turn to worldhopping. This is either so she can find a way to penetrate the Rosharan time bubble, or to give her access to sufficient resources and Investiture to allow her to be ready to render aid as soon as the bubble drops. Either way, she's likely going to have to work to endear herself to her erstwhile foes, the Ghostbloods.

Shallan and her alters have spent a great amount of time throughout the Stormlight Archive working to destabilize the Ghostbloods' operations on Roshar, culminating in her killing Mraize and Iyatil, two of the highest-ranking Ghostbloods, at the end of Wind and Truth. This also led to her tracking down the Ghostbloods' leader, the mysterious Thaidakar – better known as Mistborn's intrepid, irrepressible, and not-entirely dead martyr, Kelsier, setting up the Mistborn/Stormlight crossover fans have been hoping for.

Kelsier rebuffed Shallan's proposal for an alliance in Wind and Truth, but also said they weren't enemies, either. With somewhere between ten and eighty years, subjectively, to convince him, Shallan's charms and audacity may well convince Kelsier otherwise, and may in turn unite the Ghostbloods and prepare them for the coming storm once Retribution is ready to sally forth from Roshar and assault the holdings of the other Shards.

What This Theory Could Mean For Arc 2 & The Greater Cosmere

Shallan May Well Become A Power Player In The Cosmere, Or Even Take Up A Shard

Shallan becoming a worldhopper is a logical progression, not only for her as a character, but for how Sanderson has set up the pieces in the grand game of power being played across the Cosmere. This could have any number of consequences for the second Stormlight Archive arc, from meaning Shallan is ready and waiting at the outset with an army at her back to challenge Retribution, to the arc opening with Adolin discovering his beloved met a tragic end trying to save him. Maybe she'll even take one of Adonalsium's Shards from its current vessel.

As for the consequences for the Cosmere at large, it's safe to say that Shallan ing the ranks of worldhoppers and beginning to meddle in the dealings of worlds beyond Roshar will greatly complicate things for the various Shards attempting to direct the course of events. Shallan's brilliance and ruthlessness will serve her well as she steps beyond the world of her birth and into the broader Cosmere, and whatever path she takes, it will inevitably have a great impact on the tone of how the next arc of the Stormlight Archive begins.