During the relived wedding, Shallan leaves Adolin and follows her mother, Chana, into a separate room in Urithiru. Chana is panicked and unstable, and Shallan realizes that in this encounter she is the steadier one. When Shallan presses her, Chana admits she returned after hearing a Radiant wedding was taking place and wanted to see her daughter again, but she also confesses that Ishar and Nale had warned her not to build a family and that she once attacked Shallan out of selfish fear.

As Shallan listens, Chana explains that after dying she returned to Braize, broke under torture, and believes that failure caused the new Desolation. Shallan rejects the idea that Chana is responsible for every evil choice others make, though Chana's confession that she feared being replaced wounds her deeply. Even so, Shallan deliberately chooses to forgive her, while also recognizing that Chana is dangerous and needs to be watched and helped. With Pattern and Testament present, Chana says dead singer souls have found her, reveals that this meeting is happening in a Spiritual vision and that she truly died again months earlier, warns Shallan not to trust any Herald except Taln, hugs her, and disappears. Testament then senses a dark presence and identifies Odium.

The chapter shifts to Dalinar, who is being battered in the Spiritual Realm by Odium and by accusations tied to Honor's power. He is dropped into a prisonlike room with Gavinor, Evi, and another man on the night of the Rift's destruction, and he recognizes that Odium is using his greatest guilt to break him. Instead of denying the truth, Dalinar steadies himself, regains his sense of identity, and protects Gavinor and Evi as flaming barrels crash through the doorway.

Dalinar then steps out into a recreated Rathalas and confronts the Blackthorn, his own past self. Rather than repeat the massacre, he orders Kadash and the soldiers to stop the archers, let refugees escape, and turn the assault into a rescue. He forces the Blackthorn to understand the man he will become, ignores Odium's claim that the correction is meaningless because the vision is false, and even strikes down Sadeas when Sadeas tries to interfere. Odium counters that Dalinar has only proved humanity unworthy of Honor by disobeying orders, and the vision collapses back into a storm of guilt and burning corpses.

Overwhelmed again, Dalinar hears the remembered guidance of Nohadon, who reframes pain as part of the journey rather than a reason to surrender. Then the immense shadow tormenting him speaks with Taravangian's voice, and Dalinar realizes Taravangian is the new Odium. Refusing Odium's offer to end the pain, Dalinar grips a line of agony that Connects him to another sufferer and follows it into a small cell, where he finds the Stormfather diminished and weeping with Honor's remembered failures. Choosing empathy over rage, Dalinar asks to understand instead of condemn, and the Stormfather begins a new vision that will show Dalinar the life of a god.