Re: I don't see how he could be more free - Edit 2
Before modification by DomA at 26/09/2012 07:27:20 PM
What do you think will happen when Rand breaks the seals? Will the DO be more free than in the AOL? Do you think Egwene will convince him to wait before he destroys them?
The seals simply covered the already existing hole. So the DO will have the same amount of access as before (unless the bore has somehow widened in time...)
Both are possible - that the seals have prevented any widening, or not. Some see the seals has seven additional protective layers put between the pattern and the DO, some think the DO could still work on enlarging the Bore beneath the sealing, that the sealing isn't perfect enough to have prevented this.
The way Rand speaks, and he's no doubt relying on LTT's knowledge, he seems to expect underneath the sealing things have gotten worse. Whether this is because the Bore has kept thinning the outer layer of the Pattern over time or because the AS in the AOL could do something to hold the Pattern together they no longer could do now and so the same effect of the DO will be more dire now, it's hard to say. We'll have to wait on the POV of Rand or a Forsaken to know for sure what's up with the Bore.
There's a theory that the Bore couldn't enlarge while the seven seals were in place, but that it resumed widening since the first seal broke, and that this has accelerated with each additional seal breaking. So now the situation would be somewhat worse that it stood at the end of the War of Shadow when the Sealing was put in place.