What happened to Nynaeve in the Ter'angreal was real?

[tigerorange94]

I should say I haven't finished all the saga yet, but I believe they won't explain this later. When Nynaeve entered the first arc of the Ter'angreal that revealed the worst fears of the first one, the one who has a relationship with the past, she was assaulted by Aginor. Was this real? And in this case... the man was really Aginor or was a random old man and later she put the face of Aginor to her reprimed memory because he was another evil man who tried to attack her, but in another sense?

[Samt]

On 11/8/2025 at 11:52 AM, tigerorange94 said:

I should say I haven't finished all the saga yet, but I believe they won't explain this later. When Nynaeve entered the first arc of the Ter'angreal that revealed the worst fears of the first one, the one who has a relationship with the past, she was assaulted by Aginor. Was this real? And in this case... the man was really Aginor or was a random old man and later she put the face of Aginor to her reprimed memory because he was another evil man who tried to attack her, but in another sense?

I don’t believe that it is stated or implied that anything that happens in the Ter’angreal is true.  Certainly it doesn’t make sense that Aginor would have been around to assault Nynaeve at some point in her past.  
 

It does seem to be the case that the three rings might have some element of past, present, and future, but that doesn’t seem to align as well with the things that Egwene sees.  It’s also apparent that the things seen are associated with fears of the candidate.  It may be that this is a representation of a past fear that Nynaeve had in order for her to face it and overcome it.  So not necessarily something that happened but perhaps something that she was afraid of.  It isn’t really ever made fully clear, but I don’t think it’s meant to be the case that Nynaeve was actually assaulted in the past.

[Tenobia si bashere kazadi]

Isn't the ter'angreal some way related to tel'aran'rhiod?

[chiamac]

It may have been explained in a later book too, but my take on it from that is this is kind of a mirror of the TEL dream world with somewhat the same rules. We also get to see a description of a similar terangereal type thing in later books, and it turns out (iirc) that it's something completely different and/or way more complex. So who knows what it is, if it's another whole world like TEL that others can be in, or if it's limited to the single person and whatever sceneros are given to them, or what. But no, not real. 

Also, don't they wash the person and tell them to forget what happened and don't tell anyone? So it'd make sense that it's not real, and not telling of the future or anything, it just is what it is for whatever test the person is going through. 

[Sabio]

Aginor tossing her about in book 1, would make him a true fear, she didn't know of the other Forsaken so would've been odd for her to think of those.  Aginor was probably the scariest thing she had ever encountered.  So that became her boogie man.  It shouldn't be real which is why the Aes Sedai were surprised when she came out with real wounds also think her channeling in there surprised them.

[chiamac]

Just a thought, after finishing the books a while back and sitting in this working from home meeting... 

Rand and the DO were showing each other various outcomes in the last battle. I have to wonder out loud if some of these terangereal type things do this. Channelers can tap into them and have the ability to create a reality for someone of their choosing. Although it's more limited in control than what Rand and the DO were doing. 

[Mailman]

The testing arches are almost certainly linked to tel'aran'rhiod as evidenced by Egwenes trip through them that was massively affected by the presence of the twisted dreaming ring or her skill as a dream walker or a combination of both.