| 1 | [[quoteright:300:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ac7955d880d67a471a90f0bb79e11cea.jpg]] |
| 2 | %% |
| 3 | ->''"There's always another secret."'' |
| 4 | -->-- ''' Kelsier''' |
| 5 | |
| 6 | This page is for the original ''Franchise/{{Mistborn}}'' trilogy. You can also read about the SequelSeries, ''Literature/WaxAndWayne''. |
| 7 | |
| 8 | Long ago, a conqueror and philosopher was acclaimed as the Hero of Ages and sent to vanquish an ancient evil known only as the Deepness. The nature and character of the threat has been lost to the mists of time, but the Hero was evidently successful in his quest, as the Deepness was destroyed and the Hero returned in triumph, but not without great cost -- the sun became red, Ashmounts filled the sky with ashes that forevermore fell to the earth, plants withered and turned brown, and mysterious mists (whispered by the superstitious to be sentient and malevolent) enwreathed the lands by night. But humanity survived, even prospered, and years passed. |
| 9 | |
| 10 | The Hero, having unlocked the secret to immortality, installed himself as the Lord Ruler of the world and became their deity. He granted those who supported him in his quest titles and lands of great power and influence, and a magical power known as Allomancy. Those who did not support his rule were turned into the downtrodden peasant race, known as "skaa", who have since worked the fields in virtual slavery for their masters. A thousand years later the ruling class consists of the decadent descendants of the Lord Ruler's ancient companions, who hold massive balls and festivals in their stone keeps as the rest of the world slaves away. The Lord Ruler impassively reigns over both sides as king and god with his bureaucratic priesthood, his army of beastlike monsters known as koloss, and his brutal, near-inhuman enforcers the Inquisitors. The Lord Ruler, immortal, with unlimited power, keeps the world stable and relatively prosperous under his autocratic rule, and has reigned for so long that most people consider him virtually unstoppable, a force of nature. |
| 11 | |
| 12 | The main plot begins with a rebel that seeks to overthrow the Lord Ruler. That man is named Kelsier, who arose from the ranks of the skaa. Kelsier was once a thief, blithely stealing from the nobility for the sheer joy of it, until he was betrayed, captured, and sent to the Pits of Hathsin, the Lord Ruler's most brutal prison, a mine where prisoners are forced to find one piece of the precious metal atium every seven days or face execution. No man had ever escaped from the Pits -- but Kelsier did, earning him the epithet "the Survivor of Hathsin" and a seething desire for revenge against the Lord Ruler. In the Pits, Kelsier had come into his powers as a Mistborn -- a special, powerful type of sorcerer that comes along only very rarely, and supposedly only among the nobility. While most magicians ("Mistings") can "burn" only one type of the eight allomantic metals (iron, steel, tin, pewter, brass, zinc, copper, and bronze), generating a very specific effect, Mistborn can burn all eight and some extra ones besides, giving them extensive power and versatility. Among the nobility, Mistborn are mostly used as elite assassins, but Kelsier had other plans. |
| 13 | |
| 14 | Gathering up many of his old friends from the criminal underworld (most of them themselves allomancers, the bastard descendents of noblemen), Kelsier begins raising [[LaResistance the skaa revolution]] once more. Unlike previous attempts at rebellion, however, who mostly tried a purely military strategy and were soundly defeated every time they raised their head, Kelsier plans to hit the Lord Ruler at the place where he's most vulnerable: his vaults of atium. As for the Lord Ruler himself, Kelsier claims to have a trump card: the so-called "Eleventh Metal", obtained on the edges of the world where even the Lord Ruler has no power. |
| 15 | |
| 16 | His plans look more prosperous when Kelsier's Misting brother detects Allomantic powers in a StreetUrchin named Vin. Unbeknownst to her, she--the unknown daughter of a high noble member of the clergy--''also'' has the power of a Mistborn, so Kelsier quickly recruits her and begins her training. With two Mistborn and the support of the underworld, the rebellion churns along at a pace it never has before, and slowly the populace begins to believe in them. |
| 17 | |
| 18 | Part HeroicFantasy, part [[TheCon heist novel]], ''Mistborn: The Final Empire'' is the first novel in Creator/BrandonSanderson's ''Mistborn'' trilogy. It was followed by ''The Well of Ascension'' and ''The Hero of Ages'', dealing with the return of the Deepness and the ramifications of bringing down a thousand-year empire. There is also a sidestory [=eBook=] (later published physically as well in a compilation book), ''Literature/MistbornSecretHistory'', which details several important events that all the characters were unaware of. Note that this sidestory is full of spoilers, to the point that the author suggests that people not read it until finishing the original trilogy, and possibly the first three books of the SequelSeries as well, on the first page. |
| 19 | |
| 20 | Sanderson has compiled lengthy annotations for each chapter of ''[[https://www.brandonsanderson.com/annotation-mistborn-introduction/ The Final Empire]]'', ''[[https://www.brandonsanderson.com/annotation-mistborn-2-title-page/ The Well of Ascension]]'', and ''[[https://www.brandonsanderson.com/annotation-mistborn-3-title-page/ Hero of Ages]]'' on his website detailing the development of the series and [[WordOfGod clarifying various plot points]]. Note that they're chock-full of {{spoiler}}s. |
| 21 | |
| 22 | See also ''Literature/{{Elantris}}'', ''Literature/{{Warbreaker}}'' and ''Literature/TheStormlightArchive'' for more books taking place in Literature/TheCosmere. Also see Literature/AlcatrazSeries, Creator/BrandonSanderson's humourous YA fantasy. |
| 23 | |
| 24 | This page is split into folders depending on which book each trope occurs in. Needless to say, the folders for books 2 and 3 have massive unmarked spoilers for the previous books. Moreover, '''there may also be misfiled or unhidden spoilers for later books, or the sequel series'''. Please fix them whenever possible. |
| 25 | |
| 26 | Please put character-related tropes to [[Characters/MistbornTheOriginalTrilogy the characters page]]. |
| 27 | |
| 28 | ---- |
| 29 | !!This series provides examples of: |
| 30 | [[foldercontrol]] |
| 31 | |
| 32 | [[folder:The Entire Trilogy]] |
| 33 | * AbilityMixing: |
| 34 | ** The second and third books explore duralumin, a metal not commonly known to have allomantic properties. When a Mistborn burns duralumin while burning another metal, duralumin causes them to use their entire reserve of the other metal at once, resulting in a spectacularly powerful output. However, Mistborn are the ''only'' Allomancers who can use it, since they're the only one who can burn other metals. ''Literature/WaxAndWayne'' notes that duralumin mistings are called "gnats," since their power is useless. |
| 35 | ** If someone is both an Allomancer and a Feruchemist, they can burn metals that they've Invested with Feruchemical power. Instead of the usual Allomantic effect, this releases a massive surge of the Feruchemical attribute (roughly ten times what the Feruchemist originally put in). [[spoiler: The Lord Ruler]] was ''very'' careful to keep the two powers separate to ensure that only [[spoiler: he and his Inquisitors]] could do this (and they could only do it using Hemalurgy to give them powers that they weren't born with). |
| 36 | * AbusiveParents: |
| 37 | ** Straff Venture. More emotional distance (though he is openly disparaging) than actual physical or mental abuse, but when push comes to shove it's quite clear that Straff considers his children nothing more than tools to bring him more power. [[spoiler:And then there's what he did to Zane...]] |
| 38 | ** Hell, nobles in general. They will often put their children through a severe beating in the hopes of making the child ''snap'' and awaken their allomantic potential. |
| 39 | ** Reen to Vin (as a substitute parental figure), as he beat her a lot during her childhood |
| 40 | * ActionGirl: Vin, after coming into her powers, takes Action Girl badassery up to eleven. |
| 41 | * AfterTheEnd: The books are set in a world that is very clearly post-apocalyptic. The third book reveals what happened. [[spoiler: Rashek was very, ''very'' bad at terraforming, creating new problems with each "solution" he made.]] |
| 42 | * AllThereInTheManual: A lot of things, even things mentioned in spoiler tags on this very page, are mentioned in Sanderson's liner notes on the website, or on forums etc. For instance, the name of the world, the name of [[spoiler:the god-metal which makes people into Mistborn]], etc. |
| 43 | * AlternativeCharacterInterpretation: Kelsier is subject to this in-universe. Is he a noble messiah fighting for his peoples' freedom, a vengeance-driven fiend, or a GloryHound fighting the Lord Ruler to become a legend? Different characters have different views, but the Kelsier the reader comes to know has elements of all three. |
| 44 | * AlwaysChaoticEvil: The Koloss, which are so violent they can't even be trusted around humans (or each other, really). This turns out to be a JustifiedTrope -- and the justification borders on nightmarish. |
| 45 | * TheAntiGod: Subverted. [[BigBad Ruin]] is initially presented as this to [[BigGood Preservation]], two gods who are complementary opposites and together created the world; when the balance is thrown off between them, bad things happen (in the books, the balance gets thrown too far Ruin's way, nearly leading to TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt). However, later works set in Literature/TheCosmere show that Ruin and Preservation themselves were only two fragments of a much more powerful god called Adonalsium- sixteen such fragments (called Shards) exist in total, and none of them can properly be called {{God}} or Anti-God. |
| 46 | * AnyoneCanDie: ''Countless'' unnamed skaa and nobles, in addition to cast members. In ''Mistborn: The Final Empire'', [[spoiler: Yeden and Kelsier die]]; in ''Well of Ascension'', [[spoiler: Clubs, Dockson, and Tindwyl die]]; in ''Hero of Ages'', [[spoiler:Elend and Vin die]]. |
| 47 | * ApocalypseHow: A type X, complete destruction of the planet, is [[spoiler:Ruin's]] immediate goal. [[spoiler:He's stopped with about [[NearVillainVictory an hour to spare]], though much of humanity had already started dying off]]. |
| 48 | * ArcNumber: Sixteen, though it mostly shows up in the last book. [[spoiler:Sixteen is hardcoded into the laws of physics by Preservation, as the number of metals with magical properties and the percentage of Mistings in the population, among other things]]. The heroes first take note of this oddity when they realize that [[spoiler: the number of people fallen ill in the mist is oddly precise...]]. |
| 49 | * ArcWords: |
| 50 | ** Kelsier's "There's always another secret". While the exact phrase doesn't come up ''that'' often, it's an excellent shorthand for everything going on in these books. |
| 51 | ** "Survive". |
| 52 | * AreTheseWiresImportant: The easiest way to kill an Inquisitor is [[spoiler:to pull out a single spike between their shoulder-blades]]. |
| 53 | * AristocratsAreEvil: Kelsier certainly thinks so, though the truth is a bit more complex; some nobles are truly evil (Straff), others are actually quite decent (Elend), still others are less sadistic but still ruthless (Cett), and most are completely disconnected from reality. |
| 54 | * AttackItsWeakPoint: The Lord Ruler deliberately built multiple weaknesses into the races he created via hemalurgy. The shared weakness are [[spoiler:emotional allomancy that will bring a Koloss, Inquisitor or Kandra under the allomancer's control]] and [[AreTheseWiresImportant removing their hemalurgic spikes]]. |
| 55 | * AuthorAvatar: Elend -- per WordOfGod, Sanderson shares in particular his fondness for reading at impolitic moments. |
| 56 | * AxeCrazy: Koloss, the Inquisitors. Drawing your power from Hemalurgy tends to leave you a little... homicidal. [[spoiler:Being that hemalurgy is Ruin's power, this is not an unfortunate side effect, but a built-in feature of hemalurgic spikes.]] |
| 57 | * BadassCape: All Mistborn; the standard attire is a "mistcloak" made up of many individual tassels, designed to make the wearer blend in with the mist while flying through the air. So ubiquitous that Zane's ''not'' wearing one is extremely distinctive. |
| 58 | * [[BadassNormal Badass Normals]]: Hazekillers who are normal people specially trained to take down allomancers,even Mistborn |
| 59 | * TheBadGuyWins: The whole premise of the series revolves around what would happen if the Hero won, but in the afterward became an EvilOverlord. [[spoiler:Though it's a bit more complicated than that. The bad guy did win, but he was the lesser of two evils, and possibly the good guy.]] |
| 60 | * BenevolentDictator: Elend, of the Final Empire. |
| 61 | * BigBad: [[spoiler:Ruin]] is the driving force behind the entire trilogy. |
| 62 | * {{BFS}}: The Koloss wield them, and Vin uses one to ''bisect'' [[spoiler:Straff Venture and his horse]] in one blow towards the end of ''The Well Of Ascension''. It was awesome. |
| 63 | * BlackAndGreyMorality: Almost everyone. Elend's major character development stems from him ''trying'' to be the White in BlackAndWhiteMorality, and realizing that this just doesn't work in the real world, especially when said world is currently ending. |
| 64 | * BlackMagic: [[spoiler:Hemalurgy. For each power you gain from it, you have to brutally murder someone and then ''physically nail a fragment of their soul to your own''. Not only that, but using it also grants [[DestroyerDeity Ruin]] a degree of power over you.]] |
| 65 | * BlessedWithSuck: |
| 66 | ** Many Misting Allomancers, who can burn exactly ''one'' random metal. After winning the genetic lottery, surviving a near-death experience and knowing enough to check, well you might be something cool like a Coinshot, Thug or Rioter, but odds are you (and your family, if you're noble) went through all of that for something that is some combination of likely to cause serious or fatal self harm, only useful in a coordinated team, or is worthless unless you're a full Mistborn. [[spoiler:Special prize to the atium Mistings, who have a fantastic combat ability no one can afford to test for and, moreover that the Lord Ruler has made sure no one knows exists. Then there are the aluminum and duralumin Mistings. Aluminum burns away any other metals you're carrying (pointless for everyone, except as a way for Inquistors to render Mistborn powerless), and duralumin gives a ''huge'' boost to any other metals being burned at the same time (useless if you can't actually burn any other metals.)]] |
| 67 | ** Averted with Mistings who can burn one of the eight basic metals. Much is made in the first book of Vin briefly studying with each member of the crew who can burn a specific metal, and learning how they have specialized with their powers to make them more effective than most full Mistborn, with access to all of them. Breeze (who Soothes emotions) talks at length about how to subtly manipulate people's emotions, and how the first step is being able to read emotions, so you know what you have to work with, while Marsh (who detects Allomancy) talks about how to read the different pulses to determine not only that someone is burning metals, but which ones, and even how strongly. Full Mistborn, meanwhile, tend to only specialise in one power or pair of powers, at the expense of all others -- for instance, Kelsier's brilliant with iron and steel. [[spoiler: It could be that Marsh's instruction is the most critical in the series, letting Vin realize that she can read Allomancy through "copperclouds," which normally prevent that, as well as allowing her to detect the Well of Ascension and trace the "mistspirit."]] |
| 68 | ** The Well of Ascension sounds like a sweet deal. On paper. [[spoiler:One option releases a force that wants to destroy the world. The other one makes it likely that ''you'' will destroy the world, since it confers limited duration omnipotence without omniscience and has no instruction manual. Oh, and the universe runs on real world physics.]] |
| 69 | * BoomerangBigot: |
| 70 | ** The crew, particularly Kelsier, are rather hateful toward nobles. Most of the crew are also part noble [[spoiler:(and in Breeze's case full noble)]] |
| 71 | ** [[spoiler:The Lord Ruler ''appears'' to be one once it's discovered that the being responsible for oppressing the Terris for a millenia is a Terrisman himself. It's later revealed that he wasn't being hateful so much as ruthlessly practical.]] |
| 72 | * BotheringByTheBook: [=OreSeur=] [[spoiler: and [=TenSoon=]]] are masters of this. Seems to be a rather common kandra trait, actually. |
| 73 | * BuildingSwing: Mistborn can perform a variant using their pseudo-magnetic pushing and pulling abilities. |
| 74 | * BrainwashedAndCrazy: Various people (and even races) throughout the books. Some more than others. |
| 75 | * BreakingSpeech: Ruin does this to Vin when she is [[spoiler:captured by Yomen]]. He tries to convince her that everything she has done over the last two and a half books has ultimately served his purposes. He even gives her a nickname -- "Beautiful Destroyer". |
| 76 | * BrutishCharacterBrutishWeapon: Huge, crude {{BFS}}es are the signature weapon of the Koloss -- giant, violent brutes first created as {{Living Weapon}}s. In the Final Empire, the swords double as population control; any Koloss without a sword will fight to the death to obtain one. |
| 77 | * CapeBusters: Many nobles employ Hazekillers, normal people trained specifically to fight Mistings. They can even fight Mistborn: Kelsier had trouble with half a dozen, and he's one of the best alive. Against someone like Vin and Zane though, [[OvershadowedByAwesome they don't have a chance]]. |
| 78 | * CardCarryingVillain: Subverted with Lord Cett, who is to all appearances an arrogant, self-confessed tyrant who doesn't give a damn about anyone other than himself. His bark, however, turns out to be ''much'' worse than his bite. |
| 79 | * CharacterDevelopment: Lots of it for everybody, but the Lord Ruler is the most notable case [[spoiler:because almost all of it happens after he's dead. As the reader learns his motivations and history he becomes almost an AntiVillain, or possibly even a Hero]]. |
| 80 | * ChekhovsGun: There are a truly ridiculous amount placed throughout the trilogy. And it's awesome. Here are just a few of them. |
| 81 | ** ''The Final Empire'', Chapter 38: [[spoiler:The Lord Ruler is Rashek, and his bracers are what gives him immortality.]] |
| 82 | ** ''The Well of Ascension'', Chapter 51: [[spoiler:The Well of Ascension is in Luthadel, not the Terris Dominance.]] |
| 83 | ** ''The Hero of Ages'', Chapter 52: [[spoiler:[=TenSoon=] uses Kelsier's bones to impersonate him and get the people out of Luthadel.]] |
| 84 | ** ''The Hero of Ages'', Chapter 63: [[spoiler:Atium is Ruin's body.]] |
| 85 | ** ''The Hero of Ages'', Chapter 66: [[spoiler:The Pits of Hathsin is the Kandra Homeland.]] |
| 86 | ** ''The Hero of Ages'', Chapter 70: |
| 87 | *** [[spoiler:The mists are Snapping people.]] |
| 88 | *** [[spoiler:There are 16 Allomantic metals.]] |
| 89 | ** ''The Hero of Ages'', Chapter 71: |
| 90 | *** [[spoiler:The Kandra have the Atium Cache.]] |
| 91 | *** [[spoiler:Early in ''Mistborn: The Final Empire'', Theron's plan relied on the Obligator boats being used to transport Ministry funds. It turns out that the boats were being used to transport Atium.]] |
| 92 | ** ''The Hero of Ages'', Chapter 72: |
| 93 | *** [[spoiler:Vin's earring is actually a Hemalurgic Spike, which allows her to pierce copperclouds. It also lets Ruin talk to her and prevents her from drawing on the power of the mists.]] |
| 94 | *** [[spoiler:When killing Goradel, Marsh notes blood-frenzying makes it harder for Ruin to control him. When he goes into blood-frenzy mode, he is able to regain control and pull out Vin's earring.]] |
| 95 | *** [[spoiler:Said confrontation with Goradel also gave Marsh the knowledge he needed to know to pull out the earring.]] |
| 96 | ** ''The Hero of Ages'', Chapter 81: [[spoiler:The Mistfallen are Atium Mistings.]] |
| 97 | ** ''The Hero of Ages'', Chapter 82: [[spoiler: Arguably the biggest one in the series. Sazed's metalminds contain ''all the knowledge of the Keepers through the last thousand years'', and his specialty of studying religion, several of which he'd talked about all the way back in the first book, become important at the end. The religion that focused on mapmaking let him remake the world as it was before the Lord Ruler, the religion that focused on poetry describing the natural world let him bring back the plants and animals, the religion focused on death taught him enough about human anatomy to undo the changes the Lord Ruler had made to them, and so on.]] |
| 98 | * TheChessmaster: Pretty much everyone, from [[spoiler:Ruin]] to Kelsier. But the ultimate Chessmaster crown definitely goes to [[spoiler:Preservation]]. |
| 99 | * {{Chickification}}: Averted. Vin ''does'' develop from a pure tomboy to having more feminine interests (namely formal dances and dresses), but she ''never'' stops being a badass -- if anything, she becomes more powerful as the series goes on, culminating in [[spoiler: defeating twelve Inquisitors at once before ''becoming a god''.]] |
| 100 | * TheChosenOne: The Hero of Ages, played with in many, ''many'' ways before everything is through. Pretty much fully deconstructed before it's all said and done. For most of the books, the Hero of Ages [[spoiler:was thought to be Vin but she was just a random convergence of factors that Ruin needed. Ruin just needed someone insane enough to influence (Vin's mother) who also had access to a Seeker (Vin's sister) and Mistborn (Vin). Ruin then tweaked the prophecies to fit Vin]]. Subverted at the end when [[spoiler:Sazed, a character who had been there since the beginning and actually believed Vin was the Hero of Ages, ended up being the chosen one]]. |
| 101 | * [[ColourCodedForYourConvenience Colour-Coded For Your Convenience]]: Things associated with [[spoiler:Preservation]] tend to be white; things associated with [[spoiler:Ruin]] tend to be black. And yes, this ''includes'' [[spoiler: Vin and Elend]]. |
| 102 | * CombatClairvoyance: Atium causes this, letting one see things a few seconds before they happen. It makes one almost invincible unless the opponent also has atium, in which case the fight ends up basically a stalemate until one Mistborn runs out. |
| 103 | * ConservationOfNinjutsu: Applies somewhat to the Koloss, and happens later but [[spoiler:is [[JustifiedTrope justified]] in Vin's fight against the 13 Inquisitors, due to her tapping into Preservation's power to superfuel her Allomancy once her Hemalurgic earring was taken out by Marsh.]] She was a hair's breadth from dying before that. |
| 104 | ** In the case of the Koloss, it's mostly because they're complete berserkers, fighting with no sense of unity or teamwork. Even a moderately disciplined force can hold their own against them if they gang up on individual Koloss. |
| 105 | * CorruptChurch: The Obligators are an interesting example, in that they're a religious body whose main concern is power in this world rather than honoring God -- but this is exactly what their god designed them to be in the first place, as he himself cared more about running an efficient empire than looking into the spiritual well-being of his people. They also have some overlap with ReligionOfEvil (because they form the backbone of a hellish totalitarian government) and PathOfInspiration (because their god really isn't a god, making the whole religion based on a deception). |
| 106 | * CosmicHorrorReveal: The entire first novel is spent with the protagonists struggling to overthrow the EvilOverlord, [[spoiler: only to discover that said EvilOverlord is personally holding back a nasty EldritchAbomination from destroying the world (though Ruin isn't fully revealed until ''Hero of Ages'', something definitely starts going seriously awry during the climax of ''Well of Ascension''). Though the Lord Ruler's last words, " You don't know what I do for mankind. I ''was'' your god, even if you couldn't see it. By killing me, you have doomed yourselves," certainly hint at it]]. |
| 107 | * CranialPlateAbility: The Steel Inquisitors have several metal spikes driven through their body, with their most striking feature being steel spikes driven through their eyes. This process allows them to use all of the core allomantic powers, even if they weren't a Mistborn to begin with. They're also immortal, with [[spoiler:Kelsier's younger brother-turned-inquisitor, Marsh, appearing in the sequel series to ''Mistborn'', which is set 341 years after the end of the original series]]. |
| 108 | * CrapsackWorld: And ''how''. |
| 109 | * CreepyCathedral: Kredik Shaw, the Lord Ruler's palace, is a massive, imposing, cathedral-like building that makes those near or inside it feel intense despair. |
| 110 | * CreepyMonotone: The Lord Ruler has one of these, owing to the general emotional detachment that comes from living for a thousand years [[spoiler:and Ruin messing with his head]]. |
| 111 | * CriminalFoundFamily: Kelsier's crew are practically family, and hold together long after [[spoiler:Kelsier's death]]. Former StreetUrchin Vin is fascinated because in her experience, most gangs [[DeckOfWildCards consist of backstabbers]], and the fact that they ''trust'' each other (and her) is intriguing enough to keep her from running out on their insanely dangerous plan. |
| 112 | * CurbStompBattle: Various throughout the series, most notably [[spoiler:Kelsier vs the Lord Ruler]] (which actually went exactly as planned for ''both'' sides) and [[spoiler:Vin's fight against the 13 Inquisitors at the end of ''Hero of Ages'']] (which flipped who was ''getting'' curb-stomped halfway through). |
| 113 | * DarkMagicalGirl: Vin has definitely got the personality. |
| 114 | * DarkMessiah: The Lord Ruler is a very successful one, though it helps that he [[spoiler: really did save the world]]. Kelsier is a heroic example -- he knows he's not really a god, but paints himself as one in order to [[spoiler:give the skaa something to believe in so they will rebel]]. In ''Hero of Ages'', [[spoiler:Ruin attempts to manipulate Spook]] into becoming one. |
| 115 | * DeadPersonImpersonation: Kandra are the masters of this. Of course, part of the point is that no one is supposed to realize that the person the kandra is impersonating ''is'' dead. [[spoiler: When a kandra does impersonate someone known to be dead, it's a major plot point.]] |
| 116 | * {{Deconstruction}}: Of a lot of HighFantasy tropes; WordOfGod is that Sanderson was aiming at deconstructing the EvilOverlord, ChosenOne prophecies, and TheHero in particular. By extension, this series is also an example of the DeconstructorFleet at work. To get into specifics: |
| 117 | ** The archetypal Evil Overlord is someone who is self-defeating by nature. Why on earth would any person want to rule over a total CrapsackWorld? Even the most insane of despots would be outed by their peers (as has happened many times throughout history), and the Lord Ruler puts none of his resources into actually improving the world in any meaningful way. As a matter of fact, he puts an unusual amount of effort into making things worse, such as by banning most religions. [[spoiler: As it turns out, this is because his hand has been forced -- he needs to be a total monster due to the presence of Ruin, who is both corrupting his mind and struggling to break free of his prison. Ruin's ability to edit text also means that he could freely manipulate people from within his cage, making the Lord Ruler's seemingly dystopic ruleset make a lot more sense.]] |
| 118 | ** The series deconstructs the Chosen One in three different ways. First, the central conceit is that there's really nothing stopping the chosen one from [[DarkMessiah taking over the world after he's done saving it.]] Second, [[spoiler: the "chosen one" is more like an arbitrary ruleset to adhere to rather than an individual person to be, meaning anyone can become the chosen one if they decide to take up the responsibility. Alendi was going to become the chosen one... which would end up freeing Ruin, so Rashek killed him and took his place to protect the world]]. Lastly, [[spoiler: the main character doesn't ''have'' to be the chosen one. The true Hero of Ages is not Vin, Elend, or Rashek- it's the humble Sazed, who embodies enough strength of will to be both Preservation ''and'' Ruin at the same time. He's the one who ends up saving the day in the end]]. |
| 119 | ** The Hero is someone who is good at rousing a team, fighting evil, and disturbing the unfair social order, like Kelsier. The hero is ''also'' someone who is good at manipulating other people, slaughtering those who defy them, and causing general chaos, also like Kelsier. The story discusses the fine line Kelsier walks between NominalHero and SociopathicHero, and the general air of unease around him hangs over much of the first book. [[spoiler: Come later Cosmere works, [[FaceHeelTurn he's even become an antagonist.]]]] |
| 120 | * DecoyBackstory: The trilogy starts out with a plot about the rebel heroes trying to overthrow [[EvilOverlord The Lord Ruler]], and the first novel of the series has each chapter begin with excerpts from the journal of Alendi, the man believed to have become him, who is a parody/pastiche of the stock brooding fantasy novel hero. The heroes, who read the journal, believe that Alendi [[FallenHero went bad]] after absorbing great power, as the journal ends right before he journeyed into the source of the power. There's a few references to a man named Rashek, who was enlisted as Alendi's guide and [[TheResenter clearly resented him]], and doesn't seem the most pleasant guy. [[spoiler:It is later revealed that Rashek killed Alendi and took the power himself, but then realizing he'd accidentally released the GodOfEvil, became nobler in his goals and tried to fix things (but due to the entities influence, created the hellish dystopia in which the series is set).]] |
| 121 | * DemocracyIsBad: The second and third books don't say that democracy is inherently bad, but rather that it is unsuitable in the particular situation[[note]]The [[GodEmperor Lord Ruler]] just got defeated after 1000 years of rule, TheEmpire is split up to multiple factions that each try to reconquer the entire territory[[/note]]. Elend, the idealistic nobleman, tries to establish a constitutional monarchy, giving each social class[[note]]nobility, commoners, and merchants[[/note]] an equal representation in the Assembly. As their capital city is besieged by multiple usurpers, the Assembly promptly dethrones Elend and is ready to surrender to the enemy who is known to be a ruthless ruler who would rule with an iron fist anyway. [[spoiler:At the end, Elend decides to become Emperor himself and reconquer the territories himself.]] |
| 122 | * DieOrFly: Allomantic abilities are awakened by being brought to the brink of death, assuming you have the right "spiritual genetics". This process is called "Snapping". |
| 123 | ** Which leads to the rather unpleasant practice of forced "Snapping" by noble houses. Most of them, at some point, undergo brutal torture and beating, administered at the orders of their own families, as they hope to beat them to the Snapping point manually. |
| 124 | * {{Epigraph}}: Each chapter is headed with one, taken from a document that exists in-universe and is read by the main characters. Interestingly, in each case they are presented in such a way that they're misleading at first glance but end up turning into AllThereInTheManual. |
| 125 | * EleventhHourSuperpower: Vin's ability to [[spoiler:draw on the mists, though she could have done it at any time if not for Ruin's counterinfluence]]. |
| 126 | * EliteMooks: Hazekillers and Koloss. |
| 127 | ** Hazekillers are specially-trained fighters who wield weapons and wear armor made of obsidian or wood, and they're all trained to fight off Allomancers. They're still pretty outclassed, especially against full Mistborn, but unlike regular troops, they can at least put up a fight. |
| 128 | ** Koloss are [[DumbMuscle large brutes]] that do not relent from fighting no matter the odds. |
| 129 | * EmotionBomb: |
| 130 | ** What happens when Vin combines duralumin with zinc or brass. Straff Venture describes the latter as feeling "as he imagined death would." |
| 131 | ** Similarly, the Lord Ruler uses an immensely powerful soothing to try and rob anyone near him of the will to resist him. It's normally ''very'' successful. |
| 132 | * EmotionControl: Zinc and brass allow an Allomancer to enhance or dampen emotions, respectively. Zinc Mistings are known as Rioters, and Brass Mistings are Soothers. Note that the Allomancer can't actually tell what emotions a person is feeling (aside from the normal methods), but with practice they can become very adept at knowing which emotions to adjust to get the desired effect. Breeze (one of the most skilled Soothers ever) and Allrianne (one of the most skilled Rioters we see) can achieve basically the ''exact same results'', even though their powers supposedly are exact opposites. Breeze dampens all but one emotion he wants the target(s) to feel, heightening that one emotion relative to the others, Allrianne carefully selects one emotion to Riot, making it more prominent than all the others. The end effect in both cases is basically the same. |
| 133 | * EstablishingCharacterMoment: the prologue tells you all you need to know about Kelsier - he’s kind and paternal but also entitled in his attitudes toward Skaa, he’s rebellious, and he has little regard for anyone he sees as being in his way. |
| 134 | * EvilIsSterile: While the god Ruin cannot create anything (as his name would suggest), neither can his opposite, Preservation. In order to create the first life on Scadrial, they had to work together. |
| 135 | * EvilVersusOblivion: [[spoiler:The Lord Ruler against Ruin. The readership winds up much more sympathetic to the Lord Ruler - at least he was trying to accomplish something ''constructive''.]] |
| 136 | * ExtremeSpeculativeStratification: The Skaa are a SlaveRace who make up most of the population, live in slums, and are regularly abused if not casually murdered by the nobility, who regard them as subhuman. |
| 137 | * EyeScream: The Steel Inquisitors. Each one has numerous spikes driven into his body, including his eyes, but they don't appear inconvenienced by it, even having superhuman vision despite having ''a pair of frigging spikes for eyes.'' |
| 138 | * FaceStealer: The Kandra, who are essentially smarter mistwraiths have to eat a person's bones to take on their form. Eating a body gives them an intimate knowledge of its structure and lets them imitate it; they also have to have the skeletons to provide any form of structure. |
| 139 | * TheFamine: One of the tools that Ruin, a [[PiecesOfGod Piece of God]] bent on causing the apocalypse, uses to try to purge the planet of life. He starts with irregular weather to ruin harvests, then escalates to [[spoiler:roving armies of mind-controlled {{Super Soldier}}s]]. |
| 140 | * FantasticDrug: Allomancy isn't addictive per se, but shows many symptoms similar to drug use. Pewter dragging is mentioned in the first book and is essentially a hangover from flaring pewter too long to avoid exhaustion--not unlike a super sized caffeine crash. Spook's overuse of flared tin in the third book plays this trope much straighter, with Spook becoming maladjusted to normal life and something of a recluse for awhile. |
| 141 | ** Played with in book 2, where Straff Venture mistakes the use of Atium for an addiction he can use to control Zane. Ironically, [[spoiler: Straff is himself addicted to a fantastic drug, and has been mistaking withdrawal for poisoning. The "antidote" is another dose, which conveniently removed his symptoms.]] |
| 142 | * FantasticUnderclass: Society in the Final Empire is divided into Nobles, who control all property and business (albeit at the Lord Ruler's suffrance); and Skaa, who have no legal rights and are either effectively chattel slaves or a criminal underclass. [[spoiler: They were engineered by the Lord Ruler from people who did not support his ascension, and the class divide starts to break down after his death.]] |
| 143 | * FantasyGunControl: [[JustifiedTrope Justified:]] The Lord Ruler was afraid of that guns would make rebellions easier (since gunmen require considerably less training than archers). So, he destroyed them all, killed those who knew how to make them, and then spent a millennium crushing human scientific progress to the point that everyone forgot they had ever existed and were unable to experiment to make more. |
| 144 | * FateWorseThanDeath: Kandra who break their Contracts are executed. Kandra who do something ''worse'' are thrown down wells and given just enough food to survive. Since they're immortal but can barely move at all without a set of bones, they ''always'' eventually go insane. |
| 145 | * FighterMageThief: The three types of hemalurgic creatures fall into these categories nicely: |
| 146 | ** Koloss are fighters, being extremely physically powerful combatants and serving as a fearsome part of the Lord Ruler's army. |
| 147 | ** Inquisitors are mages, having access to powerful allomantic and feruchemical abilities. |
| 148 | ** Kandra are thieves, able to disguise themselves as other beings and functioning as spies in the Final Empire. |
| 149 | * FillItWithFlowers: This was Mare's dream, although nobody in the setting had ever seen flowers. [[spoiler:When Sazed ascends to godhood, he makes her dream come true.]] |
| 150 | * FlightStrengthHeart: A Mistborn's varied abilities include SuperStrength, NotQuiteFlight, SuperSenses, and EmotionControl. They also have the abilities to wipe out their own metal reserves and to see what their lives might have been like if they'd made different choices, generally resulting in severe emotional trauma. |
| 151 | * FlyingBrick: Full Mistborn are essentially this, with NotQuiteFlight courtesy of iron and steel, SuperStrength and SuperToughness from pewter, and SuperSenses from tin. And that's before taking the other metals into account. |
| 152 | * ForcedAddiction: [[AristocratsAreEvil Straff Venture]] keeps an herbalist to treat his repeated poisonings by one of his {{Psycho Supporter}}s. In fact, the "treatment" is a highly addictive drug, the "poisoning" symptoms are the early stages of withdrawal, and the herbalist is waiting for the right time to let the withdrawal kill him. |
| 153 | * FromZeroToHero: |
| 154 | ** Sazed is a Terrisman, which means he is a born servant, meek and obedient, and castrated to boot. He becomes more and more important for the protagonists, until by the end of ''Hero of Ages'' [[spoiler: he becomes PhysicalGod and uses his extensive knowledge to save the world]]. |
| 155 | ** Vin is an street child, a literal [[SonOfAWhore Daughter of a Whore]], as her mother was a skaa prostitute. In ''Mistborn'' she defeats [[PhysicalGod Lord Ruler]], who has oppressed Scadrial for generations, which by itself would make her a hero. But that's only the beginning--by the end of ''Hero of Ages'' she [[spoiler: saves the world, kills a god and dies heroically in the process]]. |
| 156 | ** Spook is another skaa urchin, although at least he has a home. He is the youngest in Kelsier's crew (apart from Vin), speaks in an almost unintelligible street slang and while he has Allomantic abilities, they give him only heightened senses. This also makes him open to insidious whispers of the setting's BigBad Ruin but he finally comes to his senses and saves the people of Urteau. He is also LegendaryInTheSequel--in ''Literature/WaxAndWayne'' he is called Lord Mistborn and his street slang is treated like Latin in our world. |
| 157 | * FunctionalMagic: Not one, not two, but ''three'' entire separate-but-related systems. |
| 158 | ** Allomancy: An [[FunctionalMagic Inherent Gift]] type system. People are either born with the knack or they are not[[note]]Subverted once when [[spoiler: Elend becomes Mistborn by ingesting Lerasium near the Well of Ascension]][[/note]]. Allomancers can ingest and "burn" metal to allow a specific effect, from SuperSenses to manipulating emotions. "Mistings" can only burn one metal (and thus get one effect), while "Mistborn" can burn any/all of them. The abilities are loosely tied to popular knowledge of real-world uses of the metals involved, as well: |
| 159 | *** Iron and Steel are known to be magnetic, so their power is, respectively pulling and pushing toward the user |
| 160 | *** Tin was a common material in lamps and reflectors, so its use enhances the senses |
| 161 | *** Gold doesn't oxidize under most circumstances, so it's used in a form of postcognition |
| 162 | *** Chrome is used to harden steel (roughly) so its use destroys other metal powers |
| 163 | *** Pewter, being a lead-based alloy, allows the user to act as if they were denser than they are. |
| 164 | ** Feruchemy: Another [[FunctionalMagic Inherent Gift]] system. Feruchemists are [[spoiler:Terrismen]] who are born with a genetic knack. They store certain attributes in metal trinkets, which they later "tap" to boost that attribute. The attributes that can be stored depend on the material it's being stored in, and range from senses to various mental qualities (quickness of thought, emotional resiliency), to physical traits (like speed and strength, but also things like ''mass'' and ''age''). Storing and tapping things works on a 1:1 scale. When you store strength, you become weaker; if you store strength by becoming half as strong as normal for 10 minutes, then you can tap that strength later to become one and a half times as strong for 10 minutes -- or two times as strong for 5 minutes, etc. |
| 165 | ** Hemalurgy: A terrible form of [[FunctionalMagic pseudo-Equivalent Exchange]] BloodMagic, where a victim's abilities are permanently transferred into a recipient via [[spoiler:metal spikes used to impale both victim and recipient at certain points in their bodies. The victim is killed, but the recipient is unharmed by the spikes -- even if he ''should have been'', as with spikes through the brain or through the heart.]] Like allomancy and feruchemy, the attributes transferred are dependent on what materials are used. ''Unlike'' allomancy and feruchemy, hemalurgy can even [[spoiler:grant the recipient allomantic or feruchemical powers, though only from an allomancer or feruchemist "[[HumanSacrifice donor]]+", and only one attribute at a time]]. Also, there is a slight net loss of power, as the stolen attributes are slightly weaker than they were originally [[spoiler: which only increases the longer it is before the spike is inserted into the recipient, and every time it is removed and reinserted/reused outright]]. |
| 166 | *** [[spoiler:Hemalurgy is specifically designed to be a [[TheVerse Cosmere]] spanning in that it can interact with every magic system used in the Cosmere. [[WordOfGod Brandon Sanderson]] has given hints that we will see some of those interactions in future series.]] |
| 167 | * GambitPileup: Given that it spans ''all of creation'' and most of people influencing it are [[MyDeathIsJustTheBeginning dead well before their true impact is felt]], yes this trope is in effect. The ''shortest'' possible explanation is still a textwall covering at least five different instances of someone being OutGambitted: [[spoiler:Preservation out-gambits Ruin and seals him in the Well of Ascension, Kwaan out-gambits Ruin and has his nephew become the Lord Ruler by taking the power at the Well, Ruin out-gambits the Lord Ruler by having Vin kill him and release the power of the Well, the Lord Ruler ''retroactively'' out-gambits Ruin with the underground storehouses and the Kandra, Elend out-gambits Ruin by destroying all the Atium and dying which in turn gets Vin to sacrifice herself to finally kill Ruin which was Preservation's ultimate goal, which in turn finally allows Sazed to claim ''both'' the power of both Ruin and Preservation and become a single, new God, musing that the two powers were always meant to be used together and something caused them to split at some point]]. Whew! And that's just the ''general overview'', to properly explain the specifics and details would take... well, an entire novel trilogy. |
| 168 | * GenerationalMagicDecline: The fact that fewer and fewer Allomancers are being born is of great concern, and even those being born aren't as powerful as they once were. Mistborn are even rarer. By the time of the sequel series, ''Literature/WaxAndWayne'', Mistborn are regarded as half-mythical, and even "full" Feruchemists seem to have disappeared. But interbreeding between Terrismen and others have lead to Twinborn, those with one Allomantic and one Feruchemical power. |
| 169 | * GirlinessUpgrade: Throughout the trilogy Vin grows steadily both more feminine and more badass. |
| 170 | * GirlyGirl: Lady Allrianne Cett. Vin's first reaction to meeting her is basically "what was that pink thing that just flew past me?" |
| 171 | * GlassCannon: Coinshots (Mistings who can only telekinetically push against metal) are like this; as their name suggests, they can launch coins and other metal projectiles like bullets, making them incredibly dangerous at long range, but unlike a full Mistborn they're no better at surviving in close quarters than any other human. |
| 172 | * GlassWeapon: Glass knives are commonly used against Mistings and Mistborns as they can manipulate metal items. Why they didn't just use stone is not explained. |
| 173 | * TheGoodTheBadAndTheEvil: [[LaResistance Kelsier and the rebellion]] vs. [[EvilOverlord the Lord]] [[AntiVillain Ruler]] and TheEmpire vs. [[spoiler:[[OmnicidalManiac Ruin]]]] |
| 174 | * GrievousHarmWithABody: If you're a guard wearing a breastplate, the best you can hope for is to get casually tossed aside by a Mistborn. If you're ''not'' lucky, ''you're'' going to be the one tossing aside your comrades. The guards are at least GenreSavvy about this; they can detach their breastplates immediately if they realize they're up against an Allomancer or Mistborn. |
| 175 | * HealingFactor: Mistwraiths and Kandra can heal flesh wounds almost instantly, though they can't heal bones. Pewterarms and Mistborn heal faster than normal by burning pewter. Feruchemists can use gold to store health, and then use that as a healing factor when they need to. Inquisitors have a healing factor as well [[spoiler:(thanks to a hemalurgy spike giving them the power of gold feruchemists)]], and the Lord Ruler has this to an insane degree -- supposedly not even having him decapitated or burning him down to a skeleton was enough to kill him, though according to WordOfGod these incidents were exaggerated [[spoiler:(note however that he was a compounder for all metals, and gold compounding in the sequel Literature/TheAlloyOfLaw was shown to be extremely effective, up to regenerating a character's head after a shotgun blow to the face )]]. |
| 176 | * HeartIsAnAwesomePower: Feruchemical Atium, which lets the Feruchemist alter their age, is generally considered a pretty worthless power since you'd have to, for example, spend an equivalent amount of time old in order to make yourself young. [[spoiler:It's also the secret to the Lord Ruler's immortality- as a Compounder (hybrid allomancer/feruchemist) he was able to combine his abilities to create essentially a closed loop of infinite youth for himself]]. |
| 177 | ** Also emotional allomancy: while soothing or rioting the emotions of people can be very useful outside of combat, Brass and Zinc are mostly useless in a fight... [[spoiler: unless you use them to take control of koloss]]. |
| 178 | ** Electrum shows you things you could do in the future, which generally isn't that useful... except that burning it protects you against atium-users, who are otherwise all but impossible to beat without atium of your own. |
| 179 | ** [[spoiler: Ruin has the power to alter any written words not engraved in metal. Seems like a pretty lame power for a DestroyerDeity, right? Until he uses it to alter the prophecies so they tell the Hero to do ''the exact opposite'' of what's he supposed to do, releasing the SealedEvilInACan instead of keeping it contained.]] |
| 180 | * HighlyVisibleNinja: The Mistborn cloaks clearly identify them as such, however, considering how powerful Mistborn are, this acts as a signal to most people to stay the hell out of the way. They do also conceal a person's general form in the mists as their design resembles the mists' appearance and flows like them, making it harder to tell where exactly the wearer is in a fight. |
| 181 | * HourOfPower: [[spoiler:How the Well of Ascension's power works if one chooses to use it rather than release it; a few minutes of godlike power over everything but resurrection in the world of Scandrial. However, a few minutes for a human may as well be hours for a host of Preservation in terms of how much can be done and learned.]] |
| 182 | * HowDoIShotWeb: Happened to the Lord Ruler when he first got the power from the Well of Ascension. In his case, it was a rather bigger deal, as it was his [[spoiler:clumsy use of power that lead directly to the ash-covered brown-planted setting of the series]]. |
| 183 | ** The first book has several amusing scenes of Kelsier teaching Vin about Allomancy and being a Mistborn. In particular, after he teaches her the basics of steel and iron (blue lines that connect to sources of metal), but says he'll explain the rest later, Vin's suspicious nature gets the better of her. She experimentally "tugs" on one of the blue lines, and yips and ducks as a loose nail shoots at her chest. Kelsier simply muses "I should have expected you to do that," then proceeds to explain Ironpulling and Steelpushing to her. Still takes her a bit to figure it out, though. |
| 184 | * HulkingOut: A Feruchemist can do this for a very short period of time, if they have a lot of strength stored up. |
| 185 | * HumansAreSpecial: Humanity [[spoiler:contains power of both Ruin and Preservation]]. As a result, [[spoiler: humans can both protect and destroy, while Ruin and Preservation are limited to destruction and protection, respectively.]] This is ultimately what allows [[spoiler:Vin to destroy Ruin, as Preservation could not attack Ruin, but Vin, with Preservation's power, ''can''.]] [[TheChessmaster Exactly as planned.]] |
| 186 | * IAmTheNoun: Kelsier and later Vin in Mistborn: "I am Hope." |
| 187 | ** Unsurprisingly, Ruin gets in on it too. "I am mountains that crush. I am waves that crash. I am storms that scatter. I am the end. ...I am Ruin." |
| 188 | *** However, Ruin does it differently from the other two...because he's not boasting. He [[AnthropomorphicPersonification is]] those things. |
| 189 | * ImaginaryEnemy: Vin always hears the memories of her long-gone brother Reen telling her she can't trust anybody. [[spoiler:It turns out that the voice she hears is neither imaginary nor her brother.]] |
| 190 | * ImplacableMan: The Inquisitors and the Lord Ruler. |
| 191 | * ImprobableWeaponUser: Coins are a commpon weapon used by Mistborn and steel-burning Allomancers. They're common enough that steel-burners are referred to as "Coinshots." |
| 192 | ** Coins are so ubiquitous a tool among Allomancers that Vin comments to herself at one point that it's easy to forget that to some people, coins are for buying things. |
| 193 | * ImprovisedWeapon: For an Allomancer, anything made of metal can be a deadly weapon. In an early scene, Kelsier kills several men with a paperweight. One of the most amusing and versatile weapons they can use are guards - or rather, guards' breastplates. |
| 194 | * InformedAbility: Every time Hazekillers are introduced, the author reminds us that they are "trained to fight Allomancers". The reason behind the repetition is probably that, given that Hazekillers routinely get their asses handed over to them when they fight one of the main characters, the reader might need to be reminded that they are actually supposed to be better than that (and indeed are noted to be very effective against Mistings, but the protagonists who fight them are all Mistborn). |
| 195 | * InPlaceOfAnEye: The Empire makes Steel Inquisitors by enchanting a set of hemalurgic spikes through multiple {{Targeted Human Sacrifice}}s and hammering them into the candidate's body at specific points, most prominently through the eyes. Fortunately for them, the powers include a replacement sense of sight. |
| 196 | * InsecureLoveInterest: A double example. Vin thinks she's too BookDumb and violent for Elend; Elend feels he's too much of a passive screwup for Vin. |
| 197 | * InterfaceScrew: [[spoiler:Ruin's ability to manipulate texts that aren't written in metal is an in-universe case]]. |
| 198 | * ItWasHereISwear: Sort of. [[spoiler:Ruin slowly changed the wording of the prophecies about the Hero of Ages to mislead people into [[UnwittingPawn doing what he wanted]]. The only recordings he can't change are memories in someone's head or writing engraved in metal, so the only one to notice was one person with a PhotographicMemory]]. |
| 199 | * KillAndReplace: How Kandra operate, by necessity. Oddly, they're also bound by ThouShallNotKill, so they have to get someone else to do the actual killing. |
| 200 | * LamarckWasRight: Allomancy is heritable, though the original Mistborn became that way through AppliedPhlebotinum. However, it's somewhat debatable if this trope applies since [[AppliedPhlebotinum Lerasium]] changes your SPIRITUAL genetics rather than your physical genetics. |
| 201 | * LiquidAssets: Around half of Feruchemy is this (although the new powers in ''Literature/WaxAndWayne'' reduce this proportion to something more like a quarter). Store or tap weight, physical strength (causing your muscles to deflate or bulge), health, age... |
| 202 | * MagicAIsMagicA: All three magic systems are thoroughly logical and internally self-consistent. |
| 203 | ** To the point where fans figured out the magical effects of certain metals after the series was over, even though those metals had never been used during the story and it wasn't explained in appendices, just by filling in the gaps in relationships between established ones. |
| 204 | ** The Allomantic external pushing and pulling powers are a very down-to-earth version. People who burn iron or steel can push or pull on metal objects (two separate powers; only Mistborn have them both). The force goes either straight toward or straight out from their own body, and it allows very little fine control (making stunts like a BulletCatch or forcing one person to shoot another like Magneto does exceedingly difficult). Finally, if the metal object is strongly anchored or heavier than the person doing the pushing or pulling, then the person will be moved, not the metal object (unless they're also pushing or pulling on something even heavier or more strongly anchored on the other side of them). These abilities can still be used in lots of impressive ways, but they require a lot more care and thought than similar powers do in other settings, and many uses of SelectiveMagnetism are completely impossible. |
| 205 | * MagnetismManipulation: The titular Mistborn can Push and Pull on metal of any sort (whether or not it's magnetic) by burning steel or iron respectively. Pushing metals causes them to fly directly away from the protagonist's center of mass (or causes the protagonist to fly away from the metal if the piece of metal is large or being pushed against something large and unyielding), while iron causes the metal to fly towards the protagonist or the protagonist to fly towards the metal (subject to the same limitations). |
| 206 | * TheMagocracy: Kinda-sorta. The ruling class can inherit Allomancy, while the commoners shouldn't be able to. But not all of the nobles have such powers, nor are all of the commoners without (due to nobles not killing their commoner lovers/prostitutes like they're supposed to). |
| 207 | * ManBehindTheMan: [[spoiler:Ruin. Preservation ended up being the Man Behind the Man Behind the Man]]. |
| 208 | * ManipulativeBastard: Breeze is something of a subversion -- he loves manipulating people (and the fact that he's a Soother helps), but he's not malicious about it, being a JerkWithAHeartOfGold, and often winds up using his skills to help people. |
| 209 | ** He seems to play it straight when he's first introduced, using his power for petty things like making Vin want to fix him a drink. He even flat out says that he the point of life is to get other people to do things for you. It's not until the second book, when he becomes a viewpoint character, and we see him do things like sooth the anxiousness in some guards for no reason that benefits him, that we see his HiddenDepths. |
| 210 | * MedievalStasis: The Lord Ruler deliberately suppressed scientific and technological progress, in order to maintain stability in the land and to protect himself from guns. |
| 211 | * MessianicArchetype: Lots of characters play around with this trope -- [[TragicHero Alendi]] was one in the backstory, [[EvilOverlord the Lord Ruler]] presented himself as one, [[MagnificentBastard Kelsier]] deliberately became one to the skaa so they would have something to believe in that was powerful enough to cause them to rebel, and for much of the last two books [[TheHero Vin]] acts as one. [[spoiler:But the series' real messiah turns out to be [[BadassBookworm Sazed]].]] |
| 212 | * MetaPower: The four enhancement metals: aluminum (erases all the burner's metal reserves), duralumin (when burned simultaneously with another metal, consumes the entirety of the other metal for a massively amplified effect), chromium (as aluminum, but affects someone you were touching rather than yourself), and nicrosil (as duralumin, but affects someone you were touching rather than yourself). There is also Lerasium, which if burned by a non-Allomancer permanently makes them Mistborn. |
| 213 | * MoralityKitchenSink: [[TheWisePrince Elend]], [[ActionGirl Vin]], [[BadassBookworm Sazed]], [[WarriorPoet Ham]], etc. on one end, characters such as [[GuileHero Kelsier]], [[NobleBigot Dockson]], Breeze, [[spoiler:[[IFightForTheStrongestSide Cett]], [[IDidWhatIHadToDo Rashek]], and Yomen]] falling somewhere in the middle, and [[spoiler: [[DestroyerDeity Ruin]]]] as an almost irredeemable force for evil. |
| 214 | * {{Mordor}}: Pretty much the whole world. It's not as barren as some examples, but the sun is still red, what plants that survive are drab and colorless, and thanks to a chain of volcanoes the sky is covered in perpetual clouds of smoke and ash. [[spoiler: And then in the third book ''it gets worse'']]. Notable in that this world's Mordor-like appearance [[spoiler: is actually the result of the Lord Ruler doing his best to save it, but not being able to really control and fine-tune the awesome power of a god. Each facet is the result of him trying to fix one problem, which creates another, which he then has to fix, which creates yet another, and so on. . . all in the span of about two minutes.]] |
| 215 | * MundaneMadeAwesome: According to WordOfGod, Hemalurgy was inspired by ''acupuncture''. |
| 216 | * NobleTongue: The Latin-like High Imperial. |
| 217 | * NoGuyWantsAnAmazon: Averted by [[spoiler:Elend's]] relationship with the Mistborn Vin. Doesn't stop her from worrying about it, though. |
| 218 | * NonActionGuy: |
| 219 | ** Elend in the first two books [[spoiler:[[TookALevelInBadass but not in ''Hero of Ages''.]]]] |
| 220 | ** Also Spook, to a degree. Though he's pretty tough, having grown up on the streets, the fact that he's a Tineye means he can't really compete with most of the other characters on a physical level and knows better than to try. [[spoiler: He also Takes A Level In Badass in ''Hero of Ages''.]] |
| 221 | * NiceJobBreakingItHero: Multiple examples across the whole trilogy, thanks to the GambitPileup going on. [[spoiler:It finally turns out that, from a thousand years in the past to everything up to the end, the entire series, including the post-apocalyptic setting, was the result of good people trying to do good things and getting screwed over.]] |
| 222 | * NotQuiteFlight: Mistborn can damn near fly by Pushing and Pulling and metals just right; Vin invents a technique allowing her to cross distances extremely rapidly by juggling mid-sized metal pieces, such as a few horseshoes. |
| 223 | * NotSoDifferentRemark: Zane's pitch to Vin, [[spoiler:which is much more correct than he knows, down to Ruin poking them.]] Lampshaded in ''The Hero of Ages'' with Emperor Elend Venture, ''second'' Emperor of the Final Empire, whose [[spoiler:newfound undiluted Allomancy]], extreme pressure and desire to protect his subjects and save the world leads him to change from a wannabe democrat to someone mistaken for The Lord Ruler in a matter of two years. His response? "Close enough." [[spoiler:The Lord Ruler after all having been a well-meaning human at the start as well, and gone to ''extreme'' lengths to prepare for the same apocalypse Elend is confronting.]] |
| 224 | * NumerologicalMotif: An in-universe example, but [[spoiler:the number sixteen has a nasty habit of showing up a lot. Especially in the third book.]] The most obvious example of this motif is [[spoiler:Allomancy, which is organized into four sets of four related metals.]] |
| 225 | ** [[spoiler:And it's not just Allomancy, either. Those 16 metals have uses in all three systems (we just don't know all of them until ''Literature/WaxAndWayne''). Also, exactly 16 percent of people exposed to the Mists during book 3 fall ill, and they "snap" and become Mistings. 1/16 of ''those'' fell ill far longer than others (for exactly 16 days, in fact), and they become ''Atium'' Mistings. It's explained that the number 16 was used as Preservation's way of showing that he was giving them a hand after he died, basically a big sign saying "this number is not natural, pay attention when it comes up!"]] |
| 226 | * OffingTheOffspring: It's revealed towards the end of the first book that [[spoiler:Straff Venture is conspiring with House Elariel to have Elend assassinated, though Vin finds out and foils the attempt in the nick of time. In the second book Straff also attempts to kill his bastard son Zane, deeming him too dangerous and out of control]]. |
| 227 | * ObviouslyEvil: Just about everything to do with hemalurgy. It's the purest BlackMagic in the setting, revolving around death and theft. Furthermore, the creatures it creates--eyeless Inquisitors, bodysnatching Kandra, and insane giants of the Koloss--are inherently sinister. |
| 228 | * OhMyGods: |
| 229 | ** "Lord Ruler!" -- Most people (including several of Kelsier's crew. The implications of swearing by the name of a man you intend to overthrow are bought up a couple times in the first book.) |
| 230 | ** By (all) the forgotten gods! -- Keepers |
| 231 | * OneGenderRace: The Koloss are all male. [[spoiler:Because they're an artificially created race and don't reproduce naturally, this is not an issue for them.]] |
| 232 | * OneManArmy: Invoked by Ham in the second book: "A Mistborn... well, they're like an army in one person." Also invoked by Elend in the third book: |
| 233 | -->''(talking to a local besieged by Koloss, pointing to Vin dropping from the sky)'': The first of those armies I promised you. |
| 234 | * OneSteveLimit: To the point that when Vin tells people just someone's given name in ''The Final Empire'', they immediately know who she is talking about, even if she doesn't. |
| 235 | * OnlyOneName: Skaa traditionally do not have surnames, though nobles do. Upon the fall of the Final Empire, some NouveauRiche skaa take them up, or are given the opportunity to do so through being selected as a member of a new noble class for the New Empire. |
| 236 | * OrphansPlotTrinket: Vin's earring, given to her by her mother when she killed Vin's younger sister. [[spoiler:Also, it's a hemalurgic spike that Ruin uses to talk to her and is the method by which Vin's bronze allomantic power is strong enough to pierce copperclouds.]] A slight subversion since [[spoiler:rather than learning to unlock its mysteries she mostly needs to learn to get rid of it!]] |
| 237 | * OurOrcsAreDifferent: Koloss, which are actually [[spoiler:humans who have been transformed into monsters by careful application of hemalurgy]]. |
| 238 | * OutGambitted: Several times. Notably, the Lord Ruler is OutGambitted by Kelsier, [[spoiler:everybody trying to find/be the Hero of Ages was OutGambitted by Ruin, and Ruin himself was OutGambitted by Preservation]]. |
| 239 | * PersonOfMassDestruction: Mistborn are generally treated with the same degree of respect as a tactical missile strike. This goes double for Vin. |
| 240 | * PiecesOfGod: Humanity's sentience is explained by each human having [[spoiler:a minute fraction of Preservation's power in them]]. Both [[spoiler:Preservation and Ruin]] are, in turn, actual pieces of God, which is relevant in the grander scheme of Sanderson's multiverse. |
| 241 | * PintsizedPowerhouse: Vin stands "barely over five feet tall." Don't let her size fool you. Her small size can be an advantage to her strength in that she is packing all the extra strength of a pewter burner into a smaller body, giving her a larger relative output. |
| 242 | * PlanetOfHats: According to the annotations for Chapter 78 of ''Hero of Ages'' found on his website, Brandon Sanderson deliberately tried to avoid this trope, specifically citing how boring OurDwarvesAreAllTheSame gets after a while. Lampshaded by Sazed in that same chapter when he says, referring to [[spoiler:[=TenSoon=]]]: "There is a [[spoiler:Kandra]] who fits in with his people as poorly as I do with my own." |
| 243 | * PlanetaryRelocation: When using the power at the Well of Ascension, [[spoiler:the Lord Ruler attempted to destroy the Deepness by moving Scadrial closer to its sun and burning away the mists. This unfortunately caused the planet to overheat, so - since he had no reference for where the planet should be - he moved it into a wider orbit which made it too cold, and then back into the too-close orbit where he settled with creating the ashmounts and other adaptations to the heat to maintain life on the planet.]] At the end of the trilogy, [[spoiler:Sazed takes up the Shards of Ruin and Preservation, using the knowledge from his metalminds he is able to revert the changes Rashek made and return the planet to its correct orbit.]] |
| 244 | * PostAdventureAdventure: The backstory was started by the Hero of Ages destroying an evil entity called The Deepness (at great cost to the world). Unfortunately, his StandardHeroReward seemingly got to his head and he became a tyrant, setting the scene for the story of the rebels looking to overthrow him. |
| 245 | * PowerOfTrust: A major theme throughout the entire series generally, but especially with regards to Vin's CharacterDevelopment. |
| 246 | * PoweredByAForsakenChild: ''Hemalurgy''. [[spoiler:Sometimes literally, as is the case with Vin's earring, made from her baby sister's soul]]. |
| 247 | * PowerParasite: Called Hemalurgy. By killing a person with a metal spike and implanting that spike in your own body, you can steal one Allomantic, Feruchemic, or human power from them. Some Hemalurgists, like the Steel Inquisitors, might have up to twenty spikes. |
| 248 | * ProphecyTwist: The Terris prophecy of the Hero of Ages uses a gender neutral pronoun to refer to the Hero, which Sazed takes to mean the Hero could be male ''or'' female, allowing for Vin to be the one. [[spoiler:It actually refers to Sazed himself, who as a eunuch since infancy is considered, in-universe, "gender neutral" himself.]] |
| 249 | * PropheticFallacy: [[spoiler:Ruin has been changing the wording of the prophecies about the Hero of Ages in order to make them do the exact opposite of what they're supposed to]]. |
| 250 | * ProudWarriorRaceGuy: The Koloss can be seen as a parody of this. The entire race has only two modes -- apathetic (when they just lie around in apparent boredom) and homicidal (when they try and kill anything within reach, including other Koloss if they can't get anything else). The only reason the Lord Ruler was able to use them as shock troops was [[spoiler: because he knew an allomantic trick that let him control their minds]]. Notably, one Koloss will suddenly violently attack another, and the two fight to the death. If the attacker wins, he only has to provide ''some'' kind of justification ([[DisproportionateRetribution even something as flimsy as "he looked at me funny"]]) and none of the other Koloss will care -- this also applies to a human attacking a Koloss. |
| 251 | * PstandardPsychicPstance: [[DefiedTrope Defied]]. During training, Kelsier tells Vin not to do this, because Allomancy requires no physical movement. As most allomancy battles are based around tricking the opponent, making pushing motions while Pushing is inadvisable. |
| 252 | * RankScalesWithAsskicking: {{Averted|Trope}}. Though the Lord Ruler is a PhysicalGod, the most powerful nobles [[spoiler:after his death]] are a [[SuperSenses Tineye]] and a man who is not only not a Misting (much less a Mistborn) but also ''paraplegic''. |
| 253 | * RealIsBrown: Since the sky is covered by ash from Ash Mounts and there are frequent ash falls, everything is brown and gray, as plants have adapted to the limited light spectrum. That is why Mare's picture of a red flower stands out so much. |
| 254 | * RegionalRedecoration: The world of Scadrial has had a couple, courtesy of an artifact that bestows the power of a [[PiecesOfGod Piece of God]] for a few seconds every millennium: |
| 255 | ** In the Lord Ruler's Ascension, he [[spoiler: moved his home country's mountain ranges, just to hide the evidence of his Ascension, and]] raised the {{Mordor}}-esque volcanoes that cover his Empire in ash. |
| 256 | ** [[spoiler: In the Final Ascension of Sazed, he fixes the damage the Lord Ruler caused the planet and creates a perfectly fertile river basin to nurture the new civilization.]] |
| 257 | * RequiredSecondaryPowers: Played straight and discussed with Allomancy, as Kelsier explains to Vin that Allomancers can swallow metals to fuel their powers without any fear of metal poisoning. However, he clarifies that that only applies to specific pure elements and alloys; if, for example, a Mistborn eats pewter that's not alloyed to the Allomancy-grade ratio of 91% tin and 9% lead, the outcome always ends quite nastily. The immunity to poisoning also seems to only apply if the Allomancer burns the metal, as it's generally considered advisable to burn up any metal you haven't already after a few hours. Also applies to Allomantic powers themselves, for instance, burning pewter not only increases strength and reflexes, but also makes the body more durable in order to handle the increased strength without tearing itself apart. Burning atium not only allows the Allomancer to see the immediate future, but also lets them process and react to that information almost instinctively. |
| 258 | * TheRevolutionWillNotBeVilified: Averted. Though the main characters in the first book are all rebels, plenty of people outside their group think they're evil (or just plain stupid), Kelsier's motives are heavily implied to be as much or more about glory and revenge than helping people, and there is even questioning in the second book about whether [[spoiler:killing the Lord Ruler]] was really a good thing for the world. |
| 259 | * RewatchBonus: A good deal of fun can be had by rereading ''Mistborn'' and ''The Well of Ascension'' after finishing ''The Hero of Ages''. Sanderson lays a lot of groundwork for late-game reveals to happen fairly early on in the story. |
| 260 | ** [[spoiler: The entire third magic system, Hemalurgy, is hinted at several times before it becomes relevant to the plot of ''The Hero of Ages''. Examples include the brief aside we get from the perspective of a Steel Inquisitor at the end of the first book as well as Zane's mysterious spike embedded in his chest. The fact that Kandra and Koloss can also be directly controlled via Soothing and Rioting also implies that they are made with similar methods -- an observation that comes true later.]] |
| 261 | ** Exactly what Steel Inquisitors are, and how they're made, are obliquely foreshadowed a few times throughout the first two books. In particular, [[spoiler: Marsh's apparent death is a huge hint. The room where he was supposedly killed is filled with carnage, and the narration makes mention of the sizeable amount of blood making it seem like multiple people died in that room. It turns out, multiple people ''did'' die in that room, as multiple sacrifices are necessary to turn someone into an Inquisitor. Sazed visiting one of their compounds early into ''Well of Ascension'' and finding an entire room of dead bodies also shows that they're [[OhCrap replenishing their numbers.]]]] |
| 262 | ** At the beginning of each chapter, a quote from an in-universe text can be read on the header. If you're paying ''very'' close attention, [[spoiler: one can see that the header versions of the text differ from the ones the characters in-universe are reading very slightly. This shows that Ruin's influence has been going on for a while.]] |
| 263 | ** During ''Well of Ascension'', Vin gets into a contractual relationship with a Kandra named [=OreSeur=]. [[spoiler: After [=OreSeur=] is canonically killed and replaced by [=TenSoon=], one may notice several key differences between the two. [=OreSeur=] is much more overtly mean and cynical, while [=TenSoon=] is more somber. While [=OreSeur=] keeps Vin at arm's length, [=TenSoon=] seems to sympathize with her. The biggest hint you get that [=OreSeur=] has been replaced is that Vin brings up some small details to him about events he was there for, and he expresses confusion about them. Vin chalks it up to a number of different factors, but in hindsight, it shows that [=TenSoon=]'s impersonation is not nearly as foolproof as he proclaims it to be.]] |
| 264 | ** It becomes increasingly obvious in hindsight that [[spoiler: Sazed is the real Hero of Ages all along, as numerous elements of the prophecy speak about him instead of Vin. Sazed was rejected by his people but ends up saving them, is not a warrior but fights to protect his allies, was not born a king but became one through action, and bears the future of the world on his arms ''literally'' as Feruchemical bands.]] |
| 265 | * RoofHopping: How Mistborn usually get about cities when they are pushing/pulling on metals. |
| 266 | * SchizoTech: Armies fight with medieval weaponry and the land is worked by state-owned slaves, but there are also canning factories and mills, and large canals stretch across the Final Empire. On a more individual level, people carry pocketwatches, a technology that wasn't developed until well after the Renaissance. Justified because the Lord Ruler purposefully suppressed technological advances that could become a danger for his rule, such as gunpowder. He had good reason to develop canneries, instead: [[spoiler: to store large quantities of food in underground shelters where humanity could hide from Ruin's destruction]] and presumably he considered things like pocketwatches to be harmless. |
| 267 | * ScienceIsBad: Averted pretty nicely, in that one of the reasons they need to defeat the Lord Ruler is that he is choking the world's development -- technology, fashion, and even language have barely changed in the thousand years of his rule. |
| 268 | * ScryVsScry: Atium vs. Atium. Notably in [[spoiler: Vin's duel to the death with Zane]]. Atium normally gives you the ability to see a couple seconds into the future, causing you to see ghostly images of something happening shortly before it happens for real; when two Mistborn burning Atium engage, though, the ability gets scrambled. In the third book it's revealed that [[spoiler:electrum has a similar effect, allowing you to see your own future, where Atium shows that of everything else. It's less useful because it auto-scrambles, but it can counter Atium and is much easier to acquire.]] |
| 269 | * SealedEvilInASixPack: There's a rather complicated version of this with [[spoiler:[[AnthropomorphicPersonification Ruin and Preservation]]]]. |
| 270 | * SlasherSmile: The Inquisitors have these. Kelsier's smile might be considered this too, at least from the point of view of the nobility. |
| 271 | * SlidingScaleOfIdealismVersusCynicism: The characters tend to start out at the extreme ends of the scale and gravatate towards the middle as they're given more CharacterDevelopment. The extremely idealistic Elend gets a large dose of reality, and the super-cynical, street-savvy Vin eventually learns to trust others. The series itself has traits from both ends, putting it somewhere in the middle. |
| 272 | * SoulFragment: [[spoiler:The Hemalurgic spikes which empower the inquisitors, koloss, and kandra (and possibly the Lord Ruler) are created from a piece of metal used to kill someone. They retain some kind of strength or ability from the victim, as well as a part of their soul.]] |
| 273 | * SpiritAdvisor: Reen's voice in the first book, and the trope is played with in the other two. |
| 274 | * StartOfDarkness: The Lord Ruler's gets explored, [[spoiler:though the one we're initially led to believe was his was actually someone else's]]. |
| 275 | * SuicidePact: [[spoiler:The Kandra]] are bound by one as part of a {{plan}} from [[spoiler:The Lord Ruler]]. |
| 276 | * SupernaturalSensitivity: A Misting who can burn bronze (known as a "Seeker") can detect Allomancy, but a Misting burning copper (a "Smoker") can hide it. [[spoiler:Copperclouds aren't a perfect form of defense, though, because under certain rare circumstances, a Seeker can punch through them and find you anyway.]] |
| 277 | * SuperReflexes: Available by burning Atium, in the form of getting to see what your opponent is going to do seconds before they do it and being able to react accordingly. To a lesser extent, burning pewter increases ''all'' of your physical abilities, including speed, reflexes, agility, and balance. |
| 278 | * SuperSenses: Tin grants this, as well as allowing one to see through the pervasive mists to the stars above (which is noted to not just be a factor of enhanced sight, as mist should be just as much of an obstruction to super-acute as to regular vision). |
| 279 | * SuperStrength: Pewter grants this, along with limited SuperSpeed and a minor HealingFactor. |
| 280 | * TerritorialSmurfette: Vin's reaction to meeting Allrianne who, aside from Tindwyl (who is significantly older than the two and always on the outside of their little team), is the only other female character of any real consequence. She's not particularly fond of any other female characters that she meet either. |
| 281 | * ThouShaltNotKill: The Kandras' own law forbids them from killing humans. Those who break it are confined for life. Importantly, [[spoiler:it does not -- at least explicitly -- extend to a Kandra killing another Kandra, which makes for an important [[TheReveal reveal]] late in the second book. Whether this particular point needs to be expressly stated in their laws, and what legal precedents it might set, are discussed early in the third book.]] |
| 282 | * ThousandYearReign: The Final Empire. |
| 283 | * TomboyAndGirlyGirl: Vin is almost this ensemble in one person, considering the disparity between her [[ProperLady noblewoman]] and Mistborn personas [[spoiler:which she eventually comes to terms with]]. A more traditional example happens in the second book, whenever Vin and Allrianne interact. |
| 284 | -->'''Vin:''' We went ''shopping'', Allrianne. ''Once''. |
| 285 | -->'''Allrianne:''' I know. That makes us practically sisters! |
| 286 | -->''Vin {{facepalm}}s'' |
| 287 | * TraumaticSuperpowerAwakening: Allomancers must "snap" in order to awaken to their powers. Mostly this is physical trauma, as enforced by parents beating their children severely, but can also happen emotionally, as with Kelsier seeing his wife's death. |
| 288 | * {{Troperiffic}}: Just look at the rest of the page. Sanderson loves using lots of recognizable tropes and then either subverting them, deconstructing them, or just playing them straight in cool ways. |
| 289 | * TrueCompanions: Kelsier's crew, much to Vin's initial amazement. |
| 290 | * UnintelligibleAccent: Spook is a street urchin who speaks with such heavily accented street cant that the rest of the crew barely understands him. Half the reason for it is that he is a kid who feels out of his element with the rest of the (much older) crew and does it on purpose. By book three he has mostly grown out of it. |
| 291 | * {{Unobtainium}}: Atium and its alloy are fictional metals used in magic. It becomes rarer as the series goes on, due to [[spoiler:the destruction of the Pits of Hathsin, the only place they are mined]]. |
| 292 | * UnskilledButStrong: The Koloss rely on brute strength and sheer numbers to defeat their enemies. [[spoiler:Elend as a Mistborn]] also falls under this trope. |
| 293 | * UnwittingPawn: Pretty much everyone at one point or another. |
| 294 | * VerbalTic: When Sazed offers an observation or opinion, he almost always ends the sentence with "I think". As in "the building is burning down, so we should be leaving, I think". Elend starts with "now, see" whenever he's trying to be forceful or persuasive, which has the unfortunate effect of making him ''less'' so, though Tindwyl cures him of this eventually. |
| 295 | ** Tindwyl also says "I think" sometimes. Either this is a common trait of Terris people, or she picked it up from Sazed when she was his student. |
| 296 | * VitriolicBestBuds: The refined Soother Breeze and the easygoing Thug Ham are always sniping at each other, but place great value on their friendship. They also have the PunnyName "Ham and Breeze" ("ham and cheese"). |
| 297 | * VoluntaryShapeshifting: The Kandra, which can turn themselves into anything with a few restrictions -- they can't produce a rigid skeleton of their own, and they can't reproduce an individual's features exactly without digesting them first to see how all the pieces go together. |
| 298 | * WasOnceAMan: The Steel Inquisitors. [[spoiler:Also the Koloss and the original Kandra]]. |
| 299 | * WeakButSkilled: Sazed, who is a force to be reckoned with when he gets creative with his Feruchemical abilities even though he can't match Mistborn or Steel Inquisitors in raw power. [[spoiler:For long, that is; one of the tradeoffs of Feruchemy is that all the power has to be paid for, in advance, by the user... but he can use as much of what he's stored up as he wants, as fast as he wants, letting Sazed turn into the [[ComicBook/TheIncredibleHulk Hulk]] for a few minutes and squash a bunch of Koloss. Allomancers get their power "for free" just by swallowing metals, but there's a limit to how hard they can push it.]] |
| 300 | * WhatMeasureIsANonSuper: Straff takes a very dim view on offspring, like Elend, that aren't born with Allomancy. |
| 301 | * WhatCouldHaveBeen: In-universe, the allomantic effects of gold and malatium. Gold is something most people only ever try once; it shows you what your life could have been like if things had been different and is described as being unpleasant at best. Malatium does the same thing, but lets you see other people's possible lives rather than your own. [[spoiler: The latter becomes crucial to defeating the Lord Ruler, albeit not remotely in the way Kelsier thought.]] |
| 302 | * WideEyedIdealist: Though he is ''aware'' of the ugly side of life (thanks to his father), Elend is certainly a ''political'' idealist. Eventually he does learn that trying to introduce a hybrid constitutional monarchy/democracy to a world that has known only theocratic totalitarianism for the last thousand years with no transition whatsoever is ''really dumb''. |
| 303 | * WithGreatPowerComesGreatInsanity: |
| 304 | ** Once again, the Lord Ruler; which is {{justified|Trope}}: [[spoiler:Ruin's thousand years of psychological torment wore on the Lord Ruler pretty badly.]] |
| 305 | ** Hemalurgy in general, too. The whole process would best be described as ripping out a bit of someone else's soul and stapling it onto your own. There's no possible way that's good for your long-term mental health. |
| 306 | ** [[spoiler:And it sure doesn't help that Hemalurgy brings one closer to Ruin. One spike is enough for him to sense you and push on your mind; constructs with more spikes, like koloss, can be forcibly controlled, and the Steel Inquisitors are basically hand puppets for him.]] |
| 307 | * XanatosGambit: The Lord Ruler, who had the power to conceivably live forever, had established a government and economy that ensured [[spoiler: Ruin was never able to find his body and that the crapsack world had a chance. Despite this, he prepared for the chance that he may someday be killed by setting up safehouses documenting what was happening and stocked to provide pockets of humanity with a chance of survival if he was killed and Ruin was freed.]] |
| 308 | * YinYangBomb: Crops up in several places. First off, the secret to the Lord Ruler's immortality: [[spoiler:Having Feruchemy ''and'' Allomancy allows one to break the rules for both by getting more out of a reaction than he put into it; combining the two allowed him to have unlimited youth and also to display his other abilities, like Wolverine-level regeneration.]] Steel Inquisitors [[spoiler:and Vin can pierce the obscuring effect of copperclouds due to a combination of Allomancy and Hemalurgy; someone who could already burn bronze who is pierced with a Hemalurgic spike bestowing that same ability essentially has it doubled in power.]] And most impressively, the creation of life itself: [[spoiler:Neither of the two gods Ruin and Preservation can create life unless they agree to work together; seperately, Ruin can only destroy and Preservation can only... preserve.]] |
| 309 | ** [[spoiler:And Sazed in the end, who absorbs the powers of Ruin and Preservation into his body to [[AGodAmI become God.]]]] |
| 310 | * YouAreWhoYouEat: The kandra can take on the appearance of anyone whose bones they absorb. They are, however, literally contractually obligated not to kill humans. Their employers must provide the bodies to be impersonated. |
| 311 | [[/folder]] |
| 312 | |
| 313 | ---- |
| 314 | |
| 315 | [[folder:Mistborn: The Final Empire]] |
| 316 | * AchievementsInIgnorance: Seems to be where a lot of Vin's Allomantic power comes from. Even though the rules were laid out for her by Kelsier, she has no problem trying to break them just to see if the rules aren't as steadfast as he thinks. Sometimes this works, sometimes it doesn't. Notably, [[spoiler: she tries combining Allomancy and Feruchemy by burning a metalmind Sazed had stored some strength in, to see if she could tap into it. While it doesn't work, Sazed compliments her on a well-thought out experiment.]] |
| 317 | ** [[spoiler: The combination is possible, and the experiment foreshadows the Lord Ruler's secret to immortality.]] |
| 318 | * ActionDressRip: Vin when she learns about an assassination attempt on [[spoiler:Elend]] minutes before it happens. She doesn't just rip her skirt; she uses pewter-enhanced strength to tear her entire ballgown in two, discarding the whole thing and racing to the rescue in her underwear. |
| 319 | * AGodAmI: The Lord Ruler. |
| 320 | * AngstDissonance: In-universe example: Vin's reactions to reading the Lord Ruler's logbook that she found in Kredik Shaw. She decides that he sounds far too whiny for a man who conquered the world and became a PhysicalGod. Turns out [[spoiler:she's right. The diary belongs to someone else]]. |
| 321 | * ArmorPiercingResponse: When Kelsier gets upset at Vin for risking the crew to save Elend, they have this discussion. |
| 322 | --> '''Kelsier:''' He's a nobleman! |
| 323 | -->'''Vin:''' ''So are you!''...What do you think this is, Kelsier? The life of a skaa? What do any of you know about skaa? Aristocratic suits, stalking your enemies in the night, full meals and nightcaps around the table with your friends? That's not the the life of a skaa! |
| 324 | * BatmanGambit: Plenty. |
| 325 | ** The crew's plan to fell the Lord Ruler depends on the Luthadel garrison responding to an attack by Yeden's army in predictable ways, leaving the city undefended and free for the taking. |
| 326 | ** Kelsier spends much of the book building himself up to the skaa as a near-mythical figure, much to the discomfort of the rest of the crew. This does have a purpose, however; [[spoiler:once Kelsier is killed by the Lord Ruler, his sacrifice finally provokes the skaa to rise up in full-scale rebellion]]. He even leaves instructions for the rest of the crew on how to move forward once his part in the plan is finished. |
| 327 | ** After [[spoiler:Vin is captured by the Inquisitors]], Sazed allows himself to be caught, anticipating that [[spoiler:he'll be locked up in the same place as Vin]]. He's right, and thanks to his preparation, both of them are able to escape. |
| 328 | * BattleStrip: When Vin finds out about that an assassination is about to go down when she is attending a ball, she tears off her ballgown and corset and fights in her underwear. |
| 329 | * BecomingTheMask: Vin worries that pretending to be an aristocrat might change her. [[spoiler:She eventually accepts the part of herself that likes gowns and dancing.]] |
| 330 | * BigDamnHeroes: |
| 331 | ** Sazed saves Vin during her first direct encounter with a Steel Inquisitor. While it's never explained exactly how he did it, he somehow lured the Inquisitor away, then located Vin in a dark, rainy night atop one of the many spires of Kredik Shaw in time to keep her from dying of her wounds. |
| 332 | ** Vin learns about the Mistborn assassination plot minutes before it goes off, giving her just enough time for an ActionDressRip and [[NotQuiteFlight Not Quite Fly]] to the rescue. |
| 333 | ** Sazed does it again after Vin is captured by [[spoiler:the Steel Inquisition]], allowing himself to be captured as well and then [[spoiler:using the strength stored in a pewtermind he'd swallowed to break them both out.]] |
| 334 | ** [[spoiler:Elend]] tries to help with the above problem as well, but runs afoul of a squad of guards. Just before his group is overwhelmed, Vin herself joins the fray and turns the tide. |
| 335 | * BittersweetEnding: [[spoiler:The world is saved from the Lord Ruler, but Kelsier and Yeden die. As well, Vin still doubts herself, Elend may not be the right king, and The Lord Ruler's final words imply that everything is going straight to hell.]] |
| 336 | * BrickJoke: In one humorous scene, Dockson complains about Ham tearing the sleeves off of his army uniform, pointing out that clothing costs money and ''someone'' actually has to worry about the crew's budget. Much later, Vin shows up at Clubs's shop in her underwear and covered in blood after a fight. Her first words -- after assuring the crew that she isn't seriously hurt -- are an apology to Dockson for ruining one of Lady Valette's outfits with an ActionDressRip. |
| 337 | * TheCaper: The trope page literally seems to describe the beginning of this book, the only major difference being the target of the heist being the [[GodEmperor god king himself]]. |
| 338 | * CaperCrew: A fairly odd crew. Kelsier is the Mastermind, Yeden is the Backer, Dockson is the Coordinator, the Partner In Crime, and the Aquisitioner, Breeze is a master Conman, Ham is the Muscle, and Renoux, Marsh, and Vin are all the Inside Men, and Vin doubles as the New Kid. Clubs is sort of a Concealer (he uses his copper [[FunctionalMagic Allomancy]] to hide the others' Allomantic signatures), Spook uses his SuperSenses to be a Lookout, and Sazed functions as a Driver from time to time, although he's really the team BadassBookworm. Also, Kelsier doubles as the Distraction, a second Muscle, and the Burglar, as does Vin. |
| 339 | * ClassyCatBurglar: All female Mistborn, due to being noblewomen in a DecadentCourt. |
| 340 | * DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: Mistborn wear special Mistcloaks to identify themselves as such, and the cloaks are designed to conceal them and their identities in the mists. Which nobles are full Mistborn is a carefully guarded secret by the noble houses, and the Mistborn attend all the balls and parties expected of them as nobles, but also prowl the city at night, doing whatever they can to advance their family's fortunes. In particular, several key scenes have Vin and/or Kelsier retrieving or stashing their Mistcloaks before/after being out and about doing their Mistborn business. And Mistborn powers give them super strength, speed, senses, and reflexes, along with telekinetic and psychic powers. Yeah, they're basically high fantasy [[{{Superhero}} superheroes.]] |
| 341 | * DyingCurse: [[spoiler:The Lord Ruler]] has one of these towards the end the book. |
| 342 | -->[[spoiler:'''The Lord Ruler''': "You don't know what I do for mankind. I '''was''' your God, even if you couldn't see it. By killing me, you have doomed yourselves...."]] |
| 343 | * DystopiaIsHard: The Final Empire is an unusually sober depiction of an evil regime. Kelsier's original plan for overthrowing it hinges on the fact that for all that the Lord Ruler claims to be and is officially worshiped as a god, he still needs to have funds to pay his armies, and isn't capable of micromanaging everything himself but must grant some freedom to the nobles to run things. |
| 344 | * EarlyBirdCameo: [=MeLaan=] is one of the Kandra who aid [=TenSoon=] and Sazed when they're captured. She goes on to have a greater role in ''Literature/WaxAndWayne''. |
| 345 | * TheEmpire: The plot of the book deals with the heroes trying to overthrow it. |
| 346 | * EvenEvilHasLovedOnes: The revelation that Reen [[spoiler:did not abandon Vin, but was captured and killed by the Inquisition. He was cruel, selfish, and beat Vin, but in a twisted way, he did love his sister and want to teach her to survive. In the end, even under agonizing torture at the hands of the Inquisitors, he continued to protect her, insisting to his dying breath that Vin had long since starved.]] |
| 347 | * FakeAristocrat: Most of Kelsier's crew at one point or another. Particularly Vin as Lady Valette. |
| 348 | * FantasticRacism: Of a much more realistic sort. The logbook goes on at great length about Rashek's hatred of the Hero. Rashek hates him because the prophecy of the Hero of Ages is Terris (as is Rashek), but the author of the logbook is from Khlennium, whose people had oppressed the Terris. |
| 349 | * FirstTimeInTheSun: Early in ''Mistborn: The Final Empire'', when Kelsier is teaching Vin about using tin, she uses it to see the stars through the mist for the first time. |
| 350 | * {{Foreshadowing}}: So much, it practically needs its own subpage. |
| 351 | ** Early in the book, the blurbs in the chapter headers introduce Rashek, a Terris packman who despises the Hero of Ages. [[spoiler:This hints at the fact that the Lord Ruler is really Rashek, who killed the true hero just before entering the Well of Ascension and took his place]]. |
| 352 | ** A number of tactics used by Allomancers can be figured out before they're actually employed simply by watching the characters prepare them and figuring out how the rules of Allomancy apply. For example, Pushing and Pulling puts the force of one's entire weight on the affected piece or pieces of metal. Vin, being relatively small, is at a disadvantage in a Pushing match with another Allomancer ... unless she finds something to brace herself against, using its weight as additional leverage. |
| 353 | ** One of the first things Vin learns about the Allomatic metals is that the first eight are paired, with one paired metal being an alloy of the other and the metals affecting the same thing in opposite ways. [[spoiler:Toward the end, after burning the Eleventh Metal, Vin realizes that Atium and gold, seemingly the odd ones out, are paired too; Atium is paired with the Eleventh Metal, while gold must be paired with some undiscovered twelfth metal.]] |
| 354 | ** The Lord Ruler doesn't run everything in his empire himself, leaving most of the day-to-day minutinae of commerce and the economy to the noble houses. It turns out this also applies to [[spoiler:the Pits of Hathsin, whose running is overseen by House Venture]]. |
| 355 | ** After infiltrating the Ministry, Marsh expresses his worry that he might know a bit ''too'' much about its inner workings, noting that he seems to be better at the job many of the legitimate acolytes. This knowledge does indeed draw unwanted attention [[spoiler:from the Inquisition, who decide they want to recruit Marsh into their ranks.]] |
| 356 | ** Though Kelsier never converts to any of Sazed's numerous religions, he does show interest in them, particularly the ones that endured for centuries even after the Lord Ruler rose to power and began trying to quash them. [[spoiler:Part of his BatmanGambit to start a real skaa revolt involves essentially starting a new religion by setting himself up as a Messiah-like figure for the skaa and then allowing the Lord Ruler to martyr him, giving the skaa something to believe in that isn't the Lord Ruler.]] |
| 357 | ** At one point, Vin tries to combine Allomancy with Feruchemy by burning a piece of metal Sazed had stored some strength in. Though she can sense the power stored in the metal, she's unable to tap into it due to not being a Feruchemist and [[MagicAIsMagicA Feruchemical storages not being transferable between users anyway]]. [[spoiler:Sazed later inverts the trick, swallowing a piece of metal the way an Allomancer would so it can't be taken from him when he allows himself to be captured in a BatmanGambit to rescue Vin. And later still, Vin realizes that the Lord Ruler can use both Allomancy and Feruchemy, which is the secret behind his immortality and seeming immunity to lethal wounds.]] |
| 358 | * FromBadToWorse: Kelsier's crew's original plan involves several components that range between dangerous and impossible, including ill-defined ideas of how to keep the Lord Ruler (that no one can kill) busy during the revolt and how to get rid of the Steel Inquisitors (that no one knows how to kill). [[spoiler:Then the rebel army gets most of itself killed in a premature attack. Then the Steel Inquisitors start actively hunting the crew. Then it's learned that the city skaa are so beaten down because they are actively Soothed. ''Then'' Vin sees firsthand how powerful the Lord Ruler is and realizes that if he doesn't ''die,'' everyone else will no matter how motivated they are.]] |
| 359 | * FullFrontalAssault: [[spoiler:Sazed]], when [[spoiler:he lets himself get captured to rescue Vin from Kredik Shaw. The Inquisitors strip him completely naked to keep him from using any of his Feruchemical abilities. However, Sazed [[BatmanGambit anticipated this]] and swallowed a pewtermind to tap for super strength when he saw an opening.]] |
| 360 | * FullyClothedNudity: After Vin performs her ActionDressRip, she returns to the hideout only in her underwear, much to the consternation of the rest of the crew, especially the young man with a hopeless crush on her. Vin doesn't understand why everyone keeps telling her to cover up, since the underwear isn't much more revealing than other outfits she's worn in the past. Dockson has to explain to her that it doesn't matter how revealing or concealing underwear is, but the fact that it is underwear is what makes it awkward. |
| 361 | * GenreDeconstruction: Of HighFantasy. |
| 362 | * GentlemanThief: Kelsier and Breeze both fit the archetype, though neither does much actual stealing for profit's sake during the main plot. |
| 363 | * GoneHorriblyRight: Marsh's infiltration of the Steel Ministry. His studious, perfectionist nature makes him stick out among the other, less driven acolytes. Eventually, the Inquisitors come for him. [[spoiler: [[SubvertedTrope But not because they suspect him.]] Rather, they force him to join their ranks. The process is just so horrific that Kelsier and Vin assume he's dead. This sets Marsh up perfectly to pull a BigDamnHeroes moment at the end.]] |
| 364 | ** [[spoiler: DoubleSubverted in the next two books, when Marsh's new powers as an Inquisitor come at a heavy cost.]] |
| 365 | * HeroicSacrifice: [[spoiler:Kelsier lets the Lord Ruler kill him so that the Skaa will finally rise up.]] |
| 366 | * HoistByHisOwnPetard: Had the Lord Ruler not proved himself able to use Allomancy on the metals inside Vin's body, [[spoiler: she'd never had thought it possible to use it on his bracelets, and he wouldn't have lost his youth, power, and life.]] |
| 367 | * HowDoIShotWeb: Vin goes through this when Kelsier first tells her about her powers, though she gets over it fairly quickly in the grand scheme of things. |
| 368 | * IAmTheNoun: Kelsier: "I am Hope!" |
| 369 | * ImmortalityInducer: [[spoiler:The Lord Ruler's bracers serve this function, though he made them himself. By exploiting a loophole in the magic system, he was able to store his youth and vitality in them and increase its output exponentially- so long as he's wearing the bracers, he's as young as he wants to be, with [[TheAgeless everything that implies]]. When the heroine rips the bracers off him during their duel, he [[NoImmortalInertia rapidly reverts to his real age]] - of over one thousand.]] |
| 370 | * InevitableMutualBetrayal: Any alliance between the lower-class criminal gangs eventually ends in betrayal. The question is only who can profit more by turning on their onetime associates at the opportune moment. The alliance that Vin's crew forms near the beginning of the story is expected to end in betrayal, but Vin's crew decided to bail out way earlier than expected, accepting only the 3000 boxing down-payment offered by the Obligators and then trying to vanish and let the other crew take the fall. |
| 371 | * KnowWhenToFoldEm: After seeing [[spoiler:the skaa rise up in full-scale rebellion and his father flee Luthadel to save his own skin]], Elend realizes which way the wind is blowing and decides the best thing he can do is [[spoiler:surrender himself to the rebellion's leaders in the hope of negotiating a truce that will minimize bloodshed from House Venture.]] This pays off for him in the long run, landing him the role of [[spoiler:the Lord Ruler's successor, due to being the highest-ranked nobleman left alive in the city.]] |
| 372 | * LukeYouAreMyFather: ''Vin'' knew who her father was, but ''he'' thought she (and her mother) had been killed as per the Lord Ruler's law. It's not particularly important to her, but it's eventually used against her father (Tevidian, the Lord Prelan of the Obligators) by the Inquisitors. |
| 373 | * MeaningfulEcho: [[spoiler:Kelsier]]'s dying words are turned into a PreMortemOneLiner by [[spoiler:Vin against the Lord Ruler]]. |
| 374 | * NearVillainVictory: Even after all of the crew's efforts, Vin realizes they still haven't done enough, because [[spoiler:the Lord Ruler has enough power to put down the entire rebellion himself. He's only chosen not to thus far because he wants to let the skaa decimate the noble houses first.]] When she tries to solve this problem head-on, the Lord Ruler delivers a CurbStompBattle and very nearly kills Vin and [[spoiler:Marsh]] before Vin turns the tide at the last moment. |
| 375 | * NoEnding: InUniverse, the logbook ends as they're about to enter the cave, much to Vin's frustration. [[spoiler: That's because Alendi, the writer, is killed soon after by Rashek before he could reach the Well of Ascension.]] |
| 376 | * NoHoldsBarredBeatdown: The final battle, where the Lord Ruler effortlessly wipes the floor with Vin and Marsh at the same time, while casually proclaiming his divinity. [[spoiler:Then Vin got ahold of his [[ImmortalityInducer bracers]]...]] |
| 377 | * NoImmortalInertia: [[spoiler:Once Vin rips the Lord Ruler's bracers off, all that age he'd been holding back starts to come back, ''[[RapidAging fast]]''.]] |
| 378 | * OhCrap: Vin when she concludes that the Lord Ruler [[spoiler: is so ''personally'' powerful that even Kelsier's ultimate plan of setting off a mass revolt in the capital via a new religion will just end with TLR depopulating the city ''by himself''.]] |
| 379 | * OverdrawnAtTheBloodBank: Lampshaded when Vin and Kelsier discover [[spoiler:Marsh]]'s flayed body in a room drenched with blood, enough to cover the floor and drip down the stairs outside. Amid the horror, Vin wonders if one body could hold all that blood. [[spoiler:[[SubvertedTrope No, it couldn't]]. Eleven people died in that room, and Marsh was not one of them]]. |
| 380 | * PersonOfMassDestruction: Vin realizes that no skaa rebellion has ever succeeded because the Lord Ruler is so personally powerful that he could put down an entire rebellion ''by himself'' if he had to. |
| 381 | * RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil: The Lord Ruler's law allows any noble to "bed" any skaa woman he wants, so long as she's killed before she can give birth to any children that might have been conceived (within the next seven or eight months). Vin was well aware of the law (her brother even used the threat of selling her to a skaa brothel, which has a high employee turnover rate for obvious reasons, to keep her in line), but the impact of it didn't really sink in until Dockson told her about his past on a skaa plantation, and how he fell in love with a woman there, who was bedded by their noble lord and immediately murdered. Dockson firmly believes ''all'' nobles are like that, and they've all killed several skaa women after having sex with them. This sours Vin greatly on the nobility in general, and breaks her heart when she thinks Elend has done the same. [[spoiler:It turns out he did visit a brothel once, but his father forced him to do it, and he didn't know the woman he slept with would be killed afterward. Once Elend learned the truth, he vowed to never sleep with a skaa woman again.]] |
| 382 | * RedHerring: [[spoiler:The Eleventh Metal]]. Kelsier spends much of the book playing it up as the key to the Lord Ruler's defeat and spreading rumors to that effect among the populace. However, in the note he leaves for Vin after [[spoiler:his death]], he admits that he never really figured out how to use it. [[spoiler:Ultimately subverted when Vin burns the metal to see into the Lord Ruler's past and realizes that he's actually Rashek, which allows her to piece together the secret of his immortality and kill him.]] |
| 383 | * RedshirtArmy: Most of the rebel army Kelsier assembled. [[spoiler:They get slaughtered when they attack a Final Empire garrison and expose themselves, letting an army of Empire reinforcements show up and stomp them into the ground.]] |
| 384 | * RulesLawyer: The Lord Ruler's immortality works by exploiting a loophole involving the intersection of [[spoiler: Allomancy and Feruchemy; namely, that Allomantically burning a metal can substitute for withdrawing a Feruchemically stored trait. This means that the Lord Ruler can substitute burning Atium for restoring invested youth,]] resulting in eternal youth. |
| 385 | * ServileSnarker: Like all modern Terrismen, Sazed was indoctrinated from birth to be a servant. Unlike most Terrismen, however, Sazed has a dry wit that he isn't afraid to use at his employer's expense. After seeing the perfectly docile Terrisman stewards employed by other noble families, Vin decides she prefers it that way, because Sazed at least has his own personality. |
| 386 | * TheSmurfettePrinciple: Vin is the only girl of Kelsier's crew and indeed [[ChromosomeCasting the only plot-relevant female in the entire book.]] |
| 387 | * SoupOfPoverty: The scene when Vin is introduced Soothing by Breeze is set in a "soup kitchen", where skaa, especially the poorest ones, eat cheap and really bad soup. |
| 388 | * TomboyWithAGirlyStreak: Vin starts out as a full tomboy, dressing in boyish clothing and keeping her hair cropped short in an effort to avoid unwanted...attention from her fellow crewmembers. After a few months acting the part of Lady Valette, however, Vin realizes that she genuinely enjoys dressing up and looking good. Despite this, she's still got no qualms about going full tomboy if the situation calls for it. |
| 389 | * UnderhandedHero: The plot to overthrow the EvilOverlord is basically a combination heist/scam by a talented elite thieving crew with the army only intended to be backup. |
| 390 | * VillainBeatingArtifact: [[DoubleSubversion Double subverted]] by the Eleventh Metal. Kelsier spreads rumors that it will defeat the Lord Ruler, but when Vin tries it, all it does is show her images of who people were in the past. [[spoiler: And then she realizes the Lord Ruler isn't who everyone thought he was, and uses that information to identify and remove his ImmortalityInducer.]] NoImmortalInertia ensues. |
| 391 | * VillainWithGoodPublicity: The Lord Ruler is an interesting example -- most people hate and fear him, but because everyone thinks he's God they ''still'' won't dare cross him or rebel against him. [[spoiler:Until Kelsier's death and apparent resurrection turns him into a God as well, that is]]. |
| 392 | * VirginShaming: Inverted by Sazed, who has been a eunuch since soon after he was born and is thus physically incapable of having penetrative sex, but still ends up [[spoiler: being a critical part of the team that defeats the Lord Ruler]]. Also appears in Elend's backstory: [[spoiler:when he was young, his father took him to a skaa brothel to cement his "manhood". As per the law to prevent skaa/noble interbreeding, the girl was killed afterward. When Elend found this out, he refused to sleep with another skaa woman, unlike most nobles]]. |
| 393 | * WhatTheHellHero: When Kelsier snaps at Vin for risking her life for [[WisePrince Elend]], she calls him -- and the crew in general -- out on their indiscriminate [[FantasticRacism anti-noble sentiments]] by pointing out that their relatively cushy existence gives them far [[NotSoDifferentRemark more in common]] with the nobility they loathe than the skaa they are fighting for. |
| 394 | -->'''Vin''': What do you know about them, Kelsier? When's the last time you slept in an alley, shivering in the cold rain, listening to the beggar next to you cough with a sickness you knew would kill him? When's the last time you had to lay awake at night, terrified that one of the men in your crew would try to rape you? Have you ever knelt, starving, wishing you had the courage to knife the crewmember beside you just so you could take his crust of bread? Have you ever cowered before your brother as he beat you, all the time feeling thankful because ''at least you had someone who paid attention to you?'' Don't talk to me about noblemen. And don't say things about people you don't know. You're no skaa -- you're just noblemen without titles. |
| 395 | * WhatMeasureIsAMook: Kelsier doesn't care about the {{Mooks}} or nobles he kills while performing his duties, at one point musing that as far as he's concerned, anyone who willingly serves the Final Empire has no right to live. Vin feels differently, and manages to talk a group of guards into abandoning their posts by expressing sympathy for the circumstances that drove them to take their jobs in the first place. [[spoiler:Her views also help sway Kelsier, who admits that he was planning to have Vin assassinate the rest of the nobility after his death, but her passionate defense of her views and Elend's efforts to save her when he thought she was going to be executed were enough to convince him that some of them did deserve to be spared after all.]] |
| 396 | * YouCannotKillAnIdea: The crux of Kelsier's plan to overthrow the Lord Ruler. |
| 397 | * YoureInsane: ''Everyone'' says this to Kelsier at least once. Usually turns out to be CrazyEnoughToWork, though. |
| 398 | * YouWillKnowWhatToDo: How to use Eleventh Metal. |
| 399 | [[/folder]] |
| 400 | |
| 401 | ---- |
| 402 | |
| 403 | [[folder:Mistborn: The Well of Ascension]] |
| 404 | * AlwaysChaoticEvil: [[spoiler: Marsh]] and [[spoiler: [=OreSeur=]/[=TenSoon=]]] show us sympathetic examples of creatures created by Hemalurgy, representing Inquisitors and Kandra, respectively. The Koloss receive no such redemption. The only emotions they experience are anger and confusion, and their only purpose is to destroy. |
| 405 | * ArcWords: ''Alendi must not be allowed to reach the Well of Ascension.'' |
| 406 | * AwesomenessByAnalysis: How Vin managed to defeat [[spoiler:Zane]] despite his [[CombatClairvoyance burning of atium]] giving him a huge advantage. She realized she could figure out what future action on her part he was reacting to by his movements and change it at the last moment to surprise him. |
| 407 | * TheBadGuyWins: [[spoiler:All according to Ruin's plan.]] |
| 408 | * BatmanGambit: [[spoiler:Ruin's BatmanGambit makes everyone else look like an amateur. Remember Kelsier's plans? He was running them.]] |
| 409 | * BettyAndVeronica: Vin has this dilemma in ''Well of Ascension'', with Elend as Betty and [[spoiler:Zane]] as Veronica. [[spoiler:Elend wins.]] |
| 410 | * BigBadEnsemble: Straff Venture, Ashweather Cett, and [[spoiler:Jastes Lekal]] all form a villainous group who are just as antagonistic to each other. |
| 411 | * BondageIsBad: Zane enjoys knife play a little too much. [[spoiler: Apparently, so does Amaranta.]] |
| 412 | * CainAndAbel: Elend is Abel [[spoiler:and Zane is Cain]]. |
| 413 | * ChastityCouple: [[spoiler:Sazed and Tindwyl]]. |
| 414 | * CruelTwistEnding: [[spoiler: Vin defeats Straff, figures out the secret to controlling a Koloss, ropes Cett, Straff's one remaining general Jenarle, ''and'' Penrod into backing up Luthadel, saves the city, puts Elend back in a position of power and becomes arguably the strongest Mistborn in the setting thus far. While it's not without heavy sacrifice (a good portion of the city's population, as well as Dockson, Clubs and Tindwyl), the day is looking up at least somewhat. Then Vin is called to the Well of Ascension and ends up setting Ruin free, Sazed realizes the full extent of Ruin's manipulations and forsakes all religion, and Marsh returns... [[FaceHeelTurn having turned on his friends.]]]] |
| 415 | * DecidedByOneVote: The election. [[spoiler:Elend loses, by the way.]] |
| 416 | * DidTheyOrDidntThey: [[spoiler: It's strongly implied that Vin and Elend did during the journey to Terris -- at the very least, they're shown to be sleeping naked together -- but nothing explicit is ever confirmed.]] |
| 417 | * DownerEnding: [[spoiler:Luthadel gets nuked, a bunch of the crew die, Sazed's faith is shattered forever, and Ruin is freed. Everything is going straight to hell.]] |
| 418 | * EvilPowerVacuum: The first book ended on the triumphant victory of our TrueCompanions, who managed to kill the Lord Ruler and end his tyrannical rule. In this book, they have to deal with what happens ''after''. It turns out that, even if he was a tyrant, when you kill the guy who was in charge for nearly a thousand years, you create a power vacuum in his empire. And power-hungry aristocrats are happy to create their own little kingdoms and to start fighting each other to expand it. |
| 419 | * FaceHeelTurn: [[spoiler:Marsh]] has one in this book, though this wasn't entirely [[BrainwashedAndCrazy his fault]]. |
| 420 | * TheGoodTheBadAndTheEvil: The three competing kings from the second book fit this perfectly as well -- Elend is the good, Cett is the bad, and Straff is the evil. |
| 421 | * GreaterScopeVillain: Ruin |
| 422 | * HeelFaceTurn: |
| 423 | ** [[spoiler:Lord Cett]] does one near the end. It's not out of any change of heart, but rather because he thinks his chances are better that way. |
| 424 | ** [[spoiler:[=TenSoon=]]] defects to Vin's side after [[spoiler:she showed him kindness despite the hatred he received from all other humans he had met]]. |
| 425 | * HiddenInPlainSight: The shapeshifter inflitrating the Crew is disguised as [[spoiler:the member who everyone knew was a shapeshifter]]. |
| 426 | * HonorBeforeReason: Elend doesn't want to compromise on his ideals, even when it will doom his rule. At one point, he winds up in a situation where a lie could have secured his power and keep the city from falling into enemy hands. He decides against it. |
| 427 | * HopeIsScary: Tindwyl reprimands Sazed at one point for giving hope to a situation that is more or less hopeless, which would just allow for greater despair later. [[spoiler:She seems to ultimately change her mind.]] |
| 428 | * InsistentTerminology: [=OreSeur=] [[spoiler:or rather [=TenSoon=]]] does not enjoy eating rotting meat. He enjoys eating ''aged'' meat. |
| 429 | * MayDecemberRomance: Between [[spoiler:Breeze and Alrianne Cett]]. |
| 430 | ** Also [[spoiler: Sazed and Tindwyl, which works for them because he can't have sex and she's too old and jaded to care.]] |
| 431 | * NotHyperbole: "I write these words in steel, for anything not set in metal cannot be trusted." Sazed assumes this is a dramatic statement that stresses the importance of the text and Kwaan's commitment to preserving it. [[spoiler:It's actually literal; Ruin can alter any text not written in metal, such as Sazed's paper copy and copperminds]]. Sazed later kicks himself over not taking that line more seriously. |
| 432 | * OddFriendship: Clubs and Breeze. Clubs doesn't trust Soothers, even though as a Smoker he can make himself immune to their effects. Despite this, he forms a bond (which he denies having) with Breeze, who Soothes almost constantly, over the course of the novel. |
| 433 | * OhCrap: [[spoiler: Vin fights her way past everything that was thrown at her, makes her way to the Well of Ascension, and does what the [[ChosenOne Hero of Ages]] was supposed to do. Instead of everything getting better, though, [[NiceJobBreakingItHero she hears a vast, dark presence say "I am FREE."]]]] |
| 434 | * SealedEvilInACan: [[spoiler:The Well of Ascension was keeping the AnthropomorphicPersonification of Ruin locked up.]] |
| 435 | * ShadowArchetype: Zane to Vin and Straff to Elend. |
| 436 | * StopTheHeroTwist: [[spoiler:Vin realizes too late that releasing the power at the Well of Ages was the wrong move, as this freed Ruin.]] |
| 437 | * TenLittleMurderVictims: One of the [[TreacherousAdvisor trusted heroes]] gets replaced by an impostor. A major subplot deals with Vin's attempts to figure out who it was. It eventually turns out that [[spoiler:[=OreSeur=], Vin's Kandra, was himself replaced with the hidden Kandra.]] |
| 438 | * VillainousBreakdown: |
| 439 | ** [[spoiler:Zane]] during [[spoiler:his final fight with Vin]]. |
| 440 | ** [[spoiler:Straff]], following the failed assassination at the government assembly. He starts by trying to put a ContractOnTheHitman, then strangles a mistress [[spoiler:who had gotten him addicted to a drug]], then comes to the conclusion that the city should be allowed to be destroyed, rather than save the remnants. |
| 441 | * WhamLine: The diary excerpt at the beginning of Chapter 59, finishing the incomplete sentence from Chapter 58 and upending everything the reader thought they knew about the well and the events that occurred a thousand years ago. |
| 442 | -->''Alendi must not reach the Well of Ascension...[[spoiler:for he must not be allowed to release the thing that is imprisoned there.]]'' |
| 443 | * WhatMeasureIsANonHuman: [=OreSeur=] shows this. [[spoiler:Or rather, [=TenSoon=] does.]] |
| 444 | * WorthyOpponent: How Vin initially views Zane. |
| 445 | * YoureInsane: Straff frequently says this to Zane, though he ''doesn't'' mean it in a good way. [[spoiler:It turns out that while Zane actually is unstable, most of the more visible traits of his madness were the result of Ruin's influence on him]]. |
| 446 | [[/folder]] |
| 447 | |
| 448 | ---- |
| 449 | |
| 450 | [[folder:Mistborn: The Hero of Ages]] |
| 451 | * AboveGoodAndEvil: Ruin explicitly states that good and evil are terms that have no relevance to him. He considers his actions to be both natural and inevitable. |
| 452 | * AGodAmI: Ruin, and he's [[PiecesOfGod technically]] [[DestroyerDeity not wrong]]. |
| 453 | * AllDeathsFinal: [[spoiler:Even after Sazed becomes God, he can't return souls to their corpses, although he is apparently in contact with them.]] |
| 454 | * AnthropomorphicPersonification: [[spoiler:Ruin and Preservation, and presumably other Shard gods as well]]. |
| 455 | * ArcWords: As an unusual instance of ''meta''-ArcWords: [[spoiler:Adonalsium.]] |
| 456 | * BattleCouple: Vin and Elend, thanks to Elend's new Mistborn powers. |
| 457 | * BittersweetEnding: [[spoiler:The world is saved from Ruin, Sazed's faith is restored, Spook becomes a Mistborn, and peace is achieved. As well, Sazed becomes the Hero of Ages and restores the world to what it was before the Ascension. However, Vin, Elend, Leras and many others die, Marsh is left with the horrors that he has committed, and many people of the world were wiped out by Ruin's apocalypse.]] |
| 458 | * BulletproofHumanShield: Subverted in ''Hero of Ages''. [[spoiler:Spook]] tries to use a downed attacker as a shield, but didn't count on his opponent being willing and able to stab straight through the guy to hit him. |
| 459 | * TheCorruption / TheCorrupter: [[spoiler:Ruin is a sentient form of TheCorruption with attributes of TheCorrupter. Once someone gets 'spiked' Ruin slowly whittles away at them on a very personal level. With Spook he took the form of Kelsier, his hero, and used him to sow chaos in the name of good. Lord Penrod becomes completely insane. With Vin he spoke in the voice of Reen all through her life. When he appeared as Reen, though, she saw through the masquerade.]] |
| 460 | * CurbstompCushion: The point is made, mainly in Marsh's chapters, that Ruin is in fact ''not'' as [[InvincibleVillain infallible]] as he might seem - some of his plans do fail, for instance he'd really like to get a hemalurgic spike into Elend but none of his minions have managed to get close enough. His ultimate victory is still approaching rapidly, but the fact that he can be defeated in small ways helps things from seeming ''completely'' hopeless. |
| 461 | * DatingCatwoman: [[spoiler:Spook and Beldre.]] |
| 462 | * TheDeterminator: [[spoiler:Spook]] in his role as Survivor of the Flames. |
| 463 | * DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: The hidden archives explain how [[spoiler: the true religion was corrupted by Ruin's influence, whispering lies in people's ears and causing the sacred records to be altered. The only true and trustworthy record was inscribed on plates of metal and buried.]] Anyone familiar with {{UsefulNotes/Mormonism}} will not be surprised to learn that the author is a Latter-Day Saint. |
| 464 | ** Between books 2 and 3, Spook has constantly been keeping his tin up, even "flaring" it most of the time, enhancing his senses to well-above superhuman levels. His eyesight is so sharp he has to wear a blindfold in anything but complete darkness to avoid being painfully blinded by light, and his senses of hearing and touch are so keen he can react to things almost before they happen. Then he gets the bright idea to stand up to "The Citizen's" evil regime, taking on a vigilante persona using twin dueling canes, eyes covered, and fighting off lots of thugs (and Thugs), especially after [[spoiler: he himself can burn pewter, as well.]] Yes, Spook essentially becomes {{ComicBook/Daredevil}}. |
| 465 | * EarnYourHappyEnding |
| 466 | * ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin: Ruin does exactly as his name implies: he [[OmnicidalManiac wants to destroy everything in existence]]. |
| 467 | * FirstTimeInTheSun: Vin's duralumin-powered steelpush forces her so high up that she ends up ''above'' the mist, and becomes the first person in a thousand years to see the stars without the mist in the way. |
| 468 | * ForTheEvulz: While Ruin ''claims'' to be AboveGoodAndEvil and indeed, the force he represents is not inherently evil, he himself is evil. He gloats to Vin on multiple occasions, and [[EvilCannotComprehendGood can't understand love]] and emotion. At the end, he gives Vin a real KickTheDog moment when [[spoiler: he rubs it in her face that his BrainwashedAndCrazy servant killed Elend, which [[HoistByHisOwnPetard led to his downfall]] at her HeroicSacrifice.]] |
| 469 | * GodIsEvil: Ruin, though he's less ''the'' God than ''a'' god. |
| 470 | * GodOfEvil: Subverted with Ruin. [[spoiler:Though he ''is'' evil by basically everyone's standards but his own -- wanting to destroy literally ''everything'' -- he's not a god ''of'' evil, but of entropy and decay, and was just as vital to creating the world as [[GodIsGood Preservation]]. TheCosmere as a whole reveals that Ati, the human who became Ruin, was originally a kind and generous person. Once he was warped by the power of his Shard to see destruction as the only beauty, [[NotQuiteTheRightThing he set out to share it with everyone.]]]] |
| 471 | * GoodCannotComprehendEvil: Averted, Preservation, despite by the very nature of his power as the god of stasis and stability, knew that if nothing changed, nothing could be created (and probably prompted creation as well), and while Ruin did not understand his counterpart, he knew Ruin well enough to trick him. |
| 472 | * GreyAndGrayMorality: Although [[OmnicidalManiac Ruin]] is the undeniably evil backdrop to the story, the four major factions are led by men with genuinely good intentions and valid viewpoints. [[spoiler: Once the extent of Ruin's manipulations become clear and they're able to break free of them, they all end up more or less on the same side.]] |
| 473 | ** In Urteau, Spook wants to overthrow a tyrant and bring the city to the relatively just rule of Elend, while Quellion wants to create a city truly free for Skaa while resisting a nobleman tyrant. [[spoiler: Ruin corrupts them both with hemalurgic spikes and drives them to be more vicious and destructive in Kelsier's name, something Spook is eventually able to stop when he removes their spikes.]] |
| 474 | ** In Fadrex, Elend and Vin want to access the final cache and uncover the secrets within, as well as accessing the supplies so they can be distributed, while Yomen wants to drive off a heretical invader who by any measure can't be trusted. [[spoiler: Elend and Vin are actually the main ones being manipulated by Ruin here, while Yomen himself proves surprisingly uncorruptible (although Ruin is eventually able to manipulate him with Steel Inquisitors). Once they both realize that despite their differences they both want the same things and are fighting an enemy much worse than each other, they put aside their fighting and join together in the city to stand against the Koloss]]. |
| 475 | * HeroicSacrifice: |
| 476 | ** Elend's men, who hold back the Koloss [[spoiler: by fighting with a limited supply of Atium, knowing that when it's gone, they will die, but it being gone gives everyone else a chance to survive.]] |
| 477 | ** [[spoiler:After seeing the future with a duralumium-Atium combo, Elend allows himself to die because he knows that it's the only way to save Scadrial.]] |
| 478 | ** [[spoiler:Vin has a head-on collision with Ruin so that both of them will be killed.]] |
| 479 | * HoistByHisOwnPetard: Ruin gets several in this book [[spoiler: but his biggest were killing Elend (which allowed Vin to commit a HeroicSacrifice, since she no longer had a reason NOT to), and creating humankind, which could both preserve and destroy, or destroy TO preserve, which is part of what allowed Vin to kill him]]. |
| 480 | * {{Homage}}: According to WordOfGod, the character Slowswift (a writer and friend of Cett's in Fadrex City who helps Vin with information) is based on "[[Creator/JRRTolkien Grandfather Tolkien]]" to honour the debt all modern fantasy writers owe to him. |
| 481 | * HowDoIShootWeb: |
| 482 | ** [[spoiler:When Vin absorbs the power of Preservation, it takes a little while to get used to it. Her attempts to stop the ashfalls even ''light the world on fire''.]] |
| 483 | ** Averted, however, with [[spoiler:Sazed. As he takes in both Ruin and Preservation's power, he dumps the entirety of his copperminds into his expanding mind, giving him enough information to fix everything ''without'' creating unintended side-effects. The religions he'd spent his life memorizing and preaching, which he had recently dismissed as all false, all contain different "blueprints" which allow him to restore everything to the way it was before the Lord Ruler mucked it up.]] |
| 484 | * JustBetweenYouAndMe: Ruin appears to Vin when his victory seems certain, for no better reason than to gloat. In doing so, [[spoiler:he betrays some of his humanity and helps her realise that he has weaknesses.]] |
| 485 | * LastStand: [[spoiler:Elend and his Seer force versus a seemingly endless Koloss army. They fight for ''hours'' before falling, and still manage to [[WeWinBecauseYouDidnt stop Ruin from becoming whole]]]]. |
| 486 | * MassSuperEmpoweringEvent: Surprisingly, the mist sickness in ''The Hero of Ages''. It was an effort on [[spoiler:Preservation's part to get every potential Mistborn and misting to Snap and awaken their Allomantic abilities]] to give humanity an edge once Ruin escaped his cage. |
| 487 | * MomentKiller: [[InvokedTrope Invoked by Elend]] at Yomen's ball. Vin and Elend finally have their first opportunity to dance together at a fashionable ball since falling in love with each other. He leads her out onto the floor, the music starts to play, he puts his arms around her, and then [[spoiler: pulls out a book and begins to read,]] [[{{Troll}} mostly just to tweak her.]] ItMakesSenseInContext, and it is a CallBack to their first encounter. |
| 488 | * MyDeathIsJustTheBeginning: [[spoiler: Preservation, although he lived on as a shell of his former self for a long time]]. |
| 489 | * NarratorAllAlong: [[spoiler: Coming from ''The Well of Ascension,'' the chapter header blurbs that begin "I am, unfortunately, the Hero of Ages" are meant to make the reader think that their author is a somewhat more mature and world-weary Vin. It's actually an ascended Sazed.]] |
| 490 | * NiceJobFixingItVillain: [[spoiler: When Ruin kills Elend, he also kills Vin's only reason to live, thereby giving her the impetus to destroy Ruin once and for all.]] |
| 491 | * NearVillainVictory |
| 492 | * OmnicidalManiac: [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin Ruin]]. |
| 493 | * OneManArmy: At the beginning of the third book, Elend promises two armies to the residents of the town. One is [[spoiler:the attacking koloss army, which he takes control of once their leader is down]]. The other? [[PersonOfMassDestruction Vin]]. |
| 494 | * OnlyKnownByTheirNickname: Lestibournes is referred to as "Spook," more and more commonly as the trilogy goes on. By ''The Hero of Ages,'' "Lestibournes" only comes up once. However, that one time is when it's revealed that it isn't his real name, either. Rather, it's Eastern Street Slang for "I've been abandoned." |
| 495 | * PatrickStewartSpeech: Vin gets one of these near the end of ''Hero of Ages'', combined with a ShutUpHannibal directed at Ruin. |
| 496 | * RedShirtArmy: [[spoiler:Elend and his army of Seers were never meant to beat the Koloss, they were only meant to use up all the Atium.]] |
| 497 | * ReignOfTerror: Quellion sets one up in Urteau in ''Hero of Ages'', to the extent that he's pretty much a Robespierre {{Expy}}. [[spoiler:Of course Ruin was pulling his usual ManBehindTheMan tricks -- this time for both the ReignOfTerror ''and'' LaResistance]]. |
| 498 | * SealedEvilInACan: To restore his full power, Ruin needs to find his body, [[spoiler:AKA the Atium Cache.]] |
| 499 | * TakingYouWithMe: [[spoiler:How Vin kills Ruin. Turned out to have been the end plan of Preservation all along; Preservation just couldn't do the deed itself because it was an act so counter to his being as to be impossible.]] |
| 500 | * ThanatosGambit: [[spoiler:Vin, when she realizes she has to let herself die to destroy Ruin.]] |
| 501 | ** [[spoiler: Preservation made one that encompasses ''the entire history of humanity.'' Preservation gave up a piece of himself to create humanity, knowing that this would make him weaker than Ruin. In return for Ruin's help creating humanity, Ruin was promised that he would eventually get to destroy the entire world. What Ruin didn't bet on was that the entire gambit of making an intelligent species that would be forced to deal with Ruin or perish would lead to someone being able to take Preservation's power and ''destroy Ruin,'' something that Preservation wasn't capable of doing himself. However, in order for his power to become available to his heir, he had to die first.]] |
| 502 | * TogetherInDeath: [[spoiler:Elend and Vin.]] |
| 503 | * WeWinBecauseYouDidnt: [[spoiler:As Elend tells Marsh, it doesn't matter that Ruin had defeated Elend and his army. By burning away all the Atium he already guaranteed that Ruin will never be whole.]] |
| 504 | * WhiteIsPure: After Elend becomes king, one of the first things his new Terriswoman advisor, Tindwyl, does is have white uniforms made for him to wear in public. To show a true change in leadership from [[EvilOverlord the Lord Ruler]], to encourage feelings of hopefulness, and because, with semi-dormant volcanos called ashmounts filling the sky and land with ash constantly, keeping white clothes white is so difficult no one else bothers, making Elend stand out even more. |
| 505 | * WorthyOpponent: Elend and Yomen view each other as worthy ''intellectual'' opponents. Elend frequently laments that the two are on opposite sides, fantasizing about the great intellectual debates they could have had. Though, had the Lord Ruler still been in power, those debates would have ended with Yomen having Elend executed as a heretic. |
| 506 | * XanatosGambit: Ruin frequently declares that anything Vin, Elend and their allies do will serve its purpose: they can either lie down and wait for the end, or fight - in the process causing more death and destruction, which is exactly what Ruin wants anyway. He doesn't consider [[spoiler:that someone may use Preservation's power to destroy ''him'', since that's not supposed to be possible.]] |
| 507 | [[/folder]] |
| 508 | |
| 509 | ---- |
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/context.php
FollowingContext Literature / MistbornTheOriginalTrilogy
Go To
- Show Spoilers
- Night Vision
- Sticky Header
- Wide Load
