Teasha: Hey! So, I'm sorry it took so long to get this out but it's very long! This is the chapter that summarizes a lot of what happened at the end of the Mistborn trilogy, because I'm building off of what happened. So basically, that means that there will be SPOILERS! But don't ask what my idea is, because I won't tell you right now, and this chapter doesn't exactly tell you either.

Kelsier: But that's no fun, Teasha-san!

Teasha: Quiet, you! Or would you like to do the disclaimer again?

Kelsier: ...

Teasha: I thought so. Well, I don't own Mistborn or Death Note, but the plot is ALL MINE!

Kelsier: Look out, she's defensive!

Teasha: Shut it! Er—I mean, enjoy!

"Checkmate," called out Marsh.

Fellson looked at the chessboard in disgust. "Again? That's the third time!" He stood up from the floor and kicked the board, sending all the pieces flying across the floor and ruining the game.

Marsh laughed. "Well, when you're as old as me you tend to have a lot of practice at these things."

Beyond groaned in frustration. How long was it going to take for Zara and the others to get here? He rolled over on the table, facing away from the door. By now, his leg was healing pretty quickly. It wasn't completely done yet, but Beyond figured another day or two would suffice. There were some extreme advantages to pewter.

"What is it?" asked Fellson, turning to face Beyond. "Do you need more pewter?"

Beyond shook his head. "No, that's not it…"

"He's upset that it's taking so long for his friends to get here," Marsh interrupted. How did he know? thought Beyond.

"Somehow I'm not surprised," Fellson smirked. "He's worried about his girlfriend."

Beyond narrowed his eyes into a glare. Sure, it was meant as a tease, but that didn't mean that was how Beyond took it. Zara wasn't his girlfriend—heck, Beyond wasn't even sure anymore if she was ever his friend. But he did have to agree on something. He was restless. Why?

"They're here," said Marsh, standing up and interrupting his thoughts.

"What?" asked Beyond. "How do you know?"

Marsh smiled. "Allomancy."

Another inquisitor walked into the room—one Beyond had seen before. It was the one who had brought him into the room. The terrifying room. The death room. It was overly tall and intimidating, and looked toward Beyond when it came in. It recognized him.

Behind it, though, came a man, one Beyond didn't recognize. He was of around average height, with simple brown hair and striking eyes. He held his head high in defiance.

After him came Zara. She was looking down at the ground as she walked in, completely unaware of where she was going. "Why are we here?" she asked, lifting her head to Marsh. But before she could do so, something must have caught her eye, because she stopped ant looked straight at Beyond.

"Don't ask me," he responded as Near came in as well, followed by Matt and Mello. "Ask him." Beyond pointed to Marsh.

"So is that it?" he asked, clapping his hands together and smiling. The only creepy part was that Beyond couldn't see his eyes because of the spikes. And that scared him.

"Nope," said a voice that Beyond recognized almost immediately. He had heard it only once before. L. "Don't forget about me."

He came into the room followed by another inquisitor, glaring at Beyond in disgust. He must have decided it was Beyond's fault for his capture. After all, without Beyond there, Zara wouldn't have screamed. But it was more Zara's fault than Beyond's. She didn't hold her tongue when she needed to most. Not that he truly blamed her—after all, she had been the reason Beyond survived. He just didn't want people to blame him.

"So are we all here now?" asked Marsh, smiling.

The inquisitor who came in after L nodded. "Yes."

"Good! Now, I'm sure you're all wondering why on earth I brought you here."

"Hell yeah, we are!" shouted Mello.

Fellson growled at him, signaling a warning. Try that again and it's not going to be pretty.

Marsh put a hand up to Fellson. "Look, I understand that you're all annoyed that you're here, and feel as though you can blame me. And I guess you can—"

"This isn't helping your case."

"BUT keep this in mind," Marsh continued. "Someone else told me to do this, so you can go ahead and blame him. But you shouldn't. This has to do with the fate of the world."

"Don't give us hints, just tell us why we're here!" said the brown-haired guy. Beyond wondered why he didn't recognize him.

"I will get to that, but in time," said Marsh. "First, you need to know some background knowledge for this to make any sense. You need to know the truth about how this world was created."

"Didn't the Survivor and his heir fix the world after the Lord Ruler had destroyed it?" asked Zara, quietly.

Marsh looked to her. "I see you are more knowledgeable about religion than I thought. However, that is not true."

"WHAT?"

"Yes. The greatest secret of our world nowadays: how it came to be. You see, a long time ago, there were only two beings, called Ruin and Preservation. They were balance. They were eternity. However, neither could do what they wanted so desperately to do on their own, for to destroy you need to create first. And to preserve you need to create first. But neither could create on their own, for to destroy is not to create, and to preserve is not to create either. So, they made a deal: to create a world together. But Preservation was still unsatisfied. He wanted to create something intentionally unbalanced; something with more Preservation than Ruin; something that could destroy to preserve—humans."

"Where is this going?" asked Mello impatiently.

"I'm getting there," said Marsh, waving a finger at him. "Well, Ruin agreed, but only if he got something in return. The promise that one day, Ruin could destroy the world they created together." He paused, letting that sink in.

"SO IT'S COMING TO GET US?" cried Zara, jumping up. The others followed suit.

"The… Ruin thingy, it's coming to destroy the world?"

"Is that what you meant?"

"QQQUUUUIIIIIEEEEEEETTTTTTTT!" shouted Fellson. "He's not done!"

"Thank you, Fellson." Marsh nodded toward him. "Preservation agreed, and for a long time, they were happy. But then, something happened. Preservation broke the pact they had created, and imprisoned Ruin at a place called the Well of Ascension and hid most of Ruin's power—his body—but was required to give up most of his consciousness to do so."

"So is he still there?" asked L.

"This story has quite a ways to go, and I'd appreciate it if everyone would just be quiet so I can finish. Now, are there ANY MORE QUESTIONS?" No one spoke. "Good. Well, Ruin wanted to be freed, so he started looking around. You see, when I say he was 'imprisoned,' it's hard to actually explain how it worked. Basically, he was no longer omniscient and could only influence the world with a slight hand. He couldn't see everything, but he could focus to see what he wanted. He couldn't control any one person, but he could change things. Slight things. Such as memories in a feruchemist's metalmind. Such as words on a sheet of paper. So, he looked to the Terris religion, which foretold of the event that a Hero of Ages would rise up and take the power at the Well, and he changed it. He made the alterations slight, but changed it so that the Hero was instead supposed to take the power, and then give it up for the 'greater good,' which was essentially the key to freeing Ruin. But the first Hero who went didn't make it, and was killed by his packman, Rashek, who took the power for himself and became the Lord Ruler. He took the power because he knew what would happen if it was released."

"So that's how he came to be," whispered L. "I always wondered…"

"Yes, that's correct," agreed Marsh.

"So wait, does that mean he wasn't evil?" asked Zara, confused. "I was always told he was the very image of evil."

"Well, that question is hard to answer," said Marsh. "He tried to be a good ruler, but it was… hard. He was the one who tried to fix the world, but ended up ruining it in the process. He was the one who moved the world too close to the sun. He created the Ashmounts to try and keep people from being burned alive. He changed people's physiology so that they could survive in the ash. He could no longer put everything back the way it belonged, but he could fix the problems so that the subsequent ones were smaller, and more manageable. However, Ruin still wanted to be freed, and for that to happen the Lord Ruler had to die. And so, he handpicked a certain child from birth and raised her, carefully guiding her by the nose as a pawn, until she killed Him."

"The Survivor's heir," whispered Zara. "That's who killed him, right?"

"Yes, although I prefer to call her by her true name: Vin. Vin was manipulated from her birth into defeating the Lord Ruler, then carefully guided and manipulated into freeing Ruin from the Well of Ascension a year later, with her husband, Elend. However, once freed, Ruin could not destroy the world in the blink of an eye like he wanted, because Preservation had hidden his body—his power. And so, the world began to fall apart, but slowly."

"If the world fell apart, then how are we here today?" asked Matt.

"Would everyone just SHUT UP so I can finish the story?" asked Marsh, almost shouting. Everyone stopped talking, and froze to stare at Marsh. "Thank you. Well, Vin and Elend were determined to defeat Ruin, but how was it possible to defeat a God? Eventually, Ruin had destroyed so much that Preservation was reduced to a mere wisp of power in the mists—a small fraction of what it used to be. And Vin, Elend, and Ruin were trying to find Ruin's body at the same time. Eventually though, Vin was able to figure out what it was that Ruin wanted so badly: Atium."

"Atium?"

"You know, the metal that lets you see other people's futures. Of course, it doesn't exist anymore. But basically, it's condensed destructive power in the form of metal that can be used by allomancers. You see, the Lord Ruler had this rumor about how he had a huge stockpile of atium hidden somewhere in Luthadel, and before you ask it was the capital city in those days."

"I wasn't gonna ask that," argued Mello.

"No, you would have had someone else ask for you. But no one could find the atium. And so, Vin tricked Ruin into directing his attention to her as she went back to Luthadel saying that she was going to get the atium that she had 'found.' However, Ruin sent his inquisitors—"

"Ruin had inquisitors?" asked Zara.

"Yes. In fact, I was one of them," Marsh said. "But anyways, I discovered that Vin's earring that she always wore turned out to be a hemalurgic spike, like the ones all over my body, except much smaller. Earring-sized, in fact. So, I took it out. Once her spike was out, the mists—the body of Preservation—flowed into her, because they were absolutely desperate for a host, and she was the only one who could use them."

"Why?" asked Beyond.

"Because she had touched the power at the Well of Ascension. Once the power flowed into her, she became a God—the new Preservation. She was able to figure out where the Atium was, and told Elend. Then, Elend went with some atium misting and burned the entire store up. He burned it all away, so that Ruin wouldn't be able to get his body, no matter how hard he tried. And then, he was killed."

"By who?"

"Me." Everyone was silent.

"Why did you kill him?" asked Zara, finally.

"I was being controlled by Ruin, and Ruin wanted him dead, so I killed him. But anyways, Vin saw Elend die, and decided that there was only one other thing she could do to save the world, and that was to force her power against Ruins, and clash them together. And by doing that, she both killed Ruin, and herself."

"So who saved the world then?"

"The Hero of Ages—a terrisman named Sazed. He found Vin and Ruin's dead corpses, along with their powers, and came to the realization that he could save the world, so he took the power. Because he was a feruchemist, he had all the information and memories of the Terris people, and was able to use all of it to put the world back into place. He put back the trees and the animals and flowers. He rearranged the land to put it back to what it once was. Not Vin. Sazed."

Marsh stopped. It was obvious that that was the end of the story. Beyond never would have guessed…

"So how does this tie into our problem, then?" asked L.

"Well, you see, something odd has been happening wi—" Marsh froze. His body stiffened, not a single muscle moving, and stood there, staring at the others. What was going on?

Finally, though, Marsh relaxed. His muscles started to move again as he turned to face Zara.

"Sorry for the surprise," he said. "But I need to tell you something."

This was not Marsh.

"Something that not even Marsh knows yet."

Teasha: So? Do you like?

Kelsier: AAGH! Not another cliffhanger! Why, Teasha-san, WHY?

Teasha: Hey, it was pretty long this time, even though most of the stuff people probably knew already. Sorry about that, but the characters didn't know and so I needed to brief them. Unfortunately, you, as the audience, must watch. At least tell me it was funny when Zara freaked out and thought that Ruin was coming to get them. (Please?)

Kelsier: And one more thing:

Kelsier & Teasha: REVIEW!