Chapter 68

The epigraph explains that the Lord Ruler turned living Feruchemists into mistwraiths, later restoring some as kandra, but failed to account for Feruchemical traits persisting among other Terris. This oversight allowed new Feruchemists to be born, a mistake with far-reaching consequences.

Sazed is escorted through the ancient kandra caverns, noting varied True Bodies and that kandra fear him. He observes spiked shoulder bones on guards and confirms they are constrained by the First Contract, originally with the Lord Ruler. Brought into a steel-lined chamber, he refuses passive compliance, instead declaring himself Sazed, Keeper and Holy Announcer, and announcing that the end has come.

Facing the Second Generation—aristocratic kandra led by KanPaar—Sazed asserts Terris kinship and Vin’s qualifications as the Hero. He demands writing materials, arrays his metalminds, and presents his religious tome. Challenged as a blasphemer and outsider, he argues that his Keeper specialty is religion and that while his records are corrupted by Ruin, the kandra retain original truths.

Sazed proposes a collaboration: by comparing his Ruin-tainted text with preserved kandra doctrine, they can identify deliberate alterations and infer Ruin’s plans and blind spots. The Seconds waver but remain resistant, questioning TenSoon’s influence and denying the world’s end despite worsening ashfalls and the Lord Ruler’s death.

A hidden chorus interrupts: the First Generation orders the Seconds to leave. A door opens, revealing ten ancient kandra bearing their original human bones, too old to form elaborate True Bodies. Acknowledging Sazed as a descendant and Worldbringer, they seat themselves and agree to hear him. Sazed moves to present formally, prepared to begin the crucial comparison.