Mistborn #03 The Hero of Ages

considering some things .
    Ruin screamed, buffeting against her, trying to destroy her as she had tried to destroy it. However, once again, their powers were too evenly matched. Ruin was forced to pull back.
    Life, Vin said. You said that the only reason to create something was so that you could destroy it .
    She hovered beside Elend, watching him fight. The deaths of the koloss should have pained her. Yet, she did not think of the death. Perhaps it was the influence of Preservation's power, but she saw only a man, struggling, fighting, even when hope seemed impossible. She didn't see death, she saw life. She saw faith.
    We create things to watch them grow, Ruin, she said. To take pleasure in seeing that which we love become more than it was before. You said that you were invincible—that all things break apart. All things are Ruined. But there are things that fight against you—and the ironic part is, you can't even understand those things. Love. Life. Growth .
    The life of a person is more than the chaos of its passing. Emotion, Ruin. This is your defeat .
    Sazed watched anxiously from the mouth of the cavern. A small group of men huddled around him. Garv, leader of the Church of the Survivor in Luthadel. Harathdal, foremost of the Terris stewards. Lord Dedri Vasting, one of the surviving Assembly members from the city government. Aslydin, the young woman whom Demoux had apparently come to love during his few short weeks at the Pits of Hathsin. A smattering of others, important—or faithful—enough to get near the front of the crowd and watch.
    "Where is she, Master Terrisman?" Garv asked.
    "She'll come," Sazed promised, hand resting on the rock wall. The men fell quiet. Soldiers—those without the blessing of atium—waited nervously with them, knowing they were next in line, should Elend's assault fail.
    She has to come, Sazed thought. Everything points toward her arrival .
    "The Hero will come," he repeated.
    Elend sheared through two heads at once, dropping the koloss. He spun his blade, taking off an arm, then stabbed another koloss through the neck. He hadn't seen that one approaching, but his mind had seen and interpreted the atium shadow before the real attack came.
    Already he stood atop of carpet of blue corpses. He did not stumble. With atium, his every step was exact, his blade guided, his mind crisp. He took down a particularly large koloss, then stepped back, pausing briefly.
    The sun crested the horizon in the east. It started to grow hotter.
    They had been fighting for hours, yet the army of koloss still seemed endless. Elend slew another koloss, but his motions were beginning to feel sluggish. Atium enhanced the mind, but it did not boost the body, and he'd started to rely on his pewter to keep him going. Who would have known that one could get tired—exhausted, even—while burning atium? Nobody had ever used as much of the metal as Elend had.
    But he had to keep going. His atium was running low. He turned back toward the mouth of the cavern, just in time to see one of his atium soldiers go down in a spray of blood.
    Elend cursed, spinning as an atium shadow passed through him. He ducked the swing that followed, then took off the creature's arm. He beheaded the one that followed, then cut another's legs out from beneath it. For most of the battle, he hadn't used fancy Allomantic jumps or attacks, just straightforward swordplay. His arms were growing tired, however, and he was forced to begin Pushing koloss away from him to manage the battlefield. The reserve of atium—of life —within him was dwindling. Atium burned so quickly.
    Another man screamed. Another soldier dead.
    Elend began to back toward the cavern. There were just so many koloss. His band of two hundred and eighty had slain thousands, yet the koloss didn't care. They kept attacking, a brutal wave of endless determination, resisted only by the pockets of atium Mistings protecting each of the entrances to the Homeland.
    Another man died. They were running out of atium.
    Elend screamed, swinging his sword about him, taking down three koloss in a maneuver that never should have worked. He flared steel and Pushed the rest away from him.
    The body of a god, burning within me, he thought. He gritted his teeth, attacking as more of his men fell. He scrambled up a pile of koloss, slicing off arms, legs, heads. Stabbing chests, necks, guts. He fought on, alone, his clothing long since stained from white to red.
    Something moved behind