Hey, guys! I'm finally back from my Europe vacation. Sorry I've been away for so long and sorry it took my a long while to get this next chapter up, but I've been busy checking out all the sights like the Eiffel Tower and so on. It was definitely a long trip, the longest trip I've ever been on and I was kinda starting to miss home. I got to each cheese, escargot, drink some Belgian beer and the like. Well, anyway, here's the new chapter finally. I hope the wait was worth it.
Disclaimer: Turning Red and it's characters are the property of (c) Walt Disney Pictures/Pixar Animation Studios.
Elements are borrowed from God of War (2018) and Ragnarök, owned by (c) Santa Monica Studio/Sony Interactive Entertainment.
In this moment alone, Surtr took some time to consider their words. Pondering it over, he felt sick. Worse than that.
Why?
It's only taken him now to realize that he was about to brutally murder an innocent young boy just to see his love one last time and it was just a trick for his cooperation in an evil plot to end all of humanity for good by repeating the same actions that ended the gods long ago and his own. It almost broke his mind when the facts came rolling in like wheels running down a hill. Somewhere in his mind, he was given the warning that he was being misled, but her insistence and her persuasiveness made the conception of bringing his wife back alive more of a possibility because Hel had toyed with his love for Sinmara to manipulate him.
It was all part of the game. Hel's game in her quest for millennia-long vengeance. And just one swipe of the blade of his magma-inundated twilight sword and he would've spilled a child's blood for nothing.
Was he truly the monster everyone made him out to be?
"Why does Hel want you dead?" He asked him softly.
"She most likely wants me as her company again." answered Kris straight away. "Obviously, she took a rather disturbing shine to me. And I'm guessing your own loss made it easy for her to manipulate you."
"Hel lies. She lied to me." murmured the burning giant, gaze wandering aimlessly about. Both father and son could feel his dazed revelation turn to boiling rage when they backed away as soon as Surtr's body glowed bright like wildfire itself as he jabbed his sword right into the ground, sending the two falling backwards. "SHE LIED TO ME!"
"Calm down, okay?!" Michael called out urgingly. "Just think about this!"
"I have been tricked! Used! Played a damn fool!" Surtr ranted, raved, threw a fit as he waved his flaming sword around like a madman while Kris dodged the swipes to avoid getting cut or burned. At last, Surtr took a moment to settle down, letting the fires on him sizzle and temper down.
"She needs me to bring Ragnarök." He contemptuously hissed. "She wants me to end the world for her. End all of humanity and burn everything to ash until there is none left. For years, I've been forced to remember the horrors I've wrought, the deaths I've caused and all just to bring the gods to their knees. Years of hammering, of slaving away in my forge all my days wasted after my Sinmara was taken from me. She was the only thing that made me feel…alive. I can still remember the way her eyes shone in the light like glittering jewels. I'll always remember it. It'll always be there, tormenting me, tearing me apart. She was all I had after the Æsir came around and my soul withered and boiled. Nothing like but a burnt, empty husk, lying dead with a hammer and blade, surrounded by smoke, fire and ash. Nothing mattered. Nothing mattered."
"I may not know Sinmara that well, but I know she doesn't want you wasting your life over what you don't have anymore." Michael consoled him.
Surtr, ruler of Muspelheim, stood tall, towering over the both of them, darting his glance from one pair of eyes to another, devoid of malice or hatred.
"She gave me everything." He then pointed a shaking finger at her heart in his chest. "Her heart included. I merge my fire with her heart, Hel wins. She gets Ragnarök."
"Sinmara gave you love." Kris noted. "But Hel never got any of that."
"You get away from him!" shouted the thundering cry of that of nobody else but Thor, flying in with Mjölnir like a nuclear missile when he blasted right into Surtr, shoving him away from the father and son, unaware of what had occurred. For his own part in this abrupt change of events, Surtr was quite surprised, though somewhere in him saw this coming.
"Wait!" Kris cried out for him to stop, but then Thrúd came in with her sword.
"Stay back, Kris! We won't let him harm you!" She assured the bewildered boy as she joined her father.
"He's not gonna-!" Michael couldn't bother getting a word in for the Asgardians were too war-ready to listen to reason. They were certain that Surtr was hellbent on murdering Kris no matter what and they weren't gonna take any chances.
"Always like this." Kris grumbled under his breath at their affinity for violence and battle to every situation, taking off to stop them from making things worse than they already are.
"Kris!" His father raced along with him, generally just to make sure his son didn't do anything reckless.
Spear in hand, Kris raced after them with the determination to save Surtr's life. Regardless of the fact that he tried to murder the boy, Kris had already managed to bring out the sensitive side to the fire Jötunn. While he can irrefutably hold a grudge, he was a smart boy. He knew Surtr's reasons. Relying on sound, Kris found that Thor had taken the fight deeper into the woods and a huge explosion of volts signaled their location easily. You can't possibly miss it.
So peering over a ledge, Thor was already head-deep in a straight-up fight with Surtr, with the latter having no choice but to fight back with his sword. Kris needed to do something, but it won't involve only words. He wasn't going to like this, but they needed to understand what truly went down before they intervened. With getting a sigh out of the way, Kris leapt into the air right as Thor chucked his hammer toward Surtr's head and landed feet-first right on top of it, embedding it into the ground and now in between the two. Meanwhile, Surtr, at this moment, had his sword at the ready and was originally about to use it to whack Mjölnir away like a bat to a baseball when Kris jumped in and in the process, put himself in the middle of the magma sword's swing. Acting quickly, Kris brought his hands up to defend himself just as the burning blade unknowingly hurdles towards his face. With his strength and durability, his hands merely brush against the magma weapon and send the tip straight to the ground. While the burning lava didn't burn his skin or cause any sort of permanent damage thanks to his powers, the extreme heat still hurt his hands as he winced, shaking them.
"What do you think you're doing?" The burly thunder god demanded, inexplicably taken aback that the boy was suddenly defending the monster that was sent to murder him.
"You can't kill him! I've handled it already!" Kris implored.
"This guy was trying to murder you and now you're protecting him?!" Thrúd was, at the very least, unable to comprehend all this.
But without waiting for a response, Thor called his hammer back into his meaty fist, tumbling Kris to the ground since he was standing on it, and continued the fight. Both he and his daughter charged Surtr with their weapons and his sword clashed against Thrúd when she came in first in her attempt to thrust her sword against his chest. The two dualed, clashing blade against blade, fighting to cut the other down and draw blood until the fire giant slammed her armament down and kicked her hard in the face like a football and the Asgardian girl was separated from the handle of her sword as she was pathetically thrown onto the harsh earth. Now Thor was left at the moment while Thrúd took a moment so he summoned thunder clouds to rain lightning down on the supposed attacker, even flying straight up to deliver a sharp bombing dive right on top of Surtr from the skies. The ensuing blast took a massive effect on both of them to be honest.
Not wanting to give up, Kris got back up and tackled Thor just as he was about to get up, leading to a tussle between them and Kris fighting to stop Mjölnir from returning to Thor's palm with one hand firmly clasping to burly god's and the other gripping the sparkling metal of the hammer as the force of its power grounded against the boy's own palm as it persistently tried to break free and return to its master as Kris kept it suspended in mid-air.
"You cannot be serious, boy! You've lost your goddamn mind!" Thor bellowed as he and the teen struggled against one another, lightning enveloping them both.
"Surtr doesn't want this!" Even still, Kris was adamant in his cause.
"We both know he and Surtr are in cahoots! Hel wants you dead and that's why he's here!"
"And we both know he's been tricked and used! He only wants to see Sinmara again, but he doesn't wish to have to murder a child for it!"
"So it's his word over ours now?!"
Thrúd, on the one hand, finally recovered and was about to reach for her weapon, only to be tackled by Michael in bear form, pinning her down with his big, massive paws.
"What are you-?! Argh! Can you control your kid please?!" She demanded, struggling to get Björn off of her.
But the bear only roared back in bold recalcitrance, words that she didn't understand.
"No idea what that was, but I'm sure it sounded like an insult."
At the moment, however, Surtr recovered his sword, which prompted Thor to push Kris to the side and be reunited with Mjölnir once more so he engaged with Surtr head-on, leading the two dueling deities to clash their weapons to and fro with Thor determined to keep him from murdering Kris and Surtr only fighting out of defense and nothing more. Thor proceeded to whack the flaming, smoking giant in the face with his hammer, bludgeoning him over and over until Surtr had had enough of this.
"Enough of this!" He ordered with a burst of burning rage, snatching Mjölnir out of his opponent's hand and retaliating by thwacking Thor back with it, sending him back with the power of his own hammer in a poetic fashion. Thrúd, after managing to shove Björn off of her, stormed at him with a war cry, raising her sword and taking a huge leap in an effort to shop his head off, but Surtr dodged and grabbed onto his wrists tightly in his scalding fist.
"Yes, I had come to spill the boy's blood, but he made me see reason!" He argued, ripping the sword forcefully from Thrúd's clutches and unceremoniously throwing it to the ground.
A scowling Thor called his hammer, but was stopped by both Kris and Michael to keep him from attacking him again.
"I had warned you once before, thunder god. You kill me, Ragnarök comes." Surtr grunted, pointing his sword at him.
"It's already here!" Thrúd screamed at him.
"I do not want this! I don't want this." With a heavy heart and like a campfire slowly simmering and smoldering into a puff of smoke, Surtr's fury diminished gradually into remorse and depression. "My hate and vengeance consumed me before. It won't this time. Spilling a child's blood will bring me no joy. Do you truly not believe that? Make no mistake, you are to blame for taking my one and only from me, but cannot live with that resentment forever. Your boy helped me see that."
In spite of their blind attempt to fend off Surtr, Thor and Thrúd nevertheless lent an ear to Surtr's speech and when they did, they softened and allowed themselves to. For the longest of times since anyone in the Nine Realms could remember, Surtr had been nothing more but a wrathful warmonger hellbent on the extinction of the gods and he and his actions in the past had been proof of that. Though no one had a second to consider that maybe underneath the surface that Surtr was suffering as well. A suffering far greater and darker than everyone else's and perhaps that's mostly why he hated the Æsir so much.
The more they thought about it, the more it made sense. Sinmara was one the several casualties by the Asgardians and Ymir was the most brutal of them all. It was truly a miracle that Kris, a mortal boy, would make someone like Surtr open up more about his feelings and his inner darkness.
"No! I don't wanna hear it!" Hel snapped venomously at her two parents while she stomped through the forest while they persistently followed her, trying their hardest to reason with her. "You cannot be my parents!"
"But we are, baby! It's true!" Angrboda insisted desperately.
"No, it's not!" The irate and impatient Goddess of Death snarled, not sparing them a single look back. "It's just one of Odin's tricks! Imposters sent to slow me down! To get in my way! You won't fool me! You won't stop me!"
"Hel, we're not trying to trick you!" Loki pleaded. "This is all real!"
"Shut up!"
"But you have to stop this, Hel! This won't bring you any peace!" said Angrboda.
"I don't care!" Hel barked, refusing eye contact and not slowing her pace for a second. "What's peace ever done for me?"
"If you wanna blame someone, then blame me!" Loki barked.
"I don't even know you!"
"The gods aren't perfect, but-"
"I DON'T WANNA HEAR ABOUT THE GODS!"
"We should've done something when Odin banished you to the afterlife!" said Angrboda.
"And why didn't you, huh? If you two truly cared enough, then how come none of you came to see me before or even after the All-Fucker tossed me into the cold wasteland surrounded by miserable souls!? Huh?! How come I've been told that one day, I'd reunite with my parents while they, themselves, couldn't at least come by to at least prove that they exist?!"
Hel, finally, halted in her tracks to shoot a distasteful glare into their eyes like whipping a sword out from its scabbard and aiming it threateningly in between the eyes of the victim.
Even they were jolted by her ornery scowl.
"I've been stuck living in isolation my whole entire life away from a single soul. The only company I had was a couple of horseflies, a centipede and a filthy rat!"
She didn't stop, only plunging the blade even deeper into the flesh. Though, Loki looked away with a far-away glance.
"Away with you! Both of you! You're getting in my way!" With her patience nearing a close, the disgruntled death goddess turned away and stormed off, but Angrboda wasn't ready to lose hope.
"Hel, you don't wanna do this!"
"You don't know shit about what I want." Hel growled.
"I wanted to see you again! I was forced to let them take you. I just didn't have the power! They lied to me, too! They told me I'd see you again! Please, you have to believe me!" The poor and desperate giantess mother ran to catch up with her.
" I don't!"
"Hel, stop!" Loki raced up to them.
"No!"
"I wasn't there for you then, but I'm here now!"
"Oh, nice!"
"Baby-"
"Don't call me 'baby'!" Growing increasingly furious, Hel cut Angrboda off with her words cutting sharper than a knife.
"Listen to us, Hel!" In their last act of desperation, Loki and Angrboda grabbed her arms, stopping her in place, much to the death goddess's anger. "Don't do this! You can't do this! We love you, Hel! We love all of you!"
"Let me go!" Their daughter roared viciously, trying to wiggle herself free.
"Just listen!"
"I said let GO! AAAAAAAHAHHHHHHHHHH!"
Screaming a banshee wail of the darkest, scariest fury you'd ever did hear, Hel had finally reached the the tip of her thread with these strangers trying to butter her up and so she unleashed a blast of powerful magic their way when they refused to unclasp her arms, sending both of them flying back as if they were hit by a nuke explosion. Ghostly green clouded their vision and both were flung harshly, smacking against the hard trunks of trees. Although extremely hurt, they were otherwise okay, but emotionally, they were not.
Hel couldn't make heads or tails of who these two strangers were and it felt insulting to her that they just suddenly claimed to be her parents right when she was close to bringing her scheme to fruition after three whole years of meticulous planning, after she had come this far. She had already wasted her life hoping to see her parents again under a prolonged pretense to keep her hidden from the outside world and her imprisonment had convinced to give up hope.
Give up waiting.
Give up longing for a loving, caring family.
It didn't matter to her anymore, because now it was time for all to pay for her endless suffering. The gods must have their comeuppance whether they want it or not.
One final look at the spiritual form of her brother in the sky, Hel raised her hands slowly and concentrated all of her magic solely on the humongous astral snake that only she can see at the moment. Stunned by their daughter's outburst, Loki and Angrboda could do nothing but watch in horror.
Up above, Jörmungandr's spiritual form was stationary, in a constant state of dormancy with the tip of his long tail in his mouth and gently rotating around the Realms of Yggdrasil like the moon orbiting the Earth, keeping all in place.
But then, when his head reached the spot where the moon would have been, his closed eyes began to twitch.
And his nose wiggled.
And his lips began to part.
"No!" Angrboda shouted in despair, but it was pointless. Hel won't listen to them.
Ragnarok is just around the corner, ready to loom in on all the Nine Realms like the cloak of the Grim Reaper ready to reap the wary souls of all living beings near and far. Once Jörmungandr releases his tail, the borders between Realms will be no more and Heimdall will have no choice to blow Gjallarhorn, thus bringing the final stage of Hel's plan. Loki, despite his hate for the gods, secretly hoped that the teens had all the battle and combative knowledge they had to help stop the end of days before it engulfs their entire world.
Excruciating, sweat-beating seconds later and what felt like an infinite amount of the world's precious time,...
.
.
.
.
….the Midgard Serpent opened his maw and released his tail very much like the thread of life being snipped by a shears.
As a catastrophic result, the ground quaked violently, vibrating all across the Nine Realms, even in the real world. It rattled the ground so much and with an unrestrained vigor that all the entire world, everyone in every corner of the globe felt it. Fear spiked the hearts of many to see that with the borders evaporated, all nine of the Realms converged unnaturally into one, bringing an unhealthy imbalance to the environment everywhere and the ecosystem has been thrown off the charts. When in Asgard, if one were to look to the left of the realm, there would be the foul-smelling jungles of Vanaheim and to the right would be the chilly mountain range of Jotunheim.
"Well done, brother." Hel snickered.
Her plan was almost complete and it brought joy to her unbeating heart.
"Elsa, please tell me you know something about this!" Ming's voice on the other end of the phone panicked.
"I wish I knew. I really do." Elsa swallowed her spit, looking outside the window at the black sky. She was just as afraid as her friend was right and understandably so. A lot of insane things were happening right now like winter in Norway and the daylight dying down to night and above all, Kris nor Stig still weren't picking up the phone.
Now she was getting really worried.
"How is this even possible?! It was literally daytime a moment ago!"
But then, Elsa began to think long and considerably hard.
Winter and eternal darkness.
This made her remember something she had been informed of three years ago when they met the Norns. Something about a prophecy that happened years ago.
"Wait….."
"What?"
"Do you remember three years ago about some kind of, you know, end of the world prophecy that killed all the gods or something like that?" Elsa asked her.
"You mean….What was it called again?" asked Ming.
"Ragnarök." Elsa confirmed, but it only stung her heart and made her skin crawl. It had already happened millions of years ago before everything was undone. Why was it happening again?!
"Does that mean….the world is ending?!" Now Ming was even more frightened and it scared Elsa just as much.
"Calm down, Ming-"
"How can I?!"
"I'm sure the gods are going to fix all of this up soon." Elsa assured her.
"Why do you sound so confident about that?"
"In case you didn't know, the gods had their second chance. They wouldn't dare let that go to waste." claimed Elsa, clutching the phone.
Heimdall sat in his domain overlooking the Bifröst just as the ground quaked, nearly knocking him to the ground. It had really caught him by surprise and he had no time to react. Rushing over to his balcony, he saw the damage that had been done when the spiritual form of the Midgard Serpent released his tail from his mouth. Although he had expected it, it still shocked and devastated him, seeing all the Realms being dangerously merged into one like a humongous supercontinent.
"Oh, Hel. She's gone to the serpent." He breathed with horror.
With a hand resting on the horn strapped to his side, he took a moment to contemplate his options. He knew what he must do. But he had long hoped that it would never lead to him having to use that horn. The horn was only used for drinking purposes only. However, there may be a chance that this would convince many to stand with the gods in the final battle.
"I suppose there's no other choice."
Seeing as how this needed to play out as it did the last time, Heimdall accepted that there was no turning back now.
With that said, he reached for his trusted Gjallarhorn, the mighty battle horn that would be blown and heard on the onset of Ragnarök, he took a deep breath, raised it to his lips…
…..and blew hard into the horn.
His breath was heard all over the Nine Realms and with it came the low, dark and unsettling bellow that came three times. Three long bone-chilling bellows like a warning.
A warning that the end of days was near and upon them all.
And they needed to be ready and prepared to fight.
Everyone heard it.
Kris, Thor, Michael, Thrúd, Stig, Stefan, Moose, Willow, Bödvar, Roar, Rudolf, the All-Father, everyone. All the Asgardians of Asgard, all the light elves of Alfheim, all the dark elves of Svartalfheim, all the dwarves of Niðavellir, all the Vanir of Vanaheim, all of the giants of Jötunheim, all of the sleeping fire giants of Muspelheim, all of the Einherjar and the valkyries of Valhalla and even the miserable souls of the dead of Helheim (and by extension, Garm), every single soul tingled and writhed by the sound of the horn and every ear was not deaf before it. The meaning behind it was loud and clear.
Ragnarök is coming.