Kifeda was transported through the portal so quickly he didn’t have time to react. One moment in the throne room, the next in a strange unrecognizable landscape.

For one thing, he’d never seen blue foliage. The grass, trees, and bushes all around him were countless shades of blue, from darkest cobalt to lightest cyan.

For another, the sky was black and empty. Somehow everything around him was still illuminated, but there was no sign of Sol or Mani on the horizon, nor any of Yggdrasil’s branches or the Bifrost.

Suddenly, Kifeda’s Player interface lit up. Words streamed into view:

‘Welcome, aspirant, to Hodr’s Trials!

These tests are designed to determine your aptitude and worthiness to serve the greatest of the Aesir! Every scrap of your potential will be weighed and measured, so be sure to give it your all!

After all, the punishment for failing to meet the expectations of your new lord and master is PERMANENT DEATH.’

“Bullshit,” Kifeda found himself saying out loud.

‘It is not bullshit. This space is not tethered to the Great Tree. Death here means death forever. The first trial will begin in 5…

4…

3…

2…

1…

Begin!’

“Fuck off!” Kifeda yelled when the countdown began, eyes darting everywhere around him. “I’ll be damned if I die here! I’ve got words for you when this is all over, you damned Aesir!”

The ground in the direction Kifeda had originally found himself facing began to shift and shimmer. The blue foliage was pushed back or consumed by a path of shining white cobblestones. Small walls of razor-sharp obsidian pushed their way up from the ground, lining the cobblestone path on both sides. Finally two crystal pillars sprouted at the entrance, projecting light in front of themselves.

‘Follow the path. Do not waver. Do not turn back. Nothing on the path can harm you.’

Kifeda froze after reading the glowing message, displayed by the pillars now instead of directly through his interface. Panic set in as he considered the cost of failure in this strange world. He began hyperventilating as crushing pressure and the fear of death drove down on him. A sudden rippling snarl broke through his tunneling senses.

Kifeda whirled around, hearing sounds like an avalanche now. A few hundred feet away he spotted a pale green fin burrowing through the ground towards him. Frozen in horror, he could only watch the monster advancing towards him. The fin disappeared in an instant, diving slightly deeper under the surface of the earth, but still visible through the torn earth accompanying it. After a moment the beast broke through the ground in a leap that easily cleared half the remaining distance between them.

It was a massive land shark.

When it crashed back into the ground, Kifeda found himself able to move once more. He burst forward, triggering his [Sprint] skill. The ground between him and the path may as well not have existed. His maxed out agility and dexterity ensured his speed was at least the match of the creature chasing him.

He had already been running for a couple minutes before he realized he could no longer hear the shark chasing him. Turning slightly, he looked back. He had run so far that the pillars marking the entrance to the pathway were barely visible in the distance. No sign of the shark lay behind him.

“Do not turn back,” a feminine ephemeral voice said from all around him.

Suddenly he saw the gaping maw of the shark sailing through the air toward him from the side of the path.

Kifeda hit the ground instantly, barely avoiding the attack. He rocketed back to his feet, eyes on the side of the path that the shark hand landed on.

“What happened to nothing on the path will harm you?!” he shouted at the voice.

“Do not waver,” the voice said. “Nothing on the path will harm you.”

Despite the lack of emphasis, Kifeda realized his mistake. The shark was not on the path. It was traveling alongside it. He heard the rippling snarl once more, and the monster’s fin broke the surface of the ground. It was much closer now. Cursing, he took off running down the path once again.

This time he didn’t slow until his lungs and muscles were screaming with exhaustion. He had not heard the voice or the shark for at least fifteen minutes. He knew better than to instantly stop running, especially with his weak endurance and constitution. He found himself longing for level fifty and D-Tier, wishing he could dump the bonus stats into his weak traits already.

Kifeda thought wryly.

His thoughts drifted back to Therania’s crowning ceremony. The [Crown of Kuangaza] had been placed upon her head, and everything had changed. Before that, the two of them had been like siblings. They had bickered and played together since they were children. She would drag him through the palace gardens in pursuit of imaginary monsters. He would scale the walls, climbing ever higher while she worried and yelled at him from the ground.

His steps slowed once more, his muscles sufficiently cooled. This time he knew better than to look back, but he kept his ears alert. He didn’t know if slowing down would be counted as wavering, resulting in another attack from the shark.

When nothing had changed a few minutes later, and his legs and lungs had recovered, Kifeda decided to test his luck. He stopped in the middle of the pathway, ears trained intently on his surroundings.

“Do no—” the voice began.

Without looking around he shot forward again, hearing the terrifying growl start up and almost instantly fade behind him.

Kifeda thought angrily.

Sparing a few more mutinous fantasies for Hodr, Kifeda slowed to a walk once more. Sure enough, he couldn’t hear any pursuing growls or churning earth. Resigning himself, he plodded along.

A fog started growing at the edges of the pathway. It went unnoticed by Kifeda at first as he plodded along, lost in thought. It grew more substantial with every step he took until it shrouded the sides of the pathway entirely. Finally, he looked up from his reverie to find himself lost entirely to the fog.

Shocked, he froze in place.

“Do not w—” the voice said once more.

Kifeda blasted forward, but heard no warning growl this time. Instead he began to hear voices. They were at once familiar and strange, like a memory tickling the back of his mind. His head swiveled around as he lightly jogged down the path. When he located the source of the noises, the strange sensation resolved itself.

He was hearing voices from his memory.

“Get down from there, Kifeda!” a young Therania’s voice echoed through the mists. “You’ll fall and I’ll get in trouble!”

Images coalesced in the fog. One bank of clouds transformed into a younger doppleganger of Kifeda. He was perched over a hundred feet in the air on the walls of the palace. Another bank changed into an equally young Therania. She was anxiously wringing her hands and staring up at him fearfully.

“It’s beautiful up here, Thera!” young Kifeda called down to her. “You should see the city!”

“I can see it perfectly well from the windows of the palace!” She yelled up at him angrily. “Now get down this instant!”

“I will, I will,” he said, continuing to climb higher. “Just as soon as I give the little ones some food.”

He clambered up the side of the palace, the ornate architecture giving him numerous hand and foot holds. Just a few feet later he came upon his goal. A nest of white crows. The chicks began crying out when Kifeda came into view, and he made comforting noises as he reached into a pouch hanging from his belt.

They grew even louder when he began showering them with handfuls of nuts and berries. He had pilfered them while Therania led him through the gardens, chasing some imaginary monster. It always baffled him how she could so bravely face the creatures she conjured up, but got so scared when he climbed up high.

He was smiling gently to himself as the fledglings ate his proffered bounty. Disaster chose that moment to strike.

Raucous crowing was his only warning as the mother of the chicks divebombed him. Startled, his younger self’s hand slipped from it’s hold. His arms pinwheeled as he tried to grab something, anything to hold himself. The second pass of the worried mother spelled his doom.

“You idiot!” Therania wailed over his broken body, tears and snot marring her innocent features. “I’ve told you and told you not to climb up there! Now look what you’ve done!”

“They were so cute…” Kifeda said with a smile.

A moment later, his young corpse sunk into the ground and disappeared.

he thought to himself as he continued walking the path.

It was only then that Kifeda realized he had still been walking the entire time. Somehow, it was like a portion of his soul had been in that memory. The rest had been piloting his body down the pathway.

He raised his guard, confused as to what exactly Hodr was looking for in a trial like this. It did him no good.