The passage to the Asgard Realm was the most seamless I’d ever experienced. When I used portals, I always experienced a moment in time when I experienced the Void, that place in the event horizon where I was reduced to my elemental molecules.

I had thought my connection to Cyronax was the reason for that experience once I’d learned I carried his bloodline. His [Domain] was Void related, a measure of the cold that could only be found within that expanse of nothingness.

A copy of The World Tree leaf that I had used to travel the nine realms remained clasped in my hand, except now it was no longer flickering images of random places, displaying the World Tree and the room in the Sithern I had translated from.

I wasn’t sure I knew that it would serve that purpose, but I did. The donation of blood and magic I had given the tree established enough of a connection to allow me to understand the basic mechanics of travel between the realms. It would serve as my way back to Urt and a means for escape if it were needed, so I stored the leaf carefully in the [Ring of Hidden Depth].

I would have to wait to see if my arrival had gone unnoticed before I was confident I wouldn’t need to escape immediately. I was optimistic that Heimdall was too focused on Bifrost to notice. That didn’t mean the ripple in the ether upon my arrival hadn’t been detected by Odin or that his ravens hadn’t sensed something and were on their way to investigate.

Time would tell, but for now, I wove [Illusion and Glamour] to protect myself, cloaking myself in shadow and [Look Away] spells so that I was hidden. I continued to cast spells that warped the world around me. Spells that would mask scent, sound, and shadow, empowering my Glamour so that any footsteps or trail markers I might leave were erased.

Any threads that might be snagged from my clothing, any leaves broken as I walked, or any scuff marks left behind were repaired automatically using the spell paradigm I crafted. The signs of my passage would be removed, my spells hiding my path, leaving no trail for those hunting to follow.

Once I was as confident as I could be that I was safe, I stepped forward, only to freeze in confusion. I was receiving a message- a System message. The first I’d received without entering the [Ring of Hidden Depths] since Gwyn ap Nudd had deposited my group in this Universe.

***Discovered Forest of Nightmare Plants***

I would have to consider why Asgard would have access to the System and not the world at large. Still, I was too curious not to take a look and see if my menus were available. I thought I was safe enough to open my Status to see how functional the System mechanics were in this Realm.

Name:

Teigh Mac de Beleros y Cyronax y Cailleach y Arianrhod

Rank:

A+

Perks:

Anointed

Bloodline of Gods

Defender of the Weak

God’s Bane

Illusion/Glamour Domain

Demi-God

Spellcrafter

Lifebringer

Blessed

Body

A

Mind

A

Soul

S-

The display was barebones, barely more than enough even to consider the screen a System function. It did show my elevation to the Demi-God level with my soul stat, and I had to admit it was much simpler to understand than the old System. The old system should have been simple enough, with numbers to quantify how you measured up, but they could be misleading.

This new method wouldn’t cause as much confusion when comparing attributes across ranks. It was possible before for a Rank: Knight and a Rank: King to have a strength stat of 12, but comparing the two and assuming they each controlled the same strength was idiocy and dangerous.

Each Rank had an exponential effect, a factor applied to your stat as you advanced. A Rank: King attribute displayed a number that could only be comparable to others of the same Rank. That number was exponentially four times higher than a Rank: Knight.

Other than the streamlined ability to tell how Body, Mind, and Soul compared across rankings, my titles had been converted into Perks. Each added a buff. A few added damage, and defensive multipliers.

Perks:

Anointed

Leader of Tuatha de Danann Faction. 5% increase in production, resources, and fertility for Sidhe living within a territory you control.

Bloodline of Gods

The blood of Gods has been activated. Beleros, Cyronax, Cailleach, and Arianrhod have been integrated and give you better control over Fire, Ice, Shadow, and Life magics.

Defender of the Weak

Gain a 50% buff to attack and defense abilities when protecting others.

God’s Bane

Increase your ability to mask your presence. Gods find it harder to find or notice you—5% buff to attacks -5% debuff to defense.

Illusion/Glamour Domain

You have taken your first step in claiming a Divine Mandate. Illusion and Glamour are part of the Domain you have chosen to encompass your elevation to Godhood.

Demi-God

Your Body, Mind, and Soul have been forged. You have created a vessel capable of withstanding and controlling your Divine Mandate.

Spellcrafter

You are adept at creating spells as needed. Your grasp of magic is intuitive and allows you to understand the underlying [Laws] that constrain and define magic

Lifebringer

New life blossoms around you. Your participation in the creation of the Cernunnos and the changes of Yeti have increased the potency of your life magics by 7% (5% base plus 1% for actions that cause life to bloom)

Blessed

[Fairy] and [The Wild Magic] have noticed you. They have claimed you as [Friend] and will answer your call.

I was happy at the change and what it meant. Ryu, my grandson, must have completed the Quest he’d been given and claimed a dungeon, and by claiming that dungeon earned the Sidhe the first new world to be controlled by the Tuatha de Danann in our Universe. That success allowed a System update to occur, the first in Sidhe history.

I had no idea how the rest of Talahm was adapting to these changes, but I thought the changes were long called for. I noticed I didn’t have a skills or spells menu anymore and wondered if that was because of the Universe I was in or something the System had removed for everyone.

I hoped those menus had been removed. I’d found, once I’d arrived on Urt, exactly how much of a crutch they had become. My abilities had grown since I’d arrived. My control over magic had become more refined as I began casting spells and using skills that I forged manually, rather than relying on the System to do the heavy lifting.

The only other menu I had access to was for quests.

Quests:

[Quest Created: Help Athena, Loki, Set, and Coyote to foil Zeus’ and Odin’s betrayal of Gods and keep them from learning how to cause permanent death to other Gods.]

[Quest Created: Defeat the Olympus Goddess of Time and steal Zeus’ lightning.]

[Quest Created: Avoid Heimdall and steal Odin’s Eye.] (Partially completed)

[Quest Created: Repair the World Tree by planting and creating a new Sithern.] (Completed) Reward Pending

[Quest Created: Rebuild the Sidhe, appoint a Ruler, Claim the position of Ruler, or form an effective council to rule.] (Completed) Reward Pending

The social additions for chat, guild, and clan interactions weren’t available. I didn’t think much about that. The technology on Talahm was versatile enough to serve the same function. Although I had to admit they would come in handy here.

Now that my curiosity about System access had been satisfied, I closed the menus to look at my surroundings. More importantly, I extended my aura so I could feel my surroundings and the life around me.

The Lifebringer perk allowed me to sense every living creature within my sphere of influence. Currently, I could feel the life around me for a hundred feet. More importantly, I had developed a type of empathy that provided me with a way to tell if a lifeform was benign or dangerous.

I was located in the Forest of Nightmare Plants, and the emanations I was picking up from my surroundings aligned with that name. Animals trapped in hallucinations, pollens that would poison anything they touched, and vines and plants that could walk and were as effective at hunting prey as any pack of wolves.

Everything was dangerous. Every flower was protected by poisonous pollen. Every blade of grass or leaf contained an edge that was sharp enough and sturdy enough to inflict massive wounds. The trailing vines were traps that would catch and hold anything that wandered into reach.

Honestly, it was amazing that anything other than plants had managed to survive in this waking nightmare of nature, given life and a desire to kill anything foolish enough or desperate enough to enter its territory.