Discimer - All the owners have their respective rights. I only own the characters that came from my addled brain (don’t worry, I am pletely sober).

  Asgard[July 2015]

  –He Odinsdottir–

  “So, that is the power of Odin’s chosen,” She couldn’t help but ent to Thor, her younger sibling, who was supposed to be far less powerful than her, as they flew back to Asgard, on a lightning struct created by Thor that felt solid to her and not at all what lighting should be like.

  “I see that Odin has taught you seidr well. Elemental shape and nature manipution is very advauff, and I see that you use Runes as well. Well, the old maainly didn’t spare any effort in preparing you to defeat me,” She said, once again, eager to get some sort of answer or rea from Thor, who was most definitely much strohan her.

  Even now, as she could feel Asgard’s power flowing through her, signalling her right as the firstborn and heir of Asgard, she knew, for a fact, that even with her power still surging and her mind being cleared little by little by Asgard’s sing and healing power, she was nowhere hor’s strength.

  The power that she had felt flowing through her, targeting the spell she was casting over the wastends, something that Thor had done so casually, was still in her mind. The sheer power reminded her more of Odin than someone who had not ied the main reason behind Odin’s overwhelming power.

  The Odin Force.

  Something that was ected to the bloodline of Odin, by Odin’s design. They could all feel it but she could also feel that it was not ected to anyht now, meaning that it had not chosen ao be worthy enough to fall into Odin’s footsteps or the old man had put yet awisted test io get access to the Odin Force.

  Whatever the situation was, it mattered not. What mattered was that she was to duel Thor, in both of their primes, and then hope to defeat him, which was not going to be possible, not with what she now knew of his power.

  “I never really paid attention to Mother’s seidr csses. Father didn’t really tell us about yht up until he was about to die. So, no, Odin didn’t prepare me for you. I am this strong because of the sacrifices of others, others who gave their lives so that I could get another ot to save my Mother or my Father or even my Brother but to save Asgard and I’ll be damned if I let someoouch Asgard under my watch,” Finally, Thor said as they were halfway to Asagrd, the ptform travelling at a leisurely pace for some reason.

  Thor’s words only filled her with more fusion but the vi, the sheer determination in them left a chill in her spine, something that was only more atuated by the weather all above them ging, even without her feeling a single spike of magi Thor.

  She cursed inwardly as she realised that the trap that had bee for her, and so sure she was in her prowess and her mind under a haze after spending a thousand years alone, she had opped to think about the situation and why Thor had so easily agreed to an A Archaic ritualistic duel, something that had not been done more than three times in all of Asgard’s long history.

  Soon, the ROyal Pace came into view and after dropping her off at her quarters, Thor disappeared. Another chill went up her spine as she realised that the one she was talking to, the one who had escorted her here was a mere e.

  “By Odin’s Beard, what have I done?” She whispered to herself, horrified at the realisation as her mind tio jure up sarios of her defeat. Her neantic bde that should have atleast stung, even Odin’s ski no mark on Thor’s hand wheopped the bde from reag the other brother.

  Yeah, Him. She was unsure as to what to think of him. Thor mentiohat he was too te to save his brother, but as far as she could gather from the pace maids, Odin only had two sons and Loki was the younger one.

  Also, she could sense only two recipients of the Odin For the current figuration that Odin had left it in. She and Thor.

  Loki was not ected to it, not even passively and that meaher of two things. Loki was cast out of Odin’s bloodline. Not out of the House of Odin which would only mean banishment on paper, withdrawing all authorities and luxuries but leaving behind the power, the pranted from the bloodline or..

  “Huh, so the sed one’s adopted,” She muttered to herself and stepped out to her baly, overlooking the ey of the Royal City of Asgard. At one point, it was her dream to fulfill the expectatio for her by Odin and theually, rule the ic empire that would be Asgard.

  But then…

  She sighed and thought of the Light Elves and Alfheim, where it all began, where she went too far and as a direct result of that, left Odin with no other option than to kill her.

  She realised it now, her mind was far too gone before, subjected to the death, decay and nothingness of Hel, but after thinking it through now, she realised that Odin was left with no other option.

  With her violent dispy of brutality witnessed by the allied army, Odin would have been pressured by all their allies to abandon his daughter because Alfheim, they hadn’t done much to them, aside from not surrendering, which was their right sihey were very isoted and Odin had only quered the realms which had es to the wider os and were a possible threat to his rule.

  Alfheim and the light Elves were none of that. To begin with, The leader of the Light Elves was repulsed by her mere presen his realm and had immediately shut off aiations and had demanded another envoy, without the “taint” of Death on her, whiaturally infuriated her a lot.

  She was very brash, back then. Immensely powerful and capable of destroying foes strohan her by the simple virtue of Mjolnir and her power.

  Ah, Mjolnir. She could feel it, even now, oher side of the Pace. The hammer fed by the heat of a star, sealing a i within it, all by the power of the Odin Force. A on so potent that it was only sed to Gungnir itself in all of Asgard, and Odin had fed Gungnir using his own blood infused with Odin Force as the queng agent, making sure that Gungnir could only be used by the line of Odin.

  Turning around, she entered her quarters, which were the royal guest quarters, all with its own small library. To be ho, she didn’t need any medic t her back to her full strength, her e to Asgard was more than enough for that. More importantly, her injuries were not physical, they were more on the spirit than her body.

  Sure, having her e to Asgard stripper hurt her body but she was still young and unburdened, and as such, just rest her e to Asgard was enough for her body and spirit to begin healing.

  She took out a book from the magical history catalogue and began reading, even as her mind was only half focused on the book. As the General of Asgard’s forces, which were manyfold of what they are now, she couldn’t just be a orick pony.

  Sure, most of her battles were won by her individual powers and if she couldn’t win, with the help of Mjolnoir she could at least make sure that the other side suffered just as much damage as her, making her individual battles quite easy and one sided.

  But war. War was a whole other matter altogether.

  She had to be quite adept at strategy, traps, enemy psychology, information processing, and more. Her powers were something that she was born with, the rest? She had to learn from scratch, just like everyone else.

  So, when she first nded on Asgard and realised that her home, her realm, was as undefended as it could be, her blood was boiling in ahis could not be her realm, not something that she had to shed tears, bled for, all for this weak version of Asgard, something so twisted from the Asgard she remembered that it might as not be her home anymore.

  Sure, sughtering the Valkyrie meant that Asgard would suffer from a bat force deficit for turies but she khat there were heaps of women just waiting for a ce to bee Valkyrie, to gain an honor of being that but this…

  Her eyes narrowed in fusion as she read that Odin himself had bahe re creation of the Valkyrie unit, instead encing women to get involved is of healing and seidr, which was foolish because Odin himself was the Master of seidr in all of the Nine Realms, save for a mortal on Midgard who had stopped her a her pag during one of their battles that had spilled over on Midgard.

  She had been livid but father had warned her that the mortal was backed by Elder Gods who already had pacts with Asgard and were not to be disturbed, which mollified her because she khe value of pacts with Elder Gods, not something that be easily broken even for beings on her level.

  The Berserkers were also gone, and she read that the Staffs that had been instrumental in more thatle had been decred forbidden items and were destroyed and their users hunted down, leading to the destru of that particur unit.

  The forbidden spell division was also dissolved. Runes were no loaught to battle mages. In fact, battle mages as a cept was gone because Asgard did not maintain a rge standing army now.

  “What the hell was the geezer thinking?” She couldn’t help but mutter to herself as her e to Asgard allowed her to sense more and more of the surroundings arouellihe current dition of Asgard and its inhabitants.

  Sure, the people were calm, tent, well fed and ale flew like water iaverns, as was the case duriime but there was a feeling of lethargy in the air. Sure, the Observatory itself held more defehan it did duriime but the way it was guarded.

  By a single guard who did not have the Sight, was ing.

  The standing barracks were used only for training and aside from the Einherjar who were all on a much lower level and had much less training and battle experience, as was evident by the easy going nature they had all around them, were just not up to her mark.

  “Alright, let’s think this through,” She said as she stood up and began pag around her quarters, the book fotten on the couch.

  “Odin decred Peace right after he sealed me, so maybe he was injured after putting me in that prison, or he inteo decre peace after making sure that I was not in the se anymore. Huh, coward. Should have just killed me,”

  “Then, since he didn’t want to quer anymore realms, and had to prove that to the other realms, he disbanded major parts of the Asgardian army, leaving behind a token unit that could not possible be used for wars,”

  Then again, by that point, the old man had grown so much more powerful than the handful of powerful people still left alive in the Nine Realms that there was basically o have a standing army if his goal was just the Nine Realms, and that is basically what he did.

  “Shit!” She swore as she realised that even if she did win the duel, which was very unlikely, she would have her work cut out for herself as Queen fard t Asgard back up to fighting shape, to turn it bato the mean war mae that it once was.

  A war mae that was shaped by her grandfather, expanded, and then torn down by her father.

  “I mean, look at this, basically, most of the seidrs are in the Medical Wing, and the stro one, well, aside from Thor and me, is right here. Aren’t you? Loki?” She turned around and waved her hand, releasing a green wave that then pinpoihe cloaked form of Loki who looked at his body which was now covered in green.

  “Ah, so you are well versed in illusions as well. I see,”

  “Just well versed in finding them. ever be too sure when someone might try to kill me in my sleep. I am sure you weren’t here to do that, because you are too weak to try,” She taunted Loki and it always gave her a small smidgen of joy when she wotle of words, arguably, her weakest powerset.

  If she was actually good at unication, she might have been able to vince Brunnhilde to reject Odin’s orders until she had a talk with the old man.

  “What I do for you, Loki? I ot fight or hurt you since your brother has designated you as his ally, despite your many…mistakes,” Ah, another verbal victory.

  “Yes, I know that. I just thought that I should give you some tips, to help tip the scales. You see, for some ungodly reason, my brother has grown vastly more powerful than before. Powerful enough to just ignungnir’s bsts and wrench it physically out of my hands, without even fling, which I am sure even you would be uo. So, as I was saying—”

  “Wait wait. You said that Thor snatched Gungnir out of your hands while you were able to use it as a duit to the Odin Force?” She had to stop Loki in his tirade of giving her whatever useless information he had on his brother and focus on that one juicy tidbit.

  Loki looked irritated at the interruption but answered her question, “Yes, once I had trapped Odin in my illusion, I was able to–”

  She couldn’t help it, she snorted out loud at the answer.

  “I’m sorry, was that funny?” Loki asked her, leaning forward, hands twitg so hard trying not t his ons in his hands sihat would force her to defend herself, aggressively. Hmmm, someone had doheir homework on A Rituals.

  “No. Actually, yes it is somewhat funny. You know, Loki, I have been waging war with Odin before you and your brother were even born, and as such, I know what happens when someone who is not Odin’s son tries to hold Gungir. The Odin Force is a potent ford it burns anyone who is not allowed to hold Gungnir. Besides, you ’t just take Gungnir from Odin.”

  Loki’s eyes wide that.

  “Gungnir is as much a part of Odin as the Odin Force is. Unless he wanted you to, you, with your pathetic power, would never have been able to touch let alone seize Gungnir. So, Loki, despite your Frost Giant lineage, I smell it now, Odin actually did love you and actually thought of you as his son.”

  Loki had gone pale at that, stumbling back, trying to deny her words.

  “No! That ’t be. He hated me, always.”

  “Oh boy, Daddy issues. Look, there is more than enough on my pte to deal with so why don’t you go bother Thor with those. Also, I swear this on my magic, Odin allowed you to put him under an illusion and gave you Gungnir. You didn’t take anything from him.”

  Loki pointed a shaky fi her before his face bcked out and he cast an invisible illusion on himself, running out of her quarters.

  “Damn, Old Man really did go soft in his old age, didn’t he?” She looked up at the ceiling and fell ba her book, suddenly not feeling the urge to do the whole song and dance about the duel.

  Then again, a vicious gliered her eyes as she thought, when again would she gain the ce to fight an all-out battle against someone closest to Odin alive, in terms of bat prowess?

  She would have to swear fealty to the winning party, if Thor let her live anyway so might as well as use this ake sure that Thor atleast loses a limb or an eye maybe.

  After all, she might have her sanity back but she was still the Goddess of Death.

  Word t - 2834

  A/N - A more reasoake on the whole He is bloodthirsty and will destroy the kingdom she so desperately wishes to rule.

  Also, an alternative take on Loki “putting” Odin under an illusion and seizing Rule of Asgard.

  If you guys would like to support my writing or just want to read ahead of the public release, you head on to my P*treon or Ko-fi .

  I already have upto 15 extra chapters published there.