CHAPTER 01

Lÿarah, just 18, is an expert hunter. She grew up in those hostile lands of Helheim, where the snow called death to dance to the constant tune of freezing, biting winds. Nothing grew there; nothing could remain exposed to the weather without petrifying and rotting.

The skin itself, even after just a few minutes of contact with the air, would begin to burn from the cold and, if that happened, become necrotic within a few more moments. Hailing from a strong, resilient people, the Nidhogg, Lÿarah knew how to prepare for that harsh weather. Her nearly 20 layers of clothing, mostly thick animal pelts, kept her alive in that white hell.

The experience Lÿarah had gained over her brief years of hunting warned her that the day would yield only a meager four hours of sunlight. Soon, dusk would fall in the middle of the afternoon, dominating everything with its pitch-blackness; together with the fog and wind-driven snow, it would make any attempt to advance a great folly.

The girl needed to use her time wisely, and she did so well thanks to the upbringing she received from her own father, Igor the Brave, the best hunter in the settlement.

A warrior who had always fought to provide for his family, but who had recently seen the weight of age trap him like a prisoner in his own bed. This was the grand reward for a lifetime of defying nature. It seemed her revenge was to punish his health.

In such a place, knowing how to fish beneath the Élivágar River's incredibly thick ice or hunt the scarce local wildlife was the only way to survive.

Lÿarah knew how to conjure a spell to keep herself warm, but she also knew that if night fell earlier than expected, it would be insufficient. Time was of the essence. Although the people of the ice knew how to recite and execute a few fire-magic commands, that alone did not guarantee their chimneys would remain perpetually lit. Without a perpetual energy source, gathering firewood was essential for survival. It was a pity that firewood was another luxury exceedingly difficult to find in the very few frozen forests that persisted.

This vegetation, almost always covered in snow crystals, was home to the creatures that, like humans, braved the cold in the struggle for another day of life. These beings were the food source for all the families in the settlement. And the ideal place for Lÿarah to hide her traps.

The day before, she had scattered some of them in areas where the animals were likely to pass. The young woman needed to go there and check if she had managed to catch anything with those snares. It was a mix of haste and anxiety, since if there was no prey, her people would be forced to fast until the end of that blizzard season.

Lÿarah had left four traps meticulously hidden in the snow; three had failed, but the last one had better luck.

An ice wolf ended up with its paw caught in the trap. It would have been better if it were an ice hare, but that wolf was fine. It was a fine prize. The animal hadn't died because of the trap, but from remaining motionless and freezing. Its body was petrified like a statue. Its fur was completely covered in ice crystals, but if the young woman was lucky, perhaps the pelt of her trophy could also become a new utensil, like a quiver, a waterskin, or a pouch, or even part of a new garment.

Unfortunately, they could not eat the meat. The Nidhogg people did not consume other predators. A predator is a predator and prey is prey; no matter the hunger, this respect for others they also considered hunters remained.

There was still time for fishing. She opened a hole in the Élivágar ice with her auger, the tool made precisely for this, and baited her hook.

Lÿarah sheltered in a small makeshift hut, holding the rod, hoping to catch something.

Yggdrasil seemed truly determined to bless the huntress that day. She hooked a fish and, with mastery, pulled it from the water.

It took only a few seconds for the fish to freeze outside the water because of the temperature shock between the water and the air. Just like the wolf, her catch turned into a block of ice.

She had done all she could with the time she had left before returning. It wasn't enough, but she was grateful to Yggdrasil for allowing such bounty. If other hunters had the same luck, the tribe might not have to fast.

Lÿarah tried to look at Yggdrasil to give thanks, but she was out of luck, as the dense white fog prevented her from seeing the object of her devotion in all its glory. The gigantic tree could be seen from any direction, from anywhere in the known world, no matter how many days you walked away.

No matter, the huntress shrugged. If, unfortunately, she could not be seen this time, the young woman would thank the huntress all the same.

After a long walk, she returned to her den. The huntress removed her many layers of clothing and entered the heated part of her home: the central room. Everything was very cramped and rustic, but it was warm, and it was hers and no one else's.

She was hungry. She cut a few pieces of the frozen fish and ate without ceremony. There was no point in cooking the food; moments after taking it off the fire, the meal would almost always cool down again and spoil. Her people consumed strips of meat and pieces of fish almost exclusively raw.

Finally, darkness overtook those lands. Dense black clouds almost always obscured the sky, but sometimes, very rarely, they could gaze at the stars in the firmament.

Bored, Lÿarah left her den, lit a fire outside, and tried to see them while drinking mead.

No stars were visible in the sky, but as on previous nights, she heard the noise of the merchant ships. Those flying metal monsters operated without magic, but they consumed a vast amount of fuel. Since fuel was an exceedingly precious item, journeys across the wastelands truly had to be worth the effort.

They headed south in flocks. At that time of day, they could no longer see them, but in that direction, beyond Yggdrasil itself, one more thing could be seen from afar in any direction, no matter where one was.

The majestic walls of the heated city of Mu.

Lÿarah knew that her life, in some way, was intertwined with that city, but she hoped it wouldn't be tonight. At that moment, she just wanted to eat the dried meat she had stored and drink the pleasant artisanal beverage produced by the nomadic people of the frozen desert further north.

Lÿarah always suspected that the northerners neither knew how nor had the means to produce mead, and that they acquired it from somewhere else, but deep down she didn't care much, as long as her village was always supplied with more of the drink.

After all, it was safer to drink mead than water, which was almost always contaminated.

Back in her den, she stoked her chimney with firewood and conjured the commands to keep the flame lit as long as there was something to burn.

Lÿarah fell asleep after lying in her bed. That was the rest of the righteous.

•••

A stubborn sun decided to show its face in the lands of eternal cold. Lÿarah smiled as sunbeams hit the snow and drove away the shadows of the cadaverous, almost leafless trees.

She would have a very busy day; it was training day. She knew her master was waiting for her in the usual place.

Without wasting time, she adjusted her equipment and hurried to her lesson.

Lÿarah arrived at the agreed-upon clearing and saw her master waiting for her patiently. He was not human, but rather a very ancient humanoid creature, perhaps the last of his race. A being a few centuries old, yet agile as a feline, the size of a human child, and as fast as an ice beast.

And wiser than all the tribe's sages put together.

That diminutive little being possessed grandiose knowledge.

His name was BahDehToh—the wise warrior.

“Good morning, Master,” Lÿarah said with respect and reverence.

“Good morning, Ice Rose. How are you, my dear?”

Unrushed, the ancient master stood up, leaning on his staff. His old body didn't need the staff, but it did need that object, which, despite appearances, was of immeasurable value.

“Repeat the movements from the last lesson,” he ordered. “Turn the ice into water and manipulate it.”

“Yes, Master.”

Lÿarah took her dagger and checked if the functions and commands described by those intricate symbols engraved in the metal were correct.

“[Execute: Ignition Loop]. I am fluid and free like water. [Compile: Fire Parameter].” Saying this, she moved her arms and took the expected steps to complete the activation.

The engravings on her blade were a program written in symbols that condensed layer upon layer of complexity. To trigger them, they depended on a catalyst: precisely those movements of Lÿarah's body that, being so sublime, looked more like a dance.

The magic was executed. The snow around her began to melt.

“Manipulate it,” the master ordered.

With another sequence of steps, she triggered the manipulation of air and gravity. The water droplets rose from the ground and began to orbit her until they condensed into threads of water.

“[Execute: Ignition Loop]. The biting wind. [Compile: Wind Parameter],” Lÿarah said with conviction.

The thread of water floating in her orbit began to take the shape of a whip, moving as she waved her hands.

With a perfect strike, the water beam cut a stone in half.

The script's execution time ended. The water fell back onto the snow and froze once again.

“I see progress, but it is not good enough yet. Repeat it; I want it faster. Execute the command faster.”

“Yes, Master.”

And so the master and student remained in that dynamic. Lÿarah repeated it hundreds of times that morning.

During lunch, while they ate their strips of frozen meat, the master decided to strike up a conversation with his disciple.

“Tell me, Ice Rose, how long has it been since you returned to your tribe? Do you no longer socialize with your people? Does your father not need your help?”

“Yes... he does, Master. But I think I'm more useful to the tribe by hunting and bringing supplies whenever I can.”

“Do you feel more useful, or do you not want to be with your people?”

Lÿarah stopped chewing and sighed heavily.

“Both, Master. My father is being cared for by his new wife; I'll only get in the way... not to mention that I don't want to... have to socialize... to be in the middle of the tribe.”

“Is that so? Have you told your father how you feel?”

“Yes, he knows. Since I was little, I've had trouble relating to people... I don't like it... I mean, I can't...”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“I... I... Ah, you know the story better than anyone... I've always been an outsider. The other girls see me as a mannerless savage. The boys see me as untamable, as someone with a spirit far too free for a woman.”

“The girls judge you and the boys avoid you. I can understand.”

“Right... they judge, but who said I must be what they expect me to be? They want me to be like them just because I was born a woman. If I want to be a huntress, I will be a huntress. If I want to be a warrior, I will be a warrior. I won't reduce my existence to being a man's shadow to raise his children,” she vented. “Let them live overshadowed by me, then, not the other way around.”

“Ah, suffering from the expectations of others. I know well what that is like.”

“You do, Master? But you've lived alone for centuries.”

“That doesn't mean I haven't ever lived in a community, or that I didn't want to. Believe me when I say I understand you. Even among my own, I was a very lonely person.”

“And how did you feel?”

“I was proud of my choices. After all, if there is knowledge, if there is more to discover, why not? It happens that my people thought differently.”

“And because of that, they perished,” he added.

“I'm very sorry, Master.”

“Don't be, my child. But I regret not having done more for them when I had the chance. I reduced myself to my insignificance, thinking that alone and away from them, they would be better off. What a great mistake; if I had been with them, what happened wouldn't have happened. I failed to act when I should have acted.”

“A mistake? What are you talking about, Master?”

“We all have regrets, child. That is the price of free will. Carrying our mistakes and their consequences to the grave. And even after eternal sleep, our name and legacy are still tied to those things. I hope you live a long life, girl, so you can have your own regrets and learn from them. Only through pain can we improve, one day at a time.”

“I didn't quite understand, Master, but I want to get strong soon. I may have trouble dealing with people, but I can't ignore them. I can't be oblivious to their suffering. Whether I want to or not, for better or worse, I love them.”

“I understand your concern, the privations, the suffering, the hunger and the cold that get worse every year...”

“The people can't take it anymore,” she said in a lamenting tone. “I can't take it anymore. If the cold increases even a little bit more... the people outside the walls will perish. Our culture will cease to exist, and perhaps the rest of the world along with it. Only those inside that damned walled city will survive. Is it fair that my people can't be saved too? Why do they want us outside their walls? Because we're different?”

“Human beings and their inability to deal with what is different,” the master lamented.

“My father told me that every inhabitant of the wastelands descends from someone who once lived inside those walls. So I believe we have a right to them, too.”

“Not to mention the ice beasts, which are becoming increasingly aggressive and invading our lands,” she added.

“You are not ready yet. I see a desire for war in your eyes, but when you are, then yes, you will be able to decide your own path and follow your destiny.”

“Then let's continue the training. I want to be ready soon.”

The old master nodded, but a deafening noise interrupted their conversation.

An explorer ship was flying very low. It looked like it was going to crash.

“Look, what's happening?” She pointed at the ship free-falling in the sky.

“Ice dragons, are they attacking the ship? I've never seen this before,” the master said, surprised.

The ship crashed nearby. A loud rumble was heard.

“Oh no, it crashed right next to the tribe.”

“Let's run, child; someone might have survived.”

Thus, the two warriors dashed toward the crash site.