The hallway opened into the main floor again—still too shiny, still too surreal, still freezing. The air conditioning hit my bare chest like a curse.
Whatever. I had a hat. And a laurel crown under it, somehow still glued in place. Divine adhesives, maybe. Or just my overwhelming charisma.
Alecto walked beside me like a storm cloud in heels, radiating her usual "we're not friends" energy.
Ahead, I spotted the group: Rhea, Elia, and two kids I hadn't seen before. One girl—tense posture, dark hair, sharp eyes—and a younger boy standing close beside her, expression guarded but curious.
Rhea looked up as I strolled over, gold-stuffed bag slung over one shoulder.
"Where's your shirt?" she asked, frowning.
I stopped in front of them, turned slightly, and gave the bag a good dramatic shake.
Chonk chonk.
"It was sacrificed," I said solemnly, "on the altar of capitalism."
Chonk.
"I'm rich, baby."
Elia pinched the bridge of her nose like I'd physically wounded her.
The girl raised an eyebrow. "You're the one they sent to help us?"
"I am the help," I said, adjusting the hat over my laurel crown. "Lucas. Demigod, professional survivor, occasional disappointment, god's problem solver. You must be the VIPs we're extracting."
The girl gave a nod, cautious but not unfriendly. "Bianca. This is my brother, Nico."
Nico gave a tiny wave, eyes flicking to the dried blood on my arms and the faint glow still lingering around the crown.
"Cool names," I said, offering a fist bump. "And you're not too late for the escape party, so that's a good sign."
Bianca bumped it. Nico hesitated, then copied her.
"Why are you wearing two headpieces?" Bianca asked, narrowing her eyes.
"Because I earned this one," I said, pointing to the laurels. "And this one," I pointed to the cap, "makes me look cool. Balance."
"I think he might be weird," Nico whispered.
Rhea sighed. "No, he is weird."
Alecto finally spoke, voice flat as ever. "Can we go now?"
"Yeah, yeah," I said, adjusting the bag again. "Let's get out of here before this place tries to offer to be their title card."
We stepped out into the service lot behind the Lotus Hotel.
My Sparrow was right where I left it, parked in its own little neon-lit corner like the diva it was. The sidecar looked a bit cramped with two passengers, but we'd make it work.
I dropped the sack of drachmas off my shoulder and unhooked the flap on my actual bag.
Sif's glowing yellow eyes blinked up at me from inside, where her massive wolf body had somehow compressed itself again like divine luggage.
"Watch out, girl," I said, sliding the cartoonish money bag into the extra-dimensional space. "You're gonna have company."
She let out a low, dignified boof in response.
That was wolf for as long as they don't touch my snacks, we're cool.
Alecto stood a few paces away, arms crossed, hair untouched by the Vegas heat, as always. She looked at us—at me, really—and gave the kind of nod that could cut marble.
"Hades will expect a successful mission," she said. "And results, not excuses."
Then, without waiting for a reply, she vanished in a swirl of fire and scorched tile.
Nico blinked. "Is that... normal?"
"About as normal as it gets," I said.
That was when the shouting started.
From across the lot, a figure in a dark cloak came stumbling toward us—tall, twitchy, masked. The fabric of his robes looked wet somehow, like it had just crawled out of a swamp.
He yelled something. None of us understood it.
More gibberish. Then louder. Sharper. Faster.
"Gluah… m'glaaki… r'lyeh..."
My claws clicked out instinctively.
The others were backing up.
Then I heard it—clear as day in the middle of the rant:
"Ia! Ia! Cthulhu fhtagn!"
"Oh, HELL no—" I started, reaching for my axe—
BANG.
The sound echoed like a firecracker in a steel drum.
The man dropped instantly, a clean hole through the front of his mask.
Rhea stood there, holding Ivory, zero emotion on her face as smoke curled from the barrel.
We all looked at her.
She shrugged.
"What? He was talking crazy. Put a cap in his mouth."
Elia blinked. "Rhea—"
"No. Nope. It was probably casting a spell. Weirdo had it coming."
I glanced down at the body, then back at her.
"...I'm not saying you're wrong."
"Good," she said, holstering the pistol like it was nothing.
I knelt next to my travel bag.
The flap gave a little ripple, and I felt Sif shift inside.
"Alright," I said, standing and dusting my hands off. "You two—Nico, Bianca—go ahead and climb in."
They both stared at me like I'd just suggested they live in a vending machine.
"…Climb in?" Bianca asked.
"It's bigger on the inside," I said casually, waving toward the flap like that explained everything.
Nico tilted his head. "Like a bag of holding?"
"Like a greater bag of holding," I corrected. "Cozy. Spacious. Climate-controlled. And more importantly—my dog's in there."
Bianca raised an eyebrow. "You put your dog in your bag?"
"She likes it. It's quiet, portable, and she gets to nap on my shirts. Honestly, I think she's claimed squatters' rights at this point."
Nico cautiously stepped closer, peering into the opening. "Is it safe?"
"Sif hasn't eaten anyone I like," I said, grinning. "She's a giant magic wolf with manners. She'll love the company—especially head pats. Just don't touch her ear flaps. She's sensitive about that."
Bianca looked at her brother, then back at the bag.
"This is officially the weirdest escape plan I've ever heard of."
"Then you're traveling with the right crew," I said.
They both stepped inside, vanishing through the flap like it was nothing more than a curtain. Sif let out a soft, happy wolf from within.
Rhea walked up beside me, arms crossed. "You realize how insane that looked, right?"
"It's efficient," I said, zipping the flap shut. "I like traveling light."
Elia was already getting into the sidecar, double-checking her gear.
I swung a leg over the Sparrow, the engine purring beneath me.
"Next stop—anywhere but here."
The Sparrow rumbled low as we cut through the quiet back roads of Missouri, the moon riding high over flat fields and distant gas stations.
The wind bit cold across my chest—still no shirt, just the laurels under my hat and the faint scent of road dust and victory hanging around me. Behind me, my bag jostled softly, occasionally rumbling with what I hoped was Sif and not Nico trying to reorganize her snacks.
In the sidecar, Elia sat with her legs crossed at the ankles, one hand turning the page of a worn paperback. Hardcover, aged spine, faint pencil scribbles in the margins—someone's personal copy of something way too smart for me to guess. She didn't look up as she spoke.
"You have terrible impulse control."
I glanced over. "You don't ease into conversations, do you?"
"That was easing in," she said.
Rhea snorted. "That was a compliment, honestly."
Elia finally looked up, giving me the kind of look teachers give kids right before detention. "You volunteered for a divine arena match just because you wanted to make a quick buck."
"I won the match," I pointed out.
"That's not the issue."
Rhea smirked, resting an arm on the sidecar's edge. "That's not even the worst thing he's done on instinct."
Elia raised an eyebrow.
"He once slept with a monster. Not metaphorically."
"It was a very persuasive monster, she had me hypnotized with her massive uh... persuasiveness," I said.
Elia looked like she was rethinking her entire life.
"Oh, and the arson thing we're about to do?" Rhea added. "Not his first time. He burned down an Amazon fulfillment center last time we were together."
Elia blinked. "You did what?"
"It was under divine orders," I said quickly. "A goddess told us to."
Elia looked between us. "And you just… did it?"
"Of course," I said. "It got us this awesome bike."
"It is a kick-ass bike," Rhea added.
We lapsed into silence again, the road stretching long and smooth ahead of us, the engine purring beneath my hands.
Elia sighed and flipped another page. "I'm surrounded by psychopaths."
The Sparrow ate up highway miles like it was starving for them, gliding low over the asphalt with a faint ripple of magic under the grav plates. We were pushing one hundred, maybe one hundred and twenty—wind screaming past us, the moon streaking silver across the fields. Missouri stretched on in endless field of corns.
Elia had closed her book and was leaning back in the sidecar, eyes shut like she was pretending this whole road trip wasn't happening. Rhea had her boots up on the edge, chewing on some awful gas station trail mix she picked up an hour back.
Me? I was in the zone.
Until the world blinked.
The black suns.
Three of them.
The first one split open like an eclipse.
And I felt it—my blood turning, thickening. Not burning, but becoming something else.
Hydra's blood.
Thick with venom. Fatal to the touch.
It didn't burn me—it liked me. It flowed with my regeneration, matched my reckless brawler style like it had always belonged. I fought close. I didn't care about getting hit.
And now?
Now if someone spilled my blood, it might kill them before it even cooled.
I grinned without meaning to.
Monster fighting just got more fun.
Then the second sun lit.
This one was louder.
Not sound—music. The notes that always hummed inside me, my strange companion, rose up in a blinding, clashing wave. They didn't play in harmony. They collapsed, folding into each other like stars going nova—
—and then igniting into a sphere of burning sound.
A Spark.
I could feel it radiating behind my sternum. Powerful. Mine.
I could travel the raw Khaos now.
Other realms. All underworlds or heavens. The Blind Eternities. All reachable—if I had the mana, and the patience to shape the door.
It wouldn't be easy. Meditation. Focus. Weeks of attunement to draw the essence from a place. But if I did it right... I could make those places produce motes of mana for me.
Then—
The third sun lit.
And my body lit up.
Heat surged through my veins, slow at first—like I'd swallowed a forge spark. Then it ramped. And ramped again.
My skin flushed red. Not from embarrassment. From literal combustion.
The Sparrow swerved slightly as my grip on the handles faltered.
"Elia—Rhea—bag—now!" I choked out, pulling the strap over my shoulder and tossing it into the sidecar without ceremony.
They turned in sync, frowning. "What—?"
Then they saw my face.
Red. Glowing. Not blushing—burning.
Little curls of smoke lifted from my shoulders. Chunks of skin were starting to sizzle. My veins glowed like molten metal. It felt like my bones were boiling.
They didn't argue after that.
Rhea grabbed the bag and yanked Elia inside, both of them disappearing into the spatial fold as I veered the Sparrow to a hard stop in the middle of a desolate highway stretch—no lights. No traffic. Just cornfields and cracked pavement under a blood-moon sky.
I fell off the bike.
Couldn't stand.
Couldn't scream—
Until I could.
But I didn't scream. I laughed.
My knees hit asphalt. I arched back, mouth wide in a bellow of raw, agonized fury as fire tore up my spine, shredding what was left of my skin. My nerves screamed. My eyes boiled in their sockets, reforming with something wrong. Something demonic, something holy.
I saw everything.
The guilt. The rage. The sin in the air.
My blood turned to ash. My flesh peeled away in burning ribbons.
The adamantium in my bones melted, liquefying inside me as some deeper structure rebuilt itself—bone reshaped by divine vengeance.
And I knew.
I knew what I had become.
My mind split in half, folding around a presence that didn't speak—but judged.
And through the fire, the smoke, the white-hot clarity of transformation—I roared:
"FUCK YOU, MEPHISTO!"
And then the fire took me.
It rose from the scorched pavement, smoking.
Fire roared through the bones of its form—ribs flexing, claws cracking, spinal column stitched together by vengeance.
The Rider stood.
It didn't breathe.
It burned.
The flames licking up its frame twisted—orange and yellow bleeding into deep crimson, then black. As it reached inward, something responded: a rune, carved into the marrow. A sigil of death. True death.
The Rune of Death flared behind its eyes.
And the Rider laughed.
It raised a hand—metal glinting through the blaze—and curled its fingers. The claws burst free from its knuckles with a white-hot shriek, each blade glowing with molten adamantium.
It flexed.
The claws flared with a mix of hellfire and shadowflame, crackling with the chill of destined endings. They didn't glow—they hungered to taste divine flesh, to show the mighty the size of the fall.
It turned its skull toward the Sparrow.
The bike twitched.
The machine whimpered, gears screeching, metal groaning as it buckled and changed under the Rider's gaze. Pipes twisted into horns. The chassis flared with molten trim. The exhausts breathed smoke like a dragon's nostrils, coughing out embers with every breath.
The Sparrow was no longer a machine.
It was a steed.
The Rider stepped forward, placing a burning hand on the handlebar.
The machine shuddered.
Accepted its new master.
Together, they roared.
The sky darkened.
Clouds boiled overhead. Thunder bellowed in the distance. The wind twisted sideways, like the world itself flinched from what had been reborn beneath it.
The Rider revved the engine once, turning to face the scent that only it could smell—
Sin.
The guilty.
A target.
The sidecar rumbled behind it—the bag still intact, still glowing faintly with spatial magic, still holding the precious few people Lucas protected from his presence.
It remained.
It belonged.
The Rider gave the sky a long, slow look.
Then raised one charred hand.
Middle finger blazing like a torch.
And with that, the Ghost Rider launched forward, hellish grav plates spitting fire across the road with the screams of sinful souls, riding straight into the storm.
Every inch of pavement the Sparrow touched blistered and smoked, black skidmarks glowing faintly with residual hellfire in the wake of the Rider's passing.
And the Rider was silent.
Focused.
Locked onto the scent of sin.
The Sparrow roared across the long blacktop arteries of Missouri like a beast with purpose—glowing horns, flaring exhausts, front wheel kicking up sparks as it hovered inches above the ruined road. Street signs melted as it passed. Power lines flickered. Streetlamps shattered from the heat alone.
Time bent around it. The journey compressed.
Towns blurred.
Fields turned to overpasses.
Billboards caught fire as it passed beneath them, unreadable in the smoke and wind.
The bag in the sidecar jostled—one flap half-unzipped as Rhea's boot stuck out, trying to stabilize whatever chaos was happening inside. The magic held. Barely.
But the Rider didn't look back.
It didn't need to.
The scent was strong now.
Greed. Cruelty. Hidden sin behind polished glass and concrete.
The lights of the city rose over the horizon like a challenge.
Kansas City.
A cathedral of vice wearing the skin of Midwestern respectability.
The Rider didn't hesitate.
It throttled forward—flames licking higher, eyes burning brighter, claws curled around the handles like justice itself was begging to be let off the leash.
The Rider entered Kansas City like a storm kicked down Heaven's back door.
Streetlights shattered in sequence as he passed. Windows cracked without a touch. Alarm systems wailed before shorting into silence. Thunder rolled over the skyline with no storm to justify it.
People hit their knees on instinct.
Not out of worship.
Out of guilt.
He didn't slow.
The Sparrow tore down streets that warped behind him—concrete blackened, tar bubbling in his wake. Neon signs sputtered and died. Traffic froze. Shadows stretched like they wanted to run.
And the smell—Gods, the smell.
Sin. Everywhere.
Greed in gold-tinted condos.
Lust behind blackout club doors.
Gluttony thick in alley kitchens.
Sloth soaking into couches and broken dreams.
Wrath under riot gear.
Pride sipping from champagne flutes.
Envy watching from balconies.
All seven.
And more.
Older things. Ancient sins, the kind that had been rewarded instead of punished.
The Rider glided between them—past them. They weren't the target.
Until he found it.
A wall.
Concrete. Steel-reinforced. Unremarkable to human eyes.
But the Rider saw it.
Not the wall—the lie behind it.
He revved the Sparrow once—flames shrieking from its pipes—and gunned it.
The bike hit the wall at full force—
And passed through it.
One second it was Kansas City.
The next, bark.
Endless, ageless bark.
The Sparrow screamed as it locked onto the trunk of the World Tree—Yggdrasil.
The roots of the cosmos twisted in every direction. The tree groaned with the weight of the worlds.
The Rider didn't pause.
Didn't marvel.
Didn't blink.
The Sparrow's wheels ignited, clawing into bark older than time, burning a mix of demonic and divine symbols into the wood as it climbed.
Up.
Past roots bigger than mountains.
Past branches that cradled realms.
Past stars caught in amber leaves.
The wind howled with whispers in ancient Norse tongues. The air cracked with power.
The Rider's grip tightened on the handlebars.
His claws gleamed—hellfire and black flame, ready to pass judgment.
He didn't look back, his eyes were focused on the city at the top, reeking of Sin, of the guilty dead rewarded and not punished, of mighty gods dripping with the blood of the innocent.
And as the engine roared, the world-tree trembled.
He whispered through scorched teeth:
"Judgment rides."
And Yggdrasil burned.
CP Bank:0cp
Perks earned this chapter: 100cp Spirit of Vengeance (Marvel Midnight Suns) [Transformation] There is something else inside you, something that screams for vengeance like Johnny Blaze and Robbie Reyes. Just like any other Ghost Rider your Spirit of Vengeance allows you to channel hellfire in different shapes, give souls a Penance Stare to hurt them with their soul with their own sins and a healing factor of the damned.
200cp Blood of the Hydra (God of War) [Destruction] It was not any great weapon or feat of strength that killed the mortal Hercules, but poisonous blood. Blood much like yours, as a matter of fact. Your blood is so poisonous that even the gods would fear being under its effects, and capable of killing mere mortals with but a touch. This doesn't affect you at all, of course, and you are able to toggle it on and off, if you desire to give away your blood for other reasons beyond assisted murder.
Free: Planeswalker Spark (Magic The Gathering - Iconics) [Source] The post-Mending Planeswalker Spark, not the Jumper Spark. This is the Spark of the MtG universe, and your own Planeswalker Spark has ignited. Due to this your ability to understand and mold Mana becomes incredibly intuitive such that your potential far exceeds all mortal spellcasters. You know the basics of summoning creatures that you have a connection with, creating new creatures from mana, casting spells, and forming contracts with higher powers for boosts to your capabilities. As a new Planeswalker, your current capacity to use Mana starts at 5 motes of Mana before incurring Mana Burn. This will easily grow to 10 motes of Mana within a year and from there, given thorough magical research, you will be able to sustain an additional mote of Mana per year of study. Mana is generated from Lands, of which you can bond to one after half a week. Lastly, as a Planeswalker you can of course travel the multiverse. In a ritual requiring at least three motes of Mana and six hours of mental preparation, you can take with you anything on your person. This can be trained to have a lower cost and mental preparation time. In addition, you can instead Planeswalk instantly when following someone in the immediate wake of an interdimensional jump. When navigating between planes you can either go to a plane randomly or go to a plane you know or one you have seen by visualizing it in your mind. This ability is limited to the local multiverse until you ignite your Jumper Spark.
Milestones: None350Magus exploratorMay 19, 2025View discussionThreadmarks Chapter 35- I'm going to take his face..... OffView contentMagus exploratorMay 20, 2025#2,401The Sparrow roared like a jet engine, climbing higher and higher along the bark of Yggdrasil. The World Tree buckled and burned beneath the bike, each revolution of the grav plates carving molten trails into the wood—blackening roots untouched since the dawn of creation. Smoke rose behind the Rider like a funeral veil.
Far above, nestled in unseen branches and gold-laced palaces, the horns began to blow.
All of them.
Every horn in Heimdall's hall. Every ancient relic atop Odin's watchtowers. Every battle-call forged for the last war let loose in a deafening wave that cracked the sky. The World Tree heard it. The gods heard it. So did every warrior in Valhalla, every shield-maiden, every spirit waiting for the end.
They all thought the same thing.
Ragnarök.
The Ghost Rider said nothing. His eyes stayed forward, fire curled along his back like a cloak, licking his shoulders as the Sparrow cut through the air with impossible speed. Runes etched into the bark flared red and gold, pulsing in alarm, trying to contain the desecration.
The bag in the demonic sidecar rattled. One zipper peeled back slightly—and a pale face peeked through the fold of reality.
Nico di Angelo blinked up at the skeletal inferno riding the bike.
It wasn't Lucas anymore. Not really. What stared back was pure intent: a flaming skull, a grin with sharp teeth that crackled as if the bones themselves laughed.
Nico stared a second too long.
Then he yelped, slammed the zipper shut, and said nothing.
The tree shook.
Above, the bark shattered with a thunderclap as something heavy and alive slammed down onto the path. Claws the size of plow blades sank into the trunk, dragging a wave of splinters and divine fury with them.
The Ghost Rider didn't slow. He leaned forward as the Sparrow's front lifted slightly, pushing the engine harder. The flames trailing behind him coiled like serpents, licking at the bark as divine wood curled and blackened in his wake.
He reached behind his back and drew the axe.
It came free with a hungry whine. The strings hummed like hornets, and the twin blades burst to life—hellfire on one end, a smoldering black edge touched by the Rune of Death on the other. The entire weapon vibrated in his grip, eager for violence.
Ratatoskr bounded forward. Claws ripped into the trunk. Jaws opened wide enough to swallow a car. It didn't care what the Rider was. It only knew something unholy had lit Yggdrasil on fire—and it would tear it out before it reached the gates of Asgard.
The Rider grinned.
And twisted the Sparrow's throttle as far as it would go.
Flames detonated from the back like a rocket.
Ratatoskr shrieked, fur crackling with god-static, claws tearing up chunks of bark the size of boats.
Then it spoke.
"Little skull-thing," it hissed, voice a chittering growl. "You wear vengeance like a toddler wears his father's sword. You reek of fell fire. An abomination not of heaven or hell, a angel far away from his father sight, a demon too pure for the brass city."
The Rider didn't flinch.
The fire around him grew.
Orange flame surged deeper—turning black and crimson at the edges. The Rune of Death pulsed like a heartbeat down the axe's blade. The insult only fed the hunger inside him.
The Rider came in low, the axe gripped tight in one skeletal hand, twin blades glowing white-hot. Ratatoskr lunged, jaws wide, teeth like temple spires ready to crush him whole.
He ducked under.
And drove the axe into the beast's chest with both hands.
The blades bit deep—molten edges carving through fur and bone. Blood that shimmered like gold-black sap burst into the air as the Rider tore the weapon sideways, gouging a canyon across the monster's ribs.
Ratatoskr shrieked—not in pain, but fury.
It twisted, a paw slamming down where the Rider had been—but he was already gone, the Sparrow weaving tight against the bark like a comet on rails.
In one fluid motion, he dropped the axe to his side, reached into a corrupted saddlebag, and pulled out a coil of rope.
He snapped his fingers.
The rope ignited.
Hellfire crawled along its length like a snake made of flame. The Rider surged forward and hurled the rope with one vicious snap.
It caught Ratatoskr's neck.
The beast bucked, jaws snapping, claws tearing at bark—but the rope held.
The Rider yanked it tight.
Then twisted the throttle.
The Sparrow screamed forward, dragging the massive god-beast behind it like a kite on fire. The rope burned brighter with every second, searing a spiral into Ratatoskr's throat. The tree itself trembled as they soared upward, the god-squirrel thrashing behind, scattering bark and sap like blood.
The Rider didn't even look back.
He gripped the rope.
And pulled.
The Rune of Death flared.
The rope tightened—glowed white-hot—
—and with a snap that echoed through the roots of the cosmos, Ratatoskr's head tore clean off.
The body twisted, spasmed once, then crumbled into ash behind the Sparrow.
The Rider let the axe drag along the bark behind him, carving a trench in his wake.
Where the blade passed, portals flickered open—cracks into other realms. Alfheim. Vanaheim. A hallway in Hel. Glowing windows—
Then collapse.
Smoke and fire consumed them before they could stabilize.
He was too much.
Reality recoiled.
The climb continued.
Then—impact.
An arrow slammed into his shoulder.
Cold.
Divine ice spread across his collarbone, trying to lock the joints in place.
It cracked.
Melted.
The Rider looked up.
A figure stood above—on a wide, hanging branch that jutted from the trunk like a cliff. Fur cloak. Gold-etched bow. Calm, ancient eyes beneath a winter helm.
Ullr.
And beside him—a dozen Valkyries, spears and bows raised. Behind them, rows of einherjar warriors. A full war band.
They were waiting.
The Rider looked them over.
And laughed.
Low. Dry. Fire curling from his jaws like a forge breathing.
The arrow dropped from his shoulder, melted to slag.
He revved the engine again.
Flames erupted from the pipes.
The gates of Asgard loomed ahead—massive towers of forged steel and divine gold, hammered with runes. Designed to repel giants, dragons, and gods.
But they hadn't been designed for this.
Smoke roiled up the trunk of Yggdrasil like a god's funeral pyre. The sky above the gates dimmed. Not with clouds—but with heat. The bark beneath the gates glowed red, splintering as fire crawled up from the roots. Somewhere down below, something roared.
Gunilla, daughter of Thor, captain of the Valkyries, stood at the gates in full battle armor, cloak snapping in the scorched wind. Her hammer hung across her back. Lightning danced at her boots.
She did not flinch.
"Shields up!" she barked. "If it breathes, kill it. If it doesn't, kill it harder!"
Behind her, the ranks of Valhalla responded—einherjar in formation, bows raised, blades drawn, armor clattering. These were warriors who had already died once. Who had earned their seats at Odin's table.
The smoke thickened.
Then—THUNK.
The gates shook.
A second time. THUNK.
Sparks bled through the seams.
"Form up!" Gunilla shouted. "Brace—"
THUNK.
The hinges screamed.
And then the gates of Asgard exploded inward.
A wave of heat flattened the front ranks. Shields boiled. Spears warped. Warriors fell back coughing, eyes burning.
And through the smoke rolled a machine.
No—more than a machine.
The Sparrow roared into the courtyard like a hell-born charger, frame twisted with infernal steel, pipes vomiting flame, sidecar glowing with magic.
On its seat, a skeleton.
Burning.
Axe-bass in hand. Rope across its chest. Face a skull wreathed in flames.
Dragged behind it, bouncing and scraping against the courtyard tile—
The severed head of Ratatoskr.
The Rider stepped off the bike.
Each step hissed on the stone.
The army didn't move.
Then the skull turned. Slowly. Deliberately. Until its eyes landed on a single warrior in the ranks.
An einherjar—tall, broad, gold-trimmed armor.
But more importantly?
A leather jacket from Hotel Valhalla gift shop.
On the back: I DIED AN HONORABLE DEATH AND ALL I GOT WAS THIS JACKET.
The Rider stared.
Took one step forward.
And said, in a voice like he chain smoked marlboro's since it was born:
"Eirik Skullbrand."
The soldier blinked. "I—what?"
"You are… guilty."
Just walked through the ranks, straight up to Eirik, grabbed him by the armor, and lifted him off the ground with one hand.
And stared.
Eirik screamed.
Then he dropped.
Eyes looking like pieces of charcoal.
The Rider reached down, tore the jacket off the corpse, and shrugged it on.
It changed—warped to fit him, the back smoldering, the slogan barely visible through the smoke.
Silence.
"ATTACK!" Gunilla roared.
The Valkyries surged. Behind them, the einherjar surged like a wave, blades flashing under the shadow of the smoke-choked sun.
The Ghost Rider didn't run.
He stepped into them.
The first spear struck—only to melt on contact, the tip sizzling to slag against his burning ribs. The Valkyrie behind it didn't even get to gasp before the Rider backhanded her from the air. Her armor flared, cracked, and she hit the ground in a twitching sprawl.
Another came from behind, sword raised. The Rider turned.
Looked.
Saw her.
Judged her.
The skull tilted once.
Innocent.
The Rider stepped past.
She froze in place, untouched.
But the next? Guilty.
He was ash before he hit the ground.
The axe-bass screamed as it swung, cords humming with infernal sound, each note a death knell.
A Valkyrie lunged with a cry of vengeance.
The Rider caught her mid-air.
Paused.
Judged.
Then let her fall, untouched.
Another warrior—older, scar-slick, grinning like war was a game—charged with a hammer big enough to crack a dragon's spine. He didn't make it halfway. The Rider's rope lashed out like a striking viper, caught his leg, and yanked.
The warrior flipped once, twice, and slammed down in a heap.
The rope pulled tighter. Judged.
Gone.
The battlefield changed in seconds. What had started as a charge dissolved into confusion, then fear, then chaos.
Because when the skull looked at you—really looked—you saw it.
Your worst moment.
The lie you told. The promise you broke. The oath you forgot.
And if it was bad enough?
You died.
Something that shouldn't be possible in Odin halls.
One by one, the warriors backed off or were judged.
Gunilla didn't.
She stood at the gates, hammer in hand, lightning crackling down her arms, face locked in thunderous fury.
"You don't belong here," she growled. "This is holy ground."
The Rider turned.
Walked toward her.
Slow.
Smoke curling behind every step.
He raised the axe—slowly, like a gavel—and pointed it at the great hall beyond her.
The throne room of Asgard was in shambles.
Flames curled up the walls, black and red, licking at ancient tapestries and divine marble that wasn't supposed to crack. But it cracked now. It all cracked.
Loki crawled across the scorched floor, elbow dragging through a smear of divine ichor. His jersey—once a crisp, smug white Red Sox shirt—was soaked in blood, torn open and clinging to him like wet tissue. His legs wouldn't cooperate. His hand shook with every pull forward.
He could hear the screams.
And worse—the silence that followed.
Freyr had been sent flying through one of the open archways earlier, a single punch launching him across half of Asgard. He hadn't come back.
Tyr was down near the steps, chest rising in short, wheezing bursts, hand clenched tight around a broken sword that glowed dimly but did nothing.
The fire moved with purpose now, circling the golden hall, turning everything that once gleamed into ash.
Then Thor came crashing through a pillar.
He hit the floor hard, skidding past Loki in a heap of cracked stone and trailing steam. His skin was raw with burns. A piece of shoulder armor clattered away. Mjolnir was gone. His cape had burned down to ribbons.
But he was grinning anyway.
Breathing hard. Bleeding from his nose.
"If I knew messing with you Christians was this fun," he coughed, "I'd have sent more challenges to Jesus."
Then the rope found him.
Thor didn't have time to curse a second time.
The rope yanked, dragging him across the scorched floor and into the smoke. He vanished in a trail of sparks and half-choked laughter.
Loki kept crawling.
He didn't look back.
He didn't want to.
His fingers left smears on the golden floor as he clawed toward the throne—toward anywhere not behind him.
A voice followed.
"Loki Laufeyson."
He froze.
"Liar. Trickster. Betrayer."
He squeezed his eyes shut.
"You are... guilty."
The footsteps were slow.
And getting closer.
Loki gritted his teeth and dragged himself forward, whispering spells with a dry throat, fingers searching for any trick he hadn't already used.
Then the steps stopped.
A shadow fell over him.
The Ghost Rider stood over him—silent. The axe-bass rested on one shoulder. The flaming rope curled slowly at his side like it was waiting to strike again. Fire flickered from his skull, casting long, twitching shadows across the ruined throne room.
Then the Rider reached down and grabbed him by the collar.
"Look into my eyes. Your souls are stained with the blood of the innocent. Feel their pain."
Loki screamed.
He screamed like something was being torn out of him—his lies, his pride, every mask he'd ever worn ripped off one by one and burned under the gaze of the Spirit of Vengeance. His limbs twitched. His glamour cracked. Every deception came undone in the heat of what he was.
Then he dropped—limp.
Smoke curled from his eyes and mouth.
The Rider stood there a moment longer, then slowly turned to the ruined hall.
The gods stared back.
Silent.
No one moved.
Then he lifted two fingers to his jaw—and whistled.
A second later, the Sparrow came screaming in from above, wheels blazing, frame twisting in mid-air as it roared into the throne room like a summoned beast. It skidded to a stop beside him.
He turned and walked to it, climbing on without a word.
As he sat, he snapped the rope once—CRACK—and from the wreckage of a toppled feast table, a casket of mead flew toward him, caught mid-air by the flaming cord.
The Rider angled the bike downward.
One final rev.
And then—
He dropped.
Straight through the floor, fire trailing behind like a comet, disappearing into the roots of the World Tree—leaving only a charred circle where he'd stood, there was still many too judge.
Time inside the bag was strange.
Not just stretchy or floaty—wrong. The kind of wrong where seconds felt like hours, and everything smelled vaguely like pine and fur.
Bianca sat near the wall, cradling Nico, who hadn't said a word since peeking out of the bag and immediately regretting it. He was pale, shaking slightly, and staring into nothing with wide-eyed.
Elia paced in sharp, tight circles, blade in hand, muttering the same five words on loop.
"We're not dead. It's fine."
"We're not dead."
"It's fine."
Rhea wasn't doing much better. She sat with her back to one of the support beams that shouldn't have existed in a bag, arms wrapped around her knees, breathing fast. Not quite hyperventilating, but close. Her eyes were distant.
Elia spun on her. "Okay. Enough. Rhea. What did he see? What's going on out there?"
Rhea didn't answer at first.
Then she mumbled, "I think it's the Ghost Rider."
Bianca frowned. "What's a Ghost Rider?"
Elia blinked. "Is that a Western thing?"
Nico quietly added, "Does he... ride ghosts?"
"I don't know!" Rhea snapped. "I mean—I think? I saw it once. Like a movie. Years ago. My uncle rented it. Some guy with a skull on fire. Chains. Motorcycle. I think it was Nicolas Cage."
Everyone stared.
Bianca squinted. "...Is that a kind of magician?"
Rhea let out a low groan. "No! He's—he's an actor. Probably. I don't remember. I thought it was just a dumb action movie, but now Lucas is doing it. For real."
Nico shivered again. "His face was bones. Just... fire and bones."
Elia ran a hand down her face. "Okay. So Lucas is now some kind of flaming skeleton god. Good. That's... great. Totally what I thought today would bring."
Then the bag flap moved.
Everyone froze.
Sif lifted her head with a sharp growl, ears up.
The zipper peeled back.
And something huge stepped inside.
It was a wolf—taller than Sif, darker, wrapped in melted and broken chains that dragged behind it like metal vines. Its eyes were gold, wild and deep, and it sniffed the air like it was trying to catalog each of them by scent.
Nico immediately ducked behind Bianca.
Elia raised her blade again. "Seriously?"
The new wolf didn't move. Just stared.
Then Sif stood.
She padded forward, slow and steady.
The tension in the bag spiked like a wire.
The two wolves met in the middle of the room.
There was a pause.
Then, like some unspoken code between ancient apex predators, they both sniffed each other's rear ends.
Sif let out a soft boof, tail swaying once. The new wolf—Fenrir, though none of them knew the name—rumbled something low and deep, then flopped beside her in a massive, chain-draped heap.
They curled around each other like they'd done it a thousand times before.
Elia lowered the dagger.
Bianca blinked slowly. "...Do wolves just do that?"
Rhea, still pale, stared at the ceiling. "I don't know what's happening anymore."
Nico peeked around his sister's arm. "Is that one of his friends?"
No one answered.
The two giant wolves yawned.
They waited.
Five minutes.
Ten.
An hour?
It was hard to tell in the bag. There was no sun. No stars. Just soft ambient light that flickered now and then.
Nico had curled up against Bianca, and somewhere between one heartbeat and the next, he was asleep. Bianca followed not long after, her chin tucked against his shoulder, arms wrapped around his small frame.
Rhea sat cross-legged on one of the cushions, staring blankly into space. Her breathing had slowed, finally. The panic was still there, but it had faded into a sort of surreal haze—like she'd been screaming into a pillow for ten minutes and just gave up.
Elia sat nearby, back to a storage crate, eyes half-lidded.
They said nothing for a while.
Eventually, Rhea muttered, "You think we could climb out?"
Elia didn't even look at her. "Climb where? Through the bag and into a flaming void? Pass."
"Right," Rhea sighed. "Guess we'll see where the murder bike stops."
"Yep."
Silence again.
Then a sound—whumph.
Sif had shifted her weight, stretching out across the floor like a giant, warm boulder. She lifted one of her massive paws and looked at them, just for a second, before patting the ground beside her with a soft boof.
Elia blinked.
Rhea tilted her head. "...Did she just tell us to use her as a pillow?"
The paw flopped again.
"Yeah, okay," Elia said, pushing herself up with a groan. "I've had weirder nights."
They crossed the room and gently leaned into Sif's side. The heat from her fur was perfect—comforting without burning, soft in a way that seemed physically impossible for something that big and lethal.
Rhea rested her head against Sif's shoulder, eyes fluttering.
Elia stretched out beside her with a quiet sigh. "If he comes back and we're still in here, we're suing him."
Rhea was already dozing. "With what lawyer?"
"Elia Law Services," she mumbled. "You fight me, I fight you harder."
Sif yawned. The whole bag seemed to exhale with her.
Outside, the bike rumbled on.
Somewhere.
Doing who-knew-what.
Woke up surrounded by ice cubes.
I blinked, steam curling off my face.
There was a little ding-ding-ding sound above me—metal fan spinning lazily in some overworked ventilation unit. Cold air blasted against my skin, and damn, it felt good. Like aloe vera for the soul. My body was still radiating heat like I'd come out of a forge, but the ice? Perfect.
I lay there for a minute. Let my brain catch up. Let my bones cool off.
Then I shifted, and half the cube pile slid off me in a wet clatter. I groaned and sat up, half wedged inside the kind of ice box you'd find bolted outside a gas station or down a hotel hallway next to the vending machine. The inside walls were metal. The insulation was frosted over. A paper sign above my head read:
"Ice for Guests Only – Not for Storage."
I snorted.
Still alive. More or less.
Wearing a leather jacket I didn't remember putting on. Black, heavy, lined with faintly glowing seams and a few low-profile shoulder spikes. Still steaming slightly.
Under it? A wrinkled IKEA T-shirt. White. Pale blue font.
Jeans. Not burned. Bit loose. Definitely not mine.
I patted my pockets.
Right pocket: Frozen meatballs, still sealed in plastic. IKEA branded.
Left pocket: Something small. Solid. I pulled it out.
A Hatsune Miku figurine. She was dressed like a Viking—tiny horned helmet, long braided pigtails, a little axe in hand. It was adorable. And weird. But what caught my eye was the base.
It was signed.
Sharpie. Tiny, neat handwriting:
"To Lucas – Sing strong!"
I stared at it.
"Hi, Miku," I said, hoarse.
Then frowned.
"…Wait, aren't you a robot?"
The waifu didn't answer.
I gave her a respectful nod and tucked her back into my pocket like she was important.
Then I looked around, shoulders stiff.
"Alright," I muttered, dragging one hand down my face.
I stood up. My spine cracked. The inside of the ice box was way too small for someone my size. I reached up and pushed the lid open—sunlight hit me in the face.
Outside was a sidewalk. Cracked. City street. Hotel walls behind me. Pigeons somewhere nearby.
I blinked into the light.
I was out of hell.
Probably.
Now the real question was—
"Where the hell did Zarathos park my bike?"
CP Bank:400cp
Perks earned this chapter:None.
Milestones: Ragnarok Averted?: "We did it, Patrick! We saved the City!" - 400cp