CHAPTER 1 — THE GOD WHO STAYED BEHIND
Snow fell like whispers of ghosts.
The war was over.
Ragnarök had come and gone, yet the Nine Realms still bled. The ashes of Asgard drifted over the new dawn, painting the sky in gray fire.
Kratos stood upon the cliffs of Midgard, the wind biting his scarred flesh. He had seen gods die. He had slain monsters born before time. Yet now, for the first time in his cursed life, he did not feel rage. He felt… silence.
Atreus was gone.
His son had walked his own path — a path Kratos had not dared to stop him from taking. The boy's footprints still marked the snow near their home, fading now beneath the storm.
"He is ready," Kratos muttered to himself, though the words tasted like ashes.
Behind him, the voice of Mimir echoed, soft yet edged with wisdom.
"Aye, he is, brother. But are you?"
Kratos didn't answer. His fingers tightened around the hilt of the Leviathan Axe, its edge still humming faintly with frozen light. The Blades of Chaos, wrapped in cloth, hung heavy at his side. They whispered to him in the wind — faint, cruel voices from his past.
Peace. That's what he thought he wanted.
But peace was a stranger to a man like him.
The village below was small, built on the ruins of the old Midgard temple. Humans, dwarves, and elves now lived together, trying to rebuild what the gods had shattered. They called Kratos "Protector of the Realms," though he had never asked for the title. They offered him food, carved his likeness into stone, whispered prayers to him.
Worship.
The word made his stomach twist.
"They see what ye've become," Mimir said, his voice from the satchel at Kratos' belt. "Not a destroyer. Not anymore. They see a god who stayed when all others fled."
Kratos grunted.
"They should not."
"Aye, but they will. Mortals always need their gods, lad. Even when the gods fail them."
The wind shifted, carrying with it a deep rumble from the forest.
Kratos turned his head sharply.
It was no thunder.
Something old had awakened.
That night, beneath the flicker of the hearth, Kratos sharpened the Leviathan Axe, its cold gleam slicing through the shadows. The house was quiet — too quiet. He felt it again: that crawling sense beneath the skin, like fate whispering his name.
The door creaked. Freya entered, her cloak heavy with frost. Her eyes — sharp, haunted — met his.
"There are tremors in Vanaheim," she said. "Magic twisting where none should exist. The roots of Yggdrasil are shifting again."
Kratos looked up slowly.
"The World Tree is dying?"
"No," she replied, her tone low. "It's remembering."
Her words struck him harder than any blade.
Freya stepped closer to the firelight. "You broke fate, Kratos. You killed the Norns' design. But what happens when fate decides to rebuild itself?"
He said nothing. He didn't need to. He already felt it — the pull in his blood, the same pull that had led him through Olympus, through Helheim, through every god he'd ever slain.
Something was calling him again.
The next day, they followed the tremors north, into the shadowed forests of Midgard. Trees bowed as if in prayer, frost cracking beneath their steps. The silence was unnatural.
Then came the first sign: a rune burned into a tree — glowing faintly blue, pulsing like a heartbeat. Mimir gasped.
"That symbol… it shouldn't exist. It's older than the Aesir. Older than the Norns themselves."
Kratos brushed his hand over it. The rune pulsed brighter, and suddenly the air rippled with sound — a whispering chorus that spoke in languages long forgotten.
Freya raised her bow. "This is forbidden magic."
Kratos' voice was low.
"Not forbidden. Forgotten."
The ground cracked. Frost exploded outward, and from the earth rose a figure cloaked in black ice — tall, hollow-eyed, the essence of ancient magic. Its voice was a hiss that froze the air.
"The cycle cannot end… Ghost of Sparta…"
Kratos' eyes narrowed. "Who speaks?"
"I am the Keeper of Threads. The one who binds what gods unravel. You have broken the loom of fate, and now, the weave demands a price."
Freya fired — the arrow shattered against the being's chest like dust. Mimir's voice trembled.
"By the roots of Yggdrasil… that's no spirit, brother. That's a remnant of fate itself!"
Kratos drew the Leviathan Axe, the frost mist swirling around him.
"Then fate will face me as all others have."
He charged. The axe sang through the air — a sharp arc of ice and fury — but the Keeper vanished, reappearing behind him in a storm of frozen light. Its hand struck his chest, sending him crashing into the trees. The world spun.
Kratos rose slowly, rage burning through his veins.
"You will not take what is mine again."
The Keeper tilted its head.
"We take nothing. You gave your peace when you chose to live."
It vanished in a wave of runic light, leaving behind only the faint glow of the symbol — and the echo of its final words:
"The weave remembers your sins, Ghost of Sparta. Every god you have slain still bleeds within the roots."
The forest went silent once more. Freya helped him up, her eyes dark with fear.
"Whatever that thing was… it's not of this world anymore."
Kratos looked down at his hand — the rune's glow still faintly burned into his skin where he'd touched the tree.
He clenched his fist.
"Then this world will learn… I am not bound by it."
Mimir sighed quietly.
"Gods help us, lad. You've angered the Fates themselves."
As night fell, the wind howled through the ruins like a dirge. Kratos sat by the fire, staring into the flames — but all he saw were eyes. Eyes of those he had killed. Ares. Zeus. Baldur. Odin. Their voices whispered from the dark corners of his mind, one after another.
"You cannot run from what you are…"
"You were never peace, only death in disguise…"
"You broke the gods, Kratos… now break yourself."
His grip on the axe tightened until the wood groaned.
Then he heard another voice — faint, softer, distant as memory.
"Father?"
He turned sharply, but the room was empty. Only wind. Only echoes.
Still, he felt it. Atreus' presence — faint, but real. Somewhere beyond the Nine Realms.
And above the firelight, the rune on his skin flared once more, showing a vision: a tower of ice, rising from the heart of Helheim.
Kratos' jaw set. He rose slowly, lifting the axe onto his shoulder.
"If the Fates wish to bind me again…" he said, his voice a low growl,
"then I will tear their threads from the roots of the world."
Freya watched him from the shadows, worry flickering in her eyes.
"Then it begins again," she whispered.
"No," Kratos replied, stepping into the storm. "It ends differently this time."