CHAPTER 111 — WHEN THE ROOTS BEGIN TO ROT
The first sign was not fire.
It was silence.
Midgard's wind died without warning. Snow that had been falling for hours froze mid-descent, hanging unnaturally in the air before dropping all at once, as if gravity had remembered its duty too late. The forests went still. Birds vanished from the sky. Even the distant howl of wolves faded into nothing.
The world held its breath.
Kratos felt it through the Leviathan Axe.
A dull ache pulsed through the haft, spreading into his arm like cold creeping through bone. This was not the warning of battle—it was the signal of imbalance. Of something shifting beneath the skin of the realms.
Atreus stopped walking.
"Father," he said quietly. "Midgard is sick."
Kratos scanned the horizon. The mountains stood as they always had, yet something was wrong. The air tasted stale, heavy with an unfamiliar weight.
"This is not natural decay," Kratos said. "Something is feeding."
Atreus clenched his fists. The fracture in his chest responded faintly, a low thrum like a distant drumbeat.
"The First Hunger," he whispered.
The name itself felt dangerous to speak aloud.
Behind them, the path out of the Ninth Realm sealed shut—not violently, but decisively. The silver裂 of the Endurance of Worlds dimmed further as it followed them into Midgard, its once-radiant presence now subdued, restrained.
"The cycle has begun to move," it said.
"Observation has ended."
Kratos turned. "You said it would wait."
"It said it would not feed yet," the Endurance replied.
"Weakening is not feeding. This is preparation."
A low rumble rolled across the plains.
Far in the distance, a mountain collapsed inward—not crumbling outward as stone should, but folding into itself, swallowed by an unseen force. No explosion. No echo.
Just absence.
Atreus staggered back. "It didn't destroy it… it erased it."
Kratos' jaw tightened. "Testing what can be removed without resistance."
The ground trembled again, closer this time.
From the nearby treeline emerged refugees—humans, panicked and disoriented, faces pale with terror. A woman stumbled forward, clutching a child.
"The land is dying!" she cried. "The river vanished—just disappeared!"
Kratos knelt, gripping her shoulders. "Where?"
She pointed east, hands shaking. "It was there this morning."
Atreus looked at his father. "That river feeds three settlements."
Kratos stood. "Not anymore."
The Endurance of Worlds stepped closer.
"The First Hunger weakens structural points. Resources. Lifelines."
Atreus' voice rose. "So people starve. Freeze. Fight each other."
"Survival accelerates selection," the Endurance replied evenly.
Kratos' eyes burned. "And this is what balance means to you?"
"This is what happens when balance is no longer enforced by judgment."
Before Kratos could respond, the air split open.
A rift tore through the sky, jagged and violent—nothing like the controlled portals of gods. Through it fell a figure, slamming into the earth hard enough to crack the frozen ground.
The figure groaned.
Atreus ran forward. "Tyr!"
The god of war struggled to rise, armor shattered, blood dark against the snow. His breathing was labored, his eyes haunted.
"It's spreading," Tyr rasped. "Not just here."
Kratos hauled him to his feet. "Speak."
Tyr swallowed. "Alfheim's light is dimming. Vanaheim's growth has slowed—plants turning brittle overnight. Even Hel… Hel is quiet."
Atreus frowned. "Quiet how?"
Tyr met his gaze. "Souls are no longer arriving."
Silence slammed into them harder than any blow.
Kratos spoke first. "Then where are they going?"
Tyr shook his head. "Nowhere. They're being… lost. Before death completes."
Atreus felt sick. "It's thinning existence itself."
The Endurance of Worlds lowered its head slightly.
"This is how necessity reshapes reality."
Kratos' grip tightened on Tyr's arm. "Then necessity dies."
Tyr looked at him sharply. "You can't fight this like a god."
Kratos met his gaze. "Then I will fight it like something worse."
Another tremor rolled through Midgard—closer, deeper.
The sky darkened unnaturally as clouds folded inward, spiraling around an invisible point.
Atreus cried out, clutching his chest as the fracture flared violently. Threads erupted from his arms, glowing silver-gold as they anchored him to the ground.
"Father—I can feel it pulling—choosing—"
Kratos grabbed him. "Stay with me."
The air screamed.
A chunk of the world vanished.
Not exploded. Not shattered.
Gone.
A section of forest simply ceased to exist, leaving behind a perfectly smooth void where reality ended abruptly.
Tyr whispered, horrified, "It's pruning."
The Endurance of Worlds spoke gravely.
"If left unchecked, the Hunger will reduce the realms to a stable minimum."
Atreus shouted, "And how many survive that?!"
"…Few."
Kratos turned away, scanning the devastation, the refugees, the tearing sky.
"This ends now."
Tyr stared at him. "You don't even know where it truly exists."
Kratos answered without hesitation. "I know where it acts."
Atreus steadied himself, threads retracting slowly. "Father… if we confront it directly, it will test us again."
Kratos nodded. "It already is."
The Endurance of Worlds stepped forward.
"There is another path," it said.
"Dangerous. Forbidden."
Kratos looked at it coldly. "Speak."
"The Hunger does not consume strength alone. It consumes stagnation."
Atreus' eyes widened. "You mean—"
"If the realms adapt faster than it can prune, its logic collapses."
Kratos frowned. "You are asking for chaos."
"I am asking for evolution."
Tyr exhaled sharply. "That kind of change would break gods. Laws. Prophecy."
Kratos' voice was low. "Good."
The ground trembled again, but this time the sensation felt… cautious.
Atreus felt it too.
"It's watching," he said. "Waiting to see what we do."
Kratos placed a hand on his shoulder.
"Then we do what it does not expect."
He turned to the refugees, to Tyr, to the Endurance of Worlds.
"We move the realms," he said. "We fortify what it thinks is weak. We force growth where it seeks collapse."
Tyr nodded slowly. "War… not against armies—but inevitability."
Kratos met his eyes. "I have killed inevitability before."
High above, the sky rippled once more.
Somewhere beyond the Nine Realms, the First Hunger observed.
And for the first time since it returned—
It hesitated.