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Do you like Loki's creations, dangerous experiments, and willingness to challenge enemies that appear above his league? Then you will definitely like Thairon, the protagonist of my original story, Arrival : Ruptures. Comments, likes and reviews are appreciated. Here are the links for : AO3, Spacebattles, Royal Road and Webnovel.
—
Asgard
When he finally returned to Asgard, it was to his hidden little laboratory beneath the palace. He made it outside, only for several guards to rush at him with weapons drawn.
He flicked his hand, sending the guards flying away.
"I hope you have a good explanation for your actions, or I will not wait for my father's verdict to kill you," he said. He brought his left hand behind him, feeling it start to unravel.
"My prince, is it really you?" the one who charged at him first asked, sheathing his weapons.
"Yes, who else?"
"Please forgive us. The simulation room went out of control. A replica of yours took control and started attacking everyone."
Loki rubbed his forehead, masking the instability. "Is this why this place looks like a warzone?"
"Yes."
"Wonderful. I will find my Father and see how this situation even happened. Carry on."
One of the guards came with him to prevent any more confusion. His father was in the simulation room while scholars were checking the powered-down system.
"Father, what has happened?" he asked, gazing at the scorched room. It would need repairs for sure.
"Loki, is it really you?"
He created an orb of plasma in his hand to display that he was the real one. His simulated copy wouldn't be able to use seidr. A capability he did not add due to how difficult it was and potential problems that could spring from it.
Which appeared to have paid off.
"Some of the scholars," his father threw a sharp look at the ones working on the console, "consulted you for advice. They removed the safeguards you had. This is the result."
The scholars winced but continued with the diagnostics.
"Is everyone well?" he asked. He knew they would not be so easily harmed by a simulated army, but you never knew.
His father nodded. "Your mother severed the powerlines outside."
"I will work on repairing them later if it is not an issue."
"Take your time."
—
His father gathered the family in his workroom, along with Heimdall, who he had learned was incapacitated due to a sudden explosion on Svartalfheim.
The gatekeeper was declared ready to leave the healing room. Odin wanted to hear the state of Svartalfheim before deciding what to do.
"Heimdall, report."
The Gatekeeper was bereft of his armor, the first time he had seen him so.
"Svartalfheim is gone, my king." Heimdall lowered his head, searching. "I see no existence of it except small asteroids. Everything else is gone."
He played along, freezing as his family had. He did not know who to thank that Heimdall had not recovered before he was finished with consuming Svartalfheim.
"Goodness." His mother raised a hand to her lips. "What could have caused this?"
Thor nudged him with his elbow. He looked at his brother from the corner of his eye and sighed.
"Loki?" his father asked, seeing the small exchange.
He sniffed. "We might know what it was."
"Explain," his father said, his gaze turning sharp.
"There is a hidden city on Svartalfheim," he revealed. "It is, or rather was, powered by a singularity reactor. I had seen that it needed maintenance but did not wish to meddle with it."
All eyes, except Thor's, bore down on him. Silence reigned for precious seconds.
"And how exactly do you know this?" his father asked with a low voice.
"We went there for exploration." His brother leaped to the rescue, taking the heat off him.
Heimdall lowered his head, trying to hide his small smile. His mother, on the other hand, gazed at them with a tilted head and thin lips.
"You two went to a planet that is forbidden," Odin said, waiting for a beat, "for exploration?"
"Yes. I apologize," he said, bowing deeply, hiding another instability, this time his eyes.
Thor followed along. "So do I."
His father took a deep breath, his one good eye closed.
"What of this city?" he asked, eyes still closed.
"It was hidden near the shore of the continent under a constant storm of dark matter. Grandfather Bor never discovered it, so it was left untouched."
"Were there any Dokkalfar alive?" his mother asked. Her son's unnatural amount of knowledge regarding the Dark Elves made sense now.
"Only a cursed soldier," Thor said. "They were researching ways of extending their lives since they proved to be potent weapons against the Einherjar."
"The reactor most likely went critical, acting like an oversized black hole grenade that consumed the planet," he added.
"Yet," his father opened his eyes, "it does not explain the explosion."
"I believe the gravitational waves triggered an explosion in the dark matter storm. Since we know they used Aether to hide the city, the overload must have blinded Heimdall. The power of an Infinity Stone is potent after all," he said.
It did not stretch the realms of possibility for something created from Aether to blind Heimdall. There wasn't any evidence left to investigate, and they would have to take his word for it.
"The explosion was intense, my king. I did not see much before it struck me."
"Very well. Heimdall, you will rest as Eir instructed. I, and all of Asgard, are grateful to have a loyal servant like you."
"I am merely doing my duty, my king." He bowed and left the room.
"As for you two," his father's gaze snapped at them once the door was closed. "A punishment is in order, I believe."
"You two will assist with the repairs around the palace as you are able."
"Yes, Father," they said at the same time. Considering the gravity of the situation, it was a rather light punishment.
"Now that everything is out of the way, tell me, how did your time with your lady friend go?" his mother asked. He knew she was waiting for this and having to disappoint her hurt.
"She was bored by my scholarly pursuits."
"Ah. Pity."
"Alas, I am young, Mother. I am sure I will find someone I like eventually."
"I am sure you will," his father assured, dismissing them.
—
"You blew up Svartalfheim?!" Thor erupted once they were in his room, as he needed to refresh himself.
"It was an accident," he hissed back, letting himself drop back into the sofa.
"What kind of an accident destroys a realm?"
Loki raised his hand, dispelling the outer layer for a moment, revealing the emerald energy. "The kind that will give us the edge we need to prevent Ragnarok."
"You are well, right?" Thor asked, grasping him by the shoulder.
"I am."
"Good, I have been worried ever since Heimdall mentioned Svartalfheim."
"Not like the Dokkalfar can cry about it."
"True."
Both brothers chuckled.
—
The punishment of assisting the repairs turned out to be a blessing in disguise. He wanted to increase his control over his newfound existence before a part of him unraveled before witnesses.
Using seidr to clear debris by absorbing them, carrying new materials with telekinesis, and willing scorch marks away for days was great as small-time exercises while he kept himself together.
Once his assistance was no longer necessary inside the palace, he left to fix the simulation room. First, he powered the system with a small amount of seidr. It required him to take a step forward in his work, to be more precise and exert greater power.
His copy had slipped out in the last minutes, carrying him out of the system through the powerlines and right into the Tenth Realm.
As he was not acting right now, there was time before an intervention became necessary.
Several circuits, the holographic projectors, and power lines were fried, requiring total replacements.
Which is when he decided to risk a bit more.
His master particles, his seidr, could transform into anything, and they could transform anything back into pure seidr. He had already consumed an entire planet. Rather than wait for parts, he could try to create them here.
Any mistakes and he could simply break down the parts back into seidr and retry.
What he required first was to know the entire atomic structure of the replacement part. Now that he was working on a subatomic scale, his seidr could scan extremely detailed images.
He conjured a three-dimensional representation of the part for reference.
The process was mind-numbingly slow. He was like an organic synthesizer creating an extremely complicated part for the first time. Layer by layer, the part came together. He measured the time, revealing that two hours had passed.
Slow for his tastes, but much better than expected.
He was restless on his feet while testing the part. The hologram appeared briefly before the machine shut down. He pulled it apart, seeing that several parts of the components had melted into a sludge.
A cursory scan revealed the bonds between the atoms were far weaker than necessary. Breaking the entire projector down into seidr, he started again.
His second time was an hour and a half. The melted parts were smaller and fewer in number. He tried again, reaching slightly under an hour. Over and over he broke and rebuilt the part. Each attempt was a chance to learn from his mistakes and become better as a result.
The final product had worked wonderfully. He was excited to continue his work when the recently repaired door was opened.
"Loki, there you are. It is lunchtime, hurry."
—
He did not feel hunger, not like he used to. Still, the food was too appetizing to not eat. He reached for the chicken, cutting himself a slice. He took a bite, ready for the delightful taste.
For some reason, the chicken was bland.
He had not eaten anything since his return. Consuming Svartalfheim made him feel bloated, as if he were ready to burst at the seams. He had even skipped breakfast, but the desire for tasty food was still in his mind.
Which made the lack of a taste disappointing.
Everyone else was enjoying the lunch, which meant only he faced this issue. He almost smacked himself, realizing what had happened.
He had not created receptors equal to taste buds. His current body did resemble his previously organic state. The nerve-adjacent creations helped him feel, see, and hear, but he had skipped taste.
Focusing, he had a hard time keeping a straight face. The chicken turned sour in his mouth first, then overly sweet, followed by a rotten taste that made him wince, but finally, the blissful, juicy taste of the chicken danced in his mouth.
Which made him reach for the whole chicken and several other dishes.
"Slow down, dear; the lunch is not going anywhere," his mother teased.
He just smiled and kept eating.
—
Part of the lessons he learned while working on the projector carried over to the rest of the parts. The strength between atoms and the increase in speed while working on layers met with an entirely new structure.
His speed had dropped, but it was faster than his first attempt at the projector.
Once he stood inside the repaired room, he marveled at his strength and at the speed at which his control grew.
—
Finding his renegade duplicate did not prove to be an issue. He was posing as an NPC, a blacksmith who gave a quest for the beginner's equipment bag.
"My prince, welcome. How may I be of service?"
Loki looked at the blacksmith first, then at his hand. He could assume control of the Tenth Realm and deal with him or actually test his new limits. It was one of the reasons this digital realm existed in the first place.
He closed his eyes in concentration and snapped his fingers after a moment.
Both he and his digital clone winked away, far from the people inside.
He appeared on a hill. His clone fell on his back, removing the disguise. "Took you long enough," he muttered, getting up to fix his clothes.
He shrugged. "You weren't doing any harm, and I had other arrangements."
"I do not deserve to die because those scholars made an accident," his replica scowled. He was modeled to think like him based on all available data and choices he had made but thankfully lacked the memories. It could have been an issue otherwise.
When his father ordered him to dispel, he had acted out of a desire to live, a clear sign that he was more than just a computer glitch.
"You don't," he replied. Entirely computer-based or not, he was a living being.
"What will you do then?"
"The Tenth Realm is an entire planet. You can live here as you wish, without causing problems, and no one will bother you," he said. The replica could build a life here without facing repercussions.
"If I cause a problem?"
"You are me; you know the answer."
"Though, you should probably get a new identity while here," he said. It would be pretty evident if there were a Loki inside the Tenth Realm when he was outside it.
"That's it then," the clone blinked. Just being able to think like a person did not make you him. He could not know what the original had in mind exactly.
"Indeed." He waved his hand, sending the renegade back into his previous position.
Applying his existing knowledge to his new seidr was simpler to grasp than learning new tricks.
He would keep an eye on him from time to time.
—
He continued to refine his control at every opportunity he could. Dressing himself, brushing his teeth, washing his face, carrying objects, and fixing machines. Every second he had, he worked and worked.
Because he wanted to deal with the Celestial on Midgard quickly. In his current state, he could absorb the nascent entity and disappear before anyone was aware of anything.
He was a planet-sized source of seidr compressed to the shape of an Aesir. He could not compare himself to a fully grown Celestial, but their guards would not be a match for him.
Once he understood the make of a celestial completely, he could go and absorb as much seidr as necessary to be able to defeat one. There were billions of stars and countless numbers of planets across the galaxy, and more in the entire universe. The Celestials were mighty, but not invincible.
Knowhere was proof of it.
He would outgrow them until they were no longer a threat. Not only to Asgard, but also to Midgard and the rest of the Nine Realms.
However, they were just a stepping stone on his path. His ultimate purpose for now was to stop Ragnarok. Once assured of his strength, he would travel to Helheim along with Thor to see what his father was hiding.
The experiment on Svartalfheim did not exactly go the way he had envisioned, but the results were more than satisfactory. He knew he was more than ready to put an end to Ragnarok.
If only that persistent feeling in his heart telling him otherwise would go away.
—
In the next chapter:
He stood in the crystalline nursery of the nascent Celestial. It was still asleep, close to the end of its development. Industrialization and the sudden increase in Midgard's population pulled the Emergence to a closer date. The last time he was here, he sought only understanding.
This time, he was looking for a fight.
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