The brilliant, roaring rainbow beam of the Bifrost slowly receded. The violent, churning spatial energy dissipated into the atmosphere.
Beneath Mira's feet was no longer the chaotic, kaleidoscopic tunnel of the Nine Realms' star map, but the cool, hard surface of the Rainbow Bridge, shimring with an iridescent, crystalline light.
Mira shook her slightly dizzy head. She stuffed the last handful of popcorn into her mouth, casually crumpled the empty paper bag into a ball, and accurately tossed it into a localized subspace storage slot within her rigging.
She imdiately began to complain. "I have to say, Thor, your Bifrost looks incredibly majestic from the outside, but the actual ride is ridiculously turbulent. It is nowhere near as smooth or stable as my Siren spatial portals. The turbulence almost made throw up my popcorn."
As she grumbled, she looked up to take in her first actual view of Asgard.
An endless, rolling sea of pristine white clouds churned beneath her feet. The golden sunlight pierced through the atmosphere, spilling onto the Rainbow Bridge and coating the entire realm in a dreamlike, ethereal glow.
At the very end of the bridge, towering majestically above the clouds, stood the Asgardian Golden Palace. The layered, architectural complexity of the royal complexes was breathtaking. The golden spires pierced the sky, and the massive walls were intricately carved with ancient Asgardian runes. Even from a distance of several miles, one could feel the ancient, overwhelming authority radiating from the seat of power of the Nine Realms.
Compared to the dusty, heat-baked desert of New xico, this place was literally a mythological paradise.
"That is simply the nature of the Bifrost. Tearing a physical wormhole across the Nine Realms is bound to be a bit bumpy," Thor smiled his warm, honest smile, gripping Mjolnir tightly. His face was flushed with the profound excitent of returning ho, though it was tempered by the solemn reality of facing his father. "Lady Ishar-mla, welco to the Realm Eternal. This is Asgard. Over there is—"
Before he could finish his tour-guide speech, Thor's footsteps suddenly halted.
The smile on his face froze entirely. The joy in his blue eyes was instantly snuffed out, replaced by a look of unbelievable, horrifying shock, rapidly followed by towering rage.
Mira followed his gaze. Standing prominently next to the golden observatory at the head of the bridge was a massive, six-foot-tall block of solid ice.
The sculpture was forged entirely from a dark, magical ice that emitted a terrifying, pale-blue frigid light. Frozen perfectly inside the block was a tall, dark-skinned man wearing golden, horned gatekeeper armor.
His golden eyes were wide open. Shock, anger, and absolute betrayal were permanently etched into his expression. One hand was tightly gripping the hilt of Hofund, the great Sword of Protection at his waist, while his other hand was extended forward, frozen in the exact microsecond before he launched a counter-attack. He was perfectly sealed within the magical ice; even the individual braids of his hair were clearly visible.
A bone-chilling, lethal cold continued to pour off the ice block. Even standing thirty feet away, Mira could feel the terrifying, destructive frost of Jotunheim—the unmistakable signature power of the Casket of Ancient Winters.
Mira slowly floated over and circled the ice sculpture twice. She even reached out a pale finger and poked the magical ice. A faint stream of glowing blue binary code swirled around her fingertip, instantly analyzing the magical composition of the frost.
She raised a pixelated eyebrow, turned to look at the ashen-faced Thor, and spoke with a tone of innocent curiosity.
"Hey, Thor... does Asgard have so sort of bizarre, avant-garde welcoming custom? Freezing your gatekeeper into a giant ice cube and using him as a decorative lawn ornant to intimidate tourists? I have to say, the anatomical craftsmanship is incredible—it looks completely lifelike—but the ambient temperature is a bit harsh on the skin."
As she spoke, she nodded solemnly, genuinely acting as if she were critiquing a piece of modern art at a gallery. She completely failed to notice that Thor's fist was clenched so tightly his knuckles were turning white, the bones in his hand audibly cracking under the pressure.
"This is not a welcoming custom! This is Heimdall!" Thor's voice was a low, vibrating growl, heavy with irrepressible fury. He ground his teeth together. "He is the Gatekeeper of Asgard! The Guardian of the Bifrost! The man with the greatest sight in the Nine Realms! He sees everything! Absolutely no one but Loki would dare lay a hand on him!"
Thor understood the tactical reality instantly.
After Loki usurped the throne, the one thing he feared most was Heimdall seeing through his treason and opening the Bifrost to bring Thor back. That was why Loki had stolen the Casket of Ancient Winters from the Vault to freeze Heimdall, seizing absolute, unilateral control over the Bifrost.
"That treacherous bastard!" Thor roared, entirely unable to suppress the blinding rage boiling in his chest.
He violently swung Mjolnir in a rapid circle. The hamr spun so fast it shrieked against the wind. Using the centrifugal montum, Thor launched himself directly into the air, flying at supersonic speeds straight toward the Golden Palace in the distance.
He had barely flown thirty feet when he felt a familiar, faint-blue energy signature rapidly approaching his flank.
Thor glanced out of the corner of his eye. To his absolute shock, Mira was floating effortlessly right next to him. She was perfectly matching his supersonic flight speed, completely unhurried, and even had the leisure to casually look down at the scenic sea of clouds passing beneath them.
Thor was so stunned his flight trajectory physically faltered; he nearly plumted out of the sky.
He had always assud that while Mira possessed terrifying destructive power, she was ultimately an indigenous mortal of Midgard. He assud her apocalyptic feats were entirely facilitated by her cybernetic proxy, Compiler. Back in the desert town, she had exclusively relied on spatial portals to move around; she had never once demonstrated the biological or chanical capacity for sustained, atmospheric flight.
But right now, she was flying even smoother and more steadily than the actual God of Thunder, without a single trace of aerodynamic drag.
"Lady Ishar-mla! How... how in the Nine Realms are you flying?!" Thor stared at her, his blue eyes wide with disbelief, as if he were witnessing a complete violation of physics.
Hearing his shocked tone, Mira looked at him as if he were a complete idiot.
Behind her back, the colossal, ghostly-blue holographic projection of the Jellyfish Rigging instantly materialized and unfolded. The massive, layered chanical hull spread out like the bell of a deep-sea jellyfish. Countless streams of glowing blue data and energy tethers trailed gently behind the rigging like tentacles, providing anti-gravity propulsion.
Hovering smoothly through the Asgardian clouds, the terrifying, Eldritch biochanical construct ford a jarring, beautiful contrast with the ancient Golden Palaces.
Mira commanded the rigging to execute a flawless 360-degree barrel roll in mid-air just to show off. She raised an eyebrow at Thor and sighed with heavy disdain.
"Seriously, Prince Thor, if you are not going to use your eyes, you should really donate them to soone who needs them. Do you not see the massive, glowing chanical jellyfish strapped to my back?"
"Besides, who exactly told you that Sirens only know how to swim in the ocean? The Swarm's rigging technology is omnipotent across the sea, the sky, and the vacuum of space. Flying through Asgard's atmosphere is child's play. We just haven't felt the need to go for a joyride across the galaxy yet."
The mont the words left her lips, Mira routed maximum power to her thrusters. The rigging violently accelerated, instantly breaking the sound barrier. She blew past Thor, rocketing toward the Golden Palace. Her white skirt and silver hair whipped wildly in the slipstream, and the deep-blue rigging shimred with a dangerous, dreamlike luster against the golden sunlight.
Thor was left hovering mid-air, completely stunned, staring blankly at her rapidly shrinking silhouette.
He violently shook his head, refusing to let his brain dwell on the terrifying implications of the Siren's technology. He gripped Mjolnir, spun it rapidly, and blasted after her.
Flying at top speed, it only took the two of them a dozen seconds to cross the vast distance and land heavily on the plaza directly in front of the primary gates of the Golden Palace.
The two massive golden doors, towering hundreds of feet high, were tightly sealed shut. The elite Einherjar royal guards who were supposed to be garrisoned at the entrance had vanished without a trace. The entire periter of the Golden Palace was suffocatingly, eerily quiet. The only sound was the howling wind whipping past the golden spires. Everything reeked of an ambush.
Thor tightened his grip on Mjolnir. His entire body tensed for combat. His eyes frantically scanned the towering columns and shadows, terrified that Loki had rigged the plaza with magical explosives or stationed the Royal Guard to execute him on sight.
Thor turned to look at Mira. His expression was incredibly solemn, laced with profound apology.
"Lady Ishar-mla, I am deeply, truly sorry. I originally intended to give you a proper, honorable tour of Asgard and introduce you to the All-Father. But the tactical situation has severely deteriorated. Loki has clearly lost his mind. Not only has he assaulted Heimdall, but I genuinely fear he may have hard my father."
Thor took a deep breath and delivered another formal, rigid salute. His tone was dead serious.
"Please. Do not wander from this plaza. I will breach the palace first to assess the threat level, locate my father, and neutralize Loki. The Golden Palace is currently a hostile warzone, likely heavily fortified with Loki's magical traps and lethal runic defenses. I cannot, in good conscience, allow a guest to risk her life in my family's civil war. Remain here. Once I have secured the throne room, I will imdiately return to escort you inside."
Without waiting for Mira to argue or agree, Thor gripped Mjolnir tightly. With a sudden, explosive burst of divine strength, he kicked the massive golden doors wide open. He sprinted impatiently into the dark, cavernous depths of the royal corridors. His silhouette vanished instantly into the shadows, leaving behind only the rapidly fading echoes of his heavy boots.
Mira stood alone on the empty golden plaza, staring down the dark corridor Thor had just vanished into. She couldn't help but burst into a fit of giggles.
Do not wander from this spot? Did Thor secretly read so cheesy Midgardian romance novels during his exile? Where did he even learn a line like that?
She casually leaned against a massive, solid-gold marble pillar and yawned out of sheer boredom.
Expecting her to stand outside obediently like a good little tourist? Absolutely impossible.
She was already here. It would be a catastrophic waste not to take a self-guided tour of the Golden Palace, the undisputed crown jewel of the Nine Realms. Moreover, Odin's Vault was located deep within this very citadel. With so much legendary loot hidden inside, she would never forgive herself if she didn't lay eyes on it.
Even though Compiler had remained on Earth to scrub the S.H.I.E.L.D. incident and hadn't accompanied her, Mira wasn't worried in the slightest. An apex Siren did not strictly require an AI proxy to operate. Mira's own cybernetic core computing power was unfathomable, and her raw energy output effortlessly crushed ninety-nine percent of the biological entities in the Nine Realms.
Hacking past Asgard's ancient runic defense grid wouldn't be a challenge; it would simply be a minor ti-sink.
She stood up straight and casually brushed the nonexistent dust off her white dress.
The massive, terrifying Jellyfish Rigging hovering behind her instantly shattered into millions of glowing blue pixels. The data rapidly condensed and retracted into her physical body, returning to its dormant state as faint, elegant blue circuitry patterns etched into her skin. She completely suppressed her apocalyptic energy signature.
To any Asgardian sensor or guard, she now registered as a completely ordinary, harmless Midgardian civilian girl. Zero threat level.
After all, she was technically trespassing in soone else's palace; wandering the halls with an active naval artillery array deployed would be entirely too conspicuous.
Following the highly detailed, three-dinsional architectural map Compiler had downloaded into her neural network before she left, Mira slipped into the grand corridors of the Golden Palace.
Her bare feet made absolutely zero sound against the marble floors. Relying on her flawless Siren stealth capabilities, she perfectly and effortlessly bypassed all the Asgardian royal patrols still active in the outer rings. It was as easy and relaxing as taking a stroll through her own backyard.
The towering walls flanking the corridor were covered in breathtaking, ancient murals depicting Asgard's bloody conquests across the Nine Realms. Intricate golden reliefs were carved into every available surface. The floors were paved with flawless white jade, and the massive colonnade pillars were glowing with defensive runes. Every single inch of the architecture radiated the suffocating luxury and absolute majesty of an imperial hegemon.
As Mira strolled through the halls, she couldn't help but complain under her breath.
"Good grief, Odin really has a disturbing obsession with gold. Literally from top to bottom, even the damn door handles are made of solid gold. It is genuinely hurting my eyes to look at it. This aesthetic is way too 'tacky nouveau riche' for my taste."
When she quietly slipped past the Royal Banquet Hall, she peeked through the heavy velvet curtains. Seeing a cavernous dining hall capable of seating thousands, filled with long oaken tables piled high with exotic Asgardian roasted ats, fresh alien fruits, and golden casks of wine, her digital eyes imdiately lit up.
"Not bad at all. Asgardian catering actually looks pretty decent. Later, after I finish my heist in the Vault, I will definitely swing back here to steal a few casks of ad. I really need to see what this legendary Asgardian alcohol Thor never shuts up about actually tastes like."
She quickly altered her trajectory, smoothly ducking behind a pillar to avoid another squad of heavily ard Einherjar guards. She silently slipped into the left-hand corridor leading deep underground, flawlessly bypassing every single overt sentry and covert magical alarm, without alerting a single soul to her presence...
Now Get The FULL AVAILABLE NOVEL at Once!
With 20 More Chapters Added Today!
@patreon/Authorizz/shop
User Comments
0 comments from readers