Chapter 7 - Learning

Hati and Sif were currently in Sif's room, the same room where she gave birth to him. Actually, Hati had not yet travelled far out of this room, nor did he have his own room. It seemed Sif wanted to keep her son close to her for as long as possible, something Hati was fine with. 

It's not like he needed privacy for "personal exercises" in this tiny three-year-old body. Besides, staying close to his mother like this had allowed him to learn the language quickly after he was born. In fact, he had learned to speak the language only a few months after his birth, but he figured that speaking before he reached the age of one would be a little too far-fetched.

So, instead, the last three years were mostly spent playing with his mother, uncle and great-grandfather. After all, he couldn't leave the house, nor could he read or ask questions, so really, his only option was to try and enjoy this familial love that he was experiencing for the first time, all the while suppressing his guilt, anxiety and depression over Luna's fate. This also helped him grow closer to his mother and start to develop real familial love for her.

Currently, he was asking his mother for help with something. His immature, high-pitched voice travelled through the room as he asked, "Mother, could you please teach me to read?" It was time to start learning more about his current situation, and the best way to do so was, of course, with books.

Hearing this question, Sif was a little surprised that he would ask about this already. But then, thinking about his rapid progression so far, she realised she shouldn't be surprised, as this was a logical next step after learning to talk. Besides, it meant spending even more time with her cute son, so how could she refuse?

"Of course I will, little Hati. Let me just grab a book we can use."  This world was not a friendly or civilised place. There were some public schools here and there, but these were only available when there was someone charitable enough to pay for it. And widely available educational books for children certainly did not exist. 

Most children only had the option of learning from their parents, and the quality and contents of that education would then, of course, depend on those parents. This meant that most people actually did not know how to read and would also be unable to progress far on the path of an einherjar, as they could not read any techniques and could only do their best to passively absorb the ambient spirit energy.

In other words, Sif had to pick a regular book in order to teach Hati how to read. Luckily, she had an extensive library in the ancestral family home she shared with her brother. It could not compare to the official clan library, but that was mostly because her library lacked techniques. 

The clan tightly controlled techniques, which could only be kept in the official library, an attitude shared by nearly all other factions worldwide. This meant that most of the books in her library were either filled with information on a multitude of different topics or were various kinds of novels. 

Sif loved to read, whether fictional stories or informational texts. So she decided to grab a book filled with general knowledge about their world. She decided she might as well start teaching Hati about the world they lived in.

She returned to Hati, and they sat on Sif's bed, with Sif leaning against the headboard and Hati sitting in her lap. She grabbed the book and opened it on the first page, "This book contains a lot of general knowledge of our world of Asgard, little Hati. I figured I could teach you about the world while I teach you how to read and write." She spoke with a smile.

Hearing this, Hati was overjoyed; he thought he would have to ask for specific topics, but he and his mother seemed of one mind. Then he suddenly realised he had finally heard the name of this world he found himself in. His family had never really talked about anything serious while they were with him, mostly just making silly noises to try and get a giggle out of him, so he still knew very little about the world at this point.

'Asgard, huh? I guess that confirms I am not on Earth anymore, even though I had already been pretty sure I wasn't. But Asgard is the name of the Asatro afterlife. Surely that can't be a coincidence? I wasn't exactly any kind of religious in my life on Earth, though, Asatro or otherwise, so how did I end up here? Unless it has nothing to do with that. Thinking about it, though, this is good news for Luna. 

If this is the afterlife, then the possibility that she ended up in this world, like me, increases significantly. Unless there are as many afterlives as there are religions? But let's not think about that possibility for now. Since we died in Norway, and Asatro was a Germanic religion mostly practised in Scandinavia, it's possible that the place we end up in after our death is determined by the location we die in.

Since Luna and I were both atheists on Earth, that is as good an explanation as any and comes with the added benefit of assuming that Luna ended up here aswell. Another possibility is birth, but I really don't know where she would have ended up then. Russia's religious history is a mess, especially because of its size, though Slavic paganism was Germanic just like Asatro, so there is hope..'

And so Hati started to learn how to read and write the local language and exactly what kind of place he had ended up in. Asgard was a single continent, surrounded by a grey mist that no one in remembered history has managed to pass through. Instead, they all simply disappeared. 

Asgard was divided between five large swathes of land: the southern forest, the western mountains, the northern snow fields, the eastern plains, and last but not least, the central wilds. 

In the southern forests, there was the Ljósálfar Empire, ruled by the light elves. Light elves are a fair-skinned race with a natural inclination towards the light element. They tend to be both arrogant and peaceful and prefer to live an isolationist existence, especially after the incident from about a hundred years ago.

In the western mountains, there was the Dökkálfar Empire, ruled by the dark elves. Despite their name, dark elven skin was more ash-grey than black, although they did have a natural inclination towards the element of darkness. Unlike their southern neighbours, the dark elves were more easygoing but also more warlike than the light elves. 

That being said, they cared more about receiving a challenge in a fight than they did about the war. This meant that unless you were actually strong enough to get their attention, you would be safe from their aggressive ways. 

The northern snow fields were collectively called Jötunheimr, and they were primarily inhabited by the Jötnar. The Jötnar were essentially slightly larger humans. In fact, most people considered them simply a human variant that grew a little taller. 

But the Jötnar themselves always insisted that they had the blood of Titans flowing through their veins. They insist on this despite the fact that none of them seem willing to explain what a Titan is exactly or how they got its blood in their veins. They live in nomadic tribes that trek around the planes and only interact with other clans when they get close to each other or when a tribe meet is called.

The central wilds were located in the middle of Asgard and bordered every other domain. This place was essentially the beast kingdom, considering it was the home of Asgard's most powerful beasts. 

Still, it was never called that because beasts only started getting humanoid-level intelligence after the fourth revolution, and there were not enough beasts of that power level to create any kingdom. Especially not because the many different types of beasts have trouble working together. This meant that, generally, the beasts lived in isolated tribes whose only interactions with each other were wars. But, of course, all rules had their exceptions.

In these wilds, there existed two more races that had significant impacts on Asgard as a whole. These were the dwarves and the dragons. Of these two, the entire dwarven race lived in a single metropolitan fortress city called Nidavellir, while the dragons lived in the valley of Bifrost. 

Both races had a healthy dose of xenophobia towards the rest of Asgard, but only the dragons actually practised isolationism, while the dwarves still traded with the rest of Asgard.