Chapter 8 Leif's prank

Humans, meanwhile, live in the eastern plains. The plains were divided into two kingdoms, the kingdom of Máni in the northeast and the kingdom of Sól in the southeast. The kingdom of Sól was a kingdom in the truest sense, where a single royal family produced Kings that ruled over the domain. 

The kingdom of Máni, on the other hand, was only technically a kingdom, while in practice, it was governed by a council of the most powerful clans in the kingdom. The king or queen was merely the head of the council and was elected by majority vote from among the council members themselves. They then ruled until either death or abdication, forced or otherwise. 

This meant there was no royal family, and the monarch's position was technically not hereditary, even though it wasn't abnormal for a monarch to scheme in the shadows to ensure their child won the next vote. It also meant that the monarch, though more powerful than any single council member, still did not hold the absolute power that was common among regular kingdoms.

Although the main population of these two kingdoms are human, a significant portion of the population calls themselves half-bloods. Regardless of the name, though, they are not actually half-bloods. People generally consider them fake half-bloods, but only in closed company because most half-bloods take offence to the term. 

The fact is that there are no known true-born half-blood clans left in Asgard as the bloodline purity has dropped to low, and they only have small percentages of beast blood left in their veins. The original half-bloods came into existence during ancient times when beasts were more plentiful, and the general population of Asgard was more powerful than it is now.

Because in order for a beast to produce offspring with a human, the beast needs to be able to take human form but to take human form, they first need to be sixth-revolution Einherjar, a strength level that very few have reached in the current age.

Like this, Hati spent about two years learning how to read and write from his mother, while also getting some general knowledge about Asgard. One might think that that's a long time to learn how to read and write a language that should be similar to others you already know. 

Unfortunately for Hati, while Earth's Scandinavian countries used the Latin alphabet, it seems that Asgard used the Norse runes that the Vikings were credited with. And Hati had no experience with those.

Not to mention that Sif simply refused to teach him for more than a few hours a day, as she would much rather play with him than teach him. Hati had no real objections to this. He was obviously anxious to get out there and search for his wife, but he made himself no illusions that he would be able to do anything in his 5-year-old body. 

And telling Sif the truth was obviously off the table. Finding out her adorable little boy was actually over 50 years old probably wouldn't do any wonders for their relationship. 

Sif also took this time to teach him how to play hnefatafl. Although Hati had heard this name in his previous life, he had never actually played the game. He remembered that the game was often referred to as Viking chess, and historians disagreed about the rules because the game died out before anyone wrote them down.

In this case, the game was played on something that looked like a regular chess board, except it was built up of eleven by eleven squares instead of eight by eight. The game had two sides, black and white, and presented itself like a battlefield where the black pieces had ambushed the white pieces. 

The white side had one king and 12 soldiers, while the black side had 24 soldiers. The white king stood in the exact middle of the board and was surrounded by white soldiers. The black soldiers stood equally divided on the edges of the board. The goal for white was to get their king to one of the four corners of the board, thereby "fleeing" the ambush. Meanwhile, black had to "capture" the king by putting a black soldier on all four sides of the king.

He had also finally gotten his own room. Of course, it took a lot of convincing from Hati's side, as his mother was unwilling to part with him, but eventually, she gave in. Unfortunately, she didn't agree until he committed to an extra hour of cuddle time every day.

The next day, after his mother finally agreed to give him his own room, Hati was walking through the halls of their family house alongside his uncle and mother while holding his mother's hand. His uncle had just returned from a trip to the capital where he had to fulfil his role as patriarch for a Council meeting, and for some reason, this was the moment his mother wanted to show him his room. 

The strange timing made him a little suspicious of the situation. This feeling was exacerbated by his uncle looking like he had trouble holding in his laugh, an expression Hati had seen more than once. Leif was one of those uncles who loved nothing more than to prank and tease his nephew.

As they were walking, Sif suddenly said, "By the way, Hati, now that you have your own room, I decided it was also time to get you a personal maid. As you know, your uncle just returned from the capital, and before he left, I asked him to pick up a maid from the slave market. She should be waiting in your room right now."

Hati was not surprised by the existence of slave markets in the kingdom. In fact, slaves, sometimes called thralls, were a common sight in all of Asgard, according to his lessons from the past two years. Instead, he focused on another revelation in her words as he spoke with his still immature voice, "Wait a second, mother, if you asked uncle Leif to do that before he left a few weeks ago, then… were you already planning on giving me my own room?"

A sly smile appeared on her face as she started laughing, "Fu fu fu, oh my, dear Hati, your deduction and observation skills are truly quite high for a five-year-old. You make your mother proud!"

Hati's eyebrows twitched as his mother tried to shamelessly change the topic. If he wasn't trying to act more childish than he was, he probably would have had a few more things to say, but as it stood, he just pouted and said in the tone of a scorned child, "Don't try to change the subject, mother, you set me up!"

Still smiling slyly, Sif said, "Fu fu fu, that's right, consider it another life lesson from your mother: always be aware of all the facts before negotiating with someone! And don't you dare try to renege on the additional cuddle hour! My son is not a dishonourable person!"

Continuing to pout while inwardly rolling his eyes at her antics, he said, "It's not like I could stop you, Mother. Anyway, what was that about a maid?" 

Smiling contentedly, she answered, "Good boy, never break a promise to your mother." Thereby completely ignoring the words he had actually said, she then looked questioningly at her brother before she continued, "As for the maid, Leif should know more about that."

Leif spoke up in response, still barely hiding his shit-eating grin, "Right, she's eight years old, making her three years older than you, Hati. Her name is Astrid, and I've already put a blood seal on her with you as the target. Meaning that she cannot do anything to harm you."

Immediately picking up on something interesting in Leif's words, Hati asked, cocking his head, "A blood seal? What is that?"

Sif answered instead of Leif, "Right, there are still many things we must cover in your education, dear. But for now, just assume she cannot use force against you."

At this point, they had already arrived in front of the door a little while ago, only deciding to finish the conversation first. Leif pointed at the door, still only barely containing his grin, and said, "Alright, go on in, my boy. Your mother and I will leave you to it so you can spend some time getting to know your new maid." Then he winked and said, "Don't worry, the room is soundproof."

Hati rolled his eyes secretly at that joke, but outwardly, he simply adorned a confused expression. Obviously, he shouldn't know about such things yet, being a five-year-old. Leif waved his hand, signalling Hati not to worry about it. In response, Hati shrugged his shoulders and threw another suspicious glance at Leif before he went through the door.

When he was gone, Sif immediately asked Leif, "So what did you do?" Sif had known Leif from birth and had realised even before Hati that Leif had done something. 

Leif laughed sheepishly as he looked away and asked while tussling his hair, "What do you mean? I haven't done anything!" In response, he only received a withering glare from Sif until he gave in and started snickering. "Fine, fine, I might have told the maid that this was her room and to get dressed in the maid clothes I had prepared. I just hope I got the timing right." 

In the end, he laughed out loud while walking off with Sif in tow, who was shaking her head at his antics while thinking, 'It's a good thing I put up a barrier around the house; wouldn't want those old bastards to peek on any embarrassing situations in there'.

—----

Meanwhile, two people stood frozen in the room as they stared at each other. One was stunned by the scenario, and the other was mortified as she realised her current state of undress.