Without going through the World Tree, and without relying on the "rules" of the Norse mythological order established by Odin.
What Rovi intended to follow now were the rules of the planet itself.
Not the "physics" that simply did not exist in this age, but the rules that spread across dimensions, vertically and horizontally, from below to above.
In the end, whether it was Mesopotamian mythology, Greek mythology, or Norse mythology, all of them had been built within the world enveloped by the planet's atmosphere.
Even if a mythology defined its own specific laws, that was no more than laying a sheet of paper over the planet's own "surface."
The idea that the Nine Realms grew upon the World Tree, and that one could only travel between them by means of the tree itself, was a rule of Norse mythology. It had never been a limitation imposed by the planet itself.
Seen from a truer perspective, the World Tree merely divided the world's dimensions into nine layers from top to bottom, running through them all as one.
And what Rovi intended to do now was punch through that sheet of paper called the Norse mythological order, bypassing the constraints of the Age of Gods.
He would bring the giants to the dimension where Midgard lay not by way of the World Tree, but through the planet itself.
Then he would use their power to erode that realm.
"The time is about right." Rovi smiled there in Jotunheim's dim, withered yellow light, in that eternally deep realm of giants.
Skadi was confused, utterly unable to make sense of it.
The giants prostrate on the ground all looked over at the same time, toward their ruler.
The muddle-headed giants, with only instinct and no self-awareness, naturally understood nothing either.
"How... are you planning to do it?" Skadi could not help asking again. The Ski Goddess found herself even more bewildered by this King of Giants who had "abducted" her.
"Just watch," Rovi said, turning his gaze upward instead of looking at her.
"But I can't tell what I'm looking at."
"You'll understand soon enough."
"..."
It sounded like two people speaking in riddles.
Skadi felt a little deflated. How was it that this man could pry answers out of her so easily, yet she could never see through him?
And every time this happened, that other "self" inside her head would pop up just to make sarcastic remarks.
What she did not know was that Rovi was telling the truth.
Because she really would understand very soon—without much explanation, without many words at all.
Rovi raised a hand. His fur cloak rolled in Jotunheim's frigid currents as that silver-white knightly lance appeared in his grasp once more, its shape spiraling outward like a storm. If Gilgamesh had been here, he would have recognized at a glance that this was plainly the transformed form of the Sword of Rupture.
For it was the manifestation of the concept of storm—the storm born from primordial stellar rotation. That, too, was a storm.
He gripped the lance tightly, and then—hurled it toward the heavens.
"Follow me," he said.
No more words were needed. One only had to move forward; the king's shadow led the way.
The lance shot into the sky.
And then the heavens split open.
In that moment, all sound fell away. Skadi's beautiful dark-violet eyes widened as she stared blankly at the "vortex" slowly emerging in the sky above.
It was a black, unfathomably deep hole.
A passage.
A passage leading to the dimension above.
With a single cast, Rovi bored through the sky.
With a single blow, he pierced dimension and space.
"Come," Rovi said again.
His voice echoed through Jotunheim, and beyond it, through the two other realms that likewise lay beneath the roots of the World Tree, neighboring this land of giants.
...
In Asgard, at the dwelling of the Norns, ripples spread across the Well of Urd.
In the depths of Niflheim, the black dragon Nidhogg, who gnawed on the roots of the World Tree all year round, opened his golden draconic eyes.
In the present world—Midgard itself—the earth trembled, and between the rising and falling snowy mountains, avalanches surged like tsunamis.
A black storm was gathering in the sky, and within it the outlines of towering, terrifying shadows gradually took shape.
The giants swayed as they advanced, step by step, into the world of the living.
A crushing pressure settled on people's hearts. With the storm of death about to descend, birds and beasts trembled too hard to make the slightest sound.
"So in the end, the King of Giants foretold by Odin really has come."
In a village beneath the snowy mountains, near the edge of the avalanche's path, an old man with white hair and beard but still tall of frame looked up at that deep and terrifying sight.
"Village chief, you need to get into the cave and hide!"
The ground shook without end, and someone shouted behind him.
But the old man only burst out laughing. "This little spectacle won't scare me. Come on, Beowulf, boy—bring me some wine!"
The young man named Beowulf froze, then instinctively turned and went back inside to fetch it. Only after he had the wine in hand did he realize, with a stab of frustration, that he had come out to persuade the old man to take shelter in the first place.
But now that he had already brought the wine, it would feel wrong not to hand it over.
The old man laughed loudly as he took it. "I've lived long enough, boy!"
"I'm old—but before the end of my life, I still want one more adventure!"
The people of the North were bold, and more than that, they were ambitious. Beowulf knew that in his younger days, the old man before him had once been a powerful warrior, only a single step away from becoming one of the War Gods chosen by Odin.
His life had been filled with adventure after adventure, yet in old age he could only hole up in this tiny village, reduced to telling children stories no one believed.
And yet it was undeniable that Beowulf, a wanderer who had come here from afar, had been deeply influenced by him. Otherwise, he never would have stayed in this little village.
An old warrior should not die in bed.
"I'm leaving this village to you!"
"Adventure... hahahaha!" Laughing at the top of his lungs, the old man strode off through the howling snowstorm. In the distance, the avalanche rolled like a sea, and the trembling of the earth grew even stronger. Beowulf clenched his fists, said nothing more, and turned to evacuate the rest of the villagers.
The old man, meanwhile, slowly climbed the mountain.
He faced the wind and snow, faced the world-splitting upheaval, carrying nothing but a single jar of wine.
"Are you not afraid?"
Two golden lights flared in the snowstorm.
The old man gave a rough chuckle. He had no idea what that thing was, but whatever it was, his answer would only ever be one thing:
"No."
"Not afraid of the living? Or not afraid of death?"
"Afraid of neither." The old man gulped down his wine, his words coming out thick and slurred. "The only thing I fear..."
"...Is not getting to die properly!"
"I'm a warrior."
"I've crossed blades with giants, and I've driven off evil dragons. Even if now all I can do is sit by the hearth and tell children those stories nobody believes... as long as I know I'm a warrior, that's enough!"
"Hahaha!"
"Are you a god? Or a ghost?" The old man grinned, his beard trembling.
That "person" replied, "Both."
A god and a ghost alike—the ruler of the dead, and more than that, the king of storm.
This was the shadow Rovi had cast here.
He had pierced through the dimensions.
But before the rest arrived, he had first sent his consciousness here together with that lance.
To pave the way for the "storm" that would follow.
"Since you fear nothing at all, then—are you afraid to make a pact with me?" Rovi bent down.
The old man laughed uproariously. "You want my soul? Then take it—ugh?"
He stopped halfway through the sentence, cut off without warning.
The wind and snow around him vanished.
The ground beneath his feet became hard steel.
And before his eyes was an enormous iron faceplate, its eyes burning like fire, brighter still with the radiance of sun and moon.
This was a giant forged of steel.
It wore heavy armor and a cold iron faceplate. From its back spread "wings" woven from steel, each feather gleaming with a hard, frigid light.
Only then did the old man realize, in shock, that he was being held in the palm of that steel giant's hand.
"I AM THE RULER OF THE DEAD, THE EMBODIMENT OF STORM, THE RULER OF GIANTS."
The giant bent low, its vast voice resounding by the old man's ear.
"MEN CALL ME THE WILD HUNT."
"HUMAN, I AM WILLING TO MAKE A PACT WITH YOU. I WILL SWEEP ACROSS THE EARTH WITH STORM IN MY WAKE. ALL WHO BEHOLD ME SHALL BECOME MY FOLLOWERS, WARRIORS UNDER MY COMMAND."
"BUT I PROMISE THIS: AFTER YOU, ANY WHO BEHOLD ME WILL BE UNRIGHTEOUS MEN. AND I ALSO PROMISE THAT I WILL CLEAR THE EARTH FOR YOUR SAKE, LEVELING ALL OBSTACLES BENEATH HEAVEN AND UPON THE LAND."
"I DO NOT NEED YOUR FAITH, FOR I HAVE ALREADY BECOME PART OF THIS HEAVEN AND EARTH."
"TO BEHOLD ME IS TO ENTER INTO A PACT WITH ME."
The storm of the dead swept out in savage waves.
In his daze, the old man seemed to see the King of the Wild Hunt standing high above the heavens, leading countless giants within the storm into battle.
And he was not the only one.
The young Beowulf beneath the snowy mountain halted as well and turned to look. A hunter fleeing in panic jerked his head up, the hound beside him letting out a frightened howl. The merchant hiding inside his wagon opened his eyes, his face full of excitement.
A pact between man and god.
This was not the first time Rovi had done such a thing.
But before, he had been human.
Now, however, he was making a pact with the people of this land as a god.
The ruler of death, the manifestation of storm, the King of the Wild Hunt—through this method, he would connect the living and the dead, bringing what had already "died" into the world of the living.
He would clear away the obstacles to survival for the humans of this land.
These were things even the gods did not bother with... just as Rovi had already learned from Skadi's "mouth," the Norse gods were rough and explosive. Like the savage snowstorms of this world, like its magnificent mountains and seas, their attitude toward mortals had always been hands-off. They let them live or die as whim took them.
They had neither the gods of the Mesopotamian plains' overwhelming urge to control, nor the Greek gods' craving for humanity, where sincere faith could earn careful shelter and blessing.
The people of the North were free.
The gods of the North were the same.
But that also meant they were unsafe.
The people of an entire city could be ruled and oppressed by monsters. Even the king of a nation could be bullied by Demonic Beasts.
Heroes ran across the land, hunting Demonic Beasts and making their names.
But heroes were few, after all.
Far more numerous were the ordinary people tormented by monsters, people who would never live to see a hero arrive and instead died in agony.
They, too, had once longed for the protection of the gods.
And so, in this moment, a grand voice echoed in their hearts.
The storm of death swept over the earth.
What the gods would not take in hand...
"I'LL TAKE OVER FROM HERE!" In Jotunheim, as more and more vortex-like holes opened across the sky, Rovi smiled.
Through this pact, the link between life and death had already been forged.
"COME, MY PEOPLE!"
"PEOPLE OF THE STORM!" Rovi called out in a ringing voice.
"ROARRRRR!" the giants thundered.
Skadi stood rooted in place, staring at Rovi. He was clearly one of the dead. Clearly the ruler of giants, a symbol of chaos.
And yet, for some reason... this purest "snow mountain" in all Asgard suddenly felt that this figure steeped in deathly stillness seemed more like a god than they did.
Gods sheltered the world and swept it clean.
"Coming?" Rovi turned his gaze slightly. The iron mask hung in his hand as those cold eyes of gold and fire looked toward Skadi.
He held out his hand, his low voice like a devil's whisper.
The Ski Goddess in her long purple dress stood lightly beneath Jotunheim's dim yellow light. Her figure was as lovely and pure as ever. Her purple hair lifted in the wind, tracing the delicate lines of her face. A little of the full, white roundness of her chest showed, its edges pressed by her lowered hands. Beneath her slender waist, her legs were pressed together; under the hem, the curve of her rounded hips could be faintly seen, taut and shadowed, the dark triangle between her thighs disappearing into hidden depths.
She felt a little nervous, and a little unsure why.
"If I don't go, do you expect me to stay here?" In the end, Skadi chose to compromise.
My, my... have you finally given in?
Shut up, shut up, shut up! Skadi snapped inwardly. They're all leaving. I'm not staying alone in this horrible Jotunheim!
Such an untruthful child... you just hate being alone, don't you?
That's none of your business.
Pure and white, forever as remote and stainless as the snowy mountains, the goddess hated loneliness.
Even so, Skadi still did not take Rovi's hand, because in her heart she still longed to return to Asgard, to go back beneath the protection of Odin—that figure like a father to her.
Skadi still did not trust Rovi.
"Still unwilling to yield?" Rovi smiled. He raised the iron mask in his hand and set it over his face. Then he said, "Then... SUIT YOURSELF."
The wind roared fiercely as the giants set out.
The black vortex churned...
In the present world, the storm grew ever more violent, and the shadows of the giants vanished into it.
Amid the endless mountain ranges and drifting snowstorms, countless Demonic Beasts were seized by overwhelming dread in an instant. They let out cries of terror and fled in all directions.
The storm had come.
Death was near.
"Is that a god... or a demon?" Beowulf frowned, his tall, bare-muscled body tensing beneath the lash of wind and snow.
"Whether it's a god or a demon doesn't matter."
"What matters is..."
"...Under storm and death, all things are the same." From the snowy mountaintop, the old man laughed out loud.
Bold.
Fearless.
And unafraid.
...
Within the raging wind appeared the figure of the Wild Hunt. The giants walking within the storm let out roars that shook heaven and earth. Evil dragons in the mountains and wilds shrank back into hiding, and the monsters ravaging the land scattered in panic. Even Fafnir, King of Dragons, ultimate dragonkind, trembled and withdrew.
He brought disaster, and he brought protection as well. In his eyes all things were equal, and all things would meet death at their end.
The Storm God Race, Stepden
In later ages, some would use that name for them as well.
—History of Norse Mythology