It all begins with someone in distress; something is not right. A black-scaled dragon, whose legs corrode everything they touch and devour everything in their path: Níðhǫggr. It is hunting someone. That someone is Vidar, who is desperately fleeing in search of something. His life trembles under the fear of eternal death. Yggdrasil is his only hope.

What other choice does he have but to wonder? murmurs the narrator, as the small, defenseless man continues his race.

Death zealously guards the only source of existence, hidden in a chamber saturated with pure danger and legs that strike like pillars. Vidar tears off a piece of the map he was drawing with his bloody limb, searching for the location of Yggdrasil in the middle of the labyrinth. He throws a blinding bomb at Níðhǫggr, barely gaining enough time to devise an escape route. His mind clings to a single goal: survival.

“Why the hell does this get so complicated just because I have the wrong scent?!” he gasps. “That damn wizard was a fucking con artist. She was right about his dealings...” He scratches his head with what's left of his left hand. “All I have left is the seed of that supposed tree, along with my traps and broken weapons...”

He hurriedly looks through his inventory.

Forgotten legends like Níðhǫggr and Yggdrasil have become real before his eyes. And he wonders if his regenerative abilities will be enough to save him.

“Is this our last adventure...?” he murmurs, watching from afar as the beast approaches at full speed: the inevitable.

He clutches the small medallion made from the seed of Yggdrasil, but the ground begins to shake: the devourer is approaching. The pale figure knows that the end is near. He reflects on his last moments in this world as the gigantic creature opens its jaws to devour him.

Between the monstrous fangs, he sees a flash of light: a branch of Yggdrasil caught between its teeth, responding to the call of its seed. Vidar throws himself into Níðhǫggr's mouth, using a rune prepared for emergencies, with all the strength he has left. His feet dissolve on contact; his legs are pulverized. He hangs from the branch embedded between the dragon's teeth as his body fails him. Even so, he throws the explosive rune between the fangs. The explosion tears off half the monster's face, and Vidar manages to pull out the branch with his shattered hands.

He falls out of the mouth. The dragon roars, furious. The pale man smiles, trembling with pain, and shouts:

“You, who will never leave... I will devour you until the reincarnation of your soul is a thing of the past,” exclaims the wounded beast, as his face slowly rebuilds itself.

“And I...” coughing blood, “will make sure that you never even come into existence.”

As the dragon prepares to devour him whole, Vidar, torn to shreds, embeds the seed in the branch and stabs it into his chest.

A blinding glow from Bifröst consumes his body.

The moment Bifröst's glow consumes Vidar, there is no sound. Níðhǫggr's roar freezes in a gesture of silent fury. The space around the pale man's body curves, distorts, and creaks. The branch of Yggdrasil, now embedded in his chest, emits a light so pure that its edges seem to tear reality itself apart.

The dragon, half its face still regenerating amid bursts of black steam, recoils. Its claw reaches for the destroyed man who glows like a sacred comet. But it cannot get close. Each attempt disintegrates into sparks of ancient sap and ash.

Vidar does not scream. Not in pain, not in fear. He only exhales.

The muscles of his torso, broken and corroded, begin to writhe, as if the branch were taking root inside his chest. A flower of light sprouts between his ribs. His bones are covered with bark. His eyes, once dull, flash with reflections of green and gold.

As the devourer's body writhes in rage, the seed responds to the call of something greater. A melody imperceptible to human ears but engraved in the marrow of the worlds begins to play. Yggdrasil, from its most remote roots, awakens.

“You have no right to escape!” roars Níðhǫggr, as fragments of his flesh continue to fall from the explosion.

The answer comes not in words, but in a torrent: roots emerging from the ground, enveloping Vidar's body as if the earth itself were claiming him. They cover him like a living coffin made of sap, bark, and memory.

And in that instant, with the same violence as thunder, he disappears.

A whirlwind of old leaves, white fire, and ash slowly dissipates in the chamber. All that remains behind is the echo of a whisper:

“I will return before you do.”

Níðhǫggr roars with all his might, his breath laden with ancestral frustration. Not only has he failed... he has been mocked. And deep within the roots of Yggdrasil, something has been activated.

Vidar has sown the seeds of his return...