Globe Tracers 6: Chaos Storm

Prologue

A Viking village, unknown time.

The storyteller began as me and my friends sat around the campfire. His beard flowed, as soon his words would.

"Gather round young men- gather yee boys- come, come- I will tell you a story, an ancient tale. A tale of a time long before you, before I, before your fathers, before your grandfathers- a time much closer to the very creation of the world. I will tell you the tale, the story of the first appearance of the world serpent when he did battle, with the mighty god of thunder..."

350 BC

The land of Southern Denmark

The fisherman:

I looked over the seas, ice patches covering them for a great distance, perhaps all the way to the tent of the sun itself. It was very cold out tonight- ah, but for the taste of fish and the soothing feeling of cooked meat in my belly, I would endure.

I left my spear on the beach and traveled out to ensure they were out tonight- no use if there was no bounty. My men stayed back, joking and conversing with each other as they assembled their nets.

As I approached the water I had a strange sensation. I felt like the world around me was starting to heat up. I looked at the water and saw, where once there were patches of ice leading to the land of the sun, the patches were melting, disappearing rapidly before my eyes. I started to step back, my boots in the water now starting to heat up as well.

I stared at the sea and- my heart jumped, my blood pumping as I screamed, running for the beach and my men. I had no idea what was happening. "The waters are on fire!" I screamed.

Indeed, just before I had turned to run, I had seen the water of the ocean start to boil.

The men gave a cacophony of different responses, some laughing and calling me crazy before they looked up and saw the honesty on my face- or perhaps just saw the boiling ocean themselves.

"Forgive us- gods, what have we done!" a man screamed. Our nets were dropped and we began running to the tents, to our women and our young ones. Something was coming, something far beyond us.

A scream went out, like that of an animal, but none I had ever heard before, the ground rumbling beneath my feet as I dropped to the ground on the cold sand, tripping on my own foot in fear. I looked back to see it... it... it was the head of a massive snake, firing into the sky. Bolts of electric energy ripped off the creature's body, tearing out and cutting through the beach, the sand turning molten under the blazing heat of each strike.

The snake looked down at me and my people. The screams of the women started to go out and the young too started to fill the air with their cries. Tears started to fill my eyes. "All Father... why are you angry? Why have you sent this creature to-"

A bright light slammed into the ground in front of me. I put up my arm to protect my face, then looked slowly up.

Before me, I saw a being standing in a beam of light looking like it was made of light. The creature rose to two goat-like feet, standing like a man. On its back were massive bird-like golden wings that spanned out at a length greater than that of two men lying prone in a line.

As the creature rose, I discerned its body was facing me, but still, on the back of the creature's head was the face and beak of an eagle. On the right side of the creature's head, I could make out what looked like a lion's face, and on the left what looked like an ox's face cut off just before its neck. Looking at me directly was the face of a man.

The head of the monster snake was so massive its very eyes were bigger than the body of a man as it came back down out of the land of the clouds to be visible again, I could barely tell what one thing it was looking at. I ventured to guess it was observing the being of light. The being's fur was a bright gray while his skin was white like a cloud.