Deep in a forest located somewhere in Scandinavia, a lone woman sat in a cave, notebooks scattered all around her in neat piles. Along with the normal sounds one could hear in a forest was the sounds of pen writing on paper. It was clear that she was here for a long time. The clicking sound of a pen closing followed shortly after by the snapping sound of a closed notebook could be heard. The woman neatly placed the now full notebook on top of a pile before she let out a long, tired sigh. She moved some of the piles over and laid back while resting an arm over her eyes.
“*Sigh* I knew it’d be a lot of work, but I’m so glad that I found the place from those rumors. Once I finish transcribing all of these old runes then I can finally make it big in the archaeological world.”
Yes, this lone woman was an amateur archaeologist with a focus on old Norse mythology. She had followed rumors from one of her frequent info gathering spots and she immediately rushed to gather the proper equipment and supplies necessary to make it to her current location. This ended up wiping out nearly all of the money she had saved up over years of hard work, but with this discovery she would assuredly make it big.
It took her nearly three weeks of searching, but she managed to find the cave deep in a very old forest and when she laid her eyes on it, she nearly wept with joy. Setting up camp at the entrance, she pulled out several piles of small notebooks and immediately started to transcribe every rune she could possibly make out in the stone. This endeavor has been going for nearly ten days and she had only managed to transcribe a third of the runes.
“Ugh. I wish I’d known that it’d take this long to do or I would have scrounged up enough money to buy more supplies and maybe hire an guide. I mean, there’s no point in doing this if I end up dying of starvation on the way back to civilization. Though if this place has rumors circulating about it, then someone will probably show up sooner or later…I hope.”
Another tired sigh escaped from the woman’s lips before she moved her arm and stood up. She stretched and audible popping sounds could be heard coming from her back, arms, and neck.
“Time to take a break.”
She started making her way deeper into the cave as she had done many times over the days she’d been here. She looked at the walls, carved from roof to floor in runes whose purpose was a mystery to her. When she made it to the deepest part of the cave, she sat on the elevated rock in the center and shone her flashlight on the walls. Being deeper in the cave, the runes carved everywhere were in better condition than the ones at the mouth of the cave, but time had still done them the disservice of eroding some places here and there. Popping a small ration she had pulled from her pocket into her mouth, she stared intently at the walls.
“If only I could make out what this said, then I’d be able to figure out what this place was.”
After finishing her ration, she stood up and walked over to the wall and, though she knew she shouldn’t do so, ran her hand down the carved rock, tracing the etchings to see if she could find meaning in it. She brought her hand to her chin and closed her eyes as she feel deep into thought. She started to pace as she racked her brain when suddenly the ground shook.
“An earthquake? I didn’t think Scandinavia got earthquakes this big?”
Plumes of dust fell from the cave’s roof and she heard rocks start to fall. She turned to the entrance just in time to see the faint light from outside wink out as it was covered in rocks that fell.
“*Sigh* Way to go, me. Now you’re trapped in an ancient Norse cave for who knows how long. Oh well, might as well start moving rocks if I can.”
She started to move to the entrance when something caught her attention. Some of the runes had started to glow. It was faint, almost nonexistent, but there. She quickly moved over to see if she was just imagining things when the glow became brighter and started to spread to the rest of the runed in the cave. When every rune was lit up, the glow started to turn from a white color, to one of an almost poisonous green.
“These look like Seidr runes. But there are a mix of normal ones as well. Just what was this place?”
As she stood in awe of what was happening around her, she suddenly came to a realization.
“Wait, this isn’t good. Forget about magic being real for a minute, this is very obviously bad.”
The woman started to move to the entrance so she could try to move the rocks that fell out of the way before whatever was supposed to happen here happened, but it was too late. Vertigo of unimaginable levels assailed her and she lost her balance, falling sideways and just barely managing to catch herself from hitting her head on the raised stone slab in the center of the room.
She dragged herself onto the stone before laying on her back. This set of motions made the spinning she was feeling worse. As she tried her best to not vomit, she tried to focus on one point. That point she looked at happened to be the runes she was running her fingers over just minutes before. They were a beautiful shining gold color.
“Heh. The runes for Asgard, huh.”
She moved her gaze to another set of runes close by and saw that they started to shine in a different color as well. This time it was a darker shade of green than the rest of the room.
The dizziness from before was fading and she could now move just enough to look for other differently shining runes.
“Svartalfheim, Alfheim, Muspellheim, Niflheim, Jotunheim, Helheim. I guess that makes the stone in the middle Midgard.”
The woman tried to stand, but stumbled. Her hand brushed against the runes spelling Asgard and the runes went dark. The runes all around the room started to do the same but before the gold glow could completely take over the room something happened. The sound of cracking stone and shattering glass resounded in the room. The woman felt something start to drip from her nose, ears and eyes. When she wiped a hand across her face, it came back red. She silently fell to her knees.
“Heh. *cough* Guess I’m going to die anyway. At least the last thing I got to see in my life was actual magic.”
With those as her final words, her consciousness faded.