Ragnarok- Norse EventEvent"Twilight of the Gods"

Odin's Preparations

The gods know Ragnarök is coming. Odin sacrificed an eye at Mímir's well and hung nine nights on Yggdrasil for the runes, all to learn the shape of the future. The Vafþrúðnismál records him traveling in disguise to the hall of the wise giant Vafþrúðnir, where they matched wits in a contest of cosmic knowledge. Odin won. Nothing he learned could change what is coming.

Valhalla exists for this battle. The einherjar, the chosen slain gathered by the Valkyries from every battlefield in the mortal world, feast and fight each day in preparation. Every warrior who falls in training rises again at evening, healed and ready. The Grímnismál numbers Valhalla's doors at five hundred and forty, each wide enough for eight hundred warriors to march through abreast. All of them will march to Vígríðr when Heimdall sounds his horn.

The Signs Before the End

Ragnarök will be heralded by unmistakable signs. The first is the Fimbulwinter (fimbulvetr), three successive years of winter with no summer between them. Snow will fall from all directions, and frost will grip the world. The sun will give no warmth.

During this time, all social bonds will collapse. The Völuspá describes the age that precedes Ragnarök in bleak terms: it will be an axe-age, a sword-age, when shields are cloven; a wind-age, a wolf-age, before the world sinks. Brothers will fight and kill each other, and no one will spare their kin.

The wolves Sköll and Hati, who have chased the sun and moon since creation, will finally catch their prey. Sköll will devour the sun, and Hati will swallow the moon, plunging the world into darkness. Stars will fall from the sky. The earth will shake so violently that trees will be uprooted, mountains will collapse, and all fetters and bonds will break.

The Breaking of Bonds

The gods spent the mythological age binding their enemies. Now every binding will fail at once.

Fenrir, the monstrous wolf, will break free from Gleipnir, the magical fetter that has held him since the gods tricked him and cost Týr his hand. The wolf will run with his lower jaw scraping the earth and his upper jaw scraping the sky, fire blazing from his eyes and nostrils. He has waited for this moment since the world was young.

Loki, too, will break his bonds. Since his role in Baldr's death, he has lain bound in a cave, serpent venom dripping onto his face, his writhing causing earthquakes whenever his wife Sigyn must empty the bowl she holds to catch the poison. At Ragnarök, Loki will escape at last and rally the enemies of the gods.

Jörmungandr, the Midgard Serpent who has encircled the world since Odin cast him into the sea, will release his tail and rise from the ocean. His thrashing will send the sea surging over the land. Garm, the hellhound who guards the gates of Hel, will break free and howl.

The Armies of Destruction

Two great armies will march against the gods. From Múspelheim in the south will come the fire giants, led by Surtr, whose flaming sword is brighter than the sun. They will ride across Bifröst, the rainbow bridge, and the bridge will shatter behind them.

From the north will come the second army. The ship Naglfar will set sail, made entirely from the fingernails and toenails of the dead. The Prose Edda notes that the living should trim the nails of the dead to delay Naglfar's completion. Loki will steer this ship, bringing the hosts of Hel to join the battle. Hrym will come from the east, leading the frost giants.

The forces of chaos will converge on the plain of Vígríðr, which stretches one hundred leagues in every direction.

The Final Battle

On the field of Vígríðr, gods and monsters will meet in combat. Heimdall will blow Gjallarhorn, its sound audible throughout all worlds, summoning the Æsir and the einherjar to battle. Odin will don his golden helmet and take up his spear Gungnir.

Odin will face Fenrir. The Allfather will fight wielding Gungnir, but the wolf is destined to prevail. Fenrir will swallow Odin whole. Immediately after, Odin's son Víðarr will avenge his father. In one telling, Víðarr places his foot on Fenrir's lower jaw and tears the wolf apart. In another, he stabs through the wolf's mouth to its heart.

Thor will face Jörmungandr for the final time. He has encountered the serpent twice before: once when he fished for it and Hymir cut his line, once when he tried to lift what seemed to be a cat in Útgarða-Loki's hall. Now they will meet with no interference. Thor will kill Jörmungandr with Mjölnir, but the serpent will have already released its venom. Thor will walk nine steps from his fallen enemy and collapse dead.

Freyr will face Surtr without his sword, given away long ago for Gerðr's love. He will fall.

Týr will fight Garm, the hound of Hel. Each will kill the other. Heimdall and Loki will face each other, and both will fall. The watchman and the trickster will destroy each other at the end.

The Destruction of the Worlds

After the battle, when gods and monsters alike have fallen, Surtr will cast fire over the earth. The Völuspá describes the conflagration: the sun turns dark, earth sinks into the sea, the hot stars fall from the sky, steam rises as flames lick against heaven itself. Everything burns.

The cosmos that the gods created from Ymir's body will be unmade. The World Tree Yggdrasil will tremble and groan. The sea will swallow the land.

The Renewal

After the fire has burned itself out and the waters have receded, a new earth will rise from the sea, green and fair. Waterfalls will cascade down mountainsides. Eagles will hunt fish in pristine rivers. The earth will produce crops without being sown.

Certain gods will survive. Víðarr and Váli will live through the destruction. Thor's sons Magni and Móði will inherit Mjölnir. Baldr and Höðr will return from Hel, reconciled. Hoenir will survive, and the Völuspá says he will cast lots and choose fortunes as in the old days.

These surviving gods will meet at Iðavöllr, where Asgard once stood. In the grass, they will find the golden gaming pieces with which the gods once played. They will talk of what has passed, remembering the old world and the gods who are gone.

Two humans will have survived by hiding in Hoddmímir's Wood, a grove within Yggdrasil itself. Their names are Líf and Lífþrasir. They will have been nourished by the morning dew and will emerge to repopulate the new earth.

The sun, too, will be renewed. Before being devoured, she will have borne a daughter, equally bright, who will ride her mother's path across the new sky. Light will return to the world.

Yet the Völuspá's final vision is not one of peace. After all the hope of renewal, the seeress sees a dark dragon rising: Níðhöggr, the corpse-eater, flying from Niðafjöll with bodies in his wings. The seeress falls silent, and the vision ends.