Chapter 229: Journey to Asgard
Once Matthew had laid out his plan for the group, the superheroes who'd just been busy with their own personal affairs a little while ago now had their full attention locked on the disaster ahead.
Having just learned in advance how Asgard's future would end, Thor's mood had grown considerably heavier than before.
Once the meeting wrapped up, Thor was just about to find somewhere quiet to summon the Bifröst when Matthew suddenly called out to him.
"Thor, stay a moment."
"There's something I need to talk to you about."
If it had been anyone else, they probably wouldn't have been able to catch Thor's attention, not with the mood he was in right now.
But it was Matthew asking.
Watching everyone else file out of the conference room, Thor said nothing, quietly turning over in his head why Matthew wanted to talk to him.
A finger lifted.
A chilled beer glided smoothly through the air and came to rest in front of Thor.
Looking at the beer, Thor swallowed.
After sitting through all that, he really was thirsty.
He caught the glass.
Thor tilted his head back and drained it in one go!
Then, out of pure habit, he raised his hand to smash the empty glass on the floor. On Asgard, that was the traditional way of showing your appreciation for a good drink.
He still remembered how, right after first arriving on Earth, he'd shattered a glass in a small diner the exact same way, until Matthew had gently pointed out that wasn't really done here, and Thor had stopped doing it after that.
But it had been so long since his last time on Earth that he'd forgotten Matthew's reminder entirely.
It wasn't until the glass was about to hit the floor that it suddenly came rushing back to him.
Before he could get a word out.
A small portal snapped open.
The next instant, THWACK!
A fresh beer stein popped out right above Thor's head and dropped neatly into his arms.
"Want another?" Matthew sat down across from Thor, smiling.
Thor glanced down at the glass in his arms, picked it up, turned it over once, and nodded at Matthew. "I could do with another."
The words had barely settled—
Matthew snapped his fingers lightly.
Under Thor's watchful eyes, the glass in his hands, empty a moment ago, suddenly filled itself with beer out of thin air.
Thor's eyes went wide.
There was a new spark of excitement in the way he looked at the drink now.
Ooh?!
Now that was a handy trick!
If he could learn that ability himself, wouldn't that mean an endless, bottomless supply of beer?
With that thought, Thor gave a couple of pointed coughs and asked, dead serious, "Matthew, this magic trick of yours, conjuring drinks out of thin air. Could I learn it?"
Hearing that, Matthew froze for a second.
He looked Thor up and down, and his mind immediately went to the version of Thor from Avengers 4 who'd let himself go entirely, drinking and eating his way into a completely different shape.
With that image in mind, Matthew shook his head firmly. "No."
"Why not?" Thor asked, confused.
It wasn't like this was some particularly dangerous piece of magic. Why wouldn't Matthew teach it to him?
Seeing the confusion on Thor's face, Matthew leveled with him. "If I taught you this, I'm fairly sure you'd never touch a glass of water again for the rest of your life."
"For the sake of your own health, you're better off not learning it."
Hearing Matthew put it that way, Thor let out a resigned sigh. "...Fine."
With that, he tipped the fresh glass of beer back into himself anyway.
Say what you will, but Matthew had guessed exactly what he'd been thinking.
After getting his hands on that kind of magic, Thor really had been planning to turn every glass of water he drank into beer from then on.
Once he'd finished off the second glass, Thor let out a belch and turned to Matthew. "So, Matthew, you still haven't told me why you wanted me to stay behind."
"But everyone else has cleared out by now, so you can tell me."
"Of course." Matthew nodded and laid out the real reason he'd held Thor back.
"Since the rest of the Stones are hidden on other worlds, I need to borrow Asgard's Bifröst."
"Borrow... the Bifröst?" Thor blinked, thought it over for a moment, then looked up. "Matthew, that's not a small thing. It's not my call to make."
"But I can take you to Asgard, to meet my father, King Odin."
"He's the one who'll decide whether you can use the Bifröst."
Hearing that, Matthew nodded.
That made sense. Asgard wasn't Thor's to run yet, and something of this scale really did call for a conversation directly with Odin.
The two of them settled on the plan.
Before leaving, Matthew stopped by to give brief instructions to Ada, Eleanor, and Ellis, who was in charge of overseeing public welfare and infrastructure, telling them all to hold down the fort while he was gone, and not to come back from a quick errand to find the whole place had fallen apart in the meantime.
After hearing Matthew out, all three nodded seriously, promising they'd keep Holy Terra and Umbrella Corporation running in perfect order.
Satisfied with that answer, Matthew and Thor didn't linger any longer, heading up to the rooftop to open the Bifröst.
Up on the roof, a column of seven-colored light dropped from the sky without warning.
The beam was easily several arm-spans wide, its seven colors churning and overlapping, an absolutely staggering sight.
That wasn't all.
Cascading down like a waterfall, that seemingly overwhelming column of light didn't make a single sound when it hit the ground.
The only sound came from the air itself: a dense, crisp hum, like thousands of fine needles piercing through a sheet of ice all at once.
Space itself warped violently under the wash of that seven-colored light, and even the sunlight bent and distorted at the beam's edges.
Standing at the center of it, Matthew felt an overwhelming force drop down from above without warning, hauling his entire body upward.
Feeling that pull settle over him, a flicker of genuine curiosity crossed Matthew's eyes.
Ever since he'd taught himself magic, he'd opened countless portals of his own, but this was the first time he'd actually experienced Asgard's own distinctly "local" mode of transportation firsthand.
If he had to put it into words, the feeling was something like riding an upward-moving slide.
No discomfort at all, just a natural, effortless lift into the air.
The Bifröst's pull kept building the longer it went on.
Before Matthew could take in much more of it, the seven-colored light suddenly closed in like something solid, swallowing both of them whole.
The two figures blurred into afterimages and shot straight upward.
Before long, the beam that had been as thick and powerful as a waterfall only moments earlier had completely dissolved, leaving nothing behind but a slowly fading ring of light on the rooftop.
By the time the two of them reappeared, the scenery around them had changed entirely.
They came tumbling out of the Bifröst's exit like a pair of sandbags thrown from somewhere overhead.
If Matthew hadn't already had his own flight ability, he might well have made a fool of himself in front of the locals right there.
Thump—
Hovering steady in midair, Matthew drifted down and landed on a bridge paved with shimmering, seven-colored crystal.
This had to be the Bifröst. Matthew glanced down at his feet.
A half-transparent, rainbow-colored bridge of light stretched out from beneath them, off toward the horizon.
The bridge of light spanned the void, leading toward Asgard's castle in the far distance.
On either side of the bridge, a river of stars churned and swirled.
Below stretched a bottomless void.
Unnamed mist rose up from beneath the bridge, and it really did feel exactly like standing inside a myth.
Not far from the two of them, a tall figure stood waiting.
The figure gripped a long sword, clad in heavy golden armor.
Before the two of them had even drawn close, that figure had already fixed them both with a sharp, piercing look.
Heimdall's golden eyes swept past Thor and settled on Matthew, a note of caution in his gaze.
Of course he'd seen Matthew before.
Ever since Thor's first exile to Earth, Heimdall had used his own abilities to watch over everything happening around him.
So naturally, Matthew's presence had shown up in some of those fragments too.
But after Matthew had taken up the practice of magic, his image had grown steadily harder to make out.
At first it was like looking through a thin layer of mist. Later, it was like a pane of frosted glass had gone up between them.
By now, if he hadn't been standing face to face with Matthew at close range, Heimdall wouldn't have been able to track him through space at all, even at full power.
"This is Heimdall, Asgard's guardian, and the one who controls the Bifröst." Thor made the introduction, then turned to Heimdall. "This is Matthew Lawrence, a friend from Midgard. He's here today to discuss something with the King."
Matthew gave Heimdall a nod of greeting.
Heimdall didn't press for more, simply inclining his head slightly.
With that, Thor didn't linger either, leading Matthew across the Bifröst toward Asgard's castle in the distance.
The two of them walked along the bridge.
Matthew's gaze swept over everything around him.
Back before he'd transmigrated, he'd seen Asgard on film.
But now that all of it lay spread out in front of him for real, he realized just how little the movies had actually managed to capture.
Not even one percent of Asgard's true grandeur had made it onto the screen.
In the distance, endless golden domes rose in waves toward the sky, catching a cold, divine light under the sun.
Beneath their feet, the Bifröst merged seamlessly into the city at its far end, seven colors of light flowing and shimmering through the bridge itself.
Within the city, golden gun-towers turned constantly, keeping watch over everything below.
Here and there, ranks of gold-armored soldiers could be seen patrolling along the city walls.
Having grown so used to Earth's smog-tinged air, Matthew felt a moment of real adjustment upon arriving here. Fresh air filled his lungs, and his mind cleared several degrees in an instant.
"So this really is the realm of Norse legend," Matthew murmured, impressed.
Walking ahead of him, Thor's steps grew visibly lighter at that, and he squared his shoulders, an unmistakable pride spreading across his face.
Clearly, Thor thoroughly enjoyed hearing Matthew praise his homeland, though he still felt the need to play a little modest about it out loud.
"In my view, Earth and Asgard each have their own kind of beauty."
"And I believe that under your rule, Holy Terra will only keep growing, until it's every bit as strong as Asgard."
Along the way, the two of them traded easy conversation, and every now and then ran into people Thor knew. Whenever Thor greeted an old acquaintance, he'd introduce Matthew at the same time, and Matthew, in turn, nodded politely to each of them.
No one could say how much time passed.
With Thor leading the way, Matthew finally arrived at the doors of the great hall.
Right in front of the hall, Thor came to a stop.
He turned his head slightly, his voice dropping lower.
The lightness that had been on his face a moment before gave way, in front of those towering doors, to a certain gravity.
"Matthew, once you go through these doors, you'll be standing before the Allfather Odin himself."
"My mother, Frigga, should be there as well, of course, so watch how you speak. My father isn't exactly fond of the kind of roundabout, evasive talk you Midgardians tend to favor." Thor kept his voice low.
Having said that, and worried Matthew might be feeling too nervous, he reached out and patted Matthew's shoulder in reassurance. "Then again, my father's always shown real respect toward warriors with genuine ability."
"As long as you don't go out of your way to say something offensive, he shouldn't give you any trouble."
"So relax."
Hearing that, Matthew nodded, an easy smile still on his face. "Don't worry. I know how to handle myself."
With that, he lifted his gaze toward the massive golden doors ahead, easily thirty meters tall.
A single thought.
The two heavy golden doors, as if pressed evenly from both sides by an invisible hand, swung slowly inward without so much as a stray creak.
The first thing to come into view was a deep red carpet.
Whatever material it was woven from, it swallowed every footstep completely.
The carpet ran arrow-straight from the doorway, all the way through the great hall, up to the steps beneath the throne itself.
Right now, this hall, easily large enough to hold ten thousand people, felt strangely empty.
Towering golden pillars rose up on either side, carved from base to top with countless reliefs.
Under that magnificent, vaulted ceiling, only a handful of gold-armored guards stood posted along the walls, motionless as statues.
Matthew's gaze swept past the guards on either side and finally settled on the far end of the hall.
Upon the throne, Odin sat, solemn and composed.
He wore golden battle armor, a deep red cape draped over his shoulders, and Gungnir, the Eternal Spear, rested quietly at his side, its tip catching a faint, cold gleam in the hall's light.
A single eye gazed down from that height, calm and unfathomably deep.
From the moment Matthew stepped through the doors, Odin's eyes never once left him.
There was no hostility in that gaze, no pressure behind it, only a kind of curious appraisal.
On the steps below the throne, Frigga stood quietly.
She wore a pale gold gown, hands folded gently in front of her, her face gentle, her gaze soft, and yet carrying a quiet authority that made anyone think twice about underestimating her.
At the same time Odin was sizing Matthew up, Matthew was sizing him up right back.
The two gazes crossed in that empty hall, but no sparks flew between them.
Matthew walked, composed, to the foot of the steps and came to a stop.
Beside him, Thor cleared his throat twice, stepped forward quickly to stand in front of Matthew, and looked up toward the throne.
"Father." He pressed a hand to his chest in a simple bow.
"This is Matthew Lawrence, a friend of mine from Midgard. He has a matter he'd like to discuss with you."
The words settled.
On the throne, Odin said nothing.
In response to Thor's announcement, he simply lifted the hand resting on the throne's arm slightly, then swept it outward.
The motion was slight, but it carried absolute authority.
Reading it instantly, Thor gave Odin a bow, nodded once to Frigga, and turned to head out of the hall.
As he passed Matthew, Thor's lips moved slightly, his voice pitched low enough for only the two of them to hear. "I'll be waiting outside."
"And remember. Watch what you say!" With that, without waiting for Matthew's response, Thor strode off, out of the hall.
Once he'd gone, the two massive doors of the palace slowly swung shut behind him, sealing off any view from outside.
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