Using My Blessings To Restore The Kingdom: Odin’s Lost Eye
Mavis never imagined she’d be blessed by Hel—the Goddess of the Underworld.
Just months before, she washed ashore thousands of miles from her home, a nameless girl torn from a kingdom swallowed by eternal fog. Now she hides in a foreign land under a borrowed identity, unaware that fate has already marked her.
Mavis is no ordinary survivor.
She is the lost Queen of a forgotten kingdom—the one even the gods tried to erase.
To save her people, she must walk a path tangled with magic, politics, and divine betrayal. Armed with Hel’s dark blessing, Odin’s all-seeing eye, and a serpent born from legend, Mavis begins a journey that will shake continents.
A journey to break her kingdom’s curse.
(Starts slow, picks up pace gradually.)
——————————————————
“You know of the kingdoms, don’t you?”
“I know there are seven,” the child said proudly. “Dolus, Invidia, Castimonia, Fides, Laetitia, Lues, and Ipse.”
“That’s right,” the mother murmured. “Seven kingdoms we trade with, argue with, laugh with, and fear in equal measure. Seven that send their ships across the sea, their diplomats to the cities, their warriors to the fields. Seven kingdoms you read about in your books.”
She paused, letting the room settle into stillness. Even the fire seemed to quiet, popping softly like an old man clearing his throat.
“But,” she continued, “there is an eighth kingdom.”
The child frowned. “A… a secret one?”
“A hidden one,” the mother corrected, her voice barely above a whisper. “A kingdom older than the others. A kingdom the maps refuse to show. A kingdom that does not speak to the rest of us—nor do they wish to.”
A chill—not from cold, but from something far older—slipped across the child’s skin.
“Is it real?” they whispered. “Or just a story?”
The mother leaned closer, casting her shadow long across the blankets.
“Some say,” she murmured, “that it is nothing more than rumor and superstition. That the Hidden Kingdom—Absonditus—is nothing more than an old tale told to children who ask too many questions.”
The room suddenly felt smaller, walls drawing nearer.
“Others,” she went on, brushing a strand of hair behind her ear, “swear it is real. They say the land exists far beyond the edges of our charts, swallowed by fog and darkness. Secluded. Silent. Watching.”
The child swallowed. “Watching us?”
“Always.” Her smile was gentle, but her eyes carried something deeper—an understanding shaped by years of hearing this story herself. “The seven kingdoms interact with one another. They trade, scheme, fight, and form uneasy alliances. But the eighth… The eighth watches from afar. Hidden, unseen. It keeps to itself, as though waiting for the right moment to return to the world.”
The fire cracked loudly, sending a plume of sparks up the chimney.
The child flinched.
“Is it… dangerous?” they asked in a whisper.
“Not dangerous,” the mother said slowly. “But powerful. And very misunderstood. The people of Absonditus do not come to our lands. They do not ask for help or friendship. And so over many generations, most have come to believe they do not exist at all.”
She tilted her head. “But those who live on the border of the Dolus kingdom’s coast say that when the full moon shines down at night…”
Her voice grew softer, hushed with a kind of reverence.
“…and the fog of the Arianiac Sea disappears…”
Firelight shimmered in her eyes.
“…you can see the kingdom of Absonditus.”
The child’s heartbeat thudded loudly in her ears.
“See… the kingdom?” she breathed. “Like a mirage?”
“Like a truth the world wants you to forget,” the mother murmured.
