Hundreds of vikings paused from their labours and looked up towards the skies just in time to witness a very strange phenomenon. Thick heavy clouds rolled across the snowy winter sky, followed by a low rumbling sound which sounded like thunder. There was a loud thunderclap, followed by a feint flash of light which looked very similar to heat lightning when viewed from Gaia's surface. But the great heathen army was never aware of the Mizuho's presence high above, and were oblivious to its existence. To the vikings, it seemed like a more natural phenomenon or weather occurrence, and one that most of them were actually already quite familiar with. The vikings soon went back to work as if nothing had happened out of the ordinary. In fact, they started working faster and harder now that it seemed there might be a possible storm approaching. Prince Ivar was sitting on King Sigurd's throne inside the mead hall, listening to the musical melody of the tagelharpa over the skaldic poetry and mythical songs recited by his court poets. There was a large central fire in the middle of the mead hall, which kept everyone inside warm and toasty while they filled their horns with mead and danced in celebration of Prince Ivar's successful voyage.
Just outside the great hall, however, thousands of Norsemen were hard at work, constructing new walls and ramifications for the old ring fortress. Ivar's engineers had already narrowed the scarp or hill that the mead hall rested upon, and had started to build around it, adding the foundation of a temple and a keep, with temporary ramps and bridges setup to allow traffic in and out as the new stone wall was being built. A few paths were cleared out with plows and shovels, but otherwise it was extremely cold outside, with mounds of thick and heavy snow which were knee-high and difficult to tread through. Still, it was not enough to stop the hardened vikings as they worked together like thousands of ants in assembly, using their superior strength and numbers to accomplish great things even during the midst of a cold spell. Queen Aslaug stood alone on top of a frozen burial mound, watching Fulgar Thornheim and his crew as they approached the mainland. Aslaug was in plain sight, standing still as a statue whilst still holding the horn bugle in one hand, while clutching her long elmwood walking stick with the other. Her long blue catskin dress and black feathered cloak would wave and flow with the chilly wind, her wavey red hair and almost otherworldly bright blue eyes staring silently at the strangers in the distance, no doubt noticeable to Fulgar's crew. At the base of the mound, a circle of hooded women were gathered around and huddled together in a circle, spinning and weaving threads and making spindles of yarn to be used for future purposes.
By now, many of the workers and slaves in the open fields had already started to find and collect small artifacts left behind by the warring parties and viking nations from the previous settlement. Arrowheads, broken spear-heads, silver coins, bone beads and other trinkets. Lagertha's shield-maidens patrolled the area and kept a watchful eye on the slaves and thralls to make sure they didn't steal anything, or covet any weapons they might find. Ubbe Ragnarsson and his ulfhednar were still patrolling Iskjerne Forest when they stumbled upon a certain ash tree which seemed to have a bearded man's face carved into it. There were a set of 3 nooses hanging from the branches of this sacred ash tree, and someone had painstakingly taken the time to carve runes into its trunk. Ubbe examined the markings while scratching his neck. "What do you suppose it means?" one of the ulfhedinns asked him. "I'm not sure. Copy them down, my brother will know what it means" Ubbe said, before walking away to go look at some of the other trees in the forest.
Meanwhile, the berserkers had made some new discoveries as well. One of the sons of Ivaldi came running up from the mines to inform his father of a certain small hole in the ground, which upon further inspection appeared to be some kind of hidden cave entrance. Ivaldi reported the find to Bjorn Ironside and his small den of berserkers at the watch tower. Bjorn in turn sent a rider to the mead hall to go inform Prince Ivar, who was still drinking and feasting and having a good time. Bjorn Ironside also summoned more of his own personal guards to the watch tower, deeming it to be a great point from which to conduct a nearly aerial survey of the kingdom below. Prince Bjorn had seen Fulgar Thornheim's vessel arriving from the north, even before they had reached the docks, such was the view from high up in the watch tower. Again, however, the berserkers thought little about it. After all, it was only a small crew, not exactly an entire army. The vikings were no strangers to having visitors back home, and so there was very little need for any of them to feel alarmed now that they had found new land. On the other side of the small inlet of Iskjerne Bay, however, Volund the Smith had made some interesting discoveries as well. At the top of the long stone carved stairway into the mountains, where Iskjerne Forge was located, Volund found the broken remnants of some strange foreign inventions and dazzling purple crystals. All of the round egg-shaped stones were cracked, save for one of the crystals which had a very feint pinkish glow to it. "Well that's interesting," Volund said, sticking the crystal into his pocket.
