Hopi's Story

Karvi-1 made a huge splash as it dove into the Grigori River nose-first from the sky. The waves which splooshed up from the port and starboard side of the pointed pod reached both sides of the shore, sending a flock of Xamatospondylus whooping and panicking as they squabbled away from the bank of the river. The small 25-foot-long silvery metallic almond-shaped convertiboat plunged beneath the water's surface to a depth of about seventy five feet before it leveled out and began to travel straight again. Many fish and sea creatures darted away quickly as it dove into the river. Svegdir Staghelm and his crew watched quietly as their submersible capsule slowly began to curve back upwards and arch back towards the surface. The cabin on the convertiboat was pressurized to prevent their ears from popping or feeling the difference in altitude or pressure from the water as they observed the aquatic scenery before them.

As all the oxygen bubbles around the small vessel rose around it and disappeared, and Karvi-1 slowly began to emerge from the depths, the Empyrean Norsemen gazed in remarkable wonder at the beauty and magnificence of the freshwater and all the aquatic life in its liquidy biome. Soon, a small group of Aquaxamos began to approach the vessel from underneath and prod at the metallic silver surface. The convertiboat was smooth along the sides, but the underbelly and keel was razor sharp, and would easily slice anything that brushed against it. Likewise, the rooftop over the convertiboat was scaley in nature, smooth from stern to bow, but extremely sharp when brushing in the opposite direction from bow to stern.

Svegdir Staghelm and his crew smiled, gazing quietly at the aquatic animals from inside the capsule, peering back at them through the silvery metallic mirror-glass windows. One of his crew mates had pulled out a leather bound journal and began to draw a quick sketch of one of the Aquaxamos as it circled around the boat. The Norsemen weren't the best sketch artists, but it didn't really matter to them much so long as the submersible boat continued to ascend slowly towards the surface. Just as the sketch artist was starting to add more details to his drawing, however, the small group of round-snouted creatures suddenly jetted off and disappeared into the darkness from which they came, as if something else in the river had startled them. The Norsemen glanced around, but they couldn't see anything out of the windows of their small boat which caused them to be alarmed. They had no idea what was stalking them from the murky depths below as they started to smile and rejoice at the fact that Xamoyos had life.

"We are now at a depth of thirty feet. Oxygen levels are good. There's life on land, and in the water. All systems are functioning properly. We saw mountains and forests on the way in. There's plantlife on the surface, which means we have a good chance of breathing once we reach land," Svegdir Staghelm said calmly. The small crew was smiling happily at the sound of that.

After being in outer space for several months on a voyage far far away from their home planet, Svegdir and his crew were the first to experience the likeness of another world which seemed remarkably similar to their own. Their mission to explore the stars had been a success, and Svegdir couldn't wait to inform the jarl and the king of the discovery they had just made. Little did any of them know at the time that their journey home would prove to be much more difficult than the journey which had brought them to Xamoyos.

"I wonder what scared them off," Jonah Marksberg said sarcastically as the hybridic manatee-like dolphin creatures swam away.

"Look. More bubbles," the sketch maker pointed with his pencil as a cloud of large gaseous bubbles floated up around the back of the convertiboat. This was a good sign that the air was breathable on the surface of Xamoyos.

Suddenly, out of nowhere, everyone in the convertiboat was jolted to one side as a large aquatic sea monster rammed into the submersible vehicle's hull near the underbelly on the starboard side. If not for the fact that Svegdir Staghelm and his team had been fastened to their seats, they would have been thrown about like rag dolls. No doubt at least two of them would have gotten badly injured, if not worse. But luckily they suffered no injury as their silver almond-shaped pod was rolled over on its port side suddenly, upsetting everything that was not fastened down Inside the cabin.

Svegdir and his team reached above themselves and grabbed the handles of their silver round shields which had been magically fastened to the silver rooftop functioning as oh-shit handles and double reinforcement to the karve's already elvish-crafted armour. Xamatohades slammed hard into the side of the explorer's Empyrean Norse mini-boat, causing it to roll upwards and to the left, its narrow snout acting as a weapon as it tried to penetrate the magical armour. But the silver was unphased, causing no dent to its reflective mirror like surface, nor injury to the river monster.

The convertiboat wasn't just crafted of any silver. It was made of 100% purified un-oxydated silver crafted by the Sjóálfar, the mysterious Sea Elves who served the king's heir, forging the soft but remarkable alloy from Empyrean dragon's breath, crafting it from blueish white and clear ghost flames using elvish enchantment overseen by the old nature gods and spirits. It was light-weight, flexible and easy to mold, but also extremely durable and resilient to damage from being rammed as Svegdir rebalanced the capsule using simple steering levers, tucking his thin purple gemstone skeleton key string necklace back into his shirt collar as the sketch artist tried to reach for his charcoal pencil and leather bound notebook which had been thrown from his hands into the seat beside him upon impact.

"What in Helheim was that?!" the sketch artist shouted alarmingly as he cusped the leather bound notebook under his arm and clutched the handle on his round shield.

"Big whale," Jonah Marksberg replied calmly, also grasping his shield handle while pointing out of the silver mirror-glassed window with the index finger of his other hand.

"That's not a whale," a third voice responded, looking at the pliosaur as it tried to gnaw through the hull of the convertiboat before withdrawing back to the surface for air.

"Hang on," Svegdir Staghelm said deeply as he leveled the convertiboat back into an upright position before steering the vessel towards the surface. The sooner the Norsemen made landfall, he thought, the better off they'd be.

Svegdir Staghelm struggled to keep the convertiboat level as the pliosaur circled around them, flapping its large tail in order to kick up waves and rapids in the water. The boat would shift and rock, like an airplane experiencing heavy turbulence as Svegdir pushed back and forth on both levers to steer his vessel upwards towards the surface of the water, countering the rapids which circled underneath the convertiboat. Finally as the crew was about to reach the surface, another wave struck against the bow so intense that the entire boat was flipped upside down.

The Empyrean Norsemen would hold on for dear life as their capsule was flipped over, their feet now pointing up in the air as their long hair and braided beards hung down loosely below their heads. Svegdir's purple gemstone skeleton key string necklace would once again fall out, this time falling off of his neck completely and landing on the bimini-like rooftop below. The convertiboat had finally reached the surface of the river as it floated back up above the water, only this time with the keel sticking up instead of the armoured rooftop. The Norse explorers were still safe and secured to their seats for now, but they were upside down as Svegdir tried to reach down and pick up his necklace, which seemed to be just barely out of reach as he extended his arm and tried to grab the skeleton key.

Staghelm reached frantically for the purple gemstone skeleton key on the rooftop, moving it slightly with the tip of his middle finger. But the key was just a hair's breath out of reach as the pliosaur closed in on his convertiboat, again trying to bite into the capsule with its elongated snout.

As it bumped into the side of the capsized vessel, the key would slide away from Svegdir Staghelm into the reach of the man behind him, who quickly grabbed it with his freehand before handing it forward to the boat's captain. At that moment, the frustrated Xamatohades would brush up against the side of the convertiboat before withdrawing back into the depths from whence it came.

The pliosaur would not go unscathed. The boat was now capsized, but the rooftop covering was very different from the underbelly of the explorer's capsule, being magically scaled armour aligned with razor sharp edges. The bimini-like roofing would almost filet the creature's face as it brushed its head against the topside of the boat. A trail of blood would follow the pliosaur as it swam away. The injuries would be minor and not life threatening, but the sea monster would learn from these scrapes against its tough scaley skin as it retreated into the darkness.

"Look, it is leaving. It is not following," Jonah Marksberg said as he pointed to the withdrawing beast outside his mirror-glassed window.

Svegdir Staghelm quickly pushed one lever on his control panel while pulling the other, and soon the convertiboat would roll sideways like a football, uncapsizing itself with remarkable ease. Everyone else would regain their composure as they reached the surface of the river and looked around to the banks ahead. The sketch artist once again would open his drawing book and start to draw the landscapes in front of him as Svegdir placed his skeleton key string necklace back around his neck and steered his vessel up the Grigori River towards the open lake in the center of Dracos Valley.

The sketch artist's name was Birger Torvesson, and he was the son of a talented woodworker named Torve Niallesson, a great descendant of Norse-Gaelic bloodlines. Torve's great great grandmother had been a Gaelic Celt descended from Coirpre mac Néill, one of the legendary Kings of Tara which existed in Dalraida since old times. Torve's great great grandfather had been a Swedish Norseman descended from Egil Vendelcrow of the House of Scylfings, which itself had belonged to the House of Ynglings long long ago. Birger Torvesson had followed in his father's footsteps by becoming an artist. Only instead of working with wood, Birger decided to make sketchings instead. He knew all different styles of Celtic knotwork, or Icovellavna and Old Norse sketchwork including the Vendel style, Oseberg style, Broa style, Borre style, Jelling style, Mammen style, Urnes style, and his personal favorite, Ringerike style which he used most often, especially when drawing the flora and fauna he was witnessing on the river banks of Xamoyos.

Birger would make light sketches of the sharp-toothed Xamatohades pliosaur that his team had encountered underwater, along with the small pod of manatee-like Xamatospondylus fish eaters that had surfaced around the convertiboat. He drew the rather large Xamatosuchus crocodilians which were basking on the shore, and the small pterosaurs that were flying around them. He took a few small notes, writing in Old Norse calligraphy while also making sketches of some of the plants and trees near the river bank. Jonah Marksberg was still surveying the area and keeping a watchful eye out for any more predators which might attack, while Svegdir Staghelm focused on piloting their small-sized vessel closer to the inlands. They were heading through Lake Dinesair, straight into the heart of Dracos Valley, but after their close encounter with the long-nosed pliosaur, Svegdir would not dare to lift back the protective bimini-like rooftop on their convertiboat until he was sure they had made it safely to the shore.

"How's our oxygen level?" Svegdir Staghelm asked curiously, seeming remarkably calm for someone who had almost just been eaten. Jonah tapped his finger against the strange barometric apparatus on the center console beside him. This small glass-like vertical narrow tube system measured the atmospheric pressure, temperature, water and oxygen levels inside the convertiboat without using batteries or electricity. It also provided a fairly accurate reading for the atmospheric pressure, sea levels and temperature outside the boat as well, giving the small band of Empyrean Norse explorers a better understanding of the environment around them.

"70%, looking good so far, we've got about another week or two before we start to suffocate in here," Jonah replied, before checking the other readings on the strange apparatus before looking around.

"I'm not seeing any water levels inside the boat. Nothing on the floor either. Our armour is still looking good. I don't see any punctures. Everything looks alright", Jonah informed Svegdir, who was too busy controlling the boat to look behind him.

"That's good. What is our current location?" Svegdir Staghelm asked as he steered the karve closer to land, passing over the center of the lake. Jonah Marksberg would look at the strange Norse barometric apparatus again before looking at the other two karls behind him, who were already pulling out their magnetic water compasses and small wooden sundials. One of them would pull out his portable silver canteen mess-kit and poor a small bit of water into a pot, placing the round 70mm wooden compass into the water while the other karl waited for an indication of where to place the small wooden sundial. Within about thirty seconds, they had their answers from the gnomons on the shadow board.

"We are about seven feet below sea level, heading south-south east. Both gnomons are in alignment, one with the latitude, and the other with the sun. It's about mid-day," Jonah Marksberg commented, nodding to the karls behind him as they put their belongings away. Karvi-1 was coasting smoothly now over Lake Dineasair as the Empyrean Norsemen prepared to reach the shore and step out on to land for the first time in months since they had journied across the stars.