Snippet #2816057

Hethel Svensson and his band of ulfhednar had once served Ungrulf "Ulfric" Ellrufsson aboard the Örmbátur longship as members of the House of Ellrulf in a time since forgotten. After the extinction of that family line, Hethel Svensson inherited the Nuörmbátur longship and became a jarl under the late great King Sigurd the Ringtaker of the House of Munso along with all the original ulfhednar who had served the previous household. Fudørn, Engöll and Stryder were promoted to jarls. Sigurd Hring sent them forth in the Nuörmbátur to establish a new colony along with Sjonn the Skald and 45 other Vikings whose names are unrecorded. They established a settlement on the Empyrean Sea Beach which flourished and evolved. After the death of King Sigurd and the Iskjerne Vikings, the new colony chose Hethel Svensson to be their new konung or sovereign. King Hethel the Dragontamer ruled peacefully for his entire reign and was praised after he died of old age, being given a large burial mound close to the Empyrean Sea Beach known today as Hethel's Barrow.

King Hethel was succeeded by his son King Ingvar the Highruler, who also had a peaceful reign. King Ingvar was a younger contemporary of an elder Ragnar Lothbrok in the days of old. King Ingvar would expand on his father's kingdom by building upon King Hethel's original establishment. Fudørn Ivansson's successor Ivaldi would become a famous inventor at that time, having purchased a magical purple crystal from Volund the Archer, one of the ljosalfar who had stumbled upon it by pure chance at Iskjerne Forge and sold it to Ivaldi in exchange for silver, along with many other broken remnants of lost technologies that King Sigurd had once confiscated from his Taiyou enemies in the days of old. Ivaldi wasted no time in studying and reverse engineering some of those technologies, using magic and a bit of Nordic alchemy. Using a mineral solution to grow more crystals on the surface of stones, Ivaldi greatly contributed to the accelerated advancements of the Empyrean Sea Beach settlement, helping the House of Hethel to jump several hundred years ahead of Gaia's other Viking settlement at Iskjerne Bay.

King Ingvar was succeeded to the throne by his son King Svein, who continued to expand the House of Hethel and grow his kingdom. King Svein was alive during the fall of the House of Munso under the rule of Ivar the Boneless, but did not get his own kingdom involved. Instead, he used his resources to order the construction of 3 magically advanced longships that could leave the planet and sail through outer space. The first ship was called the Stjorndrekr (star dragon). The second ship was called the Stjornkona (star maiden). The third ship was called the Stjornhestr (star horse). At this stage the Empyrean Sea Beach settlement had grown tremendously and evolved into a small nation, or Type II civilization that was fully capable of harnessing the natural elements in their local star system and utilizing Gaia's native magical defenses, something that the Iskjerne Vikings had tried to accomplish with the Hreggdreki longship many years before them but had failed to do.

During the reign of King Svein, a terrible event happened in the heavens which shook the mountains, leveled forests and left a huge shockwave of destruction throughout the land. By this time, however, the Empyrean Vikings had expanded their kingdom and had established such mighty and powerful defenses that it was able to withstand the storm brought on by the meteor as it passed overhead towards Siv'en and into the Exalted Mountains before crashing in the distance. To those peaceful Norse settlers behind King Svein's walls, it felt like a powerful earthquake. But the kingdom did not break. After the waves stopped rolling in and the earth ceased to tremble, and all the debris and thundering storm clouds had rolled overhead, the walls and towers of the Empyrean Viking settlement were still standing. After some time, life returned to normal and before King Svein died, what little forest that had been destroyed was already starting to regrow.

After the collapse of the Iskjerne Kingdom under the wrathful Titan deity Sigurd the Divine, during the time of Ivar the Boneless, the distant colony on the Empyrean Sea Beach just kept getting stronger and stronger. King Svein was succeeded by his son King Halfdan, the current ruler of that kingdom. King Halfdan was now the sovereign of a dynasty that had lasted four whole generations. Like his father and their fathers before them, Halfdan Svensson was a wise and peaceful king. He had skalds who could recall the legends and sagas of such famous heroes as Harald Wartooth, Ellrulf Trygvirsson, Hethel Svensson, Sigurd Hring, Ragnar Lothbrok, Bjorn Ironside, Harald Fairhair and others whose deeds served as lessons and teachings to the Empyrean sea king.

Halfdan the Great was a follower of Odin and a lover of wisdom who prayed to the gods and made daily offerings to the elves and land spirits. He would continue to provide a sanctuary for all the dragons, dwarves, unicorns, witches, pagans and exiles in his kingdom. In return, he received blessings from the land as the forests grew taller and the gardens grew fuller with an abundance of crops and flowers. Song birds greeted him with their beautiful songs as the grasses flourished above Hethel's Barrow and over the hillsides. There were many pleasant springs and ponds where frogs, fish and turtles nested, where crickets, ladybugs, bees and butterflies fluttered during the summer months, and the Empyrean Kingdom seemed like a quiet remote paradise. Life was good, and the Empyrean Norsemen lived without care, farming and crafting, forging and living in leisure without any needs or concerns.