Zeus Grants Stupid Wishes: A No-Bullshit Guide to World Mythology (8 page)

Bad news, guys. In this myth all the Norse gods die.

Yeah, this is the big one:

RAGNAROK

THE END OF THE GODDAMN WORLD.

So basically the first thing that’s gonna tip everyone off that the world is ending

is this thing called Fimbulvetr

which just means THE WINTER OF WINTERS

and that is exactly what it is.

It is a winter

MADE OF MULTIPLE WINTERS

like, there is going to be a winter

and then once that winter is finished there will be ANOTHER WINTER.

And then after that maybe it will be spring?

Think again, son.

MORE WINTER.

The whole point of this endless winter is just to put everyone in a really bad mood

to prepare them for the next stage of the apocalypse

which is CEASELESS WARS.

Which is funny because that is also the Norse idea of heaven.

Like, that is seriously what everyone is doing in Valhalla all the time.

But then finally after that goes on for a while

this wolf Skoll

who is one of the sons of Fenrir

is gonna eat the sun.

Then Fenrir’s other kid, Hati, will eat the moon, because he’s a fucking copydog.

Then the cock Fjalar will crow to the giants

all like “TIME FOR WAR, MOTHERFUCKERS”

and the golden cock Gullinkambi will yell the same thing at the gods

and then a third cock will raise the dead.

Hehe, cock.

THEN

there’s gonna be A WHOLE BUNCH OF EARTHQUAKES

and this is going to have the effect

of finally releasing that evil wolf bastard Fenrir

and his bottom jaw is gonna touch the earth

and his top jaw is gonna touch the sky

and his eyes are going to be on FIRE

and there’s gonna be a whole bunch of tsunamis and shit too

because the Midgard serpent, who holds up the world

(and is also another one of Loki’s horrible children)

is going to start having seizures all over the ocean

on its way to fuck up the land.

And not only that

but he’s going to breathe poison all over everything constantly

completely destroying all the air

and all the land.

And all the waves caused by the serpent

are gonna set free this ship called Naglfar

full of giants who are ready to romp and stomp everyone

and another ship is gonna set sail from hell

with all the dead people on it

and Loki is gonna be driving it

because the gods sure as shit want nothing to do with him at this point

and guess who else is coming to the party?

FIRE GIANTS.

What are fire giants you ask?

Oh, I don’t know, maybe giants MADE OF FIRE

the sole purpose of whom is to show up at this EXACT MOMENT

led by this guy SURT

and fucking set fire to EVERYTHING.

So this is when Heimdall is going to blow his horn

signaling that SHIT is finally about to get REAL

and Odin and all the other gods

and all the elves, dwarves, demons and basically just anything ever

are going to ride onto this one battlefield called Vigrid

which means BATTLESHAKER

and they are going to tear each other to pieces in the following order:

Odin is going to fight Fenrir

and Fenrir is going to eat Odin

and then Odin’s son Vidar is gonna be like “NOOOO.”

and run up and rip Fenrir’s jaw in half

which is pretty appropriate because Vidar is the god of revenge

not that he has anything to really be vengeful about because Odin is EVERYONE’S dad.

Meanwhile, Thor is gonna fight the Midgard serpent

and he is gonna kill it

but then its poison is gonna kill HIM.

And Surt is just gonna pick the weakest-looking god

Freyr

who is the god of the sun and elves and shit

and just kill him straight up

because Freyr is a tremendous pussy

who actually FORGOT TO BRING A SWORD TO THE APOCALYPSE.

Then Tyr is gonna look around like “Shit I need to kill someone to prove I’m a badass.

How about this terrible wolf, GARM?!”

and he kills it, despite the fact he only has one hand

but then Garm also kills him. Boo.

Also, Heimdall kills Loki, FINALLY

but Loki also kills Heimdall, so that will suck.

And on top of ALL OF THAT

Surt is gonna just start chucking fire in every direction

burning everything

so it won’t even really matter if you survive the epic battle

because everyone is catching fire anyway

except for these two people

Lif and Lifthrasir

a dude and a chick who will just be sleeping in the indestructible forest.

Wait, there’s an INDESTRUCTIBLE FOREST??

Why doesn’t everyone just evacuate there?

That would seriously minimize some casualties.

Anyway, when it’s all over

and the earth dives underwater to try and put out all the fire

and then comes back up again all fresh and new

Lif and Lifthrasir are gonna repopulate the world

and everything is going to be great forever.

So the moral of the story

is that when the going gets tough

the tough get going

but the SMART get inside the invincible forest.

You might not guess from their tame 2-D cave paintings

but the ancient Egyptians liked to tell some seriously messed-up myths

they’ve got all the essentials:

booze, blood, and jerkin’ it

(if you thought that the essentials were food, water, and shelter

then you, my friend have been reading the wrong myths)

and if any mortals actually managed to survive the constant barrage of nonsense from above

Egyptian lore says you had to get your soul weighed against a FUCKING FEATHER

by a pitiless demon with a dog for a head

and if your soul is heavier than the feather

YOU GO TO HELL.

So I hope you can hear me in hell, every dude who ever lived in ancient Egypt

because I am about to seriously bastardize your canon up in here.

So there is this dude named Ra.

This dude does not exist

At least not at the beginning of the story.

All there is is this totally boring infinite water called Nu

but then Ra

who—remember—doesn’t exist

is like “This sucks.

How about I CREATE MYSELF USING PURE WILLPOWER!??”

So now Ra is standing around

except actually he is not standing.

He hasn’t invented standing yet and anyway there is no place to stand

so Ra is like “Okay, time for some terrain features.

Let’s start with the ones that look the most like tits.”

So he makes a hill

and he stands on it

and later someone builds a temple BUT LET’S NOT GET AHEAD OF OURSELVES.

So Ra gets pretty bored

seeing as all there is in the ENTIRE GODDAMN UNIVERSE is a hill and some water.

So he hangs out on the hill for a bit

waiting for other awesome dudes to will themselves into being

but they don’t

so he’s like “MAN, YOU GUYS ARE SOOOO LAZY

FINE, I’LL MAKE MY OWN FRIENDS.”

But there is a problem

because, although Ra can make hills

and also HIMSELF

he apparently can’t make people.

Sexual reproduction is ruining everything, as usual.

But Ra does not even give a shit

he just goes right ahead and FUCKS HIS OWN SHADOW UNTIL HE GETS PREGNANT.

THEN HE GIVES BIRTH TO KIDS OUT OF HIS MOUTH

IN THE TWO LEAST CLASSY WAYS POSSIBLE. Yes, guys.

If Egypt is to be believed

you are all either descended from spit or puke

(depending on whether you are a boy or a girl).

See, Ra has two kids.

The phlegm kid is this dude called Shu

the god of air and stuff

meanwhile the vomit kid is a chick named Tefnut

goddess of moisture

not water mind you, but moisture

which makes sense with the whole vomit thing, I guess.

Anyway, Shu and Tefnut get together

and by their powers combined

manage to be exponentially more bored than even their omnipotent father could have imagined.

So they are sitting around and they are like “Hey

wanna hit each other with bricks?

Oh wait, bricks don’t exist. Just like absolutely everything else other than hills.

Fuck it, let’s make up some codes of laws and then get lost.”

So they make up some laws and then they get lost in the middle of an endless ocean fiasco

which is kind of like SeaWorld

if SeaWorld was everything everywhere

and there was no Shamu

and there was no amusement park

or hot dogs or whatever.

It is actually just the water part of SeaWorld.

And there are only three people there

and two of them are lost

and they are made of spit and vomit.

Actually, that last part sounds a lot like SeaWorld.

So Ra is like “GUYYSSSS

I fucked my own SHADOW so I wouldn’t be lonely.

Come baaaack.”

And then he takes out his one eye

(by the way, he only has one eye)

and he is like “Hey, eye

go find my kids.”

So it does, and it brings them back to Ra

and he starts crying

either because he is so happy to have his kids back or because now he has to raise kids

but the myth is not clear on whether he puts his eye back in before he does this

or whether it is just this weird floating sadness orb

but that is not important at all.

What is important is that those tears hit the hill Ra made

and they turn into people

and then Shu and Tefnut start boning

like siblings do.

They pop out this kid Geb, the earth

and Nut, the sky

(those are extremely large babies, no lie).

Then later, Geb and Nut give birth to all the trendy gods

like Isis and Osiris and whatever

and things proceed pretty much as would be expected

with a lot of murder and sex and stuff.

So basically what it all comes down to

is that we are made of tears

from the disembodied eyeball

of a guy who fucks his own shadow and surrounds himself with spit and puke.

I’m gonna go cry now.

I hope it doesn’t turn it into babies.

So Ra creates the world.

Sure, great

but just because you create the world

doesn’t mean you get to just be king of it forever.

I mean you get to be king of it for a
while

(like for example what Ra does

is as soon as he’s done creating everything

he turns into a dude and becomes king of Egypt)

but the problem with dudes is that they get old

and the problem with old dudes is that they are constantly getting guff

from ALL DIRECTIONS

and the problem with being a god

is that you are constitutionally incapable of taking ANY GUFF WHATSOEVER

so naturally

when everybody starts laughing at Ra’s old hair and senility

he gets
real
pissed

and when you are a god

and you are real pissed

there is only one solution, my friends:

GENOCIDE.

So basically what Ra does

is he turns around and gives Egypt the world’s DEADLIEST STINKEYE

this eye is so stinky

it produces an entire brand new goddess

the goddess is named Sekhmet

and she is basically like a lioness

with
chainsaws for legs

SEKHMET:

THE ORIGINAL THUNDERCAT.

Sekhmet’s job is simple:

KILL.

EVERYONE.

So that is what she does.

She just tears all around everywhere

mauling the ever-loving crap out of people until the ground is like

permanent red

which is disconcertingly tacky.

Eventually Ra wakes up from his old-man sleep

and he’s like “WHOA

WHERE DID ALL THE PEOPLE GO?

Damn, I feel kinda bad now.”

Gods are always doing things like this if you haven’t noticed.

But the problem is that by now Sekhmet is an unstoppable murder engine.

But the good news

is that there is ONE THING

with the power to stop an unstoppable murder engine

and that thing

is BOOZE.

So what Ra does

is he gathers up all this really good beer

and all this really good red food coloring

and he mixes it all together

and he dumps it all over the fields that Sekhmet has scheduled for murdering the next day

so that when she shows up

she just sees a big lake of what she can only assume is blood

blood that smells like booze

so, like

the blood of really drunk people?

and she’s like “ALL RIGHT

LOOKS LIKE MURDERING IS DONE EARLY TODAY

TIME FOR MY SECOND FAVORITE PASTIME:

DEVOURING THE BLOOD OF THE INNOCENT.”

So Sekhmet just dives right in and starts slurping the boozeblood

which is such good shit that everybody calls it “THE SLEEPMAKER”

and because of that she ends up passing out pretty quick

and she wakes up all hung over

and Ra is like “HaHAAAA

from now on you will be known as Hathor

and the only thing you will kill people with

is KINDNESS.”

And basically whatever Ra says just immediately happens

so that’s who Sekhmet becomes from then on.

So obviously the moral of the story

is that the best way to deal with a rampaging psychopath

is to get them really, really drunk.