'This land truly is far different than Midgard,' Thor thought to himself as he sailed high above the land of the elk. He had wasted no time in visiting Janis's land and just as the god had said, he found that a huge chasm had cleaved the land in two right down the center. He also sensed that the chasm was not naturally created, telling Thor of a rift in the land that he may need to mend.

The land of the elk interested Thor, as it reminded him of the realm of the light Elves, Alfheim. The trees were filled with wonder and magic, glowing with untold number of lights that made the forests look like something in an Asgardian fairy tale. Plants the likes of which Thor had only seen in the Elves realm grew with the colors of the rainbow, with a fruit dangling from them that watered even a gods mouth.

And then there were the elk themselves, or at least what few Thor spied in the forest from his flight above it. Much like the ponies of Equestria, all of them were colored differently, with the difference being that unlike the ponies that had marks on their flanks, the elk had marks similar to those upon their chests, almost like badges of honor.

Of course, he had only spied three elk to make that assumption and the three elk that he had spied were in peril. The three of them raced through the forest as fast as their legs could carry them, but from the eyes of a god Thor could tell that they were not fast enough to escape the monstrous spiders that chased after them. To Thor's interest, the spiders seemed to be made of dirt and stone that were always constantly moving. The eyes were made of rare gems, with the leader of the swarm having ruby eyes while the rest had emeralds. Thor was almost impressed with their beauty. But they were chasing the elk. Thor couldn't allow that.

"Halt, beasts of stone!" Thor roared as he flung Mjolnir into the ground in front of the advancing swarm of stone spiders, getting the spiders to halt in their tracks. Thor followed the landing of his hammer, rising to his full height and towering over the spiders. Behind him he heard the elk come to a halt, but he kept his eyes forward as he extended his hand and Mjolnir returned to its wielder. "You shall not claims these three today. Thor swears it."

The leader of the spiders clicked his stone mandibles and warily skittered back and forth in front of the god of thunder, but three of the spiders behind him let out a screeching sound and lunged towards Thor. Thor smirked before he swung Mjolnir in a perfect arc, shattering the first of the stone spiders and knocking the other two out of the air.

The two spiders that hadn't been reduced to pebbles landed on their backs, scrambling wildly for a moment before they flipped over and resumed their attacks. Thor slammed the closest one to him with his hammer, before reaching out with his left hand and grabbing the other spider by the face. Thor squeezed his fingers together and crushed the head of the spider to dust, causing its body to fall apart into stones and pebbles. A second shot from the hammer finished off the third spider, leaving Thor to glance at the rest of the swarm and smile at them.

"Are thou done? For I promise you, Mjolnir has plenty more pain for all of you," Thor told the spiders as he pointed Mjolnir towards the swarm. Some of the other spiders stepped forward, but the leader with the ruby eyes made a clicking sound before he began to back away. The rest of the swarm followed and a moment later Thor stood alone with the three elk and three piles of rubble.

"Are the three of you unharmed?" Thor asked as he turned on the three elk, who all gazed up at him with disbelief. Two of the three elk had antlers upon their head, but only one of their horns were fully grown. Two of them were a similar green color, Thor assumed they were siblings, while the one with the antlers stood protectively over the other two.

"You two, run. Whatever this thing is, I'll hold it off," the elk said in a deep voice, before giving Thor a glare that caused a smile to spread across the gods face.

"Dad, you saw what that thing did to those spiders. You won't stand a chance," one of the little ones whispered back, but a glare from the father silenced any further argument. Before the three could do anything rash, Thor held out a hand and gained their attention.

"There is no need for such rash action, friends. I am not here to harm you or your children. I am Thor, god of thunder and recent god of Equestria," Thor introduced himself to the three, whose eyes went wide at his words. "And I am here to speak with your god, Janis."

"Thor...yeah, I think I've heard of you," the father elk muttered with a nod of his head, the tension leaving his shoulders but the look of caution still remained on his face. "There have been rumors of Equestria finally getting a god once more. Great, just what we needed."

"I do not understand the reason for the displeasure in your voice," Thor said to the elk, who glanced down at the ground. "Thor commands that you speak."

"It's...the ponies are already plenty powerful enough, even without a god or goddess to make them even stronger," the elk said with a sigh, not wanting to disobey a gods words. "In fact, the only reason we're certain they haven't tried to take over the other nations is because of the fact that we have a god and they don't. But now, with you here..."

"I am confused. I have been with the ponies for a few weeks now and they do not seem like the type to wish invasion upon you or your races," Thor said as he crossed his arms, his look demanding more answers from the elk, who avoided his gaze. "In fact, Celestia and Luna both speak about how they wish to be friends with all. That does not sound like what you are describing."

"Not all ponies are like them. And the princesses don't speak for all of the ponies," the elk replied in a soft voice, but Thor heard him just find. "But perhaps my own views are making me negative. You have saved my family and me from a terrible fate, Lord Thor, so I have no reason to doubt your words. Thank you for saving us."

"There is no need for thanks. But there is a question you can answer. Where is your god and why did you not pray for his aid?" Thor asked the entire family, who all glanced at each other before answering.

"Lord Janis...has not been himself since the split in our nation. Sometimes we're not even sure if he is the same deity," one of the children answered, though every time Thor looked at the girl she avoided the gods eyes. "Sometimes he is the god we know, but at other times he seems completely different, speaking with himself and doing...something. We dare not question him."

"Questioning a god rarely ends well, especially when the god is not all there," Thor said before he began to swing his hammer once more, having sensed where Janis's temple in the land was located. "Can the three of you return to your home safely or do you need the aid of Thor further?"

"No, we were almost home when we got attacked. Thank you once more for your aid, Lord Thor," the father elk said with a bow to Thor once more. "Oh, I am Shear by the way. And these are my children, Wisp and Spirit. Come on you two, thank Lord Thor."

"As I said before, there is no need for thanks. You have already made even what I did with the information you revealed," Thor said with thunder in his eyes before he took to the skies once more, waving to the three before he hurled himself in the direction of the temple of Janis.

'Janis being insane does not surprise me. Many gods go mad in their life times. What concerns me is the impression of Equestria that these elk have, an impression that I have not noticed,' Thor thought to himself with a clouded expression. 'Perhaps the lack of their goddess has not only weakened Equestria, but split it from the rest of the world. Just another task to add to my seemingly ever increasing list.'

{([])}

Thor was tempted to destroy the temple the moment he laid eyes on it.

The temple of Janis resided in the center of a massive city of the elk, one that was made out of magic and nature instead of the buildings that the ponies had. Janis's temple was larger than any of the other buildings, made of a material that seemed incredibly valuable, and from the number of guards around the place, incredible valuable.

But what made Thor's blood boil was the images on the side of Janis standing over his elk, some of the images of him with his boots upon their heads or them sacrificing themselves to appease him. These were the kind of gods that dragged the name of the divines through the mud. These were the gods that had created Gor. A mistake that Thor had spent so long trying to undo.

'Yet I have made a promise to the princesses not to start any fights with any of the gods, no matter how deserved this one is of a blow from Mjolnir,' Thor thought to himself as he descended to the entrance of the temple, behind the guards who only seemed to stare forward. Thor walked inside without waiting for any of the elk to see him, pushing open the doors and walking inside.

The inside was just as infuriating as the outside. Every square space that was not being used for offerings or elk worshiping the god was dedicated to images of the deity, with hundreds of images and statues of the masked deity. Thor felt himself gripping his hammer tighter as he walked into the center of the room, getting the elk that were inside worshiping to stare at him with disbelief.

"Out. All of you," Thor ordered with a crack of thunder and a moment later he was alone in the temple. "Janis! Sinaj! Whichever you are calling yourself right now! Come out! Thor would have words with thee!"

As Thor said this he raised his hammer and unleashed a torrent of lightning and thunder within the temple, causing mass panic outside of the temple. Thor continued the light show until he felt the arrival of the god, along with a sense of anger that only a deity could produce.

"Who in the name of the underworld dares to defy my temple?!" Janis roared with fury as he materialized in the center of the temple, both halves of his mask contorted in a look of rage. The eyes behind the mask widened when they saw the god of thunder standing alone in the temple and Thor watched as the eyes did their best to suppress the rage. "Thor. God of Equestria. What are you doing within my temple?"

"Trying to draw you out, of course," Thor said with a smirk to the dual god, noticing both eyes narrow as the mask returned to its halved expressions. Thor's face then darkened as he walked up to the god of the elk, glaring down into his mask, as he did stand a good two feet taller than the god. "There are a new species of evil laying siege to Equestria, barely a week after I destroy the titan scourge that plagued their home. Would thou happen to know anything about that?"

"Why would I know anything about that?" Janis replied in a reserved voice, one that told Thor the god was doing everything in his power to restrain himself from attacking the god of thunder. "I have my own land with its own issues to deal with. I don't have time to waste on a lesser nation."

"Be careful of your words or you may feel the strength of my hammer," Thor told Janis with a growl. "And do not claim that you are in anyway aiding those of your land. On my way to this place I had to aid three that would be lost if not for my interference. Where were thee then?"

"Dealing with...issues," Janis snarled before regaining control once more. "But I swear to you Thor, swear as a godly oath, that I have nothing to do with these new evils that plague the land of Equestria. But as the god of Equestria you will soon learn that new evils pop up in that land faster than dandelions. Perhaps you will soon learn why Faust eventually quiet her job as deity of Equestria?"

Thor narrowed his eyes once more, but he turned away from Janis and walked to the exit. "Oh, and Thor?" Janis began, getting Thor to stop and turn to face Janis one last time. "Be careful if you go flying into another gods land in the future. Not all of them are as forgiving as me."

"I will keep that in mind when I am laying waste to them with my hammer," Thor replied in a stern tone before he left the temple. Janis watched until he left before he mask flipped around on itself and Janis flooded the temple with his power.

"That arrogant god of thunder. Believing himself to be so much better than all of us," Sinaj snarled to himself as he glared into one of the few reflective surfaces in the room, eyes narrowing behind his mask.

"Yet the idea of a new evil rising in Equestria just a while after the titans interest me," Janis replied with a smile, forming a ball of power in his hands as he glared at his reflection. "It seems that an evil force has either returned or resurrected once more. And in these dark times, perhaps we can finally show the ponies of Equestria that they have placed their faith in the wrong...rulers."

"Perhaps it is time we start doing what should have been done years ago," Sinaj agreed before he vanished into his sphere, leaving the temple empty yet the rumbles of thunder still echoed within.