Baldur was the Fonzie of all the Norse gods: he was super gorgeous, super cool, super talented, and everybody loved him. Men wanted to be him, women wanted to do him. Even the douchey-est of giants wanted to hang out with him. So naturally, when the gods started having nightmares about Baldur being dragged into the hellish underworld, they panicked just a smidge. To better understand these terrible omens, Odin brought an old oracle back from the dead.
“Whaddaya want at this late hour?” the oracle croaked.
Odin had blessed humanity with the gift of poetry, so he always spoke in rhyme:
“Sorry for bringing you back from the dead,
But we’re having nightmares that fill us with dread.
Help us to see
What their meaning could be,
And I’ll let you go right back to bed.”
“Baldur’s gonna die soon. With his death comes Ragnarok, the end of the world. Now shove off.”
The gods upturned tables left and right, so distressed were they: it wasn’t just Baldur’s life at stake, it was EVERYBODY’S! Baldur was especially worried, shedding manly tears and sobbing manly sobs of terror. Fortunately, Baldur had a devoted mother and father in Frigga and Odin, who concocted a magic ward that made Baldur absolutely un-killable by all substances across three worlds. The gods then thoroughly tested the ward’s effectiveness through weeks and weeks of calculated scientific experiments, which were conducted as follows:
1) Chug a mug of mead.
2) Huck an increasingly dangerous object at the terrified Baldur’s head.
3) Laugh obnoxiously as the object miraculously misses its mark.
4) Pass the mug and repeat.
It was all fun and games until Loki, Patron of Tricksters and Shitheads, figured out that Frigga hadn’t included oak in her precious little ward. He giggled endlessly as he whittled an oak arrow, and wondered how surprised Odin and his stupid friends would be when they shot the arrow into Baldur’s stupid face and killed him.
Turns out they were so surprised that they tortured Loki and murdered his kids in front of him. Then the world ended and everyone died.
C’mon, it was kinda funny.
Mike's Toybox 