The Midgardians - Character profile - Andrew Jensen
Andrew in a cave deep in Svartalfheim
Hello again, and welcome back to our journey through this fractured cosmos. So far, we’ve discussed the big picture—the World Tree, Ragnarok, and the ancient forces at play. But every epic tale needs a hero, and our story has two. Today I want to introduce you to the older of the two and one of the hearts of this story: Andrew Jensen.
Andrew is a 19-year-old young man and a student of quiet strength and profound responsibility. This is due to him being burdened by the immense grief of his father’s death, and him feeling the invisible weight of being ‘the man of the house’. He and his sister, Tessa, share a deep, emotional bond, which has become his primary source of comfort and motivation. His initial instinct is always to protect his mom, Sarah, and Tessa. This trait fuels his primary character arc and the driving force behind his actions when their sense of what the universe truly ‘is’ is shattered.
His journey begins not with a grand destiny, but with a simple desire to survive and to get him and Tessa home to their mother. However, after the catastrophic results of Tessa’s curiosity plunge them into the alien world of Svartalfheim, Andrew quickly proves his resourcefulness and natural survival instincts. In the chaos that follows, Tessa is taken in a ruthless ambush, and his desperation to find her is all that matters. Injured and barely able to walk or breathe, pursuing his sister’s captors is all that matters.
He doesn’t know that he and Tessa are the first ‘Midgardians’ to visit Svartalfheim in a millennium, and the dwarves see their presence as an honor. They take him to the Stronghammer dwarves’ capital city, Grondheim, where he’s presented with a mysterious obsidian stone.
This stone, a catalyst for Yggdrasil’s divine power, awakens Andrew’s “Gift of Austri”. His gift primarily manifests as abilities connected to the physicality and stability of the World Tree, rooting him to the earth even as his journey takes him through fantastical realms. He gains an instantaneous comprehension of the Dwarvish language and the ability to perceive and interact with Yggdrasil’s physical resonance and structural energy lines.
As Andrew grapples with these new, alien powers, his despair transforms into a fierce resolve and opens a path of acceptance and growth. He evolves from a reluctant hero who wants to escape to a growing leader who understands the cosmic stakes of Ragnarok and a formidable guardian of the realms. In this role, he uses his excellent strategic thinking and mastery over the World Tree's physical aspects to protect his sister and the worlds they now call home. He is the grounding force and a pillar of resilience and unwavering loyalty for our new powerful duo. While his story is one of him fighting battles for the fate of the cosmos, it is also of an internal struggle between duty and personal grief, and the profound journey of finding a new purpose in a life that can never be “normal” again.
