The ancestral Way of the North is filled with the alchemical Lore of the Forest. Within the Nine Realms, the Starry Mist, the Sacred Dew of Nitre is of Niflheim (the “World of Fog”) that reacts with the ice of the fire world, Muspelheim. The freezing mist and the raging flames are from the Flint Strike of the Starry Secret Fire. In the vast, empty void of Ginnungagap, between the two realms there is the Collision in the Void. The hot air and sparks from Muspelheim drifted North and met the frozen rime and cold mists of Niflheim, the ice began to thaw the life-giving drops of melted ice, birthing the Rebis, the primordial giant Ymir. Surtr guards Muspelheim with a flaming sword. Some myths suggest his sparks helped form the stars and celestial bodies.

This is the (“chemical wedding” or coniunctio oppositorum) the reaction of the marriage of Sun (Fire/Muspelheim) and Moon (Water/Niflheim). The giant Ymir represents the prima materia—the raw, chaotic, and undifferentiated substance from which all things are made. The three forces of the Alchemists Gods (Odin, Vili, and Ve) “process” Ymir’s body to create the structured world. The slaying and dismemberment of Ymir is seen as an alchemical mortificatio or putrefactio (death and decay). This “destruction” is a necessary stage to transform the chaotic giant into the refined elements of the cosmos: earth, sea, and sky. The “drops of eitr” (primordial venom/liquid) that formed Ymir are the distillation from the mist and fire.