God of War Saga - The Complete Story (From Kratos' Beginnings to Ragnarök!)

With God of War Ragnarök’s PC release right around the corner, I, Suggestive Gaming, figured now would be a perfect time to go back over the entire story of the franchise so far. You may recall that I already covered this series over seven years ago, as well as the reboot two years ago, but this time, I’ll be bringing everything together. If you need a catch-up to play Ragnarök, I’ll make sure to warn you where to stop, but if you want the whole story, I’ll be covering it here, including Ragnarök and its DLC: Valhalla.

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Now, without further ado, this is What You Need to Know about God of War! (Please don’t steal this one, GameRanx)

Our story begins with the Primordials, the very first beings to come into existence, fighting for control of their creation: Earth. This war ravages the world, and from the chaos, the three “Furies” are born from the rage and power of the battle. These formidable beings are then tasked with enforcing oaths and punishing those who dare to break them. Ouranos, the Primordial god of the sky and lord of the heavens, joins with Gaia, the Primordial goddess of the Earth, giving birth to several powerful entities. Among their offspring are the Hecatonchires, fearsome creatures with a hundred hands and fifty heads; and the Titans, a race of powerful deities who would eventually rise to rule over the Earth. The Titans, led by Cronos, govern the world with immense power, shaping its very foundation. However, a prophecy foretells that Cronos will be overthrown by one of his own children. In an attempt to prevent this fate, Cronos devours each of his offspring at birth, but his wife, Rhea, saves their youngest son, Zeus, by hiding him away. When Zeus comes of age, he leads a rebellion against Cronos and the Titans, igniting a Great War that leads him to create the “Blade of Olympus”, a powerful weapon that skews the battle in the gods’ favor, resulting in the downfall and eternal punishment of the Titans.

In the wake of the Great War, Zeus and the others emerge victorious and establish their reign as the Olympian gods, ruling from Mount Olympus, the highest peak in the world. Each god takes control of a specific domain, with Zeus leading them as king and commanding the skies and thunder, while Ares, the God of War, embodies the spirit of conflict and bloodshed. When the Hecatonchires, Aegaeon, betrays an oath made to Zeus, the furies claim their first victim. To make an example of Aegaeon, the Furies petrify his body, transforming him into the “Prison of the Damned”, a jail to house those who dare to make the same mistake in the future. Over time, the Furies come under the influence of Ares, who persuades them to join his siege on Olympus. Believing their forces are too weak to challenge the Olympian gods directly, Alecto, the queen of the Furies, decides to bear a son with Ares, hoping to create a powerful warrior. This warrior, Orkos, however, proves to be a disappointment in Ares’ eyes and is disowned. Despite this, the Furies decide to use Orkos as their oath-keeper, binding him to their service and further solidifying their role as enforcers of divine law.

With Ares still searching for the warrior who will help him overthrow Olympus, Zeus learns of a prophecy foretelling his death at the hands of one of his sons—a "marked warrior." This prophecy eerily mirrors the one that doomed his own father. Alarmed by the prediction and aware of its potential to repeat history, Zeus tasks Ares with finding and eliminating this threat. Ares soon discovers one of Zeus’ sons: Deimos, a young Spartan who bears a distinct birthmark covering his body, and storms the city to capture him. During the raid, Deimos' older brother (and another son of Zeus’), a tough young Spartan named Kratos, bravely tries to defend him. However, Ares strikes Kratos down, leaving a scar over his right eye. As Ares prepares to kill Kratos for his defiance, his sister, Athena, the goddess of war and wisdom, intervenes and convinces him to spare the boy. Deimos is then handed over to Thanatos, the god of death, in an attempt to prevent the prophecy and protect Zeus. Haunted by his failure to save his brother, Kratos vows never to falter like that again. As a symbol of both remembrance and resolve, Kratos tattoos a replica of Deimos' birthmark onto his own body, serving as a constant reminder of his lost brother and his unyielding promise.

Over the years, Kratos rises through the ranks to become a prominent leader in the Spartan army. Despite his fierce reputation on the battlefield, however, he shows a softer side as he falls in love with and soon marries a Spartan woman named Lysandra. Together, they have a daughter, Calliope, who becomes the light of Kratos’ life. However, that light is nearly extinguished when Calliope contracts a devastating plague. The disease ravages her body, leaving her skin disfigured and she’s marked for death by the Spartan authorities. The harsh decree is that she will be thrown into a chasm and left to die—a fate that Kratos cannot accept. Desperate to save his daughter, Kratos embarks on a perilous journey to find a cure. His only hope is Ambrosia, a rare and mystical element said to possess extraordinary healing properties. What Kratos doesn’t know is that the gods have their own twisted game at play. They wager on a race, each choosing a hero to be the first to claim the Ambrosia. Ares, the God of War, sees potential in Kratos, likely because of their previous encounter where Kratos demonstrated his resilience and bravery. Ares chooses Kratos as his champion, setting him on a collision course with the other gods’ chosen heroes. Kratos faces many formidable foes in his quest, each backed by a god, but his most significant challenge comes when he encounters an army of Barbarians led by their fierce leader, Alrik. Alrik, driven by a similar desperation, seeks the Ambrosia to heal his own father. The two warriors clash in an epic battle that tests Kratos’ strength, skill, and will to survive. Despite the odds and the loss of many of his men, Kratos emerges victorious, claiming the Ambrosia as his prize. With the Ambrosia in hand, Kratos returns to Sparta and heals his beloved Calliope, saving her life.

His triumph does not go unnoticed, as upon his return, the King of Sparta honors Kratos with the title of Captain. As captain of the Spartan army, Kratos leads his men to countless victories, his thirst for power growing with each battle, despite the concerns of his wife, Lysandra. His ambition drives him to greater acts of brutality, and eventually, he faces a familiar foe: Alrik, the Barbarian king who still blames Kratos for the death of his father. In a fierce attack, Kratos and his men quickly find themselves overwhelmed by the Barbarian army. With death looming at the hands of Alrik, Kratos, in a moment of desperation, calls out to Ares, the God of War, pleading for help. Ares, still searching for a potential warrior to assist in overthrowing Olympus, sees Kratos as a prime candidate. Seizing the opportunity, Ares accepts Kratos's offer of loyalty and annihilates the Barbarians, saving Kratos. In return, Ares binds Kratos to his will by granting him the Blades of Chaos—fiery weapons forged in the underworld and chained to his forearms, symbolizing his eternal servitude to the God of War.

Under Ares’ command, Kratos becomes a ruthless instrument of destruction, slaying innocents, razing villages, and spreading chaos in the god's name. With each battle fought for Ares, Kratos loses more of his humanity, descending further into madness and bloodlust. His transformation into a ruthless warrior accelerates when Ares, driven by jealousy of his sister Athena—whom their father Zeus favors—orders Kratos to raid a village dedicated to her worship. Ignoring the warnings of an oracle who foretells of dark consequences, Kratos storms the village's temple, slaughtering everyone within. But as the dust settles, Kratos is horrified to discover that the bodies he has left in his wake belong to none other than his beloved wife, Lysandra, and his daughter, Calliope. Ares, revealing his cruel deception, had secretly placed them in the temple, intending to sever Kratos's last ties to humanity and mold him into the perfect warrior. Devastated and consumed by guilt, Kratos leaves the bodies of his family to burn within the temple. As he exits, the oracle curses him, binding the ashes of his wife and child to his skin as a constant reminder of his tragic mistake. This curse turns Kratos’s skin ghostly white, earning him the name "Ghost of Sparta," and marking the beginning of his unrelenting quest for vengeance against the gods, who he feels have betrayed him.

Kratos then sets out to break his bond with Ares, angering the god, who orders the Furies to hunt him down and force him back into servitude. As Kratos searches for a way to sever his bond with Ares, he arrives in the abandoned Kirra Village. There, he is suddenly transported into an illusion, finding himself back in his home in Sparta. This vision, as it turns out, is part of the Furies’ plan to weaken Kratos’ mind, but he is soon awakened by Orkos, the disowned son of Ares and Alecto, the queen of the Furies. Orkos, using Lysandra's necklace and ring, helps Kratos break free from the illusion. Though initially skeptical, Kratos follows Orkos' advice to seek out the Oracle Aletheia in the Delphi Mountains, where he hopes to find a way to break his oath. After reaching Delphi, Kratos encounters the mechanized remains of a massive slain serpent named Python that helps him navigate the treacherous terrain leading to the Oracle’s temple. Inside, he confronts Castor and Pollux, half-brothers whose bodies were combined so Pollux (a demigod) could share his immortality with Castor. The twins refuse to allow Kratos to see the captured Aletheia unless he offers a worthy tribute, angering the Spartan and leading to an epic battle in which he kills Castor and Pollux as the Temple of Delphi crumbles around them. After retrieving the Amulet of Uroborus from the dead brothers—a powerful artifact that can manipulate time—Kratos reaches the dying Oracle, whose eyes have been ripped out of her skull by the Furies, rendering her unable to use her prophetic powers. With her last breath, Aletheia reveals that Ares’ ultimate plan is to mold Kratos into a warrior capable of overthrowing Zeus, so that Ares can claim the throne of Olympus himself. She also tells Kratos that the only way to break his oath to Ares is to kill the Furies, the very beings who enforce that oath, and that the Eyes of Truth—a powerful relic located on the island of Delos—are the only way he’ll be able to avoid their visions so he can defeat them.

With this knowledge, Kratos sets out for Delos to search for the Eyes of Truth. Along the way, he encounters Orkos again, who reveals that he is the son of Ares and Alecto, and that the Eyes of Truth are actually the stolen eyes of Aletheia. Despite the dangers ahead, Kratos boards a ship and makes his way to Delos. There, Kratos explores the ruins of the colossal statue of the god Apollo, but he is soon distracted by the Furies' illusions once again, this time finding himself in the city of Sparta. However, he quickly sees through their deception and confronts the Furies directly. In the ensuing battle, Kratos manages to sever the Fury Megaera’s arm but is ambushed by her sister Tisiphone, who attacks him with her pet bird, Daimon. Just as Kratos is about to defeat Tisiphone, the queen of the Furies, Alecto, in her monstrous sea-serpent form, sinks the giant Apollo statue's lantern—which contains the Eyes of Truth—before returning to her human form to capture Kratos. While Alecto attempts to lure Kratos back to his oath with Ares with promises of godhood, he nonetheless refuses before Orkos arrives just in time to help him escape, teleporting him to a different part of the statue. Orkos gives Kratos the “Oath Stone”, a powerful relic that allows its bearer to create temporary clones of themselves. Using this and the Amulet of Uroborus, Kratos repairs the damaged Statue of Apollo and raises the sunken Lantern, finally reaching the Eyes of Truth. However, before Kratos can use the Eyes, the Furies ambush him once again, stealing the relic and imprisoning him in the Prison of the Damned within the petrified body of the Hecatonchires, Aegaeon. For the following two weeks, Kratos endures relentless torture, as the Furies try to break his will and force him back into Ares’ service. Despite their efforts, Kratos remains defiant, swearing never to serve Ares again. When arrives one day to continue his torture, Kratos seizes an opportunity to break free before pursuing her through the prison. During his escape, Kratos is once again subjected to the Furies’ illusions, this time finding himself in a brothel where three women attempt to seduce him. Recognizing the deception, Kratos attacks Megaera and eventually defeats her after a brutal battle, reclaiming the Amulet of Uroborus.

With Megaera dead, I don’t have to try to pronounce her name anymore, and Kratos continues his quest to defeat the remaining Furies, Tisiphone and Alecto. As Kratos confronts the sisters, they subject him to more illusions, including visions of his past in Sparta and a reunion with his wife and daughter. Although the vision of Lysandra nearly deceives him, Kratos sees through the trickery and refuses Alecto’s offer to live in a false reality with his family. Furious at his defiance, Alecto and Tisiphone unleash their full power, creating a massive whirlpool illusion and transforming into monstrous forms. In one final battle, Kratos uses the Eyes of Truth to dispel the Furies’ illusions, subduing Tisiphone’s pet Daimon and forcing Alecto back into her human form. Tisiphone, in a desperate attempt to sway Kratos, transforms into Lysandra, but Kratos, undeterred, realizes the truth and strangles her. In her final moments, Tisiphone poses as the Oracle from Athena’s village and taunts Kratos, causing him to snap her neck to finally kill the second Fury. Kratos then turns his sights on Alecto, stabbing her through the chest with his Blades of Chaos, ending her life and destroying the last of the Furies.

With the Furies defeated, Kratos returns to his home in Sparta, where he is met by Orkos. Orkos reveals that the Furies, before their demise, transferred Kratos’ oath to him, meaning that the bond with Ares is still intact. Orkos, unwilling to continue living as an oath-keeper, begs Kratos to grant him an honorable death. Though reluctant, Kratos ultimately complies, killing Orkos and finally severing his bond with Ares. As Orkos dies, the memories of Kratos’ past—his killing of his wife and child—come flooding back, tormenting him once more. Now free from the Furies but burdened by his past, Kratos burns his home with Orkos' body inside, before leaving Sparta and embarking on a new journey to atone for his sins and seek redemption.

Tormented by memories of his family's death and bound to the gods, Kratos continues to serve Olympus as their most loyal warrior, clinging to the hope that fulfilling their demands might one day free him from his nightmares. One day, the gods task him with a new mission—to defend the city of Attica from an invading Persian army. As the city burns, Kratos fights his way through the chaos, slaying Persian soldiers as well as their leader, the Persian King. With the king defeated, Kratos then faces and conquers the Basilisk, a massive creature sent by the Persians to lay waste to Attica. However, Kratos' mission is far from over. As he vanquishes the Persian forces, the sun suddenly disappears from the sky, plunging the world into darkness. With the light fading, Kratos is drawn to the Temple of Helios, the last remaining beacon in the blackened world. Upon arrival, Kratos is greeted by Athena, who explains that Helios, the god of the Sun, has mysteriously vanished. This disappearance has allowed Morpheus, the god of dreams, to shroud the world in a dark fog, putting the gods into a deep slumber and seizing control of Greece. Athena urges Kratos to find and rescue Helios, as only his return can dispel the darkness and awaken the gods.

Inside the temple, Kratos encounters Eos, the goddess of dawn and sister of Helios. Deeply concerned for her brother, Eos tasks Kratos with awakening Helios’s Fire Steeds, powerful creatures capable of leading him to Helios’s location. In return, Eos promises to help relieve Kratos of the haunting nightmares that plague him, nightmares that manifest as the melody his daughter Calliope once played on her flute. Kratos successfully awakens the Fire Steeds, which transport him to their masters’ location: the Underworld. Upon reaching the River Styx, Kratos meets Charon, the ferryman of the dead. Charon, sensing that it is not yet Kratos’s time, denies him passage. Undeterred, Kratos engages Charon in combat, but is overpowered and cast into Tartarus, the deepest abyss of the Underworld where the Titans were imprisoned by Zeus after the Great War. In Tartarus, Kratos regains consciousness and discovers that Atlas, the Titan who was once chained here, has broken free. Determined to continue his mission, Kratos fights his way out of Tartarus, eventually confronting and ultimately killing Charon in a second battle. With the ferryman defeated, Kratos commandeers Charon’s ferry to follow Helios’s light down the River Styx, arriving at a mysterious temple. Inside the temple, Kratos is shocked to see his daughter Calliope, playing her flute. Kratos rushes towards her, following her deeper into the temple, only to be confronted by Persephone, Wife of the god Hades and the Queen of the Underworld. Persephone reveals to Kratos that Calliope resides in the Elysium Fields: a paradise for pure souls. She offers Kratos a chance to be with his daughter again, but at a great cost: he must renounce all the powers and weapons given to him by the gods. Desperate to see his daughter, Kratos agrees, transferring his powers into the Forsaken Tree and regaining his humanity. Reunited with Calliope in the Elysium Fields, Kratos feels a fleeting sense of peace. However, this reunion is quickly shattered when Persephone arrives to reveal her true intentions. She confesses that she was the one who freed Atlas, enlisting him to destroy the Pillar of the World—the structure that upholds the world as well as Olympus with it. Persephone’s goal is to bring about the end of the world; the only way to free herself from her prison as Hades’ wife. Faced with the destruction of the world, Kratos is forced to make a heartbreaking decision. He painfully abandons Calliope once more, reclaiming his powers and transforming back into the Ghost of Sparta. Against his daughter’s pleas, Kratos sets off to stop Persephone and save the world. Kratos tracks Persephone to the base of the Pillar of the World, where the pair engage in battle, during which Persephone commands Atlas to intervene. While they fight, Kratos chains Atlas to the ceiling of the Underworld, forcing him to hold up the world, before returning to confront Persephone. Despite her immense power, Kratos overpowers her and finally delivers a mortal blow. In her final breath, Persephone tells the Spartan that his suffering will never end, before her body releases a massive explosion that destroys the Pillar of the World, leaving Atlas as the sole force holding the earth in place. In the wake of the battle, Atlas simply leaves Kratos with a warning that perhaps the gods of Olympus aren’t the allies he believes they are. Kratos accepts his servitude to them regardless, knowing that it’s his only path that may free him from his nightmares. Before they part, Atlas states that the fates have dictated that they’ll meet again, and one day Kratos will regret his actions. Weakened and burdened by the knowledge that his sins will forever prevent him from seeing his daughter again, Kratos returns Helios to the sky, restoring light to the world. Exhausted, Kratos falls from the Sun Chariot but thanks to Helios, he lands safely on a cliff overlooking the Aegean Sea, where his equipment is stripped from him as he lays passed out, awaiting his next task.

Some time after waking from his previous ordeals, Kratos is sent by the gods to kill a Hydra that has been terrorizing sailors in the Aegean Sea. The Hydra, with its many heads and regenerative abilities, proves to be a tough challenge, but Kratos slays each head. The battle ends with Kratos impaling the Hydra’s largest head on the mast of a ship, restoring peace to the waters. This victory, like all of his others, however, turns out to be fleeting, as Kratos’ haunting nightmares overshadow any possible joy inside of him. One day, Athena appears before Kratos once again, this time with a chance for redemption. She tells him that Ares has begun waging war on her city of Athens, and that Zeus, as king of the gods, has forbidden any direct interference from the Olympians. However, Athena offers Kratos a deal: if he can defeat the God of War, the gods will finally forgive his past, ridding him of his nightmares. Kratos accepts this task before setting out on his journey to save Athens and, perhaps, himself.

Kratos reaches Athens, and fights his way through the war-torn streets, battling Ares’ monstrous minions before meeting a strange Gravedigger who refers to him as “my son” while digging a grave for him. After Kratos saves the city’s Oracle, she informs him that the only way to kill a god is to wield a weapon of immense power: Pandora’s Box, a mythical artifact hidden deep within Pandora's Temple, a massive structure chained to the back of the Titan Cronos, now cursed to wander the Desert of Lost Souls. Kratos embarks on a treacherous journey to find the temple, avoiding the Sirens’ song while navigating through the dangerous Desert of Lost Souls. Eventually, he finds Cronos and climbs onto the Titan’s back before entering the temple. Inside, Kratos faces deadly trials and puzzles, each more dangerous than the last. One of these trials, as it turns out, includes sacrificing a living captive. Kratos finds a man inside of a cage, and pushes him into the Chamber of Sacrifice, where the cage is then placed between two burners. Kratos ruthlessly pulls a level, activating the burners, killing the sacrifice, and allowing him to continue. Finally, after much hardship, Kratos reaches Pandora’s Box. As Kratos prepares to claim the box, however, Ares senses the danger and hurls a column like a massive spear from Athens, impaling Kratos and killing him instantly. Ares’ minions then carry Pandora’s Box away, thinking that their master’s victory is assured. Unfortunately for them, however, Kratos is literally too angry to die. His soul descends into the Underworld, but he fights his way back to the land of the living, escaping the clutches of Hades’s realm through the grave dug for him by the mysterious Gravedigger. Resurrected and driven by vengeance, Kratos returns to Athens, determined to retrieve Pandora’s Box and bring an end to the God of War’s reign.

Kratos catches up to Ares and frees Pandora’s Box from the god’s clutches, opening it to unleash its immense power. Empowered by the box, Kratos grows to a godly size, becoming a match for Ares in combat. In a titanic battle that shakes the very foundations of Athens, Kratos fights the god who betrayed him one-on-one. The fight is brutal and intense, with Ares using every trick at his disposal to break Kratos’ spirit, even forcing him to relive the horrible acts he once tricked the Spartan into committing against his own family. Kratos resists Ares's illusion, however, forcing the god to tear the Blades of Chaos from Kratos's arms and murder the illusion of his family before him. Freed from the vision, Kratos spots a massive sword used as an ornamental bridge and seizes it. After one more climatic battle, Kratos uses this “Blade of the Gods” to finally kill the God of War, ending Ares's reign of terror.

With Ares dead, Athens is saved, and Kratos has fulfilled his part of the bargain. When Kratos turns to Athena, she forgives his sins but explains that no man, nor god, could ever forget the heinous acts he’s committed. She claims that while Kratos has served them well, they cannot erase the nightmares that continue to torment him. Devastated by their betrayal, and seeing no other solution, Kratos climbs to the highest peak in Athens and, overwhelmed by despair, throws himself into the sea, hoping to end his suffering once and for all. The gods have other plans for Kratos, however, and Athena saves him, offering him a new purpose. With Ares’ death, the throne of the God of War is left vacant, and the gods decide to bestow this title upon Kratos. Though the nightmares of his past still haunt him, Kratos ascends to Olympus, becoming the new God of War.

Now seated among the gods, Kratos is more powerful than ever, but his heart remains burdened by the darkness of his past. Still tormented by his memories, Kratos is haunted by the persistent vision of his mother, Callisto, and he decides to seek her out (against Athena’s wishes). His search leads him to the city of Atlantis, where his mother has been imprisoned. Upon reaching Atlantis, Kratos fights through waves of the god Poseidon’s defenses and eventually finds Callisto, laying dying on the ground. Callisto tells her son that his father brought her there, but before he can ask about him Callisto further states that his brother, Deimos, is still alive, but in danger. Deimos, who was taken by Ares when they were both children, had actually been imprisoned by the gods, and Callisto urges Kratos to find and rescue him. Kratos asks who his father is, but before she can say any more, Callisto is overcome by a curse that transforms her into a monstrous creature. Forced to defend himself, Kratos reluctantly brings an end to his mother, but in her dying words she tells Kratos to return to Sparta to find Deimos. On his way out of the city, Kratos encounters the Titan Thera, imprisoned deep within the volcanic heart of Atlantis. Seeing an opportunity to wreak havoc on the gods who have wronged him, Kratos frees Thera, unleashing a destructive force that causes the city to be consumed by a devastating flood as Kratos escapes. Leaving the sinking ruins of Atlantis behind, Kratos begins his journey back to Sparta. Along the way, he is met by the mysterious Gravedigger once again, who warns him that the destruction of Posdeidon’s kingdom will not be taken well by Olympus. He then states that Kratos will never find his brother, advising him to stay away from the Domain of Death. Shortly after, Kratos is confronted by Erinys, the daughter of Thanatos, the God of Death. Erinys seeks to stop Kraos, but after a brutal battle, he is able to defeat her in battle before slaying her. Finally reaching Sparta, Kratos is welcomed as a hero by the people who once served under him as their army’s leader. His search leads him to the Temple of Ares, where he is confronted by a vision of his younger self—a spirit-like reminder of the boy he once was, filled with anger and reckless ambition. The vision reveals that the key to finding Deimos lies back in Atlantis, within the fabled Domain of Death, from which no mortal has ever returned. On his way out, a young Spartan soldier returns Kratos his arms from when he was the commander of the Spartan army. Kratos makes his way back to the now sunken Atlantis, navigating through the ruins of the city when Poseidon himself inhabits a massive statue to confront Kratos. The god of the sea warns Kratos that his actions have consequences, and that he will pay for the destruction of Atlantis. Kratos defies the god once again, however, ignoring the statue’s warning and continuing on his path. Pressing on, Kratos finally discovers the Gateway to the Domain of Death. After he passes through to the other side, Kratos at last finds his long lost brother Deimos, shackled and broken after years of torment. However, a frenzied Deimos blames Kratos for abandoning him all those years ago, leading to a fight between the two. This pleasant family reunion is cut short as Thanatos arrives, seizing Deimos and dragging him to the very cliff where Kratos once tried to end his own story. Desperate to save his brother, Kratos pursues them and is able to rescue Deimos. The brothers, now reconciled, face Thanatos together in a grand battle. Even their combined strength is not enough to prevent the inevitable, however, as Thanatos strikes down Deimos, leaving Kratos to helplessly watch his brother die before him. In a final, furious confrontation, Kratos slays Thanatos, the God of Death, ending the battle and avenging his fallen brother. Kratos then proceeds to carry Deimos’ body to the peak of the mountain, where the Gravedigger has prepared a grave for him. As Kratos lays his brother to rest, he reflects on what he has become, and the Gravedigger tells him: death, the destroyer of worlds. Athena then appears before Kratos, and knowing that he’s now free of all of the ties that made him mortal, she offers him the chance to fully ascend to godhood. Kratos quickly rejects her, declaring that the gods will pay for the suffering they have caused him and his family. As he walks away, Athena, with a tone of ominous reverence, quietly asks forgiveness from her “brother,” indicating her awareness that they share the same father. The Gravedigger, now alone, then buries Callisto next to Deimos before standing beside a third, ominously empty grave. With a sense of finality, he declares that "now, only one remains," as Kratos returns to his throne, plotting his next move against the gods.

After returning to his throne as the new God of War, Kratos continues his relentless campaigns across Greece, leading the Spartan army to conquer all who stand in their way. As Kratos leads his army on yet another campaign, he is attacked by several creatures led by the giant Argos. Argos is then slain by a mysterious assassin, who frames Kratos for the murder in order to turn Olympus against him. Determined to find the culprit and clear his name, Kratos sets out to track down the assassin. His search leads him through a series of battles across the Greek countryside, where he faces fierce opposition from enemies sent by Hades. Along the way, Kratos is stopped by Ceryx, the son of the god Hermes, Olympus’s messenger. Ceryx brings Kratos a message from Zeus: to stop his warmongering and destruction lest he face the wrath of the gods. However, Kratos, driven by his rage and distrust of the gods who have betrayed him in the past, refuses to back down. A fierce battle ensues between Kratos and Ceryx, and despite Ceryx's divine powers and his desperate attempts to reason with Kratos, he is ultimately no match for the Ghost of Sparta. Kratos kills Ceryx, further enraging the gods and deepening the rift between them. This distraction, additionally allows the mysterious assassin to escape, his identity remaining unknown.

Kratos’s warpath eventually leads him to the city of Rhodes, where he decides to personally lead his Spartan army into battle, once again against Athena’s pleas. As Kratos tears through the city, an eagle (which Kratos believes to be Athena in disguise) intervenes, secretly sapping his divine powers and transferring them into the Colossus of Rhodes, an enormous statue that suddenly springs to life and attacks Kratos. During the battle, Zeus calls from the skies and offers Kratos the Blade of Olympus, the very weapon that Zeus himself used to end the Great War between the Titans and the gods. Following Zeus’ instructions, Kratos channels his godhood into the blade, making him mortal but giving him the power to destroy the Colossus from within. However, after defeating the Colossus, Kratos is crushed by the statue’s hand as it falls on him, causing him to drop the Blade of Olympus. Kratos limps toward the Blade, but the eagle arrives again and reveals himself to actually be Zeus. Accusing Kratos of being too dangerous and uncontrollable, Zeus betrays him, stabbing him with the Blade of Olympus. As Kratos lies dying, Zeus offers him a final chance to serve the gods again, but Kratos, ever defiant, refuses. In response, Zeus kills Kratos, and his broken body is cast into the Underworld of Hades’ domain.

But Kratos' story does not end here. As his soul descends into the depths of Hades, he is saved by the Titan Gaia. Gaia reveals that the Titans, who were defeated and cast aside by the Olympian gods long ago, have been waiting for their chance to return and take revenge on Zeus, offering Kratos his own chance at vengeance by joining them. With Gaia’s assistance, Kratos escapes the Underworld and begins his journey to seek out the Sisters of Fate, the Moirai, who control the threads of destiny. Kratos plans to force them to change his fate, allowing him to go back in time and prevent his betrayal by Zeus. Gaia then sends forth the legendary flying Pegasus to assist Kratos in traversing the vast distance to the Sisters. Kratos and Pegasus, after a detour to a mountain housing the Titan Typhon and the chained Titan Prometheus, who gives his life to grant Kratos the power of the Rage of the Titans, fly towards the Island of Creation, home of the Sisters of Fate. However, they are attacked by Griffins and Ravens, led by the island’s guardian: the Dark Rider. The Dark Rider causes Pegasus to plummet to its death, but Kratos quickly returns the favor by killing the Dark Rider and riding the Dark Griffin to the island below.

On the island, Kratos encounters a host of challenges, including a reunion with Alrik, the Barbarian King. Alrik, who Kratos had previously defeated in battle, fought his way through the Underworld to escape back to the land of the living, his appearance now twisted by the fires of Hades. The two warriors clash in the Bog of the Forgotten, where Alrik drags Kratos into a poisonous swamp, intent on settling their old score. The Barbarian King, now imbued with dark magic, grows to an enormous size, but Kratos ultimately overpowers him, seizing Alrik’s mighty hammer and using it to crush his skull, killing his foe once again. As Kratos advances, he encounters increasingly formidable adversaries, including his cousin Theseus, whom he kills to obtain the Horse Keeper’s Key, which controls the Steeds of Time. He also encounters Perseus, his half-brother, whom he defeats to obtain a reflective shield, as well as the Gorgon Queen Euryale, from whom he takes her head to petrify enemies. After coming across Icarus, whom he strips of his wings, Kratos plummets below the Earth and comes face-to-face with Atlas, the Titan he imprisoned years ago. Initially, Atlas holds a grudge against Kratos for his role in his imprisonment, but Kratos manages to convince the Titan that they share a common enemy in Zeus. Atlas, intrigued by Kratos’ goal to kill Zeus, agrees to help him before explaining the creation of the Blade of Olympus and its significance in the Great War between the Titans and the gods. He grants Kratos the power of the Atlas Quake and helps him return to the surface, where Kratos continues his quest. He then reawakens the Phoenix before finding the last remaining Spartan, the same one who returned his arms to him years ago. The Last Spartan informs Kratos that Zeus destroyed the city of Sparta in his absence, angering the former God of War even further. Kratos then kills the Kraken, assisted by Gaia again, who appears to him in a vision as his late wife Lyssandra and grants him the Rage of the Titans.

Kratos eventually arrives at the Temple of the Fates and reaches the Throne Room of Lahkesis, where he confronts the Sister of Fate. She simply tells Kratos that nobody can change their destiny, and his doesn’t include killing Zeus. Kratos refuses to let anyone but himself decide his fate, triggering a battle between himself and Lahkesis. During the fight, Lahkesis’ sister Atropos joins in, transporting Kratos to a memory of his battle against Ares. Ultimately, Kratos traps them both on the other side of a mirror before smashing it, leaving their fates unknown. Kratos then reaches the Loom Chamber and confronts Clotho, the weaver of the threads of fate, and after a fierce struggle, kills her by impaling her skull with a giant pendulum blade. With the Sisters defeated, Kratos seizes control of the Loom, allowing him to rewrite his destiny. Kratos uses the Loom to return to the moment of his betrayal by Zeus in Rhodes. Now armed with the Blade of Olympus, he confronts Zeus once again. The two engage in a fierce battle, but just as Kratos is about to kill Zeus, Athena intervenes, jumping between the two of them; as Kratos lunges with the Blade of Olympus for a final strike, Athena sacrifices herself to save her father. Before she dies, Athena reveals to Kratos that Zeus is actually his father, and that Zeus’ actions were an attempt to break the cycle of patricide that has plagued his lineage. Athena begs Kratos to relent, but Kratos, consumed by rage and his desire for vengeance, vows to destroy Olympus and all who stand in his way of killing Zeus. Gaia then reminds Kratos that he now has the power to control time. Instead of simply returning back to the beginning of his fight with Zeus, Kratos uses the Loom to travel all the way back to the Great War between the Titans and the gods. There, he calls upon the Titans of the past, rescuing them just before the Blade of Olympus defeats them, bringing them into Kratos’s time to wage war against the Olympian gods. As the Titans climb Mount Olympus, Kratos leads them, declaring to Zeus that “[his] son has returned, [bringing] the destruction of Olympus.”

As Kratos scales Mount Olympus alongside the Titans, the gods prepare to defend their realm. Poseidon, the god of the sea, is the first to confront Kratos, and a titanic battle ensues, with Poseidon unleashing his full power to stop the vengeful Spartan. However, Kratos defeats Poseidon, brutally slaying the god and unleashing a massive flood that engulfs the world below. With Poseidon dead, Kratos and Gaia continue their ascent, eventually reaching the peak of Mount Olympus where they confront Zeus. Anticipating their arrival, Zeus strikes them with a powerful blast of lightning, damaging Gaia and knocking both her and Kratos off the mountain. As they cling to the cliffs, Gaia betrays Kratos, dismissing him as nothing more than a pawn in the Titans’ quest for power. Betrayed once again, Kratos falls into the Underworld. Weakened but resolute, Kratos navigates the River Styx in the Underworld, driven by his thirst for revenge. He then encounters Athena, who, despite her death, now speaks to him from a higher plane of existence. Athena reveals that to defeat Zeus, Kratos must extinguish the source of his power: the Flame of Olympus. Kratos begins his trek through the Underworld, encountering the demigod Peirithous, who is chained and suffering in a prison of tinder. Peirithous begs for release in exchange for his bow, but instead, Kratos burns him alive with a fire-breathing Cerberus to take the bow for himself. Kratos then encounters Hephaestus, the god of fire and forge, who has been imprisoned in the Underworld by Zeus. Hephaestus is bitter and weary, having been cast out of Olympus and forced to toil in his forge. Hephaestus is initially surprised to see Kratos alive, as he assumed that Zeus would have killed him by now. Despite their shared animosity towards Zeus, Hephaestus remains wary of Kratos, knowing the destruction that follows him. When Kratos inquires about the Flame of Olympus, Hephaestus warns him of its deadly nature, stating that neither god nor mortal can touch it without being consumed by its fire. Kratos continues his journey and confronts the three judges of the dead: King Aeacus, King Rhadamanthus, and King Minos. These judges evaluate the souls that pass through the Underworld. Although the first two judges find him undeserving, the final decision by King Minos allows Kratos to continue his journey, acknowledging that his destiny lies beyond the doors they guard. Kratos eventually finds himself before Hades, the god of the Underworld, who taunts Kratos about the many sins he has committed, including the murder of Hades’ brother Poseidon and his niece Athena. Hades then attacks Kratos, leading to a brutal battle. Despite Hades’ boasts that Kratos will never defeat him, Kratos manages to overpower the god, ripping out Hades’ soul with the god’s own weapons—the Claws of Hades. With Hades defeated, the balance of life and death is disrupted, and souls begin to escape the Underworld. After the battle, Kratos returns to Hephaestus, who reacts with surprise and disbelief at Hades’ death. Hephaestus explains that only the soul of a god can operate the Hyperion Gate, a portal to the world above. Hephaestus then explains that the Flame of Olympus was used to forge Pandora’s Box, which contains the evils of the Great War. Hephaestus reveals that he created a key to unlock the box—his daughter, Pandora, who was made from the essence of the Flame itself. However, Zeus, fearing the power of the box, took Pandora away from Hephaestus and imprisoned her. Despite his anger, Hephaestus agrees to help Kratos by providing him with information on how to find Pandora, but he does so reluctantly, knowing that Kratos is determined to destroy Zeus at any cost. Kratos opens the Hyperion Gate using Hades’ soul to return to the surface, where he sees Helios, the god of the sun, flying across the sky in his fiery chariot. Kratos soon encounters Gaia, who is gravely injured after her fall from Olympus. Gaia pleads for Kratos’ help, but he coldly dismisses her, declaring that it’s now his war; not hers. He cuts her loose, letting her fall to her apparent doom. Moving forward, Kratos discovers a wounded Helios, who tries to deceive him by claiming that the Flame of Olympus will kill him if he tries to use it. Kratos, not fooled by the god’s lies, tears off Helios’s head with his bare hands, extinguishing the sun and plunging the world into darkness. Kratos then uses Helios’s head as a source of light to illuminate his path. (Remember this for later)

Kratos continues his journey, encountering Hermes, the messenger of the gods. Hermes mocks Kratos for his past deeds, taunting him about his murderous rampage. Hermes is fast, but Kratos is ever relentless in his pursuit. During the chase, Kratos finds Pandora’s Box, shrouded in the Flame, and the Spirit of Athena states that it still holds the power to slay a god as long as Pandora can free it. The chase ultimately leads to a final confrontation where Kratos, with brute force out matching sheer speed, cuts off Hermes’ legs and takes his winged sandals. With Hermes’ death, a plague releases from his body and spreads across the world. Kratos then meets Zeus’s wife (and Ares’s mother), Hera, before she calls forth his half-brother Hercules. Hercules challenges Kratos to a fight, seeing this as his chance to claim the title of God of War for himself. The two engage in a fierce battle, where Kratos ultimately overpowers Hercules, smashing his brother’s skull with his own Nemean Cestus, a pair of gauntlets with immense power. After defeating Hercules, Kratos soon finds himself in Aphrodite’s chambers. Aphrodite, the goddess of love (and Hephestus’ wife), seduces Kratos, leading to an intimate encounter. (Don’t make the same mistake as Ludwig and look that up on stream) Afterward, Aphrodite opens a pathway back to her husband’s forge. Kratos returns to Hephaestus, who tells him that to retrieve Pandora, he must navigate the “Labyrinth”, a massive and complex structure built by the mortal architect Daedalus. Hephaestus reveals that he holds Kratos responsible for his daughter’s capture by Zeus. When Kratos opened Pandora’s Box to kill Ares, Zeus took Pandora away from Hephaestus, imprisoning her within the Labyrinth to prevent anyone from accessing the box again. Hephaestus, tormented by the loss of his daughter, was banished to the Underworld, where he has remained ever since, desperately trying to recreate Pandora without success. Despite his bitterness, Hephaestus decides to help Kratos, recognizing that Kratos’ determination might be the only way to free Pandora and ultimately end Zeus’s reign. Hephaestus tells Kratos that to forge a weapon powerful enough to aid in his quest, they will need the Omphalos Stone, a mythical object of immense power, which lies deep within Tartarus, the prison of the Titans. Kratos descends into Tartarus where he encounters the Titan Cronos, once again, who immediately recognizes Kratos as the one who took Pandora’s Box from his temple, an act that indirectly led to Cronos’ imprisonment in the realm. Kratos then climbs his way up the massive Titan, using his strength and cunning to overcome the formidable challenges posed by Cronos’ enormous size. After an intense struggle, Kratos ultimately kills Cronos by driving the Blade of Olympus into the Titan’s skull, securing the Omphalos Stone in the process. With the stone in hand, Kratos returns to Hephaestus, who begins forging the new weapon—a powerful item that Hephaestus promises will give Kratos the means to defeat Zeus. However, Hephaestus, driven by his desperation to protect Pandora, betrays Kratos, attempting to kill him with the newly forged weapon. Kratos, however, proves too strong and overpowers the god, killing him with his own anvil. As Hephaestus lies dying, he expresses regret, not for his betrayal, but for failing to save his daughter. Kratos takes the newly forged Nemesis Whip, a weapon imbued with the power of the Omphalos Stone, and continues his journey. He eventually reaches Hera’s Garden, a lush, yet deceptive area filled

With puzzles and illusions crafted by the queen of the gods herself. As Kratos enters Hera’s Garden, he is confronted by the goddess herself. A drunken Hera proceeds to taunt Kratos about his quest, mocking him for the destruction he has caused and the gods he has slain, blaming him for the unraveling of Olympus. The garden itself is a maze of illusions designed to confuse and mislead intruders.

Kratos navigates his way through, and at the heart of the garden, Hera attempts one final act of defiance. She summons more illusions to hinder Kratos, but when it becomes clear that he cannot be stopped, she confronts him directly. In a fit of desperation, Hera insults Kratos, but he remains unmoved by her words. When she attempts to get to him by insulting Pandora, however, Kratos grabs Hera by the throat and snaps her neck, silencing his step-mother forever.

As Hera’s lifeless body falls to the ground, the garden begins to wither and die. The lush greenery turns to ash, the once-vibrant flowers wilt, and the entire area becomes a barren wasteland. Hera’s death signifies the end of fertility and growth in the world, plunging it further into darkness and decay. With Hera dead, Kratos continues through the now desolate garden, moving closer to his ultimate goal.

As Kratos enters the Labyrinth, he encounters Daedalus, who is trapped in the machinery of his own creation. Daedalus reveals that he built the Labyrinth under orders from Zeus, who promised to reunite him with his son, Icarus. Kratos coldly reveals that Icarus is, in fact, dead, before activating a trap and killing the architect.

Kratos continues through the Labyrinth, solving puzzles and defeating enemies, until he finally finds Pandora. Pandora, a young girl with a strong will, insists on helping Kratos extinguish the Flame, despite his initial reluctance. Kratos, seeing Pandora as a reflection of his lost daughter Calliope, becomes protective of her, and together, they make their way towards the Flame of Olympus. On their way, Pandora stresses to Kratos the power of hope, which has replaced the fear in her heart.

Kratos is then forced to break the Chains of Balance held by the three judges of the dead, which raises the Labyrinth, along with Pandora, up to the box. However, Kratos refuses to let Pandora sacrifice her life to extinguish the flame, as he does not want to cause her death as he did his own daughter’s. She chooses to embrace her fate however, and breaks free, only to be stopped by an arriving Zeus.

A battle between father and son then ensues, and after a fierce fight Pandora again attempts to sacrifice herself to extinguish the Flame and allow Kratos to retrieve Pandora’s Box. Kratos rushes over and grabs her, torn between his desire for revenge and his protective instincts toward Pandora. Pandora pleads with Kratos to let her seal her fate, and Zeus provokes him by goading him not to fail Pandora like he did his own family. Kratos summons all of his will and reluctantly lets her go, tackling Zeus as the Flame of Olympus is extinguished and they’re both knocked out in the blast following Pandora’s sacrifice.

When Kratos comes to, he finally opens Pandora’s Box, shockingly finding it to be completely empty. Enraged and confused, he battles Zeus in a final, epic confrontation. Their battle is soon interrupted, however, as a surviving Gaia arrives to defeat them both. The two then enter a wound in Gaia’s chest, and fight beside her heart, draining the very life essence out of it. Kratos, now empowered by the heart of Gaia, then impales Zeus into it with the Blade of Olympus, finally killing both Gaia, as well as his father, Zeus in one swift blow.

However, Zeus’s spirit, filled with hatred and malice, refuses to be defeated. His spirit rises from his lifeless body and launches a final, desperate assault on Kratos, attacking him mentally and emotionally. Zeus’s spirit invades Kratos, and he finds himself trapped in a surreal, nightmarish landscape within his own mind, where he is forced to relive his most painful memories. He is tormented by visions of his dead wife, Lysandra, and daughter, Calliope, reliving their murder while he was under the influence of Ares. In this dreamlike state, Kratos is also confronted by a vision of Pandora, who urges Kratos that in order for his sins to be forgiven, he must first find the power to forgive himself and to let go of his rage.

Kratos returns to the physical world and forces Zeus’ spirit back into his fallen body. Kratos then charges him and beats him to death with his bare hands, finally killing the king of the gods for good and bringing an end to the reign of Olympus.

In the wake of Olympus’s destruction, the spirit of Athena appears once again, congratulating Kratos on his success. She then reveals that the true power within Pandora’s Box was not the evils it contained, but instead the power of Hope. Athena explains that Kratos unknowingly absorbed this power when he opened the box to defeat Ares, while the Evils were actually unknowingly absorbed by the gods. It was this power, even buried beneath his pains (NOT PANTS), that allowed him to defeat the gods. By forgiving himself, however, Kratos unleashed the power of hope within him.

Athena demands that Kratos return the power of Hope to her so that she can rebuild the world in her image. However, Kratos, now realizing the true nature of the power he possesses, refuses. He understands that the power of Hope is not something to be controlled or wielded by a god, but something that belongs to humanity. In a final act of defiance and redemption, Kratos decides to release the power of Hope into the world. He raises the Blade of Olympus and, instead of striking down Athena, he plunges the blade into his own chest. This self-inflicted wound releases the power of Hope from him, sending it out into the world where it can be embraced by mankind.

Athena is shocked and angered by Kratos’ decision, expressing her disappointment in the man she once made a god. Kratos simply responds to her with one final scoff before she removes the blade, and walks off leaving him to die. Kratos then simply lays in a pool of his own blood as it seeps into a mural of an Eagle etched into the ruins that were once Mount Olympus. Sometime later, we see the mural where Kratos’ body once was now abandoned, with nothing but the Blade of Olympus lying next to a trail of blood, leading to the great sea that now envelops the world. This world, now devoid of the gods, faces an uncertain future, but through the power of Hope, there is a chance for humanity to rebuild and forge a new path, free from the influence of the Olympians.

Sometime after bringing an end to the reign of the Gods of Olympus, Kratos awakens to find himself denied of the comforts of death, and instead cursed to walk the Earth as punishment for his deeds. Soon, the Blades of Chaos return to him, and he attempts to throw them into the sea, only to find them mysteriously returned to him after he sleeps. Hoping to escape from his past to at least find some kind of solitude in his eternal punishment, Kratos sets sail to new lands, again attempting to rid himself of the Blades. When Kratos reaches shore, he passes out, and when he awakens, he finds the Blades waiting for him once again. He discards them once again before coming across a village, where he is met by the inhabitants with fear. He soon learns from an old man that his legend as the Ghost of Sparta and the God of War is known in this “Land of the Pharaohs”. The man warns Kratos that he cannot escape his destiny, but Kratos simply knocks him aside and walks off.

Kratos continues walking, sleeplessly, to avoid the Blade’s return. As days turn into months, Kratos eventually succumbs to his slumber, and awakens to again find the Blades of Chaos before him. Refusing to allow his past to keep up with him, Kratos again leaves the Blades behind and continues his trek, being taunted by various animals along the way who warn him of his destiny that lies ahead. Again, Kratos is overcome by exhaustion and passes out, finding Athena waiting for him in his dreams. The goddess tells Kratos that the two of them are not yet through with each other, and instructs him to return to his home and “fulfill [his] purpose”. Kratos then awakens, unsurprised to find the Blades of Chaos returned to him once again.

However, Kratos is surprised to find the old man from the village now before him, who instructs him to pick up the Blades to prepare for battle, as “the hour [he] will be needed is fast approaching”. Kratos defiantly throws the Blades aside again and continues walking, eventually reaching… the same village he left months ago. While Kratos is confused at how he circled back to the village, he is soon distracted by the villagers, who are again fearful, but not of him this time. Instead, they beg for his help in fighting the giant “Chaos Beast”, which soon attacks the village. The villagers, and the mysteriously present old man, surmise that their prayers to the Gods summoned Kratos. Angered at the thought of the Gods controlling him once again, Kratos refuses to help. The villagers run to escape the beast, and Kratos turns to find that the old man has vanished, as the creature advances towards him. Kratos gives in and fights the Chaos Beast, defeating it with his bare hands. Afterwards, the villagers return, but tremble in fear once again, running off while screaming of a “monster”. Kratos, confused as the Chaos Beast is dead, turns to see the old man once again, who claims that the threat has not yet been defeated. He turns, and a much larger Chaos Beast emerges from the sea. The villagers beg Kratos to help them once again, but wanting to be left alone, he again simply walks away. The beast follows him, and an annoyed Kratos gives in, lunging at the monster to attack. The giant creature simply shrugs him off, sending Kratos crashing to the ground below, where the impact knocks him unconscious.

In his dreams, Kratos finds Athena once again, this time accompanied by Thoth, the Egyption God of Wisdom, and the two tell Kratos that he must fulfill his purpose as it was written, instructing him to finally take the Blades of Chaos, Kratos tries to deny his fate, but Thoth, revealing himself to be the old man as well as the talking animals, simply tells the former God of War that much like in his homelands, in the Land of the Pharaohs, his destiny is already written and cannot be avoided. Kratos reluctantly succumbs to their reasoning and picks up the Blades, awakening back in his battle, which he continues, finally emerging victorious and slaying the Chaos Beast. Exhausted from the battle, Kratos passes out once again, and Thoth states that his purpose in the Land of the Pharaohs is complete, and his path will carry him to another land that needs him as well. Kratos, frustrated that he is still a slave to fate but now knowing that there’s nothing he can do about it, simply grabs the Blades of Chaos, and continues walking, forced to relive his nightmares in his mind as he journeys towards his destiny: another new land.

Decades later, Kratos has found his way to the land of the Norse Gods where he meets a woman named Faye whom he marries and settles down with in a home in the “Wild Woods” region of the Midgard realm. The pair soon have a child, who Kratos gives the name “Atreus”, after a Spartan soldier he fought alongside long ago, and he decides to keep his status as a demigod a secret from the boy. Hoping to learn to control his rage, Kratos frequently ventures out into the woods, where he is attacked by the animals inside. Honing his anger, he learns to refrain from fighting back, and instead simply deflect their attacks. However, he soon learns from a large Troll that he still doesn’t have full control over his emotions.

One day, Faye leaves to go hunting, leaving Atreus and Kratos at home. Kratos instructs Atreus to stay behind and chop wood as he heads off to find another “challenge” for his rage control. He soon comes across a giant bear attacking an old man, and Kratos fails to control himself, violently killing the bear before walking off, blaming the old man for setting off the events that led to him losing control. He leaves him for dead, returning home as another group of men watch him pass through an illusionary wall cloaking his home. Kratos returns to find Atreus playing with toys instead of chopping the wood, but before he can scold the boy, the group of men arrive and begin to speak to Kratos in their tongue, which he cannot understand. Atreus translates and reveals that the men have come to take revenge on Kratos, blaming him for their brother’s death. Kratos denies killing anyone, claiming that he only killed a beast, before the men transform into bear-like creatures themselves and engage in battle. Kratos defeats the creatures, killing one threatening Atreus with the axe the boy was to use to cut the wood.

When another man threatens to go bring the rest of his clan to the house, Kratos chases him, bringing Atreus along. Frustrated at losing the man’s trail, Kratos begins to feel his rage boiling inside, but he is able to control it, just as he tries to teach Atreus to control his own fear. Atreus suggests that the pair visit the “Old Seer”, who may know more about the clan of Beast Men. Kratos agrees, and Atreus leads the way. Once they arrive at her hut, Kratos speaks with the Seer, who reveals that the men are known as “Berserkers”, who receive their strength from their own fury, focusing it through a totem they worship. Kratos asks the location of the totem, and the Seer only states that she can reveal the location through a ritual she must perform. Kratos and Atreus wait outside for her answer, and she soon shows them the way to the totem, warning Kratos that he must control his own anger in order to defeat the Berserkers.

Kratos leaves Atreus with the Seer and journeys to the Berserker’s camp, where he finds their sacred totem. While Kratos tries to sneak past the sleeping Berserkers to destroy their idol, one awakens and alerts the rest, as they transform into their bear-like forms. Kratos’s rage immediately burns white-hot, and he attempts to fight the horde, only to find their own strength surpassing his. Finding himself unable to use his brute strength alone, Kratos remembers the Seer’s words and centers himself, controlling his rage and thinking quickly to destroy the totem, transforming the Berserker’s back to their human forms, who he is easily able to kill before burning their encampment to the ground.

Back in the Seer’s hut, the old woman gives Atreus a mysterious knife, telling him he must use it soon. Before he can ask what she means, a Berserker arrives in the hut and attacks the Seer. Kratos arrives shortly after, and snaps the man’s neck, instantly killing him. As she lays dying, the Seer asks Kratos to take care of her remains, before warning him that while he is able to defeat his enemies with ease, one day he’ll have to conquer himself. Kratos exits the woman’s hut, and he and Atreus build a funeral pyre for the Seer’s body. As they walk back home, Kratos tells his son, as well as himself, that from now on, he’ll handle the fighting.

Not long after, a dying Faye asks Kratos to scatter her ashes at the highest peak in the Nine Realms. After she passes, Kratos uses her weapon, the Leviathan Axe, to chop down a tree marked with her handprint to use for assembling her funeral pyre. While cremating Faye’s body, Atreus notices her knife and grabs it, burning his hand in the process. Kratos nurses Atreus’ wound, giving the boy his mother’s knife. Knowing that now it is his sole responsibility to raise his son, Kratos takes Atreus hunting to prove himself. Atreus grabs his bow and the pair go looking for deer while Faye’s body burns. While Atreus finds a deer, he is unable to calm himself enough to hit it as it runs off. As the pair track the deer, they are attacked by undead draugrs which Atreus notes have never come that close to their home before. After Kratos fights them off, the pair continue to chase after the deer, and when they find it, Kratos helps his son aim his bow to finally hit and take down their prey. As Kratos and Atreus run over to kill the deer, a giant troll attacks, forcing the father and son to fight it off. Kratos takes the creature down, with Atreus providing support with his bow. After Kratos kills the troll, Atreus runs over and slashes at it’s corpse, unleashing his own rage and frustration, which causes Kratos to believe he is not yet ready to carry his mother’s remains to their destination, despite the boy’s protest, claiming that his “sickness” won’t hinder him. They return home, and Kratos collects Faye’s ashes into a pouch, solemnly giving his wife one last goodbye. Inside their house, Kratos speaks with Atreus about controlling his anger to use it as a strength instead of a weakness, warning him that their path ahead will be difficult. The pair then hear a strange man outside, yelling at them to come out, as he knows “what [they] are”. Kratos hides Atreus under the floorboards before exiting the house to confront the man. The Stranger comments that he thought Kratos would be “bigger” before attempting to goad him into a fight. Kratos attempts to diffuse the situation, but when the Stranger refuses to leave, Kratos throws a punch. The Stranger shrugs it off and delivers his own, powerfully propelling Kratos into the air and prompting a battle between the two. While the man has his own god-like powers along with an extreme resistance to pain, Kratos is able to hold his own. When the fight moves to the roof of Kratos’s home, the Stranger notices two beds inside, and decides to investigate who Kratos is hiding inside. After trapping Kratos under a pile of rubble, the Stranger advances towards the house, triggering the Spartan’s Rage and allowing him to rush at the man with the full extent of his god-like power. As the battle draws to a close, the Stranger reveals that Odin, the Norse God and “All-Father”, sent him to find “answers”. He then reveals that he can’t feel any of the pain Kratos is inflicting on him, forcing him to snap the Stranger’s neck before throwing him off a nearby cliff. Now knowing their home is no-longer safe, Kratos returns and collects Atreus, taking him with him to embark on their journey to the peak of the highest mountain.

On their way up the mountain, Kratos and Atreus reach an overlook where they see that a protective stave was placed around the woods where they lived, but it was broken where Kratos cut down the tree adorned with Faye’s handprint, which allowed the Stranger to enter. While Kratos is confused as to why Faye would have him cut down the tree protecting their home, the pair nonetheless carry on. Shortly after, the pair are ambushed by a cannibalistic group called the “Reavers”, and Atreus is forced to kill one of them to protect himself, an act that takes a heavy toll on the boy’s consciousness. Kratos tries to convince the boy that he was forced to take the man’s life to protect his own, before the Reavers’ corpses rise from the dead as “Hel-Walkers”, which the pair fight and defeat again.

Continuing on their way, Kratos and Atreus meet a dwarf named Brok, who claims that he and his estranged brother created Faye’s Leviathan Axe, presenting his brand as proof. Kratos then lets Brok improve the Axe, which he is soon able to test out. Further up their path, Atreus spots a strange boar, and draws his bow to practice hunting once again. After his arrow simply bounces off the animal’s hide, Atreus gets after it, piercing its skin, but losing Kratos after chasing it. When Kratos finds the boy, he is being scolded by a woman, known as the Witch of the Woods, who chastises the men for attempting to kill the last of the boar’s kind. Kratos helps to nurse the boar before carrying it back to the Witch’s home. There, the Witch sends Atreus to find supplies for medication, while Kratos stays behind. The woman reveals that she knows the man’s true nature, as well as his son’s, and she questions his decision to hide that fact from the boy. She warns Kratos that once the Gods of this realm find him they will be in grave danger, but Kratos simply states that it’s his problem to deal with. After Atreus and Kratos retrieve the materials for the medicine, the Witch offers her thanks by giving them marks which will hide them from the gods. She then opens a shortcut for them to pass through before they say their goodbyes.

The pair find a boat and row to the giant, central Lake of Nine, where they find a rune which Atreus translates to read “Sacrifice your arms to the center of the water, awaken again the cradle of the world.” Kratos then throws the Axe into the water, awakening the giant World Serpent, Jörmungandr from its deep slumber. The Axe returns to Kratos, and as the serpent leaves, the water level of the Lake drops, allowing the two to find the Temple of the Norse God of War Týr, where they again meet Brok. Traversing through the temple, Kratos and Atreus emerge back on the path to the mountain to find another dwarf: Brok’s brother Sindri, who also enhances the Leviathan Axe. Soon the pair are met by a large Ogre, which they defeat to finally reach the base of the tall mountain. As they arrive, however, they find their path blocked by a cloud of “Black Breath”. Surprisingly, the Witch of the Woods arrives and tells them that the only thing that can clear the Black Breah is the “Light of Alfheim”. She leads them back to Týr’s Temple, where she shows them a room they can use to travel between the realms. Inside the Realm Travel Room, the Witch gives Kratos a “Bifröst”, an object that will allow him to travel between realms, as well as capture the Light of Alfheim. Kratos places the Bifröst inside the room’s pedestal, and he turns the Temple and its bridge outside to travel to the realm of Alfheim. As the group pass back through the Temple to emerge in Alfheim, however, the Witch is suddenly pulled from the realm, and she tries to give Kratos a warning about the light, but is interrupted as the doors of the Temple lock behind her.

Kratos and Atreus travel towards the Light of Alfheim and encounter the Light and Dark Elves of the realm engaged in an endless war. The pair fight through the hostile Dark Elves to reach the central chamber and the source of the light. Kratos enters the light, handing the Leviathan Axe to Atreus beforehand. Inside the light, Kratos sees a vision of his journey where he hears Atreus speaking to Faye about his resentment over his father’s distance towards him. Kratos then sees Faye, but before he can reach her, he is yanked out of the light by Atreus. The rattled boy yells at Kratos for how long he was inside the light. While Kratos states that he was only inside for mere moments, he looks around to see the remnants of a battle between Atreus and several of the Dark Elves. While Atreus is initially angered by his father abandoning him, the pair press on, with Kratos imbuing his bow with the power of the Light of Alfheim that’s now contained in the Bifröst. Using this new ability, Atreus and Kratos are able to exit, allowing the remaining Light Elves to re-enter the area. As the pair make their way back to Týr’s Temple, they are attacked by the Dark Elve King, who they are able to work together to swiftly defeat. Afterwards, Atreus asks Kratos if he saw Faye in the light, but angrily states that he wouldn’t even care if he did, prompting a quick fight between the two, where Kratos reveals that he grieves in his own way, and the father and son reconcile, reaching a better understanding of one another.

Kratos and Atreus return to the Realm Travel Room and use the Bifröst to return to Midgard, where they make their way back to the mountain. Kratos clears the Black Breath using the Light inside the Bifröst, and the pair are able to make their way inside the mountain, discussing and learning about the Giants of Jötunheim who had disappeared from Midgard long ago on their way. After making their way up a tall shaft, being attacked by various enemies on the way, the pair are confronted by a giant dragon. While they are able to escape from it, when they leave the mountain’s caverns, they find the dragon outside, attacking Sindri. Kratos battles the dragon, killing it with Atreus’ help. To express his gratitude for saving him, Sindri gives Atreus a bundle of braided mistletoe arrows before asking Kratos to retrieve a tooth from the dragon, which he then uses to imbue Atreus’ bow with lightning powers. Further up the mountain, Kratos helps Atreus repair his quiver’s strap using some of the mistletoe from the arrows. The pair soon spot the Stranger who attacked their home, along with two other men, speaking to a man with one glowing eye trapped inside of a tree growing around him. The Stranger, revealed to be one of Odin’s sons, named “Baldur”, probes the man about where Kratos is headed, but the man claims to not know. After Baldur and his accomplices leave, Kratos speaks to the man in the tree, who introduces himself as “Mimir”: the smartest man alive. Mimir reveals that the highest peak in the nine realms isn’t the mountain they’re currently on, but rather one in the realm of the Giants: Jötunheim. He further explains that only one bridge to Jötunheim still exists, but it is locked with a rune that only a giant would know. Atreus states that all of the giants left Midgard long ago, but Mimir offers to help them speak with the only remaining one. Mimir then tells Kratos to cut off his head, instructing him to take it to the Witch of the Woods to have her reanimate it. Before Kratos does so, Mimir warns him not to keep his secret from Atreus, as the longer he waits, the more damage he does to the boy’s psyche. Kratos cuts off Mimir’s head, and takes it back to the Witch.

When he and Atreus arrive, the Witch spots the boy’s mistletoe arrows and demands he give them to her, which he does, before she promptly burns them and warns them about their danger. Afterwards, she helps Kratos revive Mimir’s head, and the disembodied man recognizes the Witch as the goddess “Freya”, Odin’s former wife; something Kratos becomes angered at her for keeping secret, but she quickly points out his hypocrisy. Kratos and Atreus leave Freya’s home once again, now with the company of Mimir, or at least his head, who asks to take him to the Týr’s Temple, where he can speak to the last remaining giant in Midgard: none other than the World Serpent. At the temple, Mimir blows a giant horn, summoning the World Serpent. He speaks with the giant, who aligns the tower’s bridge to where they need to go: the location of a magical chisel that will allow them to draw the rune that will open the gate to Jötunheim. The trio head to the corpse of the chisel’s former owner: the Giant Thamur. Kratos and Atreus climb up the dead giant’s hammer, releasing it from the chains holding it up, causing it to fall and smash through the frozen tundra below, allowing the pair to make their way to the chisel. On their way, however, they hear the voices of the two men that were with the Stranger when he confronted Mimir: Modi and Magni, two sons of Odin’s son Thor. While they try to avoid the two demigods, Modi and Magni soon find Kratos and Atreus, prompting a long and grueling battle. During the battle, Modi taunts Atreus by speaking ill of his mother, which causes the boy to lose control of his anger and go after him. Kratos, meanwhile, violently kills Magni, forcing Modi to run off in fear. Afterwards, Atreus collapses from his sickness, but the pair press on. After reaching the buried chalice, Kratos is able to break off a piece for his own use, and the pair leave, with Mimir warning Kratos that there will be repercussions for killing Thor’s son. Mimir surmises that they will be able to learn the Giants’ secret rune by finding it in Týr’s hidden vault, below the temple, and they head there to investigate. Using the chisel, Kratos is able to find the vault, where he and Atreus are soon ambushed by Modi. The demigod insults Faye once again, causing Atreus to lunge at him. While Modi simply smacks him aside, Atreus’ rage finally boils over, and he has his own moment of Spartan Rage, overwhelming him and causing him to collapse. Kratos’ own rage takes hold, and he overpowers Modi, taking his weapons and causing him to flee once again. Kratos grabs the unconscious Atreus and takes him back to Freya at Mimir’s suggestion.

On their way, Kratus hears someone blowing the World Serpent’s horn. When he reaches Freya’s hut, the witch reveals that Atreus’ true nature is fighting within him, and Kratos keeping it a secret is what is causing the boy’s illness. To help him, Freya sends Kratos to the realm of the dead, Helheim, to retrieve the Bridgekeeper’s Heart. However, due to the realm’s frigid nature, Freya warns that the Leviathan Axe will be useless against the enemies Kratos will face there. Knowing that Kratos must use the only weapon in the nine realms that can create a flame, he leaves Atreus in Freya’s care and returns home. On his way, Kratos witnesses a haunting vision of someone from his past: the Olympian goddess Athena, who he is able to temporarily shake. When Kratos reaches his home, he retrieves what he came for: the Blades of Chaos, which he buried underneath the house decades prior when he found he could not escape them. Athena appears before him once again and taunts Kratos, claiming that he’ll never be able to change, and will forever be a monster. Kratos accepts this fate, but claims that at least he’s no longer her monster. With the Blades returned to his wrists, Kratos makes his way to Týr’s Temple, where he uses the realm travel room to reach Helheim. There, Mimir notices that Hel has become overwhelmed with the dead. They eventually reach the Bridge of the Damned, where Kratos fights the Bridgekeeper. After killing the large creature, he is able to rip out its heart to take back to Freya. As he goes to leave the realm, Kratos spots an illusion of his father, Zeus, beyond the bridge, but Mimir warns him not to go there, stating that Hel is known to torment its inhabitants with their pasts. On their way back to Midgard, Mimir realizes that Kratos is the legendary Ghost of Sparta, and he also encourages him to tell Atreus about his true nature, stating that because Kratos hates all gods, including his son, Atreus can sense it, and it will only harm their relationship. Kratos brushes this off, and returns to Freya’s home. Kratos gives Freya the heart, and she tells Kratos that the only way to fully heal Atreus is by telling him the truth. Freya then confides in Kratos and tells him about her own son, who was prophesied to die a needless death, forcing her to make a sacrifice to protect him, which only led to his resentment of her and drove him away. After Freya uses the heart to heal Atreus, the boy awakens and the pair leave, with Kratos giving his thanks to the Witch on their way.

As the father and son make their way back to Týr’s vault, Atreus grows distant. Kratos asks him about this, and the boy reveals that he overheard part of his father’s conversation with Freya, interpreting it to mean that Kratos is disappointed in his son for being weak. Kratos finally gives in and tells his son the truth: that he is a god from a far-away land. Kratos reveals that when he arrived in Midgard, he chose to live as a man, but in truth, he was born a god, as was Atreus. Atreus is shocked by this revelation, and asks if his mother was a god as well, and Kratos responds that she was only a mortal. When asked why he waited so long to reveal the truth, Kratos tells his son that he had hoped to spare him of the lifetime of tragedy that he himself went through. On their way back to the vault, Atreus notes that he doesn’t have any godly powers yet, but Mimir theorizes that the boy’s faculty for language is one of them. The pair are finally able to descend below Týr’s Temple to his vault, and look for the “Black Rune”. In a room full of his treasures from the various lands, Kratos finds a bottle of wine from his homeland, and next to it, a vase depicting his days as the God of War, which he quickly tosses aside, breaking it upon the ground. When the pair find the rune, they must lower it to retrieve it. As Kratos operates the mechanism, however, he is caught in a vine-like trap. Atreus is forced to quickly solve a puzzle related to the prophesized apocalyptic event known as “Ragnarök”, but when he does so, spikes begin to descend from the ceiling. Atreus is then forced to use his mother’s knife to jam the gears operating the spike trap, saving his father, but destroying the boy’s heirloom in the process. When the pair finally reach the rune, Kratos gives Atreus a new knife; one he forged himself from metals from his own land, as well as Faye’s, on the day of his son’s birth with the intention of gifting it to him when he was ready to use it. Atreus then uses this knife to retrieve the rune, and he takes note of it before the pair are attacked by a pair of two large Trolls. After the battle, the pair return to the surface, and Kratos gives Atreus a drink of the wine he found from his homeland on the way.

Kratos and Atreus make their way back to the gateway to Jötunheim, seeing Sindri on the way. Atreus, now arrogant and empowered by his knowledge of being a god, insults the dwarf, leaving him visibly hurt. This leads Kratos to ask how his mother would react to Atreus behaving that way, and the boy brushes it off, implying that her opinion wouldn’t matter, seeing as she wasn’t a god. Kratos, retorting that she was better than a god, warns his son against dishonoring his mother. As they enter the caverns in the mountain, Kratos and Atreus are again stopped by Modi, now badly beaten by his father Thor, who had blamed him for his brother’s death. The man collapses, and Atreus goes to kill the man for what he said about his mother. Kratos simply states that he isn’t worth it, but when Modi makes one final insult towards Faye, Atreus stabs him in the neck with his new blade before kicking him off a nearby ledge. Kratos scolds the boy for killing an already defeated enemy in indulgence instead of in defense, and he further warns that there are especially consequences for killing gods. The two reach the summit of the mountain and Atreus draws the rune on the gateway, allowing Kratos to use the chisel to trace it and open the portal to Jötunheim. Before they can enter, however, Kratos is ambushed by Baldur, and Atreus attempts to help, revealing he is also a god, and is quickly overpowered. Kratos grabs Baldur and slams him into the stone gate, collapsing it and destroying their only way to Jötunheim. Atreus tries to fight, but Kratos holds him back, forcing the boy to shoot his father with one of his lightning arrows to subdue him. Atreus then rushes at Baldur, stabbing him with his knife, but the invincible man simply pulls it out of his arm and plants it in Atreus’, grabbing the boy and jumping off the mountain. Kratos follows and lands on Baldur’s dragon where he fights the man, eventually getting knocked off the dragon to the bridge of Týr’s Temple below. Kratos runs inside the temple and reaches the realm travel room, where he finds that Baldur has locked in the bridge to the realm of Asgard: the home of Odin and the other Gods of his Aesir tribe. Kratos struggles to insert his Bifröst and instead locks the bridge into Helheim, where he, Atreus, and Baldur are violently sucked in. There, Kratos is able to knock Baldur aside, and he and Atreus land safely within the realm. After Kratos scolds his son for acting out of character, asking him to honor his mother and choose the right path, the pair work to make their way to a boat they can use to get back to Týr’s Temple. On their way, the pair experience visions of Atreus’ past; Helheim’s way of torturing its inhabitants, and the boy watches how he killed Modi in shame. The pair soon find Baldur re-living one of his own memories, and they learn that he is none other than Freya’s estranged son. As it turns out, when she placed a spell on him to make him invincible, he was robbed not only of the feeling of pain, but also any of the pleasures of life. He begged his mother to remove the spell, but knowing it would cause her son’s death, she refused. This caused Baldur to strangle his mother, but at the last moment he allowed her to live; a decision he now regrets. When Kratos and Atreus reach the boat, they begin to see the visions of Kratos’s past: that of his final battle with Zeus. After getting the boat to set sail upwards towards the bridge, the pair watch the memory of Kratos killing his father, and Atreus is forced to snap his father’s attention back to the task at hand as the ship begins to crash. The pair jump to a nearby building, crashing through the roof and landing inside of one of Odin’s secret chambers. There, Atreus finds a panel depicting Týr somehow traveling to different lands, including Kratos’s own homeland. Using the gift of sight granted to him by the Giants, Mimir is able to uncover secret plans on the panel to create a key for another chamber Týr kept hidden which will lead them to Jötunheim. Hoping to create the key, the group head back to Brok, realizing that when Freya reanimated Mimir’s head, she placed a spell on him to never speak about her relationship to Baldur, or what his one weakness is. When they reach Brok, he refuses to make the key, but Sindri arrives shortly after to reconcile with his brother and help forge it. Kratos and Atreus find the secret chamber and open it with the key, finding themselves below the realm travel room in a seemingly upside-down room. The pair work to break the chains holding the temple’s chambers, and Kratos is able to flip it using his brute strength. When they climb back up to the realm travel room, they find what Týr was hiding: the Unity Stone, which allowed Týr to travel within the realm between realms to reach all of the lands he explored. Using the stone, Kratos enters the realm between realms and jumps into the void, landing safely to find the tower to Jötunheim, hidden there by Týr to protect the realm of the Giants. Inside the tower, Kratos finds a pedestal that absorbs the Unity Stone, and unleashes various powerful enemies from the various realms Kratos and Atreus traveled. After the grueling battle, the pair emerge from the tower to find themselves back in Midgard, with the tower to Jötunheim returned to a location the bridge of Týr’s Temple can reach. When they enter the realm travel room to lock in the bridge, however, Mimir realizes the “travel crystal” is missing, and in order to travel, the pair will need to find his other eye, which was taken by Odin. They ask Brok and Sindri if they know where Mimir’s other eye is, and Brok reveals that Odin placed it in a statue of Thor, which Kratos and Atrus saw swallowed by the World Serpent. Mimir blows the Serpent’s horn once again and asks if they can investigate his stomach for the eye, which the ancient Giant agrees to, and the group grab their boat and row inside. There, they are able to find Mimir’s eye and return it to his head. Now with everything required to reach Jötunheim, the pair row their boat back out of the creature. On the way, however, they begin to feel massive blasts outside. Soon, the creature spits them out, and they land nearby as the World Serpent falls unconscious. Freya arrives, confused at what happened to the Serpent. She claims to be looking for her son, but is surprised to find Kratos and Atreus meeting her with suspicion. Shortly after, Baldur emerges from the waters nearby, shocked to find his mother with his targets. Baldur threatens his mother, but Kratos steps between them, trying to tell the man that he will find no peace in vengeance. When Baldur refuses to listen, another fight between the two breaks out, with Freya attempting to stop the two. Atreus attempts to stop Baldur, but the man delivers a mighty punch to the boy’s chest. Kratos catches his son, worried that the boy is covered in blood, which the boy simply states isn’t his. Kratos looks up to see Baldur with the mistletoe from Atreus’ repaired quiver lodged in his hand, with the man delighted that he can finally feel something. Nearby, Freya, realizing that the spell protecting her son has been broken by his one weakness, reanimates the corpse of the Giant Thamur, which grabs them and carries them off to a new location. Baldur follows, and another fight ensues, with the giddy man now enjoying feeling the battle. While Freya continues to try to use Thamur’s body to interrupt the fight, Kratos is able to gain the upperhand, eventually causing the woman to have Thamur use his frosty breath to freeze them. Atreus thinks quickly and uses his abilities to speak the old language of the Giants to call upon the now awakened World Serpent to take the Giant’s Corpse out of the equation. Afterwards, Kratos begins to strangle Baldur, but Atreus reminds him that he doesn’t need to kill a beaten enemy. Kratos gives Baldur one final warning to leave him, Atreus, and Freya alone before walking off. Baldur ignores this warning and approaches his mother, refusing to forgive her and instead begins to strangle her, which she accepts if it will make him feel better. Kratos then grabs Baldur and quotes his father Zeus, stating “the cycle ends here”, before also stating that “we must be better than this”, before snapping the man’s neck. In his last breath, Baldur sees the snow beginning to fall, as he finally dies his needless death. Freya rushes over to his body and promises Kratos that she will use all of her abilities to punish him for what he has taken from her. She states that Kratos is a cruel and rage-filled animal who will never change, and asks if Atreus knows the true depths of his father’s past. Kratos then reveals his true history to his son; telling him about the deal he made with a god, and how it led him to killing the innocent, the guilty, and his own father. Atreus asks if he will be cursed to kill Kratos, but the Spartan simply states that “we will be the gods we choose to be, not those who have been.” Freya then picks up Baldur’s body and walks off without saying a word.

The pair return to Týr’s Temple one last time, and lock in Jötunheim in the realm travel room. Atreus uses Mimir’s head to focus the energy to travel, and the door to the realm of the Giants is finally unlocked. Mimir requests that they leave him behind so the father and son can have their moment, and Kratos leaves him with Brok and Sindri at the temple. As they approach the summit of the mountain, Kratos removes the bandages covering his scars from the Blades of Chaos, claiming that he no longer has anything to hide. He then hands Faye’s ashes to Atreus, allowing him to carry them the rest of the way. The pair find a room with statues depicting the Giants’ exodus of midgard. They wonder why Faye sent them there, but Atreus touches a wall, revealing a large mural. The pair are shocked to see that the mural depicts Faye, as well as all of the events the father and son had lived through, including the battle that just happened. Kratos surmises that the mural depicts Atreus’ story, and that he wasn’t the only parent with secrets. Atreus then realizes that Faye was a giant, making him part god, part Giant, and part mortal. Kratos also realizes that Baldur was never looking for him, but rather had been sent by Odin to find Faye. As Atreus continues up the mountain, Kratos spots one last panel depicting Atreus screaming in pain while holding a man’s dead body. Finally at the peak of the highest mountain in the nine realms, Atreus and Kratos look around to see the remains of dead Giants. Kratos, finally calling Atreus “son”, elects that the two scatter Faye’s ashes together. The two then say their goodbyes to Faye as her remains join those of her kind. Afterwards, Atreus reveals one last thing confusing him about the mural: when translated, he was referred to by the Giants as “Loki”. Kratos recalls that this was the name Faye wanted to give Atreus when he was born; but he elects to save this mystery for another day. Kratos and Atreus return to the realm travel room to regroup with Mimir, and as they return to Midgard, he warns them that their actions have accelerated the coming of the great “Fimbulwinter” which precedes Ragnarök. Atreus and Kratos return to their home and finally rest.

Three years later, we find Kratos and Atreus braving the harsh conditions of the fabled Fimbulwinter as it draws near its end. As the pair return home from a hunting trip, they’re attacked by a still vengeful Freya. While she proves to be a formidable foe, they are able to hold her off long enough to reach the protective stave around their home. When they get home, Atreus tends to an ailing wolf they’ve taken in named Fenrir. Unfortunately, while the boy is able to cut a piece of meat with his knife to

Feed him. Kratos convinces his son to let the wolf rest for good. As Atreus holds Fenrir close, he unknowingly casts a spell releasing the wolf’s spirit (which is then transferred into Atreus’s knife).

Immediately after the wolf dies, Kratos urges his son to train with him, but an emotional Atreus shouts that simply waiting around for Ragnarök isn’t what Loki is “supposed to be doing”. Kratos refuses to allow his son to make the same mistake he did by waging a war with the gods, but Atreus responds that maybe it’s what his mother, Faye, would’ve wanted.

Kratos allows his son to have a moment alone with Fenrir before he buries him, entering their house alone to inform Mimir about the wolf’s death before sleeping for the night. In his dreams, Kratos reunites with his wife, Faye, and relives a time when they had hunted together. In this dream, the pair search for a sick wolf that had entered their protective stave. Faye regrets not acting sooner, but Kratos argues that the problem wasn’t theirs until it crossed their doorstep. Faye, however, insists that they should take responsibility if they have the power to prevent harm, rather than hiding and doing nothing.

As they continue through the forest, Kratos helps Faye navigate fallen trees. Briefly losing sight of her, Kratos feels a moment of unease before she suddenly reappears with gold paint on her hand and she places her palm on his forehead. Faye then ominously warns him that time is running out and there’s much left to do.

Kratos is suddenly pulled out of the dream, and awakens to learn from Mimir that Atreus never returned from burying Fenrir. Kratos places Mimir on his hip and goes searching for his son, following his tracks to find one of the trees supporting their protection stave broken, allowing Raiders to invade. Kratos keeps following the trail, before being attacked by a massive bear, called Björn. After a fierce battle with the beast, Kratos nearly strangles the bear, but as he does, its form begins to shift to reveal that Björn had been Atreus all along.

As Atreus comes to, he reveals that he can’t remember anything after burying Fenrir and having his emotions overwhelm him. Kratos ensures his son that he did nothing wrong, and reinforces that their training is more important than ever, as they need to fully understand Atreus’ abilities before they can use them in combat. While the boy again stresses that he needs to search for the answers his mother kept from them, Kratos sternly holds his ground. The pair then work together to repair the protection stave before heading back home to rest.

Soon after, however, the pair are shaken awake by events they dreamed of years prior. Grabbing their weapons, Kratos and Atreus open their door to find an unexpected visitor: the God of Thunder himself, Thor, wielding his mighty hammer Mjölnir. Surprisingly, however, Thor calmly asks if he can come inside their home, offering to share a bottle of mead. Kratos reluctantly allows him inside, and the two sit at a table as Atreus fetches them mugs. After the two gods place their respective weapons on the table, Thor pours them drinks. Moments later, Thor’s father, Odin—ruler of the Aesir, one of the two tribes of Norse gods—arrives unannounced and lets himself in.

While the All-Father Odin brushes past the deaths of Thor’s sons Magni and Modi, he holds a debt against Kratos for his killing of Baldur. When Kratos asks Odin what he wants to pay the debt, the All-Father responds by simply asking for peace, revealing that he knows that Atreus has secretly been searching for Týr, whom the boy believes is still alive despite the god of war’s supposed death at Odin’s hand. To sweeten the deal, Odin also promises to settle Kratos’ score with Freya. Ever defiant, however, Kratos refuses the deal, and Odin exits his house, leaving Thor to take care of Kratos.

A vicious battle then ensues between the God of Thunder and the killer of gods, with Thor trying to goad Kratos into letting his anger out while they fight across the landscape. When Thor finally states that Odin has “plans” for Atreus, Kratos unleashes his rage, satisfying the god of thunder, who simply leaves. Brok and Sindri then arrive and help Kratos get back home to check on Atreus. Luckily, he finds his son unharmed, as Odin had simply left the boy with payment for the damages to their home as well as an invitation to Asgard.

Kratos then scolds Atreus for hiding his search for Týr from him, but the boy convinces his father that they’ll need all the help they can get to go against Odin and Thor. Atreus then takes Kratos to a nearby temple to show him what he’s found that’s led him to believe Týr still lives. There, Atreus shows Kratus one of the shrines of the Jötnar (the Giants) that they had previously seen on their journeys. Atreus reveals that he figured out the shrine hid a door that he is able to reveal and open, leading to a realm only Giants were meant to see.

There, Atreus and Kratos see the true fate of the wolf-giants Sköll and Hati, who were destined to chase the sun and moon across the skies. Atreus explains that Sköll and Hati were captured by Odin, who had hoped to use them to control the start of Ragnarok. Somehow, however, two giants set them free, and they now hide in Vanaheim. The prophecy then states that someone then steals the moon, leaving Hati with nothing to chase. Someone else then rescues the moon, which blocks out the sun, creating a total eclipse. The two wolf-giants are then left to chase an arrow. The scene then shifts to Ragnarok, with Odin’s army being opposed by another led by the Norse God of War himself, Týr. This prophecy is what has led Atreus to believe that Týr was never killed by Odin, but instead imprisoned by him.

As the two exit the shrine, Atreus shows Kratos something else he found in another shrine: a marble that Mimir determines must have been crafted by Giants. Atreus then reveals that Sindri had been helping him decipher the clues in the shrines, further angering his father. Regardless, Kratos and Mimir determine that if Týr is imprisoned, it may be in the mines of Svartalfheim, the realm of the dwarves.

With the protective stave damaged by Thor’s attack, Kratos and Atreus meet with Sindri, who lets them stay in his home in the realm between realms. As Kratos helps Sindri restore travel between realms, he learns from Brok that their best bet in learning more about the mines is their cousin Durlin (who Freya once recruited in a failed uprising against the Aesir gods). With some final assistance from Mimir and his Bifrost eyes, the group are able to restore travel between the realms, allowing Kratos and Atreus to open a pathway to Svartalfheim.

There, the pair make their way to the local tavern to learn of Durlin’s location. Once reaching his location, Kratos and Atreus meet Durlin, who (despite his history with Faye) refuses to go up against Odin and the rest of the Aesir gods. Despite his outward hostility towards the two when they ask about Týr’s location, Durlin secretly gives them directions to a nearby mine. After a treacherous trip to the mine, Kratos and Atreus enter it to find the boy’s suspicions confirmed. After exploring deep into the mine, the pair find Týr, the Aesir god of war, alive in the flesh.

After freeing the god from his imprisonment, Týr grows fearful and runs off. The two pursue him, and while Atreus tries to reason with him, Kratos is able to take a stronger approach to convince the Aesir god to come with them. On their way back out of the mines, Týr reveals that he’s renounced all violence, leaving the god of war a pacifist refusing to fight if Ragnarok begins. Kratos and Atreus explain that they do not wish to start a war, and only hope that by freeing Týr, who the Giants trusted, they may be able to get answers regarding Loki’s true purpose.

Kratos and Atreus then take Týr to Sindri’s house, where he settles in. Later, Atreus sneaks out of the house to search for Freya, hoping to mend a bridge between them before Ragnarok. Sindri discovers this and agrees to help, as long as they stop to speak with Jörmungandr first. The two go to Midgard and find the World Serpent, who Atreus calls in the ancient Giant tongue. This awakens Jörmungandr, and when Atreus asks the beast about Loki and Fimbulwinter, it simply responds with “Iron Wood” before leaving just as quickly as he appeared.

Atreus and Sindri then head off to find Freya, with the boy eventually sneaking into her camp alone. While he tries to approach her calmly, Freya traps Atreus in a growth of vines. Atreus tries to reason with Freya, but her grief and rage over the death of her son Baldur make her resistant to any attempts at reconciliation. However, as Atreus listens to her and offers genuine remorse, he begins to break through her anger to redirect it towards their common enemy: Odin. Freya ultimately releases Atreus when he reveals that he’s the last remaining Giant.

Atreus then asks Freya for her assistance as Queen of the Valkyries (whom he and his father freed from Odin’s curse during their previous journey… if they had the patience and skill). Unfortunately, Freya’s patience runs thin once Atreus mentions Týr’s survival, which she denies could be possible, as she throws him from her home, barricading him out with more vines.

On their way back to Sindri’s house, the dwarf confides in Atreus about a dark event from his past: long ago, Brok had actually died in an accident at the forge. Sindri, unable to accept the loss of his brother, traveled to the Lake of Souls in Alfheim and stole him back; or at least three of his four soul-parts. Brok then awoke, thinking he was simply knocked out: a lie that Sindri let him believe ever since. Atreus and Sindri then agree that they both need to come clean with their respective family members.

The entire group then reconvene at Sindri’s house, and Kratos and Týr decide to go to Alfheim to learn more about Ragnarok from another shrine near the Temple of Light. As they head out, Kratos meets Ratatoskr, a squirrel who guards the World Tree, Yggdrasil (whose branches hold the Nine Realms). Ratatoskr assists Kratos and Atreus by giving them a “Realm Seed”, which allows them to open the pathway to other realms. The trio then enter Alfheim, in search of the shrine of Gróa, the Giant sorceress who had foreseen Ragnarok.

When they reach it, Atreus opens the shrine and they learn that Gróa’s vision of Ragnarok was incomplete, as she was interrupted and killed by Odin before she could fully understand its implications. The shrine then reveals the word “Ironwood”, which Atreus recognizes from his short conversation with Jörmungandr. Tyr reveals that Ironwood is the fabled sanctuary for giants. The shrine then shows the vision of Tyr fighting in Ragnarok, further showing that Odin dies as Asgard gets destroyed while the other realms survive. This revelation leads them to realize that Gróa had lied to Odin about the outcome of Ragnarok, giving Atreus hope that they can somehow defeat Odin and win the massive war.

As the trio leave the shrine, Týr rejects the idea of leading the army to destroy Asgard, but Kratos shelves the conversation for later as they make a daring escape out of the Temple of Light. They then return to Sindri’s house, where the group discuss their next course of action. Atreus, emboldened by the knowledge he has gained, is more determined than ever to understand his place as Loki, a “Champion” in the prophecy. Kratos, however, holds firm that his son must instead stay safe, causing the boy to storm off to his room. As his anger begins to take over him, a protective Sindri advises him to sleep to calm himself down.

Atreus takes this advice, and as he drifts to sleep, he hears a voice call his name: “Loki”. He then finds himself transported to a mysterious, sand-filled realm, where he sees a vision of a wooden mask that vanishes before he’s forced to relive moments from his previous journey when he struggled with the darker aspects of his godhood, including killing Modi. Suddenly, Atreus finds himself in a forest where he encounters a wolf that leads him to a hidden painting. As Atreus inspects it, he’s startled by a voice that sneaks up on him.

Atreus looks to find a young Giant named Angrboda, who reveals that she’s been waiting for him for a long time and offers to guide him through the region he’s now in: the “Ironwood”. After Angrboda leads Atreus to her treehouse within the Ironwood, she shows him his own shrine, the shrine of Loki, which he can now see fully unobscured. Atreus then sees depictions of Kratos’s death at Thor’s hands, as well as himself aligning with Odin. Overwhelmed with emotion once again, Atreus transforms, this time into a wolf, but Angrboda calms him down and helps him regain control. Despite her insistence that this is the way things must be, Atreus refuses to accept the foretold future.

To help him process what he’s learned, Angrboda teaches Atreus about his Jötunn heritage and how to harness his abilities. During their time together, she notices and informs Atreus that there is a soul trapped inside of his knife. Finally, Angrboda fulfills her role in the prophecy and reveals to Atreus that the remaining Giants never truly died; they simply left their bodies behind to trick Asgard as their souls hid away. These souls were then placed inside of marbles, the same ones that Atreus had found inside the shrines. Angrboda then explains that Atreus is destined to be the keeper of these souls, a role he is reluctant to accept.

Believing her role in his destiny to be over, Angrboda takes Atreus back to her treehouse to send him off. On their way, Atreus learns of Angrboda’s grandmother Grýla, who was driven mad when the girl’s parents died, isolating herself while stealing the souls of the animals inhabiting the Ironwood. When she captures one of the wolves in the forest, Atreus feels a responsibility to rescue it. While searching Grýla’s house for the wolf, they find the lifeless body of a large snake. Atreus gets the idea to place one of the Giants’ souls into the snake, and grabs a marble from his pouch. While Angrboda questions his decision, Atreus releases the soul from the marble, and she helps him lead it into the snake. However, once the snake awakens, it immediately slithers away, leaving Atreus unsure if he made the right decision to use the marbles. Feeling like he let down his mother, the boy gives the marbles back to Angrboda, asking her to refer to him as “Atreus” and not “Loki”.

Unfortunately, the pair’s search is interrupted when Grýla arrives home. The two are able to free the wolf, but are forced to sneak around the Giant old woman when she spots them. Atreus and Angrboda manage to overpower Grýla, destroying her cauldron of captured souls, leaving the elder Giant devastated. Enraged, Grýla demands that Angrboda leave, threatening to stab her granddaughter with a shard of the broken cauldron. Atreus, ready to defend his friend, draws his bow to attack, but Angrboda stops him, urging that they just leave. As they depart, Grýla bitterly shouts that Angrboda is nothing and that even Atreus will soon forget her, as soon as he’s too busy mourning his father’s death.

Outside, Atreus tries to console a heartbroken Angrboda, who reveals that despite her grandmother’s harshness, she has continued to care for her in small ways, insisting that while Grýla is “lost,” she’s not a monster. To lift her spirits, Atreus suggests a race back to her treehouse. Angrboda agrees, and they dash through the forest—Atreus in his wolf form and Angrboda atop her fox. Back at the treehouse, Angrboda gives Atreus a marble inscribed with his mother’s name, Laufey, and while it is empty, he can use it to navigate the dream world and find his way back home. Atreus reassures her that they will meet again and that he will change his fate to protect his father. He clutches the marble, thinks of “home,” and drifts off to sleep.

When Atreus awakens, he finds himself back in his and his father’s home in Midgard, now surrounded by Hel-Walkers due to the broken protective stave. He attempts to use Laufey’s marble to return to Sindri’s house but is forced to flee when a Hel-Walker nearly breaks into the cabin. After fighting off the undead attackers, Atreus heads to the Mystic Gateway to reach the Realm between Realms, only to bump into Kratos as he steps through from the other side. Kratos, furious and worried, demands to know where Atreus has been, revealing that two days have passed since he disappeared in the night.

Atreus tries to lie, claiming he was visiting Fenrir, but Kratos sees through it, insisting that Atreus never lie to him again. Atreus retorts by stating that if both his mother and father could hide things from him, it’s only fair that he can do the same. Their argument is cut short by another wave of Hel-Walkers, and immediately after, a Valkyrie suddenly attacks Kratos. Recognizing Freya beneath the Valkyrie armor, Kratos hesitates, giving her the upper hand. Atreus, panicked, transforms into his bear form and attempts to help, but Kratos holds him back, reminding him that Freya is still their friend.

As Kratos calms Atreus down, the boy returns to his human form, and Freya recognizes this act of kindness. Instead of continuing to fight, Freya instead demands a temporary alliance with Kratos and Mimir, seeking their help in Vanaheim to break Odin’s curse that binds her to Midgard. Brok and Sindri then arrive, and Kratos sends his son with Sindri back to the dwarf’s home to stay safe while he assists Freya. Brok joins Kratos, Freya, and Mimir on their journey to Vanaheim, helping them navigate between the realms. Freya, still bound by Odin’s curse, can only manifest in her bird-like form while outside Midgard.

Upon arriving in Vanaheim, they are confronted by Freyr, the Vanir (the other tribe of gods) God of Rain and Fertility, who is also Freya’s brother. Initially, Freyr greets them with hostility, capturing Brok and viewing Kratos as a threat. However, Freya quickly intervenes, explaining that Kratos, Brok, and Mimir are her allies and that they share a common enemy in Odin and the Aesir gods. With the misunderstanding cleared, Freyr releases Brok, and tensions ease. Brok decides to stay behind at Freyr’s camp, where he reunites with another Dwarf, Lunda.

Meanwhile, Kratos and Freya continue their quest, tracking down the source of her curse. On their way, the pair bond over their similar plights, with Kratos telling Freya about his own brother, Deimos, as well as the loss of his daughter, Calliope. Their journey eventually leads them to the roots of the World Tree, Yggdrasil, where they encounter Níðhögg, the ancient multidimensional dragon and caretaker of the roots. When Freya and Kratos attempt to destroy the cursed roots that Odin used to bind Freya to Midgard, Níðhögg attacks, compelled to defend the roots and stop them. A fierce battle ensues, with Kratos struggling against Níðhögg’s power. As Freya works to lift the curse, Níðhögg opens a portal between realms, trying to continue its attack. Kratos manages to hold the creature in place with the Blades of Chaos, buying Freya enough time to close the portal. Left with no other choice, Freya severs Níðhögg’s head, killing it. After the fight, Freya is able to rush over to the roots and unbind them, fully lifting the cure and granting Freya the freedom to once again travel across the Nine Realms.

When Kratos asks where they stand, Freya acknowledges that while she will always carry the pain of Baldur’s death, their shared goal of defeating Odin takes precedence. The two then reconcile, shaking hands and agreeing to move forward as allies. The pair then make their way back to Freyr’s camp, seeing Sköll and Hati in the skies above. Once they arrive at camp, Freya meets her brother face to face, and finally makes amends with her brother, strengthening their alliance for the war to come. After potentially helping Freya destroy some of her old belongings from her wedding with Odin, Kratos returns to Sindri’s home with his new ally.

Back at Sindri’s home, Kratos finds Atreus and Sindri in the midst of an argument. Kratos interrupts and continues to press Atreus for the truth of where he disappeared to, demanding to know if he went to Asgard. Atreus reveals that he had contemplated the idea of going to Asgard, but only to act as a spy against Odin. Despite Mimir, Freya, Týr, Brok, and Sindri all urging him not to go, Atreus’s emotions get the best of him again as he transforms into his bear form and runs away, returning to Midgard through the mystic gateway.

Alone in the Fimbulwinter snowstorm, Atreus fends off Hel-Walkers, Wisps, and Wights while searching for shelter. Atreus manages to find and enter Freya’s home, where he starts a fire to stay warm. As he finishes, Huginn, Odin’s raven, arrives and flies into the house. After a moment of hesitation, Atreus tells Huginn he’s ready and allows the raven to take him to Asgard.

Transported by a swarm of Odin’s ravens, Atreus finds himself falling into a river in Asgard. After pulling himself ashore, he begins the long climb up Hrimthur’s Wall, the large formation protecting the home of the Aesir gods. At the base of the Wall, he meets a boy named Skjöldr, who tells Atreus that Odin brought him and other Midgardians to Asgard to save them from the desolation following Ragnarok, though they are not allowed inside the Wall. Atreus insists he must climb the Wall to meet Odin and become his apprentice, much to Skjöldr’s surprise.

As Atreus scales the Wall, he is confronted by an Aesir god with piercing purple eyes: Asgard’s watchman, Heimdall. Suspicious of Atreus’s intentions, Heimdall nearly drops him off the Wall but relents when Atreus introduces himself as “Loki of the Jötnar,” while insisting that he is not their enemy. Heimdall begrudgingly pulls him up, and Atreus notices Heimdall’s fabled battle horn, Gjallarhorn, and the man introduces himself as the guardian of the Aesir. Heimdall escorts Atreus to Asgard, descending the Wall on a wooden lift before riding through the Gladsheim region to reach the “Great Lodge”, where the All-Father himself resides.

Heimdall then summons a group of Einherjar—elite warriors who have died in battle and were resurrected by Odin to serve him in Asgard—to attack Atreus, calling him their “practice dummy.” Atreus manages to defeat the Einherjar in combat, but when he turns his attacks to Heimdall, he’s exceptionally outmatched, with Heimdall taunting him at every turn. Just as Heimdall prepares to strike again, Thor arrives and intervenes, warning Heimdall that Atreus is the All-Father’s guest. Shortly after, Odin himself arrives, greeting Atreus warmly (as “Loki”) while playfully dismissing Heimdall’s suspicions. Odin, understanding Atreus’s quest for knowledge, assures Asgard’s watchman that the boy’s in Asgard to find answers about his destiny.

Odin then takes Atreus on a brief tour of his realm, checking in with three of Odin’s remaining Valkyries—Hrist, Mist and the new Queen, Gná—as they train the Einherjar, before visiting Svartalfheim to monitor the progress of war machines Durlin is being forced to build. After returning to Asgard, Odin leaves Atreus to settle into his room, asking him to meet him in his study once he’s ready to learn more. As Atreus opens the door to leave his room, however, he is met by Thrúd, Thor’s daughter, who holds her weapon to him while pointing out that the room once belonged to her brother, Modi. However, she soon drops her weapon and shifts to a friendlier demeanor, stating that they’re better off without him before offering to show Atreus to Odin’s study. As they walk, Thrúd shares her aspiration to become a Valkyrie, much to her mother Sif’s disapproval.

After their conversation, Atreus meets with Odin, who is busy with Huginn. Taking advantage of Odin’s distraction, Atreus steals a scroll containing information about Heimdall’s Gjallarhorn. Odin, noticing Atreus taking interest in a sentient sword called “Ingrid”, gifts it to him as a “perk of the job”. Odin then escorts Atreus to his study, explaining that his pursuit is purely for knowledge, not power. He shows Atreus a magical rift created in the aftermath of his long-ago battle with Ymir, the original Giant, as well as a familiar mask he’s found that radiates with the same energy as the rift, which he believes will allow him to safely peer into it. Hoping the other side of the rift holds the knowledge required to stop Ragnarok, Odin tasks Atreus with finding the missing pieces of the mask to complete it, warning the boy of the dangers of looking into the rift without it (a mistake which took one of the All-Father’s eyes).

Odin then pairs Atreus with Thor, before sending them to Muspelheim—the realm of fire—to find the first piece of the mask. During their journey, Atreus and Thor struggle to find common ground, with Thor nearly killing the boy out of frustration and revenge for his son, Modi. However, Atreus convinces Thor to work with him, emphasizing their shared goal of impressing Odin. In Muspelheim, Atreus finds a Jötunn shrine, and is shocked to see Angrboda nearby, searching for more marbles. After the pair enter the shrine together, they see the prophecy of Ragnarok. In it, the fire Giant Surtr battles with the frost Giant Sinmara; that is until they are forced to fight alongside each other to combat an approaching common threat. Afterward, the pair fall in love, combining to become the mighty Ragnarök before destroying Asgard with a massive sword. Before leaving the shrine, Angrboda informs Atreus that the snake they put the soul in has been growing bigger and bigger alarmingly fast. Atreus then returns to Thor, and the pair fight side by side, impressing the god of thunder before they find the first missing piece of the mask. After Atreus retrieves it from a pool of lava, it combines with the rest of the mask. Thor and Loki then return to Asgard, where Odin eagerly inspects the semi-repaired mask and excitedly states that they all make a good team. Odin questions Thor about their mission, but Thor dismisses him and leaves. As Atreus prepares to leave Odin’s study, he questions the god’s trust. The All-Father then hands Loki the mask, stating that as long as he chooses to work there with him, he’ll be honest about everything and earn the boy’s trust.

Atreus then takes the mask back to his room, where he begins to translate the ancient language written on it. Meanwhile, left searching for his son once again, Kratos decides to seek guidance from the Norns, the Norse goddesses of fate, hoping to learn what they know about the future. Accompanied by Mimir and Freya, he travels to Midgard, where they find the Norns living within a well. The mysterious goddesses toy with them, forcing each of the three to re-live painful memories, including Freya’s son Baldur’s death, Mimir’s fallen love (a Valkyrie named Sigrún), and Kratos losing Atreus to Asgard.

Once their trials are through, the Norns finally reveal three critical pieces of information to Kratos inside of their hideaway. First, they tell Kratos that he will one day die. Second, they explain that fate is not predetermined; rather, the future is determined only by people’s own choices (which just happen to be so predictable that the Norns can guess them far in advance). Most importantly, however, they predict that Heimdall plans to kill Atreus, which will lead Kratos to kill yet another god before Ragnarok brings the skies falling. As the group exits, Freya spots the noose Odin used to hang himself to learn more from the realm of the dead (which subsequently led to the world tree returning him to the land of the living a broken, mad man). Knowing the object has great attachment to Odin, Freya takes it, hoping to find use for it later.

Taunted by the Norns’ words, Kratos decides that they must kill Heimdall before he can strike. After sharing the Norns’ revelations with Brok and Sindri, Brok suggests that to counter Heimdall’s godly ability to predict and evade attacks, they must craft a ring with duplication powers, called “Draupnir”, into a spear that detonates its duplicates on command. With this plan in mind, Kratos, Mimir, Freya, and Brok journey to Svartalfheim to seek out the mystical “Lady of the Forge”, a mermaid capable of crafting such a weapon.

After reaching the Lady’s Forge, the mermaid begins the forging of the Draupnir Spear. After she finishes it, however, Brok tries to introduce himself to the Lady of the Forge, only to be met with no response. Brok quickly realizes that she cannot see him due to his soul being incomplete—a consequence of his past death and resurrection by Sindri. This revelation enrages Brok, who feels betrayed by his brother and the truth he has been kept from. Kratos consoles him, asking him to bless the spear as a skilled blacksmith.

As the group attempts to leave, Odin arrives in Svartalfheim, looking to speak Kratos, “father to father”. While Odin expresses that Kratos should be proud of his son, who the All-Father thinks is the key to peace among the realms, Kratos demands Atreus’s return, lest Odin meet the god of war he once was. Odin mocks Kratos’s godhood, taunting him that perhaps his own shortcomings are the reason his son ran from him before vanishing as quickly as he appeared.

Returning to Sindri’s house, Kratos rests and is haunted by another dream of Faye, this time holding an infant Atreus. The pair then take their son to a boat and row down the river, and when Kratos expresses his fear of failing his son, Faye assures him that “[they] are not [their] failures…they must be better.” With one last message from Faye to protect their son, Kratos awakens from the dream.

Meanwhile, Atreus finds himself punching a wall to focus, and opens up to Skjöldr about Heimdall’s relentless bullying of him, trying to provoke him into losing control. Atreus is determined to resist and control his emotions. Their conversation is interrupted when Thrúd joins them, informing Atreus that Odin wants to see him. Before Skjöldr leaves, he hands her a jar of milk curd for Sif, asking the girl to pass on his regards to her mother. As they return to Atreus’s room, he asks about the jar, and Thrúd explains that the milk curd is her mother’s favorite, and that it’s Skjöldr’s way of helping out. She bids Atreus farewell, promising to catch up with him later.

Afterward, Atreus heads to Odin’s study. As he approaches, he overhears Thor questioning his father about why the boy’s even allowed in Asgard, given that he was responsible for the deaths of Thor’s sons. Odin dismisses Thor’s concerns, telling him that he wouldn’t understand even if it were explained, accusing Thor of letting his wife cloud his judgment. Frustrated, Odin finally sends Thor away, remarking that he used to like him more when he was a drunk.

Atreus and Odin then examine and speak of the rift once again, with Odin sharing his obsession with knowing what exists beyond his realm of existence. The boy then shares his own discovery that the text written on the mask refers to a cold wind, which Atreus determines must mean Helheim. Odin agrees that it’s worth a look, and summons Thrúd to accompany him to the realm. Unfortunately, Odin reveals one final member of their party: Heimdall. As soon as the three are whisked off to Helheim, Heimdall announces that he has another task from the All-Father before vanishing.

Atreus and Thrúd then work together to search for the mast piece, arguing about their ancestors Odin and Kratos’ past actions. Soon, the pair come across a massive, chained wolf named Garm. Despite Thrúd’s warnings that the chains must be there for a reason, Atreus insists on freeing the wolf, believing that he should not be imprisoned. As loosen his chains, Garm awakens and breaks free before rushing off. Atreus and Thrúd then enter the chamber that Garm had been guarding, but find nothing inside, making Thrúd realize that their efforts have been for nothing. This realization causes her to regret trusting Atreus, knowing that they’ll face her grandfather’s wrath for releasing Garm. Her concerns are quickly validated when Heimdall arrives and condemns Atreus for setting Garm free. Heimdall then reveals that the wolf possesses the ability to open tears between realms, and will soon wreak havoc on reality itself. After a signature character lashing from Heimdall in which he tries to push Thrúd to her emotional limit, the trio return to Odin’s study. There, Heimdall informs the All-Father that he had found the item they secretly discussed, but chastises the young ones for failing to find a piece of the mask while freeing Garm.

Later, Odin speaks with Atreus privately, informing him that Garm is already causing chaos to spill out into the other realms. Knowing the realms outside of Asgard are no longer safe, Atreus tells Odin that he wishes to leave. He gives the mask and Ingrid back to the All-Father, who tells Atreus that he can return whenever he’s ready before whisking him away back home.

When Atreus returns to Sindri’s house, however, he finds the consequences of his actions have already reached his friend’s door, as Hel-Walkers are arriving through a tear opened by Garm and attacking. Atreus assists in holding off this attack before helping Freya close the tear while Kratos protects them. In the wake of the battle, Kratos finds his son and asks which name he should call him by. The boy simply rushes into his fathers arms and admits that he set the Hound of Hel loose, a thought that immediately terrifies Freya, Tyr, and Mimir. Kratos stands up for his son, however, knowing that while his son has made a mistake, they will fix it, together.

An upset Ratatoskr opens a path to Helheim, allowing Kratos and Atreus to head through alone to deal with the Garm situation. Inside Hel, the father and son chase the giant wolf while discussing their ultimate plan; either killing Garm or taming him. Atreus ultimately decides to distract the wolf while Kratos freezes his chains with his axe. This plan ultimately fails, leaving Kratos to make his own: attacking the wolf head-on the old-fashioned way. Unfortunately, the pair are forced to kill the out of control Garm, leaving Atreus guilt-ridden over letting him loose in the first place.

The pair go to leave the realm, but soon find that the wolf had somehow survived their encounter, and he attacks them once again. During the ensuing battle, Atreus climbs atop Garm and stabs him with his knife, transferring the soul that was trapped inside of it, resurrecting Fenrir inside of the massive wolf. Reunited with Fenrir, Atreus commands the wolf to use his new abilities to open a tear to go back home.

On their way out, Kratos and Atreus speak with Hraesvelgr, the Jötnar ruler of Helheim, who tasks them with closing the six tears remaining from Garm’s rampage. After returning to Sindri’s and speaking with the group, Kratos, Mimir, and Atreus travel to Vanaheim to meet with Freya to assist her brother Freyr. When they arrive, however, they find Freyr’s camp mysteriously empty. They’re soon met by Hildisvini, the human form of the very same boar Atreus shot outside of Freya’s hut years prior. Hildisvini informs them that Freyr has been captured by the Einherjar, and that the celestial wolves have vanished from the sky.

When Kratos and his son find the wolves, Atreus fires an arrow into the sky, fulfilling the prophecy of their shrine and giving the wolves something to chase again. This restores the balance of time, and the wolves leave them with a scepter that will allow them to control day and night. Kratos and Atreus then find Freya and Hildisvini, and the four work together to devise a plan to rescue Freyr. While searching for him, however, Kratos and Freya are confronted by Heimdall. Freya leaves Kratos to take care of the Aesir god, whose foresight has allowed him to never once be hit in combat. However, Kratos is able to strike him, eventually using the Draupnir Spear to overwhelm his predictive abilities and pierce Heimdall’s arm with one of the Spear’s duplicates. Despite being defeated in combat for the first time, Heimdall refuses the mercy Kratos offers, prompting Kratos to detonate the spear embedded in Heimdall’s arm, blowing it off entirely. Kratos informs him that this is his final warning to leave Atreus alone before walking away from the injured god. Heimdall, however, uses his powers to construct a new arm from the power of Bifröst and attacks Kratos once more with all of his rage and might. After an intense battle, Kratos gains the upper hand and loses control, placing his hands around Heimdall’s throat. Despite Mimir’s pleas reminding Kratos that this isn’t who he wants to be, the ghost of sparta returns to his old ways as he adds another god to his casualty list, killing Heimdall as he watches a void replace the purple shine that was once in his eyes.

With Fate now rewritten, a shaken Kratos continues on, reuniting with Atreus, Freya, and Hildisvini. Together, the group get the rescued but wounded Freyr back to safety. Leaving Vanaheim in Hildisvini and the others’ hands, Kratos, Atreus, Mimir, and Freya take Freyr back to Sindri’s house. There, Kratos reveals to them that he killed Heimdall, displaying Gjallarhorn as proof. Tyr then notes that Kratos has broken Odin’s deal of peace, and the All-Father will now be set on vengeance.

Hoping to distract Odin with his research on the mask, Atreus offers to return to Asgard––an idea Kratos quickly shoots down. Atreus assures his father he’ll be safe, and Mimir admits that it’s their best bet to buy them time. Kratos gives his son his blessing, and Atreus returns to Midgard with a special item from Sindri that will allow him one escape from any situation.

Arriving at his and his father’s home, Atreus finds not only Fenrir but Angrboda outside. Atreus introduces the two, and Angrboda gives him a marble labeled “Loki”—his very own. Atreus then asks Angrboda to take care of Fenrir while he’s away, and she agrees. He then tosses her his marble to keep with the others, before he speaks with Odin’s ravens, who whisk him away to Asgard.

There, Atreus finds Odin in his study, and the All-Father asks the boy if he knows anything about Heimdall’s death. Atreus feigns ignorance, implying that perhaps Thor found out that Heimdall struck Thrúd during their exploration in Helheim and took revenge. Atreus then reveals that he figured out he had mistranslated the text on the mask, and that it was actually referring to a “first breath”. Odin immediately recognizes this and gives the boy the mask and Ingrid back, instructing him to find Thor to go to the Niflheim realm.

Atreus enlists Thrúd’s help to find her father, and the pair quickly find Thor at the local tavern. A frustrated and disappointed Thrúd chastises her father for giving up and returning to the drink, and when Atreus tries to get Thor to go with him on a quest from Odin, a bar fight breaks out. Atreus and Thrúd then fight through the bar’s drunken patrons alongside a likewise intoxicated Thor. Eventually, Atreus helps Thrúd drag her father out of the bar, where she assures him that she and her mother love him, even though he messed up. Thor then grabs Mjölnir and accompanies Atreus to Nilfheim to search for the last mask piece.

The pair work together to find the final piece, and once it combines with the mask, Odin quickly arrives. Before the All-Father can finish expressing his excitement, however, Sif arrives with the Valkyries. She informs Odin that Forseti, the God of Justice, has proof that Kratos killed Heimdall. While Sif tries to have Atreus taken in on account of all of the negative events surrounding him, Odin refuses, stating that while Loki seems to be in the center of those events, he’s never the actual perpetrator. A frustrated Sif reminds Thor about their sons, Magni and Modi, fearing that Odin isn’t protecting the Aesir anymore. Thor then turns his mighty hammer on Atreus, expressing his disgust over the boy sleeping in the beds of his sons, who he killed, as well as turning his own father and daughter against him. Thor lifts Mjolnir, and as he moves to strike Atreus, the boy uses the item from Sindri to escape, pulling him away to the realm between realms.

Kratos retrieves Atreus, and they return to Sindri’s house. There, Atreus shows Tyr the mask, but admits that he didn’t get to use it to look into the rift. Tyr then proposes that they sneak into Asgard so Atreus can use the mask to peer into the rift so they can gain the knowledge they need to finally shatter the prophecy of Ragnarok. When the group realizes that they need a way into the heavily armored Asgard, Tyr heroically volunteers to pick up his spear to lead them there. Brok, however, quickly points out that Tyr never mentioned having a way into Asgard before now. While Tyr seems to have an answer for every question, Brok still doesn’t trust the god of war, pointing out that he referred to Atreus as “Loki”, which nobody else does.

Suddenly, Tyr pulls out a blade and stabs Brok, screaming at him as his facade fades away. At this moment, it’s revealed that the “Tyr” they had found was actually Odin in disguise all along. The All-Father then grabs Atreus, holding the knife to his throat while demanding that they hand over the mask. Unfortunately, Freyr is forced to throw Odin the mask so Atreus can break free. The All-Father then regretfully states that it’s “war after all” before vanishing in a swarm of his ravens.

The group rush over to Brok, who despite Freya’s best efforts, lays mortally wounded. As Sindri holds his brother, Brok uses his last moments to tell him that he learned of what he did at the Lake of Souls. Brok tells his brother to stop trying to save him and finally let go before dying in Sindri’s arms for a second, and final time. A broken Sindri then vanishes along with his brother.

As Freya, Freyr, and Atreus prepare their next move, a sullen Kratos hands over Gjallarhorn and tells the siblings that he and his son are done. Atreus likewise gives them the mask, and the father and son return to Midgard to head home where they hunt together like old times. During their hunt, however, Kratos tells his son that they can’t run from their pain forever. Atreus decides to look for Sindri, but when they find him at one of Brok’s forges, the dwarf meets them with reservation and anger. Atreus and Kratos try to apologize for unknowingly bringing Odin into his home, but Sindri refuses to hear it, cutting all ties with the father and son, ending their friendship.

Kratos and Atreus return to Freya, who’s decided that it's time to unite the realms against Odin, once and for all. Knowing that they’ll need to find the Fire Giant Surtr to breach the walls of Asgard, Kratos takes a seed from Ratatoskr to take Atreus to Muspelheim to search for his forge. Meanwhile, Freya, Freyr, Hildisvini, and surprisingly Sindri work separately to unite the armies of the other realms to build numbers for the forthcoming war.

Kratos and Atreus locate Surtr’s forge, but find the Fire Giant unwilling to talk to them. After fighting off the defenses he summons, Surtr admits that he knows why they’re searching for him, but he refuses to help them, knowing that Ragnarok will lead to his love, Sinmara’s death. Surtr then reveals that he holds Sinmara’s heart within his own chest, just as she holds his. Seeing Kratos’ blades, Surtr recognizes the primordial fire within them and decides to have Kratos try to plant them into Sinmara’s heart to transform him into Ragnarok without her involvement at all. The Fire Giant then takes them to the Spark of the World, where Niflheim and Muspelheim meet and where the first realms came into existence.

There, Kratos attempts Surtr’s plan, driving his Blades of Chaos into Sinmara’s heart. As Surtr falls lifeless off of a cliff, however, Odin’s Valkyries, Hrist and Mist, arrive and attack. Kratos and Atreus fight a mighty battle against Odin’s strongest warriors, pulling out all of the stops to eventually defeat them. In the wake of the battle, the pair hear Ragnarok call out to them, confirming Surtr’s plan’s success. With Ragnarok ready, Kratos and Atreus know all that’s left is blowing the Gjallarhorn to call the beast to war against Asgard.

Afterward, the father and son return to Midgard, where they make their final preparations for the war ahead. There, they find Freya, who has given the corrupted Valkyries new, corporeal forms with her Vanir magic, calling them “Shield Maidens”. Knowing that the one thing they need is an experienced general, Freya asks Kratos to lead their combined armies into battle. Kratos decides to sleep on the decision, retiring to his tent to rest during the calm before the storm. Mimir, meanwhile, reunites with his old love, Sigrun––now resurrected as a Shield Maiden.

As Kratos hangs up his weapons for the night, Atreus joins him in his tent and the pair fall asleep. In his final dream before Ragnarok, Kratos again dreams of his wife, Faye. This time, he relives the moments where she shared her wishes for what should be done with her remains after her death. As they mark the trees for her funeral pyre, Faye reveals her desire for her ashes to be spread on the highest peak in the realms, a place Kratos would later discover to be in her homeland of Jötunheim. During this tender moment, Faye teases Kratos about his desire to control his own destiny. Faye emphasizes that her preparations are about ensuring a better future for those she loves, even after she’s gone. She urges Kratos to open his heart to the world as he did to her, as doing so will help him find the strength to continue living in it.

After a final embrace with his wife, Kratos awakens from his dream and tells Atreus that it is time. Donning his weapons, Kratos exits his tent to inform Freya and Sigrun that he will lead them into battle as their general. Kratos then leads his allies into Tyr’s Temple, where he stands before them and tells his tale of entering the Norse realms. While Kratos initially came there to run from his past, he knows that he can hide no longer. Kratos then lifts Gjallarhorn to his lips, and sounds the call, opening the doors to all of the realms. The group then brace themselves before storming into Asgard.

Immediately, Odin’s forces try to cut off the other realms’ access to Asgard, hoping to prevent Ragnarok’s arrival. Freyr surprisingly calls out to his sword, which immediately returns to him. Atreus is shocked when he recognizes the sword, learning that Freyr was Ingrid’s previous owner. As the group fight on to stop Odin from destroying the Realm Towers, they notice other allies arriving to help them as well, including Angrboda and Fenrir, as well as Jörmungandr. Kratos notes that the world serpent looks different, and Mimir points out that he didn’t.

Follow them from Migdard. Atreus then reveals that the soul he put into the lifeless snake belonged to the giant Jörmungandr. Sindri then appears to assist in bringing down the dwarven-built War Machines just as Ragnarok finally arrives.

As Atreus sees the Midguardians who took refuge in Asgard being used as cannon fodder by Odin, he attempts to “close his heart to it” as taught by his father. Kratos then realizes his mistakes and calls off Ragnarok, telling his son that he should instead open his heart to their suffering, and that today, they will “be better”.

Kratos decides that instead of risking more innocent casualties, he and Atreus will sneak into Asgard through a flaw in Hrimthur’s Wall that Mimir informs them of. As Atreus escorts Sindri to crack open the flaw, however, he is stopped by Thrúd. While Atreus is relieved to see his friend is safe, she doesn’t meet him with the same warmth. Instead, Thrúd attacks Atreus, accusing him of being nothing but a killer, just like his father.

Atreus apologizes for his mistakes, focusing instead on the safety of Skjöldr and the other Midgardians. While Thrúd initially can’t believe her grandfather would sink so low as to use the refugees as cannon fodder, Sif arrives with Skjöldr to confirm the claims. Sif tells her daughter that Odin will sacrifice anyone to protect himself, including his own family. She then expresses her blessing that Thrúd become a Valkyrie, so long as she isn’t serving Odin.

After Sindri opens a path in the wall, Thrúd assists Atreus and Kratos, hoping to reach her father Thor before it’s too late. As they make their way towards the Great Lodge, the group watch Thor battle with the young Jörmungandr, with his final blow sending the serpent back in time. (Pretty cool, right?) Thor then turns his sights on Kratos, who trusts Thrúd with protecting his son and the mask.

Kratos and Thor then engage in another fierce battle, with the god of war pointing out that this time he’s “allowed to kill” Kratos. While Kratos fights with Thor physically, Mimir tries to break down Odin’s lies to reason with him. Eventually, Kratos bests Thor in battle, but instead of spilling more blood, he instead points out that their children call each other friends, so there’s nothing stopping them from putting aside their nature as destroyers to work together for peace.

As Thor realizes that he must finally do right by his daughter, Odin arrives to chastise him for lowering his weapon. Odin commands his son to stop thinking for himself and simply kill who tells him to, but a defeated Thor refuses. Suddenly, the All-Father snaps and stabs Thor, killing his own son for defying his command. Thrúd arrives just in time to see her father die at her grandfather’s hand, and as she tries to attack him, Odin throws Mjölnir at her, throwing her off into the distance.

An angered Atreus draws his bow, and prepares to fight alongside his father. The two then fight, side-by-side, to defeat Odin outside of the Great Lodge. Unfortunately, Odin soon gets the upper hand and incapacitates them, taunting them for their poor judgment. Suddenly, Odin himself falls to his knees, unable to move. Freya then appears, holding his noose and using its magical connection to him to choke her estranged husband. Announcing that he no longer has a hold on her, Freya spreads her Valkyrie wings before instructing Odin to bow before his queen. While Odin claims that he always loved her, Freya responds that he’s never loved anyone.

Suddenly, Odin casts a spell that causes the ground to fall beneath them. Atreus finds himself alone, noticing the rift Odin was obsessing over nearby. He grabs the mask, which reacts to the rift, just as Odin appears before him. Odin puts down his weapon and tells Loki to put on the mask and look into the rift. Kratos then appears as well, leaving the decision up to his son. Atreus, knowing the knowledge contained in the rift would be too powerful in anyone’s hands, let alone Odin’s, snaps the mask in two. In the mask’s destruction, the rift absorbs its remains and finally closes.

A bewildered Odin screams at Atreus in anger, picking up his weapon once again and launching another battle. This time, Freya joins Kratos and Atreus, unleashing the anger and frustration she’s held for the All-Father for decades. In the wake of this final battle, Odin falls at the hands of Kratos, Atreus, and Freya. As Odin tries to blame Atreus for the fall of his family and his kingdom, the boy is quick to point out that all of the All-Father’s losses were due to his own actions. Atreus then tries to reason with Odin, telling him that he can choose to be better. The All-Father disagrees, however, stating that he won’t stop until he knows what his future holds.

With no other choice, Atreus takes a marble and incants the same spell he used to release Fenrir’s soul. Odin’s soul then leaves his body, entering the marble, which Atreus gives to Kratos. Knowing that he cannot rob Freya the choice between Odin’s life or death, Kratos hands it to her. Freya subsequently hands the marble back to Atreus, knowing that whatever happens to Odin will not make her whole. Suddenly, Sindri appears and grabs the marble from Atreus, placing it on a surface before taking his hammer and smashing it. With this action, the soul of Odin is finally destroyed, and with the All-Father killed, Sindri takes his vengeance for his brother’s death.

After Sindri vanishes, Ragnarok appears again, bringing destruction upon Asgard. Luckily, Angrboda arrives just in time with Fenrir, who opens a tear to exit the realm. Freyr is forced to stay behind to hold back Ragnarok, much to Freya’s dismay. She says her unfortunate goodbye to her brother before heading through the tear with Kratos and Atreus. Suddenly, Atreus spots Ingrid on the ground, and rushes to pick her up, pushing Kratos back as he tries to stop him. At this point, Ragnarok fulfills the prophecy and destroys the realm of Asgard.

Suddenly, Kratos finds himself bathed in a white light, where he hears his wife’s voice once again. Faye comforts Kratos, telling him not to be afraid, and to instead follow the path he chooses from now on. Sometime later, Atreus is awoken back in Midgard. He then finds Thrúd and Sif, safe and sound, who he offers his condolences to. Atreus then shares his gratitude with all of his surviving allies before finding Angrboda.

Suddenly, Kratos joins them, and the girl shows them to something that’s long been hidden from both of them; a shrine depicting the actions of the Giant Laufey. In it, it’s revealed that Faye had destroyed Loki’s shrine, ensuring that her husband and son would create their own destinies. Atreus then reveals that as a Giant, he must go searching alone for the other lost souls that still remain. Kratos knows that his son is ready, telling him that while “Loki may go”, Atreus remains in his heart. The two then share a hug before Atreus leaves with Angrboda to begin his own journey.

Kratos then looks at another shrine, seeing his own fate as a celebrated figure amongst those in his current realm. Knowing now that he has a path ahead of him he never imagined, Kratos works alongside his allies in Freya and Mimir to rebuild what was destroyed in the wake of Ragnarok. Before anything, however, Kratos travels to Svartalfheim to attend the funeral of one of the few friends his fate allowed him: Brok. Kratos solemnly places Brok’s body inside of a boat just before Sindri arrives to give his brother one final goodbye. Kratos and Sindri then send Brok off, before the latter lights one of Freya’s arrows aflame. Freya then fires her bow, which ignites the boat carrying Brok’s body on the water.

As Brok’s viking funeral commences, Kratos attempts to console Sindri. Unfortunately, the dwarf still wants nothing to do with the ghost of Sparta, simply vanishing between the realms. Sometime later, Kratos and Mimir receive an invitation from an unknown party, giving them directions to a location in Asgard where they’ll find the entrance to a section of Valhalla: the famed hall where the Valkyries took fallen warriors to become Einherjar. This section contains a gauntlet that Valhalla uses to draw from the memories of those who died in combat, allowing them to come to terms with the lives they lived. Stripped of his equipment and abilities, Kratos attempts to fight through the offenses created by Valhalla, but is quickly overwhelmed and defeated in combat.

Suddenly, Kratos awakens back on the shores of Valhalla, where he’s surprisingly joined by Freya, who’s accompanied by her Shield Maidens. Freya accosts Kratos for marching into Valhalla without speaking to her, confused as to how he even found it in the first place. Kratos shows her the invitation he received, asking her to help him return inside. Freya informs Kratos that the only reason he and Mimir can enter Valhalla is because they’ve died, something she has yet to do. Before she leaves, Freya reminds Kratos of a decision she asked him to make: to become the realms’ new God of War. Kratos admits that he hopes his journey through Valhalla will help him make up his mind.

Armed with the knowledge of Valhalla’s rules, Kratos goes back into the gauntlet alone, but is now able to have a fighting chance. Kratos then battles through projections of his memories of the realms, eventually finding himself before a throne: his very own from the time he was God of War. Suddenly, a mysterious voice begins to speak to him, assuring Kratos that they have not “forgotten the debt [they] owe [him]”. Suddenly, Kratos awakens yet again back outside upon the shores. Freya recovers him and informs him that sometimes one can only go as far as Valhalla, or their own mind, allows them to. This is a valid story point and definitely not just an excuse to make the DLC a roguelike.

Back inside the gauntlet, Kratos battles further than his previous attempt, eventually seeing another manifestation from his past: the statues of the three judges of the dead that he encountered in his homeland during his search for Pandora. When he reaches his old throne once again, he hears the mysterious voice congratulate him. Kratos then lifts Mimir’s head on his hip to discover that it’s been replaced by another he used to carry around: that of Helios, the Greek god of the sun. Kratos reaches the giant chains of the three judges before re-living yet another memory of his viciousness. In it, Kratos is back in the Chamber of Sacrifice, where he was forced to sacrifice a living Athenian soldier to simply progress on his journey. This time, Kratos puts Helios in the cage between the burners before activating the machine to turn them in on each other. However, just before the burners turn to sacrifice Helios, he is replaced by Mimir once again. Kratos rushes to help his friend escape from the cage, eventually breaking it open just as the burners are about to roast Mimir. An explosion then throws Kratos and Mimir into an abyss, where they fall towards a swirling vortex. Just in time, Sigrun arrives to catch them, her Valkyrie wings aflame due to her not belonging there. Sigrun is able to open a portal back to the shores of Valhalla, rescuing her love, Mimir, as well as Kratos. Although they are safe, Mimir apologizes to Sigrun, who assures him that she’ll heal. Kratos thanks her for her help, and the two acknowledge their shared debt to each other.

Kratos and Mimir head back inside the gauntlet, fighting through to reach the Chamber of Sacrifice once again (encountering a Cyclops on the way). Helios replaces Mimir once again, but this time, instead of placing him inside the cage to be burned, Kratos activates the machine and enters it, sacrificing himself. Suddenly, Kratos is transported to a new location yet again, where he finds Mimir. Kratos turns to find the sender of the invitation: Tyr, the real one this time. Tyr consoles Kratos about his decision, revealing that he himself came to Valhalla to make his own decision about becoming the God of War, gesturing to a massive door that holds Kratos’s answers. Stating that he is unready, however, Tyr dons his spear and shield to spar with Kratos, knowing that if the Spartan is able to defeat him in combat, then his mind is ready for what’s next. Kratos defeats Tyr, who allows him through the doorway. As Kratos tries to enter, however, he finds himself overwhelmed and awakens back outside on the shore.

Kratos and Mimir re-enter the gauntlet, finding the Throne Room now changed. Inside of it, Kratos watches a well project the memory of the pact he made with Ares to protect him from the Barbarians. Continuing on, Helios returns to Mimir’s place, and Kratos faces more enemies from his past, including a Siren. After Mimir returns and Kratos fights another victorious battle with Tyr, another well appears, Tyr proceeds to help Kratos accept the decision he made to sell his soul to Ares, as it was the only way he could protect his people at the time. With this to reflect on. Kratos makes the conscious decision to return to the shores of Valhalla to think.

Entering back into the gauntlet, the Throne Room well shows Kratos his memory of removing Helios’ head. The god then chastises Kratos for this action blocking out the sun and throwing the world into ruin. After fighting a memory of one of Thor’s sons, as well as a Minotaur, Kratos battles Tyr yet again. After another success, Tyr shows Kratos a well displaying his journey to restore the sun to the sky, before he had to kill Helios, showing that Kratos’ legacy is a complicated one, and that goodness isn’t a quality, but something he always needs to practice. You’ll never believe what happens next: Kratos returns to the shores of Valhalla and enters the gauntlet once more.

In the Throne Room, the well shows Kratos the memory of Pandora, as well as his opening of Pandora’s Box, which released all of the Evils into the Gods of Olympus. After a battle with Thor’s other son, as well as one final match with Tyr, Kratos is presented with the final well. In it, Tyr shows Kratos the sacrifice he made to return Hope into his homeworld. While Kratos lived on after his sacrifice, so did the hope within him, which Tyr theorizes he even brought back to the Norse realms. Tyr tells Kratos that Hope and Evil, Good and Bad, exist in everyone, and it's up to the individual to choose which path to travel.

Now ready to walk through the door, Kratos opens it to find….himself, just after he took the throne of God of War vacated by Ares. Realizing now that he’s more than he was then, Kratos takes a seat upon the throne of God of War, knowing that if he can be a better man, he can be a better god. Kratos places Mimir’s head on his armrest, telling his friend that now… he’d like to just sit for a while. And with that, we end Kratos’s story, coming full circle after nearly twenty years. Through nine games, three mythologies, and two voice actors, we’ve joined the Ghost of Sparta on one of the greatest journeys in gaming history; but now his comes to a close as perhaps another is just beginning. Whatever the future holds for the God of War franchise, I “Loki” look forward to it. Eh? Hey everybody! Thanks for watching, and a huge shoutout to all the patrons and channel members for their incredible support! Also, another big thanks to Factor, for making this video possible. Remember to use code SUGGESTIVE50 at FACTOR75 dot com, or at the link in the description, to get 50% off your first box plus 20% off your next month of orders. If you enjoyed this content, drop a comment below and let me know what video game series you want me to cover next. Don’t forget to like, subscribe, and hit that notification bell so you never miss a new video. This has been Suggestive Gaming, and now you’re in the know.