This is the true story of Ulrig Hausmarten, according to what he had read before hearing the truth from his own lips. He had been born in a little fishing village, in the far north, the icy north. Where the fjords are green, the glaciers white, the maidens pink, and the dolphins play among the frozen corpses of dead boys. (‘Twas the custom of the barbarians to permit only the first born son of any litter to survive.) As a second born son, Ulrig had been slated for death from the moment of his birth, but an overdoting mother, Hegworst, had hid him from the High Shaman and his shamanic investigators, whose sole purpose in life was to rigorously enforce the custom. So Hegworst hid the infant Ulrig wrapped only in a thin reindeer hide in a secret ice cave not far from the village in a secret place that only she knew. There she kept him year after year, bringing him food secretly, often her own, seeing as there was very little to spare in the village. The other villagers, especially her husband, Brutusus, had their suspicions, but did nothing, said nothing. It was the custom to hide non-first born sons in secret ice caves, sort of a hobby, all the women were doing it. Often they bumped into each other on the way to feeding their secret boys secretly, and then they had embarrassed conversations with each other. For instance, one would say, “O Norvegah, fancy bumping into you in this dark and gloomy and secret place…”. And the other would reply, “yes Hegworst, what a peculiar coincidence…” and then they would giggle and dart away secretly like frightened squirrels to their hungry encaverned offspring. Ennn.n..n…nyhows, Hegworst had an advantage over the other barbarian wimmen, in that her husband, Brutusus, was very rich. He had a lot of fish, mackerel and kipper, dried, in barrels behind the main hut. It stank like buggery. He also had a lot of reindeer hides, seal’s teeth, and dried dolphin penis. Was he a good hunter, or fisherman? No. Was he a wealthy merchant? No. Was he the Imperior? No. Well what then? Well, he was descended from a long line of bezerker bards, as had been his father before him, and his before him. He was also very big and strong and he liked bashing people in the face for a joke. He especially like biting the wimmen. Everyone was scared shitless of him. So yes, he was the King. Ennnyways, thanks to Brutusus’s vast wealth, Hegworst was able to bribe the smartest druids from the Druid Academy to secretly tutor the growing Ulrig in his ice cavern everything that he needed to know, including how to speak, eat, and wipe his bum. Also maths, geography, and all that stuff. Also how to fight, martial arts, secret psychic powers, kickboxing, esquimaux nose-twisting, the works. And then, at age 25 Hegworst died. Beaten to death by Brutusus in a drunken rage at the breakfast herring not being salty enough. So all support to Ulrig suddenly stopped, he had no visible or invisible means of support. By then he was a brave and sporty sort of lad, for a barbarian, with a big bushy lousy moustache, which he always kept covered with a delicate lace spiderweb nose-skirt—one of many dozen provided for him by the late Hegworst over the years. He was big and wide, just like his father Brutusus, with muscles the size of rockmelons, pectorals the size of big mushy rotten wobbly rockmelons, and toenails long and sharp like knives. So when Hegworst died, Ulrig got together with a few of his buddies, other non-first borners, and they all pooled their wealth, which with Ulrig’s contribution was considerable, given all the stuff that the late Hegworst had engiven to him over the years. and a whole lot of second and third brothers that had been hiding in ice caves for years, came out of their hiding places, blinking in the unaccustomed brightness. And they built a longboat, which they named in the old way the Relentless Prick, got a whole lot of stuff together like swords and shields and bows and arrows and food and water, And then they quickly built another ship, and another, and another, and another, to take all the second brothers and third and fourth and even fifth brothers with them, to colonise the Great Southern Land in the name of the Barbarian King Brutusus the Brutal. And eventually they had thousands of hairy barbarians, and their wives and girlfriends, and many many bleating shitting goats, and some chickens, all loaded up onto forty five longboats. At the docks, their was a brief ceremony, the shaman did a little dance. The stench was indescribable, and the noise, as they said goodbye. And so off they sailed, Ulrig leading the way, standing tall and proud in the prow of the Relentless Prick… behind him sounded the splish splosh splash of sixty oars times sixty ships times sixty strokes times sixty seconds, that was a lot of splashing I can tell you. Some died when they ran into dragons at the edge of the world where all the waters pour off into space. There's so much steam you can't see very much, but the scientists say that if you try very hard, and if you have the right equipment, and if you are a total jackass, you can look into the steam and your eyeballs will boil and your whole brain will explode. Some died of scurvy, some of savage beatings, some of boredom. But most survived, and they made their greasy barbaric way through tropic waters. Before heading inland, they slowly wound their barbaric way up the coast, ravaging and pillaging with a laconic, bored sort of attitude that said, “I’d really rather be drinking mead”. One hundred and forty two miles north of Codgutter’s Cove, the horde stopped at a place called Warrawarra in the Uggabugga tongue, where they made camp their tents stretching across three hillsides and two valleys. It was noisy, smelly, restless. And so off he went, he and his handpicked, into the unknown jungle. Copyright © S R Schwarz 2007. All rights reserved.
And so, in the year of 765, Ulrig Hausmarten, age 25, pressures of life weighing heavy on his soul, left his little fishing village where the fjords are green and the dolphins gambol, took to the ocean wave with an ambitious plan—to explore the unexplored vastnesses of the vast Southern Ocean, more specifically, to attempt to find the Great Southern Land and colonise it as a Barbarian colony, where all the second, third, fourth and fifth brothers could live in peace and harmony, without having to worry about being killed at birth.
Two years later the longboats were sighted rounding the headlands of the Cape Dork Peninsula---the northenmost tip of the the Imperium--- they made landfall at Codgutter’s Cove, as had been foretold.
At Warrawarra Hausmarten the Barbarian leader left the encampment on a secret mission. Taking only six handpicked men with him, he told his barbaric lieutenants only that he had had secret information of a powerful new weapon, and that speed was of the essence, and that if they were successful it would make the invasion that much easier, and to trust in the Gods.
