God Of War released just over a week ago now, meaning that many players have already reached the end of Kratos and Atreus’ journey and have learned its secrets. There’s no shortage of end game content and optional bosses to keep us busy now that the adventure is over, but many are already asking, “what’s next?” Well, we have some theories on what comes next for our father and son duo, but if you haven’t finished the game, close your browser now because there are big spoilers ahead.

If you haven’t already seen it, our article speculating on God of War when it was first announced in the fall can be found here. Primarily focusing on Norse mythology, it does detail a few things that we’ll mention here. This is your final spoiler warning.

For starters, it’s important to know that the Norse creation and destruction stories are cyclical. They have happened before, will happen again, and there’s no end in site. It’s the way that it has been and the way that it will always be. But now that Kratos has arrived in the land of the Nine Realms, it’s possible that his involvement could alter the cycle enough, so that Ragnarok never reaches it’s previous conclusions.

During Ragnarok, the children of Loki, or in our case, Atreus, are responsible for much of the world’s destruction. Jormungandr, the world serpent, and Thor slay each other after bringing down a great deal of destruction. Hel releases the dead from Helheim back into the land of the living. And worse, the giant wolf, Fenrir, breaks free and swallows the world whole along with Odin, Tyr, and many other Asgardian deities.

But in our God of War, young Atreus has already encountered Jormungandr. In a brief piece of dialogue, Mimir mentions that Thor and Jormungandr were involved in such an intense battle, that it blasted the world serpent back into the past. If God of War is to stick as closely as it has to mythology in this series as it has, it means that Atreus met his snake of a son, long before he met his giantess wife, Angrboda. This also means that we’re likely to meet a few giants who hid away and escaped Odin’s fury.

To my disappointment, we did not get to explore Asgard, Vanaheim, or Svartlfheim in the first part of this rebooted series. Svartlfheim is the land of the “dark elves”, or dwarves. Based on the rest of the content, I’m surprised that Svartlfheim was omitted, but we’ll surely see it later on. More importantly, is Asgard and Vanaheim with the Aesir and Vanir reside respectively.

With Asgard and Vanaheim open, it means we’ll be diving head first into even more mythology. Thanks to pop culture, Odin and Thor are household names, but there are plenty powerful characters that could give Kratos and Loki quite the challenge.

Hyrrokin is a giantess known for her strength that surpasses even Thor. Nidhogg is a dragon large enough to chew on the roots of Yggdrasil. Surtr, an unprecedentedly large flame giant who predates the gods themselves. And of course, Heimdall, who has absolutely witnessed Kratos and Atreus’ journey and kept Odin aware. It can only be so long before the Asgardian all-stars begin to arrive.

But what if God of War opened the door for a bit of mythology-mix-and-match? Deep inside his vault, players discover Tyr’s lore panel that he did everything he could to hide from Odin. Tyr learned how travel to other realms with their own famous mythologies, including Greek, Egyptian, and Japanese. From a production standpoint, it’s an obvious nod to worlds that the creators have in mind for future stories. Perhaps, even a part of this story.

If Tyr went through so much effort to hide his secret from Odin, it’s only because he knew that Odin would abuse the ability to travel between worlds.  Knowing both that Santa Monica loves surprising players at that Kratos has a history of leaving worlds in ruin, could it be possible that this new God Of War series is not about Ragnarok? What if this first tale was only a soft introduction to ease us into a far grander story. Should Odin uncover Tyr’s secret, he’ll surely set out to become the Allfather of all realms, even if it means traveling to Egypt and hunting down the jackal Anubis.

At this point, all that any one can do is speculate. Even when the franchise was contained to Greece, the scale of the God Of War games have been tremendous. The newest game has only expanded upon that and all we can do now is wait and see how much bigger it gets.

Have any theories of your own? Let us know!