Vikings is the modern name given to seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway, and Sweden). From the late 8th to the late 11th centuries, raided, pirated, traded, and settled throughout parts of Europe.

They also voyaged as far as the Mediterranean, North Africa, Volga Bulgaria, the Middle East, and North America. In some countries, they raided and settled; this period is popularly known as the Viking Age. The term "Viking" also commonly includes the inhabitants of the Scandinavian homelands as a collective whole. The Vikings profoundly impacted the early medieval history of Scandinavia, the British Isles, France, Estonia, and Kievan Rus'.

Expert sailors and navigators aboard their characteristic longships, Vikings established Norse settlements and governments in the British Isles, the Faroe Islands, Iceland, Greenland, Normandy, and the Baltic coast, as well as along the Dnieper and Volga trade routes across modern-day Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine, where they were also known as Varangians. The Normans, Norse-Gaels, Rus' people, Faroese, and Icelanders emerged from these Norse colonies. The Vikings also voyaged to Constantinople, Iran, and Arabia.

They were the first Europeans to reach North America, briefly settling in Newfoundland (Vinland). While spreading Norse culture to foreign lands, they simultaneously brought home slaves, concubines, and foreign cultural influences to Scandinavia, influencing genetic and historical development. During the Viking Age, the Norse homelands were gradually consolidated from smaller kingdoms into three larger kingdoms: Denmark, Norway, and Sweden.

The Vikings spoke Old Norse and made inscriptions in runes. They followed the Old Norse religion for most of the period but later became Christians. The Vikings had their laws, art, and architecture. Most Vikings were also farmers, fishermen, craftsmen, and traders. Popular conceptions of the Vikings often strongly differ from the complex, advanced civilization of the Norsemen that emerges from archaeology and historical sources. A romanticized picture of Vikings as noble savages emerged in the 18th century; this developed and became widely propagated during the 19th-century Viking revival.

Perceived views of the Vikings as violent, piratical heathens or as intrepid adventurers owe much to conflicting varieties of the modern Viking myth that had taken shape by the early 20th century. Current popular representations of the Vikings are typically based on cultural clichés and stereotypes, complicating modern appreciation of the Viking legacy. These representations are rarely accurate—for example, there is no evidence that they wore horned helmets, a costume element that first appeared in Wagnerian opera.

Scandinavian Scotland refers to the period from the 8th to the 15th centuries during which Vikings and Norse settlers, mainly Norwegians and, to a lesser extent, other Scandinavians and their descendants, colonized parts of what is now the periphery of modern Scotland. Viking influence in the area commenced in the late 8th century, and hostility between the Scandinavian earls of Orkney and the emerging thalassocracy of the Kingdom of the Isles, the rulers of Ireland, Dál Riata and Alba, and intervention by the Crown of Norway were recurring themes.

Scandinavian-held territories included the Northern Isles of Orkney and Shetland, the Hebrides, the islands of the Firth of Clyde, and associated mainland territories, including Caithness and Sutherland. The historical record from Scottish sources is weak, with the Irish annals and the later Norse sagas, of which the Orkneyinga saga is the principal source of information, sometimes contradictory. However, modern archaeology is beginning to provide a broader picture of life during this period.

Various competing theories have addressed the early colonization process. However, the Northern Isles were the first to be conquered by Vikings and the last to be relinquished by the Norwegian Crown. Thorfinn Sigurdsson's rule in the 11th century included expansion well into north mainland Scotland, and this may have been the zenith of Scandinavian influence. The obliteration of pre-Norse names in the Hebrides and Northern Isles and their replacement with Norse ones was almost total. However, the emergence of alliances with the native Gaelic speakers produced a powerful Norse–Gael culture that had wide influence in Argyll, Galloway, and beyond.

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Scottish influence increased from the 13th century on. In 1231, an unbroken line of Norse earls of Orkney ended, and Scottish nobles since held the title. An ill-fated expedition by Haakon Haakonarson later in that century led to the relinquishing of the islands of the west to the Scottish Crown. In the mid-15th century, Orkney and Shetland were also transferred to Scottish rule. The negative view of Viking activities held in popular imagination notwithstanding, Norse expansion may have been a factor in the emergence of the Gaelic kingdom of Alba, the forerunner of modern Scotland, and the trading, political, cultural, and religious achievements of the later periods of Norse rule were significant.

According to reliable historical evidence, a small number of Vikings had black—or brown skin. For centuries, dark-skinned people willingly traveled to Scandinavia or were forcibly taken there as slaves. Over time, some assimilated with the Vikings through farming, marriage, combat, and other cultural factors.

Born and raised in Edinburgh, Scotland, Rebecca Nordstrom is an African-Caribbean human woman born on August 22, 1989. With her mother and father practicing the Viking culture, she surrounded herself with active people who hunted, fished, and fought all day. Particularly, her parents were both farmers. However, her father was an engineer who learned from him and made a living off the land. Being the only daughter out of three children, she was usually the youngest.

Many females in the Viking culture tuned with the Aether were mistakenly called Volva, or more accurately Völva, which means “wand-wed” or “staff-carrier” in Old Norse. This staff was an essential attribute of the Volva, who were considered seeresses, shamans, and practitioners of Seidr magic.

Her mother, a Volva herself, encouraged Rebecca to tap into her sensitivity to Aether. At age 11, she was already mastering Seidr magic.

With two strapping brothers that enjoyed physical activities, she fit right in. And just like her brothers, she had a knack for engineering and even earned a scholarship to travel abroad at age 15. With her skills, she was given a full scholarship from a benefactor at her local high school. Her recruiter was no other than the Aethereal Queen, Lycka Benibara.

Rebecca’s engineering skills, mastery of Seidr magic, and sensitivity of the Aether made her a perfect candidate for the seventh heavens to make her part of the Empyrean as Iota Crucis, the rarest out of the seven.

Under the careful tutelage of her former mentor, the former Iota Crucis, she had no problems fitting in and learning a lot. With a high IQ and natural superhuman strength, she became naturally tired and bored. Even when she was a child, she always acted like this. Rebecca is one of the people who don’t take things too seriously and would usually make jokes out of every situation, even at the expense of others. Always brash, arrogant, and somewhat cynical, it usually rubs serious people wrong. Especially when they have no idea who she is as a person. But deep down, she truly cares about her friends and family but has a light nihilistic way of showing it with her dark and dry comedy.

In two years, the seventh heavens recognized Rebecca as Iota Crucis. Her family knew about the Crux since their family is deeply rooted in their affiliation, was the talk of her hometown. Her father, a proud Viking, gifted her daughter with her own battleax, Night Shade. Forged from purple slab stone, bone steel with the blood of a lesser earth Dragon passed on from her family.

With this battleax, she can cause earthquakes, volcanoes, and even sandstorms with a mighty swing. As big and ominous as this weapon is, the true nature of weapon is not intentionally used for melee combat. Relying on her skills as a Volva, it’s more of a magic wand than a blunt weapon. But it doesn’t mean she can’t kill something or someone with it.

While she’s not creating natural disasters with her battleax, she is usually in her office creating inventions with her engineering skills or a nice brew of homemade mead. From time to time, she creates inventions that help her townspeople and her family. But most of her inventions are created and used for heaven. Comically and sadly, she uses the lesser members of the Crux as guinea pigs and assistants. To combat this, Lycka would give the poor girls “extra credit” for evenings lasting three months without quitting.

The jury is still out on whether or not the seventh heavens will approve this…