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In-universe
The Sword of Summer
- Magnus walking right up to Surt and cutting his nose off.
- Sam embracing her nature as a shape-shifter, and going toe-to-toe with Fenris Wolf as a lioness is amazing.
- Magnus using Jack to rebind Fenris Wolf and banish Surt back to Muspelheim all in one swoop.
The Hammer of Thor
- Loki's truly magnificent Batman Gambit that is pretty much all of Book 2. It takes a special kind of devious mastermind to make people dance to your tune when they know they're being manipulated, and can't do anything about it.
- Sam proving herself to be The Determinator, and resisting Loki's attempt to kill her via mind control.
- Hearth and Sam were stuck in Utgard-Loki's hall for a full day, and survived seven murder attempts.
The Ship of the Dead
- Alex sculpting a warrior out of clay and bringing them to life.
- Magnus using his power of Frey to disarm all of the zombie soldiers (and his comrades) in his shouting range.
- The amazing callback to the first modern mythology novel Rick has ever written with Annabeth saying Percy and his half-sister have a lot in common when he mention how she drools a lot. It's this as well as Funny and Heartwarming.
- Sam goes through the whole book, with all its dangers, battles, and hardships, in the middle of fasting. Magnus mentions multiple times how impressive she is.
- Made better if you know a bit more about Ramadan, namely that there's a stipulation that you are allowed to break fast if you are sick or if it will harm you. Sam could eat if she truly needed to, but something as simple as the threat of Norse apocalypse isn't enough for her fast to endanger her.
- She also Took a Level in Badass, and flat-out refuses to let Loki command her.
- Magnus defeats Loki in an insult duel by by listing the valiant deeds of his friends and chosen family, and telling Loki that no matter how big of an army he has, he will still be alone.
- What's more... Loki truly is alone. He looks back, and who isn't there? Sigyn - the one person out of the entire world who had never turned their back on Loki. The one who intentionally subjected herself to a punishment that would not be out of place in Tartarus.
- Blitzen and his expand-o-ducks against an army of draugr and giants, crossing over with Crowning Moment of Funny.
