I am confused of how January's monthly event works. I keep getting the big wolf but it only does a story and no options to d9 anything. Am I doing something wrong?

No, you are not. That one introduces the story. You should scroll down because sometimes there is an event action you can take, to earn coins.

Currently, I had this for the January Event.

First thing that happened, Fenrir in chains asking for food from your stash. After that, the second type of event message appeared, telling that Fenrir breaks out of the chains. Then, I had Loki asking me to defeat all three of his children (Fenrir, Hel, and the third one I can't remember the name of). I did that, but when Loki appeared again, the explore thing glitched so I don't know what happens then.

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The thing I don't know yet is if the story slowly develops through doing actions or not.

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or what the gold link does.

I heard you use them at january 6