Ant Lions

Waking of Sunday, June 25, 2017

Ant Lions

I waited all day on that platform for the Tower’s shadow to find me. Firing a few test shots—and hoping Kass wouldn’t mind me taking potshots at him—I hoped this wouldn’t require a Phrenic Bow, because I was fresh outta those....

But when the shadow crossed over me, a single arrow in the general direction of the sun turned out to be sufficient. Up out of the ground rumbled the Sasa Kai Shrine. A Modest Test of Strength.

I nailed it. Even forgetting until about halfway through that I was still wearing my Warm Doublet instead of the much stronger Champion’s Tunic.

Yes I think I am definitely feeling more confident in my combat skills.

After that I continued my circumnavigation of the mountain, and found a rich weapon cache under a big prominent hill! I took the rupees, the Opal and the Bomb Arrows, but I left the rest for later, and blocked up the entrance again, as I had first found it.

As I continued my trek just below the frost line, I briefly wondered whether my course would take me straight through the mountain range, for there was a lower spot that seemed as if it might cut straight across, and spit me out somewhere near Satori Mountain.

It was a deep canyon of red, windswept stone—felt like I was suddenly in Sedona—and it cut a great, penetrating swath of blank space into my map. Guess it belonged to a different Sheikah Tower.

I stayed high, as usual, but I was dreadfully curious about the layers below me, for there were many. And there seemed to be a road or path down at the twisting bottom, and it was lined along both sides with small stone frog statues.

This was so unusual....

But I still stayed high. The canyon rock at my level formed immense natural bridges and domes and I contented myself with a bird’s eye view.

One giant hole opened up in front of me into which a ringing curtain of sand was gently spilling, like a gossamer veil in the sunlight. I peered into it; a much more complex arrangement of the frog statues seemed to adorn a wider space below. What did it mean....

I got too close and fell in—I threw up my paraglider and scrambled to turn and get purchase on the stone....!

I stopped about six feet from the bottom.

Well, as long as I was here....

I let go and hit the ground—and some ruckus started up.

It was a Yiga Nest. Three Yiga Archers poofed in and out all around me, laughing and taking shots—but at least they stayed still longer than their blade-wielding brethren. I cut them down, and took their bananas, their rupees and their.... Duplex Bows. Interesting weapons. Two arrows at a shot. Can’t beat the Forest Dweller’s Bow or the Lynel’s Bow, though.

When the area was quiet, I studied the frog statues—the faces of the ones up here had been covered by flags bearing a perversely inverted Sheikah Eye. Yiga. I looked to the end of the canyon—for it seemed to end just right there—and found what I believed to be a door in the stone.

But I could not open it.

Not that I was quite so sure I wanted to.

David turned up again, froze for a heartbeat or two, and went into a transport of excitement. “I know where you are!” he said.

And then he turned to me. “Andrea.”

“Yeah?”

“This is about Zelda.” It was the preface he had designed to alert me to when he really was talking about Zelda, as there had been occasions where I’d heard him say snatches of some completely unrelated things that I’d mistaken for spoilers.

“Okay?”

“This is the part that I have most wanted to see you play.” He was positively aquiver with anticipation.

“Ah-huh....”

I still couldn’t open the door, though.

“What, do I need to walk up through the entire canyon first?”

David helpfully just shrugged.

I walked down the path in the canyon a bit—killed a couple more Yiga Archers—and came to a large platform with a sign in front of it: “Offer a Glowing Blue Stone” it said, or something like it. Would this open the door?

There were four Luminous Stone deposits surrounding it. I blew one up with my bomb, and accidentally landed a fragment right onto the pedestal.

And.... a shrine burst out of the ground.

The Sho Dantu Shrine.

A little too much fun with high explosives in that one.

The door still didn’t open, though. But I was not concerned. I climbed my way back onto the sandy natural domes and arches above it, and continued into the high canyon.

I waited out a Blood Moon and soon came to another giant hole in the ground, this one much more conspicuous—at its center was a deep pit, with sheer, wavy Sedona-rock sides. The perfectly round mouth of it was paved with flat stones above, and lined with hanging flags and draperies below the edge. What did this mean? Was this a way in?

I felt amazingly stupid as I tried to get a better look, stepped too close again and once more fell off the edge.

And again, I scrambled to cling onto the wall before I hit the floor, tasting a great impending danger this time.

But when I finally psyched myself up to let go.... nothing happened. No Yiga Clansmen jumped out at me.

There was another stone door on one side like the one back in the canyon. I was certain some diabolical passage under the rock connected them. What was in there?

And then there was that giant pit in the middle.

David had tried jumping in it.

Eh, I’d try it too.

I floated down for a bit, fell, and the screen went black. Would there be a dungeon?

There wasn’t. I just came to back on the edge above.

A note: don’t jump in the Yiga Pit; it’s just a hole to nowhere and you die. Makes me wonder about that hole where the Gerudo Tower stood, actually....

Well there was nothing I could do here, and so climbed out through the snow, freezing only a little on my way back to some warmer ground where I could stand.

It looked like this cut across the Gerudo Highlands was too high after all, even for my Warm Doublet.

But no matter.... I’d just keep going right around the mountain range....