Unwarranted Reserve

Waking of Friday, June 29, 2018

Unwarranted Reserve

Mary and Dorothy were over, and they wanted me to play, but I didn’t want to do the main quest.... And so from a save I had cast at the entrance to Chief Riju’s palace, I warped to the Forgotten Temple, and PROCEEDED TO CLEAN—IT—OUT.

It was awesome. Always good to get more practice in parrying Guardian shots. c: ....Though I must say it does tend to run my shield supply down right quick.... :c It’s harder when they’re far away.... and Daruk’s always having to help me.... I find the timing much easier when they’re.... hahhh.... RIGHT ON TOP OF YOU. 8(

It was a lovely hard drudge pushing the infestation out toward the canyon.... but well worth it. Did you know there are treasure chests down there in hidden cavities beside the air-fountain cracks in the ground? Rich ones, too! :D To say nothing of the treasures of Ancient Tech leftover from the slain Guardians.

It was nice to have my own run of the place when they were all gone. So spacious and cool.... It must have been a retreat most beautiful and serene once.

I paraglided back to the giant Goddess statue at the back, and offered a long overdue prayer, to receive another Heart Container. That was nice. :)

That particular exercise bumped me up to twenty-two gears, and so it was time for another visit to Robbie’s place.... and Cherry.

I spoke to her and she beeped and bwopped and I got through her menus and I scrolled down and—

....

I could get the pants. If I wanted to.

I could afford them.

But.... wait.

I quickly warped to Kakariko to check with Cotera, to see if there were anything else to which I could put my gears.... Oh, what was I thinking of? The difference betweeen a strong but partial set, and a weak but complete set? The Great Fairy told me what materials I needed.... But it looked like the higher Ancient upgrades would require more cores.

And I was short on cores.

....

Sooooo I warped back to Robbie’s, spoke to Cherry, dropped another great honking wad of cash.... and got the Ancient Greaves.

I had the set! 8D

My gosh when I put them all on I looked.... all dark and awesome and intimidating! ^_^ Especially when I put on the helm and you couldn’t see my eyes. X-)

So cool. XD

I had enough lesser parts to have Cotera upgrade my new Greaves by one level. But I only had two Ancient Gears left, and would not be able to upgrade further until I’d done a little.... mmmm.... shopping.

Or rather, a lot of shopping. A lot of shopping between Dueling Peaks and Hateno, looking for Teli and his miraculous wares....

I also took a moment every day to check with Hino in regards to the next Blood Moon. But I never did catch him at the right lunar phase.... there was a shrine waiting for me on Washa’s Bluff, I was SURE of it.... If I could just be there on a Blood Moon Midnight....

One thing I was very happy to discover was that, if I found Teli on the Hateno road, and it happened to be raining.... to lift the gloomy mood he would put out all his best wares! Including gears and cores! 8D

Ah, the rain in Hateno would be so sweet to me now....

....

Hateno Rain should be a song.

. . . .

Didn’t the Hateno Rain so depress and spook me once?

.  .  .  .  .  .  .

I do believe it did. Back on that long, weary road punctuated by my first Yiga Clan encounters.

Ah but I needn’t’ve let the rain spook me anymore. I was braver now, and the road was haunted anyway, rain or shine.

Because.... the Yiga were attacking me in the open now.

I guess my little trespass in Satan Canyon and the whole incident with Kohga must’ve.... not sat well with them.

I’d be jogging along a path, and that telltale orange glow would coalesce off to one side or another, that wicked cackle would clatter through the air.... Once in the bottleneck west of Teli’s Slope, I employed the Meteor Rod to fend off a Yiga Clansman, and the ricocheting fireballs nearly killed us both.

Travel was going to become a whole lot more.... interesting.

....

Well.... they wanted me to go full Curare—

I’d go full Curare.

I visited Kakariko to buy some carrots for one of my upgrades, played an arrow game for one Rola, and as long as I was there, decided to visit Impa.

She saw right away that I had reclaimed the Master Sword—my sword, she called it—and impressed upon me that Princess Zelda had sacrified everything to protect that sword and me, and told me not to forget it.

Well that was a sobering note.

Hhhh, in truth, I had not been using the Master Sword much, or at all. Barely.

I hunted Lizalfos, I hunted more Guardians....

Maybe I was subconsciously treating it like one of my other special weapons, like Mipha’s trident or Daruk’s hammerclub—no wait did I even pick that one up? I never used them because I wanted them to last, to stay pristine. They took up my pocket space.... If I bought that house in Hateno, would I be able to stow them there?

I bought more gears and another core. Or two.

I knew the sword wouldn’t break like any of my other weapons. I knew it could briefly lose its power.... But I had never taken it to that point. Why was I leaving it alone so much?

I showed Nebb the Duplex Bow. He gave me fifty rupees.

There’s a good lad.

I suppose there was the point that some of my other weapons were, in fact, stronger than the Master Sword.

But why was that?

I hunted still more Guardians.

I had seen David play, and his Master Sword had a damage-dealing level of sixty.

But my Master Sword.... had only a level of thirty.

No but sometimes it glowed with a brighter strength and a higher level....

No but then it was weak again.

Why did it do that?

Not that thirty was all that weak, mind; for a single-handed weapon that was pretty good....

But why did it change?

What was the pattern?

I visited.... Kaysa, to upgrade my greaves one more time; I had amassed the ten required gears. She kissed her giant finger and bopped me with it in a small explosion of magical dander, and that brought my third of three Ancient Armor pieces up to level two....

I put them all on.... Full sets of clothing that were double-enhanced came with a perk.... usually....

And this perk was.... Ancient Proficiency?

What did that even mean?

Or was it really a perk after all? Or simply a pronouncement of my own skill? I’d killed a lot of Guardians to get this far....

I supposed I’d find out soon enough.

I checked with the Great Fairy to go over my shopping list: Naydra horn, Molduga fins, diamonds, and cores.

I’d just figured Naydra was the name of the third dragon, the one I had not met.

For surely there must be three.

Well, I knew where to find the diamonds easily enough, and warped to Zora’s Domain. But before I found Ledo, I came across Prince Sidon not on his usual balcony above the square, but down near the fountain, before the statue of his sister Mipha.

I heard him murmuring to himself.... or to her....

“Mipha, are you still inside the Divine Beast?” He looked so heavily pensive. “Are you aiding Link in his fight?”

And then he turned—

“Link!” He started at the sight of me. But he made no pretenses. “So you heard that, huh? I’m afraid you caught me in a moment of vulnerability.”

He said.... something more, about his sister, though I don’t remember the words.

He was just a man missing a loved one.

And that’s all right.

“I’m sorry you had to see me in a weak moment,” he finished, or some such words, and I moved away.

Everyone’s weak some time. Even the Prince of the Zoras.

Even my sword....

Sure, I wielded it now, but did I really own it?

I needed to figure this out....

I found Ledo, traded him some Luminous Stones for a Diamond, and saved.