Riding the Dragon

Waking of Thursday, May 25, 2017

Riding the Dragon

Hm, maybe I’m getting too in-depth with these entries. I feel like they might be stressing me out. Maybe I’ll try and sparse ‘em up like they were at the beginning....

I warped to the Dueling Peaks Tower, paraglided through the rain over to Giro’s Woods, and made my way back to Deya Village Ruins. It didn’t take too long to recolate the Two Statues memory. Luckily the sun had come out by then, and I was able to get a few decent pictographs.

A wonderfully scudded sky blew indecisive sun and shadow over the hill as I remembered....

But in my memory.... it was raining after all.

Zelda sat beneath the tree, beside the statues. “This won’t let up any time soon,” she said.

I was standing. Moving. Honing my skill. My sword was in my hands, and I cut and sliced through various stances, ending on a deep exhale as I brought the blade in before me.

“Do you ever wonder if you’ll wake up one day and realize you’re not a fighter?”

I didn’t.... quite understand.

I think I still don’t understand. What she was talking about.

Of all the memories I had revisited, I recall this one the least vividly. Perhaps because there was one thing she said that seemed to blot out all others—so strong, I don’t even remember the way she worded it. Just the raw concept rings in my mind:

She said I take after my father.

I have a father.

I was born into a house of the Royal Guard. It had been expected all my life that I would become a Knight.

Then why was Princess Zelda saying these things....?

I took after my father, I had great skill, prowess....

“It’s no wonder that you would be the chosen one,” she said.

Chosen one?

It was always expected that I would become a Knight.

That was how I was raised.

“But if you had been told that your entire life....” she said.

Why did she look so.... sad?

“Do you think you would have chosen a different path?”

Why did she look so sad?

I came back to myself in the half-sun, took a few more pictographs, forgot to scare up the Korok that would have photobombed them, and moved on.

Now that I was so close to it again, I really was curious about that huge, dark-stoned bridge. I climbed the tree over the Two Statues, and leapt from its branches to paraglide across the river toward it....

I bypassed the bokoblin’s treehouse and went for the bridge’s north end. The Bridge of Hylia it was called. An impressive structure.

But the whole time as I crossed it, I kept looking over the edge, and straining my ears for that beautiful erhu.... Where was Farosh? Wouldn’t he rise? He did for David....

I had a brief party with three Lizalfos in the middle of the bridge, and a troublesome scuffle with their stal-counterparts at the south end, and some stalbokoblins. Nearly knocked me off into the lake! That annoying one with the swinging spear....

But I put them all down, and considered the nearby Sheikah Tower....

Nnnnnghyeahhh I would do the tower north of Upland Zorana first. I was pretty sure that would show me Akkala.

But while I was on the bridge I decided to climb up on top of the south bridge-tower just because of.... curiosity.

“That’s a good reason,” David affirmed.

As I climbed onto the last parapet—“Hey there’s an updraft!” I said. It had blown up out of nowhere.

“That’s because—!” David started, but he didn’t need to continue.

As I got on top, Farosh was right there, twining before my eyes!

“Isn’t that a sight!” I beamed.

I remembered—how David had said he’d encountered a simliar updraft when Farosh flew by, and followed it out of curiosity. How he’d said he’d gotten too close to Farosh, and been zapped by one of his little lightning balls.

Well, the next time Farosh came around, erhu in tow, I decided that.... I wanted to see where that updraft would take me too!

I leapt after Farosh and it was a turbulent affair! Getting close! LIGHTNING BALLS! Dodging, dodging—and how he twined all about! And I was too low and he was above me! And there were so many lightning balls! Beeeennnding to the right to follow his course—and I zipped around one lightning ball so close I thought for sure I’d had it—

And then Farosh dipped lower—I was weaving, darting, dodging and—wonder of wonders—I got above his back.

Maybe it was just the lightning balls that were dangerous. Maybe he’d acknowledge me somehow if I actually made contact....

Now or never—I let go of my paraglider.

SIZZLE.

I bounced off his back with a painful choking sound.

But his back was still beneath me.

SIZZLE. “Hlck!”

I bounced again as he continued in his perfect, sinuous course.

SIZZLE. “Agck!”

Bounce.

SIZZLE. “Gmff!”

Bounce.

SIZZLE. “Hrack!”

Bounce.

“Oh my gosh, Farosh! Let me OFF!” If I could just tip down over his flank—

“It doesn’t keep hurting you!” David pointed out. And I looked at my hearts. I was down one from those stal-fiends on the bridge, but I wasn’t going down any further.

SIZZLE. “GYAAAH!”

That was so comforting.

Farosh’s long, long body and tail finally passed out from under me and I fell through the cool, soothing air, and parachuted toward a little dock on the central southern shore. “I RODE THE DRAGON!” I cheered. 8D

“I wouldn’t exactly call that riding,” said David.

I warped to the Bosh Kala Shrine—the shrine by Proxim Bridge—and had a nice visit with Brigo. He wasn’t so skittish this time, but dutifully patrolled the bridge, as it constituted part of an important route.

After that I decided to chase down a beacon I had left in my scope—I had placed it on a shrine just a little north of Proxim Bridge, between Proxim Bridge and the Floret Sandbar.

And heading north from Proxim Bridge, sporting with a few octoroks and a rich little camp of bokoblins, I came upon the Riverside Stable.

So this was the Riverside Stable that bored kid at the Wetland Stable had mentioned!

A couple of people spoke to me, such that I gained a couple of new sidequests:

Gotter, a food connoisseur who was strangely obsessed with beauty and whose grandfather’s grandfather had been the Royal Family’s chef, asked whether, if I ever got inside Hyrule Castle, would I please keep my eyes out for a cookbook?

“Gotter.... you nuts,” I said, and fled inside the stable, where I met Parcy.

She told me she used to sneak inside the castle all the time for all the cool treasure there.

ò__O ????

But no longer, ever since it had become so dangerous.

But she asked me, if I ever went inside the castle—what was wrong with these people?—would I keep my eyes out for the Royal Guards’ gear?

Hey, I was a Royal Guard—you filchin’ my stuff, Parcy?

I spoke to the innkeep, thinking maybe I’d just take a little nap. His name was Ember.

Huh, Embry had been the name of the one at the Outskirt Stable.... I hadn’t been keeping track otherwise. Were all their names somewhat similar?

It was in the nine o’clock hour. I slept until noon.

It was overcast when I woke up.

The Erhu Sublime

Waking of Thursday, May 11, 2017 ~ 2

 

The Erhu Sublime

Fortunately the Katah Chuki Shrine—which David kept calling the Cat-a-Chucky Shrine—only contained a Minor Test of Strength. And when I completed it, and collected the monk’s Spirit Orb, there was no more fooling around.

It was time to head south.

It was time to follow the river.

“Ignore the bird—follow the river!” my Mother had quipped to me on the occasions she’d seen me at it. I’d been following a lot of rivers lately. But I had a good feeling about this one....

I wanted to warp to the shrine by the Dueling Peaks Stable, but, at David’s insistence, I warped instead to the one by Proxim Bridge. Better to be direct, I suppose.

It was raining when I got there.

I thought of Brigo, the first human I had seen at the start of my travels long ago. And I did catch sight of him, but he was running east toward the woods, trying to get out of the rain.

Oh well.

Presently the rain left off. I started up the hill behind the shrine, and headed south along the west bank of the river, playing with what Koroks were convenient to my path.

The land climbed quite steeply about the river, especially on the west side. I hoofed it higher and higher until I came to a small ruin at the top of a hill.

It was small, and quiet. Far removed from much of anything else I could see.

I’m not even sure if it had a name. [It did – it was called Scout’s Hill.]

But from the top of its crumbling wall, I had an excellent view of the river’s course: There before me, spanned by a mighty bridge of dark weathered stone, filling up a vast green bowl it seemed, was an immense body of water.

Surely this was the waterway I’d been seeking!

And something else I hadn’t noticed from the lower elevations: a road seemed to come from the direction of the Plateau, and for a time run somewhat parallel to the river, until it came to one end of the dark bridge. Before it got there, however, it passed by an absolutely riotous-looking treehouse full of belligerent red-skinned creatures.

It looked.... like a delightful challenge, and sweet good looting, no doubt....

But I didn’t want to give time to it just now. Surely I was closing in on Mei.

I moved closer, and it was as I was studying the steep incline down to the water’s edge, catching sight of a dock—and a raft—down there.... that I heard it.

Something shifted in the wind. A new sound came, seemed to coalesce on the air....

One of the Piano’s tricks, I was sure, but what did it mean? It didn’t sound like anything bad was coming after me....

Actually it felt more like.... it wanted to preface the leap I was supposed to take from the high ground.... before I went gliding.... out over the water....

I shook my head and looked toward the treehouse—were they doing anything? No? It didn’t look like it. Why was this new music happening?

I turned back to the water.

“UH—DYIS—WHUH—TH—IDT—” I said, or something like it.

Head, neck and shoulders out of the water, the dragon Farosh was twining up out of the lake before a few scattered islets.

I was much closer to him than I’d been back in the river north of Satori Mountain. Now I could see his skin, his eye, his mouth, his limbs, his claws, the great jutting horn upon his head, all so clearly. Truly an enormous creature....

And then I understood—his was the music. This new sound on the air.... it belonged to Farosh.

And there was something else, another element aside from the Piano and its usual contingent of other shimmering sounds.... It moved as serenely as Farosh did, slowly clawing his way into the heights, bending over the water to loom low across the bridge.... An erhu.... What a beautiful sound. Sublime.

He dipped down into the water on the other side of the bridge.

David had asked me where I had first seen Farosh, and I’d told him about that river round the back of Satori Mountain, and looking up into the Gerudo Highlands. And I remembered he had looked skeptical, his eyes narrowed....

Because this lake was where David had first seen Farosh. Right over his head as he was crossing the bridge. He’d been looking at something else entirely through his scope when the mighty dragon had risen in the background—the most majestic of photobombings....

Farosh’s head surfaced again a great distance from where his midsection and hindquarters were still disappearing into the water. I could only imagine the great arc his serpentine body must have been carving deep beneath the lake’s surface.

And as he rose again into the air, little ball-lightnings began to manifest in his wake.

Heh, “little”.... They were still so far away; up close they must have been quite sizeable. But compared to Farosh they were tiny.

Maybe that was part of the danger my Compendium had spoken of, regarding approaching close to this dragon.

He continued his graceful arcing through the air, and in and out of the lake, beautiful creature.

Maybe this lake.... was Farosh’s home.

It was . . . . joyous to behold.

Shrouded

Waking of Saturday, MARCH FOURTH, 2017 ~ 15

Shrouded

The rain came down in a thick grey haze that swallowed the world.

We couldn’t see far. We just kept riding the road, passing rocks where bokoblins jumped out at us, galloping away from them.

And I kept looking around.

Places another me would have stopped to go explore.

Which was worse, the Guardians or these Yiga Clansmen?

The Guardians. Definitely.

But that still didn’t make the road feel any less threatening.

On the road to Kakariko it was just the monsters that were coming after me. Now there were people, too?

I remembered I had been so pleased to first see Brigo’s face on the road to the Dueling Peaks—

Back through the haze to my right, up on a hill against the rocks, a white-haired man sat still on a pale, grey-mottled horse.

Was he waiting for me to come speak to him?

Waiting to try to kill me?

I couldn’t make out his features through the downpour.

Actually he reminded me of that guy from The Witcher III.

He just sat there on his horse.

Watching us as we walked.

I had been happy to find people, but now....

Who could I trust?

Human Life!

Waking of Friday, March 3, 2017 ~ 5

Human Life!

The road was long, and eerie. Stone ruins, mossy overturned carts, chests with rusted weapons inside them....

The world was big. And empty, it seemed.

But as I crossed a great stone bridge, I saw something that astounded me—another shape, something upright on the stone, something moving—

It was a person!

I went to meet him—his name was Brigo, and he remarked on the abundance of towers he had seen spring up all around.

And he wondered if that thing was going to wake up as well.

What thing? I asked him.

And he pointed to the beach to my left, on the far side of the river I was crossing.

It was one of the rusted guardians.

One of them had sprung to life and chased after him, he told me. He’d thought his life was over and all he could do was run as fast as he could.... But he escaped into the woods—it was only luck that he’d gotten away, he said.

He wondered if the end of the world were coming.

Maybe the world was big and empty to him, too.

But it was nice to see a friendly face.