Another Hat!

Waking of Saturday, August 4, 2018 ~ 2

Another Hat!

I sand-sealed back to Gerudo Town and found Barta again. As we visited in the barracks, she confided to me that when I’d shown up out there in the desert, she thought the voe of her dreams had appeared.

....Heh.

I also spoke to Liana, and she was so happy I’d found Barta, she said, “Here, take this,” and handed me a hundred rupees, “Go buy yourself something nice at the market.”

Aww, thanks, Liana. ^_^

I said hi to Captain Teake on my way into the palace, where I saw that young Chief Riju had a certain red exclamation mark above her head.... Had I really already....?

I spoke to her.

“You’ve brought back the smiles to my people,” she said, “I know that you more than anyone else will be able to use this helm to its full potential.”

Or some.... such.... words.... Ah, that wonderful little ITEM GET song played, and I found myself in brand new possession of the Thunder Helm.

I was now LIGHTNING PROOF.

SWEET.

Would it make the same bubble-effect in a large radius around me? Would it glow?

I almost tried it on right then and there, but I remembered myself, and where I was.... I would have to leave town first.

I took my leave of the palace and jogged outside to put it on and have a look at myself!

....

There was no glowing or magical effect. Which wasn’t completely unexpected. I was sure it would still protect me well enough....

It did make me look just as buggy-eyed as it had done the Chief, but it was otherwise very shiny and ornate!

Cool. ^_^

Agh but I did not want to stop—I warped to Dueling Peaks to check with Hino just one more time.

But Hino wasn’t there.

I blinked and turned to gather Swift Violets from around the waterfall behind the shrine for a bit.... and after I had plucked as many as I could, then Hino made an appearance.

But there was no Blood Moon tonight.

Hhhhh.

It was in the three o’clock hour in the afternoon. A bit later for myself on the couch.

....

I just went to bed, and slept until morning.

Good night.

The Young Chief

Evening of Sunday, June 10, 2018

The Young Chief

When the night was cool I walked out from the Gerudo Canyon Stable to Kara Kara Bazaar to go arrow-shopping. Then it was off to Gerudo Town for more of the same, chased by Lizalfos all night....

My goodness, that arrow-stall in town.... It’s like a candy store. A very expensive candy store where the sweets come with fletching and they oftentimes explode. I bought most of the lady’s stock, spending thousands of rupees I am sure. But I got a little of it back when, after I was done purchasing, I sold the lady my spare Gerudo attire. I don’t need it.

I met Jules in passing on the street again—“Sav’otta!” she said, “Instead of ‘good morning’.” She said she wanted to practice using Gerudo words.

So Sav’otta meant good morning....

Well, that was one phrase I could translate, then!

I approached the palace. The guards maintained a fierce manner (“. . . or else you and my spear will have a very personal conversation!” Link flinched at threatened retribution for bad behavior!) but they let me in. Evidently Chief Riju was still up to entertaining visitors.

The throne room was wide, with gently-flowing, shallow aqueducts lining the way to the throne. Riju sat leaning to one side upon it, her cheek resting lightly on delicate knuckles. Her clothes were exquisitely beautiful, and an ornate headdress nestled perfectly in her fiery hair. She certainly had the air of a Chief, but she was still so young—short in the midst of all these towering women. To her left stood her protector Buliara, an enormous guard with intimidating armor. She looked down at me with wideset eyes flanking a broad nosebridge....

“Just another traveler....” Riju started, but then seemed to subtly notice something, and added that perhaps there was more to this one that met the eye.

It was that thing on my hip....

The Chief seemed to have a soft-spoken way. So young but so collected. Calm. Her blue lipstick only ever bent her mouth between a coolly disconnected concern, mirrored by her brow.... and a quiet, intelligent smile, beneath eyes that could see a thousand miles.

They asked me what I wanted. I told them I could calm Vah Naboris. And as I saw Link gesticulating in his Gerudo Attire I just imagined him talking in a girly voice, and laughed.

Somehow it felt relatable to a contralto like me.... |D

Buliara scoffed that only Champions like Lady Urbosa could possibly stand a chance at such a venture. And she didn’t recall any Hylian vai among the Champions.

Riju asked me my name.

“Link.”

There was one Hylian among the Champions, too, Riju reminded Buliara. The Chief remembered hearing that the Princess Zelda had put the fallen warrior into an enchanted sleep. And his name was Link, too.

Chief Riju opened her eyes from thought and looked at me.

“You’re a voe.”

Oh they found me out.

Buliara became incensed at this incursion!

But Riju directed her protector’s attentions to the object hanging on my hip: “A treasured relic of the Sheikah,” she said, “You don’t think, Buliara, that they’d entrust it to just some drifter, do you?”

I think Riju knew who I was....

Though her face and demeanor were so well masked.

I suppose it came from dwelling in a city of all women.

Still, Buliara had limited faith in me, and suggested—perhaps not entirely out of good will.... “Why not have him prove himself by retrieving the stolen Thunder Helm?”

Riju softly considered this and hmmm.... agreed to it. “Go through that arch,” she directed me to my right, “It leads to the barracks. Talk to Captain Teake.” The Captain and her subordinates, Riju suggested, would be able to give me any information I needed on the whereabouts of the thieves....

And so I took my leave.

I remembered these barracks—I walked down the stairs and visited with all the Gerudo in training again, gleaning what tidbits they could give me, until I came to Captain Teake on her higher platform in the back.

Captain Teake stood strong and solid with her arms crossed, overseeing the exercises of her soldiers. I’d forgotten that she had the lightest complexion of any Gerudo I’d ever met. I wondered if she burned in the sun....

The Captain and her women seemed to have been made aware that they were to cooperate with me, and they did. I asked around, collected some clues, and wouldn’t you know it.... It seemed the thieves who had stolen the Thunder Helm were nestled away in Karusa Valley.

Or as I had become wont to refer to it....

SATAN CANYON.

Yup.

There was nothing for it then but a quick warp to the Sho Dantu Shrine in that valley, a little bit of a hike up the way—worked my way up, killed some Yiga—and before I knew it I had once again come to the end of the canyon.

But this time.... the doorway into the sandstone was wide open.

....

So I called my brother David.

He sounded busy. “What’s up?” he asked, or some variant thereof.

“Well I am about to enter the Yiga Nest and I wondered if you wanted me to wait for you.”

I heard him gasp.

Seemed like a real dilemma.

I knew this was the part he’d said he was most excited to watch me play.

“Where are you?” I asked him.

“Shara’s house.”

“What are you doing?”

“Just talking.”

“What are you talking about?”

“. . . .”

Sometimes I feel like such a family dog.

Not that I guess I’d know at all—we’ve never had a dog.

David hemmed and hawed and huffed and hmmmed but.... in the end he said he just couldn’t make me wait, when he knew where I was, when he knew what I was playing. He was too far away to be back any time soon . . . . though if I felt like waiting for him at all.... that.... would be cool.... Oh but he couldn’t, not really. I should just go ahead....

I should just go ahead....

I should just go ahead....

. . . .

Mmmm ehhhhhh I would just....

Forbidden City, Take Two

Waking of Friday, January 19, 2018 ~ 7

Forbidden City, Take Two

I tried again. And this time, I did not remove my Gerudo garb.

Some ladies at the Canteen were driving me nuts—muttering to each other about some secret password to some secret place. But every time I listened in, they shut up about it and told me to get lost.

Fed up I grabbed a loose barrel from the corner of the room and chucked it into their general midst before turning to leave.

I derived a really wonderful juvenile pleasure from their shrieking reactions then.

But on my way into the other room, I met and spoke with one of the few Hylian women I’d seen wandering around.

Jules was her name.

“Say, are you, uhh... I really don’t know how to say it... Might you be... A boy?”

Link jolted back in surprise!

“You are! I knew it!”

Who was this lady?

“It’s really impressive—you getting in here without anyone else noticing!” she said, “No need to worry. I won’t tell a soul. Just a little secret between us Hylian vai, right? Hehehe.”

Oh my gosh this was awesome. X-)

I left the Canteen and continued to climb around, until a guard kept me from inadvertently entering the palace, whereupon I wound up back at the entrance of said palace and saw....

“TRAYSI?”

That was the name. That was her. In the flesh. A Hylian.

The author of all those volumes of the Rumor Mill.

She looked nothing like I had imagined. Her writing sounded more like a hyperactive teenage girl, but she was.... rather a well-filled out, wide-faced woman.

She seemed to be arguing with one of the palace guards, maybe over entry into the building, maybe over something else. I forgot very quickly, because I was more interested in the plight of another nearby Gerudo.

Her name was Malena. But I might have first called her Shorty. Her stature really was quite small, especially next to those guards.

Malena had asked them for help, but they were still on high alert after the theft of the Thunder Helm, and couldn’t spare time or energy for the citizenry.

Malena’s husband had fallen very ill, and I caught from her that only the innards of a Molduga would cure him.

....What the heck was a Molduga?

Malena told me it was a monster so fierce that even other monsters fled before it. She said that it lived to the west, and the south, and that it was impossible to approach for it was sensitive to vibrations in the ground, and that any who drew near it would surely be KILLED.

Wo . . .

. . . was her.

The sidequest banner flashed over the top of the screen.

What the heck was a Molduga?

Dazed, I continued combing the endless city.

I discovered that I could in fact make it to the top of the central stone formation without the aid of the Zora Armor or my Climber’s Bandana—and was rewarded with a Korok at the top for my trouble!

The view from the topmost waterspring was excellent. And I’ve just reached three hundred pages. What in even the heck.

The view from the topmost waterspring was excellent, and after taking a look over the city I sailed down into a partition I had not yet explored—a training area of some kind.

The Captain Teake I met there, and her subordinates, said much the same thing the other guards had been telling me: the Thunder Helm was stolen. Everyone was on high alert.

Aside from this they didn’t say much. Except perhaps for some minor grumbling from the low-rungers now being overworked, and practicing endless spear-jabs.

Further wandering brought me to a little paddock with a few sand seals in it. They were more ruddyrose-colored than the ones out in the dunes, and they wore harnesses.

These ones were domesticated, and wouldn’t burrow away if you left them alone.

Frelly’s mother, Kohm, was renting them out.

Twenty rupees.

....

....Molduga . . . .

“I’ll take one,” I said.