Never The End

Evening of Wednesday, June 19, 2019 (comprised of many raw note editings from May 1 through May 10, 2023 that I really hope sound consistent because I left it alone for too long) ~ 5

Never The End

Credits.

It was really the Credits.

The game was done.

The game.... was done.

I let them wash over me.

And as they rolled, Mom asked, “Are there going to be any more Zelda games?”

Ah-heh, well.... I knew just the thing to show her.

But for whatever reason I kept it inside and only probed what she knew....

“Why do you ask?” I said, letting just a little tightness into my voice, and wondering what she suspected.

“I don’t want you to commit suicide.”

Oh.

Oh Mom—

I don’t remember if—I don’t think I responded, but only.... went back into the credits.

We were looking at the pictures, and I was identifying them.... And I saw the American’s name! Wow! He was one of only two programmers for the wildlife! They did such a wonderful job. ^_^ And I was so happy for him for going so far to follow his dream....

....

Mom.

....

I guess if someone who loves you sees you wounded, and hears you name your salve, even in dark jesting.... they don’t forget it easy.

I don’t even know if the cure is real or psychosomatic.

Maybe it doesn’t matter.

These were the most relaxing credits I had ever seen in my life. At least, that I could think of just then. Slow through the serene iterations of familiar musics.

I gave a little cheer at the name of Eiji Aonuma! And did some up-and-down worshipful bowing from the couch. Mom laughed.

And I gave another at Shigeru Miyamoto!

And at.... Satoru Iwata.

I told Mom that he’d passed away.

Still glad to see his name in this beautiful game.

The Legend of Zelda ~ Breath of the Wild

Copyright 2017

Or some such words.

This last segment came to a stop and hung still in the middle of the screen.

2017.

Two years ago.

I can still remember standing in the cold outside the GameStop. I was first in line. And that employee with the glasses and the handsomely-trimmed scruff had been so friendly. Despite that he almost forgot to give me my amiibos as well.... See the preorder receipt.... ?

It’d been a long journey.

The serene credits finished into a breathless black.

And then.... the Castle....

I had never seen it so still and sunlit before.

Birds even chirped.

Zelda and I stood before the ruined gates in the sunlight. I in my blue Champion’s Tunic, she still in her beautiful White Dress.

The malice was gone.

And the Castle was in ruins.

But.... it was quiet now.

It was at peace.

We looked on it.... and then turned our backs to go.

....as high above among the spires, the spirits of the Four Champions.... and lastly of Her Father....

                                                                                    ....departed from this world.

Seeming to sense something, Zelda stopped and looked back.

So did I—

A blue breeze was blowing through the air....

The sky was full of Silent Princess petals.

But the Princess only gazed up at her once home, the sun beyond beaming it into a silhouette.... into a line.... into a memory....

The Piano that had softly accompanied us, having had no real aim for the spotlight anymore, now turned the final notes of its wanderings to the familiar ascending Theme of Legend, as the view arced up into the blue, blue sky....

The End

But it wasn’t.

We were on a hillside. Zelda and I.

Somewhere southeast of the castle, seemed like....

Zelda once again wore the blue tunic and dark trousers in which she had so often traveled in my memories. Boots and all. She held the Sheikah Slate in her hands.

“We’ll make our way to Zora’s Domain. Divine Beast Vah Ruta...looks like it stopped working. Let’s investigate the situation.”

There was something there, I thought. Something in that last sentence. A kind of spark.

The Princess was still a nerd.

And confident, and brilliant, and determined.

She was going to make it.

But her glittering eyes softened after a moment, and she looked up.

“Mipha’s father...” she murmured, “I believe he would like to hear more about her. The least we can do is visit him and offer him some closure.”

The Piano and the Pipe courted about the hillside on the simple Hero’s Theme, as the sun shone so brightly on the rolling grass.

“Although Ganon is gone for now, there is still so much more for us to do.”

Some clouds still rolled between, though.

“And so many painful memories that we must bear.”

The Princess took a few steps forward down the hill, standing confidently.

“I believe in my heart, that if all of us work together... we can restore Hyrule to its former glory. Perhaps...even beyond.” Right on that hopeful secondary dominant, Pipe, you dastardly genius.... “But it all must start with us,” Zelda finished.

The dancing pair on the grass invited the rest of the Orchestra to the theme.

“Let’s be off,” Zelda said. And started walking straightaway.

Like she did.

And.... I followed. That gilded sheath still bearing the Master Sword on my back.

Ah.... our horses. Grazing higher up the hill.

And hers so white—was that Memory she was riding, then?

It suited her.

....

It suited them both.

Zelda came near to them, but.... stopped before she got there.

I was once again faced, as I had been many times before, by only her unreadable, lovely blonde mane of hair....

It wasn’t long before she spoke.

“I can no longer hear the voice within the sword,” she halted again.

I knew that she had yearned for some connection, some awakening. To lose it again....

“I suppose it would make sense if my power had dwindled over the past 100 years...”

Princess Zelda turned then and looked at me, and even the Orchestra took pause.

The wells of her eyes ran for a thousand miles and looked.... tired of it.

But she allowed the sorrow only a moment’s heaviness on her gaze before softly blinking it away with a little turn.

“I’m surprised to admit it...” she started, and something else shaped her lips now. Something brighter, as she faced me directly. “But you know? I think I’m all right with that,” she said.... and smiled.

And the Deku Tree was right.

She did have a smile like the sun.

And I jogged just a few paces to come even with her, and follow her to the horses, as the camera swept back from the beautiful, sunlit hillside, up the slope to where the Silent Princess flowers grew all over, in the lofty heights overlooking the ruggedly beautiful kingdom of Hyrule.

The End

.....

There’s a star by my last save file.

....

I’ma look at it.

2 Spirit Orbs

118 Shrines

534 Koroks

2089 Rupees

In the castle.

And I have the pictograph of Ganon’s butt.

So.

Do I go seek shrines from here?

Or from a previous save?

If I wish to maintain this choice....

I cannot move.

....

Hm.

I quit for now.

.... Soon.

If I were to go back to a previous save, wherein I had not beaten the game yet....

That would do no justice to the adventure I just completed.

.... I feel as though I faced the same thing in.... Skyward Sword.... somewhere....

Yes. I quit for now.

....

I’m still short two shrines.

But.... should I say....

You know?

I think I’m all right with that.

 

 

 

The Abomination

Evening of Wednesday, June 19, 2019 (comprised of many raw note editings from May 1 through May 10, 2023 that I really hope sound consistent because I left it alone for too long) ~ 2

The Abomination

All right, up from the Library, out the upper exit, a run past the Guardian, dodging an attack, under the pillarway, scaling the wall—required slightly more Stamina than I had....

But I made it to the top.

....

I am going into the Sanctum now.

That room. That broad, round room with many entrances encompassing, tiled and pillared and ramped and balconied and hung with crimson banners and run with crimson carpets within, no doubt so stately and handsome once, all reddened under the rupturing sky.

That room with the pulsating thing clung onto the ceiling, like one of Naydra’s gigantic Malice Eyeballs.

That room from which I had so desperately fled before.

I stepped into it now.

And I stepped further.

And further....

Mercy, Game, when would you just take me and—

Ah.... There was the blackout at last....

The visuals came back unmercifully focused on that.... thing. That ball, that orb, that wiggling, pulsing abomination, rooted to the ceiling by unholy burning tendrils, sapping who knew what life from the very stone. Its globular, blood-colored surface, bound in by sickly-looking iterations of the ancient Sheikah constellation motifs, constricted and recoiled with a slushing sound.... and then the light came.

Golden Light, ringing like a bell, beamed from the center of the mass, while the raging sky silently blew glowing hot fire and hell beyond the high windows.

I stood near the center, eyes cast upward and trained on the demonthing—

A muffled sound—

“...

Link...

Link.”

Zelda.

“I’m sorry...but my power isn’t strong enough...”

She sounded strained.

“I can’t hold him...”—A darkening, another slursh—and a LASER EXPLODED FROM THE GLOBE—bright, blinding, shrieking, it cast about so quickly, violently, stone and pillars crumbling and flaming and smoking in a ruinous wake behind its frenetic trail about the chamber—again—again—

I barely had time to react, casting up two warding forearms as the beams sliced through the stone about my feet—but it never hit me—

A second of silence, and then—more controlled this time—an entire array of penetrating lasers seemed to come from within, swirling smoothly around the globe’s surface in efficient, sweeping arcs—and then their light finally dimmed as well, as smoke poured from the sickly Sheikah stars—

I looked up from behind my warding hands.

My help—Hyrule’s help—was exhausted.

With a final obscene wriggling and gurgling, the pulsating sac ruptured with an almighty SPLURT—dark liquid exploded from within, raining putrid globlets to the floor with a gelatinous splattering—and a form—some incomprehensible, monstrous form—fell out like an unholy birth, crashing onto the stones below—the stones that were cracked and fissured by the lasers—

The dust of a hundred years had sprung up at the impact, obscuring the thing almost immediately—now the floor began to buckle under its weight with a cracking, a rumbling, a grinding and grating—

I only caught a glimpse of it for a second: a flash, a streak of red, like hair—something long and gangling—

The floor dropped out.

And I fell with it.

Stones and rubble and debris and rocks.... Plummeting, plummeting—what was this shaft?

The monster rhooshed into the yawning dimness below, still unmoving, still limp, still nondescript in the dust and rubble, I only a heartbeat behind and above it, stones big as horse-stalls raining down around my head—

The tubular tunnel opened at last onto an immense half-dome chamber, its sectioned ceiling splayed with a heaven of  Sheikah constellations.... but all still stained so blood-magenta red....

The monster dropped through and slammed into the final floor.... and at last began to move.

Peeking through the smoke and the dust as it rose, as it turned and roiled....

Oh gosh what is he, what is this monstrosity—what—I don’t—what—

Strong arm. Flaming blade. Legs. Spider legs.

I had caught myself—my paraglider—I was coming down now—there was nowhere else to go—

The demon turned in the darkness. Insect-like. Spider-like. Mismatched—Cobbled—A perverse mutation—A sick amalgamation of all that Ganon’s Malice had consumed—

I touched down and skidded coolly to a ready halt.

Blue blades, Guardian legs. Stomp went one foot.

Hair. Mane. Abdomen like a vinegaroon. MORE legs. HAND?

It turned....

Head....

Skull-like....

A man’s face?

LOOKING—AT—ME.

The demon reared—

So many grabbing, flailing arms.

Scourge of Hyrule Castle

CALAMITY GANON

We faced one another....

            ....as the scene blacked out—

But....

As the demon’s apocalyptic choir hung onto its dark caesura.... elsewhere a clarion bell rang out. The orchestra’s strings swelled in Revali’s teal glow where he perched in sleepless vigilance atop Vah Medoh—

The Champions!!

“Now my moment has finally come,” the rapier twirled as Revali threw out one wing-arm. “Brace yourself, Ganon, for the sting of my revenge!”

And Vah Medoh BLASTED the mind-bogglingly powerful laser it had been keeping trained upon the demon for this very moment—the blue-white, all-destroying column shaking the earth as it bored through the skies—all melting into white—

“This will be our final opportunity.” Mipha’s hands were gently clasped as she stood serene and beautiful on Vah Ruta. “We will not fail!” Her voice actually cracked as she thrust her arms forward—

Vah Ruta likewise emitted a bolt of such devastating power.... What on earth could withstand....? So blinding.... so blinding....

“Let’s go, little guy!” Daruk POUNDED his mighty fists together. “Now! Open up wide, Ganon!”

Vah Rudania blasted the air from its entire, open, flowered head. The center of the beam.... blacking out.... as though it were all too much and so bright that it had clipped the game’s camera.

“A hundred years in the making...” Urbosa stood cool as ever. Collected. Her waiting was over. “Hold on, Princess.” She didn’t even take the weight from her hip, but only extended her arm, her fingers ready to snap—“Our moment has arrived!”—which she did—

And Vah Naboris’ laser BEAMED out into the sky, burning shadows into the very air behind the Divine Beast....

The Choir and the entire Orchestra marched gloriously into the melting white light.

And the four giant, ancient, incomprehensibly powerful beams CONVERGED UPON HYRULE CASTLE.

They did know I was in here too, didn’t they?

Bright blue, thick, huge, thunderous blasts so violent I was afraid they would shatter the castle and blow the stones to dust and steam.... the bright white light growing and growing....

But the architecture remained undamaged.

Rather, as the demon and I stood face to face, the mere radiance of the Divine Beasts’ power came spearing down through the shaft, down into the very basement half-dome chamber, gleaming like sunrays, and drawing even the Calamity’s twisted attentions.

It looked up.... and we both saw what followed:

The energy of the four combined beams came down the shaft like a glowing blue bubble. Filling up the space, squeezing downward, pressing closer, coming for its target.

And before it had entered the half-dome, it reduced for only a split second to a much smaller, white-hot glowing sphere.... and then exploded into a divine rain of bright, piercing, penetrating, decimating white-blue light.

Down, down, down.

Pummeling.

Relentless.

The Calamity shrieked beneath the cascading downpour of bolts; the earth shook at the continuous battering of every blistering strike; gleaming blue spheres and plashes danced off the demon’s filthy hide like the impacts of raindrops, magnified a thousand times and set with a righteous luminescence.

Calamity Ganon’s life meter, there at the top of the screen already, had begun to drain.

Beneath the barrage it dropped and dropped and dropped as the monster howled, down and down and down.... until with a final blue explosion and a following cloud of charged blue smoke.... it had dropped to the halfway point.

Calamity Ganon was already half dead.

But he remained the Demon yet....

The smoke dissipated, the Calamity stirred again, raised itself from the floor.... and with an eldritch fury howled twice as loud as before, fit to rend the very air. The rippling burble of a Malicey roar gurgling somewhere beneath the scream....

That wild fiery red mane and.... beard?.... surrounding his dark-surfaced, monstrous skull-head with the glaring, glowing orange eyes.... that jewel still set in the center of his forehead, even now.... so many spidering limbs.... each ending in fire-red blade or Guardian-blue sword or sharp-clawed hand, or wielding other incomprehensible horrors.

My gosh he was terrifying.

I....

Stood Firm.

And drew my blade.

And the battle for Hyrule was on.

He pulled back enormously, and slashed at me with the giant blazing sword that was his foremost right arm. I leapt away. The numberless terrors of all his thinner, ganglier spider-legs groped creaking after me with their snipping blades and fidgeting claws—

How could I do, here?

Difficult to get close....

Arrows, then.

And there was no point holding anything in reserve anymore.

Bomb Arrows it was.

But the Demon had its own projectiles. The Piano had long since fled before the pounding Choir and Orchestra now filling up the space, and so I did not hear that most reliable of aural cues—but I did recognize that beeping. That was a Guardian laser.

I could dodge those....

I ran, I jumped....

The monster tromped and shuffled and heaved and—

“OH MY GOSH GET DOWN FROM THE WALL!” I hollered.

Ganon had crawled up onto the constellation-covered dome-wall and begun creeping round to flank me at an alarming speed.... for something so large....

I could see the whole of his.... ancient-tech.... segmented.... vinegaroon-back.... bulbous and bloated and sagging like an overfed arachnid’s abdomen. His legs clutched the wall; his dorsum was toward me—then how did—? —And yet somehow he still faced me. Somehow a putrescent shape which might in nightmares be called a torso still rose incomprehensibly from the mass to set his grinning, scowling, hateful visage toward me, its own attendant arms splayed wide in screaming violence. Crawling.... CRAWLING....

The Calamity’s arsenal was broad and varied. From his higher position he cast his glowing blue spear at me, again and again as it reappeared in his wicked grasp—Moblin’s Magic Spear, I again thought ridiculously.

The cannon fused into his flesh fired rapid volleys of laser pulses, as well as strange, warping bursts of air.

Above his wicked head he conjured fiery meteors.... and sent each one plummeting down toward me with nightmarishly slow-moving finality—these I could not dodge—the fiery blasts so all-engulfing—run as I might—

And there was always that accursed Guardian laser.

But I could dodge that....

When the Demon jumped down from the wall, he landed in a ponderous pounce of weird blue light spread over the floor—a dangerous radius in which to be caught. And I found he needn’t always come from the wall to employ it.

The giant flaming sword, however, was strictly a ground-level implement. A closer-range, tree-sized melee weapon. Its swipes were enormous and far-reaching, trailed by flame, and casting flames out wherever it swung, its terrible downward-chop blowing up infernal jets like dragonfire on the rebound.

I ran and leapt—

The Demon crept—

We harassing each the other with incendiary affronts to the face—I dropped him from the wall—he speared me to the floor—I cut him—he burned me—

Were not these the Champions’ weapons?

He had all the Champions’ weapons here, just as he had had them in the Divine Beasts....

What were they?

That giant flaming sword was surely a reflection of Daruk.

The spear for Mipha.

Those pulses for Revali.

And...

What, those grabbers? So many limbs ended in a sharp, Guardian-blue gleaming—at least one of them was a blade.... for Urbosa....

The Demon’s pulses chased at my heels—

My Bomb Arrows exploded again in his face—

His own erupting missiles blasted me to the floor and set my hair alight—

I let him feel his very Bane in the Master Sword—

We tasted every species of wrath and pain that we could inflict upon the other until—

!!

Oh no....

....

Of course he had a second stage....

Having had enough of my quiver, steel, and fury, the Calamity reared up and with a ferocious roar conjured a flaming, blazing sphere around itself—just like his Fireblight had done—

But no—the sphere disappeared after only a moment—

But the bright blazing glow remained.

The Calamity had turned golden. Its demon body shining a hot and fiery radiance.

Oh no.

Well I’d had enough of his fire as well. But now he looked hazardously hot, and so I quickly donned my Flamebreaker Armor—

However, his color seemed to have been all that had changed. No new firestorms arose, no Fireblight bomb trickery went off.... He hadn’t changed tack. He still swiped his gigantic sword, still beeped his Guardian laser after me, still body-slammed a moderate pool of flashing blue pain into the floor to catch me—

But no, that wasn’t all....

I noticed that none of my Bomb Arrows were affecting him anymore.

No....

Then that glow.... that brazen fire.... wasn’t a fire—it must have been a shield, then.

I put off the Flamebreaker and returned to my Champion’s Tunic.

Really?

I fired again and watched his life meter closely—

Really.

I couldn’t penetrate his stronger defenses.

But he could still penetrate mine—a number of hearts evaporated from my bottom row, and I chowed apples to regain them—

How could I do, here, now?

My arrows were ineffective.

If I couldn’t stun him....

And I dared not get too close....

How could I do....?

At whiles he still hurt me. The laser pulses, the giant blade with its flames, those bloody meteors—whatever it was—

Some terrible blow caught me.

“I NEED MY GREENS!” I howled, groping for another cooked Hearty Radish to eat—

Even the music seemed to recoil in horror before the invincible Beast. It was the same music that had played during my battles against the Blights, really—or it had been. Only now, some of the notes, some of the intervals.... were off, wrong, disoriented. As if the music track itself were screaming in petrified terror, only straining to channel what sounds it could manage into performing its accompanying duty to the conflict.... a tempo-increase borne of fear nipping at everyone’s heels....

The brazen, flaming Demon now stomping, now crawling, now screaming, all its hateful wickedness casting down at me in the tearing mad cackle of ten thousand years of stewing, boiling evil, as it spun round and round and round the room like a great malevolent crab....

So wrong....

So wrong....

How could I do?

That beeping came again—the Guardian laser.

I could dodge those.

But—

!

I could dodge those....

Though.... could it be?

The laser?

Beep-beep-beep-beep-beep-beep-beep-beep—

It was always easier at close range....

I stepped toward the Devil.... steadied myself....

Be-be-be-be-be-beeee—

Was this the right distance?

The first twining glimmer of light began to coalesce—

Now!

I pressed forward—swung my arm—the laser’s vortex charge completed, discharged already—my shield flashed at the apex of its arc—the blue-white bolt came—

AND I PARRIED IT.

LIKE I HAD TAUGHT MYSELF TO DO SO VERY LONG AGO AND PRACTICED SO MANY MANY MANY TIMES.

AND IT REBOUNDED.

AND IT PENETRATED HIS SHIELD AND HE WENT DOWN.

AND I RAN IN AND MASTER SWORDED HIS FACE!

But every stroke of the Master Sword dealt such a tiny amount of damage to his life meter....

But it was damage nonetheless.

The Mouse could bite, Ganon.

This repeated for a few cycles....

The winning culmination of so many trials prepared for and so many hardships overcome pounded through my veins like a war-drum. I was so PUMPED at the simple learning, the earned advantage, the flashing leap in understanding—that I was dreadfully tempted to say “EAT MASTER SWORD, B[let us kindly redact the remainder of this word]!”

But.... No, I mustn’t.

Besides, Mother is here with me.

Dang you, world and your catchy vulgarities.

Chip by chip, piece by piece, I whittled the demon’s interminable life meter away.... I would bring you death if need be by a thousand cuts....

Striking and slicing and slashing—until at the stroke that proved to be one too many, the Calamity reared back and away from the blow, screaming an unholy, shrieking howl that melted all into the blinding white Void....

.... Dang it I forgot to take a pictograph....

.......

....

.

.

.

.

 

What Garill Knew

Waking of Saturday, May 4, 2019 ~ 2

What Garill Knew

It’s 8:40 in the evening.

I’ll go out and get Dragmire.

Oh, but not before snagging a Korok behind Impa’s house first.

After that I come back to the broad thoroughfare before the house; I’d left Dragmire there to graze and lounge beside Cado and Dorian.

I give him a carrot.

And we are on our way.

Dorian says it’s dangerous to travel at night, but....

I’m going.

I round onto Hestu’s Hillside and can see the Dueling Peaks Stable in the far distance.

Very close.

Dragmire and I continue down the road at a trot.

Talk with Brokka.

Talk with Bugut.

Old friends.

But still keeping my eyes peeled for enemies.

I see the disguised Yiga by the foot of the mountain. In your dreams, creeper.

I pass by, and cross Kakariko Bridge.

And.... there’s another lady walking on the road. I suspect her, but—I hear them.

Stal creatures. And a Yiga man, laughing as he foregoes pretense and somersaults from nowhere to have it out with me....

I put on my Radiant Gear—too late—and kill the Stalkoblins, and the Yiga Archer....

And with the threats put down I see the lady breathe a sigh of relief....

I collect the spoils, and then go to check on her....

.... But she is yet a Traveler?

I must say, this is a trick I had not seen them use before.

Fine. What.

“Hey, buuuuuddy!”

“Me?” My response.

“Awwww! You’re so cuuute!”

Really.

“Want to spend some.... tiiiiime with meee?”

My choices: “OK...” and “I refuse!”

I’d rather not, lady.

“I refuse!”

“Whaaaaa—?! But whyyyyy?” she pouts. “Don’t you like meeee? If you doooo, please cloooose those eyes!”

Choices: “Well...OK, then.” or “No, I don’t like you.”

I’m not going to play your games.

“No, I don’t like you.”

“You’re so meeeean. Well, theeeen... Hylian Champion...”

The tissue-thin guise dropped and her face contorted into a snarl.

“Begone, enemy of my Master!”

YOU begone!

It’s on.

Aaaand it’s over quickly.

Not tonight.

I am busy.

So near the stable.

I’ll put Dragmire to manger first.

And I do. Thanks, Tasseren.

It will be light, soon.

....

I think I’ll go find Garill.

I kill things that get in my way. But that Bokoblin.... it went after someone else. I pursue and kill it anyway.

Still wary from the bridge I do not talk to the other man this time until I’m sure I know him. It’s Agus. And his donkey.

Don’t think the Yiga keep donkeys....

I buy all his milk and butter.

Thanks, Agus.

Heh, and as I continue along the winding road.... here comes Joute, the old Witcher III guy who spooked me in the rain before on his pale horse. Joute.

“White horsies, giants, and bony ones too. They’re out there for catchin’, and that’s what you should do...” he sings. “You like my song about the legendary horses? There’s only one of each, but I took some liberties to make it musical.”

I do like it, Joute.

The Guardians grow thick now. Here in the Valley of Terror.

I heard that.... Octorok....

Found it. Killed it.

So close to the fort now.... I’ve surely passed where the memory lies....

But I continue....

Garill. My friend. ^_^

“Incredible!” I hear him say.

And I visit with him.

“The more I see of this place, the more it hits me just how hard the old tragedy struck here. But even knowing that, seeing so many Guardians... It boggles the mind. That warrior must have been some threat to the forces of darkness, huh?”

Huh. Well, I would like to think so at least.

Garill doesn’t say anything else.

....

Good old Garill.

I’ll take his pictograph.

I coax him to speak again; try and get him to look up....

“If I’d been alive 100 years ago...I like to think I’d have fought these Guardians here, right at the warrior’s side.”

More....

“The warrior and his soldiers at Fort Hateno risked their lives to protect the world. I wasn’t there at the time, but I’m alive now because of them, and I’ve got to make sure future generations know it!”

Now there’s a good smiling face! ^_^

Got a good pictograph.

Now.... to find that memory....

Heh, I see Toma heading back toward the crossroads too, on her horse.

More familiar faces than I’d realized, around these parts.

Wander, wander.... back into the field.... I won’t be able to tell until I’m within a few feet of it.... There was a Guardian’s husk in the foreground of the painting on Impa’s wall. I look around all the clusters of Guardians, but.... No.... Must be further out....

I might have to kill all the central baddies....

And I do. That Frostspear did come in handy!

Searching, seaching.... Not in any of these clusters near the wall, then....

Perhaps that cluster farther back. Is that the one with an active Decayed one in it?

I go. Find three more Bokoblins, but.... nothing else.

I won’t be able to tell until I’m within a few feet of it.... Was that a trick of the setting sun’s glare? Or....

No.

It’s here.

It’s right here.

My memory.

!

And.... a lot of.... swords. In the ground. Oh....

Oh...

What....

What happened in this place?

....

It’s been two years and two months and two days.

It’s time for me to find out.

Impa's Final Message

Waking of Saturday, May 4, 2019

Impa’s Final Message

It was still the waking of Saturday, May 4, 2019, but I was into the morning of May 5, 2019, because that was two years, two months, and two days since this game came out, and DANG IT if I wasn’t gonna get some time in on it today. I wanted to see Impa. And so help me after so much bloody laundry and dryers and other chores and the sucking black hole of the following circuses of self-medicinal YouTube and its inebriating memes and vines for ever I WAS GOING TO FREAKING PLAY THIS BLOODY GAME.

I was already in Kakariko.

It was 8:00 pm.

Paya was polishing the guardian deity statues.

I decked myself out to look presentable. No beast weaponry.

Now. Impa.

I went up the stairs. I went through the door.

I had all Divine Beasts. All memories.

What would she say?

She sat cross-legged on her little tower of pillows.

I spoke to her.

“I sense it... Their presence.

Daruk. Urbosa.

Revali. Mipha.”

Her old face furrowed. “A hundred years ago, I put my life on the line to fight alongside everyone. But...I could not protect them. They died without fulfilling their destinies. I have lived all this time thinking they died in vain.” She looked so downcast, and then, “But this energy I feel from their presence...” she trailed off.

“It seems they have not given up,” she smiled. “I can also sense...that they were all overjoyed to see you again,” she said, still smiling.

Heh, even Revali?

Well.... guess he can’t hide it from Impa.

That’s comforting.

And then suddenly intent! “Now you all serve the same purpose! Now it is time to attack Calamity Ganon, while he is weak! Hurry to the princess! Go, now!”

Oh, my map opened. And there was a new dinger at the castle.

“I believe you will find Calamity Ganon in Hyrule Castle.”

And I came back out of the map now.

“Even with blessings of the Divine Beasts on your side, you must be careful,” Impa went on, “Calamity Ganon will be well protected. Be prepared for anything!”

And then, “By the way... How are you faring thus far?” A bit jarring. And with a dynamic little zoom out in the cinematography, back to my person and then coming in close.... all dramatic.

Ah, on to the other quest, I see.

I gesticulated my response.

“No... All twelve pictures already? You’ve visited every place?!”

Was it really that shocking, Impa, with how long I’ve taken? |D

“Hmm... Then I suppose it’s time.” The camera zoomed in toward her face. The music had changed. An eerie, haunting, mystical version of some Sheikah tune.... “I will reveal the location of the final memory,” she said, and there was another zoom in toward myself.... in such a beautiful shot....

This is what I have been waiting for. I’ve seen the empty place for the last memory. I remember flashes of trailers. I’ve heard the stories from all the people in the land.

But will it be where I think it is?

“Here is what happened.” Impa.... got up off of her cushion!—I’d never seen her move from that spot before—and walked over to... where are we going? I followed.... “Lady Zelda asked me to wait to show you this. She gave me very specific instructions.” Or some such words!??

“This is the final picture.”

What is it....?

I looked....

The painting on the wall.... illuminated by a small standing lamp.

It was a rolling green field full of.... Guardian husks....

I knew it.

The flashing final stand in the rain beneath my hood.

Watching the lurching, gleaming beasts from the highest battlement.

The Valley of Terror.

Garill’s Haunt.

Fort Hateno.

“Does it look familiar?” Impa asked, “From this village, you should be able to get there in a half day’s time. Now go, child. Seek out what Lady Zelda has shown you.”

And the music went back to normal.

Free the Divine Beasts – Complete.

The long, long-awaited banner gleamed across my screen.

....

How did Zelda.... tell Impa.... that it was....?

....

I will go. And regain my final memory.

....

Impa still won’t let me touch the orange orb though.

How....

Safe Roost

Waking of Sunday, January 6, 2019 ~ 7

Safe Roost

I’ve got to check on Teba, I thought. Had he been able to make it back to the village?

I dashed onto the twining boardwalk....

And I found—

Harth! He’s all right!

He was on his feet and well again!

And he said Teba was safe at home! Oh thank goodness! ^_^ :’D

I pelted higher up the boardwalk and round the Neck.... and there was that bright white plumage—

“Tebaaaaa!” :D

He stood whole and well in his house with his wife and son. “You... I really owe you for what you did,” he said.

“Are you hurt?” I say, though he didn’t look it.

“I’m fine. Thanks to my wife, I’ve recovered to the point where I can stand.”

I guessed I was on that Beast for a good long while....

“Actually, my wife told me something about you.”

Oh?

“She says you’re a descendant of the Champion.”

My only option was, “...”

“Hahah! Go on. There’s nothing to hide!” Teba laughed. “Your bowmanship...the way you move through the air. There’s no doubt about it, you have the blood of a Champion.”

Well, he wasn’t wrong.

“What? You look like you’ve got something else to say.”

And again, I was only give one response: “Actually...”

Teba stared at me. “Don’t tell me...” he started, “You’re the Hylian Champion?!”

I was then treated to two entire paragraphs of silence from the Rito warrior:

“...” Teba says.

“...” he says again.

And then....

“Hahaha! Good one, pal!” he burst out laughing.

Hahhhhhhh.

“Everyone knows that all of the Champions were wiped out by Calamity Ganon 100 years ago. And even if they survived that, they’d be old geezers with canes instead of swords!”

Heh.... it must have seemed pretty ridiculous after all....

“I let the elder know about what happened with Divine Beast Vah Medoh, but you should probably go talk to him,” Teba finished, and I left his house.

I regarded his family on my way out.

.

Snow-white Tulin really was his daddy’s boy.

....

Despite it all....

I love these people.

I talked with Kaneli.

“You have done it!” he hooted, “And you survived, at that! You conquered Divine Beast Vah Medoh!” His owl eyes really were huge.

“To think the beast has taken up roost at the top of the village! It looks simply...divine.”

Heh, fitting description.

“If the legends are true,” he mused, “‘the light from the Divine Beasts will ravage the Calamity.’ For now, Divine Beast Vah Medoh will become the protector of this village and live on in legend...alongside you. Hoo hoo hoo...” He gave a hearty laugh so low and rumbly for an owl! XD

And then, “...Oh, yes! Of course! I must reward you properly! Feel free to take what you find in that treasure chest. You will get more use out of it than I.”

There was a new chest in his little house. I could guess what was in there....

“Champion descendant... I have only just realized. That sword you have in your possession...”

His big, grandfatherly owl face—heh, eyebrows like Kaepora Gaebora come to think of it—and his half-closed, smiling bird eyes as he stroked his braided beard.

“Could it be the sword that seals the darkness?”

Think so, Elder Kaneli?

“The Hylian Champion who fought alongside Master Revali 100 years ago... Could...that be you?”

Divine Beast Vah Medoh – Complete

The banner flashed across my screen.

I checked the chest beside Kaneli’s chair. Inside was a Great Eagle Bow. 28x3 attack power. Nothing to sneeze at.

Its description read, “A bow without equal wielded by the Rito Champion, Revali. It’s said Revali could loose arrows with the speed of a gale, making him supreme in aerial combat.”

Cool.

....

My inventory was full.

....

Later, I guess.