Waking of Thursday, May 31, 2018 ~ 2
Many, many moons ago, before any moons I could remember, before moons
were moons, I hurried with a shake
from the cold and entered into the Keh Namut Shrine, high on the Great Plateau,
and found myself face to face with a three-legged devil terror that wanted to kill me.
It was only the second Guardian I
had ever faced, the first having appeared before me in the Shrine of Oman Au.
But in engaging that second one....
somehow....
....Somehow I blocked that one with my shield
and learned something called the Perfect Parry.
Hopefully I’ll be able to employ this more purposefully in the future....
That
was it....
I checked my list of skills. It was
actually called the Perfect Guard,
but I think I preferred the alliteration.
That was it. That was what I was
remembering.
I.... had never taken the time to
finesse my swordplay—I’d always imagined
I would, in the future, at some point....
But I never had.
But now....
Well I wanted to show David
something but he wasn’t coming and I dared not do anything important in the meanwhile but I could go hunting because I needed
those gears for the Ancient Cuirass—
AND
I WAS GOING TO PLAY THIS GAME FOR THE
PRESENT ANYWAY.
I needed gears. And only Guardians had gears.
So....
Up to my aid came the memory of an
accidental parry, and....
I wanted to test it.
I wanted to try doing it on purpose.
Perhaps it had only been foolish to
think of making the attempt in the middle of that basement full of nightmares, but.... where could I....?
I
knew.
Back to Robbie’s place—The Decayed
Guardian down the hill would suffice for the experiment. I floated down to say
hello....
I.... stood my ground.... and held
my shield....
No
was it a two-handed weapon in my grasp? What was I doing—Daruk’s protection
wore thinner....
I had come in too fast without a
plan—And then as I could not take much more I made a dash for the other side of
the stone, falling shamefully back to a panicked mashing of buttons.... I was
Z-targeting, but I was facing away. The blast came. Daruk roared again.
But—
....
And
the Guardian died?
How had—?
Was
it because the shield had been on my back?
That happened to me in Majora’s
Mask.
But if the shield were not actually
deployed (for it was a Guardian
shield)....
....
This needed more practice.
I collected the Guardian’s
remains—there were no gears.
Cheapskate.
I was out of Ancient Arrows anyway.
I didn’t want to go charging up against any more Guardians, decayed or not,
without some backup. So it was back to Robbie’s again, where I bought ten more
arrows. But I only had eighteen or nineteen gears. Not enough for the Cuirass.
Soon....
VERY SOON....
I warped to Kakariko Village—there
were a couple more fairly manageable Guardians near there. I wanted to see if I
could get more gears, continue practicing the Perfect Parry and, if need be,
put my new arrows to use.
Oh
my gosh I was hunting Guardians.
My first target was that one in the
pit out back, at the top of the
Sahasra Slope.
That first live one I’d ever
seen....
Where
was this Courage coming from?
....
I guess.... the lightning strikes
near you often enough, and makes the earth to shake....
At some point you just stop
trembling.
....
But you try not to get struck
nonetheless.
My timing was very much off, and I lost my footing in the
fireballs. One laserbolt destroyed my Guardian Shield and I had to switch to a
Knight’s Shield—It wasn’t Ancient Tech;
would it work the same?
This
was a dangerous skill to practice; there was no padded training arena for
this. But Daruk protected me. And Mipha kept watch.
I managed to take the Pit Guardian
down using only the Perfect Parry followed up with normal arrows to its eye.
I
slew a Guardian without an Ancient Arrow.
And the second one just through the
PitGate and out on the grass was almost as manageable! But, as Daruk became
exhausted with my poor sense of timing—and, as I
also lost my Knight’s Shield to a laserbolt—I did use an Ancient Arrow
to finish that one off.
Two Guardians with one Arrow. Heh.
I made one last stop at Cotera’s to
see if there were anything I could upgrade—turned out there were—I bumped up the defense on some of
my Circlets.
And then it was back to Robbie’s once again because
those two Guardians out back of Kakariko had bumped me up to twenty-four gears!
I
HAD ENOUGH GEARS FOR THE CUIRASS!
AND CHERRY MADE IT FOR ME!
KhuAGH!
My wallet! >⩄<
But it didn’t matter—I had enough
rupees—and now I had two of the three pieces of armor that would defend me from
my deepest nightmares!
DANG it, Nintendo! I said it before! Why do they do this!
The only way to acquire the thing that
would make your most dreaded trial more bearable.... is to first complete your most dreaded trial without it! OH you
cruel
ironic
building
my
character
so
I can—hrrmph!
Back to Cotera’s and I upgraded my
new Cuirass, for there were no gears required for the first level. Plenty of
lesser parts, but I had enough of those to spare.
There were gears required for the second
level of upgrades: ten gears per piece for the Ancient Armor set. I assumed it
would be the same case with the Ancient Greaves. After the twenty gears it would cost me to acquire those in the
first place....
These things were so expensive.... and not just in rupees.
But.... I was getting better.
Soon
I would become better still.
A Blood Moon rose as I ran around
Cotera’s forest.
More
gears would be ready and waiting for me to collect them.
SOON.
I just needed a few more shields.
Mine were running out pretty quick.
