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.

Divine Beast Vah Medoh

Waking of Sunday, January 6, 2019 ~ 4

Divine Beast Vah Medoh

“Well now,” said a well-polished voice as I stood on the Divine Beast, “I think I’ve seen that face before.”

Revali!

“I had a feeling you would show up eventually. But making me wait a hundred years is a bit...indulgent.” The rapier glimmered in deigning to even prick me.

“You’re here to wrest control of Medoh away from Ganon, correct?”

I was.

Revali pointed me toward the interface and Sheikah Stone from which I could distill the local map, asking at the last if I thought I could make my way there.

Huh, didn’t sound like he thought any more of me, after all these years.

I made it to the map terminal just fine; it was in the bird’s head, seemed like. Two large, circular windows—Vah Medoh’s eyes—were set into the walls on either side of the chamber, which was surprisingly smaller than I’d have thought.... this being a Divine Beast.... I feel.... like I’ve written this before....

Once I’d distilled the map into my Slate, Revali ran down the control terminals, stating that I would need to activate them all. And then, again, “Think you’re up to it?”

Even now, his voice bore a tinge of.... snideness.

Well.... Better start makin’ my way around, I thought.

I checked out the Divine Beast’s controls. Tilt? It looked like I could rock the wings....

And I regarded the inside of the torso. I’d seen it getting to the head, but now studied it more closely in light of how the Divine Beast might move.

A number of large blocks were suspended in the central space, far removed from both floor and ceiling, but all on the same horizontal plane parallel to the ground. The two metal blocks were attached to two rails that spanned the space from fore to aft. The three stone blocks ran on rails crossing between starboard and port.

I could see—the metal blocks I could move with Magnesis, but the stone blocks would slide according to the tilt of the Beast.

OH this could really screw things up. I hated disrupting their discovered orientation, and knew I probably wouldn’t be able to restore it, but I wouldn’t let that stop me now! Besides, it looked like different orientations would give access to different areas. So I started moving, Vah Medoh cried out at my commands, and I made my way into the port wing.

With the bending of the world inside the Beast, I found that the tilt of the inner decks was at a steeper grade even than my paragliding angle. This meant I could fly farther and longer, but it was dizzying—never paraglided up to something before....

Inside the port wing—MALICE MOUTHS?

OH GOSH WHAT—THIS WAS UNHOLY!

I KILLED IT.

Ugh. ._.

Also, the music sounded.... poisoned.

This place did NOT want me here.

I came to the first terminal and activated it.

“There are four terminals remaining,” came Revali’s voice, “Still a ways to go.”

And that was when it all.... turned.

Oh my gosh, this music was so freaking.... the strings....

THE STRINGS. I CAN’T.

THE DESPERATION.

THE HOPE.

As the music of the early Beasts had been open, and neutral.... and then turned dark and insidious once it caught on to me activating the terminals....

And as the music of the following Vah Naboris had started out in seething anger at my presence.... only to give way to a brighter, stronger sound as I claimed more territory, returned hope to the ancient contraptions....

Now the music of this final Beast—what the harmonic minor....—at first poisoned in the wretched wrath and fury of a cornered, dying thing.... at my DARING to move forward for the kill and the entire reclamation, was now running, now flying, now clinging and willing and praying in the desperate heat of a final bid for freedom from the darkness. Undauntable not by choice but by necessity. Surely this music had to be the culmination.

There is hope for the world, I thought.

There is hope for this world.

I found the second terminal behind a gusty, howling puzzle involving a very large, round porthole in the wall that I’d had to open.... and activated it.

“There are three terminals remaining!” Revali’s voice echoed, “Keep going.”

And Hey! I could see Shatterback Point out the window! And Death Mountain! As we wheeled through the sky....

I can’t take this music, it’s.... it’s too amazing.

I couldn’t find the lower terminal in the port wing indicated by my map, so I went to the starboard side and locked down the third terminal there. Paragliding upward to find treasure chests was so strange....

“There are two terminals remaining. You’re almost there.”

He sounded.... surprised.

I looked out another porthole I’d opened, and I could see Mount Nero! And the Tabantha Tower! Clear as day.... Right there.... As if I were only paragliding very, very high.... All the world stretching out before me.... So many familiar landmarks.... all close enough to fly down and touch....

The music was not changing anymore with the different terminals.

It was still just that strong, determined, indeterrable, indomitably swelling string section.

There is still hope for this world.

My Compendium already had pictographs of Cursed Bokoblins and Cursed Moblins.... Now in the lower part of the torso, down on the floor, I finally got a pictograph of a Cursed Lizalfos.

Gross.

There was a Malice Mouth down there, and it would occasionally spit these undead floating skulls out into the room.... It was.... really alarming, when the Cursed Lizalfos saw me and just.... rushed me in this distorted flying lurch—

I prefer the live ones.

After I’d gotten the pictograph and killed the skull, I found and accessed an outer deck via a large open hatch on the starboard side. This deck wrapped around to the fore in a broad and happily uniform kind of walkway. The arc of it passed beneath Vah Medoh’s neck and continued round to the port side, where a similar hatch led back into the central chamber.

That was where the eyeball was. The eyeball to that mouth what’d been spittin’ out gross things.

I shot it.

That cleared up the central chamber all right, or it cleared it up enough—there were always little rogue Malice Pools you couldn’t get rid of, and which you just had to watch your footing around.

But after that I went back outside, for I had seen something else along the outer walkway....

There were launch points out here. Like grandiose diving platforms, complete with ornate little railings leading up the steps to nowhere. I could imagine the ancient Rito who must have manned this thing diving off them into the sky....

And beyond the port side launching platform, I could see, there, in the belly of the port side wing.... there was the next terminal. Standing in an open belly hatch near the wingtip.

I would have to fly to get there.

Oh my gosh.

So—I tilted the bird—rocked the port wing down into a dip—the Rito Rock was RIGHT THERE below—I had stood on that rock—the angle aligned and the port wing was down—and—

I flew.

Oh my gosh this music COULD NOT be more.... appropriate.

I did not want to let go of my paraglider until I was WELL inside the little hollow of the belly hatch. I landed on the pedestal itself, in a deep recess far away from the door, and ACTIVATED.

“Just one terminal remaining!”

And he laughed a little huff.

“What do you know?”

Still sounded surprised.

I rocked Medoh’s wings the other way and paraglided back to the main deck. Now I’m dropping the Vah....

Starboard side? The last terminal was in that wing, but.... I hadn’t been able to reach it via the inner decks....

I jogged through the Beast and out onto the other external walkway.

There. It must have been in the same, opposite belly hatch.

And that was guarded by a Malice eyeball.

The last terminal must be in there....

It took a few arrows, but at the proper tilt, I was able to shoot the eyeball at long range. And once its attendant cluster of Malice had evaporated, I scoped in and could see....

There was a gondola!

The track ran above, attached to the underside of the starboard wing!

I tilted the Beast, brought it to me.... and rode it.

I stepped inside, rocked the wings back the other way and it started moving my gosh I was.... I was in the air with so little to hold me.

“Don’t fail me, Gondola....” I murmured.

The apparatus seemed so spindly. Somehow I didn’t trust it as much as I did my paraglider....

But it held firm, and took me well into the starboard belly hatch. At the far end was an upward ramp leading back to the inner deck. The last terminal was up there....

I’m here, Revali.

I activated it.

“That was the last terminal! Now you just need to start the main control unit!” Revali’s voice echoed in what sounded like impressment. But he quickly brought the rapier under a fine-tuned control again, “I want you to take a good look at your map. There should be a new glowing point on there. Well?”

Still condescending a bit.

But I don’t mind.

“Flap to it!”

And the aforelocked door between this last terminal’s antechamber and the rest of the starboard side wing-deck opened. I was free to move back into the interior of the Beast, bypassing the gondola.

The music has changed.

This is desperation. This is some kind of wire.

Have I gotten all the chests? I think I have....

I feel like I need to hurry.... This music....

This is it.

WHERE THE MEN ARE FINE ARCHERS

Waking of Sunday, January 6, 2019 ~ 3

WHERE THE MEN ARE FINE ARCHERS

It was snowing when I woke up. I’d been hoping for clearer weather, but.... oh well.

From the lodge, I skirted the jagged foothills southward, past the inexorable wolves, until I came the short distance to the great break in the wall of dark stone to my right: Dronoc’s Pass.

The pass opened onto a roughly round kind of dell, with a path leading round the edge, counter-clockwise back toward the north. The path so lay due to that the middle of the dell seemed to be a bottomless, gusty pit, full of dark, reaching spires like teeth.

I could see a round structure higher up at the north end; it looked Rito, and was about the size of one of their dwellings.... And there were big painted target-boards attached here and there to the treacherous rocks.

This seemed to be the Flight Range all right.

I made my way toward the circular building, and could see—Teba?

Someone was on the high platform. He looked like.... a snow white Rito.

I climbed a ladder to access the structure, went inside—there was a lit wok in the middle, but nobody around. Then I turned to the left and could see, on a kind of runway heading out over the dell, someone was hunkered there in the cold, working on something.

He just looked over his shoulder with a gruff, “Yeah?”

It had been voiced with its own cinematic.

This was Teba.

....

He just peered at me with his sharp, slit-pupiled bird’s eye for a moment before turning back to whatever he was doing with that bow, adjusting it, testing its spring.... “I don’t know you. And I’m actually pretty busy here. You should probably go.” His voice was so gruff and harsh....

But I approached him again, and told him that I could help him with Vah Medoh.

“Let me get this straight,” he said in bigger-than-normal font. ._. “Some random Hylian wants to help me bring down Divine Beast Vah Medoh? I’m not buying it. Let me guess, the elder sent you here to talk some sense into me.”

“That’s right,” I said.

And under his breath he murmured, “Just like the elder to trust any old fool who wanders into town.”

We introduced ourselves, and at normal volume he asserted he wasn’t going anywhere until he brought down Vah Medoh—until Vah Medoh fell from the sky. “If I have to kill Medoh... so be it.”

“Then let’s get started,” I say. Lol fresh little punk.

“You’re serious?” said Teba, “HA! Well, far be it from me to talk you off the ledge.”

Oh Dang! XD

I wasn’t sure whether I should like this guy or not....

“But it’s as the elder said: the only way to stop Divine Beast Vah Medoh is to get inside it.” But there was no way we could set foot in Medoh, he added....

“Actually...” I started, like I do, and contradicted.

“Not only are you wingless, you’re brainless too,” Teba retorted, “The only ones able to set foot inside a Divine Beast were the five champions of old, and unfortunately for us and for the rest of Hyrule, they all died 100 years ago.”

But Teba shook this off and came back to the present. “Never mind... Let’s focus on bringing down Medoh...one step at a time.”

He accepted my help and I was on board, but before we did anything, Teba wanted to test me here in this aerial archery training zone, the Flight Range.

He set me to destroy five of the painted targets within three minutes. If I could do that.... we could work together.

I DID IT WAY FASTER. Sailing over the dellpit, riding the gusts, now rising, now letting myself drop, I plugged target after target after target with my bow. And all the while Teba’s voice grunted begrudging encouragements in the background.... Engrossed in the task at hand, I only caught the last two: “One more...” and “Perfect!”

He had a bark of gravel and iron—His voice was so.... low and cool! XD

I pelted my five targets in something like thirty seconds—definitely less than forty—and Teba called me back in.

“Hmm... Not bad at all...for a Hylian.”

Why thank you.

“I’ve got to tell you, Link... When you first showed up, I thought someone was pulling a prank on me. But after seeing you handle that bow, I can tell you’re the real deal. You must have seen a battle or two.”

My choices were “Hundreds of them.” or “I’ve seen a few.”

I wouldn’t boast. “I’ve seen a few,” I said.

He grunted a syllable of laughter in a Hm. “Don’t be modest. I can tell just looking at you. Link... I feel I’ve heard the name somewhere before...”

Hhhh, they said that sometimes....

“Well, if you really want to help me bring down Medoh, it’s now or never. I’ll get you into position so you can give its cannons all you’ve got. Inside that treasure chest is a bow I’ve modified. Take it, and let me know when you’re ready.”

I went to check it out.... Ooh, a Falcon Bow.

It looked cool.

Teba told me normal arrows wouldn’t put a dent in Vah Medoh’s cannons. I’d need Bomb Arrows. “These are a precious commodity, so don’t expect me to do this again, but... take these Bomb Arrows.”

He gave me twenty. Don’t worry, Teba, I won’t waste them.

“Also, it’ll be cold up there. You’ll want to prepare a warm meal or bring some warm clothes.”

Well it was a good thing I was packing my W I N G A L I N G   H A T !

The plan was that he would draw Medoh’s fire, and I would destroy the four cannons.

Ohhhhhdfhdsjkalghjklgjfkl....

“I’m ready,” I say.

“All right. But let me ask you just one question,” Teba said, “Why are you doing this? Why risk your life to bring down Medoh?”

He sure dropped the Vah a lot....

Oh gosh my CHOICES.

“To rescue Zelda.”, “To save Rito Village.”, “I can’t just watch...”, or “Just because.”

Hm. I thought about this.... I was gonna be honest and say.... “To rescue Zelda.”

“Zelda? But that’s the name of the princess Revali served 100 years ago at Hyrule Castle. I don’t know what she has to do with Divine Beast Vah Medoh, but whatever. As long as you’re helping me bring down Medoh, your motivation is fine by me.”

....

“...Right. Get on.”

Oh my gosh!

He was a large Rito, not as large as Prince Sidon, but his wings seemed powerful and I didn’t suppose it was unbelievable that he could carry me!

We fly out! I’m on his back!

He told me if I wanted to retreat to just hover in the updraft for a moment and he would come get me—Vah Medoh was surrounded by a tempestuous updraft.... Good thing for me.

When we drew close, the Divine Beast threw up a blazing red force field that seemed to sizzle—it encapsulated the Beast entirely except for four protruding points.... THE CANNONS.

I jumped off Teba’s back and he peeled off and flew around and I could see the first cannon’s targeting laser chasing after him as he rocketed in great wheeling arcs through the air! But I had to focus on the cannon—as it was distracted I drew my bow mid-air and shot a Bomb Arrow at it—came up short—and so I hovered closer riiisiiing, DROPPING, riiisiiing, DROPPING and I shot it again at much closer range and got it this time and its life only went down halfway so I shot it again and BOOM it was down!

I circled counter-clockwise round the Beast to the next cannon and then—“Watch out!” came Teba’s voice—the next cannon was targeting ME!

“Teba I thought you said you would draw its fire!” D8

Cannons 2 – 4 put me in their sights, but the lasers had a devil of a time finding me as I paraglided up and then fell, up and down, up and down through the endless updraft. Teba flying around, wheeling, circling, calling out every once in a while in his gravel-iron bark things like “It’s targeting us!” And I going round so slowly it felt—the Beast was huge—until I finally blew up the last cannon!

“That’s done it!” said Teba, or something like it. “Well done, Link!” or some such words....

And he soared around....

And I thought “Now come get me, Teba!”  .____.

But I paraglided on down toward the Divine Beast.

And Teba watched.... and then grunted with a grimace.

Oh! D8

His left thigh.... was scorched right through. Ugh...

“Bad news, Link,” he said, his voice becoming more ragged. But I could tell he was trying his utmost to tough it out. “Looks like I got hit pretty good back there.”

He was hurting.

He said he was afraid he would have to get back to the Flight Range.

“If I can make it there,” he added.

BUCK UP, Teba, of COURSE you can make it back! 8C

“It’s all you,” he said, and gave a thumbs-up with his left outstretched wing-hand.... and then peeled away like a jet.

And I floated down onto the stern of the Divine Beast.

The top.... was mossy.

Felt....

....like some kind of Ghibli movie....

[[Now that I had a clear picture of Teba in my head—tall, white, stark, and gruff; pointed crest feathers springing back from his crown in an aerodynamic rush, sharp beak glinting, sharper eyes glaring—artworks began to dance in my mind of painful, post-assault shelterings in the Eye of the Neck, the freshly injured Harth wincing back against the stone, Teba casting a protective wing over him as he glares hungrily back up into the dark and flashing sky. There is rain....

Perhaps it miffed Harth even more that he was the one who’d been hit, even though the bright white Teba really should have presented a clearer target. But he would not stomach holding that thought for long....]]

Brazen Peacock

Waking of Saturday, January 5, 2019 ~ 5

Brazen Peacock

How fitting. He would take the top of the five-hundredth page.

The Divine Beast hovered massively up in the sky. I could see it from where I stood on the Painted Landing. Alone.

But a RUSH over the railing, a howling whirlwind straight up into the sky, and Revali came up from below, stalling out at the top with a careless flourish before dropping perfectly onto the rail, gripping it surley beneath his avian toes.

“Impressive, I know,” he crooned. That rapier voice.

He spoke smoothly of how few could achieve a mastery of the sky. But with his artful technique he was able to create a powerful updraft that allowed him to soar up into the heavens—“A superior and masterful skill, even among the Rito.” Or some such words. He lovingly admired his handsome, blue-grey wings.

“Now then,” he said, hopping lightly down onto the landing, “pardon me for being so blunt, but let’s not forget the fact that I am the most skilled archer of all the Rito.”

He was almost.... circling me.

“And yet, I have only been tapped to merely assist you, just because of that darkness-sealing sword on your back.” The rapier twisted a bit. “It’s just... asinine.”

I drew my head back where I sat on the couch.

Whoa.

With his skill, he said, he didn’t see why we couldn’t easily dispense with Ganon.

“Of course we could just settle this one-on-one,” he leaned in close to say. “But where? Hmm...” He cast about in grand mockery. “Oh, I know, how about up there!” And he threw one wing toward the Divine Beast as sunlight glinted off its bronzebeigy form in the brilliant day.

“Oh, but you must pardon me!” The rapier glinted in razored jolity.... before plunging once more into my forehead. “I forgot you have no way of reaching that Divine Beast on your own.”

And with a spread of his wings, he thrust up into the sky, that updraft of his.... And as he powered away so hard and fast—“Good luck sealing the darkness!” he called back.

And he was gone.

Man....

“CHAMPION DESCENDANT!” Saki yelled again, and I snapped to. “Are you all right?”

I was.

He seemed.... a little full of himself.

Mipha loved me.

Daruk was friendly with me.

Urbosa respected me.

But Revali?

....

I didn’t know what to make of Revali.

He’s neither crazy nor blind, I finally thought in Mr. Harris’ voice.

He’s just vain.

Poor, vain fool....

Harth opened up to me a little more then, too. He told me about Teba, and said that yes, he could be hot-headed, and a little rude. But he and Harth, they looked out for each other.

I.... probably needed to go to bed.

I did. At the Swallow’s Roost. A lady Rito named Cecili checked me in.

“Only stalkoblins are up at this hour, traveler,” she said.

Don’t you know it.

I took the Rito Down Bed for the higher price of 80 rupees. Didn’t often get the softer beds. This one had sound in the blackout. Soft fluffing and even breathing sounds. Ahhhhh.

I woke up with full hearts plus three extra, and an extra stamina wheel.

Naaaaaice.

GOOD NIGHT.

Wise Old Owl

Waking of Saturday, January 5, 2019 ~ 4

Wise Old Owl

There was only one more Rito house before the spiral of boardwalk finally came to an end. And in this house, resting in what might have been a wooden rocker—I wasn’t entirely sure; there were a lot of feathers in the way—was the largest Rito I had ever seen.

He was aged, with a gentle demeanor, honeynut plumage, and great, cream-colored brow-feathers you could clean a pipe with.

Just as Kass was more parrot-like than most of his kin, this elder Rito seemed more like a great horned owl, with luminous eyes and a fine, pointed beak. Beneath his creamy brows and covering most of his face and neck was an equally creamy beard, brushed grandly out to either side, and braided thickly downward for a foot and a half before it ended in a gigantic bob. Was it feathers or was it hair? He stroked it as he greeted me.

“Ah, a visitor. Welcome to...” But he trailed off before—“Oh. OH! That object on your hip. Could it be...?” But he caught himself. “Forgive me. Where are my manners? I am Kaneli, Elder of Rito Village.”

He asked about the Sheikah Slate, and when I confirmed that that was indeed what it was, he leaned forward in excitement, and his already large eyes widened to an alarming size! Owl indeed!

“Then it is true!” he exclaimed, “You must be a Champion like Master Revali! One of the few people able to board Divine Beast Vah Medoh!”

But here he paused and murmured beneath his breath that the Champions had all been dead for a hundred years.... and shortly concluded that I must be a “mere descendent”. An inheritor of the Sheikah Slate.

He begged my pardon once more before asking if I would listen to the request of this old man.

Here we go, I thought....

And he told me straight up that he would like me to deal with the Divine Beast Vah Medoh.

“Only Champions were able to control the Divine Beasts,” he stressed again. And he told me how he had tried to impress this upon some of the more headstrong Rito Warriors of his tribe, but they didn’t heed his warnings.... He could not stop Teba and Harth from launching an assault against the Beast. And.... it hadn’t gone well.

Harth was badly injured.

And the other....?

“Teba escaped unscathed,” said the Elder, and I was relieved— “but I fear he now plans to face Medoh alone.”

—and just a little bit disappointed at the same time.... No derring-do, dashing rescues of the desperately wounded here. That was okay.

“As a descendant of Champions, you might have a chance,” the Elder went on, “Please, find Teba. If you work together, you may be able to stop Divine Beast Vah Medoh.”

And that seemed to settle it.

Hahh.

I thought about the other places I’d been. The grandness of King Dorephan, Lord of the Zoras, the seclusion of the protected Gerudo Chief.... But this old owl, he seemed more.... grandfatherly than anything else, here in this rustic place of small wooden lodgings.

It just seemed so.... humble.

I kind of liked it. c:

I spoke with the Elder for a little bit longer to get more details. I learned a little about Vah Medoh, not much I didn’t already know, and some about the old Champion Revali. He had been a skilled warrior, wielding a bow twice his own size with ease. Kaneli wondered what could have happened inside the Divine Beast a hundred years ago to defeat such a celebrated warrior....

I also learned that, evidently, attacking Vah Medoh had been Teba’s idea to begin with. Oh gads, that made it even worse that Harth was the one who was injured. Shot down, the Elder said.

Elder Kaneli suspected that this failure may have only strengthened Teba’s resolve to make another run at Medoh, and that he was likely preparing for the assault. Ah, so he had gone missing of his own accord, it seemed....

The Elder directed me to speak to Teba’s wife Saki—oh, that pretty one just next door—Saki, he said, might be able to offer me clues regarding Teba’s whereabouts.

So, I went back to the boardwalk, walked a ninepace downspiral and turned back into Saki’s house. Teba’s house, I guessed.

But Saki had already overheard me talking with the elder. Their dwellings were so close, and these homes.... they were so open.

Saki opened up to me then. She told me she thought her husband was somewhere in the Flight Range, a place where the Rito would go to practice aerial combat. (She gestured over the lake and toward the icy Hebra Mountains.) At least, that was where Tulin, their son, had said his Dad had gone.

She said, assuming I had a means of air-travel, if I took off from Revali’s Landing it would be a straight shot to this Flight Range, and I would easily be able to find Teba.

I looked where she pointed this time.

Revali’s Landing was only a little way down the Neck, and it was one of the larger landings off the spiraling boardwalk. So large it had little landings of its own, stepping off into the sky. The dark planks of its broad platform were painted with a stylized, flying kind of design in white....

I had been here before.

Memory took me....

Rito Village

Waking of Saturday, January 5, 2019 ~ 3

Rito Village

I had a feeling I was going to like it here.

Mazli was the next Rito I met; he seemed to patrol the boardwalks about the townward end of the series of bridges. He told me Vah Medoh shot down anything that flew too high, and that it was frustrating for the Rito to have to fly so close to the ground.

I looked up. Now that I was here, on the Rito Rock, I could see that the Divine Beast seemed to be set in a circling course around it high in the sky. Like the biggest buzzard in the world....

Another Rito, this one with seagreen plumage, lazed on a larger landing as the boardwalk veered off to the right and began to circle the Neck. He seemed down; I guessed the oppressive Divine Beast had everyone in low spirits.

Like they do.

There were shops branching off this lowest circuit of the path, and they all seemed similar in build to that house I had seen of Kass’ up on the treeshroom, only bigger. An ample, circular floor, a short wall rising up to about waist-height around the circumference (excepting at the door), and above this, enough vertical supports to hold up the high roof, which was conical, rustically shingled on the outside, and warmly raftered on the inside. The resultant open views onto the lake and the yellow mountains beyond were spectacular.

Each shop seemed to have its own clappercaller standing outside, hungry for custom. There was the Swallow’s Roost, which was the local inn. Two honeymooning Hylians were staying there, but the wife thought this town was a hole; I told her she didn’t know what she was talking about. Then there was the Slippery Falcon, which sold all the goodly foodstuffs you couldn’t find out in the field, like milk, wheat, and butter, as well as some pretty good arrows. And then there was the Brazen Beak, which was the clothing and armor shop. And they sold....

“THE WINGALING HAT!” I gasped. 8D

This set was called the Snowquill Trousers, Shirt, and Headdress. WOW! And they imparted a cold-reducing effect. Excellent! I bought the whole ensemble, and oh did they look smashing.

The basis of all the clothing I could see the Rito wearing included a front-lacing, corset-like girdle that reached all the way up to the breastbone and ended in an acute chevron just below the waist. It looked very aerodynamic, and its design was echoed in the Snowquill Shirt fit for Hylians. The shoulders and waist-back also sported decorative feathering, and the whole outfit was trimmed with the soft-spoken diamonds and gentle geometric patterns of the Rito aesthetic, which I’d seen painted neatly along the boardwalks on my way in.

And with my head at long last under the Wingaling Hat, my sidelocks were now bound into pristine little tresses, completely enclosed at the bottom by those decorative, anchor-shaped jewelry-weights. And leaping up behind my pointy left ear, the namesake of the thing: a single, wing-shaped piece rising white and glittering from the circlet. The asymmetrical design gave the headdress.... an archaic, sylvan kind of grace.

Now these would be good for cold climates!

Further along the winding, rising boardwalk as it wrapped counterclockwise around the Neck, I met more Ritos, in their open, circular dwellings, more Ritos, talking about the Divine Beast, more Ritos, wishing they could give it what for, and—oh my gosh—BABY RITOS! Oh my gosh they were so cute! ^_^

One little one I spoke to told me tales about how “Molli’s dad got hurt—” ( Uh!? D8 ) “—and Tulin’s dad went missing.” Oh my gosh....

Maybe some of them had tried to give the Divine Beast what for, and their efforts had gone awry.... I’d seen that with other peoples. I hoped they were all right—I wanted to help—I can’t help it—when I hear about people getting hurt—

My shrine-detector had been brreep-brreeping at me, and I found the shrine, partway up the spiral, at the end of a little jutting tangent of the boardwalk, on the broad, grassy top of another great thrusting shoot of yellow rock. The Akh Va’quot Shrine.

A dizzying windmill puzzle lay inside. My sleepy mind couldn’t handle much more of this....

I locked it down all the same, and continued along the path.

The spiraling boardwalk just opened up on the right side at whiles, sometimes plainly with simple breaks in the railing, sometimes grandly in broad landings. I guessed these were an airfaring people after all. Perhaps the spiraling path wasn’t so linear as it looked, if you included the airways....

And then I came to the dwelling of one Harth.

Harth sat on the floor at the back of his house, head bowed, holding one wing. “Owwwwwwwww...” I heard him murmur. This must have been the one who was injured.

All of the other Rito I had seen had plumage in a modest rainbow of colors; the children were more and especially vibrant. But Harth was black as soot, with long crest-feathers drooping in a brooding sulk from his head.

I asked him what the matter was, but he didn’t really want to talk to me about it, only muttering about that cursed monster. When I pressed, he introduced himself as the village bowsmith. But he couldn’t raise his arm just now, so business wasn’t that great at the moment.

He left it off at that.

“Are you all right?” I asked him once more.

“Not really... If this is what we are up against, we should have put more stock in the elder’s words.”

I couldn’t get anything else out of him, and on that enigmatic note he dropped his head again and returned to cradling his wing.

What did he mean ‘we’ should have....?

Did he and someone else attack the Divine Beast?

“Molli’s dad got hurt, and Tulin’s dad went missing.”

But where else could one go who went missing? After attacking a Divine Beast?

I hoped missing only meant missing, and not DEAD. For the child’s sake. Though.... some romantic in me hungered after higher stakes and drama.

I left Harth alone. I could only go back to the boardwalk and higher round the Neck in hopes of finding out more from someone else.

But I only found more of the same, Ritos sighing and lamenting about the Beast overhead. And then I came to the home of Saki.

Saki looked different from the other female Rito—for oh she was definitely female, stunning in light, roselavender plumage with bright pink crest-feathers set back into a voluptuous bouffant, upcurled ends in pleasant, bouncing layers. Her face was somehow softer, not as sharp as other Rito faces, her eyes like wells.

Similar to other female Rito, she wore the decorative hoop-bangles where the men wore their anchored sidelocks. But her double-breasted oversash (the men’s sashes were single-sided, as was the one on my Snowquill Shirt) was white, instead of the seemingly traditional red. The rest of her ensemble was also lighter.

Surely now, I thought, maybe this one will open up and tell me something....

“Can I help you?” she asked when I approached.

“What’s wrong?” I asked her.

“Never mind. Forget it.” And she broke off.

Dude....

I approached her again.

“Hello,” she said, “Please. Now is not a good time.”

Nothing.

I was really curious and concerned about the fate of that missing Rito....

And I was quickly running out of Rito houses to call on....

The Last Frontier

Waking of Saturday, January 5, 2019 ~ 2

The Last Frontier

From the Ancient Columns and down the gentler, grassier back of the hill, I sported with a few Moblins and a lily-Korok before striking toward the Sheikah Tower.

The tower stood at the crest of a rocky hill to the north, across an empty gorge where the road bent and twined. Malice crawled all over the stones around the tower’s base. It was at a lower altitude than where I was, but I could tell I wouldn’t be able to paraglide directly onto the tower. The best I could hit was partway up the slope on the gorge’s far side.

Mom was with me during this part. I enjoy.... just being with my Mom. Even when she still starts and warns and cautions whenever I run along the edges of cliffs or take flying leaps into the air.

She is a Good Mom. <3

I floated over, scrambled up the far slope, and came to where the tower was. Malice completely encompassed its base; I couldn’t access it. There were a few tall stones standing here and there; I thought perhaps if I could get on one of those.... I could paraglide from one to the other.... maybe paraglide onto the side of the tower, but.... No, the distances were too great. I’d fry in the slime.

“Gooped. Ya got gooped.” –PBG

I couldn’t climb a stone and float over to the tower, but....! There!

I found an eyeball. :)

I shot it, it poofsploded and evaporated, taking a lot of the Malice with it, and the column it had been surrounding collapsed against the tower! Access!

And a long climb through the fargazing music later, I was at the top.

This was my last Sheikah Tower. The Tabantha Tower.

I set my slate into the pedestal, distilled the rune, and.... ♪You get the thing!♪ ....The last blank space on my map populated. This was the Tabantha Frontier.

Complete Map of Hyrule Extracted, said my Slate.

Wow! ^_^

The Rito Rock—that tall, oddly-shaped spire—Heh, Oddly-shaped indeed—it looked like a bird!—Although.... that Oddly was probably a mockingbird or a grackle; this rock spire looked more like the neck and head of some kind of crane or stork....

*AHEM*

The Rito Rock, I could see from the tower, was so close now, standing tall and straight, its neck hewn all up and down with odd angles from erosion, and its “beak” jutting out at a stark perpendicular angle at the top. I could see, both from the tower and on my map, that the spire actually stood in the middle of a sizeable lake. Huh.

Okay!

I considered, as I was so high up and could see all the world laid out before me. I could have struck out on a more direct route to the Rito Rock, but.... I decided to follow the road instead. Rather unlike me, now that I think about it.

It was rife with Lizalfos.

But after cutting and dodging my way through so many belligerent hoodlums I came at length to the Rito Stable. This was the one I had seen from the edge of Hebra.

Kass was there.

After talking with some of the other people there, I approached him.

He was happy to see me in one piece! The feeling was mutual as always. ^_^ And here so close to his hometown of Rito Village, he said he was feeling terribly homesick, and confided to me that he’d had to leave his wife and children back in the village.

Kass has a wife and kids? I thought. My goodness!

I never knew.

“But I can’t go home until I fulfill my promise to my teacher,” he said.

“Promise?” I asked. It was my only option.

“My promise to... No, perhaps now is not the time.”

He said he would tell me, in Rito Village, once he learned all the ancient songs.

So mysterious, Kass.... I’d heard him talk about his teacher before.... What promise did he mean....?

I decided to sleep the night at the stable before moving on. And in the morning, I headed toward the village.

The lake—Totori Lake—was different from most other lakes I had seen, in that its “shore” consisted mostly of two-hundred-foot dropoffs all the way around. The water shimmered distantly below in the enormous, sunken, beigestony pit. A few other rock spires stood attendant to the mighty bird-shaped one in the center, but none it seemed were half so tall. I could see the occasional updraft blowing here and there as well, in the event I should paraglide around and sink too low, but aside from those.... there didn’t seem to be much down there....

Not that I had reason to worry: well kempt, handsome bridges of dark wood spanned from shore to spire to spire to spire, high above the water. It was at the beginning of the first of these bridges that I met Gesane of the Rito as he patrolled the path to the village.

He introduced his home and kin for me: “The Rito of Totori Lake. Where the men are fine archers and the women better singers.”

Heh.

^_^ I liked it.

The tops of the spires were grassy, and pleasant, with birds and flowers and pine trees and even the occasional little water pocket pond. This really was beautiful country. Breezy and beautiful.

As I crossed the third bridge after the second rock, there were.... Malice drips and a sudden blackout? Would I meet the Divine Beast? I’d forgotten these bits! But it was.... a BLOOD MOON CINEMATIC?

“The Blood Moon rises once again,” came Zelda’s voice.

BUT IT WAS DAYTIME.

“Please be careful, Link.”

THE SCENE ENDED. It was six-something in the morning.

What the heck?

Afraid I had missed the proper cinematic on a glitch, I reloaded from the stable, and went toward the village again. I stopped to pick the same peppers or berries or whatever it was I had grabbed before. I moved forward at the same pace, had the same talk with Gesane. Began crossing over the water and came to the same bridge and....

Nothing.

Huh.

But.... I had reloaded.... Was the game acting like I had saved?

I kept moving slowly and shoot that was a bear over there, didn’t want to get its attention, what was a bear doing on one of these rock spires—

But nothing else happened. And.... I.... finally just kind of accepted that.... the game had somehow deprived me of the cinematic.

I resigned myself to just find it on YouTube later.

I sighed, relaxed my guard, and just continued on AND THEN THAT TERRIBLE BIRDLIKE SHRIEKING FROM THE SKY.

Then came the Divine Beast introduction cinematic.

. . . . Whoof.

That was alarming. I told David about it later and we laughed.

On into the village, and I was really liking the look of this place. Lush grass, sweet flowers, breezy pines; the dark, comely wood of the bridges-turned-staircases and -boardwalks intermittently broken by soft earthen paths under the gentle sun; the wilderness on all sides and above and below....

And the music. Rito Village’s music....

*-!-*

And in a soft jolt, I was both surprised and not:

It was DRAGONROOST. <3

It was the musical theme from Dragonroost Island.... only settled cozily in a cabin in the woods, instead of flying fiercely about a wild island in the bluster of an untamed sea.

Of course it was Dragonroost.

Ahhh. <3

The handsome boardwalk continued straight inward and upward, ending directly against the base of the central pillar of the Rito Rock, the Neck of the Crane. At this landing, the wooden path continued to the right, winding upward and away around the Neck. But for a moment I was more taken with the sight just in front of me.

At this juncture, a gentle alcove had been carved into the light stone of the spire, and a small Goddess statue erected in the hollow. The little shrine was laid with decorative cloth; offerings of flowers lay thereon at the statue’s foot, and a crown of similar blossoms rested gaily upon its head. All bright and fresh-looking as if they’d just been picked.

Of all the shrines to the Goddess I had seen, this one was surely the fairest in its happy simplicity.

*

The pine trees smiled and the wind and wood breathed.

The earth and the sun had never been as content.

The world was at ease here.

*

Well at this point I was pretty sure I’d finally done it. I had seen every major habitation Hyrule had to offer. Just in case.... Just in case....

Just in case of that notion I well knew by now to be only fancy, but which I had still decided to humor through to the end: I had made sure, or sure enough, that there were no other houses to be bought aside from that one in Hateno.

So that was the only place.

Hahhhh.

But if I had had a choice.... the pines, the grass, and open air, the open-walled homes in cozy simplicity, village full of flyers and all musically inclined....

Yes.

I think I would have lived here.

I think I would have lived here.