Unwarranted Reserve

Waking of Friday, June 29, 2018

Unwarranted Reserve

Mary and Dorothy were over, and they wanted me to play, but I didn’t want to do the main quest.... And so from a save I had cast at the entrance to Chief Riju’s palace, I warped to the Forgotten Temple, and PROCEEDED TO CLEAN—IT—OUT.

It was awesome. Always good to get more practice in parrying Guardian shots. c: ....Though I must say it does tend to run my shield supply down right quick.... :c It’s harder when they’re far away.... and Daruk’s always having to help me.... I find the timing much easier when they’re.... hahhh.... RIGHT ON TOP OF YOU. 8(

It was a lovely hard drudge pushing the infestation out toward the canyon.... but well worth it. Did you know there are treasure chests down there in hidden cavities beside the air-fountain cracks in the ground? Rich ones, too! :D To say nothing of the treasures of Ancient Tech leftover from the slain Guardians.

It was nice to have my own run of the place when they were all gone. So spacious and cool.... It must have been a retreat most beautiful and serene once.

I paraglided back to the giant Goddess statue at the back, and offered a long overdue prayer, to receive another Heart Container. That was nice. :)

That particular exercise bumped me up to twenty-two gears, and so it was time for another visit to Robbie’s place.... and Cherry.

I spoke to her and she beeped and bwopped and I got through her menus and I scrolled down and—

....

I could get the pants. If I wanted to.

I could afford them.

But.... wait.

I quickly warped to Kakariko to check with Cotera, to see if there were anything else to which I could put my gears.... Oh, what was I thinking of? The difference betweeen a strong but partial set, and a weak but complete set? The Great Fairy told me what materials I needed.... But it looked like the higher Ancient upgrades would require more cores.

And I was short on cores.

....

Sooooo I warped back to Robbie’s, spoke to Cherry, dropped another great honking wad of cash.... and got the Ancient Greaves.

I had the set! 8D

My gosh when I put them all on I looked.... all dark and awesome and intimidating! ^_^ Especially when I put on the helm and you couldn’t see my eyes. X-)

So cool. XD

I had enough lesser parts to have Cotera upgrade my new Greaves by one level. But I only had two Ancient Gears left, and would not be able to upgrade further until I’d done a little.... mmmm.... shopping.

Or rather, a lot of shopping. A lot of shopping between Dueling Peaks and Hateno, looking for Teli and his miraculous wares....

I also took a moment every day to check with Hino in regards to the next Blood Moon. But I never did catch him at the right lunar phase.... there was a shrine waiting for me on Washa’s Bluff, I was SURE of it.... If I could just be there on a Blood Moon Midnight....

One thing I was very happy to discover was that, if I found Teli on the Hateno road, and it happened to be raining.... to lift the gloomy mood he would put out all his best wares! Including gears and cores! 8D

Ah, the rain in Hateno would be so sweet to me now....

....

Hateno Rain should be a song.

. . . .

Didn’t the Hateno Rain so depress and spook me once?

.  .  .  .  .  .  .

I do believe it did. Back on that long, weary road punctuated by my first Yiga Clan encounters.

Ah but I needn’t’ve let the rain spook me anymore. I was braver now, and the road was haunted anyway, rain or shine.

Because.... the Yiga were attacking me in the open now.

I guess my little trespass in Satan Canyon and the whole incident with Kohga must’ve.... not sat well with them.

I’d be jogging along a path, and that telltale orange glow would coalesce off to one side or another, that wicked cackle would clatter through the air.... Once in the bottleneck west of Teli’s Slope, I employed the Meteor Rod to fend off a Yiga Clansman, and the ricocheting fireballs nearly killed us both.

Travel was going to become a whole lot more.... interesting.

....

Well.... they wanted me to go full Curare—

I’d go full Curare.

I visited Kakariko to buy some carrots for one of my upgrades, played an arrow game for one Rola, and as long as I was there, decided to visit Impa.

She saw right away that I had reclaimed the Master Sword—my sword, she called it—and impressed upon me that Princess Zelda had sacrified everything to protect that sword and me, and told me not to forget it.

Well that was a sobering note.

Hhhh, in truth, I had not been using the Master Sword much, or at all. Barely.

I hunted Lizalfos, I hunted more Guardians....

Maybe I was subconsciously treating it like one of my other special weapons, like Mipha’s trident or Daruk’s hammerclub—no wait did I even pick that one up? I never used them because I wanted them to last, to stay pristine. They took up my pocket space.... If I bought that house in Hateno, would I be able to stow them there?

I bought more gears and another core. Or two.

I knew the sword wouldn’t break like any of my other weapons. I knew it could briefly lose its power.... But I had never taken it to that point. Why was I leaving it alone so much?

I showed Nebb the Duplex Bow. He gave me fifty rupees.

There’s a good lad.

I suppose there was the point that some of my other weapons were, in fact, stronger than the Master Sword.

But why was that?

I hunted still more Guardians.

I had seen David play, and his Master Sword had a damage-dealing level of sixty.

But my Master Sword.... had only a level of thirty.

No but sometimes it glowed with a brighter strength and a higher level....

No but then it was weak again.

Why did it do that?

Not that thirty was all that weak, mind; for a single-handed weapon that was pretty good....

But why did it change?

What was the pattern?

I visited.... Kaysa, to upgrade my greaves one more time; I had amassed the ten required gears. She kissed her giant finger and bopped me with it in a small explosion of magical dander, and that brought my third of three Ancient Armor pieces up to level two....

I put them all on.... Full sets of clothing that were double-enhanced came with a perk.... usually....

And this perk was.... Ancient Proficiency?

What did that even mean?

Or was it really a perk after all? Or simply a pronouncement of my own skill? I’d killed a lot of Guardians to get this far....

I supposed I’d find out soon enough.

I checked with the Great Fairy to go over my shopping list: Naydra horn, Molduga fins, diamonds, and cores.

I’d just figured Naydra was the name of the third dragon, the one I had not met.

For surely there must be three.

Well, I knew where to find the diamonds easily enough, and warped to Zora’s Domain. But before I found Ledo, I came across Prince Sidon not on his usual balcony above the square, but down near the fountain, before the statue of his sister Mipha.

I heard him murmuring to himself.... or to her....

“Mipha, are you still inside the Divine Beast?” He looked so heavily pensive. “Are you aiding Link in his fight?”

And then he turned—

“Link!” He started at the sight of me. But he made no pretenses. “So you heard that, huh? I’m afraid you caught me in a moment of vulnerability.”

He said.... something more, about his sister, though I don’t remember the words.

He was just a man missing a loved one.

And that’s all right.

“I’m sorry you had to see me in a weak moment,” he finished, or some such words, and I moved away.

Everyone’s weak some time. Even the Prince of the Zoras.

Even my sword....

Sure, I wielded it now, but did I really own it?

I needed to figure this out....

I found Ledo, traded him some Luminous Stones for a Diamond, and saved.

Patience

Evening of Sunday, June 10, 2018 ~ 2

Patience

I’ve been.... known to be a nice sister sometimes....

I would wait for David before entering the Yiga Nest.

In the meantime.... I erranded.

Off to Dueling Peaks to ask Hino about the moon.... No Blood Moon this time.

Away to Hateno to swoop down on Teli once more.... No cores this time either.

Then a warp to the Divine Beast Vah Ruta to start another float down the lazy river, fishing for more Hearty Bass. As well as venturing inland to clear out some of my obsolete stamps. More than a few Lizalfos misadventures there—I’d forgotten what fun Shock Arrows can be.... @_@

I ended up in the wetlands before I thought to go back to Zora’s Domain to see if anybody were simply selling Hearty Bass.

They weren’t that I could discover.

But my sensor did lead me to find some more of the fishies out back, shooting up the waterfalls into Upland Zorana, until finally, finally.... I had ten of them.

Another warp over to Cotera—the fairies had respawned—how long do they take?? I caught three of them, but failed to notice a fourth before accidentally scaring it away.... Rats!

The Great Fairy was able to upgrade one of the remaining two pieces of Zora Armor. But I found that I had been so focused on collecting Hearty Bass.... that I had completely neglected to watch my supply of Lizalfos Tails! I was SHORT! D8

I don’t know! I had just always assumed I would have enough! You know, like Bokoblin horns, I thought they’d never run out! I’d certainly killed enough of them....

Evidently not.

Well.... I knew where I could find them at least.

I warped back to the wetlands and got busy hunting.

[Masks.... are so handy.]

But the reptilian devils were stingy; I wasn’t able to collect very many tails.

But as long as I was there.... when I could find no more Lizalfos to fight, I turned to the loose Guardian Stalker that had so terrified me before, as I had skirted round it high on the naked cliffs....

I killed it.

And—oh delight of delights—it dropped a CORE for me.

Excellent.

As the days continued to turn, I bounced again between Hino for moon details, and Teli to check for cores. But I had no luck with either of them....

Until David came home.

But by then it was so late, and I knew I would have to wake up so early, that....

I wasn’t sure if I was even up to tackling the Yiga Nest anymore.

Which was a little dispiriting. For both of us. But.... I was trying to be as sensible as I could be, with whatever sense I had leftover.

In the end, out of juice, I flipped to my map and piddled around aimlessly looking at various locations....

“You know,” said David, “I think you spend most of your time in this game just looking at your map, groaning about places you can’t visit.”

KhAUgh! .... My heart! X⩄X

He was exactly right. I was hungry to play more and yet fearful of getting too far ahead of the log.... looking at all the places I could visit but didn’t want to let myself get to.... And I didn’t want to cheat myself of too much sleep besides.

A laughing groan was my touché back to him, and we grimly grinned in my plight.... fed up....

But I wanted to finish up with something.... And on my map I spied a very large Korok spiral on a butte southeast of Spectacle Rock.

Spectacle Rock....

I may not have played every Zelda game.... but there were some names I knew to hold in reverence.

Spectacle Rock was a huge, wide, flat-topped mesa just east-southeast of the Wasteland Tower. Or perhaps.... did it include the natural arch that connected to the tower’s butte?

Did it include both mountaintops?

I don’t know.

I warped to the Wasteland Tower, and paraglided as far as I could toward my destination, but was brought to my feet halfway across the natural arch.

I had never been to Spectacle Rock before. The vast openness of its upper reaches—its upper reach, for how could a plane so singular be anything but whole?—was unsettling.

It should have been the home of Taluses. I felt sure that once I crossed the midway point, some gargantuan monster of stone would erupt out of the ground at my trespassing to have a stern word with me.

Or perhaps in the center—those tiny little knobs there—surely between those would be a Korok hiding under a rock.

But there was nothing.

Just nothing.

There was a wolf. And a blue butterfly.

And nothing.

The afternoon was sinking; I wanted to be off that rock.

I steered according to my HUD and did not stop when I came to the edge but leapt off at once, heading for the Korok spiral’s butte.

I landed on the wall somewhat below the mark, but the scramble to the top was easy enough.

There were two spare rocks here. And a long way down on all sides, and so I knew I’d best not waste them....

I couldn’t quite tell where to put the extra rocks until I actually counted how many there already were in each arm of the spiral.

Two of them were shorter than the others.

Well, a little heavy lifting fixed that!

And out came the Korok and gave me a seed.

And that.... that was enough for the night.

I warped back to the Gerudo Canyon Stable.... and a good night’s sleep.

Firefooted Flight

Waking of Tuesday, June 5, 2018 ~ 2

Firefooted Flight

Hateno Tower was fabulously tall. And it overlooked that stretch of road where I had met Teli.

Actually.... it overlooked a lot of things, and I had to play marker games on my map and through my scope before I was able to locate the miniscule strip of beige between a tiny cliff and a pinprick lake that I was looking for.

But the distance wasn’t too great for my paraglider.

I swooped in, shed some leftover altitude and perched on a great big spire of stone beside the small lake. I felt like some bird of prey as I scanned the little valley.... and there was Teli on the path, just making his way into the bottleneck preceding the Cliffs of Quince to the west....

I swooped down to catch him before he could get too far, and found that he was carrying different wares this time, but no cores.

Hmmm.

I warped back to Hateno Tower and tried this approach a few times. The results were variable, but.... it seemed a bit of patience was in order....

In the meantime I warped back to Dueling Peaks. Maybe I was thinking again of going to the desert. Maybe I was just continuing to look for ways to waste time. I don’t really remember, because the latter won out, and was then therefore free to rewrite the history of my inner battles as it saw fit.... had I had any.

I decided, after a very long time of avoiding it, to once again take on Rensa in his horse-taming challenge—the same challenge that had brought my beloved Brown to me, if you recall—or rather, that had left the brown horse standing stark in the field, caught between the wild and the domestic, which I had then decided out of a sense of duty to take on and care for as my own.

You know I do not like to attempt to take a horse out of the wild lightly.

My efforts this time would have to be perfect.... Or close enough to it.

Rensa started the clock and I was off. Sprinting into the fields I quickly found a small herd grazing.... I was wearing my Stealth Suit for an extra edge, but as I neared the herd, I really wondered how much good it would do me. I didn’t have to worry about making a sound, even at high speed—But not every horse would turn its gaze away at the same time, and so I found myself pinned in a crouch afterall.

Some horses trotted away, but I was able to come close behind one handsome red one....

And on I jumped, and soothed it to a huffing standstill before urging it back toward the stable!

I would make it this time.... I would make it....

And I did. With twenty or thirty seconds to spare, no less. Out of two minutes. Not bad.

And Rensa rewarded me with a fifty-rupee purse.

Cool.

But I did not register the horse.

Instead, I rode him all the way to Gerudo Canyon, admiring his form from all angles as he picked up the road and followed it. He was a handsome beast: red body, white socks and muzzle, fiery mane and tail....

I woulda called him Firefoot.

But I didn’t.

I sold him to a man named Zyle, for three hundred rupees.

I had met Zyle many, many moons previously, in Gerudo Canyon. He was stranded halfway from anywhere in a little alcove against the canyon wall, just waiting for someone who would be willing to sell him a good, strong mount....

As the one who had tamed it and ridden it so far already, I felt a certain amount of responsibility toward the fiery steed. It was hard to hand him over.... But....

Zyle would take good care of him.

After the exchange, Zyle thanked me for my help, and started walking his new horse toward the Gerudo Canyon Stable.

I walked with him.

Ah what fine screens of the two of us traveling and glancing as though in friendly conversation on the long and dusty road.... I wished I could still save screenshots.

I had thought to see what would happen if I walked all the way to the stable with Zyle, but.... well, the NPCs, they just move so slowly....

I’m afraid I became impatient, and got a little ahead of myself running circles around my companions, and in my haste.... I lost them.

Once they fell out of proximity, the game depopulated them.

Hhhhh.

Well....

I continued on foot to the Gerudo Canyon Stable, arriving there just after midday, the one or two o’clock hour, and.... I slept until the evening.

Return to Hateno

Waking of Tuesday, June 5, 2018

Return to Hateno

I wanted to play, but there were people around; I could not continue on with my main quest with that kind of buzzkill risk hanging in the air.

Have I only lost faith in humanity?

Hm.

I warped from Gerudo Canyon to the Shrine of Kaam Ya’Tak. There were plenty of crawlies in there; surely one of them would drop an Ancient Core for me....

No joy.

So I warped to Hateno—I could have sworn there was somebody who sold Guardian parts SOMEWHERE near there.... someone I’d met a long time ago on the road....

No luck.

But I did buy that fancy armor set David had reminded me of in his playthrough—the Soldier’s Armor. And I showed Nebb the Moblin Club, for which viewing he gave me fifty rupees! That was nice. :) The next thing he wanted to see was a Duplex Bow....

Haeh, well.... given where I was fixing to go in the near future that didn’t seem like too tall an order.

I also cleaned up an old sidequest by stepping behind the counter and addressing the lady inkeep directly. Dunno why I hadn’t tried that before.... I asked her what she liked, and she told me “Darners!” more out of a desperation to get rid of me than out of honest consideration. I relayed this to the lovesick chump down the street who’d put me up to it, whereafter he paid me a royal rupee for a handful of my own darners. I don’t even remember which kind.... I had plenty to spare.

I also made a friend at the inn, Worten. He was just sitting out on this patio I had never explored, looking content with the world. He was a traveler like me, and he told me about a few of the places he’d visited—or at least tried to; he hadn’t actually made it to Goron City. Nor had he been able to enter Gerudo Town. But he said if I was looking for adventure, I might try Zora’s Domain or Rito Village, though both of those were quite a ways away.

The sight of him contentedly sipping from his mug as he sat there in the breezy shade was so happily striking that I took a pictograph.

It’s a good one.

I felt like I might have been overworking poor Cotera, so I warped to Mija’s fountain in Akkala to see what she could make of my new armor set. She was able to enhance each piece two levels at least—three levels for the greaves. But I needed Hinox guts for further upgrades.

Fortunately I knew where a few Hinoxes could be found.

At Digdogg Suspension Bridge I left I think it was Memory a couple of bridges out while I marched straight in and killed the Hinox myself—ON FOOT! And I didn’t even get squished. :)

But the brute didn’t drop any guts. Cheapskate.

I boarded Memory again, warped to Dueling Peaks, took out Brown, and—dear me.... as I had done long ago in the dreary, dreary rain.... rode him down the long Hateno Road.

I had not taken that road in so, so long.

Why is that?

....

I don’t know.

Maybe my very first Yiga encounters had made me shy of it.

Maybe the pressing danger of the Yiga and the madness of the Valley of Terror had made me detest Hateno, and its road.

I still have not purchased that house.

....

We’ll see.

I spoke to everyone I met along the Hateno Road, and this time.... good luck was with me—I met a man named Teli, who sold GUARDIAN PARTS. Er, Ancient Tech, I mean.

However bad luck was with me too, for he carried no cores.

Hhhhh.

I rode Brown onward into Hatenooooish lands. One more place to check.

David keeps saying They’re in shrines! The cores.

Well, I knew of one shrine with a high chance of core capacity, that’s.... an odd way to word it.... core containment, no.... breach the core, um.... mockingbirds—

—I knew of ONE shrine with a high chance of containing an Ancient Core. I had quit from it many moons before in a bid to preserve mine own life. Just quit from it—I hadn’t known how to load a previous save from within the menu.

I had Brown take me back to it this time, while I maintained a rotation of different masks; for we passed roaming Moblins in the Woods of Concussion, and Bokoblins in the heights beyond.

The great, jutting mountain-cliff beside the sea was perhaps not well suited for horses, but we picked our way as best we could between stones and along ledges (Brown at one point attempting to align to a path crossing forty feet below us), and we made fair progress until we reached the highest, broadest open shelf.

The Shrine that stood at its tip over the ocean may very well have been the most prominent Shrine on the map. You could see it for miles from many directions. Maybe that’s what had drawn me to it so long ago. I’d been out of my depth, then. But now.... I was stronger.

On the flat, open ground Brown and I broke into a welcome gallop, slipping past the strong camp of curious Bokoblins until we were safe about the reaches of the shrine.

Even so, I led Brown around to the shady back of it, out of sight of the baddies.... just in case.

And then I stepped inside the shrine—the Muwo Jeem Shrine—and faced the long-feared Modest Test of Strength that had so daunted me into retreating before.

I beat it easily this time.

But there were still no cores for me.

Hhhh.

Well, it was another Spirit Orb anyway. I was overdue to pray at a Goddess statue....

I rode Brown back down the mountain [back toward home I wrote in my original notes—To Hateno? Strange of me....]—it was a little tricky to reclaim the path we had imagined for ourselves to get up here in the first place. And when we finally reached the road, I met Teli again.

I asked him about his wares just to see.

AND HE HAD A CORE!

I BOUGHT IT. FOR A COUPLE HUNDRED RUPEES AND THEN SOME.

SWEET.

Aha! So Ancient Cores could be bought!

It was raining as I galloped back westward. But I was feeling too jubilant—this called for a change of outfit! I ripped off my Bokoblin Mask. And then.... I ripped off everything else! And rode back to Dueling Peaks in my skin.

“Well, you’re looking peppy today, stranger!” said Tasseren the stablehand when I came to board Brown again, and I laughed.