Before you read: This series is rated M for frightening scenes, violence, strong language, usage of alcohol, and the occasional sexual scene. If there is any sexual stuff in a chapter I will warn you at the top. That being said,the focus will not be on heavy sex or romance unless it directly influences the rest of the plot. If that's what you're here for, this is not the place for you.
This is a story based off of the many universes of nintendo with a heavy focus on Legend of Zelda.
I'm not planning on following the cannon too strictly. You will notice that some things will be different (OOT Gannondorf in the BOTW world, Corrin in FE awakening world, etc.), so if that kind of thing annoys you, maybe avoid this story. Regardless, I will still try my best to do these characters justice, because I grew up with many of them and they mean a lot me.
Lastly, I will try to update the story as often as I can. If there are long periods of time where I don't upload, I will try to give you updates and let you know what is going on.
Without further ado, enjoy Smash Bros: Shattered Destinies!
Chapter 1: Sheik
The fog hungers for the damned.
If you ask a Hylian about the Lost Woods, this is likely one of the first things they will say. Even the bravest of adventurers will tell you to stay away from this cursed place. That's why it was all the more confusing when Sheik found the Dark Lord himself, Gannondorf, making his way into the maw of the woods.
Sheik knew that, after years of searching for him, she would find Gannondorf eventually, but she never expected it to be here. He never saw her, of course. While he and the troops that accompanied him navigated the maze of the Lost Woods on foot, Sheik would trail closely behind in the refuge of the tall treetops.
The party below started out 30 strong, but quickly dwindled to a 10th of the size. The Woods is a dangerous place plunged in eternal darkness.
It all started with the blinding fog, the same fog that carries with it a horrible illness. Once it made it's way to Gannondorf's camp, many of the soliders started to lose their way and catch the disease of the stalthos. Sheik saw it all unfold from above. First, the paranoia sets in. One by one Gannondorf's troops began to turn on one another. Fights broke out over meaningless figments of their minds every other minute. One bokoblin even burned the tent of a fellow solider because of a dispute over a cooked duck.
Then, confusion and loss of memory begins to show. Many of them would start to wander off and forget who they were or why they were there. This is where the effects of the disease become permanent. You start to roam meaninglessly around the woods, slowly losing sight of reality, until the final stages of the disease become apparent.
The skin on your body starts to flake off in clumps, and your muscles shrivel up into nothingness. By the end, you are nothing but brainless skeletal remnants forced to roam the cursed woods for all of eternity. You never die of age or hunger, and you never leave. The only way to meet your end is by the ferocious bite of fire.
Sheik saw it all happen to one of the bokoblins in the army early on. It was a particularly dark night when he decided to leave the comfortable confines of the campsite. Nobody knew what had happened to him. They started inventing wild stories about the soldier getting abducted by a strange creature or being lured away by a seductive siren.
A week passed until they had found him again. By pure coincidence, the remains of the red bokoblin had shuffled his way back to the campsite with withered, weak feet. When they saw him, when they had laid eyes upon what he had become, they had learned the true extent of fear.
The bokoblin soldier, not much older than a boy, had returned to them a monster. The entire left side of his body had succumbed to a sickly brown rot. His darkened gray bones shown beneath the areas that rotted off, and the joints that still functioned gave a weak, feeble twitch.
The worst part was the moaning. As he looked around at his past friends with lifeless, swollen eyes, he gave a horrible, guttural wail comparable to a mother that had lost their child. He was mourning something. What would the dead have to mourn? Is it their past life? Is it that they miss their family? Perhaps it isn't something for the living to understand. Perhaps it is such a horrible, miserable feeling that our brains are incapable of understanding it.
When the camp saw those sad eyes and exposed ribs, they knew that the stalthos had taken him. They impaled his lifeless body atop a spike, and burned him until there was nothing left but the small pile of soot and ash laying on the mossy ground.
Sheik watched it all from above. She never knew the little bokoblin soldier, but she couldn't help but weep for him.
By the end of their two week journey into the Woods, there were only three people in the party still alive. Gannondorf himself, a lizalfos, and a moblin. The disheartened party moved deeper into the ever-expansive forest until they reached a small wooden shack.
By the looks of it, it must've been standing there for centuries. The wood was rotted and covered in moss, and the intricate web of the vile skulltulas had already claimed it long ago.
Whatever they were doing here, it had to have been of the upmost importance. No sane person would traverse the Lost Woods like they were without some sort of purpose. Whatever was happening in that old shack must've been something truly dark.
Sheik sat on the branch of a dead tree and observed the party march into the foundation. The moblin stood watch outside, while Gannondorf and the lizalthos made their way through the old crooked door. Their footsteps came to an abrupt halt and the dim light of an oil lantern shown through the many cracks in the wooden walls as well as the window off to the side.
Sheik snuck past the giant moblin and made her way to investigate. Upon peering into the rotted window, she saw Gannondorf standing upright in front of another hunched over figure with a collection of strange masks at his back.
Usually, Gannondorf has a way about him that causes everything to absorb his dark energy, but it pails in comparison to the sheer hopeless feeling exuding from the other man. Sheik couldn't look in his direction without feeling nauseated and having an incessant static ringing in her ears.
There was something inherently unnatural about this man's very existence. The lizalthos would seemingly agree, as he stayed close to the door, ready to take off into the dark at a moment's notice.
The man looked to be in his 40's, but his skin was so unnaturally smooth that he had to be younger. The large smile that slashed across his face was one that was too big for his narrow cheeks to contain.
"I'm done with games, sorcerer. You promised me that five years after I broke the triforce I would obtain power beyond imagination. Five years has passed since that day, and yet I am no more powerful now than I was then. I want to know why you lied to me," Gannondorf said.
The man put down a hot cup of tea and cupped his large hands in front of his fading purple robe; all the while keeping that evil smile. He gave a quiet chuckle and began to speak.
"Do not lose patience now, my friend. You will have the power you seek in due time, but there are more steps you must take first," the figure stated.
"I've followed enough of your steps. You've done nothing for me but weaken my power since the day we met. Your useless magic tricks have done nothing,"
"Oh no no no, you misunderstand. I am no sorcerer or magician or any other form of magic user. I am simply a humble salesman who collects information from afar,"
Gannondorf kept his arms crossed at his large chest and let his eyes wander around the room, looking at the various odd trinkets he had strung around haphazardly. Then, quickly reestablishing contact with the sulken man.
"I would imagine a place like this would be a bad spot to be a simple 'salesman', isn't it?"
"I rather like it here, myself. You may not get as many customers, but the few that do find their way here always have a story to tell, much like yourself. Sometimes, they are even polite enough to give me a nice mask for my collection. Perhaps you could even give me your own mask, if you so desired,"
The man reached for one of the many masks fastened to his pack. Sheik noted that it appeared as though it was bound with human skin. The expression on the face looks like that of pure terror, and it made Sheik all the more uneasy.
"I did not come here for your oddities. I came here to discuss the power you persuaded me of last time we met. Your idleness in this matter has begun to anger me, and I seek answers,"
"Tell me, do you even understand the inner workings of the power you seek, oh great dark one?"
Gannondorf's expression gradually grew more irritated. His red brow lowered and his jaw began to clench.
"Perhaps I would've known if you would've just told me five years ago!"
Most people, when confronted with such a powerful menacing presence such as Gannondorf, would grow visibly frightened at the very least, but this man did no such thing. He just kept wearing his smile and long narrow eyes.
"Let's begin this tale millions of years ago, in an age long past. Before the three goddesses even existed, there existed four, far more powerful beings whose names are lost to time. These four beings bound together to create a perfect universe. In that universe, they made vast, beutiful lands with creatures just as beutiful as the world they roamed. But one day, the four beings gazed down upon their creation and saw that it had grown tainted with evil and darkness. Their world had escaped the confines of their perfect vision, so they started anew and created another. When darkness found its way into that universe as well, they created another, then another, then thousands more to follow. Nothing they did worked. Every single creation they made became tainted. The beings realized that they were incapable of creating a perfect world, so they killed themselves out of grief,"
Sheik couldn't believe what she was hearing. As the man was talking feelings of dread, confusion, and anger all competed for the leading spot in her head. With those emotions also came questions. Who was this man? How did he know this? Sheik wasn't sure, but she knew that he was dangerous.
"How does this tale of yours relate to obtaining great power? And why did it require breaking the triforce?" Gannondorf asked.
"Oh, but you didn't let me finish, my friend. When these great beings died, their souls were bound into four shards, known as the Aetherforce. They were scattered across four different universes, and reside within worthy hosts to this day. I do not know the whereabouts of these shards, but I do know how to find them, and breaking the triforce was the first step,"
"Elaborate,"
"The triforce was made by the goddesses Din, Nairu, and Farore. Although they are powerful to be sure, they are simply children's toys in comparison to the four great beings. The triforce, in the same way, is like a butchered replica of the Aetherforce. Despite being nothing compared to the Aetherforce, it still holds a tremendous amount of power. So when you broke it, it broke the very fabric of space and time and created bridges between the universes, the likes of which we haven't seen since the days of the creation itself. You can use these newly created bridges to travel through the universes and claim the Aetherforce for yourself. That is how you will finally get the power you desire,"
"And how exactly would I travel across these 'bridges' that you speak of?"
"There is an ancient and powerful song that has the ability to let you pass through these bridges-"
Gannondorf quickly extended a muscular arm and grabbed the man by his slender, pale neck.
"Then stop wasting time and play the song! I did not come here to discuss your strange religion, Hylian!"
"I do not know the song. The only people who do are the Rito, and they won't let you have it willingly,"
His grip on the man's throat tightened, but the man still smiled.
"Are you mad!? I can't just start a war with the Rito now! We're under a ceasefire for a reason! If they join the war, they could easily retake Hyrule Castle! Now that the triforce is gone, they would even be able to kill me,"
"By the time you can jump through dimensions you will be able to stomp the Rito like ants. It's all a temporary setback on your quest for total domination. You will be a god!"
"And how do I know you aren't just tricking me? So far your promises have been empty, and your allegiance is questionable at best. My patience with you is wearing thin. Prove yourself trustworthy or I will see to it that you meet a fitting demise!"
The man turned his head to lock eyes with Sheik. Her fight or flight response kicked in immediately as his bony finger arose to point in her direction.
"If I was so untrustworthy, my friend, I wouldn't have told you about the girl that's been looking at us through the window this whole time,"
Sheik quickly let loose a smoke bomb and jumped as high as she could until she could feel her fingertips brush against one of the rough tree branches.
"Find her! Find the girl and kill her!" Gannondorf shouted.
She swung as quickly as she could from branch to branch. Her arms began to strain as her weight was constantly shifting from one side to the other, but the adrenaline helped her ignore it. She pushed herself to keep going, even as she heard the stomping feet of the moblin approach from below.
"Come out of the shadows, girl. Don't be afraid," said the moblin.
Her hands found a branch that was big enough to stand on and sustain her weight, so she hoisted herself up onto the tree to catch her breath.
"You're going too far from the light, girl. You and I both know that once the fog rolls in we're both as good as dead, so you might as well just give yourself up now and save me the trouble," the moblin continued.
Sure enough, the bitter fog began to warp through her linen clothing and kiss her skin. It started as a gentle touch, but it started to warp into strangulation. Soon enough, it began to cover her eyes and slide it's fingers through her throat.
"If you want to kill yourself in this godess forsaken forest than go ahead and do it, but no matter what I will hunt you down! I died long before I found myself here anyhow,"
Sheik briefly contemplated heeding his words, but deep down she knew she couldn't. If she doesn't at least try to survive, then this whole mission would've been for nothing and terrible things would be sure to come. She needed to warn the others, and if it meant she might turn into a stalthos, so be it. She bounced from treetop to treetop, and tried to resist the cold grip of the fog.
There was but one mission on her mind now; one last thing that kept her going through the evil Woods. She needed to find Link.
