Disclaimer: I do not own any segment of the Legend of Zelda franchise. Those rights belong to Shigeru Miyamoto, Takashi Tezuka, and Nintendo.
Author's Note: This was supposed to be based off of Windwaker's Gannondorf but it kind of went all over the place. One-shot, character piece.
Pairing: None
He had been chosen to rule the deserts, the lands blessed by the goddess Din herself, to lead his people to the path of glory. But as the years passed, he soon felt his blessed kingdom was cursed. His desert was blasted by the scorching sun during the day and transformed into a frozen wasteland by nightfall, spoiling any of the crops or livestock cultivated by his people. The pleading prayers his tribesfolk made to the goddesses fell upon deaf ears, the divine forsaking them in their moment of need. Famine and disease began to overtake his tribe, the winds singing a haunting elegy throughout the canyon. Any nourishment, any sustenance, had to be found beyond the constraints of the harsh desert, away from the dictation of his rule and protection. And so his people ventured out of their sanctuary and into the neighboring lands, in search for the means of survival that had been denied to them by the gods. Three seasons passed without incident, the gaunt faces of his people slowly becoming full once more, and for a brief period of time, it seemed as though peace would befall onto his land. How wrong they all were.
Winter was especially frigid that year, the winds howling with frost. The little rations they had been able to save depleted quickly, spurring another venture into the neighboring planes that would earn them little but despair.
The flour that the villagers milled had been forbidden to them under the heavy weight of taxation, ruppees gleaming with wicked glee, just out of the reach of their tattered pockets. The game they had once hunted in the fields had been walled off, preserved for the wealthy overlords whose prosperous land bore them enough riches yet their greedy fists yearned for more. And the streams which they had once fished in became heavily patrolled by the water spirits, attacking anyone who dared to venture too close to their precious secrets.
He soon ruled over a kingdom of death, where the young died before they even had time to gasp in the arid winds that surrounded them while the elders helplessly looked on, withering under the harsh rays of light. What option was left to them other than to pillage? All the bazaars turned his people away with a harsh sneer, any honest work denied from them. The villagers viewed them with disgust, treating them as if they were a plague that was to be cast out.
So they stole into the royal city at night, when the townsfolk slept under their comfortable furs and woolen blankets, ransacking their wares until the hunger was sated and their pockets full. The morning after proved far more sinister than their night of misdeeds, morphing a fallen king into a wicked beast.
War cries could be heard throughout the kingdom as the first rays of the sun peaked over the horizon, curdling the blood of all living creatures save one. They dared to claim his people committed treason, when they themselves had never been without, had never suffered? Were they content to see them all rot one by one, becoming nothing more than bleached corpses under the sun? So be it. He welcomed the challenge, clambering onto his stallion without a moment's hesitation, his grin as wicked as his heart had become. Bodies littered the roads, either scorched from his dark flames or sliced in half by his claymore, each signifying his descent into chaos. By the time he reached the palace, the earth was stained scarlet, echoing the sands of his wasteland.
The heavens protested his prescience on the scared grounds, the clouds becoming distorted against the dark horizon, lightning crashing down to the earth in angry flares. His stride was swift, his cape billowing past the carcasses of the royal guard, his eyes alight with the ember glow of magic. The blood in his veins pounded in discord, the electric hum of magic crackling against his fingers as he raised a hand to the ivory throne doors, unleashing a blast of dark energy. The magic ate through the barrier, disintegrating the sturdy marble into little more than ash, as he emerged through the wreckage.
Perhaps if he could hear anything other than the suffering of his own people, he might have been able to prevent what happened next.
He entered the royal court, the very air surrounding him stale with ancient power, his gaze trained upon the throne. Ice collided with fire as he unsheathed his broadsword, his pace rapidly increasing, his wrath demanding payment in blood. Before he could even graze the skin of the monarch, cloaked figures stepped out of the shadows, chanting the language of the ancients. Their words immobilized him, his weapon falling out of his grasp, the magic prickling against the back of his neck, making his skin crawl. In an instant, he was surround by a brilliant light, it's burning rays enveloping his form, the raw power knocking him away like a helpless rag doll. His muscles screamed in anguish, blood dripping from the corners of his mouth, as he tried to scramble to his feet, only to be halted by the blade of the King's weapon. The rapier was trained upon his throat, forcing him to stay knelt to the ground as if he were a groveling animal, the cold metal biting into his worn skin.
"Your people chose their damnation, let them revel in it."
The words were seared into his mind, consuming all thought and reason, leaving him naught but one desire: Revenge. He would steal the Golden Power that had been bestowed upon the wretches, condemning them as harshly as they had forsaken his tribe. Their precious light would be consumed by his fury, swallowed by the darkness of his people's despair. They would quake in terror under his heel while his own chosen ones, the Gerudo, would take back what had rightfully been there's from the start. He was Ganondorf Dragmire, King of the Gerudo, Ruler of the Deserts, and he sought vengeance.