Prologue

Several Miles Outside Phoenix, Arizona- Present Day

As the sun rose to its apex over the desert sands, Saria continued her long march across the desert plain. The heat was bearable for her, she didn't mind getting out of Appalachia once and a while, even if it meant going to a place that was the polar opposite. She was glad that Darunia couldn't see her now, his teasing would make this walk even harder than the time she had to listen to Rauru talk about the duties of a sage! She looked up and glanced around the blue sky. Good, her master wasn't following her in his owl form.

She knew she was running late, but her flight had been delayed for five hours from Chicago, due to some heavy snowfall. She had called Rauru to ask if it would be an appropriate time to use her powers to teleport to Phoenix, but once again he had reminded her: no magic in the presence of any human. Period.

Harquahala Mountain was in view now, just a few more miles to go. Gods, why did she have to walk? She understood that she had to show some respect to the goddesses, but did this qualify? Couldn't she just send them a text? "Thx for all my powers+Keeping Evil at bay."

It took her five more hours to finally reach the mountain. She had seen a group of climber walking around it, but she was sure they were out of sight now. She closed her eyes and opened up her spirit energy, searching for a response back.

The response came back immediately, a surge of energy overwhelming her. She felt as if her skin was burning, the heat melting her into a puddle. She opened her eyes quickly to shut out the source. It was coming from above, a small little alcove on the lower face of the mountain.

She didn't feel like climbing, so she decided to break Rauru's rule this one time. As she extended her hand over the sand, a large root broke the surface and crawled its way to the spot on the mountain. She skipped her way up the plant and looked around.

The symbol wasn't hard to find, even though it had faded a bit. Saria placed her hand on Din's crest and watched as the Forest Sage crest glowed on her hand. The stone in front of her gave way, and she stepped inside the void.

The statue of the goddess was in the center, surrounded by smaller candles and a variety of gifts lying around the altar. A quick glance at them gave her a feeling of relief, seeing as she was not the last Sage to bring her gift to the goddess.

They were ordered to do this ritual every hundred years. She remember how long the journey was the last time, thank the goddess for modern air travel. None of the three goddess' had ever spoken to her, but Rauru said that this journey had to be made just in case the goddesses wished to tell the Sages something of importance.

She placed her gift, one of the seeds from the Great Deku Tree, on the altar and said a short prayer. "Done," she thought to herself and turned to head back outside.

"A hero is born."

Saria turned back. Had she heard a voice? She hastily ran back to the statue and nelt before it. "What is it, Goddess?" she asked.

"A hero is born," said the voice again. " In the realm of Farore."

"In Chicago?" the Sage asked. "Where my Goddess, where?"

" In the realm of Farore, a hero is born," repeated the voice.

Saria nelt in the same spot for several moments, but it was clear that Din, or whomever had spoken, was finished. She dusted the sand off from her knees and left the chamber, returning to the warmth of the sun.

"So, how did it go?"

She jumped in surprise, expecting to see Rauru doing another one of his surprise check ups. The actual visitor was much worse.

"Hello Ghirahim," she said flatly. The name made her tongue immediately dry.

"Oh Saria, don't be so sad! We've had a great friendship over these last couple of years! You got your dream job of living in the woods like a hippie, and I've enjoyed this world's finest wine, cars, and women!"

It was true. When the old realm of Hyrule had ended, all of them had migrated to this world, full of humans and no magic whatsoever. To stay incognito among the humans, everyone had adopted a facade, something to make them look human.

That had been over 2,000 years ago, so every century or so she had had to change her facade. These days she was what the humans would call a tree hugger.

The Demon Lord on the other hand had played his cards well. No one had seen him since The Arrival, but he surfaced sometime during the 1990's as an up and coming banker. Since then, he had acquired many assets and was now considered the worlds 2nd richest man.

That would explain the clothing he was wearing. A black suit with a red tie, and a large overcoat were not exactly desert attire. He was also holding a black walking cane, just for show of course, but Saria knew better. There was only one reason he would be carrying it with him.

"We've never been friends," she spat and continued walking towards the root that she had summoned.

CRASH

The entire root shattered like glass before she even set foot on it. She launched herself back to the entrance of the shrine.

Ghirahim tapped his cane on the rock. "Come now Saria, if you don't tell me, I'm going to have to force it out of you!"

"I can kill you with a single twitch of my finger," she said.

"Unlikely," he replied, removing his overcoat and laying it on the floor. "You're out of your element. There are no plants here, the heat would kill them before I could."

He was right. Summoning the root had used up more spirit energy than she had thought. And it had shattered so quickly.

The demon twirled his can and slowly walked toward her. "So, what did your little goddess tell you?"

"I'm going to regret this," Saira thought to herself. She opened her spirit energy to full and launched herself at Ghirahim.

He hadn't been expecting it. She had successfully pushed both of them off the mountain. Now just to find a soft landing spot.

There were none.

"Great, just great," she thought before hitting the ground.

The pain seared through her whole body, and she felt herself lose consciousness briefly. The fall would have killed any human, but thankfully she was stronger than them.

But if it hadn't killed her, it most certainly didn't kill Ghirahim. Where was he? She stood up and scanned the dead landscape. He was gone.

BANG

The blow came from above. She collapsed to the ground and fainted.

It was several hours later when she woke up. She found herself in a large board room, sitting in one of the many leather seat. She turned her head to look out a nearby window. New York City.

She tried to sit up, but discovered she was held in place with dark chains. Ghirahim had taken all the precautions to keep her contained.

A door opened and he walked in, followed by another figure, one that was twice the Demon Lord's size. As both of them entered the light she saw the second figure more clearly. He had muscles the size of a professional body builder, they were barely contained by the suit he was wearing. His neck was extremely thick, and his hands were the size of shovels. Clearly this beast could snap her in two, Sage or no Sage.

"Saira, are you up? Good to see the bleeding stopped. I must say, I had no idea Sages had that much blood in them!"

"I'm not telling you anything," she spat.

"Oh you don't need to! You talked an awful lot when you were unconscious. We've got a flight leaving in an hour."

Impossible! There was no way she gave up the words of Din that easily!

"You're probably wondering who my friend is? Well, we're both of the same species. Funny enough though, he doesn't look or act at all like me!"

"Lord Ghirahim, I thought we had agreed to keep my role in this anonymous for the time being."

"SHUT UP MALLADUS! I wanted to tease her a bit!"

"Malladus?" she said out loud. "You haven't been seen since the Dark Ages!"

The beast of a man grunted and turned to leave the room. "You finish up with her," he told Ghirahim.

"I'm almost done!" the demon said with a chuckle and moved over to Saria. With a snap of his fingers, the chains vanished. With his other hand, he punched a window, shattering it, and opening the room to the wind.

"Well, I do believe our time is done here," he said, pulling her towards the opening. "Don't worry, I'm not going to kill you! Where would the fun be in that?"

"Then….what are you…...going to do?" she gasped.

"I'm forcing you to do something you don't want to do," he said and pushed her out the window.

"To bad you don't have the Wind Waker!" he yelled as she fell. Satisfied with the job, he turned and left the room. He took the express elevator down and got into the car waiting for him. Malladus started it and they drove away.

"Why did you tell her that we knew the prophecy?" he asked Ghirahim. "She didn't say a word the whole time."

"To make her think we did. That way, her and her six friends will be on their toes looking for us." He pulled out his smartphone and opened the CNN app.

"Do you have any idea what the prophecy could be?"

"I have a hunch," he said and chuckled. It hadn't been even three minutes and already the story was the top headline.

Young Women Falls from New York Skyscraper: Body Not Found

So she had teleported anyway. Now the Sages secret was out, and the whole human world would be wondering how a girl disappeared before hitting the ground. He closed the app and looked at Malladus.

"I believe it may concern an old friend of mine. A certain Sky Child."