Legend of Zelda:
Son of the Fairy King:
The Prologue:
Centuries ago, before corruption of the Blade of Evil's Bane and the "3-front War," a lone salesmen in the dusty cellar of his new workshop hummed the "Nocturne of shadow." With a gently stoke of his brush, he seemed to be restoring an ancient relic.
"The evil has long left this accursed thing," he said with a smirk, "but its value has not."
He hymned and hawed, washing his brush off with delicate care. Mustn't let the wrong colours bleed together, now. Restoring an artifact as old as this required a precision, especially with its both vague and mysterious history. Each colour, each line had to be exact, as if he was drawing a glyph to summon the power of the "Sacred Relic" itself. Carefully dabbing his brush on the inside of the vile of red ink, to rid the bristles of access paint, he gently drags the colour along the Mask. Like the caress of a lover, like a man wanting to pay tribute to a master.
"My people, with their gifts, have done a great and many terrible thing to protect this land. In its many incarnations," he mused to the Mask, as if the demon still resided in it. "But, playing nurse-maid to the royal family does not erase history. It does not change the price of a transaction."
He lifted the mask with a tool of glass and metal attached to his eye so he could inspect each crack and sign of aging of the Mask. Papers scattered around his make shift workspace, detailing connections to times lost, magic's and sciences of other realms, legends and stories of other masks he collected, and stories of the Great Hero, the Goddess incarnate, and the Demon King. With all of whom he, if the stories were to be believe, have had dealings. Each of them, playing a piece in the complex story of the Mask, and other histories forgot. Histories that the simple occupation of restoring masks became an obsession for a twisted little man, gnarled by a past he demands to remember, even if it means traversing time.
Each mask, each piece of evidence, tormented him. Teased him. As if insulting him by giving him only a taste of knowledge, a trait he would assume after years of his obsession. There was a story here. There was something more to these tales than legends. They were connected, and he had proof! They connections lead him to re connect himself with a culture he was long removed from, and that culture was always connected to magic, death, and the kingdom. Connected to worlds of light and dark; times of past, present and future; the three in which the conflict always stars. Always, in some form or another. Connection to the reign of peace or destruction along the lands. A connection even to the Goddesses themselves.
He had to know. He had to know what happened to them. Temples robbed, lies told, intentions hidden, covers and alibies flawless. Yet even having the Mask back did not help him. Yes, purifying this ancient totem meant it was less likely to kill him when he studied it, but when the creature was trapped. That hostage was the key to everything, the answers he had hoped to seek. Though, playing that game would not be wise. The creature left, it was not dead. Or, rather, it had not stopped existing entirely, if it was indeed dead before. It was out there.
"If only I knew where the thing had gone," he hissed, as he stared into the burning eyes of the mask, "if only I knew who you were, and how you were connected to me. Connected to the Hero!"
"If only I knew what your part was to play in Hyrule's Story… now that you are no longer imprisoned in Termina."