Vaun Harkinian: I have a few things to say before I begin. The first is directed to those of you who have read this before. Thank you for staying with me through the truly sickening amounts of changes this has gone through, but this is the last time. To those of you who haven't read this yet, thank you for trying something new. I hope you enjoy this fic.

Disclaimer: I, unfortunately, don't own Zelda. If I did, this fic would be a game not a story.

Chapter 1

On the Plains of Hyrule

The plains of Hyrule truly were beautiful, the tall grasses swaying in the wind that usually blew around mid-afternoon. The only thing that disturbed this long green pattern was the long ridges and dusty paths that led to the castle in one corner of the field. In the middle of all of this was the Lon Lon Ranch. It's tall farmhouse peeking over the ridge that surrounded the area. Although from the sky it looked like a barren area, in fact, the place was littered with small towns.

Histle was one such town. Although it was very small it had never been invaded or attacked by any neighboring town or one of the bandit clans that usually roamed the area. This was because, although it was small, everyone in the town was a part of the always-able defense force. The citizens of this small town didn't take their protection for granted either. At many times of the day you could see the villagers practicing with various forms of weaponry and combat. These were simple people in simple times. The King still reigned in his castle which seemed so far away from the simple little town that stood on the far side of the field. Everything was at peace…but then, that was only because news traveled slowly in those quiet times.

The villagers were training in the square. This exercise would continue for another couple of hours yet. It was all pretty standard, the same schedule each day. So standard in fact that one might get bored from the utter repetitive nature of the place. One such person was Galivan. He was the son of the town elder and thought of himself as having more responsibility because of it. His father was elder in name only. He was actually quite young, nearing the early signs of middle age and despite his short years he was generally a competent leader. Galivan himself was a young boy of only eleven. He had spiky blonde hair that framed his still boyish face. He was built as one ought to be after spending most of ones life in training for the militia. Although he was short he had well defined muscles.

Partly because of his youth, partly because of his increased sense of responsibility, he felt bored with all this repetition and training. During this particular session he had hidden in his secret spot in a cave within a ridge near his small town. Even this had started to repeat itself. Lately he had thought that he should find a new place to keep away from the repetition just because of the sheer repetitive nature of his going to one place every time he had to escape.

From his hiding place he still had a reasonably good view of the town and the path leading up to it. After sitting in the dusty cave for what seemed like hours he saw something unoriginal. A runner was heading for his town. He had an odd bunny hood on that seemed slightly out of place in the surrounding greenery. However, he was a messenger, which meant that something important had just happened. So, being naturally curious as an eleven year old he just had to check it out. He ran up to the odd bunny-man, trying hard to keep up with him as he virtually bounded across the field.

"Hello mister bunny-man, what's the news today." Galivan said, trying his best not to blatantly stare at those bouncing, yellow, fuzzy, tall…he had to shake his head to get himself to stop thinking about the subject.

"It's horrible oh so so horrible. There's a man named Ganondorf you see oh but I'm sure you know that he is rather important after all but you see he has taken over the castle you see and he is just so so horrible and mean and cruel and nasty and just oh so terrifying and he's attacking the local villages you see and everything is in an uproar and just oh so-" and he fainted. A normal man just isn't supposed to talk that quickly.

Galivan had heard of Ganondorf of course. The man was rather infamous in the courts and even on the fields themselves. He was known as a rather mysterious man who had emerged from the Gerudo. Of course, this was obviously a made up tale. Everyone knew that there were only women in that tribe. The thought of a man from that area who wasn't dead or dying was absurd.

Ganondorf however, had made quite a name for himself as an evil, rather insensitive man who looked down on everyone indiscriminately. The news that he had taken over the castle was horrible indeed, but it was somehow expected.

The bunny-man, who had previously passed out and thus been forgotten by the boy with a short attention span, had brought himself to his feet and was now making his was to the village.

'The village will not be happy about this' was the first thought that came to his mind. This was followed closely by 'I wonder what's for dinner' and so this was all forgotten.

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The town's bells resounded across the field, their echoing cries bouncing from tree to tree. It was as if the town itself was screaming for salvation from the monster that would soon be upon them. Ganondorf was calling on the little town of Histle. Apparently the very defense force they had set up to keep them away from all the harm of the outside world had finally brought in all the harm the outside world had to offer.

Ganondorf strode leisurely into the town, taking out the gate with a simple flick of the hand, even though it was made of very valuable steel that was sought after for its impregnability. That wasn't the scary part though, far from it. The scariest part of this whole ordeal was the expression on his face. As he walked along the path to the village he just stood there, smiling. It seemed as though he was laughing at some joke that no one else knew. He brought his arm up, lazily dragging it from his side. The villagers cowered in fear. Even though they had trained so hard and with such exceptional results they all knew that one blast of dark energy would end their life, but he had no intention of that. He just smiled even wider and pointed at a building at random. If at all possible, his smile grew as he walked up to the entrance of the ill-fated household.

The family inside knew its fate, but the members of the family were stubbornly refusing to just lie down and die for this man. As Ganondorf entered the rather small and cozy-looking house the father of the family of five jumped from behind the door and attacked with a pitchfork that had been lying around the house. But Ganondorf was too quick, and at the last second he grabbed the end of the fork and tossed the man over his head into the far wall, effectively crushing all of the bones in his body and killing him quickly.

The rest of the family was cowering in the corner of the main room. The three children of six, eight, and twelve were grabbing on to the end of their mother's dress, clinging as though if they let go they would die, and this was most likely true. The mother was different. She had a defiant look in her eyes even though physically she was shaking. She was clutching to her children much as they were holding on to her.

Ganondorf smiled. This was much more like it. This was the way things should be. All the fear present in that room was almost temporal in its pressure. All that fear was like good wine to Ganondorf. There were many different kinds of fear, the subtle kind when an innocent child is falling on a road and scrapes his knee, or the full-bodied taste that now engulfed the room. It was the wonderful taste of the fear of death. Ganondorf took a few minutes to savor the moment, to feel all the terror with all his senses, but fear dwindles and goes sour and then there is no more use for those who had once possessed it. Ganondorf had no need of a weapon. He didn't even need to use energy to kill all of these people. He simply brought his hand up with an open palm. He moved quickly, the open hand moving like lightning and at the end of the attack the far wall was covered in the blood of the mother and Ganondorf's hand was protruding from the far end of her chest.

Why the mother first? To produce even more fear, and fear was the essence of Ganondorf's being. It's what brought out the true power of his piece of the triforce. Now the children had renewed terror in their hearts, but it wouldn't last long. It had to be extracted to be fully used. He spread his fingers, and this time hoped for a much slower death. He thrust his hands, catching all three of their throats, but only enough to puncture the windpipes, leading to a slow, wheezing death.

He watched them writhing there on the floor simply enjoying the moment, but there were other houses to visit and fears to extract. This process seemed to go on forever, everyone being slaughtered one house at a time. It was all so slow that some villagers ended up killing themselves, favoring a quick death to the end that Ganondorf offered.

As Ganondorf was killing everyone house by house, Galivan was sneaking away to his secret cave. Ganondorf had blocked off the entrance to the town with a mass of dark energy to prevent escape, but thankfully he had not found the small hole that led to the cave. Galivan struggled through the tight squeeze and exited the tunnel into his cave. Now that he was free for a little while he had to figure out a way to get everyone else out of the town before they were all killed. There were other parts of this cave he had never explored before. It was possible that there could be another tunnel that led into town near the back.

There was no light inside the tunnel and very little air to breathe, but he had to keep going for his family's sake. The tunnel got smaller and smaller as he traveled along its deep recesses. The closeness of the walls was disturbing the boy. The tunnel was rising up as it kept going. Getting steeper and steeper as he climbed, the walls seemed to be closing in on him, crushing his mentality.

The tunnel abruptly ended near where the open air should be. Galivan was about to give up when he saw a little light coming through the dirt at the end. He began to dig, pushing the dirt out of the way with all his might, praying that he would be able to get out of this place. He no longer cared for the lives of the villagers, forsaking them for the fear of this tight enclosed space. He could feel the walls closing in on him, suffocating him.

After a great deal of effort he was finally able to break through the dirt and reach the other side. What he saw was certainly not what he had expected. He was peeking through a crack in the floorboards into the main entrance of his own home.

He was about to remove the floorboards and go back into his house when the door literally flew off its hinges and broke against a table in the middle of the room. In the broken entryway he saw a great shadow looming above him. That figure entranced him. He could see nothing but the shadowy figure as it walked calmly through the door. Galivan knew that this monster of a man must be Ganondorf. How could anyone else have so much evil and ill intent then, but the famed killer whose name had become commonplace whenever there was trouble. Ganondorf was an imposing figure, with black and silver armor covering most of his body. A tattered cape rested on his powerful shoulders. It was red on the inside and black on the outside so that no matter which way you looked at him he was just as frightening. The only visible part of him was his face. He had tightly-drawn dark green skin and an amber jewel surrounded by smaller silver gems rested on his forehead. He had red hair the color of dried blood and a rather large nose that would have looked comical on any other man. His mouth was curled up in an ever-present smirk that made him look as though he were already the king of the world, and for all Galivan knew, he could be. A sense of power emanated from his body made even more obvious by the drawing of the triforce on his glove with the triangle of power highlighted. Of course it was only a drawing. No one that evil would ever be allowed to hold a piece of the triforce.

'I have to warn my family,' Galivan thought, meanwhile trying to make as little noise as possible, but when he tried to move and free himself from this cave to warn and flee with his family he found that he could not move. It wasn't that the cave was too tight, or that the floorboards were too heavy. The more he tried to move the more he realized that the reason he couldn't move was not because he was stuck physically, but because he was too frightened. Moving meant having to face this monster that stood before him and he just couldn't do it.

There were no such restrictions on Ganondorf however. He strode on over the floorboards that Galivan was hiding under. He stepped on one of them and heard it creak beneath his weight. Galivan was truly terrified now. He knew that he would be seen if Ganondorf inspected the area closely enough. Ganondorf paused momentarily and looked around to see if anyone was there, but he moved onwards out of Galivan's line of sight.

Galivan breathed a sigh of relief. Now all he had to do was wait for him to leave and he could tell other people about the cave and entrance he had found. He didn't have to wait long, Ganondorf left the house with a somewhat disappointed look on his face and Galivan began to hope. Maybe he hadn't found his family, maybe they had escaped safely. Galivan pushed up the floorboards and climbed out into the room and looked around to get his bearings. He saw a sight that almost made him faint then and there. His family was lying bloodied on the other side of the large room. His father was slumped against the wall. His face had been crushed in at the middle and was now unrecognizable. His mother was in an even worse state. At least his father was dead. His mother had become a mess, something that could hardly be defined as human at all. Her legs had been chopped clean off and were lying in a heap on the table. Her bones were protruding from her body in various places the gash that they were coming out of was bleeding profusely. Her jaw was hanging loose, and it was obviously shattered and although she was in such a horrible state all the vital organs had been spared seemingly on purpose. She currently had her arms stretched out to her only son wheezing some words that could not be heard from that distance. He crawled over to his mother with tears falling unashamedly from his eyes and cradled her dying body in his arms, spattering himself in her blood. His mother gazed up at him with glazed eyes and whispered two words into his ear.

"Kill…me…" Galivan's eyes grew wider and his tears started falling faster as he heard those words coming from the woman who had given him life, especially so because he knew that that was exactly what he must do. He took a piece of a broken piece of furniture and stabbed it through her heart. As her life ended her last expression was a smiling face of peace and serenity. Galivan backed away from his mother and, seeing the wholesale slaughter that had occurred, he threw up on the floor.

After recovering himself from the sight he went outside. He knew what he had to do next. He had to warn the other villagers and stop this from happening to them. He ran out the door into another sickening sight. It made him throw up once more. His town was in ruins. All the houses were shattered and the people of his village were impaled on various lampposts and whatever else was still standing up. Some were even hanging from the bodies of other unfortunates, using whatever they could find for rope.

After taking a moment to gather himself again his sadness and disgust quickly turned to anger. He had to take revenge for his town. He knew where the weapons store was and quickly ran towards it. The weapon house had already been raided by others trying to stand up against Ganondorf or just to end their own lives, but there was still a good amount of weaponry to use. Galivan chose a short sword and a shield from the stock and ran toward the entrance to the town. The dark barrier had been lifted and he headed straight from Histle towards the castle town and the castle itself standing above a lava pit. He remarked to himself that he had never seen that pit before, but there was no real time to think about it. He only had one thought on his mind and that was the destruction of Ganondorf.

It was a rather long trek across the field and it took Galivan over a day to cross the plains, staying one night at the Lon Lon Ranch at the gracious pity of Talon. He was able to wash his clothes and himself while he was there and get the blood off of him due to the request of the farm's daughter Malon. As soon as the sun came up he left the ranch and thanked his hosts before hurrying to the castle before the sun set and the gates could close. It turned out he didn't need to hurry that much after all. The bridge was untended and wouldn't have been brought up at night. Warily, Galivan entered into the town square to find re-dead walking around freely. The re-dead were a strange people. They had no thoughts or minds of any kind at all. The re-dead are said to only inhabit crypts or places filled with the dead or dying. Apparently no one living was residing in the town any longer. Galivan exited the town and headed for the path to the castle. As he neared the bridge he saw a group of Stalfos, soldiers that had been corrupted by evil and turned into walking skeletons, sitting around a bonfire and…drinking? 'How is that possible?' Galivan asked himself. 'Stalfos are just bones, they can't drink.' But apparently they could, and were doing so quite a bit.

Galivan quietly approached the group, hoping to bypass them without being noticed. Unfortunately for him, he couldn't see as well as he had hoped in the dusty volcano smoke and tripped over a rock, alerting all of the Stalfos to his presence. "Whaaat'ss zzaattt kiiid dooiing all zee waay out 'eer." The Stalfos had a voice that grated on the ears, and it sounded somewhat like a cat scratching on a blackboard.

Galivan froze where he lay in the gravel for some time, but eventually he got up, took up his sword and shield, readied himself, and said "I have come to kill Ganondorf and I'm not going to let you stop me you boney bastards." The Stalfos all laughed and Galivan realized that he must look somewhat ridiculous with an oversized sword and a shield that he could barely lift. He was just a little shrimp attacking the now king of darkness, but he was determined. He was determined to attack Ganondorf even if he knew he could not win, but he had to get to him first and these were the obstacles.

"Oy Zzzaaack tttthhhiss kiddd waaanntss too sseee Gaaanoondooorfff. Cooommmee nooww leeet'ss shhoooww himm hooow wooorttthhless hee iss." Galivan prepared himself. This was exactly what he'd been training for since he was old enough to walk. He set his shield up and stretched his sword arm behind his back. He had been training most of his life to fight people. Unfortunately, these were not people. Five Stalfos got up, two jumping behind him with incredible speed. He turned around to face these two and left his back open. The three behind him slashed him simultaneously creating three parallel gashes that would most likely leave long scars. Galivan screamed in pain and dropped his shield. He had not trained well enough. He had never experienced such great pain in his life. He was also completely open. All five Stalfos closed in on him, slashing and hacking at his fragile human body. He tried feebly to fight back, swinging his sword recklessly until his sword arm was slashed. The five skeletons beat him until he could barely stand the pain. After they were done they kicked him into the town square where he hobbled out of the town before the re-dead could attack. Bloody, battered, and defeated, he limped out of the town and into the dark, foreboding plains of Hyrule.

Vaun Harkinian: Please Review and tell me if I should bring this up to M or not.