I don't think I worded something in my last author's note correctly. I meant I'd title a chapter after a piece of music, and then develop the chapter similarly to how the said music is developed. Usually, such chapters are when I develop my characters, so if you're looking for character development here, you've got it.

In this case, I chose the scherzo from the work that gave this one it's name, A.K.A. Symphonic Metamorphasis on themes of Carl Maria von Weber. The scherzo is titled Overture to Turandot. In the case of this scherzo, it's a semi-pentatonic theme jumping around the orchestra that has eight repetitions. In this case, I trimmed the number down to four (I don't plan on focusing on enough characters to be able to create that many points of view), and it follows that vague outline of developing character.

I introduce a love triangle in this chapter. This triangle is between Roy, Zelda, and Link. Roy loves Zelda, who is in a relationship with Link.

Believe it or not, Roy's crush mirrors one of my own. You see, I have this crush on the principal oboist at my school (those of you who have read Atrorie: Land of Dreams who know about the whole 'growth magic' thing with the court musicians and the A/N in the chapter following it should know who I'm talking about), and yet she's in a relationship with somebody else too. To emphasize this point, I portray Zelda in this fiction to be as close an approximation to this person I know as I can write up. However, Link won't be the same as her love. As of now, I think I'm doing a good job with that (I almost wrote her first name instead of Zelda two times in a row).

Oh, and for those of you wondering whether the looks match, they do; just add craploads of clothes that cover her skin completely are any color but pink and you're there.

So yeah. That's all from me.

And I give you the next chapter. Enjoy!

Chapter 3: Scherzo (Turandot)

A young woman of blonde hair and eyes that shone like sapphires looked outside to the garden quite indifferently.

Princess Peach Toadstool sat looking out towards the garden. She had been bored of all of this talk about a great tournament in the works. She herself did not know what the buzz surrounding the tournament was all about anyway. After all, she did figure it was just a showcase of people from all over getting together to fight.

Peach had no idea why she was invited in the first place: the young princess was always getting kidnapped some way or the other, and even then it was up to Mario to save her. True, she did save Mario and Luigi from Bowser's control of speech and other vocal effects, but other than that, she had been playing the role of damsel in distress time and time again.

In her opinion, damsels in distress never knew how to fight.

Peach sighed, stood up, and walked to her room.

Bowser had been invited as well. When people asked her about Bowser, she told them what she knew; she had always known Bowser as a king who would stop at nothing to take control over her kingdom for whatever wicked reason. Whether Peach had told them everything was left for them to discover.

Her thoughts turned to her roommate, Zelda. She was a blonde with sapphire eyes just like Peach, except she had elfin ears. She was a nice woman, though she was often subject to being offended easily and then rushing straight into a fit of rage over matters that were really quite trivial. For some reason, the Hylian princess was in a relationship with Link that did not seem to go well but continued anyway.

Peach figured that Zelda's relationship with Link would change such that they would not speak to each other again.

After all, Peach figured that Link was not the kind of person for Zelda.

She arrived at the door of her room and entered. Upon finding nobody there, she took a spot at the desk and began to continue to read the romance novel her friend Mario had given her as a birthday gift.

"Hey, you weren't supposed to do that!"

"What do you mean, I wasn't supposed to do that? This is tag. I can do whatever I want!"

"Yeah, but most people would not hide behind trees to tap people!"

"Well, I just did. What are you going to do about it?"

"Now, now, Ness, let's not get smart on your playmates."

"But—"

"Ness, please."

"Okay, okay, but don't expect me to be so nice on you next time!"

Bowser was monitoring a group of children at play that included Popo. The other three in the group were his sister Nana, a smart aleck by the name of Ness, and a young boy who claimed to be Link's younger self; this last went by the name of Young Link. Popo was a youth with brown hair and large eyes, and anything else about him was difficult to see because of the large ocean-colored parka that he wore. Nana was almost identical, except her parka was colored a very rosy shade of pink. Ness had black hair and eyes, and he wore a striped shirt, shorts, red sneakers, and a large baseball hat the color of blood. Young Link looked exactly like his older counterpart.

The game of tag that had been going on in the garden continued. Young Link was it, and thus he chased the other three children around the grounds. Popo jumped over flower beds, Nana hid behind the various animal-shaped shrubs and ran when such a hiding place was no longer useful, and Ness used his telepathic skills to jump over the various foliage of the garden in ways that had never been seen before.

Bowser sat back on a bench and watched the scene in relative silence. Occasionally, Nana would hide behind his shell, and he would laugh a little and send Nana on her way.

The elder king thought back to his own young days, when he was able to run as freely as the four kids that were doing the same things. In his mind, those were good times. He could not run in his own garden, but he ran in the streets with friends. Bowser knew the exhilaration of the chase as a child was frantically trying from being 'it', and he knew the sadistic desire of the one deemed 'it' to strip him or herself of the somewhat dubious title. For he too had been a child once; he had been a very happy child.

As he thought back to his less violent days, he lost all track of the children.

His thoughts went to when his wonderful childhood suddenly came to a crashing end; it was the day that his father had been killed under the most bizarre circumstances. Then, it all changed; the pain had begun to seep into his being, and thus he had become a manifestation of this pain. He was fueled by revenge; and revenge would keep him searching for the one who murdered his father.

Popo leapt onto Bowser's lap and tapped him on the chest.

"You're it!" shouted Popo.

Bowser was taken very much by surprise at this.

"I'm it?" asked Bowser. "Since when was I part of the game?"

"We decided on it while you were lost in thought," said Young Link. "Come on! It'll be fun!"

The king was surprised by this. Most people would not notice that Bowser was lost in a great scheme of mind whenever he was, and thus, nobody said anything at all.

With a mental wave of the hand, Bowser dismissed the notion of Young Link being very observant.

The king stood up with a grunt, but not before Popo leapt off of the large reptile's lap.

"Okay, then," said Bowser. "Here I come!"

With a playful roar, the king of the koopas scattered the children, and thus the game continued.

Captain Falcon sat in a corner of his dorm.

He had removed his helmet and was currently sitting in his room.

Ganondorf sat on the older man's bed, not much farther from the man in the blue jumpsuit.

The pilot had removed his helmet, and thus one was able to see his features. His amber eyes seemed to trace everything in his path, and the scar on his left eyebrow attested to a past that was quite difficult. The gloved hand of Captain Falcon was going through a mop of somewhat unkempt chocolate-colored hair as if searching for something there.

"I wonder why you wear the helmet," said Ganondorf.

"Weall, for bein' thawty-siyex, I do look mighty attrayactive," said the racer. "Buyut I prefer to hahde mah face behind a heyelmet in front o' other people."

"I see," said Ganondorf. "I respect your opinion, but I think everybody would be after you."

"Now whah do you sahy 'ever'body'?" asked Captain Falcon.

"All the men and all the women would be after you," said the king. "Think about it for a minute. That jumpsuit of yours is very tight to your skin, so people can see those rather large muscles of yours. And then, there's your brown hair and eyes to match. Those would make people go crazy. Lastly, there's the scar. I think it's quite properly positioned."

"Yeah, said the captain. "But some people hayave told meh thayat gay peyople hahde behind mayasks so that nobawdy can proyove anythin' about it."

"Now who ever told you that?" asked Ganondorf. "People would not recognize a homosexual just by looking at one."

"Ah don't know," said the captain. "Those peyople that coyome from where ah was born were as meyan ayas a druyunk on the sahde of the streyet."

"You were not raised in a good environment?" asked Ganondorf.

"Thayat's exayactly it," said Captain Falcon. "Wheyen ah told pa about mah preference, he gone an' threw a fit thayat y'all could hear from theh valleys o' Tenessee. You would not hayve wanted ta be me wheyen pa goyot as mayad as hi did thayat day. He trayed tah kill meh, and wheyen ma got home, she gone threw a fit thayat y'all could hear from theh other sahde o' the world."

"My goodness!" said the king. "That is really quite horrible! All because of your preference?"

"Yep," said the F-Zero pilot. "Ah rayan away aftah thayat. Where ah live nowadayes hayas much bettah people, ayand so ah can say thayat ah'm gay an nobody'll say a dawn thing about it."

"I can see why you would be free in such an environment," said Ganondorf. "So who do you find attractive so far in the tournament?"

"Weyell, there oyone person ah seyem to be interested in," said Captain Falcon. "Fiyrst, there's thayat doctor around here."

"Doctor Mario?" asked Ganondorf.

"Yep," said Captain Falcon. "Asahde from theh doctor's stuff, ah think he's quahte cute. He's quaht showt, but fo' me, thayat mahkes a man look bettah."

"I see," said Ganondorf.

The F-zero pilot stood up, went to the armoire, and opened it.

"Ah'ma go tahke a showah," said the captain. "Ah'll talk to ya latah."

"Alright," said Ganondorf.

Captain Falcon walked into the shower room with a second jumpsuit and a towel dangling from his broad shoulders.

Roy sat in a chair inside of the mess hall, looking at a young man in a green tunic and a young woman in a pink dress with a strange lilac apron-type apparatus on top of the dress.

The young fiery-haired man sat up in his chair as he spied on Zelda. It was already the second day of the tournament, and he found himself staring at the beautiful young Hylian almost half of the time that she was in the immediate vicinity. He did not know why, but there was something about those oceanic eyes that captivated his being and drew him in for more.

Roy had talked to Zelda a few times, and Zelda seemed like a very random woman. She usually said the most random things in the most random tones of voice that one could imagine, and this made her quite funny in an unintentional way. She also did the most random things when the situation was not quite calling for it. In this way, Roy knew that he had to watch his back whenever he was around her, since Zelda was as unpredictable as the weather.

In that light, Roy liked to watch Zelda from a distance. She was usually at her most sedate from a distance (She was even more so with Link, for some reason.), so Roy tended to watch from a distance.

Zelda did seem quite sociable to Roy, however, all of the conversations he had ever had with the young Hylian were quite short and simple. Why this was, Roy was not quite able to tell. However, she seemed to be more acquainted with some of the others in the tournament, so he figured she preferred to want to know what a person was like before getting into a long conversation.

For some reason, Zelda avoided Ganondorf. Roy knew from his roommate Marth that the king of the Gerudo was a fairly good person, so he had no idea why Zelda was ignoring him. Whenever he addressed her, she just waved her hand and either turned around or continued on her way. Of all the people he figured she would want to know, he was the one who was avoided all of the time.

Roy thought of this as he continued staring at the Hylian beauty.

Zelda then stood up and left with Link.

Their hands were joined as they left.