Chapter 7: Monster Slaying 101

"Holy crap!" I shouted, my eyes protruding a good foot out of my head, "Those are friggin' walking skeletons! Alright…uh…what do we do? What do we do? You're supposed to be the expert around here!" I was of course referring to the six foot tall skeletons, complete with sword and shield that had leapt out from the trees, as the two of us had been warily marching through a shadowy forest. And Link's answer was rather simple on what to do.

He pulled out his magic sword, and without a sound rushed forward, shield out in front, meeting their charge with one of his own. Being less experienced with the proper educate on fighting animated bone dudes, I was forced to follow his lead, instead of coming up with my own reaction that was really cool and badass. As one could see with this fight, our journey, nay our quest had truly begun. But I'll say this; it certainly had taken a while…

Earlier…

Things didn't start out quite so explosively. Earlier in the day, we exited the village as bold as brass with our escort of cheering citizens, feeling super awesome and ready to kick some evil wizards in the nuts. However, once it was just the two of us, the mood became a bit more, shall we say…boring. There was all this countryside in front of us, spanning for hundreds of miles it seemed like, and my feet began to throb at the mere thought of tramping over all of that.

Nonetheless we marched. And marched…and marched some more. All was peaceful, no monsters attacking or terrible creatures of inconceivable horror bellowing at the tops of their voices. Nope, nothing like that. We had nothing but the chirping of birds, the slight wavering of the wind, and a few unseen insects making those weird noises amongst the trees. And that was all.

I guess that over the course of the previous idle days, my expectations of the adventure stuff had been raised higher and higher by everything I had heard from the village locals. Monsters roaming the countryside, hundreds of them, all of which were out hunting Link and any allies of his, to ensure none could stand opposed to Ganon. Excitement around every corner, peril lurking behind every tree, and horrible creatures to slay at a moments notice. Glamorous hero work. Not quite.

It was almost two hours of walking in some seemingly random direction before I saw anything of interest. What it happened to be was a lake. It wasn't big, almost more of a pond than anything, and as we approached, Link slowed his pace, and paused, sitting under a nearby tree, presumably to rest. He sat, so I sat nearby. The last thing I wanted people to think was that even though we were fighting along side one another, that we weren't…partners. Two guys in the wilderness, one a handsome pretty boy…Yeah, I'll just push those thoughts from my head.

"So…Link," I said aloud, as he took a drink, "Where are we headed for first? I think it'd be a good idea for me to…well I don't know…stay informed…and such. For convenience sake…" It was clear that I was starved for conversation, having to endure an almost perfect silence for two hours was close to the point of maddening.

Not that I expected Link to say anything. At this point, I knew better. He may have been able to speak as I was still undecided about that, but for all intensive purposes, he was a mute. And as I thought, he didn't answer me with words. All he did was point, towards a cluster of hills down the road, still looking to be like a thousand miles off or something.

"So, one of these temple places that we're looking for is…there?" He nodded. End of conversation. Woo. After a few more minutes of rest, we were off again, on our way towards whatever it was that we were hiking towards. And again, still no contact from any other living thing. Seriously, I never even saw a squirrel or a rabbit.

Before we could climb those hills that he had indicated to before, we needed to pass through a clump of heavy trees that impeded our path. Link walked inside without so much as a second thought. I however was a bit more cautious. When one knows that evil monsters are out for your skin, stepping into a dark and sinister wood just didn't strike me as being all that wise.

I stuck my head beyond the threshold, and glanced around. All clear. I stepped inside a little bit…still nothing…a little more, and still nothing. Link was giving me this peculiar look, as if silently asking me, "What the hell are you doing?" I took the hint, and followed, my eyes looking this way and that, my body poised, ready to spring to action. As it turned out, my caution was well earned.

For out jumped the skeletons, their bones grinding together, waving their weapons at us, and began to shamble forward. It's funny, I had been waiting and waiting for something to happen, itching my pants off to get involved in a little action, and when it finally came, I was too freaked out to move at first. Then Link rushed in with no fear, and I figured it was time I did the same. I pulled my sword free, hoping this wasn't going to get messy, for me anyways, and went into battle.

I lost track of Link right off as two of the seven came at me. I guess Link was more their primary target than a sidekick, or whatever I was. Not to mention that currently, he could kick an enormously larger amount of ass than I. No matter. I faced the two, squared off, me shifting to the left, they shifting to the right, somehow being able to see rather clearly despite having no eyes.

I didn't want them to move first, so I came in with my sword, and took a chop. The closest one blocked with its shield, and further more, pushed me off, throwing me off balance. And whilst I was stumbling, the other nimbly leapt over his counterpart, his own jagged sword aimed for my head. Not one to be killed so quickly after this job had only just begun, I intentionally didn't regain my footing, and fell into the dirt, his blow missing my neck.

I realized that this was going to be tougher than fighting the moblins, as those things had been brainless, and while technically the same thing could be said about these skeletons, they were more formidable foes. I also realized that being in such an unfavorable position left myself open to an attack, thus I scrambled forward on my hands and knees, to gain some distance.

I heard a thunk behind me, a sound that could very easily have been a metal blade hitting a clump of dirt, a cut that had probably been intended to hack my foot off. That just made me more determined to get up and…well, do something. Which I did. Once I was back up, the skeletons were circling again, so I started to do the same thing. As we were spiraling around and around, I stole a look over at Link to see his progress. Not surprisingly, it was better than my own. Of the original five, there was only one left. And I saw how it was done.

Link and the skeleton were doing the same thing I and my buddies were doing, eyeing each other, slinking through the grass back and forth. Link took an occasional slice, but the skeleton was guarding, the blow not getting past his shield. But Link must have known this, and hadn't made the attack with a lot of force behind it as I had, as it left him in a bad position to be…I don't know, thrown off balance maybe?

It seemed Link was waiting, but for what? What indeed. The last remaining skeleton leapt through the air, sword aiming down. Link just stepped to the side, his foe landing past him. That put Link on the skeletons blind side, and with as much casualness as one picks a much loved flavor of ice cream, he made a single cut, severing the skeleton's spine, causing the whole…well, skeleton to come apart. It broke into a dozen or three pieces, and those pieces quickly vanished, consumed with that familiar blue fire from before.

So, thought I with a smile, that is how you do it. You let these things make their own attack, and one takes advantage of their over-zealous moves. Alright. Thus, I waited as well, as the three of us continued our game of Ring Around the Rosy. And as with Link's, the lead skeleton, instead of leaping, made a rush forward, swinging its sword in a powerful diagonal arc. Before I even knew I was moving, I somehow slipped past it, and turned, my sword leading the way. There was a crack, a slight resistance, and sudden the skeleton came apart, falling to pieces on me.

I would have whooped out some wild cheer, but I was not done just yet. My move had left me vulnerable to the other skeleton, so I whirled to face him again, and hopped back. Surprisingly enough, the skeleton hadn't made a move while my back was turned. He was still circling. I was at once reminded of martial arts movies. One guy fights the hero, gets his butt kicked, and then up steps the next goon. All the while, there are like fifty badguys in the room, all dancing around the two fighters in a threatening manner, waiting for their turn.

Still, I wasn't complaining. Once again, we started slipping around, he going right, I going left. He then began to slide forward a bit, not much, but closing the gap. Somehow, I can't explain how though, I saw an opening in his defense, his shield lifted up a bit too high. Guess it must have been instinct, for I quickly lunged my sword into the open gap, and stabbed. It's quite weird though. I hit something, but I don't know what exactly. I mean, I actually saw my blade sliding into the open spaces of the ribcage, not actually striking bone, and yet it felt as if I had. What's more, the skeleton keeled over, and started to spontaneously combust, and just like that, the undead threat had passed.

As I felt the adrenaline start to fade, I began to breath normally, and gingerly put my sword away. Link meanwhile had finished a long time ago, being his usual calm self, once again scouting through the grass. And then it came back to me. When we killed the moblin things, they had dropped little gems. So I checked around where I saw my two foes fall. Luck was on my side for once, and I saw a little glint of red, which I picked up.

It was the same shape as the others I had found, only this baby was blood red, crimson. Almost like a ruby. Pretty sharp. Link too had come away with some loot, a blue gem and a green one. He slipped his into the little pouch on his belt. I lacking that stuck it into my pocket. And just like that, on we went.

Emerging from the forest, we found ourselves much closer to the hills, but still a ways to go. As we walked, I did take the time to enjoy the scenery. I have to admit, all the nature stuff was really refreshing. Being a city boy, more or less, I wasn't in much of a place to be surrounded by trees and rivers and such. But I certainly felt more at ease; the calm sunny days, hiking through green fields and lush forests. If not for the hordes of scary monsters out to eat my brains or some such thing, this easily could have been classified as a vacation. And speaking of scary monsters, we came across some more of those not far from the forest.

We soon passed by yet another pond, though this one was more of a lake. Big, but not huge. And sticking out of said lake were these weird fish-like things, with fins and dark olive green skin. They were glaring with their tan eyes, which were big and watery. They were also hissing or groaning or croaking, or something equally bizarre and rather unpleasant. Link paused, but instead of drawing his sword, reached around under his shield, and brought out that big hunting bow from before.

I swear right now, I was standing like five feet away, and I still didn't see how he did that. I mean, I was staring right at him, and it just sort of materialized into his hand. Go figure. Anywho, he quickly fit an arrow, yet another mystery as to where that had come from, since he didn't seem to carry a quiver either, took aim, and using that superb precision, nailed one of the things in the head.

It squalled and thrashed before slipping under the water, presumably to die. That however didn't seem too sit well with the others, who began a chorus of wailing, and that's when the fireworks started. Each one of those things, like fifteen of them, began hurling fireballs at us from their mouths of all places. No joke, they were the size of oranges, with burning red fire, in a huge volley. The two of us on shore had to dodge the incoming salvo, rolling and dodging. They were moving pretty fast, like the speed of a pitching machine.

Now, beating these things probably would have been easy, as they didn't look too fierce. Unfortunately, they were far out in the water, maybe thirty feet from shore, and I doubted I could wade out that far, or even swim in armor. Link had his bow, which he fired flawlessly again, whilst I, lacking such a fine projectile weapon, felt a bit like a fifth wheel. But when one fireball came right at me, right down the center, I got myself a little idea.

I pulled my sword out, stepping closer to the shore. "New batter," I called, waving my arms, hoping to draw the water guys attention. It did. They squealed at me, and fired a barrage. I hope this works, thought I, as I shouldered my sword up like a bat, keeping my eyes on the ball, otherwise, this is really going to hurt like hell. They sort of converged at me as they came close, and I waited until I could wait no more, and I swung my sword/bat. The effect was most excellent.

With perhaps the most peculiar sound I had ever heard, almost like a wonging, the whole lot of the fireballs were sent right back towards the senders. Several of them went in wild directions, whilst the others hit their marks. In a blast, four of the fishmen were struck by their own attack, wailed, and died. I think. Link saw me do this and gave another of those funny expressions of his, the ones that convey words without actually saying them. This one said, "Not a bad idea." With him shooting, and me playing baseball with these fireballs, we knocked out almost all of them. The few that remained retreated out of range, and dove down into the water.

As Link made his bow do its amazing disappearing act, I put my sword up, which was now actually a bit hot to the touch. Once we were set, we got moving. As we walked, Link gave me a grin, and a nod, most likely of approval. I got the message. I think. I believe what he meant to say, but didn't because he didn't seem to like speaking was, "Not too bad rookie, you're getting the hang of it." Truth be told, I think I was too. It's a learning experience after all, and I hadn't ever fought evil monsters before. Never thought I would either.

But despite everything so far, I knew that there was more to do, just beyond those hills. The ones we were walking towards. The ones that didn't seem to get any bigger. Ah man, I whined on the inside, walking sucks…