Link awoke from his remarkably lucid dream, out-of-breath and panting.

His head… didn't feel as bad as he had expected it to.

His heart… felt about as bad as he expected it to.

He was sitting in waist-deep water under the small walkway at the sacred grounds. It was still just after four in the morning, and he'd apparently only been out for a few minutes. This surprised him.

What didn't surprise him, however, was the same menacing sounds of those hostile guardians pacing to-and-fro above him...

Link shrugged. At the very least, he'd gotten what he came here for. Quite a bit more than what he came for, in fact. As he wiped the tears from his eyes, he pulled out his Sheikah Slate and turned it on. He knew precisely where he needed to go next. It was finally time to return to-

Wait.

What is this. He stared at the screen of the Sheikah Slate.

'Enter Passcode' it said. Link stared some more.

...

What. How? How did this happen?

WHY DID THIS HAPPEN.

Link thought for a minute, frantically tried a random set of numbers. Nothing.

He tried Zelda's full name. Nothing.

He tried the names of places around Hyrule Castle, the names of people. He tried his own name. Nothing, nothing, nothing…

And then some words flashed on the screen. Finally...

'Your Sheikah Slate is disabled. Please see a technician for-'

Link SLAMMED the slate against the wall, nearly drawing the attention of a searching guardian above. He clenched his jaw. Guess I'm doing this the hard way…

He reached into his rucksack, searching for something expendable to throw as a distraction for the guardians.

Apples? No… Ore? Maybe… Steak? Absolutely not!

He looked down.

Sheikah Slate? Definitely . He chuckled to himself.

He felt around in his bag some more. Surely there was something in there he could-

Ah-hah! He pulled out that odd treasure he had 'procured' from the raided Bokoblin camp under the Dueling Peaks. It was just some random piece of carved wood anyway, but at least he could probably throw it pretty far…

Reluctantly, he slipped the currently-useless Sheikah Slate on his hip again, crawled to the edge of the small moat he was in, slowly poked his head up. The guardians were still marching about, still scanning… but hadn't noticed him yet. He took a deep breath, yelled loudly, then threw the hunk of polished wood as far away as he could in the opposite direction. Immediately, the guardian stalkers locked onto this new movement and began chasing it down. As soon as the three guardians had passed him, Link jumped up and out of the moat and began his wild sprint in what he hoped was the direction of the central Sheikah tower of Hyrule Field.

...But the sound of marching guardians wasn't slowly fading away like it should have been. In fact, it almost seemed like it was getting louder-

CRACK!

Something collided with the back of Link's head, knocking him to the ground. He scrambled to his feet in a battle-ready pose, glanced around, then spotted what hit him:

It was the piece of wood, lying on the ground next to him, just waiting to be picked up again.

What…? How did it…

Oh. Only then did Link recognize what it was. He groaned loudly to himself.

He'd thrown a boomerang.

He looked up in time to dodge a laser blast from one of the three guardians, now hot on his trail. At this point, he didn't know or care what direction he was running anymore. He just needed to get away from these things before they vaporized him like that poor tree earlier.

Hearing all three pursuing guardians charging their lasers at the same time, he counted down in his head… waited… then dove to the ground as supercharged plasma flashed through the air just above his head, turning the entire field of grass in front of him into a roaring inferno. Link picked himself up and decided to take his chances with sprinting through this crazy firestorm. Perhaps it would mess with the targeting systems for each of the stalkers...

He ran through the flames, ignoring the intense heat that seared the bare flesh of his torso. As he did so, he noticed his cape billowing up above him from the rising air current, caused by the burning field. Instinctively, he pulled out his glider, unfolded it quickly, and held it above his head. The updraft instantly lifted the glider, sending Link skyward, higher and higher and away from the chasing guardians. One last missed laser blast, and he found himself finally, mercifully out of range of the guardian's laser targeting systems.

One of these days… he thought as he flew away, I'm going to tear apart one of these stupid things limb from limb...

A minute later, Link landed, checked his person. Still alive, still breathing… He examined his surroundings, smiled and laughed.

Once again, he was utterly lost.

And once again, he was really rather pleased about it.


The pleasant feeling was gone.

It had been bad enough having to fight endless waves of skeletal bokoblins way back at the plateau before. But now… he was dealing with skeletal versions of strange creatures whose fleshly forms he hadn't even seen yet.

And they were enormous. They absolutely towered over him. Their skulls were elongated into large snouts, a long horn protruded from their foreheads. The weapons they wielded were as big as Link himself, and they hunched over menacingly as they each took turns swiping at the exhausted Hylian.

Link managed to destroy a few of these with his spear, having to destroy their skulls to do so just as he had with the undead bokoblins. But they just wouldn't stop coming. And with at least a couple of hours left before the sun rose and stopped the waves from spawning, Link decided that he'd much rather just flee than fight.

So he did. He began to sprint away, aimlessly, hoping to find some cover somewhere - so he could simply rest and prepare for his long travels likely ahead. Link still had absolutely no idea where he was, though he could see a glowing red and purple speck far southwest that was probably Hyrule Castle. After some running, he decided to check behind him to see if he'd managed to outrun those enormous skeletons.

Nope.

In fact, there were now roughly thirty of these things relentlessly giving chase.

As he ran, he spotted a natural stone bridge spanning a wide river up ahead. Link decided that if he could at least make it to the center of the narrow bridge, perhaps he could turn around and fight two or three of these things at a time, instead of all at once. He arrived at the bridge and began to sprint across-

-when a fireball flew straight towards his head from in front of him. Link rolled to his left instinctively, peering through the darkness to see what had tried to hit him. He recognized the creatures instantly.

Moblins.

So this was what those skeletal beasts used to be. He'd run into an entire encampment of them, and they were now shooting an endless volley of fire arrows at him. Surrounded on either side by moblins - both dead and undead - Link made a quick decision and dove off the extremely tall bridge to the river below. He was struck by several arrows on the way down, but the cool water extinguished the flames immediately. He glanced back up at the bridge as the current of water quickly pulled him downriver.

But these things were relentless. The army of moblins were all still drawing back their bows, ready to send another hail of fire arrows at Link. He dove to the bottom of the river, using the water as a natural shield, and continued to swim downstream. I'll only last about ten seconds down here, he mused, bitterly.

It was enough. As his head breached the surface, he looked back and sighed. He was safe for now, though at this point he wouldn't even dare to swim ashore. Not when it was still this dark out, and when these things could still spawn up from the ground for yet another pursuit. A small log drifted gently through the water nearby, and Link latched onto it to use it as a flotation device. He laid his head down as he floated, tried to get a bit of rest as he did.

He floated this way for a couple of hours, his random thoughts drifting in and out. But he focused on staying awake as long as he could, at the risk of falling asleep and drowning in the cold waters below…

Finally, fortunately, the sun began to rise, giving way to the embrace of the sun's warm light and the promise of safety. As his surroundings were illuminated, Link saw that he was floating near a large man-made bridge of stone. The log he floated on eventually washed up to the shoreline, and he slowly, painfully, clawed his way up the bank. An enormous coliseum rose up in the distance.

Won't be heading there anytime soon...

He found his way to a main road, limping all the way; but he was surprised at how little pain he felt. Surely the freezing cold river helped to numb the pain a bit... but unfortunately, it had also brought his body temperature down to dangerously low levels. The rising sun actually did very little to prevent him from shivering violently, as he continued along this path.

Soon, he spotted the welcoming sight of a giant wooden horse head peeking out at him from around a hill. A horse stable.

He made his way there and sat down next to the stable's community fire, utterly exhausted. As he examined his sore body, he saw that three arrows had struck him before: one in his thigh, one in his shoulder, and one in his arm. Yet again… it's a good thing I'm ambidextrous, he laughed tiredly to himself.

Link began to treat his own wounds, and knew he'd have to start by removing these arrows from his body first. He wondered if he'd been struck by arrows at some point in the past, because he suddenly realized that he shouldn't simply yank them out of his body. This carried the risk of leaving the arrowhead behind, and causing even more damage. So he focused on the arrows lodged in his limbs first. They had both passed clean through, so he'd have to break the ends off and then pull them the rest of the way out from the head.

Fun.

The arrow in his leg actually came out quite smoothly, and he was grateful that the fire arrows seemed to have cauterized the wound instantly upon impact. This of course didn't stop him from bleeding profusely now. Still, he also wondered if the Great Fairy's blessing had somehow mitigated the damage to his body. His wounds really should have been a lot worse than they were. He'd have to thank her later...

Meanwhile, a pair of travelers were already seated by the community fire when he arrived. They paused mid-conversation and stared intently at the shirtless, hooded, wounded traveler in front of them for a bit, before continuing their conversation.

"So anyway. The tin can's lid basically sliced my finger open," the first traveler said. "It was the most painful thing I've ever experienced in my life ..."

"Aw, that's rough!" said the other. "I can't even imagine how much that would have hurt! I don't think I could have handled it!"

Link turned his attention to the arrow in his forearm. He gripped it tightly with his right hand and snapped the tail off, suppressing a grunt as he did.

"What's the worst injury you've ever experienced?" asked the first.

"Hmmm… I'll have to think about that." replied the second. "But I did skin my knee when I was really young once, and that was pretty awful."

Link grabbed the remaining half of the arrow by its tip, braced himself, and slid it out as quickly as possible. It briefly snagged on the way out, causing him to quietly shout in pain as a spurt of blood shot straight out of his-

"Do you MIND?!" the first stranger suddenly yelled. "We are having a conversation over here! Your weird grunts are distracting!"

"Sorry about that…" Link said calmly. He slowly stood up, tossed the bloody arrow into the fire, and began to limp away. "I'll just go die over there then…"

"Thanks!" They resumed their conversation, as Link made his way over to where another cluster of travelers sat eating their breakfast. There were four of them there, and they all waved politely. He limped over to their fire and flopped on the ground, still shivering from his trip downriver. He pulled his Sheikah stealth top from his bag, tearing some cloth from the arms to use as crude bandages for his leg and arm. At this point, he no longer had the energy to even move around anymore. Barely had the energy to even sit up on the ground. So he just stared at the fire for a while…

He drifted in, then out… then snapped awake. He absentmindedly pulled out his Sheikah Slate, tried a few more passwords, locked it out again. This puzzled him. He didn't remember setting a password...maybe in his sleep? He wasn't sure.

He found himself too tired to even reflect on his extended flashback from a few hours ago. His wounds throbbed, his chest hurt, but he was too wired to actually fall asleep.

And too broke to afford a bed at the stable inn.

He peered in his bag, and smiled. The note was still in there, sealed safely in the waterproof bag he'd put it in. The presence of this note seemed to calm him, especially knowing the words they had conveyed to him… and right there, sitting by the fire, he finally passed out.


"From here, we'll make our way to Goron City." Zelda said. "Then, we'll need some adjustment on that Divine Beast so Daruk can manage it as easily as possible."

It had been two weeks since their ceremony. The pair was walking down a road through a small clearing of trees, on their way back from the Tabantha region - home of Revali and the Rito tribe - to meet with Daruk to check his progress. Zelda was dressed in her own version of the Champion's tunic, blue shirt with gold accents. The shirt's stomach and chest were textured white, and she wore black tights with knee-high boots. She seemed to be in quite a hurry to get to their next destination, and Link found himself wanting to suggest they ride horses or hire a carriage to get them there faster. But her inexperience with horses, combined with her insistence on relying on her own two feet for their mission, made this an extended speed-walking marathon for the both of them. Not that Link particularly minded all that much. He quite enjoyed the exercise.

The princess was weaponless, and oblivious to her surroundings. As usual. She stared at her Sheikah Slate as she walked, picking up readings from each of the Divine Beasts. She seemed almost exuberant, excited, free, now that she was outside the confines of Hyrule Castle - and outside of her stifling duties as the princess of Hyrule.

"He's figured out how to get it to move..." she said of Daruk, "However, it's apparent that we still have much more to learn."

Link walked a few feet behind her, only somewhat paying attention to what Zelda was saying. His eyes scanned the road, ever-aware of any potential dangers they might face, any potential threats to Zelda's life. This was, after all, the first time the princess had explored anywhere outside of Hyrule Castle without the full entourage of Royal Guards that usually accompanied her.

Now, she had only Link. And he wasn't about to let her be harmed under his assigned watch…

"But to think," Zelda continued, musing to herself, "that Divine Beast was actually built by people..." She continued her brisk pace, as if she were trying to out-walk Link. "That means we should be able to understand how it works and how to use it to our advantage."

"These Divine Beasts... so much we don't know... But if we want to turn back Calamity Ganon, they're our best hope." Her brisk pace slowed suddenly, and then she stopped walking entirely. A somber, sullen look grew on her face as she slowly turned her head sideways to look at Link out of the corner of her eye. Link realized she couldn't even be bothered to look at him directly…

"Tell me the truth." She said, still refusing to make eye contact, "How proficient are you right now, wielding that sword on your back?" She paused for a second, then continued.

"Legend says that an ancient voice resonates inside it. Can you hear it yet... hero?"

The word 'hero' was like a poison from her lips. Link could feel the resentment, the weight of indignation echoed through her tone.

Of course he'd heard the voice inside the sword. Fi, the sword's spirit, had spoken to him the moment he tried and succeeded in pulling the sword from its pedestal. Even now, he could sense Fi's presence, could feel her intense joy at being useful to the master again.

But with Zelda's present attitude, with her vexing exasperation, he was inclined to not give her a proper answer.

His silence remained. She shrugged, turned, and continued on her way...


Delirious, Link snapped awake again. He'd been caught in the dream for just a few minutes, but all of the travelers at the fire had already left as the morning sun continued to climb its way through the clear skies. He shook his head, reached for his bag, grabbed a piece of meat and began to slowly chew through it. He was so tired that he could barely move his arms, could barely move his jaw...

But neither trauma, nor injury, nor exhaustion, was ever going to stop him from satiating his demanding appetite.

He finished eating, swallowed, and reached over to toss another log into the fire. And as the flame's image grew and danced and spun and flailed across the crespice of his eyes, he zoned out once again...


It had been one week since their trip to see Daruk and Vah Rudania. Impa and Purah had met Link and Zelda in Goron City, and they watched as Daruk slowly and steadily got the hang of the Divine Beast's controls. Link was quite happy for Daruk, but Zelda seemed just mildly satisfied as she immediately turned her attention to their next stop: Vah Naboris, and the Lady Urbosa.

After their weeks-long trek to Death Mountain, the home of the Gorons, Zelda was finally convinced that they needed a more efficient method of transport. So they stopped by Hyrule Castle on their way to Gerudo Desert to borrow some steeds from the Royal stables.

Link's personal horse, Epona, had been assigned to him by the Royal Guard upon his induction two years ago. Unfortunately, she was still recovering from a training incident so she was not in any condition to be ridden by Link during his current travels. So instead, he borrowed Lieutenant Relk's own horse, Onyx. She was a gorgeous steed, brown in color with a black mane.

Zelda chose a solid white horse, part of a special breed reserved only for use by the Royal Family. After fumbling about for some time, she at least got the basics of riding down. And so they were off on the road to Gerudo town.

Like a child in a toy store, Zelda would positively freak out every time she came across one of the mysterious shrines that erupted from the ground. These ancient Sheikah constructs sprouted out from the dirt with relative frequency across the land of Hyrule - another hint to the possible return of Calamity Ganon. Every time she'd spot one of these mysterious buildings, she would tell Link to stay behind and set up camp while she ran ahead to investigate. And every single time, Link would follow her - only to get chided by her for not obeying commands. He was a bit irritated that she would nag him for doing his job, but he tried to remain as non-intrusive as possible as he hovered around to ensure her safety. But she continued to hint that Link shouldn't even bother, that he should leave her alone with her work.

Now, Zelda stood alone in front of yet another shrine, tapping her Sheikah Slate on its pedestal in a fruitless effort to get it to open…

"Nothing. Just as I thought." She looked up towards the shrine. "Hmm... It appears that this structure was designed to be exclusively accessed by the sword's chosen one."

She found herself growing irritated at this notion. She looked back down at the pedestal. "...But designs can always be worked around, at least I hope. How do I get inside...? I need to activate it somehow." Zelda resented that fact that everything seemed to revolve around the chosen hero. Why him?

Surely she could circumvent his necessity, at least in this one instance.

The sound of a horse's gallop echoed behind her, growing louder and louder. She turned to see the source, but she already knew who it was. An irritated scowl grew on her face.

As Link arrived, he stopped next to Zelda's horse, leaping to the ground before jogging over to where the princess stood, glaring. She had ridden to this shrine early that morning, abandoning Link at their campsite about an hour's ride away. She'd told him the night before that she was perfectly fine on her own, and that he should return to Hyrule Castle immediately. Regardless of the King's orders.

So much for that.

"I thought I made it clear that I am not in need of an escort." She said with indignation. She placed her hands on her hips, stuck her nose into the air. "It seems I'm the only one with a mind of my own." She gestured at herself. "I, the person in question, am fine, regardless of the king's orders." She began to walk past Link, her fists curled at her sides.

"Return to the castle. And tell that to my father, please."

Link stared for a minute, then he followed after her, matching her pace. He knew this move would irritate her but he really could not be bothered to care at this point. As he prepared to say something to her, hoping to calm her down, she spun around suddenly, narrowed her eyes in a glare.

"And stop following me!" she yelled. She stared at him, angrily, for about ten seconds. Then she clumsily mounted her horse and rode away into the distance...


Link snapped awake again, and rolled his eyes at the memory. Hope I was getting paid well enough to deal with all that, he laughed-

"It's the naked chef!"

A woman's voice from nearby. He glanced over, peered his eyes, then flashed a tired grin once he recognized the source.

Her name was Asha. She was a middle-aged woman, short and stocky, very kind. Link had first met her at the Dueling Peaks stable several days before, as she had been part of the great feast that Link and several others had carefully prepared for the stable's many guests.

Link sat himself up off the ground. He'd apparently collapsed during that last dream. The sun's high position indicated that he'd slept a bit longer this time, at least until noon. He reached up and shook Asha's hand.

"It's a pleasure to see you again," he said to her, nodding. "Though, I'm a bit surprised you remember me…"

"How could I not?!" She asked. She sat down next to him. "You single-handedly made my entire week! I'd been subsisting off of acorns and charred steak for months before you came along! I still can't get over how delicious your peppered crab was!" She winked.

"Besides, a shirtless young man is a nice bit of eye candy for a weary traveler - especially when he's cooking for you!"

Link laughed, painfully. "Well, I'm glad I could provide some form of entertainment at any rate. So... what can I do for you now?"

Asha shrugged. "Actually, I should be the one asking you . I saw you just laying there on the ground. And I thought I'd point something out to save you some embarrassment…" She gestured at Link's shoulder.

"It looks like your arrow is showing."

Link laughed again, glanced at his shoulder himself. "Ah, so it is. How mortifying."

"Would you like some help with that?" Asha asked. "I doubt you're going to be digging that arrowhead out yourself anytime soon."

Link shrugged. "I don't want to trouble you-"

"No trouble at all!" she shook her head. "I insist you let me operate! I may not be much of a cook, but I'm a decent medic." She pulled some small medical instruments from her bag, along with a bottle of some rice liquor. She handed it to Link. "Check it out."

Link looked over the bottle. "To sterilize the wound?" He asked.

"No. For the pain."

"...Ah."

"Have as much as you like. You'll need it."

Link smiled in gratitude. "I'm the last person you should say something like that to." He uncorked the bottle and chugged the whole thing in a few short gulps.

The alcohol immediately began to work its magic. Link glanced up at the stranger, laid down on his stomach, and grinned. "Let's do this."

It was a messy, painful operation. But Link gritted his teeth and bore with it. He even pulled one of his belts out of his bag and stuck it in his mouth to keep his teeth from grinding together. After some digging around in his shoulder, she was finally able to remove the arrow. It left a jagged scar behind, but he didn't mind so much.

Scars make me look tough…

"So, I think you probably know what's coming next…" Asha said, as she put the finishing touches on some stitches for the wound.

Link knew. "You probably want to know how I got into this mess, right?" he asked.

"Precisely."

He looked up at the sun, shrugged. He wasn't going anywhere anytime soon anyway. So he gave her a brief synopsis of his experience. He'd done the same thing enough times and to enough people, that he actually had the whole thing down to about two minutes, three tops.

"...And so, here we are now. I'm lost in the middle of nowhere, no money, no way to travel… no way to get to Zora's Domain."

He paused, grinned. "But that's enough of my sob story! It could be far worse. Why don't you tell me about your-"

"Have you thought about renting a horse?" Asha interrupted, as she tried a few more passwords in Link's Sheikah Slate.

Link tilted his head. "Wait, you can do that?"

"Yup." She reached into her pocket, producing two red rupees to cover the fee. "Here you go, this should cover it."

Link shook his head. "I absolutely cannot accept that. At least let me-"

She forced the rupees into Link's hand and shook her head. "You are really too kind, and what you're doing is far more important than what I could ever hope to accomplish. Please, take it…" She paused in thought for a minute, then smiled.

"All I ask, is that you give Ganon a good smack for my sake!"

Link grinned widely, and shook her hand. "It will be my pleasure."

He said his goodbyes to Asha, and limped over to speak with the stable operators. After proving his membership with the identification card he'd received at Dueling Peaks, he found himself heading eastward on a new spotted white and blue steed - Cloud - who galloped happily down the dirt road. The stable owners had even thrown in a map of the country for good measure. According to the map, he'd apparently floated down somewhere far, far west of the Great Plateau. Zora's domain was at least a week's ride northeast along the main road.

But he hardly cared. He'd already made up his mind.

It was finally time to return home.


A bit of a short recovery chapter by all accounts. For myself, and for Link.
Hope you enjoy. Next is Chapter 13: On the Threshold.