Chapter 10: Invading Terrors

In-game Challenge description: A swarm of Guardians have suddenly appeared! Stop them in their tracks before they deal too much damage to the area.

Note: So this chapter was kind of difficult to place because it deals with Guardians after the Calamity had passed, and since it's at the same level requirements as the final chapter, I was going to just place it before the end of the main story, but character development-wise, I feel like it's an important endpoint for part of Mipha's character arc, so I wanted to keep it as a post-game chapter. I actually think the reason why these Guardians are so hostile in this level is fairly reasonable, all things considered. If not, kindly disregard as filler and move on to the main event next chapter.

Mipha awoke with a lot more pep than she had had in quite some time. It had taken a lot longer than she thought it would take, but she was certain this was the night that she was going to finish the armor for Link.

By this point, the actual armor part was finished. In its current state, it would absolutely do what it was intended to do. However, the more personal touches, like the markings on the scales and the designs on the harder pieces needed to be cut in by hand. This process was meticulous, but the broad strokes were done. Mipha was confident that she could be done in a night, at which point she could begin planning how she would give Link the armor.

Admittedly, she probably should have thought of such things sooner, but there was a subliminal urge to put this whole thing off that she was fighting back against. The entire idea was unnerving - putting herself out there emotionally to Link was still something unsettling for her, but she had come so far now that there really was no turning back.

As she went through her day, she felt an odd sense of calm about the Domain - the kind you feel right before your day gets shaken up by catastrophe. Was it just her internalized fears? Or could something be on its way? In any case, she didn't allow it to slow her day down. She had worked far too hard, and she was not going to put this off any longer.

After finishing up her final bit of business - watching her brother fishing with his trident - she made the walk for home. She thought about the future Sidon and wondered if he ever fished in this way anymore. Or had he simply allowed the merchants to do the job. Part of her hoped he still did, if only because it was a bit of independence from childhood that she tried her best to maintain.

As they entered the palace, she was surprised to see a face in the Domain that she didn't usually see.

"Oh, Purah! This is an unexpected surprise!"

Purah, the Sheikah scientist who had assisted greatly during the events of the Calamity as well as before, had a pensive look on her face.

"Heeey, Mipha! I didn't see your dad anywhere, so I was getting concerned. Good to see you too."

"My father is overseeing plans for a celebration involving all of Hyrule. All the other kingdoms have had one, and he feels we've put ours off for long enough."

"That's great. That's great.."

"Is everything ok? You seem distracted, Purah."

"Do I?!" Purah was holding a forced smile, but it could only hold so long. "Ok here's the deal. You know how the Guardians were put under Ganon's control during the Calamity, right?"

"Of course."

"Well, I've been inspecting the lot of them, guardians and guardian scouts alike, to see if there was anything that could be done to make them more resistant to a future attack."

"Why would you need to do that if we sealed Ganon away, though?"

Purah puffed herself up a bit. "Because as a person of science, I cannot rest knowing that we left a flaw in the event the future doesn't pan out as we hope!

"... But anyway, I kind of got carried away and activated a bunch of the ones near Akkala, and I guess they hadn't had their programming inactive because, again, totally not my intention! They all kind of went rogue and are marching down here to Zora's Domain."

"They WHAT?!"

Purah put her hands up. "To be clear, they aren't evil or under Ganon's control. They just weren't tinkered with properly after the battle… and I may have intentionally messed with one or two…"

"Why would you activate so many at the same time?!"

"I didn't mean to! There was a surge of lightning in the area so when I tried to start one, it spread to the entire area."

Mipha was now in full panic mode. The Zora army was no longer mobilized in full force; only a few outlet bases were active to keep watch over the Domain. They would not be prepared for a multi-Guardian attack. "How many are there?"

"Well…"

"Purah!"

"So there weren't that many in the area, so we're looking at like 5 or 8… maybe closer to 12… 20 at most."

"TWENTY Guardians?!"

"Most of them are scouts, though, so your army should be able to take care of them if they spread the numbers right."

"No, because we're back to peacetime military outposts. There are only a couple groups out there!"

Purah now couldn't hide her concern as the veil of self-confidence fell. "How fast can the rest of them get out there?"

"Not fast enough. I'll have to ride through and take as many as I can out myself."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. This isn't that simple. They will be overrunning this space in about an hour's time if there's no resistance. You'll have to take them out as they enter the Domain and dispatch them almost immediately if you're going to have any chance of taking them out alone."

Mipha was listening as she grabbed her trident, but ultimately heard nothing to deter her. "I have to give my people a chance. You said many of them were the small scouts. I can dispatch them without issue. It will be the full-sized ones that concern me. I hope they provide me at least a little separation."

"Well, if you're going, you should know that some of them were the elemental guardians."

Mipha turned nervously. "Which elemental guardians?"

"Ice… and electric."

Mipha gulped. She had not wanted to hear that any of the electric guardians were active. "If I must, for my kingdom, then I will not fail!"

And with that, Mipha rushed into battle.

As she swam across the Domain, the irony of this situation was not lost on her. At the final battle with Calamity Ganon, Mipha made good on her promise to be present to heal Link, and she even got the chance to keep him standing during the fight. It was a moment of great pride for her. That said, she still hadn't left an imprint on the battle like so many of the others had. She had wanted so desperately to be a factor in the fight alongside Link, but found herself in the healer role for most of the fight because of the damage she'd taken on the way into the chamber.

Now, here she was only a little bit later, rushing into a battle exactly as Link would - with total reckless abandon.

She quickly dispatched three guardian scouts before facing off with an ice guardian, then two more scouts and an electric guardian. Each of the large ones took a lot longer, but with a few of the Zora soldiers holding them back, she was able to find the weak point, and within a minute each one went down. She took a pretty bad strike from an electric guardian before finishing it off, but thanks to her training from before the Calamity, she was able to pick herself back up far faster than she used to.

"Seven… eight… nine…" She kept counting off the guardians in her head as she took them down. Before leaving, Purah had said that there were, at most, 20, so she knew she'd have to keep moving until that number was met or until she was able to get to a high enough location to check for more.

She got about 13 guardians in before she realized Purah had neglected to mention one type.

"Oh, the flying ones… great…"

The aerial guardians were much more difficult to reach, but thanks to Mipha's ability to shoot up her own water pools, she could reach their height fairly quickly. She had made it through her 15 before she realized that all the remaining five were grouped together.

And unfortunately, she'd gone ahead of most of her soldiers. This would have to be one task she took on alone.

One electric guardian at the entrance, and beyond the entrance was a clearing meant for training. There was a scout, two flying guardians and an ice one waiting for her.

"Ok, don't take too much damage from the electric one, and the other four shouldn't be too bad," she assured herself.

Mipha dodged as best she could, but the fatigue was definitely settling in. Eventually, the guardian got another shot in on her and she felt the electricity rush through her again.

She felt sick and ready to fall. But she didn't. In that moment, every moment of frustration she had felt about not being able to fight harder kicked in. Instead of giving in, she got angry.

Her eyes keyed in on the weak point of the guardian, and she slipped past a swing to strike the eye with pinpoint accuracy. This led to the guardian kicking its leg up, and Mipha immediately bounced back to the ground and unleashed a rush of water that forced the leg into the eye as well. With the guardian now damaged. She put it through a full weak-point onslaught until it fell.

With the most dangerous one out of the way, the rest were child's play. Four on one had seemed daunting when she saw it, but now, it was almost as if they were moving at half-speed. She flung her trident as hard as she could at the guardian scout. Hitting it perfectly so that it was destroyed on impact. Before releasing the trident, she sent a water pool below the first flying guardian's flight path. She grabbed the trident before the scout had even fallen apart properly, and she shot through the pool. Before she landed, she had struck both flying guardians in their eyes so many times that the weak-point attacks she wanted were almost mundane in their execution.

Finally, there was the ice guardian. As she engaged it, the Zora soldiers had finally caught up with her. They saw the carnage she had set upon these guardians in the short time it took them to catch up, and they were not about to step in at this point unless she needed it. This was her moment of heroism.

The ice guardian had no chance at this point to go one-on-one with Mipha. She was in a form that she'd never felt before. Never in her life had the counters come so easily. She knew this guardian was outmatched, and this fight was over before it began.

With a final trident strike, the last guardian fell, and a mix of triumph, exhaustion, pride and relief hit all at the same time. As she turned her head, she was greeted by about two dozen Zora soldiers giving her a standing ovation. Even by the standards of her combat skills, what she had done in under 10 minutes would go down as the stuff of legend. Just as her father had recently gotten his due credit for tossing a guardian into the river, Mipha would be remembered for crushing 20 guardians before any soldiers were even seriously injured.

Mipha returned to the palace with Purah still sitting there. It had been so quick that King Dorephan's meeting had not even ended yet. "You're back?"

The princess smiled. "Yes, and I'm happy to report that all 20 guardians have been defeated."

"Wow, by yourself?! You've been holding back on us! I didn't know you had it in you!"

"Neither did I, but now that I do, I have something I must take care of. Thank you, Purah."

Purah looked quizzically. "For releasing guardians on your home?"

"No, for reminding me that I am a great warrior. And for giving me confidence. I will be sure to mention you at the reception."

"Reception? For what?"

She didn't get an answer, though, as the adrenaline was still pumping, and Mipha was focused on her mission. That armor would be done.

And Link would be receiving it next time he visited.