Midna warped us over to the Northern Faron woods, just outside of some place Link claimed was a temple he had to go through before all this twilight stuff began. According to him he saved Talo and a monkey there before the twilight came through, and then freed even more monkeys after. I was a bit skeptical of the whole story, tilting my head in disbelief as he relayed it for me. He chuckled at the weird look I was giving him before nudging my side.
"It sounds weird, but it's all true. Trust me, I can't make this stuff up." He assures me. I smiled as we approached the Forest temple as Link called it.
From over to the side of the temple, a grey monkey sporting a pink flower by her ear swung over to the area in front of Link and I. If I didn't know any better I'd say it was the same monkey that... I looked over at Link to find him already staring at me with a playful smirk (or at least the best version of one a dog could manage).
"You actually did all that... didn't you?" I ask and he just chuckles.
As soon as the monkey landed, four odd looking wooden creatures appeared around her and she cowered in fear. However, the wooden creatures seemed slightly more interested in us than the monkey. We raced over to her regardless and attacked the things, killing them all and watching them disappear in a puff of black smoke. When it was all over, the monkey looked around and noticed they were gone.
"Did...Did you save me?" She asks timidly. Link and I nodded and she seemed to smile a bit.
"Well, thank you. Listen, since you're so nice, let me tell you something: there's a really pretty wooded area on the other side of this cliff! I climbed over there, but when I tried to get deeper into the woods, THOSE guys attacked me! What's in those woods anyway?" She says. Link and I share a look before nodding to each other and bidding the monkey goodbye. Whatever was in those woods is important. That much we knew for sure.
We head over to the edge the monkey came from and looked at all the ledges leading to the wooded area the monkey was talking about. It was going to be a tricky series of jumps to get across in one piece, and it made me nervous.
"So there's another section of forest beyond this cliff. Alright, guys, let's go!" Midna says. I looked over the edge of our first jump and eased a bit of my nerves to see I could just climb back up if I missed. The rest of the jumps, however, made me audibly gulp.
Link seemed to notice my discomfort and gave me a reassuring look.
"Just wait until I tell you to follow me, and keep moving. It'll all be over before you know it. Be careful and don't look down if you can help it." He said calmly, lulling me into an almost submissive state. I nodded once to him and he jumped, landing on the first small ledge perfectly before continuously moving between each one. He didn't stay on a single branch for longer than a second, only stopping on a large, hollow section of a tree that had grown into the side of the cliff.
"Come on." Link coaxed me over to begin the series of jumps for myself. I took a deep breath and focused, taking it one leap of faith at a time. I nearly struggled to keep my eyes open as I lept over the seemingly bottomless drop multiple times, but let them squeeze shut while I made the final jump to where Link stood waiting on me.
He made sure that I was okay before we moved on through the next much shorter series of jumps. Link went first and I followed shortly behind him, and we continued on to some weird bridges that were turned sideways. They looked to be made of wood and had an odd spinning thing in the center on a tall pole. When the wind stopped blowing, so did the spinning, but another strong gust of wind came soon after. The spinning started up once again and the bridges rotated around so that we could use them.
Link and I quickly ran across before another gust of wind rotated the bridges once again, allowing us to get to a piece of land with a rope connecting it to another small island of land, and a rope connecting that to the next mountain-like piece of woods. We crossed the ropes, dodging two swinging logs wrapped in vines.
At the opening of the next wooded area, a stone with a strange symbol on it was whistling in the wind. Link stopped by it and listened to the tune, so I did the same. The little song sounded vaguely familiar, like one of the short songs my mother used to hum to me.
"What's this?" I ask, interrupting his concentration on the song. He looked over at me before glancing back at the stone.
"It's hard to explain. Basically, I try to copy the tune with a howl and then a golden wolf howls back and once I'm human again, I find him and he teaches me ancient fighting techniques." He explains. I try not to stare at him like a second and third head just popped out of his neck, but I don't think my efforts were very good.
"I'm sorry I asked. Rescued monkeys swinging you around a temple was a stretch, but this is insane." I say. He tilts his head and gives me an 'oh really?' look.
"Says the girl that was turned into a wolf by a twilight-wielding weirdo." I couldn't stop the small smile that worked its way onto my face as I rolled my eyes and left him to his glorified rock.
A few moments later, he had howled the tune and spaced out for a bit before we moved on. The next area looked like the rest of the Faron woods. Big trees were growing throughout the small room that seemingly had no exit other than the one we just came through. Another odd stone was placed in the room with a triforce on it, whistling a different song than the one outside. This one, I immediately recognized as the one my mother favored most. The same song she hummed to me to comfort me, cheer me up if I was ever upset, and a lullaby to put me to sleep.
This was the last song I ever heard from her.
Before I could really comprehend what I was doing, I had sat beside the stone and howled the song along with the whistling. When I stopped, another quiet sound could be heard whistling the song from above us. A small creature came down from the tree top and stood at the base of the tree. He chuckled in a strange echo-y way, then blew into a horn he was holding. At the sound of the horn, wooden puppet-like things fell from the tree tops and came towards us as the (I'm gonna call him a kid) ran away towards the large section of tree at the opposite end of the small area. The wall disappeared as the kid ran through, leaving us with his little puppets.
They didn't seem like much of a threat, really. They just slowly crowded around Link and I and tried grabbing at us. We quickly disposed of them and ran off through the passage way the strange kid ran through. It opened up to an area with another open path, which we followed in search of the kid. We followed the sound of his little trumpet to find him, occationally fighting off more puppets.
When we found him, I attacked, only really succeeding in grabbing his attention. He floated up and chuckled at us, disappearing and reappearing elsewhere, then blew his trumpet and summoned more of his puppets. This cycle of searching and fighting and searching again repeated at least two more times and took nearly twice as long as the first time due to more paths being revealed.
Finally, we followed him into a room with multiple stumps in a circle, and juggled trying to fight his puppets with landing a hit on him. After successfully attacking the kid about three times, he stood up, laughed, and disappeared, saying "bye" before opening up a passage way for us. All of his puppets disappeared immediately afterwards as if they'd never been there to begin with.
I looked over to Link, who was already glancing over at me.
"All of that...and he just...disappeared?" I ask between semi deep breaths from the game of chase. Link only shook his head and we head through the new opening. It opened into a large area with a door being guarded by two soldier statues. In the middle of the floor was a triforce.
We stood on the symbol for a moment before Link nudged my side.
"I think you need to howl that song from earlier." he stated and I sat in the center of the triforce. I took a breath before doing just as he suggested, howling the song that reminded me of my mother.
When I stopped howling, the ground separated into multiple platforms in the shape of a heart and the two statues came to life. One jumped to a platform in front of Link and I, and the other behind us.
"We are guardians of this land. Guide us to where we once stood." was all that the statue in front of us said before and air of silence swallowed the area.
"Umm...okay. Maybe they'll follow us? So if I jump here.." I think aloud as I jumped to a platform to my left. The statue behind us copied my movement while the other stood still.
"I think we have to move them separately. That one seems to follow you so this one..." Link trailed off as he jumped to a platform on the right and was followed by the statue that remained unmoved after I jumped.
"This one follows me."
It took a while of jumping around the platforms, trying to keep from having the two statues collide or crush us while also getting them to their places they once stood. After a solid five minutes (give or take an extra ten to that) we were finally close to having the statues where they belong. Link and I jumped a couple of times towards each other, ending up closely standing on the same platform as the two statues reached their marks.
They turned in place to face forward, then the door between them opened, revealing stairs. The ground was returned to its former state and the statue once again spoke.
"Go now to the sacred place, beasts. We yield passage to the sacred grove."
We took the statue's words as our invitation and walked through the new opening, climbing the short flight of stairs. At the top was another big room with a sword stuck in the center of the floor.
We approached the sword, watching as the blade began to glow brightly. A powerful wind-like force blew back at us, but we stood our ground to the best of our ability. The feeling of twilight being removed from my body was an odd one, but what was even more odd was somehow knowing, it wasn't all gone. After the light subsided, Link and I were once again our old hylian selves.
Link drew the sword from the ground and raised it into the air, Midna commenting from behind us that the sword had accepted him as its master. He gave it a few swings before Midna appeared in front of us with two strange-looking pieces of twilight floating above her hand.
"These things are the embodiment of the evil magic Zant cast on you. It's definitely different than our tribe's shadow magic. Careful...if you touch it you'll turn back into a beast! This thing is too dangerous...it's probably for the best if we just leave it here, huh? But on the other hand...if we kept it, you'd be able to transform into a beast anytime you wanted...Yes, since Zant was kind enough to give this to us, we should be thankful and use it all we can! If you need it, just call me. I want to keep a low profile, so I'll hide in your shadow when you're human, but I can change you whenever." Midna explained that she could change us into wolves to warp places and get around faster, and that she could change us back to our Hylian forms after. Then she asked a favor.
She wanted to find something called a Mirror of Twilight, our last link to Zant, to stop him for good. Link and I exchanged glances before nodding her way, agreeing to help find the Mirror.
"We'll help you, Midna. First things first, let's warp over to Castletown." Link said, and Midna nodded, pulling out the two pieces of twilight and turning us into wolves before opening a portal. In a flash, we were gone, reappearing on the outer edge of Castletown, and Midna turned us back into our Hylian selves, only this time, I knew something was wrong.
I could feel the reaction that the different magic of being turned into a wolf again had with whatever magic was left over from Zant's attack. A strange feeling like a slight burn resonated through my chest, bubbling under my skin with an uncomfortable heat. I flinched, holding onto Link's shoulder as the burning spread, reaching up my neck and down past my stomach.
"Rheikah? Rhei...are you okay? What's going on? Rhei!" Link held onto me as the feeling slowly subsided. I didn't answer him, only took off my tunic, revealing dark marks resembling those from a burn in the pattern of twilight. It reached from the top of my chest to above my hip, and reminded me of what Zant had threatened to do to me.
He said a darkness lived in me, and I guess this is his way of making sure I didn't forget it.
A/N: Okay so hi, first of all. THIS STORY ISN'T OVER AND I'M NOT DEAD!! This was actually supposed to be posted a long time ago but I couldn't find a good stopping place for the chapter. So, better late than never I guess. Thanks again for staying around and supporting this story, it means a lot to me. Next chapter will be up a lot sooner than this one, I promise!