Prince Sidon swam gracefully through East Reservoir Lake with Link and Zelda on his back for the final time, this time without the saddle. He gently dropped them off at the platform of Vah Ruta.

"This is where the real work starts, you two! I'll meet you back at Zora's Domain when you've finished the job. Remember, show the enemy no fear."

Zelda was a bundle of nerves as they watched Sidon swim away. She knew they would be facing the scourge of pure evil that defeated Champion Mipha a century ago, but they didn't really know what to expect. It was for that reason Link asked Zelda for her help with the inevitable face-off.

Link saw the concern on Zelda's face and took her by the hand. "We'll do this...together." He kissed her on the forehead.

A travel gate appeared on the floor in front of them just outside the entrance. "Good, if anything goes wrong, we can use this gate to easily leave and return if the need arises, but I'm not planning on it." Link was determined.

They stepped forward and Mipha's voice rang out. Her sweet, gentle voice echoed inside the walls of the Divine Beast.

"Link! You've made it! I always knew you would come back for me. The first step is to find the Guidance Stone. It will unlock the map and controls for Vah Ruta. I'm so happy you're here!" Zelda teared up hearing Mipha's sweet, delicate voice again after so many years, but she quickly composed herself.

A large glowing yellow-orange eye with a slit for a pupil, exactly like the ones attached to Naydra, came into view in front of them as they entered. It was an Eye of Malice that was completely blocking their way. Black viscous foul material spread out from around the eye like tar into the surrounding floor. The eyeball appeared to have black roots that were attached to the sticky puddle below, seemingly acting as a life support system for the slimy, reptilian eye. Several separate pools of the liquid Malice were scattered around it in the walkway as well. Link started to approach it, and Zelda yelled out a warning.

"Don't step on that stuff, Link! It will hurt you!" They hadn't encountered Eyes of Malice before up close, only from a distance when Naydra was covered in them, but Zelda knew firsthand how dangerous it was. Touching pure liquid Malice, even through boots or armor, would drain life force with a single touch—she had seen it happen. Link stopped just in time as Zelda drew her bow and aimed at the staring oversized Eye, and her arrow pierced it, sending the round black and orange glob vanishing into thin air and taking all of the Malice with it. A large terminal surrounded by what appeared to be closed stone flower petals stood in the center of the room.

"That's the main control unit. I think we have to activate that once we've finished activating all of the other terminals."

Link looked at her. "Let me guess, you know this because of your research?" He was grinning at her.

"Exactly! I see you're catching on!"

With their path cleared, they proceeded forward, only to be immediately stopped by a Guardian Scout that raised itself up and took aim at them. Link lifted his shield and ran straight at the small mechanical nuisance, defeating it with one hit of his Lynel Sword. Zelda picked up the Ancient Screw it dropped and held it close to the slate on Link's hip, and it disappeared into the inventory.

They noticed a pool of water on the floor, and a closed gate covered in Malice across and to the left of the somewhat shallow water that led to a currently-inaccessible area.

"Now what do we do?" Link asked her, unsure. Zelda thought for a moment, then said, "Check your runes. See if you can use Magnesis or Stasis on anything."

Link's face lit up as he realized the interior of a Divine Beast, at least this one, was similar to the many shrines he had visited so far, and he began to think of it as a large shrine with puzzles inside to solve.

Activating Magnesis, Link saw there was a chest under the water and pulled it out. As he was doing this, Zelda spotted the Eye of Malice that oozed the goo blocking the gate. It was gazing at them from under the water, and she swiftly shot it with her arrow, releasing the still-closed gate. The chest Link pulled out of the water contained another Ancient Screw. "I was hoping it would be a key for the gate. Guess that would be too easy."

Zelda giggled at him and an idea came to her. "Open up your Cryonis rune."

"One step ahead of you!" He was already switching to Cryonis and manifested a large ice block out of the water directly under the gate, forcing it open.

"Well done, sir!" She was impressed, and he grinned. She didn't know he had already done that a few times inside shrines, and he wasn't about to tell her.

They jumped into the water and swam to the other side of the gate. Another Guardian Scout took aim at them, and Link shot it from a distance with a shock arrow. He ran to it and finished it off with a great swing of his sword.

"Link, you may want to save your Lynel Sword for fighting...whatever it is at the end." He could detect the fear in her voice. He knew she was right, so he switched to the Zora Sword Prince Sidon had given him earlier that morning. Just beyond the Guardian Scout was the Guidance Stone, a tall dome covered in glowing light blue Sheikah glyphs with an area built in on the front for the Sheikah slate. It looked identical to the one in Purah's lab, similar to the stone pedestals in towers and shrines. "Sheikah slate authenticated. Divine Beast controls have been enabled." The familiar robotic voice echoed within the ancient stone machine as he held the slate to it.

Suddenly Mipha's tender voice echoed again. "You've obtained the Guidance Stone for the Divine Beast, revealing your map and controls. Take Ruta back by activating the terminals. Be careful."

Link handed Zelda the slate. "Do you want to be in charge of the controls? Since you've researched these Beasts before you probably know more about how to do it than I do."

"Sure, Link!" He was right. She had manipulated these controls before.

They were at a dead end, so they turned around and went through the room with the pool of water while Zelda studied the controls on the screen. Link activated Magnesis again so he could easily spot anything to use it on. They ran toward the main room where they had started, and Link noticed a bright pink area in his vision. It was a crank, and he used his Magnesis Rune to turn the crank. Zelda watched as a platform with a terminal on it raised upward and out of a deep pool of water on the floor. "Link! It's working! It's the first terminal!" Once it was raised up enough, he activated the terminal with the slate. Mipha's encouraging voice sounded again. "You have four terminals remaining. Keep going!"

Zelda noticed another doorway, so they ran out of it and up a ramp that was around the corner. A third Guardian Scout was at the top, and Link easily defeated it. It left behind an Ancient Spring in addition to another Ancient Screw. Just behind where the Guardian Scout had been was a large rotating cogwheel, and it was turning due to flowing water that was aimed at the top of it.

"There's another terminal on that wheel! We have to get the water stopped when the terminal is upright and out of the water," Zelda instructed. Link thought for a moment until an idea came to him. He used another Cryonis block to stop the flow of water at Zelda's signal.

"Perfect!" she shouted. They activated the second terminal and heard Mipha's gentle encouragement come from within the Beast. "You're doing great! You have three terminals remaining! Good luck."

Link shattered the Cryonis block to get the water flowing once more. Zelda watched him, amazed, as his instincts seemed to take over and he ran with confidence over to the cogwheel. "Come on Ari, I see a chest up there!" They held hands as they rode the platform on the outside of the wheel up to the ledge containing the chest. Link kicked it open, and there was a silver rupee inside.

"Got our money back from that bet!" Zelda said aloud.

"What bet?" Link was confused.

"Oh, it's nothing, never mind." He gave her a weird look as she placed the rupee in the slate with the rest of them, then examined the Divine Beast Controls. They could control the level and angle of Vah Ruta's trunk, which was still spraying a fountain of water. Zelda played with the angle of the trunk on the screen for a while and settled on the fourth position from the top, which would raise the trunk to a higher level than its current one.

"What made you choose that?"

"Oh, just instinct I guess."

As soon as she moved the trunk to the position, the water that sprayed out of it came flowing down inside the ancient machine and began turning a second large cogwheel ahead of them. It was right next to another smaller cogwheel that was spinning in the opposite direction.

Link noticed an Eye of Malice immediately; it was riding on one of the large platforms on the outside of the cogwheel. He waited until it came into view again. With a perfect shot to the pupil of the grotesque Eye, Link destroyed it, revealing a chest that had been hidden by the black ooze beside it. They watched the cogwheels turn and realized they would have to jump onto one cogwheel, then back onto the other, and time it just right to open the chest. With a great leap, they both made the jumps and reached the chest on their first try. They worked quickly to open the chest, which contained ten Fire arrows, then quickly turned around and jumped to the ledge that was at the top of the cogwheel.

Yet another Guardian Scout met them, but it wasn't a threat for long. Link shot it with a couple of the Fire arrows before it even had a chance to aim at them.

"Well done, Link!" Zelda shouted. She hadn't seen him furiously working inside a shrine yet, and she was impressed by his ability to solve the puzzles and defeat the enemies so swiftly for his first Divine Beast.

The undersized robot Guardian had dropped a Guardian Spear—a good weapon for striking from a distance—and it dematerialized into his weapons inventory. While he was picking it up Zelda noticed what looked like a square button on the floor and hopped onto it, activating a small waterfall below.

Link noticed there was a terminal behind a barred gate that was attached to the inside of yet another gigantic moving cogwheel. By paragliding, they landed together in the room below. They watched the cogwheel turn for a few minutes. There was a large sphere on a rail that would move to each end of the rail as the wheel turned, and when the sphere pressed a button on one side, it would open the gate. Using the Stasis ability, he froze the sphere against the button, opening the gate long enough and giving them access to the third terminal.

"We're over halfway!" Zelda exclaimed excitedly after Mipha's kind words of encouragement rang out from within the Beast. Link saw that there was also a chest on the same cogwheel between two blocks on a rail, so he used Stasis again when the block was away from the lid of the chest and quickly opened it, revealing an Ancient Core. He jumped down to where Zelda was waiting next to the cogwheel and they used the paraglider to reach the bottom of the earlier waterfall she activated.

Link smirked at her. "Looks like you'll have to put on your Zora Armor. Go ahead, I'm waiting." He was already wearing his.

She smirked back at him, raised her eyebrows, and put her armor on over her outfit, much to Link's disappointment. They swam easily up the waterfall, one at a time, back up to the level of the floor button that had activated it.

They looked around and noticed a ledge above them they hadn't been to yet, so they decided to paraglide together down to the bottom of the waterfall again, swim up, and paraglide to land on the new ledge. Zelda was happy she got so much practice swimming up waterfalls with him and Prince Sidon, or she wouldn't have been so eager to try it. They did just that, landing precisely on top of the new ledge next to the chest. It contained a weapon, a Knight's Halberd.

Zelda noticed a small doorway far ahead of them on a level below them, so they dropped down to it and ran toward the doorway. It led outside to the trunk area. Zelda checked the map, and according to it there was a terminal on the very tip of the trunk they couldn't see because the trunk was still raised high from when she repositioned it earlier.

Zelda brought up the controls on the slate and moved the trunk to the lowest position. With a great shaking and rumble, the trunk lowered, and the deafening trumpet blast sounded from the Beast. They used the paraglider together and flew toward the tip of the trunk. On the way there Link spotted a treasure chest on the trunk below them that was covered with the familiar sticky black slime and another Eye of Malice. Link steered them toward it as Zelda jokingly laughed. "You and your treasure chests!" Link just grinned at her.

Zelda shot the Eye and Link collected the treasure as soon as the Malice cleared. It was an Ancient Shaft.

Pulling up the map again, Zelda realized they wouldn't be able to scale the trunk from where they were to reach the tip of it where the terminal was. They would have to raise it while standing on it and paraglide back to the small doorway.

"I'm not too sure about this, Ari." He didn't like the idea of riding on the trunk while it was moving, but Zelda had done it several times, albeit a hundred years ago. "It will be fine, Link. Just hang onto me with one hand and your paraglider with the other."

She made sure they were ready and she moved the trunk close to the top position, and they jumped off with the paraglider, landing perfectly in the doorway again.

"That was fun, Ari!" Link said, grinning widely.

I know it's fun, I used to play around on this thing with you, Mipha and Sidon!

Zelda smiled at him and pulled up the controls again, and she once more lowered the trunk to its lowest position, making it somewhat horizontal. Vah Ruta cried out with its deafening blast once again.

When they were both ready, they ran and jumped off the ledge and flew to the tip of the trunk. Unfortunately, the terminal was sticking out at a ninety-degree angle below where they were standing because of the trunk's more horizontal position. Horror crossed Link's face as Zelda told him what they needed to do.

"Link, we'll have to move the trunk up again. We'll have to do that while we're standing on it, but look - there's a ledge we can stand against so we don't fall while it moves."

She was right; he hadn't seen that before. He still wasn't comfortable standing on the trunk while it moved, but at least there was a bumper.

Zelda carefully calculated which position to move the trunk to, and Link held her hand while it started moving. They both easily jumped up to the now-flat platform where the terminal was, to Link's relief. They were hundreds of feet above East Reservoir Lake, and he really didn't want to fall. After catching his bearings the fourth terminal was activated.

"Now where do we go?" Link asked, pulling up the map. He saw that the last terminal was still inside the Beast, but his eye caught sight of another chest that was drowning in the same black ooze ahead and below them to the left. They paraglided to the platform, but they were surprised to see that there was no Eye.

"Wait Link, it's over there!" She was pointing across to the other side of the Beast. He took out his bow and arrow and let the sharp weapon fly across the chasm, making contact with a wet pop and a squish as the Eye disappeared, taking the rest of the nasty black goo with it. Link opened the chest and received ten Ice arrows as his prize.

Looking out, Zelda could barely see a small hole in the roof of Vah Ruta's head that appeared to be close to where the last terminal was on the map. They used the paraglider to reach the hole and dropped down into it.

In this new room an ugly mouth with teeth in a puddle of Malice was above them on the ceiling.

"That's a new one," Link quipped. To his horror the skull of a Lizalfos popped out of the mouth and came snapping toward them. His eyes grew wide. "That's a new one too."

Zelda spotted the Eye in a different area on the ceiling and destroyed it with another arrow, taking out the mouth and the rest of the Malice in addition to the Eye. He quickly beat the skull with his Zora Sword once as it approached them, and it disappeared. They noticed the last terminal on the level just below them, but it was on fire.

"What are we going to do about that?" Zelda asked.

Link took in the scope of the room they were in and noticed another crank on the wall. Using Magnesis he turned the crank, which turned some attached gears and opened the roof above them.

"Of course! The water from Ruta's trunk!" Zelda cried.

Zelda quickly pulled up the Divine Beast controls on the slate again, and she put the trunk in position so it would spray water through the opened roof and onto the fire. After another round of shaking as the trunk moved into position, water from the trunk came pouring in and put the fire out on the last terminal.

"We did it!" Zelda yelled. They quickly dropped down to the level below where the terminal was and activated it.

Mipha's voice echoed within the Beast again. "You've activated all the terminals! Now you can start the main control unit! There should be a new glowing mark on your map. Head there, but be careful not to let your guard down."

Following the new mark on the map, they reached the room where they first saw the main control unit. There was a layer of shallow water covering the room now. After switching his weapon back to the Lynel Sword, Link placed the slate up to it to activate the main control unit.