Black light enveloped me and shattered my body into Twilit particles. As before, I felt consciousness in every square at once and saw through a million eyes, breathed through hundreds of noses, and heard through thousands of ears. Before I knew it, I was reassembled in Faron's Spring. Briefly fearing I had been turned backwards like President Skroob in Spaceballs, I checked myself and was relieved when my body was in its proper state.

"Zach..." I turned around to see Faron looking down at me from his loft. "Leave these woods and go to the east, where you will find the land protected by the spirit Eldin. There you will find that which the shadow being seeks... But know that when you set foot beyond the curtains of twilight, you will revert to your beast form, so be prepared."

Once the spirit faded away, I once again turned around to be met by Midna floating in front of me. "Good," she said. "Searching should be much easier now. But... Of course, you know exactly where the Fused Shadow is, don't you?"

I nodded and said, "Eldin Province, Death Mountain specifically."

"It's seriously called 'Death Mountain'?" she asked. "That's not ominous at all."

"It's not as bad as it sounds." I started on my way towards my temporary house. "The worst we need to look out for before we reach the area with the Fused Shadow are the Gorons."

Midna floated beside me in her shadow form and asked, "What's a Goron?"

"A Goron is a... well, I'm not sure exactly what they are, but they're the inhabitants of Death Mountain. Some kind of rock-animal hybrid or something."

After gathering supplies, I walked into the area with Coro's hut with the intention of going straight for the exit, but unfortunately, that was not to be. "Hey, Guy!" The housekeeper ran up to me and patted my shoulder. "I can't believe it, you're alive! I thought you were done for, guy."

"Zach." I cleared my throat and gently removed his hand. "I was busy clearing the marsh of monsters, and now I'm heading to Eldin Province."

Coro recoiled and said, "You're going there on foot? You can't do that, it'd take you three days!"

"Three days?!" Midna screeched. "Three days before we can find the next Fused Shadow, are you freaking kidding me?!"

I sighed. "Come on, I doubt it would take that long. Do you have a better idea?"

"Well, no," Coro said meekly. "We don't have any horses, we usually wait for a caravan from Kakariko or go with Rusl when he's heading there." He shrugged and smiled at me. "If you can last a day in that stinky marsh, guy─Zach, then you'll probably do fine out there. Best of luck to you."

I nodded and shook his hand. "Thanks. Take care of yourself. Guy." He laughed and went on his way. With that done, I re-prepared to leave Faron Woods and headed for the exit.

"Three days of walking across open country... I might as well claw my own eyes out right now," Midna grumbled from below.

"I'm not thrilled about this either," I replied as I went through the gate leading to Hyrule Field. "In the game, it wasn't nearly this long of a walk to Kakariko." The threshold of Faron Woods was barely noticeable; it was all forest as far as I could see. In fact, the area looked very similar to that spot in the first Twilight Princess trailer where Link was running through a dark forest.

Midna harrumphed and said, "How lucky of that Midna."

Hours later, Midna emerged from my shadow and perched herself on an overhead tree branch. "It's getting dark, let's rest for now."

I nodded and sat between two roots of the tree. "Time went by fast."

"I know, right?" She sighed and stretched her arms. "We burned through what? Two hours?"

After checking my phone, I said, "Almost four. Wait, I've been walking nonstop for the last four hours?!"

"To be fair, you did take a few sips of spring water along the way," Midna said. "This is as good a place as any to set up camp for the night, anyway."

I nodded and pulled the tent out of my satchel. It was one of those easy-setup tents from the store, not a heavy-duty survival tent. Still, it would do. But did I have to set it up by myself? "Err, Midna, could you give me a hand?"

The sound of clapping was not what I wanted to hear. "Bravo! Encore!"

"HA HA haha hahahahahaha... Shut up!"

Midna chuckled and floated down beside me. "Relax, I was only teasing. Kind of. Eee hee!"

It took a bit of work but we finally set up camp with the tent and a warm fire nearby. "Well, this is cozy," I said through a yawn. "I'm gonna turn in."

"Hehe, no, you're not," Midna said. She removed her Fused Shadow, summoned my wooden sword, and trotted into the nearby clearing.

I sighed and asked, "Why not?"

She twirled the blade deftly in glowing fingers. "I'll not leave it up to chance for you to improve your swordsmanship. We're gonna be working every night until you can wield that sword decently."

"Come on, Midna," I complained. "I don't know what the big deal is. I did okay with those Bokoblins and Diababa, didn't I?"

Midna rolled her eyes. "You did okay. Emphasis on that last word." She poked my stomach with the sword. "You're not gonna get by on just 'okay'. There'll come a time where I won't be there to bail you out of trouble, and when that time comes, I'd feel comfortable knowing you received the proper instruction." She backflipped and stretched her neck. "Now, show me where you currently are in your training. Pretend you're fighting an enemy."

I decided to just get it over with and started swinging my sword at an imaginary Bokoblin. Some slashes, jabs, and twirls later, I turned to Midna for her input.

"You're making me cry," she said. "That... what in the world was that?"

"Er..."

"You call that fighting? That... UGH!"

"Could you put that into words, master?"

Midna stared at me and poked her wooden sword at my knee. "Don't honor yourself by calling me that. I thought it'd be funny when we first met, I admit, but now it's just creepy. Anyway, ouch." She shook her head and walked up to me, and I'm not gonna lie, it was adorable seeing a teeny little thing with such a serious face. "Your first problem is that you keep closing your eyes even when nothing is coming at you. Having one eye, that may be understandable, but you need to overcome that phobia."

"Got it. And second?"

"Second, stop using that reverse grip. Flipping the blade like that can be handy at times, but it's not a very viable offensive technique. So ditch it." She floated up and patted my shoulder. "Here's the good news: You're fairly light on your feet. You move around a lot, which is good. You just need to be more balanced overall." She moved back and readied her stance. "Now, let's start working on that eye thing."

I agreed, and then I noticed something: Midna was left-handed.

An hour passed before I finally threw down my sword and declared, "I am done! I am exhausted, I am sore, and I just want to eat some dinner and go to sleep!"

"Okay, okay, calm down," Midna said as she grabbed my phone.

"Hey, what are you doing with that?" I asked while reaching for the phone.

Midna leaned away. "I want to listen to music."

"How'd you learn how to use it?"

"I had time to practice." She seemed to know what she was doing as she turned the phone on, went to the Music app, and pressed a song. Immediately, May It Be began playing. "Earth has a very strange sense of music, but it's somewhat interesting. I don't understand any of it, but whatever."

I sighed, wondering when it would end, and changed into some sleeping clothes inside the tent. "Terrific, there's a Twili girl using my phone and she chose a song that perfectly describes her..."

"What was that?" Midna asked. "This describes me?"

I sighed again and cursed my mumbling. "In a way. It's not specifically about you, but the lyrics are basically a prayer for a traveler to be safe on their dangerous journey."

"That is fitting," Midna said. "I like this song even more now." She entered the tent and curled up on one of the two mattresses we took with us. I handed her the softer blanket and wrapped myself in another, slightly less soft blanket. With gentle music playing, we lay apart, both staring up at the ceiling of the tent. "Hey, Zach?"

"Yeah?"

"... What happened to your eye?"

I rolled over so my back was to her. "When I was five years old, my brother smacked me in the face with a BB gun, a... a toy weapon. It caused swelling that pinched off the optic nerve of my left eye. I'd never see out of it again. The doctors removed it and I've had several fake eyes made ever since."

There was an awkward silence before I felt two small arms wrap around my torso from behind. My muscles tensed up as she said, "I'm sorry that happened to you. I really am."

"Thank you, now please let go."

"I was just trying to be nice." She pulled back and returned to her side of the tent. "That... that must have been rough, especially at that age."

I shrugged and snuggled tighter into my blanket. "It could have been worse," I muttered. "I could have lost both eyes."

"That's true, I guess."

"Look, Midna, my life isn't much when compared to a princess like you," I said. "That being said, it's not the worst life around. I don't have any allergies, I had a roof over my head, and I didn't have to scrape my way through each day. Therefore, whatever problems I had were irrelevant. Not many people can say the same."

After a pause, Midna said, "My people don't have it easy. It's difficult growing crops when there's no natural light or a reliable water source. What water there is must be thoroughly cleaned, which turns a cup of water into a tiny puddle. There's not as much open violence anymore, but corruption runs rampant in the elite upper class and the poor are just struggling to survive."

I closed my eyes and sighed. "I'm sorry I mocked your people, Midna. I'm sorry I mocked you, period."

"Thank you. I'm sorry I made fun of your eye and your body. You're not that chubby."

I snorted as I rolled onto my back and grabbed my belly. "Who am I kidding? I'm fat."

"Not as fat as that big guy in the village."

"The Mayor? Yeah, that's true."

"I think with a healthy diet and some exercise, both of which you're getting already, you'd be one hell of a stud."

I snorted again. "Lying does not become you."

"I wasn't lying," she said. "I paid you a compliment, why would I lie about it?"

"Because it's nonsensical."

"Why?"

"It's me, Midna. I don't get compliments, and if I do, it's because I'm being set up as a joke."

"That's an incredibly depressing viewpoint, Zach."

"Thanks, I made it myself."

It was noon the next day, and we were still in the forest between Faron Woods and Hyrule Field. Thankfully, Midna didn't bring up what happened last night. Instead, we settled for a peaceful silence. Until...

"I'm hungry," Midna whined. "Zach, why didn't you bring better supplies than that cruddy stuff?"

"I wasn't in charge of that," I said. "Maybe there are berries or something we can eat."

Midna hummed in thought. "That could work. One moment... I think there's a berry bush to your left somewhere."

Sure enough, when I looked left, there was a bush full of ripe red berries. "Ooh, yummy."

"Wait, they may be poisonous."

"I got this." I removed my left gauntlet, rolled up my sleeve, and grabbed some of the berries. "You see, if you crush up a plant and rub it into a spot on your skin, you can tell if it's poisonous by seeing if it leaves a rash. Like so." I squashed the berries and slathered them along my forearm, and then I grinned at my accomplishment.

Midna popped out of my shadow and grimaced. "Okay, that may be true... but riddle me this: If it causes a rash, how are you gonna get that stuff off?"

My smile vanished as I looked at my slowly-blistering arm. "... Oh."

A few hours later, the afflicted area was reddish and swollen, and it hurt to move my elbow or wrist since they pulled on the dry skin. The fingers on my opposite hand were similarly affected since they crushed the berries. "Ooowww..."

"Hush, you brought it on yourself." Midna gently patted my arm down with a damp cloth. "Well, look on the bright side. You were right."

I rolled my eye and said, "Yes, yippee for me. Stupid berries."

Midna sighed, her skin slightly glistening with sweat from the heat. "Yes, blame the berries. That'll teach them."

"Grrr," I growled towards a random bush. "I blame you."

She chuckled and sprinkled some spring water on the rash. The cracked skin repaired some of its more serious wounds but it overall stayed red and swollen. "Okay, we learned something else today: Spring water can't really heal rashes very well. You're just gonna have to tough it out."

"I don't wanna."

"Well, I'm sorry, but there's nothing I can do." She continued patting down the area. "If I had chosen to take my studies into healing rather than fighting, I probably could have repaired both this and your fever easily. Twili magic can heal any wound. Well, almost any."

I raised an eyebrow at her. "What do you mean by that?"

Midna sighed and shook her head. "I'd rather not talk about it," she said. "I'd rather we get going again."

"Alright, fair enough," I said as I got out the map. "Let's see... do you know where north is?"

"What, that little device doesn't have a compass?"

"No, that would require more technology." I rubbed my face with my clean hand and pointed down at Faron Woods. "That's where we left..." My finger traced a path to Kakariko Village. "And that's where we're headed. Eldin's Spring should be just inside the village."

Midna hovered over my shoulder and said, "Should be there, but for all we know, it's over here." She pointed at another spring. "That one feels important, but then again, they're all important."

"Yeah, but Eldin Province is closer," I said. "It'll take less time than trying to get to Lake High-Leia."

"Wait, what did you just say?" She giggled and poked my cheek. "I'm pretty sure it's pronounced High-Lee-Uh."

"How would you know?"

Midna shrugged and said, "I don't but it doesn't matter, let's go to Eldin Province. As you said, it's closer."

I nodded and put the map away. After wiping my arm down with the towel, sterilizing it with some spring water, and having some jerky and fruit for lunch, we headed off. Through the forest we went, passing the occasional large stone and hollowed tree trunk. Birds chirped overhead as I started humming a dainty little song that caught Midna's attention.

"What's that song?" she asked from below.

I chuckled and replied, "It's called 'The Trail We Blaze', from a movie."

"What songs aren't from movies on Earth? Eh, don't answer that. I wanna listen to it."

With another chuckle, I brought out my phone and scrolled to the designated song. It made the next hour much more fun than it should have been. Even after we got sick of the song, we kept on our way, only stopping to eat, train, and sleep—and fight the occasional deku baba or Bokoblin.

This went on for two more days before we came upon a great hill guarded by rocky walls and a hall of trees. Step after step, I approached the crest and leaned against a tree to catch my breath. It was hot and humid on this day, which annoyed me to no end because the sweat kept dribbling into my eye. Wiping my brow, I sighed and looked over the hill, and then I was entranced by what I saw.

It was so beautiful. Rolling green hills as far as the eye could see and mountains to the east that marked our destination. To the west, I saw the edge of Gerudo Mesa. In the center of the view, in all its marble majesty, was Hyrule Castle itself.

This was Hyrule, and I was an insignificant dot on the surface of such an incredible world as this. The only blemish was the curtain of Twilight that smothered the gorgeous landscape in a hauntingly beautiful permanent sunset. Well, that and the clouds brewing over the stretch of land to which Midna and I were headed.

I cleared my throat and sighed. "Well, we're almost there. Death Mountain is just that way, and Eldin Province is even closer."

Midna nodded beside me and said, "Almost there. It looks like the Twilight hasn't expanded much after all."

"Maybe. Let's get a move on." I started down the hill. "We haven't run into any monsters today and I'm starting to get paranoid."

"I don't know what all the fuss was about," she said. "Maybe beating that plant got the monsters to clear out."

After walking for another hour, the afternoon light matched the Twilight almost perfectly. As it was getting dark, Midna emerged from my shadow and joined me in my walk, only for me to sit down on a rock to catch my breath. The terrain was changing from a lush green field to a rocky gravel-filled area, signaling our approach to Eldin Province. "Eesh, these rocks look so jagged. I bet you could cut yourself just brushing against one."

"I'm not taking that bet." If my memory of the game was correct—and it was!—we were getting close to the Twilit curtain that marked the entrance to Eldin Province. "Come on, we're almost there."

"HEEEEEEY!" a voice cried from nearby. I turned around and saw who else but the Postman sprinting at me. His sleeveless, short-shorted uniform was soggy and mud-stained, and the flag attached to his back was in tatters, but it was definitely him. Poor guy must have been caught in a rainstorm. He slowed down and rested on his knees to catch his breath while I waited less than patiently for him to speak. "Go... Go no further! There is a black wall ahead that blocks the way!" The poor fella started pacing, and I think I saw a tear in his eye. "I-I thought I would deliver a few letters, but it seems impossible..."

"Erm..." I rubbed the back of my head. "I don't mean to be rude but—"

"What? Oh!" The Postman bowed with dignity. "I am the honorable and dependable letter carrier, known to some as... the Postman. Now that I have introduced myself, please!" He reached into his satchel and pulled out a small envelope. "Take this letter and read it at your leisure!"

Taking the letter, which felt thicker and heavier than I expected, I sighed and said, "I'm sure you're a busy guy, but I don't exactly have room to hold mail." Actually, I did, I just didn't want to hold his crap.

The Postman immediately reached back into his red-and-white satchel and pulled out... another red-and-white satchel. Evidently, hammerspace bags were common in Hyrule. "Please receive this post bag. I carry a spare around in the event of hapless travelers like yourself."

"Uh... thanks..." I took the post bag and stuffed it carelessly into my own satchel. "Hey, what's your real name, anyway?"

"Well, my business is concluded!" The Postman saluted me and turned on his heel towards Faron Woods. "Onward to mail!" And off he went, leaving a trail of mud in his wake.

Midna popped out of my shadow and said, "What a strange fellow. What did he give you?"

I sighed as I opened the letter. "It reads, 'If I have a letter for you, I will approach you at high speed! Please do not flee!' … Wait, there's more. 'PS: Thank you for choosing United Hyrule Express! Included is a complimentary red rupee for our favorite customer!'"

"Wha... but you didn't even choose... WHAT?!"

With a shrug, I held up the gem. It was as big as my fist and looked exactly like it did in the games. "It's a marketing scheme, I'm guessing. Still, it's free money." I stuffed both the letter and the rupee into my satchel and continued on my way. "We're almost there, at least. He said there was a black wall up ahead... and..."

Oh, there was a black wall, alright. What the Postman conveniently left out were the two Gorons standing guard in front of it. They were enormous, standing a good two feet over me, with pot bellies that fooled no one and expressions that convinced everyone.

"Uhh... What are those?" Midna asked.

"Those... would be Gorons," I replied.

A minute passed, and then Midna said, "Well? Get up there!"

"Gimme a second! They're scary-looking..." I gulped loudly and walked up to them, and for a moment, I thought they were just very well-done statues.

"HALT!" the closer one yelled suddenly. I was so startled by it that I fell flat on my ass. Midna giggled quietly below me. "None can enter this way!" He had a very curious accent, like a mix between Scottish and Russian.

Standing back up, I held my hands up peacefully and said, "Look, I'm just passing through."

The Goron shook his head. "I mean it literally. None can enter through this black wall. Not even the Goron Special Crop could penetrate it." He pointed a tree trunk of an arm in the opposite direction. "Turn back, human."

"I need to go," I insisted, but I probably did not sound very confident, especially when the Goron's beady blue eyes peered down at me. "L-listen, I heard that you could get inside if you say a special phrase." I quickly glanced down at my shadow. "Midna, help me out here."

"Why should I?" she asked. "This is fun, seeing you quiver in your little Hero boots."

"Oh? And what phrase is that?" the Goron asked. His breath stank like a mudslide.

I quickly waved my hands in a hush-hush pattern, then beckoned him down and whispered, "It's a secret to everybody."

"You're quoting something again, aren't you?"

"Um... nooo..." I cleared my throat and stepped away from the Goron. "Let me have a try. What do you have to lose?"

The Goron guardsman looked over to his companion, who simply shrugged. "Very well, human. Have your go at it."

Sighing in relief, I passed them and walked up to the black wall. "Ugh, now I have to be a wolf again," I grumbled. "I am going to have so many fleas when this is over."

"Could be worse," Midna said. "I'm waiting on the other side. Do your super-secret ritual, Mister Hero. Eee hee!"

I cleared my throat again and raised my arms dramatically. "Klaatu! Verata! Niktu!" After a moment, Midna's hair hand erupted from the wall, grabbed me, and yanked me inside.