"It's locked, because of course it is." Nika finally accepted the fact, "Now... I have to go back to the damned bottom, again and-" Nika was about to yell, but two mole guys came out of the ground and talked to eachother.
"Yo, Ledd! This is the place, ain't it? So what is it they buried again?" "A key! K-E-Y, KEY! They busted up the key to that door and hid the pieces all over the place. I'm telling you, one of the five pieces is buried right around here." "Hey about scattered, you wouldn't have happened to see my spare gloves lying around?" "You lost your spare gloves!? You do realize that if you lose the pair you're using right now you won't be able to dig for treasure right?" "Yeah! That's why I asked!" "Ugh, whatever, let's go look around for your gloves, then the key" They finished talking and went away to search the gloves.
The timing couldn't be more perfect, if the red guys in the camp nearby broke the key, then the pieces wouldn't be far, as for some being buried, would you look at that, them mole wa dumb enough to not even turn around, and there were the gloves they were talking about, "This is way too convinient, it really is." Nika thought before she started searching for spots on the ground.
To Nika's surprise, one of the pieces was right next to her, another was on a ledge next to that one, the third was down a slope next to a lookout tower (Which she brought down with a bomb), the fourth one was on the other side next to the monster camp, only they know how they did it, and only they know how they managed to put it on a ledge which Nika was only able to reach thanks to geysers that led there and the last one was in a hole in the wall that she had to throw a bomb to to break, and there was absolutely no way the monsters put the boulders there as the slope the wall was on was so slippery, it almost made Nika want to scream.
"FIVE! FIVE PIECES! I'M DONE HERE! LET'S GO IN AND I'M NEVER DOING SOMETHING LIKE THIS AGAIN!" Nika lamented to no one in particular, this helped her calm down before going in the temple, and unknown to her, again Ghirahim was watching.
Earth Temple.
Inside the temple, the temperature rised five folds, "...I hate this... I hate this so much... The only thing that could make this worse is the guardian of this temple not being a dragon there are so many dragon statues here, it has to be one." Nika thought as she made her way on the stone bridge, leading her to a drawbridge, there were chains attached to it, but ropes were keeping it from going down, luckily for Nika, she had a bug shaped solution.
She sent the beetle to cut the ropes, causing the bridge to open, allowing her passage, "This might actually be hard to do." Nika muttered, before seeing the next room which was filled with lava, "I know this is not what I'm supposed to do, but I don't care." Nika said before the sword spirit could speak.
Stretching her arms she wanted to grab the ledge, but failed as it was too hot to grab, "YEOWCH! WELL, I'm not doing that again." Nika exclaimed, she looked around for another way through and saw a bunch of bomb flowers that grew on the side of a broken off statue head, thinking she could use the debris to walk across, Nika grabbed a rock from the ground and threw it at the bombs, causing them to explode, leaving only the eye to remain, seeing that there were no debris to walk on, Nika came up with another idea.
Waiting a bit for the eye to roll over to her, Nika jumped on it and started guiding it around the lava, "Not what I had in mind, but I can work with it." Nika thought as she made the eye roll towards a cracked wall which she used a bomb to break down.
The eye rolled without any issues, occasionaly stopping to unlblock the way from the occasional gate, this was until she reached the end where she saw a trigger attached a third of a bridge, this looked absolutely useless, Nika even commented "Between this and the room where I fought Ghrim or whatever, I'm unsure which is more unneeded", that is before she accidentaly made the eye slam into the trigger, causing another part of the bridge to rise from the lava, "Okay the room is more useless." Nika realized as she climbed onto the bridge and prooceded into the next room.
In the room was the steepest slope she ever saw, "Why?" She asked the sword spirit which replied "Because... Good night master.", Nika sighed at the response "Some guide it is... Whatever, Acceleration Engine!" She exclaimed as she puped her legs, she used the additional speed to climb the slope faster than she otherwise would, even avoiding boulders she didn't know would fall, passed the first, there was another, she did the same here.
Nika was now in front of the final room, she knew because it was locked behind a lock similar to the one in the woods, the fact that there was a dragon statue pouring lava in front of it also helped, "Not that way. That way." Nika rationalized, heading for the way that wasn't blocked by lava.
Once again, there was a slope, it wasn't nearly as steep as the previous two so she didn't bother using the Acceleration Engine, "Calm walk, no lava, maybe it's for a rest?" Nika thought.
She reached the top where there was a chest identical to the one that held the key for the previous temple, "This really is too easy, it really must be a dragon." Nika smiled at the image she got in the head of her fighting a dragon, but it didn't last long as a boulder dropped behind her and started rolling down the slope, "Damnit!" Nika exclaimed as she started running down and moved out of the way, just nearly avoiding the boulder which ended up actually blocking the flow of lava from the dragon statue, freeing the way for the door.
Placing the key was simpler this time, she opened the door and saw another slope, when she started walking climbing it, she heard "Oh, it's you." she looked up and saw Ghirahim sittin on yet another dragon statue, "Oh, nice to see you again, uhh... Ghrrimma?" Nika said in a questioning tone which actually sounded like an insult, "GHRRIMMA!? OH THE NERVE!" Ghirahim exclaimed in an offended manner, "I'm Ghirahim! And I won't stay here to humor this! Instead this will!" Ghirahim said before vanishing.
"This will?" Nika thought as she looked around, "There isn't a dragon, I'm already disappointed, can I get more disappointed?" Nika said outloud, and almost as if to reply, the dragon statue Ghirahim was sittin on opened it's mouth and spat the boulder from before out, "Okay! I'm sorry!" Nika exclaimed, hoping the statue would swallow it back, of course it didn't and Nika had to dodge the boulder before it crushed her.
Thinking that was it, Nika started making her way up the slope, but stopped when a noise came from the boulder, she turned to look at it and saw it sprout fire legs, it used them to stand before opening a mouth which caused the entirety of it's structure to crack, revealing an inside of magma, along with what looked to be an eye underneath.
Pyroclastic Fiend Scaldera.
The thing started going up the slope releasing sparks all over, of course Nika didn't just stand there, she used Acceleration Engine and dashed to the top, "Now I'm really disappointed and full of panic!" Nika commented as she reached the top where a field of flower bombs was located.
Looking back down, Nika saw that the fire ball cooled down and that gave her and idea, "Taste gunpowder weird spider!" Nika exclaimed as she threw a bomb down, when it made contact, it exploded causing the creature to lose it's footing and roll a few meters down, "Now let's try this!" Nika thought as she picked up another bomb, readied her arm and exclaimed "Booming Mortar!" Before throwing the bomb at the creature, which started inhaling for some reason causing it to swallow the bomb which then exploded inside it, breaking it's stone shell.
"It's stupid, wait... Maybe I can try that..." Nika thought as she repeated this process a few times until the creature shell was completely broken off, which allowed Nika to inact her plan, she bit into her thumb and exclaimed "Pneumatic Engine!", she then blew air into her bones, inflating her fist to the size of a giant's arm, "It worked!" Nika exclaimed as she tried moving the air to her other hand, succeding in doing so.
Nika chuckled as she thought "Thanks Gaepora! Weight in my attacks is exactly what I needed!" Nika thought, remembering what Gaepora told her before she left, "This is it! Tsar Cannon!" She yelled, slamming her fist into the searing creature, and while she did burn herself, the monster took way more damage, dying in the process.
Pulling her arm back, Nika let the air she breathed out the air she blew in her bones, causing her whole body to shrink to the size of a small child, her clothes along with her, "It burns! It burns so much!", after a bit of screaming in pain, Nika turned back to her actual size and after a while longer, the pain subsided, she noticed what happened to her while in pain, "I used Pneumatic Engine for five seconds, I shrunk down for five secons, I see how this works." Nika realized before going through the last door.
Crossing the door, the first thing Nika saw was Zelda, she ran to her, but was stopped by another girl, "It took you far too long to get here. Looking at you, I fear the goddess is mistaken in her choice of agents. If this failure is any indication, you have no hope of defending Her Grace from those who seek to assail her." she said, only getting Nika to be annoyed, "Hey! If you're supposed to be guarding her, you've done a really bad job too! In the woods they said she was attacked by those red thing!" Nika retored, realizing Nika was right, the girl just looked away and opened a portal for her and Zelda to go through.
"I swear, the nerve of some people." Nika said before once again striking the crest with her sword, releasing a note which she replicated with her sword causing another opening in the clouds, this made her realize she needed to go back to the sky, but this time, she would head directly to the newly opened passage, "Too late, I'll show her too late!"