DISCLAIMER: I do not own the Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild or any of these characters. They belong to the wonderful people of Nintendo.
Chapter 1: Link's Awakening
Everything was still and silent for a brief moment. Something had changed. He started to feel the warmth seceding from his skin.
"O...er...ys". The boy thought he heard something.
" Open your eyes".
He tried to do as the strange voice said, but his head felt groggy and he was oh so tired. He soon realized he was submerged in some sort of liquid, and started to feel said liquid reside. As the liquid disappeared, so did the warmth that went along with it, leaving him feeling the cold hard surface beneath him. No, don't go he pleaded, but it didn't matter anymore.
"Wake up Link" said the voice again.
That name, Link, the sound echoed in his mind, down to his very being. He knew that was his name, although he didn't know why he was so certain that it was. Link replayed the voice's words in his mind, and could identify the voice more clearly this time. It sounded feminine, and oddly familiar. He slowly opened his heavy eyes and was enveloped in a blue light. Link started to look around. He had been lying in a circular tub in the ground, just above it a peculiar apparatus with swirling designs jutted out from the ceiling, and glowed a dim blue; how strange.
Link took a grasp of his surroundings. He was in some sort of cavern, with nothing but stale air, the basin he came from, and a strange pedestal in the corner. He also realized he was only wearing a pair of dark blue shorts, no wonder why he felt kind of chilly. As Link walked closer to pedestal, he noticed a rectangular shaped tablet lying on top.
"That is a Sheikah Slate. Take it. It will help guide you after your long slumber" said the voice.
"A long slumber? Is that why I'm here? That doesn't make any sense" Link thought to himself.
Link picked up the so called Sheikah Slate and examined it. It had an eye with one lonely tear cascading down the center. As he pocketed his Sheikah Slate, the door in front of him started to open up, revealing another room.
Link stepped inside and noticed two chests lying by his feet. He opened one of the chests to find a pair of well worn trousers and an old shirt in the other. The sleeves on the shirt were fraying at the end and it came up to his elbow. It also was to short at the waist, and it revealed a bit of midriff. The pants came way up over the ankles and they were a little tight, but they were clothes nontheless.
Link noticed another pedestal in the corner, similar to the one in the previous room.
"Hold your Sheikah Slate up to the pedestal, it will show you the way" said the voice.
Link took his Sheikah Slate and placed it on the pedestal.
"Authenticating... Sheikah Slate confirmed"
The door next to the pedestal started to open up like the previous one before. As he stepped through the new opening and climbed up a ledge right before the exit, the voice spoke once more
"Link, you are the light - our light - that must shine upon Hyrule once again!"
Link felt his breathe catch in his throat. Whoever was speaking to him sounded so sure of their words. so sure of him. "The light? What does that mean? And is that what this place is called? Hyrule?" Link pondered. His mind was a frenzy of questions and uncertainty's, and felt knots forming in his stomach as he contemplated his role foretold by the voice. He had no recollection of who or what he was supposed be doing, and the words spoken by the strange voice felt unbearably daunting.
Link took one last look at the cavern he awoken from, and decided he couldn't figure out his fate standing alone in here. He needed answers, and he was going to do his best to find them. Hopefully.
Link mustered up some courage and finally stepped out of the dark cavern into the sunlight. It felt like it had been forever since he had the warm sun gaze upon him and the cool breeze blow across his skin. He ran up to a ledge overlooking the land around him, and took a deep breath. The world around him was indeed beautiful and exceedingly vast. He could look on forever without knowing if its beauty ever truly ended, with its lush green fields dotted with trees, winding blue rivers, and towering mountains. But as he stared more intently, Link noticed it held some sort of sadness. Among its landscape was crumbling ruins, uninhabited; echoing the cries of a forgotten past.
"This is Hyrule, then" Link thought with reverence.
Link's fixation on his newly discovered world of Hyrule was broken, as he noticed something out of the corner of his eye and turned around to see. It was a cloaked figure, peeking at him from a distance.
Link's previous thoughts of this land being barren were quickly diminished. The sight of another living, breathing individual stirred something within him.
"That person might know a few things about this place and why I was in that cavern" Link thought to himself.
He decided he would go talk to the strange person. After all, what did he have to lose?
I LIIIIIVEEEE! Hi there. It has been QUITE a long time, A little over 5 years actually, as of 8/22/22. But alas I, Iris have returned. If you happen to stumble upon this story, Hello there! welcome! This is the (re)start of my BOTW story To Remember When! if there are ANY of you who happen to have read this chapter when I first published this way back when I was in eighth grade, APPLAUSE for you people for sticking with me. I highly doubt there will be, but for the sake of just one person, lemme explain. BOTW came out in March of 2017 and I fell absolutely in LOVE with it. So much so I had this idea for a story for my all time favorite LoZ game, with numerous head cannons and what not, that would be a shame to remain just thoughts floating around in my head. I believe you only live once, and it would be a shame to let this story die with me. So here I am! now a softmore in college finally giving this story the justice I believe it deserves. I know we really don't need another retelling of BOTW pre and during game fanfic, but this is my story so I say there can never be to many. When I first started this I was so sure I would stick with it and write it, but as I entered high school and the world of honors classes and AP's, This story remained unfinished. But I WILL try my darndest to really create this masterpiece, with the SEQUEL to BOTW coming out (hopefully) within a year, I figured now is a better time than any to write this story before the game comes out. Updates will most likely be sporadic but I PROMISE I wont leave y'all in the dark again, so I WILL promise Chapter 2, but I don't know how soon. Cheers babes! ^-^. (P.S since i did write this first chapter when i was like 14, i revised it a bit. hopefully its a little better to read)
