Hey, guys! Sorry I'm late with this chapter, I had a lot of things going on at work, and it's really hard to play the game and write the story at the same time. That, and I've been addicted to a new anime: Fullmetal Alchemist. That series is pretty interesting, and I cannot get over how Winry Rockbell looks like Samus Aran from Metroid.

I won't be offended at all if you don't like this chapter as much as the previous ones. There's only so much I can do to make dungeon crawling be interesting.

I don't own Legend of Zelda, or Minish Cap. Enjoy!

Deepwood Shrine

"You know, for an abandoned shrine, this is surprisingly well-lit," observed Link as he stepped into the entry room of the Deepwood Shrine. The stone that made it up was a dark green, and there some plants from outside broke through. Almost immediately, he noticed two sets of stairs leading upwards. Unfortunately, they were both blocked by large webs. "Forward it is, then," he said as he pushed a totem aside, revealing a door, which he entered.

"I think you'd better take that back, lad," said Ezlo. "It's pretty dark in here!"

Link squinted into the darkness and was able to see a pressure plate next to an unlit torch. "Hey Ezlo, do Minish dungeons have traps?"

"Of course they do, my boy!" responded Ezlo. "However, they're more obvious than that pressure plate. More likely, it'll just light up that torch."

Link tested that theory, and sure enough, a small flame sprung up, lighting up the room a bit more and revealing three more unlit torches. It also revealed five very large slugs. Fortunately, the Sluggulas, as Ezlo called them, were easily dispatched, and the boy stepped on all the pressure plates. The room lit up, and a small treasure chest appeared, which contained a Small Key.

"Hm… I'm guessing that key is supposed to be used on that locked door," said Ezlo, using his beak to point it out. The door opened, allowing Link to continue into a room that had water surrounding an island with a mushroom growing on it. He went to the right and was about to continue, when Ezlo cried out, "Link! Above us!"

The boy instinctively rolled to the side, and saw what caused Ezlo to briefly panic. "Falling slugs. What will they think of next?" he said wryly as the monsters fell to his sword. Further along, he found a lever of unknown purpose. Link shrugged and pulled it, causing a bridge to the small island to appear. "What kind of mushrooms are these?" the boy asked.

"Ah, those mushrooms are of a special variety," said Ezlo. "You can pull on them, and when you stop, they can launch you in the direction you're facing."

"Really?" asked Link. He pulled it experimentally, and when he stopped, he ended up being launched… straight into the water.

Ezlo laughed as a soaking Link dragged himself out. "I don't see why you're laughing. You're just as wet as I am," the boy grumbled.

"Come on, you've got to pull it harder than that!" said Ezlo, still laughing at the boy's misery. Link suddenly took him off and dunked him into the pool for a few seconds. When he pulled the hat out, he was wetter than Link. "On the other hand, accidents do happen," he mumbled under Link's glare.

Link went to the mushroom again. This time, he pulled back even more, marveling at the elasticity of the mushroom stem. When he stopped pulling, the mushroom launched him again, this time to the other side of the room, faceplanting on the wall.

"Ow…" Link grunted, peeling himself off. He couldn't help but laugh at Ezlo: his beak was embedded in the wall. "How about this, Ezlo: you keep quiet about the water, and I'll keep quiet about the wall. Deal?"

The hat tried to say something, but his voice was muffled. Link sweatdropped. "Okay, just wave your body to the left if you agree." Ezlo complied, and Link carefully took him out of the wall. "Now that that's sorted, let's move on."

The next room was larger than the previous ones, and the main feature seemed to be a large barrel held in place by some vines. Link walked up a small ledge to the right, where vines were connected to the barrel from an unlit torch. "Something tells me that barrel might be important," said Ezlo as Link stepped on a pressure plate, lighting the torch and burning the vines. After standing by the flames for a few minutes to dry his clothes, Link walked through a hole in the barrel to the other side and saw a similar ledge with vines. This one had two pressure plates, so Link pushed a conveniently placed totem on one of them and stepped on the other, igniting the vines and causing the barrel to be untethered.

"Now, let's see if all that work was worth it," said Link as he climbed into the barrel again. Released from the vines that held it, the barrel easily moved. The boy experimented a bit and saw that there were three holes in the barrel, one of which was blocked by a spider web. He adjusted the barrel so that the top-left hole was pointed down, and he went through the hole quickly. Outside the barrel, he saw another room to go through.

"Wow. That was a happy accident."

Link ignored Ezlo's comment and entered the next room. There was a single enemy there- what Ezlo called a Chaser- but he defeated the cat-faced monster quickly. Link spotted another mushroom, and even though there was a door in front of him, he saw a large chest on the other side of the room, so he pulled the mushroom back all the way, launching him. He went up the stairs to where the chest was, and relieved its' contents: a Dungeon Map. He jumped down back at the mushroom and pulled it back again, this time landing in front of the door.

He went through, and almost immediately had to dodge a falling slug, as well as a large bug called a Pesto. After dispatching those enemies, Ezlo pointed out another pressure switch. Link stepped on it, causing a bridge to appear, but when he got off, the bridge disappeared. "Hm… It seems that switch is the kind that needs something on it to stay activated. We need something heavy to put on it."

Link gestured with his thumb at a pot on the other side. "Will that work?"

"Let's find out!"

He pushed the onto the switch, and the bridge activated, allowing Link to cross into the next room. There were two totems in this room, both in front of pressure plates. Link pulled one totem out, them pulled it and the other one onto the pressure plates. This allowed a chest to appear, and inside was another Small Key.

"Well, there's nothing left in this route, my boy. Let's go back to the barrel room. I think there might be a way forward there," advised Ezlo.

Link backtracked to the room with the barrel, this time moving it so a way to the top-right part of the room was accessible. He used the key on the locked door and continued to the next room. This one had two ways to move forward- up a ledge, or down, using mushrooms to jump across deep pools of water. Link instinctively chose the water route, and they moved on.

The next room was shaped like a big square, and was filled with Sluggulas, both on the ground and falling from the ceiling. Link easily dispatched them, and saw that there were two totems blocking the way to a pressure plate that would open a door. He pulled one totem off to the right, then he pushed the other onto the switch, allowing him to continue through the dungeon.

As he entered, the door behind him suddenly shut. "Link, watch out!" cried Ezlo as three Chasers appeared. The boy quickly slayed one of them, but the other two were about to slam into him. Unable to swing his sword fast enough, he did the next best thing: he used his shield. The monsters bounced off the sturdy metal, becoming slightly dazed by the impact. Link stabbed one through the face, and as it dissipated in a puff of smoke, he reversed the grip on his sword and sliced behind him, killing the other.

To say that Ezlo was impressed was an understatement. "Well done, my boy!" he praised as the way out opened. Another Small Key appeared, which Link collected. "Very nice improvisation with that last monster!"

Link, failing to hide his blush, said, "Thanks, though I really wasn't expecting that maneuver to work."

"Just remember to not make a habit of it. You've got a lot of potential, and it'd be a shame for you to die before it's fulfilled."

With that cheery thought, Link entered the room with multiple mushrooms again, this time going up the ledge, jumping down at a spot Ezlo pointed out. He spotted some stair leading to basement area, so he went down, slaying a Pesto that flew towards him. Seeing a large chest to the left of him, he pushed a couple of blocks out of the way and opened it, gaining a Dungeon Compass, which allowed all treasure chests in the Deepwood Shrine to appear on his map. He also saw a pressure plate surrounded with pots, so pushed one onto the plate, making another chest appear. However, the appearance of the chest blocked the only way to get it.

"Now there's a puzzler…" remarked Ezlo. "I suspect there's not much else we can do here right now. Let's press on."

As much as Link hated to let treasure slip away, he knew Ezlo was right. "Yeah, hopefully we can work this from another angle later on."

Link went back up the stairs and into the next room, where a new enemy sprung up from the ground. "Puffstools!" exclaimed Ezlo. "Your sword alone won't penetrate those caps." Despite this excellent advice, Link swiped at the mushroom creatures anyway, so he could move to the locked door and open it. He entered, and the door slammed shut behind him.

"Uh-oh. That's not good," said Link.

"To the right!"

Ezlo's warning gave Link enough time to move out of the way of a large blue caterpillar-like monster, imaginatively named the Madderpillar.

"Ezlo, how can I get this thing?!" shouted Link as the monster barreled past.

"Hit the nose with your sword, then slash at the heart!"

As the Madderpillar crawled towards him, Link swiped at the monster's nose, causing its' blue color to become grayed-out and freezing it in place. "Ezlo, I don't see a heart anywhere! I don't think my sword can cut through this thing's armor!"

The monster, recovering from the initial attack, saw Link. It became red with fury, and crawled at a faster pace. It knocked Link over, and the boy was barely able to get out of the way of its' feet.

"Listen, boy! Hit it again, and look for the heart!" said Ezlo, seeing the Madderpillar turning blue again. Link stood back up, very annoyed with with both the monster and the creature on his head. He ran towards the monster and whacked it on the nose, this time looking for any weaknesses he could exploit. When he looked along its' body, he saw a heart-shaped bladder on the tail of the monster. Unfortunately, he was too late, and the Madderpillar recovered before he could take advatage of its' moment of paralysis.

Link dodged out of the way of its' enraged state, coming up with a plan to take it down for good. He positioned himself at a corner and waited for the Madderpillars' "Tantrum state" to play out. The monster saw him again and rushed forward. When it was close enough, Link rolled out of the way, causing the monster to crash into the wall. This inadvertently triggered the pressure-sensitive nose, turning it gray and causing the "heart" to inflate. Link quickly ran along the monster, racing to get to the tail before it turned red with fury.

"HYAAAHHH!" he shouted, stabbing his sword into the tail. Apparently this was a fatal blow, because the segments of the monster started exploding, ending with the head blowing up in a plume of black smoke. As if sensing that the intruder of this dungeon had passed a test of some kind, the doors opened up, and a large treasure chest appeared.

Link, gasping from effort, rested a bit by the chest. "Y'know, I don't believe anyone would take me seriously if I told them I was just in a life or death battle with a deranged caterpillar," he chuckled.

"Remember lad, everything has a weakness," lectured Ezlo. "The trick is finding it. You would do well to be more observant- not every weakness will be as obvious as a heart on a tail."

Link nodded, then stood up, finally opening the chest. "What the heck is this thing?" he asked, pulling out the reward. It was a large white jar with a blue stripe level with the handles. It also had two protrusions on the lip of the jar, slanted outward. A piece of paper was sitting next to the jar in the chest, so Link carefully pulled it out.

"Hm… This is in ancient Minish, but I can read it," said Ezlo, looking at the paper. "According to these notes, this is called the Gust Jar. To use it, hold both triggers on the handles to draw things in, then release to fire them out. Try it out on the webs in this room!"

Link positions the Gust Jar so the opening faced a large web on the wall. He pulled on the triggers as instructed, and the two protrusions started to rotate on the rim, but more importantly, the web was sucked into the jar. He released the triggers, and a large ball of dust and web was spat out.

"This thing may be important, but how am I supposed to carry this thing around? It isn't exactly as light as a feather," said Link.

"And with the Picori Blade still needing to be reforged, your bag will get pretty cramped real fast…" mused Ezlo. The top of his head quivered. "Link, my boy, put me down a second."

Link complied with his request. "Alright, now place your item bag in front of me."

"Why do you want me to do that?" asked Link.

Ezlo looked at him, a triumphant gleam in his eye. "I just remembered a little spell we can use to solve this dilemma. Just trust me, this is one of my better ideas."

Link thought about it for a second, then nodded. "Okay, but you'd better not break it," he said, placing his bag in front of the funny hat.

Ezlo raised his head in the air and chanted a few lines of an unknown language. Link's bag flashed a few times, then faded. "There, that should work nicely. Try putting the jar into the bag."

Link did so, and was amazed to see that not only did the Gust Jar not stretch it out, it didn't seem to have any effect on the size of the bag. "What did you do?" he asked in wonder.

"I placed a 'Bottomless Storage' charm on it. No matter how many items you have in it, or how big they are, the size will still be the same. If you need a certain item, just shout the name, and it shall launch into your hand."

Link tested that theory by placing his sword into it, marveling at the fact that the blade wasn't poking through the side. He shouted, "Sword!", and the blade launched out of the bag, the handle slapping into his palm. "Nifty."

"Your welcome, m'boy," said Ezlo as Link picked him back up. "Since we've gotten that unpleasant business out of the way, shall we continue?"

I'll try to write more sooner, but work is really picking up, and I end up being tired in the evenings.

Thanks for reading, and keep those reviews coming!