Now onto Part 2 of the Kesuta and Korume arc, it's time for the mystics to throw down the gauntlet, but who will prevail?
"We're getting pretty deep into the Temple..." Nabooru muttered, taking a moment to glance around, "It won't be long before we reach the sanctum where the twins should be..."
"Ugh, this place gives me the creeps." Aviel said, she turned to see a statue of a woman's face and screamed out, jumping into the air and into Link's arms while she hugged him tightly, "I think I'd prefer to be spooked by Kesuta and Korume's little fire and ice ghost things..."
"Yes... I can't believe I'm saying I miss their pranks." Nemisa sighed.
"Then we have to save them." Link nodded with a grin, "So they can go back to putting gravy in your shoes!"
"Don't remind me of that..." Nemisa scowled.
"Hey, I think I see it!" Nabooru said, and with that the four of them all went running into the inner sanctum, where Kesuta and Korume were standing, about ready to battle.
"Korume, Kesuta!" shouted Link, running ahead of the group, The two girls turned in reaction to hearing their' king's voice.
"Wha- you?!" becalmed Kesuta.
"It can't be..." muttered Korume.
"You guys, your mother told us what was going on, you can't do this!" Link shouted.
"Yeah, you don't need to battle! We're here to take you back home!" Aviel exclaimed.
"Stand back!" shouted Kesuta angerly, "This is something we have to do!"
"Yes, if mother did tell you, then you understand why we're doing this. Please leave, and wait for the winner to return." Korume said.
Link just ignored their words,narrowed his eyes and charged up towards the two of them.
Kesuta scowled as she clicked her fingers, causing a surge of flames to shoot up as a barrier in front of them.
"What th-" Link stopped in his tracks as the fire shot out.
"What is this?" Nemisa asked, looking at it herself
"I've seen this magic before..." Link said, "A fire barrier that can block off intruders, and reacts to motion."
"No sweat, I'll just fly over it!" Aviel said, turning her arms to wings and flying upwards to go after Kesuta and Korume. However, the fire barrier reacted to her plan by surging up just as she was about to cross, blasting Aviel with fire and sending her backwards to the ground, covered in soot.
"Never mind..." Aviel muttered with spiraling eyes.
"Now that they're blocked off, let's begin." Kesuta said.
"Y-Yes..." Korume said, taking one last sad look at Link, before turning back to her sister.
The two girls closed their eyes and concentrated. Everyone watched in curiosity as the two stood there motionless, then fire stated to form around Kesuta while ice flowed around Korume, their whole bodies soon became engulfed in their respective element, and in a large burst the two had taken on an unusual transformation.
Kesuta now stood with her mystic clothing gone, and in it's place were flames spiraling around her body, covering her chest and crotch in particular, with flames shooting out from the points where she shoulders and hips were. Her long ponytail had turned into a flame as long as her hair was, with small flames spiraled around it. Her forearms and lower legs had been covered, or maybe even turned into fire themselves, with the very ends where the feet would had been replaced with long, sharp tips of flame. She brought up her arms and swung them downwards, causing 15 foot long strings of fire to lash out, which she swung around like whips.
Korume meanwhile caused ice to start forming around her body. Her chest and crotch were both covered in pure ice, with extra spikes shooting out from the shoulders and hips. Her ponytail seemed to turn transparent for a second, before it took on the resemblance of an aurora-borealis, and beautifully swayed through the air. Her forearms started adding up ice in large amounts, soon forming into long spear-like shapes. Her lower legs were engulfed in ice as well, until they took on a pointed tip form similar to Kesuta's. She brought up her ice spear limbs and clashed them together.
"What?! How long have they been able to do that?!" Link shouted.
"I've never seen them able to use power like that before..." Nabooru observed, "Have they been practicing their elemental arts this hard over the past months...?"
"Enough gawking, we have to figure out another way past this barrier!" Nemisa said, looking around for an alternative means of getting around it.
"As far as I recall, this is the only means of getting into this sanctum. They're trapped themselves in." Nabooru narrowed her eyes.
"Girls, stop this now!" Link shouted, but it feel on deaf ears.
"Now it's time to fight, I'll burn you!" shouted Kesuta, rushing at Korume with her flame whips.
"I'll strike you down first." Korume said, rushing at Kesuta with her ice spears.
The two of them immediately went into battle, Kesuta lashed out her whips, while Korume came forward with her spears. Kesuta swung a flame whip at Korume, who leaned back just enough to avoid it before thrusting her spear at Kesuta. The fire mystic sidestepped the spear and swung her leg up, kicking Korume in the chin, sending her back. Kesuta then lunged forward and brought both her whips down, knocking Korume to the ground. Before Kesuta could get another swing of her whip in though, Korume dodge rolled and quickly slashed Kesuta across her side.
Kesuta snarled in fury, sending her whips out far to the sides and attempted to slam them together on Korume, who quickly swung up her spears to drive them upwards, then charged right in and smacked Kesuta in the chest, propelling her backwards. Kesuta grinned however, and pulled back her whips, causing them to smack into Korume from behind, allowing Kesuta to whip her continuously.
"They're not holding back..." Link said with growing concern, "We need to do something before one... or both of them..."
Nabooru tried swinging her swords at the fire barrier, but the force just repelled them, "This kind of power, they've gotten far stronger then I imagined."
"And they did all this, so they could fight to the death here... for the sake of the Gerudo people..." Nemisa muttered, her head lowered and clutching her wrist.
"We can't let this happen, we have to save them!" Link shouted, he pulled out his Longshot and aimed it at a statue near the ceiling, but was stopped by Nemisa.
"Wait you moron!" Nemisa said, gripping his arm, "You saw what the barrier did to Aviel!"
Link just looked out at the two mystics still clashing against each other. Korume managed to swipe Kesuta across the arm with her spear, but Kesuta countered by smacking Korume with her whip, causing her to yelp out in pain.
"But... what can we do...?" Link asked.
Korume meanwhile, went on the offense with a barrage of projectile ice spears, which Kesuta managed to melt away with her fire, but then one particular spear managed to impact into her, causing her to scream out.
"What?! What is thi-" Kesuta took a look down and realized the ice spear was red colored, "Wait, you can cast red ice now, like that Morpha thing?!"
"Was saving it for a surprise." said Korume, "Well, surprise." and with that she fired another barrage of red spears down at Kesuta.
Kesuta snarled and formed a ball of blue fire, which she sent back to melt away the red ice, but another spear still managed to hit her.
"Blue fire doesn't work on normal ice." Korume said, "I'll keep you guessing with what attack I use... this will be over soon, and Link shall be my husband."
Korume continued to fire down spears of normal ice and red ice down on Kesuta, who tried to fight back with regular and blue fire. Fire balls and ice shards shot out at each other, but with Korume's faster shots Kesuta's attempts were becoming more and more futile. As the spears were grazing her body, Kesuta narrowed her eyes, looking up to her sister, feeling the anger within her growing...
"That's it!" shouted Kesuta, pumping her fists, and bringing out her whips, then started spinning at a ridiculously fast pace.
"What...?" Korume asked, her eyes widening.
Kesuta spun so fast with her whips that she took on the form of a giant fiery tornado. She started spinning closely towards Korume, who tried to counter by launching her ice magic, but it was easily repealed by the motion of the tornado. Before Korume could come up with any other strategy, she was sucked into the tornado and screamed out as the fires engulfed her.
"KYYYAAA!"
"Korume!" Link shouted.
Korume screamed out as the fire burned her heavily, she couldn't do anything to escape. Soon the tornado went away, leaving Korume dazed in midair. Kesuta grinned sadistically as she gripped her flame whips at shot at her sister, lashing out with multiple whipping stings on Korume, and then dealing one more blow with a flaming kick, causing the ice mystic to fall and impact to the ground with burn marks all over, and her body changed back to her normal self.
"Looks like this is it." smirked Kesuta, slowly walking up to her sister, "This was my win after all."
"No... I... sister..." Korume muttered, forcing herself up to her knee.
"You know, I've always hated having a sister..." Korume said, conjuring a flame whip in her hand, "You were such a pain to have around... but now I can finally end this, and I shall become Link's bride!"
Korume didn't say a word, but hung her head down, as she remembered back to when they were younger.
Flashback
"Hey look, we caught a witch!" laughed a teenage Gerudo girl, holding a ten-year old Korume by her arm.
"L-Let go..." Korume muttered.
"Yeah, she's one of Twinrova's descendants huh? She'll probably end up just as scummy as those two, I bet." said the second one.
"She should be punished, maybe we should burn this witch?"snickered the third one.
"HEY! Get yer hands off of her, or I'll burn you!" shouted a ten-year old Kesuta, running at the three teens with her hands engulfed in flames.
"Woah, she's nuts! Run away!" shouted one of the bullies, dropping Korume as the three of them ran off. Korume was left on her hands and knees, sobbing.
"Jees, you alright Korume?" Kesuta asked, kneeling down to Korume's level. She took her sister's hand and helped her up.
"I-I'm sorry Kesuta..." Korume said sadly.
"Nah, don't worry about it! We're sisters, aren't we? We gotta look out for each other!" grinned Kesuta.
"O-Okay..." Korume said with a small smile, and the two shared a hug together.
Korume's eyes closed tightly, with tears running down her cheeks, 'Was everything you told me before... just a lie, sister...?' she thought to herself.
"Now, it's time to pay our debt to Aifet, with your life..." Kesuta said with a wicked smirk, raising her whip into the air.
"NO!" Link shouted. He wracked his mind, deep in thought of what to do. He looked up at Kesuta and Korume, narrowed his eyes, and nodded to himself. He grabbed his canteen of water and poured it all over his body.
"W-What's that for?!" exclaimed Nemisa.
"I'm going to save them." Link simply said.
And with that he shouted out and charged right into the fire barrier. The force of the barrier tried to drive Link back, but he held his ground, summoning all his strength to push he way through the flames.
"Link, what do you think you're doing?!" shouted Nabooru.
Before Kesuta could bring down her whip, she heard the yelling from everyone, and turned to see Link forcing himself through the fire barrier.
"What, your highness?!" she exclaimed.
"Graaaahh!" Link shouted in pain as he trudged through the force of the barrier, before finally breaking through it. He gasped out, then charged up to Korume and knelt down, wrapping his arms around her protectively.
"Link...?" Korume muttered weakly, slowly looking up at her future king.
"Korume... are you okay...?" Link asked.
"I... you... you're covered in burns..." she whispered,seeing the marks on his body.
"Don't worry about that... I'm just glad I got to you." Link grinned.
Korume blushed lightly, looking down and pressing her head against his chest.
"Y-You got through the barrier?!" exclaimed Kesuta, "My king, that was dangerous!"
"Well what did you expect me to do, you were about to kill your own sister!" Link shouted to her.
"I have to! It's the will of the Desert Goddess that one of us shall be sacrificed to her!" Kesuta yelled back.
"I don't care about what the goddess thinks, the important thing is what you think! You really want to kill her?!" Link shouted.
"Y-Yes! She's..." Kesuta gulped a bit, "She's... nothing but a pain! As far as I'm concerned this is a blessing from the goddess Aifet, and I'll be a lot happier without her around!"
"...do you really mean that?" Link asked, holding Korume close to him, "Or are you just saying this because you think you have to...?"
Kesuta's eyes widened, she stood motioned for a few seconds. She put her free hand to her heart, as she started to tremble. The fire barrier even started to die down, allowing Nabooru, Aviel and Nemisa the chance to run up to the three.
"I-I..." Kesuta muttered.
"Sister...?" Korume asked.
"To save the Gerudo from goddess Aifet's wrath..." Kesuta closed her eyes and clenched her fists, "One of us must be sacrificed..." she then brought up her flame whip again. She opened her eyes and looked up to see not just Link now, but Nabooru, Nemisa and Aviel all standing in front of Korume to protect her. To say Kesuta was shocked was an understatement.
"You'd... all protect her...?" Kesuta asked.
"Of course we would." Nabooru said, "I don't know what goddess Aifet's goal is here, but I won't allow one of our sisters to be struck down like this."
"Everyone..." Korume said, with her eyes full of tears.
"... ...very well." Kesuta muttered, "Everyone seems to care about you so much Korume... especially our beloved king..." she seemed to linger on those last words a bit, "Then if I can't take your life..."
With that, Kesuta reached down to her boot and pulled out a knife. She then brought it up into the air.
"I'll take my own."
"H-hey, what do you think you're doing?!" shouted Nemisa.
"To save our people... I'll sacrifice my own life, it's my purpose..." Kesuta said, as tears fell down her face. And with that, she swung the knife towards her chest...
...only for Link to catch her arm with his hand.
"Huh...?" Kesuta asked, looking up at Link, who squeezed her arm to force her to let go the knife, which fell to the ground with a clang. He then gave the fire mystic a tight hug, causing her to gasp out.
"Don't ever think like that again, Kesuta." Link muttered, holding her close to him.
"Y-Your highness?!" Kesuta exclaimed, blushing heavily.
"Your life is just as precious as Korume's, or anyone else's..." Link whispered, "And no one's is worth sacrificing."
Kesuta lingered on those words, as tears were running down her face. She looked to see Aviel smiling brightly, Nemisa folding her arms and nodded, and Nabooru giving a knowing smirk. She then saw Korume looked up at her with tears of her own going down her cheeks.
"Your highness... I..."
"WHAT IS THE MEANING OF THIS?!" boomed a loud voice, startling everyone from the moment, "How dare you mortals interfere with this sacred ritual!"
"Is... is that the desert goddess Aifet?!" exclaimed Aviel, who quickly bowed to the ground, along with Nemisa, Kesuta broke from Link's grasp and bowed as well. Nabooru meanwhile, stood tall and narrowed her eyes.
Link himself just stood and walked up a bit to the giant statue where the voice was booming from, "So I take it you're the Desert Goddess?"
"You dare speak to me in such a manner?" boomed Aifet's voice, "Yes, I am the great Aifet, divine goddess of the thousand sands!"
As Link and Aifet spoke, Nabooru just stood and watched carefully.
"Why would you interfere with this ritual? Are you not aware of what shall happen if neither of these two die tonight?!" shouted Aifet.
"Yeah, but I don't care. I just want to know is why the hell you would subject this on them?!" Link shouted, "Kesuta and Korume did nothing to you!"
"Their ancestors, the dark witches Koume and Kotake committed an unforgivable crime, and stole the sacred jewel on my statue's forehead!"
Link looked up and sure enough, saw the forehead of the statue had a large indent in it, like there was supposed to be some object in it.
"I see..." Link said, contemplating on that, "What if I were to track down and find this jewel for you? Would that satisfy you?"
The statue seemed to pause for a few seconds.
"... ...impossible." Aifet said, "The sacred jewel has been lost forever to those two witches, and since they have no regard for the safety of their people, I've been kind enough to allow their descendants to fight each other for my satisfaction! Only when the blood of one of them is shed may I spare the Gerudo from death!"
"Well in that case... why don't take your satisfaction..." Link muttered in a soft voice, "And shove it into your empty forehead?!" he then shouted.
Aviel, Nemisa, Kesuta, Korume and even Nabooru all gasped out loud at Link's words.
"What... did you just say... MORTAL?" boomed Aifet, as strange power started to surge out from the statue.
"H-Hey," exclaimed Nemisa, "Watch what you say, you moron!"
"These two are precious to me and Gerudo Town!" Link shouted to Aifet, "They've worked hard for the future of the people, after the Gerudo almost fell into extinction, and I won't allow any of them to die by your hands, especially because of this petty grudge against their ancestors! If you want their blood so badly, you'll have to get through me first!" With that, he unsheathed his sword and pointed it at the statue's face.
"H-he would even defy the goddess herself...?" Korume asked.
"You challenge me... the great desert goddess?" Aifet asked, "Just who are you to make such a demand?!"
"I am Link... the future king of the Gerudo, and I'll say as their king that ALL their lives are worth keeping. And because of that, I'll defend them all from anyone, including the goddess of the desert herself!" he said.
There was a momentary pause, the girls all stood in shock and awe of Link's brazen and courageous attitude, and perhaps for a few of them a little turned on by his assertiveness as well...
The statue meanwhile, stood there are statues usually do, until they heard Aifet speak up.
"...future king...?" Aifet asked, "You... DARE call yourself the king of the Gerudo? I would never allow you to do so! For this act alone, you must die for my satisfaction!"
"Heh, I would never do that." Link grinned without even a moment of hesitation, "I'd just make myself look like a hypocrite in front of everyone. I have too much to live for now, and I'm not giving it up for you or anyone!"
"Oh my..." Korume said, putting her hands to her cheeks.
Nabooru chuckled to herself, "Well put."
"You fool. If you do not appease me, then I shall reign death upon the Gerudo for this act alone!" boomed Aifet, "I shall call upon the insect goddess Ikulia to bring down a swarm of locust to devour their crops, then from the sand goddess Sofuira who shall call forth sandstorms to tear apart your town and destroy your homes! And for those who still survive, the death goddess Hotaig will bring down an incurable disease that will finish them all off! You'll all suffer by our great power!"
There was a moment of pause in the sanctum, Link himself just stared up at the statue, contemplating his next action...
It was then that he realized something he was told some time ago and his eyes widened.
"Wait... what did you just say just now...?" Link asked.
"What ?!" shouted Aifet.
"You just said the death goddess Hotaig will bring down an incurable disease that would finish the Gerudo all off..." he said.
"Of course, it is within her divine power as the goddess of death!" Aifet stated.
It was at that moment Nabooru's eyes also widened and she gave the smallest of grins.
"But... isn't Hotaig the Gerudo goddess of war, not death?" Link pointed out.
"Oh that's right!" Aviel realized, "We even visited her coliseum and mausoleum some months back!"
"...w-what...?" Aifet muttered.
"That's... a bit strange..." Nemisa said, narrowing her eyes and stepping up to Link's side, "...that the divine goddess of the desert would make such a glaring mistake."
"That's... I..." the goddess sounded unusually nervous in that moment.
"While we're on the subject, I also find it odd that the divine desert goddess wouldn't be aware that Link was chosen as our king until this very moment, especially after the festival meant to honor her." Nabooru said crossing her arms.
"Um..." they could swear in that moment they saw a drop of sweat going down the statue's head, then they heard the slightest of mumbling coming from it.
"Wait, was it Hotaig or Ositir who was the goddess of death?"
"I don't know! I thought you knew, that's why we decided you should do this!"
"Do I look like a living encyclopedia you, ya old coot?!"
"I wouldn't expect you know what two plus two equals, but if you're going to do this, I would except you to at least know the goddess of beasts!"
"We were talking about the goddess of death, you senile hag!"
"Hey Nabooru..." Link said, narrowing his eyes, "Does that bantering sound familiar to you at all?"
"Too familiar." Nabooru said, glaring at the statue.
"You idiot!" they heard a shout from the goddess statue, "You were speaking too loudly!"
"What?! D-Do you think they heard anything...?"
"I don't know, let's keep quiet."
"We heard everything dammit!" Link and the five Gerudo all shouted in annoyance.
"Uh oh... I think our cover has been blown..."
"Alright the two of you, show yourselves!" Link shouted, holding out his sword.
"Ah-heheheh! Time to make our appearance then!" cackled a familiar voice, as appeared before Link and the group was the fire witch Koume.
"Eehehehehe! We're going to make the lot of you pay for your disobedience!" laughed the other voice, appearing as the ice witch Kotake.
"W-What...?" Korume stammered, staring up at the witches.
"It can't be..." Kesuta said in shock, "Does this mean...?"
"Twinrova." Nabooru said coldly, "It's been quite a long time."
So that ends this chapter, now the true confrontation between our heroes and the twin witches Koume and Kotake awaits...
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