Chapter 54 time, Link and the team are about to confront the dragon who captured Link-Goron, but what truly awaits them there...?
Link, Nabooru, Aviel, Nemisa, Darunia and Impa all charged after the mysterious dragon that had captured and taken Darunia's kid Link-Goron into a large room of the mines. There wasn't a whole lot of mining work that had been done here, but it was even more spacious then the previous area. There was a large pool of magma in the center of the room, and in the middle of the pool was a large set up of rocks with dry straw laid out in it.
When the arrived, the dragon itself had just descended down onto the straw and set Link-Goron down onto it. The child Goron shivered at the sight of the dragon, worried of what it was going to do, but the dragon just stared down at Link-Goron with a somewhat uneasy expression. It didn't seem to be completely sure of what it wanted to do with the Goron in that moment.
"SON!" shouted Darunia to his kid.
"Dad! Help me!" pleaded Link-Goron, rushing past the dragon and to the side of the small island. He looked out at the magma pool and saw how long it stretched out, way too far for him to get over.
"It's no good." Darunia grumbled, "That magma looks too wide to jump over, and too deep for me or Link-Goron to walk through."
"Yeah, not even a heat-resistant Goron's Tunic could help us with something like this." Link said looking out at the magma lake.
"Hm... that's odd..." Impa muttered, kneeling down and seeing a few purple objects on the ground, she picked one up and looked it over, "These are the air sacs of Octoroks that give them their suction abilities, what's this doing here?"
"I don't know but there's a lot of them around the place." Aviel said looking around, "Somebody's a sloppy cave-keeper."
"We can figure that out later, right now we have a dragon to strike down, and a Goron to save!" Nabooru said, with her scimitars out.
The dragon, seeing the warriors from before that gave it such a hard time, growled out and spread it's wings, taking to the air and roaring. This frightened Aviel so much she went back to cowering like before.
"It's... so scary..." sobbed Aviel.
"Please Aviel, I know it's bothering you but get it together!" Nemisa said, admittingly feeling bad for snapping at her earlier, "We need to help Darunia's child!"
"I... o-okay..." Aviel gulped.
"Aviel, is there any way you can fly out to that island and save him?" Impa asked.
"I'm... not really strong enough," Aviel said, "I can barely carry a human if they grip my legs, let alone a big Goron like him."
"We'll figure out a way to save him, but for now we have to deal with this thing." Link nodded.
The battle began as the dragon flew upwards and breathed down fire onto the group, who quickly scattered to avoid the attack.
Link, Aviel and Impa stayed on the offense by shooting arrows and kunai at their opponent. The dragon shot a fireball down at the three to retaliate, but Darunia jumped into his ball form and bashed through the fire to protect the others from it. Nabooru and Nemisa meanwhile, being close range fighters, stayed on guard for any opportunity to attack.
The dragon growled at the barrage of arrows and kunai, realizing it's fire attacks weren't working, it decided to go back to a close range fight and swooped down at the group with it's wings spread out, as Link and Impa stepped to the side to avoid the attack. The dragon let out a steady close range stream of fire across the ground, forcing Link to run from it. Nemisa reacted by jumping off a wall and kicking the dragon across the face in midair. The dragon swatted Nemisa away with it's wing, before rushing at Impa.
"Impa, look out!" Nemisa shouted out.
The Shiekah ninja simply held her hands together with her index fingers pointing up, and just as the dragon bit at her, her body seemed to vanish, confusing the dragon. It looked down to see a short wooden log where Impa once was, with a poorly drawn picture of her face drawn on it. The dragon looked blankly at the log before Impa came down out of nowhere and slashed the dragon with a kunai.
"Impressive." grinned Nabooru, "She even knows the temporary decoy Shiekah technique I've heard of."
The dragon fell downwards from Impa's attack and it impacted across the ground. It staggered up to it's feet and growled, letting out a roar at everyone, who stood ready for whatever it tried next...
But it was then the ground started to rumble a bit, as the rocks all around them started to shift.
"Now what?" Nemisa asked, looking around.
It was then the rocks started to emerge out from the ground, with limbs growing out from them. They were more Stone Pebblits like what they fought earlier, and they all started to surround Link, his team and the dragon.
"More of these stupid things..." Nabooru said, spinning her scimitars in her hands.
It was then the ground rumbled more, and the much larger Stone Talus creatures started to rise up from the ground, letting out loud grunts, and pulling powerful stone limbs out from the ground to fight with.
"Okay, this just went from bad to worse..." Nemisa muttered.
The dragon growled and roared out at the stone creatures, lashing it's tail left and right.
"Looks like the dragon considers them a threat too." Link observed, "How about we ignore it for now and focus on these guys?"
"Good plan." grinned Darunia, "Now let's rock em and sock em!"
The Pebblits and Talus then all lunged at the group and they all went into battle. The Pebblits were easy enough for the group to battle, but the bigger and tougher Talus ones put up more of a fight. One brought it's fist down at Aviel, who leaped out of the way in time. She tired firing her arrows at the creature, but they had no effect.
"You wouldn't possibly be able to eat these things like the one earlier, could you Chief Darmani?" Aviel
asked the Goron chief Darunia.
"No way, these things taste way too bitter for us Gorons!" Darunia clarified, smacking away a Pebblit with his hammer, confused about where she got a name like that for him.
Link meanwhile blocked a punch from a Talus with his Hylian Shield, before smacking it with his sword. He backflipped to avoid a Pebblit's attack and punched it away with his shield. He then heard a roar and looked in the direction of the dragon.
The fire dragon they were fighting before was smacking away the Pebblits swarming it with it's wings. It bit down on one and threw it into the air and into the magma. It then swung out it's tail and smacked away more of the creatures, only for a Talus to come up and punch the dragon, giving the Pebblits and another Talus an opportunity to gang up on it.
"The dragon's really taking a beating." Link said.
"That might be the best for us." Impa said, standing by Link's side in a fighting stance, as she threw a bombling kunai at a Talus, blowing off it's arm, "If they weaken that thing then we can finish it off afterwards."
Link thought on that note and looked back at the dragon. He wasn't sure why, but as he saw a Talus get a punch in on the dragon and it screeched out weakly, he found himself taking pity on it...
The fighting continued, and Aviel eventually realized she was out of arrows, and unable to do anything against the rock creatures. She found herself staying back to avoid combat, fending off any Pebblits that came at her with her crossbow. She gulped a bit as she looked out at the magma island where Link-Goron was standing there helplessly...
As Link continued to fight, he then heard a loud screech, as he turned back to the dragon who was getting beaten by the two Talus. It was knocked down to the ground and was groaning out in pain, and Link could see a sad look in it's eyes. He took a deep breath, before kicking away a Pebblit he was fighting and charged at the dragon and the Talus.
"Link, what are you doing?!" Nemisa shouted.
"Get away from that thing!" Link shouted out, running at the Talus and smacking one with his sword. The other tried to punch Link, but he puled out his Longshot and fired it at the creature's shoulder rock, attaching to it and allowing Link to yank the arm off the creature, then swinging it right into the other Talus, knocking it over.
The Talus with it's arm ripped off grunted angerly, but Link stepped out in front of the dragon, holding his sword and shield out. The dragon weakly looked up at Link in confusion.
"Why is Link protecting that thing...?" Impa pondered to herself.
The Talus was about to attack Link with it's other fist, but Nemisa flipped through the air and jump kicked the monster in the side, knocking it over to the ground as well.
"And stay away from my husband!" Nemisa shouted to the Talus, she turned to Link with a cross look on her face.
"Um, Nemisa, I'm sorry, but I couldn't just let it-" Link started, but was cut off by her.
"...it's okay Link I understand." Nemisa nodded with a light smile.
Link grinned lightly at his fiance before the two charged off to fight more of the rock monsters, leaving the dragon itself to gaze over at the two of them...
"He saved the dragon...?" Impa muttered. She was surprised to see what Link did for the dragon just then, as well as the understanding between him and Nemisa. It seemed as though Gerudo could understand him so well without much words...
"That's our king for you, he's just full of surprises." chuckled Nabooru standing alongside her. She impaled a Pebblit with her sword and swung it at a Talus to knock it down.
"I see..." Impa whispered, before going back into battle herself.
The battle soon came to end after that, with all the rock monsters having been destroyed by the group. But before they could even begin to plan what to do about the dragon and Link-Goron, the ground started to rumble again.
"Not this again!" Darunia shouted in annoyance "Whoever you are, come out already and we'll crush you!"
This time the earth shook more violently, with small rocks breaking off from the ceiling, before emerging out of it was a giant Stone Talus, far bigger then the others. It had four long legs made from smaller rocks and giant rocks at the ends to act as feet, and it had six arm limbs around it's body from all sides. It looked down at the group, letting out a loud moaning grunt.
"W-What the heck is that now?!" exclaimed Nemisa.
"That's a Igneo Talus Behemoth!" Darunia exclaimed, "One of the most powerful of it's kind!"
"Can we ever get a break?" sighed Link.
The Igneo Talus Behemoth then flexed it's six arms and jumped into into the magma. Everyone watched with curiosity as it started to draw in heat from the lava, causing itself to heat up, until it's entire body was overheated, and was now practically made of magma rock. The magma itself it had been in was now little more then melted, but hard rock.
"It... absorbed the heat from the lava...?" Impa muttered.
"Could it be that the reason why the hot springs were losing their heat was because of this thing?" Link asked.
"I assumed it was the dragon here doing it." Darunia said, looking to the fire dragon who was gasping out from the beating it had taken from the group and the stone monsters.
"Well regardless, we're stopping it!" Nabooru said, wielding her scimitars.
The Igneo Talus Behemoth grunted out loudly and the group went into battle once again. It brought up it's fists and punched down at the ground around it as the group ran around it, taking opportunities to smack at it's legs with their weapons, though not too close to avoid being burned by it's body. Nemisa couldn't do much to hit it herself due to her hand-to-hand battle style, so she instead oped to kick rocks at the Talus to distract it, allowing the others to get in extra attacks.
The Talus then bashed it's arm into the ground, pulled out another rock that it ignited with heat, then tossed it at the heroes, but Darunia stepped out in front of it, brought up his hands and blocked the fiery rock, before spinning around in circles and tossing the rock right back into the Talus. The rock monster staggered back, before slamming all six of it's limbs down at once, causing a fiery wave out at everyone, blasting them backwards.
The Talus then looked behind it to see Link-Goron attempting to climb out of the dragon's island now that the magma was solid enough to stand on safely. It brought up one of it's fists from behind with the intention of smashing the child Goron.
"Son!" shouted Darunia.
Link-Goron gulped and cowered at the giant's attack, but then out of nowhere, someone flew downwards and crashed headfirst into the Goron, knocking him to the side and barely avoiding the impact of the punch. Link-Goron regained his senses and looked to see who had impacted into him.
"Hey, you okay there, Lonk?" Aviel asked with a large bump on her head.
"Ms. Aviel, you saved me!" Link-Goron said with wide eyes.
"Course I did! I'm a bodyguard after all!" Aviel grinned.
"Thanks..." sobbed Link-Goron, hugging the bird girl tightly.
The Igneo Talus Behemoth then tried to bring back it's fist for another attack, but Darunia curled into a ball and spun forward, bashing into the leg of the Talus and throwing it off, while Impa chucked some explosive kunai into the monster's arm joint, stunning it and allowing Aviel and Link-Goron to escape.
Getting far enough away, Link-Goron ran right into his father's arms in comfort. Seeing he was okay now, Aviel let out a gasp of relief, rubbing her head. She then looked to see Nemisa looking down to her. The martial artist just smirked lightly and gave her a thumbs up.
"Nice work there, partner." Nemisa said.
"Yes, thanks so much for saving my boy Ms. Aviel!" Darunia sobbed out loudly to her.
Aviel just smiled with a bit of pride at the sight of Darunia and Link-Goron untied..
"This thing is still pretty tough though, we need another plan of attack." Nabooru said.
"Stand back, I'll handle this now that the magma is gone!" Darunia shouted with his Megaton Hammer, he curled into a ball and rolled right at the monster, bashing into one of it's legs.
The Behemoth stomped around trying to hit Darunia, but he was too fast. He bashed into another leg as the Behemoth tried to punch the Goron with it's fist. Darunia however, curled out from his ball form and smashed into the fist with his hammer, breaking it off, causing the monster to groan out loudly in pain.
"Ha-ha! Take tha-!"
Before Darunia could finish though, the monster stomped on the Goron with it's foot, leaving him embedded into the ground, before swatting him away, causing him to roll backwards and crash into a wall.
"Dad, are you okay?" Link-Goron exclaimed, running up to him.
"Grooouuhoo.." Darunia muttered with his eyes spiraling, "I'll be fine... but that thing really packs a punch!" It was then the Goron looked to his son, noticing something off about him.
"What's wrong Dad?"
"Uuugh... say Son, what's that thing you have there?" Darunia asked Link-Goron, pointing out something red and yellow stuck in the rocky cracks of his son's back.
"Dunno, I think it got stuck there when the dragon put me on that island." Link-Goron said, pulling it out, seeing it was a large feather of some kind.
As Aviel was watching Link in desperation, unable to do anything to fight the monster, she looked and saw the feather Link-Goron held. She stared at it with upmost curiosity, walking over to get a close look at it. She also most felt drawn to it somehow...
"Hey Lunk... can I possibly see that...?" Aviel asked.
"Huh? My name's not Lunk, but sure." Link-Goron said handing the feather to her.
It was then as Aviel slowly reached out and touched it, the feather brushed her feathery Roc's Wing sleeves, and the three of them looked in surprise as her sleeves began to glow brightly...
As the group were fighting off the rock monster, it tried to smash Link with two fists at once, but it was then the dragon had gotten itself up and roared out, flying right at the Talus and bashing it in the side with it's head, before swinging out it's tail and smashing off one of the monster's arms.
"Woah, look at it go!" Nabooru said wide-eyed.
The dragon bit down on another arm to rip it off, but the Talus then swung out and punched it, sending it flying off and falling to the ground in a daze. The Talus then turned to the dragon and swung out for another punch at the dragon, but it was blocked off by Link firing off his Longshot and grappling onto the monster's arm. The Talus looked to see Link pulling on it's arm and yank it backwards to protect the dragon.
"Lay off that thing you bastard!" Link shouted.
It was then however the Talus instead swung it's arm upwards, sending Link flying skyward above the monster.
"Link!" Nemisa shouted as they all saw the Gerudo King start falling downwards towards the Talus Behemoth monster, who rose up all of it's still functioning arms, planning to crush Link between all of them. Even the dragon looked up somewhat in shock at Link and roared out.
But it was then something flew by and snatched Link out of midair, shocking everyone, even the Talus.
"Huh?" Nemisa gasped out seeing a swift figure take Link into the air far away from the monster, before slowly descending to the ground and releasing him from it's grip. Everyone just stared in shock at who it was that saved him...
"What the hell-:" Link spoke in surprise, seeing who is was that saved him, "Aviel?!''
"Link, are you okay?" Aviel asked desperately, trying to dust him off with her wings before stepping back to look him over..
Link took a brief second to look at Aviel as she was now. She had her Roc's Wings out, but they looked much different then before; much bigger and longer in size. In addition, her hair seemed to spike out slightly longer in back, she now had tail feathers sticking out from just above her rear end, and her legs were now longer and skinnier, much like that of a bird, including large bird talons in place of her feet.
"Aviel, what happened? Your bird form changed!" Link exclaimed.
"Yeah, I don't know how it happened exactly, but I'm not complaining!" Aviel grinned, doing a quick little spin around and spread her wings out. She moved her butt a little to make her tail feathers wave around.
Impa meanwhile flipped into the air and chucked some bombling kunai at the Talus monster, but it then flexed it's arms and released a wave of heat from it's body that caused the bomblings to explode in midair.
"Damn, it's too hot from absorbing the magma heat..." Impa said landing down, "If only we could cool it down first then we could destroy it easier."
The Talus slowly lumbered towards the group, really to launch another attack. They all deployed their weapon to prepare themselves for anything, even the dragon forced itself up and roared out, standing alongside the group, seeming to recognize that it's help would be needed despite how weakened it was. The Talus brought up it's fists and was about to assault the group with it's fiery punches...
But it was then a new powerful roar went off, and out of nowhere a shockwave of sound shot out and impacted into the Talus monster, the powerful vibration blasting through it, paralyzing it's movement. The monster then staggered backwards as everyone turned to see who was there.
"Howdy yall The cavalry's arrived!" Togau shouted, grinning widely in her Lynel form, as Dr. Sarami rode on her horse half's back, and standing alongside the two was Saria and Reirousa.
"We got worried about you all and came to check on you!" Saria said.
"Nice timing." grinned Nabooru with a thumbs up.
"Now back off ya rockhead!" Togau shouted, gripping and tossing her hand ax out at the monster, slicing off one of it's limbs. The creature was about to retaliate with a punch, but then the ax returned back the other way, slicing off that other arm and leaving the creature with just two left.
Before the Talus could retaliate with another attack, Aviel took to the sky and used her talons to drop a glass bottle on top of it. The bottle shattered and caused a large amount of blue liquid to pour out all over the monster, and it looked in surprise as the strange goop caused the excessive heat it had absorbed to cool off, with great amounts of steam escaping it's form.
"Aviel? Just what was that?" Link asked the bird girl.
"I don't know, Sarami just gave it to me and told me to spill it on the Talus!" Aviel said landing down.
"Fufufu... my blue chu jelly typically works as a cooling agent for medical purposes, and it can be used to sooth burns, but this makes for another nice use for it." Sarami answered, giggled darkly, "I made sure to bring extra for us since we were coming to a hot place like Death Mountain."
"Alright, my turn now that it's cooled down!" Reirousa said, loading a bomb into her Bombos Warhammer. She ran at the monster, who tried to punch her, but she brought up her Warhammer and impacted it directly into it's fist, causing the rock to blow up into dust. The Talus staggered back, giving Impa a chance to throw an exploding kunai into the other arm's joint, blowing it off.
The Talus was at a loss of what to do since all it's arms were blown off at that point. It limped a bit trying to get some distance to make more limbs from the earth, but then realized it's legs were bound to a halt. It saw some strange vines were tied around it's legs, leaving it immobilized.
"You're not going anywhere!" Saria said holding out her Deku Staff. She had used the power of her weapon to trap the monster with vines and bind it.
This allowed Darunia to roll forward and bash into the monster, knocking it backwards and impacting to the ground, then allowing Link to jump into the air and bring his sword down on the main rock of the body and pierce his sword right into the center. The Talus let out one last groan before it exploded into purple mist.
"Ha ha ha, we did it! Great work everyone!" Darunia shouted out, raising his hammer, and everyone else cheered out as well.
"I don't know what happened while you were here Aviel, but just I love your new look!" Sarami said, stroking her hand along Aviel's longer bird wings, "You make for such a cute little birdie!"
"Yeah, you and I are like real kin now!" Togau grinned, gesturing to her Lynel body, before changing back to her normal Gerudo form.
"Hee hee, thanks." Aviel grinned, "I can fly way easier now, and I can use my talons to grab stuff too like Link and Sarami's potion!"
"It's probably because your wing span allows you to stay airborne. Your thinner legs also make your body weigh less, and the tail feathers help to increase wind resistance for flying." Sarami pointed out.
"Yeah, guess that does makes sense." Aviel nodded, putting away her wings which made her body change back to her normal self. She looked down at the feathery sleeves and saw the straps that held them on now had a gold color to them, "I don't know how that feather did that, but I felt a strange attachment to it... like something was calling out to me to use it."
"Gee, wonder why it did that for you...?" Link-Goron asked, "And what was it doin' on that dragon's island of all places?"
"I'm not sure..." Aviel said, taking a nervous look over to the dragon.
Speaking of which, Link, Nabooru, Darunia and Impa all looked to the dragon who had collapsed, and was now laying on the ground, exhausted and injured from the battle. It let out a weak growl, and looked helplessly up to see the four before it.
"So what do we do about this one?" Impa asked.
"Think I outta just smash this darn thing and put it out of it's misery?" Darunia asked with a snarl, remembering how it seemed like it had been about to ate his son.
"...hold up on that for a second Daunia." Link spoke up.
The young Gerudo King paused, staring down at the creature. He then slowly walked forward towards it, his features darkened by his hair hanging down his head.
"H-Hey Link, what are you doing? Be careful!" Nabooru said worriedly.
Link slowly reached out his hand at the dragon. The creature flinched and closed it's eyes, too weak to fight back, and actually fearful of what the man would do...
But that was when Link placed his hand gently on the creature's forehead, surprising everyone, especially the dragon itself.
"It's okay." Link whispered, "The monster's gone now."
The dragon stared up at Link with wide eyes, having expecting him to finish it off. Instead, Link reached into his travel pack and pulled out a box, placing it down in front of the dragon. He opened it to show off the rest of the takoyaki from what he had been eating before back in the other room during their break.
Everyone looked on in confusion as the dragon stared down at the food, sniffing at it. It hesitated for a second and looked up at Link, before it stated slowly eating.
"Huh? What are you doing Brother?" Darunia asked in confusion.
Link didn't say a word, but watched as the dragon kept eating the food in front of it. Impa herself stared at Link, and saw a look of compassion in his eyes as he rubbed the dragon on it's forehead. By the time it finished, the dragon let out a relieved sigh.
"Was that good?" Link asked it.
The dragon seemed to stare up at him for a few seconds, before it's body was suddenly engulfed in orange flames. Link stood back as everyone watched in surprise, the flames started to die down, and in the dragon's place was a new surprise...
"What? This dragon is..." Nabooru exclaimed.
"So my guess was right..." Link nodded.
Sitting there before them all was a small boy, probably around seven or eight years old in Hylian years. He was completely nude, but had his legs folded which hid his loins. He had long red-orange hair which ran wildly down the back of his body. The hair fell over his eyes to overshadow his left eye, and they could only see his right eye peeking out from under it. They could also see a small fang sticking up from the side of his mouth.
"Oh my... the dragon is a child?" Sarami gasped out.
The boy just sat there, before slowly looking up at Link.
"You... saved... me...?" the boy spoke, shocking everyone once again.
"It can speak in human tongue as well?" Impa exclaimed.
"Um... hi, my name is Link." the Gerudo King greeted the boy.
"...Link...?" the boy muttered, "That's kind of a weird name..."
Link heard Nabooru let out an amused snort behind him and he sweatdropped.
"Um, so what's your name... do you have one?" Link asked the child.
"...no, don't really have one." shrugged the boy, "Guess you can just call me... uh, 'V'. Nice to meet you, I guess..."
'And he says my name is weird.' Link thought to himself.
"Aw, what a polite boy!" Sarami said cheerfully, "He's actually rather cute!"
"So uh... why did you save me before, mister?" V asked Link.
"I... well... do I really need a reason to help someone?" Link asked, rubbing the back of his head, "You were getting ganged up on by those things and... I guess I couldn't just leave you like that."
"But I took away your friend there..." V said, looking to Link-Goron, who was peeking out from behind Darunia, "For all you knew I coulda tried to eat him."
"Well you didn't right?" Link pointed out.
"Y-Yeah, sorry 'bout that... I needed to make a getaway and I guess I sorta panicked..." V said looking to the side "I really wasn't gonna eat him or anything like that... Gorons don't look very tasty to me..."
"Hey, that's...!" Darunia shouted in protest at first, but then paused, "Wait, should I be offended by that or not? I'm confused..."
"So how did you know this dragon was a child Link?" Nabooru asked.
"Something intrigued me when I saw that round cracked rock Link-Goron found earlier." Link spoke, "I think that might have actually been a dragon eggshell."
"Yeah, sounds like mine." nodded V in confirmation.
"Oh, so it was an egg? No wonder it tasted so horrible!" Link-Goron said in disgust.
"Then that means the island in the center of that magma pool with all the straw was a dragon's nest!" Aviel realized.
"Yeah, that place was my home all this time." V nodded, "A bunch of Gorons started making noise and making it hard for me to sleep, so I thought roaring at them would scare em off."
"So this means the supposed ghost all this time wasn't Volvagia, but it's child!" Nabooru said, she smirked lightly, "Well that's a nice surprise."
"Hey uh, what are these things you gave me to eat anyway?" V asked, "They tasted kinda familiar."
"That's cause they're cooked Octorok meat." Link grinned, "I figured you'd like them."
"You mean those squealing things I go out and hunt at night?" V asked with lit up eyes, "Never tasted them like this before."
"Oh, so then it was this kid who was causing the Octorok shortage then!" Impa realized, "That also explains the air sacs we found earlier!"
"Yeah, that part of them is really gross, so I spit them out." V said sticking out his tongue.
"Fufu, like a little kid spitting out the vegetables they don't like." Sarami giggled.
"So... uh, what're you going to do to me now...?" V asked a little nervously, "You gonna finish me off or something...?"
"You're not going to try and run?" Darunia asked.
"Y-You all bested me in battle, and as part of a dragon's code, my fate is yours to decide..." V muttered, gripping at his knees in worry.
Link just paused, staring down at V. He looked over to Nabooru who looked uncertain, Impa who was observing the two, and Darunia who was trying not to look directly at the child. Link looked back to V and closed his eyes, nodding to himself.
"...nah, I don't think I really want to do that." Link said with a light smile.
"Wait, really? Even after I kidnapped that Goron over there and all the trouble I caused you?" V asked in confusion.
"Well yeah you did cause everyone some trouble, but you also helped us out against the rock monsters earlier." Link nodded, "What do you think Darunia?"
"I... guess so..." Darunia spoke as he turned and looked a little awkward at the child before him, "Just... you know... don't do it again."
"Sounds like we're both willing to forgive you then." nodded Link, "Sarami, can you look over his injuries?"
"Of course!" Sarami said, kneeling down to the child, pulling out her medical supplies, and started examining his arm.
As Sarami tended to V's injuries, Darunia gulped a little and cleared his throat, "Um, listen kid, as the Goron leader, I had to stop Volvagia before it hurt my brothers..." he then let out a sigh, "But as a father, I kinda wanna apologize for.. um, killing your mom..."
"So Mother's dead then? Eh, don't worry about it." V said with a shrug, looking away, "She disowned me a long time ago. She didn't like my scent for whatever reason, and I refused to hunt Gorons, so she abandoned me here in the mines and went to some place called the Fire Temple."
"Your own mother abandoned you? That's terrible..." Sarami said sadly, as she applied some cooling agent jelly to a bruise on him.
"How sad..." Aviel whispered, she herself took those words to heart. As fearful as she was of the dragon before, she instead now saw a small child, lost and alone. Aviel thought back to when she had been separated from her parents, and her blanking out before waking up in that village like she had told Saria the other day...
And it was then a horrible thought occurred to her.
'Could... my parents have possibly...?'
She thought to herself, with faint tears forming in her eyes. Saria was quick to see the pained look on Aviel's face and she placed her arm against the Gerudo girl to comfort her.
After a short while, Sarami looked at her medical work on V and nodded.
"There, I think that should do it for your injuries!" Sarami said, giving a bandage she placed on him a gentle kiss, "You're a strong little one, and you seem to be healing nice and quickly, I'm sure you'll be just fine!"
"T-Thanks..." V said blushing red.
"So what are you planning to do now then, kid?" Nabooru asked.
"Well, my nest was destroyed by that monster, guess I really need to find a new place. Didn't really like dealing with the rock monster things anyway." V said, getting up, "Um... I'm sorry again for everything I did to you guys..."
"It's alright, everything worked out anyway." Link said with a big grin, patting the dragon boy on the head, "
"Y-Yeah..." V said with a slight smile, "I'm probably going to go do some traveling for a while and try to find a place for myself... So uh, thanks again, all of you for sparing me."
With that, V engulfed himself in flames and changed back into a dragon. He spread his wings and flew off into the air. He stopped and took one last look at the group and gave then a slight nod, before going through a small hole in the wall
"Think he'll be alright?" Nabooru asked.
"...yeah, I think so." grinned Link.
"Well with that Talus' destruction, the hot spring heat problem's dealt with. And the dragon's gone so my men can finally get back to work now! This calls for a celebration, we'll rock the mountains tonight!" Darunia shouted out with a wide smile.
The group all collectively cheered out in agreement, while Impa took that moment to glance at Link and the bright smile on his face.
She was rather impressed at how kind and strong the Gerudo seemed to be, as well as how well they all worked together as a team.
Impa reflected on how well Link himself took to the dragon child V and the kindness he gave him, and she couldn't help but smile a little herself, as she thought more about the suggestion Nabooru gave her...
Unknown to all of them however, they were being watched by a mysterious person in the tunnel that led to the area. The person was covered by a strange silver cloak with blue markings, and his face was half-hidden by an eye-mask with golden markings on it that had the resemblance of a single eye. The figure had just watched the dragon leave the cave, as their teeth were clenched in what looked like anger. But it was then something gave off a faint glow under their robe, as their attention was focused on the young blonde Hylian man in the black vest.
The figure smirked a little, and left without anyone even seeing them...
And that ends the chapter, thank you all for reading! Next time the group are going to celebrate their victory, while Impa has a choice to make...
(also, unless I forgot, I think this is the first chapter in forever that I've written without a scene transition, neat!)
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