Explanations in Order
The heroes escaped and made it back to the surface. They also decided that it was time to start talking. Link was the first to speak up. "You girls knew, didn't you?" he asked Max and Emily. "You knew all along that Vaati had a shard of the Cobalt Star."
"Yes," Emily answered without hesitation. "We knew ever since we first saw him at the tournament."
"Why didn't you say anything sooner?" Link demanded to know.
"We had to keep it on a need-to-know basis," Max answered. She looked to Ezlo and said, "Much like how Ezlo here did with his own problems." And everyone looked at him.
"It's true," he admitted. "I knew that eventually, you would all have to learn the truth, and now it's come to that."
"Ezlo, how is it you and Vaati know each other?" Yugi asked.
"Did he really used to be your student?" Joey asked.
"And more importantly," Kaiba was asking, "what is this Light Force and why is Vaati determined to find it?"
Ezlo calmed himself, promising to answer everyone's questions. To start, he revealed that he and Vaati were both Picori. Ezlo was a sage and Vaati was his apprentice. Ezlo wanted to do good and help others just like all the other Picori. And like most others, he was fascinated with the stories of Millennia's followers aspiring to fulfill her wishes of bringing peace and harmony. And when Ezlo learned that the Great Goddess had the power to grant wishes, he decided he wanted to do the same thing. So Ezlo used his magic to create a cap that would grant the wishes of whoever wears it. That's when it all went wrong.
Vaati was also familiar with the stories of the Great Goddess and the Dark Lord, but Vaati didn't share the same beliefs as his master. Unlike Ezlo, Vaati was more fascinated with the evil ways; especially when he saw how people used violence and rage to get what they wanted.
One day, Vaati snuck into his master's workroom and took the cap and placed it on his head. Sensing Vaati's darkest wishes, the cap turned him into a powerful mage. Ezlo tried to stop him, but Vaati placed a curse on his master, giving him the form of a bird-shaped cap.
"After he cursed me into what you see me as now, Vaati revealed to me that he was after the Light Force," Ezlo told the heroes. "But he knew he could only find it during the only time we would be able to come to your world."
"And that time only comes once every hundred years," Emily recalled.
"But what is the Light Force?" Link asked.
"The Light Force is a pure force that provides limitless power," Max answered. "But its power also reflects what's in the heart of the person who possesses it."
"The Light Force was a gift to us Picori from the Great Goddess herself," Ezlo added. "It made her happy to know that our kind loved to help people out of kindness and eagerness, so she gave out ancestors a power that they could use to help someone only in a great time of need."
"Like the time when the Picori helped the hero in the legend when they gave him the Picori Blade?" Yugi asked.
"Precisely," Ezlo answered.
Emily placed her hand over her chest. So the Light Force was given to the Picori by the Great Goddess, she thought.
"Guys, can you imagine what would happen if Vaati were to obtain the Light Force?" Max asked.
Ezlo apologized to the heroes. "This is all my fault."
"That's not entirely true, Ezlo," Emily argued. "It was your ideals that were flawed," she said, earning a shocked expression from Ezlo. "Wanting to help others is always an appreciative thing, but granting wishes can go wrong in many ways. It's just like what happened in Atlantis many centuries ago."
"What happened?" Link asked.
"The people of Atlantis became consumed with greed and began to abused the power of having their wishes fulfilled," she explained, "and the evil in their hearts began to turn them into monsters on the outside."
"And the same thing could happen to Vaati if we don't stop him," Max added.
"Where is the Light Force now?" Kaiba asked Ezlo.
"When we gave it to the Hyruleans, the royal family had it," he answered. "I don't know where they're keeping it now."
"Should we go back to the castle and ask the king?" Joey asked.
"No, that's just what Vaati would expect us to do," Emily said. "Right now, we should concentrate on finding the Wind Element."
Her friends agreed. Link unfolded the map and placed it on the ground. Kaiba took out his glasses. "We went to the Fortress of Winds and the Wind Element wasn't there. And when we arrived, we found out that the Wind Tribe left and took it with them."
"To the Palace of Winds, no doubt," said Ezlo.
"Palace of Winds," Kaiba asked, and began looking at the map again.
"I don't think it'll be on the map," said Max. "Remember, the Wind Tribe left long ago. And according to what I read in Elder Librari's house, the Palace of Winds is in the sky."
"In the sky?!" all of her friends echoed.