Rhea and Seteth gave Claude a look. Claude looked back at them. "What? The assassins had good equipment."
Jeralt shrugged. "He has a point."
Looting the bandit hideout and the Yiga assassins proved to be rather profitable. The bandits had a fair amount of warm clothing. According to Link, they would need it. Plus, the bandits had a decent amount of rupees (good, funds were running low), food (it wasn't good food, but if they ran out of good food they'd be glad they had it), and other items.
Mercedes had managed to find a hidden stash of gems, including a glowing gem that Link identified as a Star Fragment. It wasn't an actual piece of a star, but it did come from space.
Regardless, nothing in the bandit lair was what interested Annette and Linhardt. They were more interested in what could be found on the Yiga assassins. And they weren't talking about their well-made weapons, or the Mighty Bananas they all had.
No, what was interesting was Zimmer's mechanical body and the Yiga Power Armor.
The Power Armor had almost been a game changer for the Yiga in the battle. It made the Yiga much stronger, and made it difficult to actually kill them. The only weapons that had actually managed to pierce the armor were the Boulder Breaker and Robbie's weapons.
They had gotten the suit that was most intact (the Yiga assassin had been speared in the neck, which appeared to be the armor's weak spot) and had figured out how to remove the dead assassin from inside.
Annette had attempted to use the armor. However, as it turned out, the armor wasn't as simple to use as just wearing it. There were controls that needed to be figured out.
While the rest of the Company was headed to Rito Village, the two of them had teleported back to Robbie's lab to drop off the Power Armor.
"This is really interesting tech," Robbie noted. "It looks like the Yiga did manage to do some interesting things with their technology."
"There was one assassin who replaced almost his entire body with it," Linhardt informed him.
"Very interesting," Robbie said. "Well, let's start reverse-engineering this suit."
Meanwhile, the Company had made camp, and had eaten. Some of the others had already unrolled their bedrolls and went to sleep. A few were on watch. Link wasn't on watch, but he was awake anyway.
Link was thinking about the nearby mountains. He remembered the mountains. He and Zelda had spent some time in them. Maybe not the ones he was looking at specifically, he thought the ones they had visited had been further south, but they still reminded him of his past...
Link knew the Princess didn't really want him watching over her, but he also knew the chances of something bad happening were not zero. So he was watching over her anyway, but he did his best to stay beneath her notice as she waved the Sheikah Slate over the pedestal on the Shrine.
"Nothing. Just as I thought," she mused. "Hmm...it appears that there is a further condition to opening the Shrines that hasn't been met. But what could it be? How do I get inside? I need to activate it somehow."
Unfortunately, it seemed that he would catch her notice after all, as his horse Epona chose that moment to noisily try to get him to give her the apple he was eating. He decided to comply, but it was too late. The Princess had noticed him.
"I thought I made it clear I am not in need of an escort," she told him. "It seems I am the only person here with a mind of my own. As you can see, I, the person in question, am fine, regardless of what the king says. Return to the Castle at once."
"With all due respect, my princess, I can't do that," Link said.
"Why, because you think I can't take care of myself?" she asked sarcastically.
"Even if I wasn't ordered to protect you, Hyrule Castle is several weeks' ride away," Link told her.
"Oh. Yes, that would be a problem," the Princess acknowledged. "Well...return to the Trading Post, then. I'll meet you there later."
"Unfortunately, I can't do that either," Link said. "If it was reported to the King that I was disobeying orders, he would have me killed."
"If he did that, he would have no one to wield the Master Sword," the Princess argued.
"He would have my sister wield it," Link said.
"Isn't your sister only eleven?" she asked. She had only met his family once. He was surprised she remembered.
"Twelve next month," Link told her. "And it wouldn't matter. If I can't be trusted to fulfill my responsibilities as a knight, I can't be trusted to fulfill my responsibilities as wielder of the Master Sword. And if I can't be trusted with those responsibilities, I can't be allowed to keep the Sword. The consequences could be disastrous."
"How disastrous?" the Princess asked, seemingly genuinely curious.
"If I misuse the Sword, it's a threat to the Sword itself," Link informed her. "Using it in violation of any of Hylia's commandments would cause it to lose its power. Potentially permanently, if I did so severely enough."
The Princess frowned. "How severely would you have to misuse it?"
"If I used it to kill an innocent person except as a mercy kill, or if I used it to kill someone who had surrendered even if they were obviously insincere, or if I used it against someone who was not currently an active threat to innocents even if I knew they would be in the future, the Master Sword would become nothing more than a normal sword," Link explained. "If I misused it in a less permanent way, it would potentially be able to regain its power. For example, if I used it to try to avoid fulfilling a promise, it would lose its power until the promise was fulfilled."
"I thought the Master Sword couldn't be used against the innocent," the Princess said.
"Can't as in 'can't be allowed to.' Yes, if I tried using it against an innocent person, its power wouldn't aid me. But it's still a sharpened metal blade," Link explained. "If I tried to kill an innocent person with it, that person would die. And it would render the Sword powerless. The way it was explained to me, it was a precaution by Hylia, in case a Hero ever became corrupted. By evil from without, or his own selfishness."
"But...would going back to the trading post without me really say you were corrupted?" the Princess asked.
"It would say I'm corruptible, and that's enough to say the Sword needs to be taken out of my hands while it still can be saved," Link told her.
"I didn't realize," the Princess said. To Link's surprise, she bowed her head. "I am sorry. I was cruel to you. I resented that it had seemed you were granted the Master Sword without having to be proved worthy of it. But you have to prove yourself worthy of it constantly, don't you?"
"Every minute of every day," Link answered honestly.
"I am sorry. I judged you, and I was wrong. Please forgive me," she apologized.
"Water under the bridge," he assured her.
"Perhaps you can help me, then. Do you have any idea how to open the Shrine? Perhaps it is set to respond only to the rightful wielder of the Master Sword. You should try unlocking it." He did so, but the Shrine remained closed.
"Hmm," she mused. "This is most vexing."
That conversation marked a turning point in their relationship. Before, she had been cold, aloof, and resentful to him. After, though, she started to become more friendly and open with him.
"Had another memory?" Ingrid asked.
"Yeah," Link nodded. He decided not to discuss the specific importance of the conversation. "A conversation I had about the Master Sword."
"Do you remember where it might be?" Ingrid asked.
"No, it was more about the rules associated with using it," Link said.
"Well, that's important too," Ingrid said.
"I'm going to sleep," Link told her.