I don't know if my regular reviewers are commenting later on chapters or FFN's comment moderation thing is holding those comments hostage for a few weeks before letting me see them, but I've gotten some reviews in! Yay!

Q/A:

When will the Harrys get trained? I'll repeat my answer: after completing Light World Dungeon 1. There will be a few more chapters (maybe three after this) at the castle, and then the boys will set off. The Harrys are already quite capable if you look at what they've accomplished rather than taking their unreliable narration as fact. If a Harry goes, "Oh, it was no big deal," look back at the train-sized electric eel they managed to slay in its natural element and ask, "Are you sure?" They'll improve their footwork and get better at dodging/redirecting attacks once they start doing combat lessons in between dungeons/exploring, but like...they can already achieve things that a whole company of knights couldn't. You'll see what I mean in the Mountain's Heart story arc~

When will the Harrys meet Link and Zelda? The answer is also after completing LW D1. At this point, the boys aren't even aware that a current incarnation of Link exists and have no inclination to do the equivalent of strolling into Buckingham Palace to speak to the successor to the throne. The completion of this dungeon will be what gives those characters a narrative reason to meet. I will try to work in at least one intro scene each for Link and Zelda sometime during that long story arc to ease them into the fic before the official meet-n-greet, though.

Albus leaned back in his chair, massaging his temples. The disastrous situational reports he'd been studying for the last three hours had burned themselves into the undersides of his eyelids. He'd been spending every spare moment (those not being taken up by meetings or staring in horror out the window) to check Hogwarts's resources, calculate how long they would last, and puzzle over how to afford more once they inevitably ran out.

Everyone in the castle was, to borrow his young pupils' informal vernacular, utterly screwed.

Magical societies were heavily reliant upon magic, as one would expect. They depended on magic as much as Muggles needed their electricity. More than that, even! Magic was baked into the very foundation of how mages functioned, while electricity was a much more recent addition to mundane styles of living. Muggles were incredibly adaptive folk, resigned to an amount of toil most witches and wizards rarely had to bother with. Magicals often had difficulty figuring out how to do tasks the mundane way once they became accustomed to using a wand for everything. In a situation such as this, Albus was sure there were a number of non-magical solutions to their predicament that a Muggle would think of, but that were failing to come to his mind. There were so many logistical issues happening at once that he hardly knew where to begin problem-solving!

For instance, the potential issue of their limited food stores rotting before they ran out. The castle's storage rooms were heavily enchanted to keep their contents fresh for as long as was needed. If times were tough and a foodstuff needed to be multiplied to last the season, the rooms would oblige if politely asked. However, in this magic-hostile world, right after an incredibly powerful ancient mage had ripped through many of the enchantments that kept the castle running, those storerooms were barely able to function. Their stasis charms were completely shot and their ability to multiply food had been destroyed. The only magic they had left was the ability to plunge to freezing temperatures, and Albus knew better than to depend on that enchantment holding out for much longer without serious maintenance.

Another problem was their complete lack of funding. Hogwarts had never ever been without donors, even from its earliest days. Money was needed for food deliveries, staff salaries, class materials, and—quite urgently, due to the monsters creeping up along the shore—stone to replace what was lost from the castle's walls during transport. And to pay the builders repairing those gaping holes in the stonework, of course. Right now, the only money on campus was the two thousand Galleons kept in reserve for times of emergency. That amount wouldn't have sustained their considerable numbers for long even if they'd landed in a familiar country, let alone a place that might not care for their coin.

They were stranded, doomed to starve within a few months, and deprived of any readily available avenues through which to ameliorate either of those things. Truly a hopeless situation all around.

He shut his eyes, furrowing his brow. Yes, they were a tight spot, but there were certain…less popular measures that could always be taken. Albus had never run into a problem he couldn't solve; there was just the matter of making whatever unfortunate fix he came up with seem palatable enough for others to act upon it. Even if the solution was only slightly less terrible than the problem, that still counted as an improvement.

First things first: they needed to learn the magic and language of Hyrule. The tools at hand: Hermione Granger, Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter (who, being such a tenacious child, would assuredly find his way back to the school), a handful of native magical creatures, whatever Magic Rod materials they had sitting around the castle, and a possessed book that refused to speak to him or his more closely trusted staff. Miss Granger would cooperate with his orders in a heartbeat. If Albus so much as subtly suggested that she pass on her knowledge of creating Hylian staves, the girl would throw herself into creating a curriculum. The Malfoy heir was a trickier pawn. Through his window, Albus had seen him going to swim in the Black Lake and interacting with the Zora that had taken temporary residence there, and from those observations Albus had developed a strong suspicion that the boy shared some connection with the foreign merfolk that would make it easier for him to convince them to do whatever Albus needed. Draco was prideful and prone to acts of spite, however, which could make having him assist with Hylian-learning sessions tricky. Albus would need to have Severus work closely with him. Harry, assuming he returned soon, would be as easy to put to use as Miss Granger. He was eager to please and would stay on task if kept under adult supervision. Although with him, Albus would have to consider what would happen when the boy inevitably pulled a disappearing act and did something foolhardy under the mental sway of his recently-acquired weapon. That was something to ruminate upon later, once the urgent situation had subsided somewhat.

Earning money would come after learning the basics of Hylian language and magic. It would be an incredibly difficult step to take, however; as much as Albus hated to consider the hit his reputation would take for putting the idea forth, he would have to put some of his students to work in addition to his staff. It was a terrible notion, making the children under his care work to eat, but it was looking like it would be necessary within a few months' time as their food stores ran out and/or spoiled. Even with a significant section of the Ravenclaws currently separated from the rest of the castle population, Albus still had five-hundred ninety-three mouths to feed. The teachers going out to ply their skills in nearby towns would bring in some revenue, but not nearly enough to keep all those children from starving.

The choice was between his students dying and his students working to help fund their survival, and while the latter option might end in him becoming Hogwarts's most hated headmaster, at least the children would be alive to think him a monster. Again, the solution was terrible, but less terrible than the problem it solved.

Some fact-finding expeditions would have to be conducted to take note of what skills would be useful for odd jobs and what industries his staff and upper-level students already had the needed expertise for. It would also be most important for the sixth and seventh years to learn Hylian language and magic before the younger children, as they were the only students he felt comfortable sending out of the castle.

Speaking of sending people out…the castle was on an island. Somehow that had slipped his mind. He sighed and rubbed his forehead. Transportation was, of course, going to be an issue. Even if they weren't surrounded by monstrous lizards and undead flesh-eating fish, they were still trapped in a lake in a giant basin with no way to the top of the cliffs. He'd seen the train tracks crossing the north side of the lake, but that was a swim of at least three hundred meters through monster-infested water. The western edge was a much shorter one hundred meters away, but he doubted it was possible to climb those steep hills without taking a bone-breaking tumble back down. Hopefully the castle's cache of brooms still worked.

Actually, did they even have any brooms? Albus racked his memory. The Quidditch equipment sheds had definitely been left behind, but Madam Hooch had…Ah, yes, there were brooms by the food storage on the first floor! Madam Hooch had evacuated them from the equipment sheds to keep them from rotting in the flood. His pattering heart slowed just a smidge. While they still had no way to expediently transport people or supplies, they at least had around forty vehicles at their disposal, assuming some Quidditch team members were willing to share.

Then realization crashed upon him again and his temples gave a dull throb. If wands hardly worked, how could he be so certain that brooms would?

Albus allowed himself a single groan that was echoed by the tired, sickly-looking phoenix drooping over his desk. He gave poor Fawkes, who had been wilting ever since their arrival, a sad pet.

"It's going to be a long day for all of us, old friend," he sighed. Then he got out a quill, pulled a fresh piece of parchment from a desk drawer, and got to planning.

"Harry!"

"You're back!"

"And there's still four of you!"

"Where have you been?!"

Ron could hear the shouts from his bed. He scrambled to his feet and ran to the stairs in time to catch the Harrys' sodden trudge into the Gryffindor common room. They looked terrible. Slumped over from exhaustion, hollow-eyed, and bleeding from a dozen cuts each. Their clothes—and what foreign clothes those were!—had been lightly shredded, either by small claws or teeth, and were spotted with blood all over. It was no wonder the crowd of Gryffindors exclaiming over the state of them were also giving the boys a wide berth.

Hermione sped down the opposite staircase and intercepted the Harrys before Ron could. He hesitated on the landing. He still didn't want to talk to her again because she was sure to say something that would start another fight. At the same time, that was Harry down there and he looked like death warmed over. He took the stairs two at a time and pushed through the crowd.

"—Skullfish in the lake," Blue was explaining to Hermione when he reached them. "We saw some of the Zoras they got ahold of." His lips pressed in a grim line. "We've seen a lot today."

"I don't doubt it. You all look like you've walked through a ghost," Hermione said. She pulled out her magic staff and cast a few Scouring and Mending Charms.

The Harrys brightened, looking over their repaired clothes. "We really need to make ourselves some wands like that before we head out again," Red said, shimmying his jacket out of his short leather corset and taking it off. Several spots on his back were still bleeding, the stains showing through his salmon-colored tunic.

Ron and Hermione hissed through their teeth at the sight of the bites scattered across his skin, then glared at each other. They were both concerned for their multiplied friend; that did not mean the matter of Sirius Black's possible (but highly doubtful) innocence had been resolved.

Yellow looked between the two of them. "Are you guys alright?" he asked. "What happened while we were out?"

"That's not important right now," Ron said. "You're all still bleeding, and Hermione can't do healing spells using her Hylian wand without setting you on fire."

Hermione puffed up indignantly. "Ron! It would only cause a bad first-degree burn at the worst!"

Ron shrugged. "Same thing." He put his hands on Red's and Yellow's shoulders. "Off to the Hospital Wing! Even if magic is wonky, Pomfrey still has medical supplies."

"But sleep!" the four Harrys protested simultaneously. They sent longing looks in the direction of the boys' dorms.

"If you go to sleep as you are, you'll wake up lying in bloodstains," Hermione said flatly. "Bloodstains that none of you have the magic to clean, if you recall. I'm sure you wouldn't want to put those nice clothes and sheets to waste, would you?"

Ron scrunched his nose. That was a dirty move, using what they'd learned about Harry in the third temple against them. The appeal to extreme frugality worked, though. As one, the Harrys paled and stopped digging their heels in.

"You'll make sure our clothes don't have blood in them once we've gotten patched up, though, won't you?" Yellow asked plaintively. "We only just got them, and from a really nice lady, too."

"Yes, I'll cast another cleaning spell on your clothes later to make sure," Hermione assured him.

Ron started hustling Red and Yellow toward the portrait door, while Hermione did the same with Blue and Harry. The Gryffindors still standing around dispersed around them, although Ron could still feel their curious stares and hear their wondering whispers over what the Harrys had been up to.

"What happened on your end?" Ron asked once they were all out in the hall. "Hermione was half-convinced that Vaati had killed you, and I didn't know what to think!"

"We wound up getting teleported to the islands way to the south," Harry said. "It took an eight-hour train ride just to get here." He looked mildly traumatized just thinking about it. "Those trains are so fast."

"Shadow Harry put us on Outset Isle for a lark," Red said. "Being all the way out there meant we could stop by Ruka's and pick up those bags and Rupees he promised, though, so it wasn't a total waste." He held up the gold-embroidered messenger bag hanging from his shoulder. "This thing has some serious magic. I could probably wedge a Moblin in here if I wanted."

Blue scowled at him. "You'd better not try!"

Red rolled his eyes. "Oh, like you wouldn't want to find out whether we can stuff monsters in here! For 'science' or whatever."

"I wouldn't start with a Moblin!"

Yellow pointedly shouldered his way between Red and Blue and took off his bag, holding it out to Hermione for inspection. "We even managed to put our swords in it for a while," he said. "Shadow Harry got a little miffed about that, though."

Hermione eagerly took the bag and started studying it. Ron, meanwhile, was less concerned with magic knickknacks. "You saw Shadow Harry?!" he squawked. "When? What did he say? Did he throw a monster at you?"

"We saw him on our first day here," Harry said. "He explained what we have to do to beat Vaati, which is…" the heavy bags under his eyes seemed to intensify, "…so much."

"Then he popped back in later to yell at us for almost killing ourselves by accident," Yellow said. He rubbed the back of his neck with a sheepish smile. "Our swords can't stay in magic bags for more than a few hours, I guess. We accidentally fell asleep without taking them back out first."

"Why on earth would you put your swords in a Bag of Holding? The nature of such a thing means it stores the enchantments and powers of whatever's in it," Hermione said. "Shadow Harry said back in that sea cave that the Four Sword is tied to your life and magic. Not to mention three of you aren't technically flesh and blood—"

Red flapped a hand at her to hush. "Yeah, yeah, we've heard it already," he said.

Blue folded his arms crossly. "In our defense, what else were we supposed to do when a lightning dragon conjured a thunderstorm around us?" he groused. "We were in the middle of a rainforest with lightning rods on our backs, and it wasn't like we could just set them down somewhere and come back later!"

"Wait, hold on, 'lightning dragon'?!" Ron repeated. "You were in a rainforest? With a dragon?"

The Harrys nodded with varying degrees of exhaustion.

"I'll explain," Harry volunteered, raising his hand. "Or try to, anyway. So, after we woke up on Outset…"

They didn't make it to the Hospital Wing for another half-hour.

Ten minutes into the Harrys being fussed over by Madam Pomfrey, Ron was still trying to come to terms with everything his friend had been through in the short time they'd been stuck in Hyrule. Just the fact that the Harrys had gone to a tropical rainforest and seen a lightning dragon was making his head spin. What was a rainforest even like?

Remembering what Harry had said about coming across that overrun town and those half-eaten Zoras in the lake made him sober up, though. The monsters here were strong enough that even professional warriors had trouble defeating them without taking heavy losses. He closed his eyes, grimacing at the memory of Blue going down in a spray of blood after the mind-controlled Deku Queen raked her vines across his torso. What would have happened if she hadn't been affected by the magical atmosphere around Hogwarts? Would Blue have been fully cut in two?

He shook his head to banish the thought. Now wasn't the time for "woe is us" thinking. Especially since it was so very tempting to fall into.

Ron rested his chin on his hand and gave the opposite wall a glum stare. He wanted to support Harry, because he was the first friend Ron had ever had who didn't make fun of him for being poor or find it odd that he had so many siblings, but he honestly didn't know what to do. The Harrys had been sent on an impossible quest to search an entire country for five buildings designed not to be found. On top of that, the Harrys would have to find a way to escape Hogwarts and get back on the road without the teachers catching them every time they went to find a new temple. Ron doubted there was anything that could convince the staff to let four third-years step out of the castle to wander the monster-ridden countryside of an entirely alien foreign country in search of ancient hidden treasure. No amount of explaining that Harry's magic sword was the only way back home would get them to budge, he was certain.

Having adult supervision was just the worst sometimes.

Hermione returned from the other side of the Hospital Wing, where she'd been poking her head through the curtains of various beds while the nurse's back was turned. Pretty rude, if you asked Ron, but Hermione only had manners when she was talking to an adult or doing her best not to hurt Malfoy's tender pureblood feelings.

"Professor Lupin is here, along with Professor Flitwick and what looks like every house elf on staff," Hermione reported in an undertone. "She's packed the poor elves three to a bed, since there are so many. I know they were mentioned in Hogwarts, A History, but I didn't expect them to be so small."

Ron jerked up straight. There were sick house elves? Weasleys didn't keep servants as a general rule, but he had heard about the hearty constitutions of those magical creatures. While it was easy for them to get alcohol poisoning, they had few other weaknesses. He'd never heard of one taking ill without being severely mistreated first. "How did the elves get sick?" he asked.

"Madam Pomfrey said it must have to do with the magic of this place. The only thing for it is to keep them hydrated and hope they acclimatize," Hermione fretted.

Peering down the line of curtained beds, Ron wondered, "Are Flitwick and Lupin here for the same reason?"

"That…" A strange look came over Hermione's face. "That might be it, actually," she said. "Madam Pomfrey wouldn't tell me anything, but they're both unconscious and sweating buckets. It seems to me like they have the same mysterious fever as the house elves, but a lot worse. Likely because their human constitutions are more fragile than the magical side making them ill." She turned to give a cot on the other side of the ward a narrow-eyed considering look. "I understand why Professor Flitwick would be here, given the situation with the elves, but why Professor Lupin? And shouldn't Hagrid be here, if it's affecting people who are part magical creature? Hmm."

"What?"

"Nothing. For now. I'm going to have to ask Luna if she's seen Hagrid in the Lost Woods. And check my calendar for the last few months."

"What?"

Hermione just continued staring shrewdly across the room.

Ron rolled his eyes. "Fine. Be vague and mysterious, then." He sat back in his chair, making his back creak as he rose from his slouch. "Look, I still think Black is a nutter and you're almost as bad for believing him, but we've got worse things to worry about," Ron said. He held out his hand. "Truce? Because we have some thinking to do."

She pursed her lips, then shook his hand. "A person's mental health has nothing to do with their ability to tell the truth," she said sternly, "but I'll agree to a truce. What did you have in mind?"

They stepped out of the Hospital Wing to conduct a discussion in low tones.

"Well, for one, we've got to figure out the whole temple situation," Ron said. "I want to make sure the Harrys don't get themselves killed while they're staggering from that shared-pain thing, but I have no idea how we'll sneak six people out of Hogwarts every time we want to find a temple."

"Seven, counting Malfoy," she corrected. "I don't think it'll be as difficult as you're imagining, though. If we escaped from the castle and managed to find a way out of the lake basin, there's little the teachers could do to stop us. We could stay out as long as we need to."

Ron gave her a slow blink. "You just want us to run out? On the teachers? What about getting to class? Or…Or getting food? How are we supposed to eat on the road—steal from the kitchens first?"

"If need be, yes," she said with a shrug. "I've told Professor Dumbledore everything we know about Hyrule and he must understand that Harry's the only one who can fix this mess. Surely he'd forgive us stealing some food to stay alive while helping Harry save the world." She crossed her arms, looking down at her toes. "As for class…It pains me to say this, but we probably won't have any classes at all. Not for a while, and certainly not anything on the normal curriculum."

Ron's mouth fell open. Here was Hermione, the most obsessive student he knew, expressing doubt in her beloved school. He never would have thought he'd see the day! "Wh-What makes you say that?" he asked hoarsely.

"Well, normal magic mostly doesn't work. That knocks Charms and Transfiguration out of the running. Probably Divination, too, as useless as that already is," Hermione began. "We're in another world with different flora and fauna, so Herbology, Care for Magical Creatures, and Potions won't be happening. The stars may be different here, so I doubt Astronomy will pick back up for a while. Strictly book-taught subjects like Ancient Runes and Arithmancy will be fine, but I haven't seen a single ghost since we've arrived here, so I doubt History of Magic will be getting taught unless there's a substitute."

"Thank Merlin for that," Ron muttered.

"And, I'd be surprised if the teachers aren't called upon to do other kinds of work soon. The castle needs money for food, and the only way to earn that is to do community outreach and develop a reputation. We need to make ourselves known as people who can help and people who need help," she continued. "With all the teachers running around to keep this place financially afloat, no one will have the time to keep classes going."

"But then what will everyone else do?" Ron wondered. The point of being at school was to do school-related things. He had a hard time imagining being at Hogwarts, not being on winter vacation, and still not having schoolwork. How would the five-hundred-something kids stuck in the castle handle all that boredom? They needed something to occupy their time.

"If it were up to me, I'd put out sign-up sheets so students could leave the castle with an adult chaperone and slay monsters or find rare artifacts to help earn money for the school. I'm sure all the people who have been forming adventure teams would be excited to put their hard-won skills to use," Hermione said. "Of course, that would only be once I've put together a Hylian phrasebook and taught everyone how to enchant a staff."

Ron shook his head at Hermione's ambition. Coming up with a whole phrasebook for a language she didn't speak a word of? Tutoring the entire population of Hogwarts in a style of magic she'd only just begun learning? She was going to work herself to the point of a heart-attack within a week! "Teach everyone how to…Hermione, you said making that silly stick took four hours of spellcasting!" he pointed out. "

Neville can't make a basic potion without it trying to kill him and people like Lavender are always too busy talking in class to pay attention. There's no way you're going to be able to teach them a one-hour chant, let alone four."

"It isn't that difficult. All I had to do was read what Zelda wrote and speak the words with the right rhythms," Hermione argued. "She knows a great many chants and songs, even though enchanting wasn't her specific field of study. I'm sure there's a way to start small and work our way up." She squared her shoulders with a hard glint in her eyes that made Ron preemptively groan. "In fact, I'm going to start coming up with a lesson plan right now! Come on, I'm sure I'll be able to use your input for something." She seized Ron by the wrist and towed him back to Gryffindor Tower. He just sighed and let himself be swept up in the wake of Hurricane Hermione.

Luna studied the man who had gone from being a nightmarish moving portrait on a wanted poster to being the reluctant adult supervisor of thirty-two children within the span of a few days. Sirius Black was tense when he slept, and occasionally switched between dog and human form. It was as though his magic wasn't sure which one he should be. Maybe that meant he was equally both.

She wasn't sure what to make of him quite yet. He seemed like a decent man, but there was a certain grayness about him. Had they been back home, she would have been able to see what creatures collected near him and made a judgment based on that. Here, though, where the magic and spirits were different, she'd have to depend on other lines of observation.

Mr. Black was innocent of what he'd been accused of. She was sure of that much. His story was too wild not to be true; she'd learned from her father that the less likely a story sounded, the more likely it was to be based in fact. After all, no one wanted to sound like a foolish liar for making up an especially implausible falsehood. That would just be silly.

As for his character…She could tell he cared about her classmates. If he didn't, he would have left them by now. He was the least affected by the forest and current environmental conditions out of any of them; there was a decent chance he could successfully set out on his own as a free man roaming Hyrule. And yet he'd stayed, enduring the suspicious glares of her classmates, just to make sure everyone was alright.

With all that said, though, Luna could sense a level of darkness in his aura. He was a good person at heart, but she didn't doubt there were some lengths he'd be willing to go to that definitely weren't good. It was one of those many feelings she had that she couldn't explain.

'What will he do once he catches up to Peter Pettigrew?' she wondered. Mr. Black had insisted fervently to the Head Girl that his only goal was to have his record cleared of the crimes he'd been framed for. Luna wanted to believe it, but she doubted he would stop there. The manic brightness that flashed in his eyes at the mention of Pettigrew told her he sought more than just exoneration, even though Tomoko didn't seem to notice it.

She envisioned the man in his Animagus form with a rat in his mouth, whipping it around like a feral dog would its prey.

Luna shuddered. Mr. Black was a person to keep an eye on, certainly. She trusted him so far with the lives of her classmates, but Peter Pettigrew? Luna could imagine the man doing a great many terrible things to his former friend if anyone made the mistake of leaving them in a room together. If she remembered later, she'd warn Tomoko about that.

Looking out the window, she observed the lack of a moon. The night sky was an expanse of black with occasional slips of red. Ash had started falling that afternoon and the air had quickly started turning strange. Luna and many of the other students had spent much of that day coughing and wheezing as their throats burned and lungs ached. The Deku Scrubs, who had centuries of experience with the fallout of Death Mountain's dark moods, had quickly shuttled the resident humans into the guesthouse with assurances that the Deku Tree would do something about the air soon.

As soon as the ash had begun raining on the forest, Mr. Black had pushed Tomoko to round up volunteers to make masks. He'd declared that he had enough experience with the fallout of Fiendfyre to have learned the dangers of smoke inhalation. Tomoko had been reluctant to take advice from a criminal, but after some kids had started coughing, she'd realized he wasn't just trying to hassle her. Several sets of sacrificed spare robes later, everyone now had a bandanna-style mask to protect them against the worst of the ash.

Another point toward Mr. Black's good character. If he were more selfish, he would have simply fashioned a bandanna for himself and skipped the bother of arguing with the notoriously combative Head Girl.

The man lying on the twisted pile of woolen blankets by the window shivered and turned back into a dog. Luna leaned down and ruffled him between the ears. He whined in his sleep and she hummed in thought. Was he dreaming of the troubled Slytherin boy now left on his own all the way back in the castle? Luna wasn't certain of what had happened to Malfoy, but she'd seen the number of Wrackspurts trailing behind him. Mr. Black, as Dog, had been the one keeping the brain-fogging creatures at bay with his positive canine thoughts.

She rubbed at her burning eyes and used a gardening spell her father had taught her to wet down the drying bandana protecting her nose and mouth. Whatever Malfoy was going through, he definitely didn't need this on top of it. Luna knew very little about volcanoes, other than their tendency to explode and spout rivers of liquid fire. The fact that they also turned the air to itchy poison had come as a surprise.

Luna picked up the thick tome lying in front of her and opened it on her lap. "Has Harry gotten your message about the volcano yet?" she asked.

"No, not yet. He fell deeply asleep before Hermione could pass it along. His stay in Hyrule has been a trying experience, from what I've heard," Zelda said. "I'll do my best to make sure he hears about Death Mountain's eruption in the morning."

"But not before breakfast," Luna intoned. "Bad news should never come before breakfast. It can leave you riddled with Wrackspurts for the rest of the day."

"Yes, that sounds like a wise policy to follow. Tell me, what are these 'Wrackspurts' again?"

Luna smiled. She loved being asked about her interests. She spoke to Zelda until she ran out of words and curled up on the folded blanket beside the window, dreaming of home.

Notes:

-Dumbledore is in full Chess-Player Mode, but he's doing his best here. He really just wants to keep these kids as safe and well-cared-for as he can.

-Magic Rods cause healing spells to burn due to the super-charging effect they have on most wizard magic. The Magic Rod speeds up healing to the point that the flesh metabolically cooks itself a little in the process. Yes, this is to create a reason for HP mages to use Zelda potions :P

-As with my love of writing realistic human limitations, we're going to go with a little more real-world-science when it comes to any natural disasters that befall Hyrule in this story. Death Mountain is one of the mainland's most important landmarks, and something that big going off would affect the whole country to some degree.

-*MILD SPOILERS* Ron and Hermione are making plans, but won't be going with the Harrys. They'll have important roles to play at Hogwarts, while the Harrys will mostly be adventuring on their own (sometimes with a tag-along in the Overworld, but just their quartet in dungeons).*END SPOILERS*

IMPORTANT FIC NEWS: I've become uncomfortably aware that my verbose writing style lends itself to a bonkers word-count, so in the interest of keeping this story under 2 million words I've cut the number of dungeons in Quest II down to five, with a bonus final boss level that rounds the total level count for this fic out to 10. This change was done to make room for side-exploration and longer dungeon arcs that emulate the levels before temples in Four Swords Adventures. It will also slightly boost the amount of strength the Four Sword regains with each Sacred Maiden power crystal that the Harrys find. I'll integrate elements of those cut dungeons into other things, so you won't even miss 'em, I promise. I'm putting out this PSA in case the level count comes up later and people who have been reading up to this date are confused. The main edit concerning this has been made to Chapter 48, dated [4/12/2022].