A/N: Keep a lookout for numbers like these: [1], [2], [3]. When you find one, feel free to scroll down to the "Special Notes" section of that particular analysis (just below "Weaknesses") to find out what more there is to be said about the topic that was just mentioned!
A/N2: Welcome to Season 3! We've got some wild ones coming up, and we're starting with one of the coolest. To me, anyway. So, um, remember how my last Link fight was 27k words long with a 9k word battle? Yeah… this is 32k words long with a 10k word battle.
I'm sorry. I will do my best to not make these nearly as long in the future, but it does seem kind of fitting here, right? It's the Season Premier, and a direct replacement for a Season Finale, and is the first new chapter in years. Plus, it's one of only three matchups I actually picked for myself this season, so… please forgive this self-indulgence of mine.
The good news is, with how many fan requests I'm doing this season, chances are pretty good that at least one person will like one battle.
Well, this thing is 100 Pages long on Google Docs, so maybe we should just get started.
Welcome, everyone, to:
Episode 20: Aloy (Horizon Zero Dawn) VS Link (The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild)
LZ: When a robot army destroys civilization and humanity is left squandering in the wilderness, we all will hope for a hero to rise up and protect us from the post-apocalyptic evil.
TWO: And who better than legendary heroes of the old world, reborn as our new champions to explore a massive open world, fight giant monsters, and kill the demons controlling the robots?
LZ: Aloy, the Savior of Meridian.
TWO: And Link, the Hero of the Wild.
LZ: For this bout, both characters are at their maximum in-game potential, meaning highest numbers, levels, and material amounts across the board within the confines of the lore. Being open-world adventure games, there are specific playstyles players will stick to and must make take priority in terms of, say, valor surges or weapon slots. Not so here. They are everything they ever can be.
TWO: Oh, and this is exclusively the Link from the era of the Wild. That means all the stuff from Breath of the Wild, Tears of the Kingdom, and Age of Calamity, but nothing else. All the other Links are kinda the same guy born in different situations, but this one's pretty unique. Of course, Aloy is Aloy is Aloy is Aloy.
LZ: I'm LittleZbot, and it's my hobby to analyze their weapons, armor, and skills to find out who would win a Death Battle.
…
Aloy
LZ: In just a few decades, life will be pretty good. Not perfect, there'll be corrupt politicians and chintzy Vegas scams as always, but we'll have crazy-advanced science stuff, like, Star Trek levels of science stuff, including holograms, spaceships, replicated food, advanced artificial intelligence software, and our very own Tony Stark: Ted Faro, an egomaniac brilliant inventor who, despite some psychological disabilities, made it his primary goal to help humanity through the big picture.
TWO: Until the second game, when they made him a literal psychopath for no understandable reason.
LZ: Hush. Ted Faro invented a line of powerful military drones, the Chariots, to fight wars on humanity's behalf. Built with metals from outer space, these machines could convert biomass into sustainable fuel in emergencies, self-replicate, hack into any other machine while being unhackable themselves, make their own in-field emergency decisions, and each individually had more firepower than the entire weapons stockpile of most countries.
TWO: Wow, that might just be the absolute hardest anybody has ever set up for a machine apocalypse. Did the Terminator movies not exist in this timeline? Well, surprise, surprise, the machines turned evil. A "glitch" caused a group of them to start rapidly self-replicating and attacking anything that approached, and humanity figured out pretty quickly that we were absolutely screwed. So Faro put together a group of scientists, CEOs, and World Leaders to figure out absolutely any possible way to get out of this situation alive. Kind of like the Avengers, but if the founding members were Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk.
LZ: In the words of Dr. Leonard Church: "When faced with extinction, every alternative is preferable." They thus launched a bunch of projects to help humanity survive. A space-faring ark to make a new Earth somewhere else, massive underground bunkers with unlimited power and centuries of resources, and the one that actually worked, Project Zero Dawn. Headed by the best scientist on the planet, Elisabet Sobeck, Zero Dawn was a group of scientists that would develop an artificial terraforming system based on a hyper-intelligent AI. It would work for centuries to brute force its way into hacking Faro's robots, and once accomplished, would re-seed and recreate life on Earth, including new humans, with its own robots. These robots would be guided by artificial intelligence, would be capable of consuming natural resources to sustain themselves, and had expansive defensive measures in case they were under threat of destruction.
TWO: Did… did they just-
LZ: Make the exact same mistake twice in a row under the same parameters while still fighting the extinction-level consequences of the last time they did this? Yes. Yes they did.
TWO: Then why is Sobeck revered as basically a god by all the main characters?
LZ: Because Forbidden West is a poorly-written story.
TWO: Oooh, the Z-bot's up in here with the room-temperature takes! You do know that this show is supposed to be a celebration of the characters, right?
LZ: Well, I, well, uh, hey, it's still one of my favorite games of all time-
TWO: Nope, too late. Now if Aloy loses, it's all your fault.
LZ: Ugh, whatever. The AI guiding the terraforming process, Gaia, would create new humans a few hundred years after the planet was restored, reborn and fit to survive a harsher land filled with remnants of the Old World. These humans would form their own tribes and cultures and, over the generations, forget about Gaia and the lessons they were taught. It was a true fresh start for all.
TWO: Until an alien collection of digital souls based on the ark-bound humans of Sirius One… oookay… decided to shoot a signal at Gaia that gave her subroutines sentience! Cool!
LZ: Keep reading.
TWO: …annnnd a desire to destroy all of humanity. Well. Less cool.
LZ: One of the subroutines, Hades, was originally programmed for the purpose of restarting the terraforming process in case something went wrong, and so had all the tools he needed to kill everything that lives. To stop him, Gaia self-destructed, scattering her subroutines to whatever large-storage computers they could find.
TWO: Because that's totally how data transferal works.
LZ: But it didn't stop Hades. Posing as the god of the Shadow Carja, one of those tribes of people, he dug up the machines of old and corrupted the machines of new, giving humanity another war. Their hope lay with a single person: Aloy.
TWO: Jeez, it took forever and a half to get to this point. But hey, par for the course with this series.
LZ: Because she was "born from the mountain", AKA made by machines the tribe thought were spirits, Aloy was branded an outcast of the Nora tribe, and raised in the wilds by the Death-Seeker Rost. Determined to rejoin the tribe, the flame-haired girl spent her entire childhood training under Rost to be the greatest warrior the tribe had ever seen. She would win the warrior contest of The Proving, and gain the favor of the Nora leaders.
TWO: Things… didn't go as planned. Oh, she entered The Proving and kicked everyone's butts, sure, but there was a trap at the end. Shadow Carja ambushed the trainees with Old World technology, and killed everyone. Aloy was the only one who lived to tell the tale, and even then only because Rost sacrificed himself to save her.
LZ: So, after losing her foster father, having the very few friends she did make mercilessly slaughtered, immediately afterwards being attacked by a bunch of hostile machines, and surviving falling off a mountain, Aloy was pretty pissed. She was determined to go to the capital city of Meridian, hunt down the Shadow Carja, find out what in the world was going on, and defeat whoever she needed to to fix things. And after being accepted by the Nora and granted the political title of "Seeker," she did exactly that. The path wouldn't be easy, laden by scheming assassins, malevolent AI, and killer robot dinosaurs, but she didn't train all her life for nothing, and now she had the tools to see her job through.
TWO: Finally, we're through with the backstory and into the stuff that matters! Aloy has the standard physique you should expect from Death Battle combatants by now, super strength, speed, durability, and stamina. She can fight for days on end without food, water, or sleep (it does catch up to her eventually, though), survive being smacked in the head with boulders the size of buildings, roll out of explosions, and knock over mechanical monstrosities several times her size. Huh, that's weird. She is supposed to be a regular human, right?
LZ: Regular Human means something very different in a thousand years. Even the humans of Faro and Sobeck's time would be superhuman by our terms, what with shrugging off the weight of dozens of tons of rubble and surviving being impaled with exploding spikes, but the recreated ones from Gaia are even more so. A trained soldier can pull around a robot elephant, a Tenakth Martial can tear through spaceship steel with his bare hands, and a member of the Hunter's Lodge can dodge electric burst wave attacks from a Shellsnapper. And Aloy's matched and outmatched all of the above plenty of times.
TWO: Oh, so that's why she looks like she's in her thirties even though she was only nineteen!
LZ: Um… maybe?
TWO: She might have only started her journey with a wooden spear and a makeshift bow, but, over her time exploring the world, that arsenal has been upgraded significantly. And even though this world might be sort of reclaimed-by-nature post-apocalyptic with a sci-fi-flavored squeeze of lemon, these weapons can feel straight out of a D&D campaign! Bows, slings, explosive tripwires, plenty of stuff to take down the heaviest and most dangerous robot dinosaurs about. She has dozens of versions of these weapons, though they usually vary in strength and have different elemental abilities. Plasma ones that wreck the body from the inside out, purgewater ones that disable elemental abilities but enhance Aloy's, adhesives that cover foes in thick sap-like goo that makes moving around way harder, plus plenty more.
LZ: Throughout her adventures, Aloy has taken several legendary weapons-
TWO: Just know that whatever we're describing when we talk about them, Aloy also has ones that do fire, freezing, shock, acid, explosions, and all the other stuff I talked about before.
LZ: …Right. Anyway, she's claimed the bow known as the Tears of the Land-god, which, befitting its name, is incredibly powerful, capable of piercing almost anything. Iriv's Downfall is a Sharpshot Bow, a weapon previously used by warrior kings. It can strike further and harder than any other bow, with a longer draw time. On the opposite end of the bow spectrum is the shortbow, the Eye of the Storm.
TWO: Woah, that name's amazing! What does it do, make hurricanes that destroy islands or something?!
LZ: Er, no. This pseudo-crossbow is meant exclusively for close-quarters combat to be mixed in with melee attacks.
TWO: What? Really? Geez, I'm going to have to do a big calc for how disappointed-
LZ: It also shoots arrows that harness the elements of the storm, disorienting or freezing or electrocuting enemies.
TWO: Mmm, well, that's okay, I guess.
LZ: The Tinker's Pride can shoot and lay down explosive tripwires that will send anyone who triggers them to the afterlife, or it can lay shielding wires. If the two wires are able to connect, a hard-light forcefield that blocks projectiles and explosions will pop up between them.
TWO: She wields the Skyhammer, which you'd think would be some kind of awesome Mjolnir ripoff, but nope. It's a slingshot.
LZ: A legendary slingshot that "strikes like a storm" and can level entire battlefields with its fire or frost effects, though! And if you want a sling for bombs that are, well, just bombs, The Legacy's Reach is for you. Some of the bombs even split into a bunch of bombs right before they hit!
TWO: Keeping on the trend of crazy-awesome names for weapons you would never think have that name, The Final Chapter is a Shredder Gauntlet, an arm band that throws buzzsaws that lodge into foes and tear into them before returning to Aloy's hand. Okay, that one gets a pass, that's pretty sick.
LZ: The Skykiller launches explosive spikes into foes. Spikes is a generous term; they're more like battleship bolts of metal. These "spikes" are sharp enough and launched hard enough to pierce even the toughest machines and armors-
TWO: And a few seconds later, you couldn't scrape what remains off the sidewalk! But the best of 'em is the Brawlbreaker, a heavy tribal machine gun that launches shrapnel so hard and fast, the game itself says "Nothing ends a fight like this"! Sure, it takes forever to reload and you're kind of stuck standing still while shooting, but after the guy in front of you finishes taking almost two hundred armor-melting bolts of death, which can also explode, mind you, I don't think they'll be alive to care.
LZ: You're really going to call that "the best of 'em" when the Stormslinger exists?[1] A hand cannon that shoots electric charges that ignore armor plating, so powerful that just using it for too long can kill you? And what about the Icerail, the frost-spewing gust-bellows that turns whatever's in front of it into an ice sculpture? Or the Forgefire, a literal flamethrower with flames that overpower blizzards and can melt through futuristic supermetals?
TWO: I mean, yeah. It's an armor-piercing machine gun. Flamethrowers are cool and all, but what's supposed to beat that?
LZ: I'd say the Tearblaster. By creating a concentrated burst of compressed air upon impact, this weapon tears apart armor, knocks weapons out of hands, and rips off machine components effortlessly. You want to stand there and fire your machine gun without moving? Yeah, you better have knocked the other guy's sword out of their hand first!
TWO: Puh-shaw. You want to shoot to disarm, you go ahead, but when I take my shot, I finish the fight.
LZ: Speaking of, Aloy does have one more weapon she stole from future alien warriors: The Specter Gauntlet.
TWO: What did you just say about fut-
LZ: This futuristic gun encases a hand and fires bolts of compressed metal that tear though most armor. By tagging an enemy with a special tracking bullet, all future shots taken will home in on said enemy. And if she switches to Railgun mode, the gun charges for a few seconds before unleashing a powerful blast that can kill most regular machines in one hit. Just make sure you're aimed at an opening in the armor for maximum carnage.
TWO: Speaking of, Aloy (and a bunch of other warriors apparently) learned how to temporarily slow down their perception of time to land more accurate shots.[2] Aloy's proven herself able to shoot mechanical bits as small as the head of a nail from a city block away, so I wouldn't rely on any armor with any kind of exposed point if I were you.
LZ: With years of training under her belt, Aloy's also patented some more unique skills with her weapons, like notching and shooting three arrows at once, firing projectiles into the air to land on opponents a few seconds later, having her explosive spikes split into more explosive spikes before impact, making bouncy or sticky bombs, or shooting an arrow that detonates when she hits it with a melee attack.
TWO: She compliments this impressive arsenal with a variety of extra tools and resources. Healing Smoke Bombs for quick getaways, motion-sensitive traps of all kinds she can set up around the battlefield, a Pullcaster that works like a Zelda-style hookshot, a Ropecaster that can tie down machines or attach canisters to them that Aloy can then shoot to blow up, a diving mask that lets her breathe underwater indefinitely, and the Shieldwing. Formed from the remnants of a futuristic hard-light shield, the Shieldwing is, unlike what you might expect, a glider. Aloy might've survived falling off a mountain before, but now she doesn't have to worry about anything like that. She can drift down as slowly as she wants. It can be deployed in an instant, and it doesn't matter if you fell from space and only deploy it a second before hitting the ground, you're landing as softly as if you hit a bunch of pillows.
LZ: And, if things get troublesome, plenty of Medicinal Salve that can quickly heal any wound. To further aid to that effect are several large potions that can even overheal Aloy, giving her temporary hitpoints, or regenerate stamina, remove status ailments, and boost some damage. She can also eat meals to the same effect, plus a bunch more temporary buffs, like increasing her evasion, stealthiness, and automatically healing her at low health.[3]
TWO: And then there's her prized primary melee weapon, the classic Nora Spear. Aloy's been through a lot of these four-foot small spears, but her latest and greatest was given to her as a gift from the Sun-King himself. The Champion's Spear is made by combining Old World technology with New World engineering. It can cleave through machines, humans, and even alien tech, and is virtually indestructible.
LZ: It also can charge up with resonator energy, eventually coating a struck enemy with a blue aura. The next time they're hit with any kind of projectile, they'll be double-hit with a wave of concussive force. She can even attach elemental capsules to it so that her strikes will deal additional elemental damage.
TWO: Aloy's also modified it with computer attachments that let her ignite flammable materials, reroute energy, or open up any sort of old-world door or technology.
LZ: Or hack into machines and take control of them.
TWO: Oh, yeah. Aloy spent her entire life learning how to kill the toughest robots around, but after embedding her spear with a Corruptor Override Unit and unlocking the codes from Cauldrons, she can also just sneak up on them, plug her spear in, and rewrite them to be on her side.
LZ: After upgrading to the Master Override and gaining Omega Level Clearance from Ted Faro himself, she can take over any machine you can think of, including Hephaestus, an AI that controlled a global network of machine-producing Cauldrons. Once she had an opening, just plug in the spear, and boom, one free super-weapon.
TWO: These overrides last indefinitely, and Aloy has created calls that will bring an overridden machine to her side at any point, whether to fight or to escape. These include machines like robot horses and robot fire-breathing giant warthogs, which she can ride on like the motorcycle of the apocalypse, or a Sunwing. Sunwings are robot pterodactyls with plasma cannons that Aloy has learned to ride. Hm, you know, I don't think I emphasized that enough. SHE CAN CALL A ROBOT PTERODACTYL FROM THE SKY AT ANY POINT AND FLY ON IT LIKE SHE'S FROM HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON!
LZ: She also once used Hephaestus to craft and deploy a small army of overridden machines to fight a bunch of alien robots. And these weren't the small fries of robot horses and robot deer. I'm talking Clawstriders (Raptors), Tremortusks (Elephants), Scorchers (Hellhounds), and Thunderjaws (T-Rexs). Any one of those creatures in the old world could have threatened to wipe out the population of entire countries on its own. A hundred or so of them more than got the job done. But this is definitely a last-resort tactic, because doing so freed Hephaestus of this reprogramming and allowed it to escape into another network, which, being an evil AI that can craft any machine it wants to kill whoever it wants, isn't exactly a good thing.[4]
TWO: But even after all that, the spear ain't her best weapon. Nor is the flamethrower. Nor is my sweet prince, the Brawlbreaker. Her best weapon isn't a traditional weapon the way you might think of it, but make no mistake, it absolutely seals the deal on your death. Her Focus.
LZ: Not "Focus" in the emotional sense, but a literal device called a "Focus." Found by Aloy in some ancient ruins when she was a child, the Focus is a triangular device that attaches just below your temple and gives you an entirely new way of looking at the world.
TWO: It's literally referred to as "second sight."
LZ: The Focus gives you a computerized readout and understanding of everything in your surroundings. See a tree? Now you know what kind it is, what animals have lived in it, its health, how old it is, and what it can be used for. Want to follow some tracks? The Focus is better than the highest-trained trackers on the planet. It'll pick up the specific one you're looking for out of hundreds even if snow has fallen or sand has blown over them and they're covered up, and can follow the faintest trails for miles, even telling you how recent the tracks are.
TWO: Want to fight a robot dinosaur or anything else? The Focus will highlight the specific spots where their weak points are located and implant that into your vision, as well as telling you all the details, make, model, style of fighting, durability levels, and specific weaknesses of any model of the machine. Things like "if you hit this canister with shock weapons, it will cause a chain reaction and disable nearby machines" or "if you break off this part of the wing, you can pick it up and use it as a weapon for yourself." It's like having the strategy guide to life overlapping your vision every second, every day. It's as broken as Smash 4 Bayonetta.
LZ: The Focus can download and store massive amounts of data, literally absorbing entire libraries of code in a matter of seconds.
TWO: And it records every single thing you see, do, say, and hear while it's on, which is a bit iffy on the whole moral scale, sure, but it can also boot it up holographically to be manipulated like in the Iron Man movies, so, you know, worth. You saw a cool weapon and want to know how it works? Replay that memory, move things around, disassemble the weapon, put it together how you want to, have the Focus tell you exactly what you need and how to build it.[5]
LZ: Have you ever looked at a book and wanted to have the experience of having read it without actually doing so? With a Focus, just glancing at the cover of a book will enter scans of every page into your mind, translated however you want. Someone attacking through a cloud of smoke, hiding behind a locked door, or using invisibility? The Focus finds out exactly where they are and what they're doing, and can track their exact location at all points.
TWO: Want to have a big dance party? You can play any music you or anything you've scanned has ever heard and choose who gets to mentally hear the song and who doesn't. And just because it wasn't handy enough, it warns Aloy whenever she's about to be attacked and tells her the direction the attack is coming from. It even absorbs all the data from any other Focuses it scans, including all of that person's memories! It's a cheat code to life! Seriously, this thing is busted!
LZ: Speaking of busted, if the Focus ever does break, Aloy has some dozens more that have all the data of the original to immediately replace it. It's actually thanks to Aloy having such a dangerous piece of technology that Hades called for the death of everyone in the Proving in the first place. Well, that, and because, plot twist… Aloy is Elisabet Sobeck's reincarnation!
TWO: …What?
LZ: Okay, it's not quite THAT dumb. As Gaia realized she needed to destroy herself, she also understood that Hades would only be delayed, and the world still needed a terraforming system or the whole planet would eventually collapse. So she used the machines that rebirthed humanity to make a genetic duplicate of Sobeck, in hopes that she would eventually repeat what she did a thousand years ago.
TWO: Well… that didn't quite work out how she hoped it would, did it?
LZ: Well, it kind of did. It just… took a while. Through her Focus and skills as a hunter, Aloy learned about Hades and the Gaia of the old world. She learned who she was and what her purpose was, and armed with a new, powerful motivation, set out to stop Hades. She united the tribes under a temporary alliance, killed a ton of Faro's old machines, and, with a lot of planning, some outside interference, and a boatload of weapons, managed to take down the Shadow Carja and end the threat of Hades once and for all. It was this that earned her the title she'd be known by for the rest of her life: the Savior of Meridian.
TWO: But her journey didn't stop there. She ventured out into the Forbidden West to seek a Gaia backup and to collect her subroutines. All the while handling more dangerous mechanical menaces than ever before, a tribe of rebel warriors with Old Ones tech that wanted her dead, and an alien invasion via the Far Zeniths. Wait, what?
LZ: Just don't question it.[6] Aloy proved she more than had what it took to live up to Sobeck's legacy. She's conquered foes both man and mechanical, from the Rebel leader Regalla to legendary monsters like Redmaw and The Claws Beneath. She's wiped out the Sons of Prometheus, been labeled the greatest machine hunter in the world, and proven herself in the Arena of the Tenakth, defeating all foes put before her.
TWO: Not to mention that, being the reborn best scientist ever, she's super smart. She's come up with plans of attack in moments, invented new pieces of technology to solve unforeseen problems, and can apply those brains in combat just as easily. Like when she was captured by the Shadow Carja, stripped of weapons and armor, and they tried to feed her to a Corrupted Behemoth. Instead, she lured the Behemoth into breaking the pillars of the structure around her, getting her stuff back and killing it with ease. I mean, come on, we haven't even talked about her Valor Surges yet!
LZ: I just didn't want to overwhelm them with too much information too quickly! Ahem, Aloy can use special techniques known as Valor Surges in battle, though they take enough mechanical energy where she typically can only use them once per fight.
TWO: These are mostly temporary buffs, like powering up her Focus to get higher crits or attaching a power module to her spear to make it hit like a truck and always have that resonator energy. Increasing elemental abilities, doing more ranged damage, radial blasts that hurt or turn people against each other for a bit, and she can even cloak herself in light-bending camouflage. There's a visual distortion, sure, but unless you're somehow able to constantly keep your eyes trained on her, it's effectively invisibility. Oh, did we forget to mention Aloy is a master of stealth and enjoys Metal Gear-ing every human enemy camp she can? Because she is and does. These surges all can last anywhere from thirty seconds to over three minutes, and actually can be a big deciding factor in a fight, especially when they let her bowl down the largest machines like a trash can. Not that she needs a buff to do crazy physical feats anyway.
LZ: She's tracked and manipulated energy as it traveled through wires. In order to even run on an electrical circuit, energy must have speeds equivalent to light, and while traveling along those wires definitely slows it down, that's still reacting to something moving at Mach 1000! But while that creates a possibility of light-speed reactions, that possibility jumps up way higher with some of her other feats. She's reacted to laser-guided energy blasts from a Thunderjaw and plasma laser beams from Slaughterspines, avoided attacks from Grimhorns and Behemoths that employ magnetism, and she can even react to blinding flash attacks from enemies like Clamberjaws, which are literal bursts of light. Oh, and, in the story, she can track data transfers between locations that should move at the speed of light. So, yeah, there's a fair bit of evidence pointing to this.
TWO: Well… crap. It does connect with the Zeniths using hard-light tech before it can finish forming, though, and another Sobeck clone, Beta, could keep up with the processing power of a weakened Gaia shell, which sounds less impressive than it is, 'cuz that shell could still track and calculate objects and signals moving at light-speed. Plus, it's hardly the only crazy superhuman thing about her. She's waded through lava and molten steel without any serious injury and survived being poisoned, frozen solid, struck by lightning, and being coated in acid that melted through metal plating. She also endured the pressure of a coiled Slitherfang. That's at least 8800 Metric Tons of Force, probably way more given feats by other powerful machines.
LZ: She once was propping open a piece of junk on a massive pile of machine wreckage that was blocking a waterfall, and then the whole thing blew up on top of her, clearing the wreckage thoroughly enough that there was hardly a trace of it left. And she was totally fine!
TWO: And those machines she fights are crazy strong. In Burning Shores, a single Stormbird created a local thunderstorm surrounding a tiny island! The clouds here are huge, and Aloy could both fly through the lightning clouds on her Sunwing and kill the bird that did it, no problemo!
LZ: The storm is actually deceptively small compared to the thunderstorms you or I are used to. If it were formed through wind and movement, the energy required to form it would only be a few hundred Tons of TNT. However, that's not the case; the Stormbird directly gathered energy to create this storm, and when it died, the storm dissipated completely in under five seconds. The amount of sheer energy needed to MAKE this thunderstorm is, at minimum, 269.7 Kilotons of TNT! That's eighteen times the explosive power of the nuclear warhead dropped on Hiroshima. And, naturally, Stormbirds would be channeling this same energy through their weaponry.
TWO: One time, she scanned some barrels full of the explosive component "Blaze" and calculated that there was enough explosive power to level half a city. Then she blew them up while she was right next to them, and guess what? Totally fine. That's not even the half of it, she was in the middle of an entire ROOM of Blaze when it exploded and somehow survived. In Forbidden West, she ran into a similar pile of the stuff, and called it powerful enough to blast open a mountain!
LZ: Which sounds like hyperbole, sure… except that it's not. Tracking by the amount of barrels and the size of them compared to the ones that could destroy half a city, she's right. And she has other feats that imply greater levels, like breaking an energy flow that was erupting the Yellowstone Caldera, and defeating Specter Prime, an exoframe developed as the ultimate combat machine by people who had previously helped develop machines capable of terraforming planets!
TWO: Oh, and there's the little detail of a Behemoth being able to destroy mountains.
LZ: And no, we're not talking about that somewhat-vague quote in Zero Dawn that others have discussed and dismissed. We're talking about in Forbidden West, when an Aloy who has spent months of her life studying these things and has a supercomputer in her brain that tells her everything she could ever want to know about how these machines function, outright says, and I quote directly from the game: "A Behemoth could bring down a mountain if it wanted to."[7]
TWO: Considering the crazy level of power Faro's machines had, how a more advanced humanity than us could barely bring down a few of them, and we actually have stories and see evidence of other machines having broken mountains, it really isn't as crazy as it sounds. And a Behemoth is nowhere near the top of the totem pole of combat machines Aloy fought and beat the crap out of! They'd lose a dozen times over to a Thunderjaw or Fireclaw!
LZ: Or a Horus. These massive machines are heavily armored spider-like juggernauts that we actually see breaking through and crumbling mountains. The amount of energy they command allows them to build things like spaceships or Corruptors, rain barrages of missiles on their enemies, and explode the ground around them with energy waves. These are the monsters that were sent to conquer entire countries, and even Hades himself took the body of one as a display of power.
TWO: So, needless to say, the Horus is pretty nutty. But so was the Far Zenith Walter Londra, who activated one and used it to fight Aloy. And she won. Breaking its defenses, overheating its coolers, taking full hits from its giant tentacle hands, even crawling into its insides and destroying the power source Londra built. Not even a machine that could single-handedly remake the apocalypse was enough to kill this redhead!
LZ: And remember that energy flow that was going to erupt the entire Yellowstone Caldera? Aloy broke it by sending in alternative programming with her spear, but, in the process, the energy ended up backfiring through her body before dissipating. Her being able to stand up after that is…insane. We don't know all the specifics of how the Caldera was to be erupted. However, if the energy were supplied directly to overrun it, it could possibly reach over 17.5 Gigatons of TNT!
TWO: She's both tanking this force and hitting back just as hard. Geez, no wonder she wins just about every fight she finds herself in, even when she's super outnumbered and facing snipers and other crazy folks. And all this durability is without taking her armor into account.
LZ: She has dozens of armor sets that each provide various defenses and passive buffs, from increased healing to silencing footsteps to some elemental resistance. She does, however, have to manually take them off and put them on, which means she generally only gets one per battle. But if you have to pick one, then without a doubt, you pick the Ultraweave Mk7.1. AKA… the Shield-Weaver armor.[8]
TWO: Salvaged from an ancient underground facility, this armor is made of nanofiber and coats Aloy's body in a constant skin-tight forcefield. While this field is active, even the attacks of a Thunderjaw, arguably the most powerful robot dinosaur around besides the Horus, have no effect. This field is so good, it practically makes all her other armor sets pointless. Why take less damage from fire when you can just stand in a volcano and laugh?!
LZ: Not too dissimilar to the forcefields of the Far Zenith, which rendered them practically unbeatable, even by someone as strong as Aloy.
TWO: This one ain't perfect, though. Like a Halo Overshield, too much damage too quickly and it shorts out, leaving Aloy vulnerable. Not vulnerable for long, mind you, only about twelve seconds, but a lot can happen in twelve seconds.
LZ: It would have to be a lot of damage, though, seeing as the same technology could keep the original Faro Plague from entering bunkers and hurting those with similar armor, and that plague, as we've already talked about, manhandled mountains like plastic.
TWO: With all this, it's hard to see how she could lose to, well, anyone in the same power tier. Her only real combat weakness is that she can be outsmarted, though they'd have to be crazy good to outsmart her, and, if she loses her equipment, well, that's all she's got. Superhuman or not, she's no bare-fisted martial artist.
LZ: Though it should be mentioned that she is considered one of the best melee fighters in the world with her spear. After winning every challenge in every Melee Pit in Tenakth territory, she was allowed the honor of dueling the best warrior the Tenakth had to offer in a Spear VS Spear test of skill: The Enduring. And although the fight was tough, in the end, Aloy came out on top.
TWO: There'll always be levels she can't reach, though, things she can't do. Heck, she was only able to beat the Far Zenith aliens because of tons of outside help and one of them turning traitor.
LZ: True, but she also understands that. More than anything, Aloy recognizes her own limitations and struggles. And despite that, she'll keep struggling. Even against a foe that seems unbeatable, she still stands proud, unwilling to flee. Red hair in the wind, the Savior of Meridian is ready for anything that comes her way.
In the final battle against Hades, Aloy and her many allies fight against machines, the Shadow Carja, and the false god himself. As the Shadow Carja invade the Spire, Helis, King of the Shadow Carja, drops in. He immediately cuts down two Carja guards and sets off to clear a path to the top. He is stopped in his tracks when Aloy swings down on her grappling hook, clashing spears with him. The two fight bow-to-bow and spear-to-spear before Aloy is distracted by additional Shadow Carja backup troops.
As she knocks them down one by one, Helis calls to her, voice seething. "Why do you fight? I am chosen, you come from nothing. Only endless night awaits you!"
Aloy freezes the last man solid and kicks his body off the high ledge, killing him. She jumps at Helis, and time seems to slow as she draws and fires an arrow, knocking his helmet off.
Helis fires his forgefire at her while continuing to shout. "What are you, before the terror of the Sun?"
"The one who will take you down!" Aloy replies. She bursts through the fire, Shield-Weaver Armor taking the damage for her, and knocks Helis down with a wide spear swing. As he falls, she shoots his knees with a shortbow, keeping him from getting back up.
On his knees and disarmed, Aloy's spear at his throat, Helis stares, dumbfounded. "I-Imposssible. I am chosen." He gasps for breath, his wounds bleeding profusely onto the wooden ground. "This… is not meant to be."
Aloy looks down at his blood and lowers her spear slightly. "None of this was meant to be, Helis. You made it happen."
Helis begins to choke, and Aloy does not help him. "You followed your orders, butchered so many, and for what? To die on your knees, used like a pawn by a power you don't even understand."
Helis raises his face, looking into Aloy's eyes with a disturbed, somewhat astonished, look in his eyes. "You… pity me?"
Aloy sighs. "Turn your face to the sun."
Helis stared a moment longer, then turns. He gazes upon the face of his god once more.
And Aloy pierces his throat.
He falls without a single sound. Aloy stands, gathers herself, and turns to finish her fight with the false god.
Aloy:
Name: Aloy, the Annointed
Species: Human… technically
Height: 5'6 / 168 cm
Weight: Approx. 150 lbs / 68 kg
Age: 20
Occupation: Nora Seeker, Carja Machine Hunter, Banuk Werak Chieftain, Tenakth Champion, Savior of Meridian
Genetic clone of Elisabet Sobeck
Possibly in a relationship with a Quen named Seyka, despite having zero chemistry
Apparently lost her appreciation for fine art in between games, along with most of her personality
Abilities:
Superhuman Physique
~Strength, Speed, Reaction, Durability, Stamina
Expert Spear-based Martial Arts
Genius-level Intellect
Stealth
Concentration
~Slows perception of time while aiming weapons
Lure Call
Weapon Skills
~Braced Shot
~Spike Trap
~Triple Notch
~Burst Fire
~Propelled Spike
~Spread Shot
~Melee Detonator
~Quick Wire
~Burst Dodge
~High Volley
~Triple Shredder
~Knockdown Shot
~Spread Blast
~Splitting Spike
~Sticky Bomb
~Power Shredder
~Penetrating Rope
~Focused Shot
~Sustained Burst
~Double Notch
~Bouncing Bomb
~Shredder Mine
~Ultra Shot
Valor Surges
~Toughened
~Stealth Stalker
~Chain Burst
~Powershots
~Overshield
~Radial Blast
~Elemental Fury
~Part Breaker
~Critical Boost
~Trap Specialist
~Melee Might
~Ranged Master
~Warrior's Vigor
~Trap Mines
~Hunter's Mark
~Defy Death
~Berserk Blast
~Override Overdrive
Machine Calls
~Mount Call
~Flying Mount Call
~Combat Call
Outfits:
Utaru Hardweave
Oseram Vanguard
Carja Trader
Tenakth Sky Climber
Tenakth Marauder
Banuk Werak
Nora Silent Hunter
Nora Survivor
Tenakth Marshal
Carja Behemoth Elite
Carja Stalker Elite
Tenakth Vanquisher
Utaru Harvester
Tenakth Recon
Oseram Wayfarer
Tenakth Dragoon
Carja Behemoth Trapper
Tenakth Skirmisher
Nora Brave
Oseram Artificer
Shadow Stalwart
Carja Blazon
Tenakth Reaver
Oseram Sparkworker
Tenakth Vindicator
Carja Silks
Banuk Ice Hunter
Utaru Winterweave
Tenakth High Marshal
Utaru Thresher
Utaru Protector
Sobeck's Raiment
Carja Shadow
Banuk Sickness Eater
Utaru Whisperer
Nora Protector
Tenakth Tactician
Oseram Forester
Utaru Gravesinger
Utaru Ritesinger
Oseram Arrow Breaker
Banuk Trailblazer
Nora Lookout
Carja Storm Ranger
Utaru Warden
Outcast
Oseram Explorer
Oseram Striker
Carja Wanderer
Quen Deadeye
Blacktide Quen Commander
Quen Commander
Quen Marine
Nora Lookout
Shield-Weaver
Weaves:
~Medicine Capacity
~Silent Strike +
~Silent Strike Heal
~Power Attack
~Ranged Defense
~Resonator Blast
~Valor on Impact
~Plasma Defence
~Fire Defense
~Machine Damage
~Low Health Ranged
~Trap Limit
~Silent Strike Gain
~Mounted Defense
~Purgewater Defence
~Critical Strike
~Heavy Lifter
~Skilled Salvager
~Resonator Build-Up
~Low Health Defence
~Melee Defense
~Concentration Regen
~Heavy Weapons
~Resonator Damage
~Smoke Bomb Capacity
~Frost Defence
~Shock Defense
~Quiet Spear
~Valor Surge Master
~Machine Elemental
~Low Profile
~Lasting Override
~Stamina Regen
~Weapon Stamina
~Quiet Movement
~Acid Defense
~Potion Proficiency
~Potent Medicine
~Stealth Ranged
~Elite Concentration
~Elite Deployment
~Elite Elements
~Elite Evasion
~Elite Melee
~Elite Traps
~Elite Valor
~Elite Infiltrator
~Elite Silent Strikes
~Elite Weapon Technique
~Elite Low Health Melee
~Elite Low Health Ranged
~Elite Machine Overrides
Arsenal:
Pouches/Pack
~Abnormally large
~Seemingly weighs nothing
Focus
~Personal neural network, attached via biomagnetic computer chip on temple
~Scanning, translation, x-ray vision, 360 degree vision & warning signals, data encryption and decryption, information absorption, radio, hacking, flashlight, instantaneous analyization of environment
~HUD displayed over eyesight
~Considered a form of "second sight"
Nora Spear
~Coil: +30% damage
~Handcrafted by Aloy
Sylens' Lance
~Data Transferal Unit
~Carries a constant minor electrical charge
Champion's Spear
~Old World Metal
~Visual and Auditory indicators to guide martial artists
~Resonator Blast
~Master Override
~Omega-Level Clearance
Bows
~Death-Seeker's Shadow
~The Sun Scourge
~Tears of the Land-god
~Forgefall
~Iriv's Downfall
~Carja's Bane
~Eye of the Storm
~Rain of Sparks
~The Emperor's Reign
~Gravesinger's Lament
~Adept Banuk Champion Bow
Ropecaster
~Elite Ropecaster
~Elite Canister Ropecaster
~The Tie That Binds
Boltblasters/Rattlers
~The Blast Forge
~Brawlbreaker
~Eternal Vengeance
~Adept Shadow Rattler
Blastslings
~Skyhammer
~Wings of the Ten
~Legacy's Reach
Shredder Gauntlets
~The Final Chapter
~Ancestor's Return
~Distant Thunder
Spike Throwers
~The Skykiller
~Defiance
~Last Argument
Tripcaster
~All-Mother's Blessing
~Tinker's Pride
Adept Stormslinger
Adept Forgefire
Adept Icerail
Adept Tearblaster
Specter Gauntlet
Heavy Weapons
~Unable to be stored in inventory, can be found scattered around the world
~Deathbringer Gun, Mine Launcher, Ravager Cannon, Blaze Bomb Launcher, Plasma Lancer, Dart Gun, Plasma Spine Launcher, Acid Bomb Launcher, Cluster Launcher, Plasma Cannon, Inferno Bomb Launcher, Electric Rattle, Frost Blaster, Plasma Bomb Launcher, Fire Repeater, Shock Cannon, Bomb Launcher, Disc Launcher, Acidspitter, Firespitter, Firestriker, Oseram Cannon, Pulse Cannon
Traps
~Elite Blast Trap
~Proximity Blast Trap
~Elite Acid Trap
~Elite Shock Trap
~Elite Purgewater Trap
~Elite Vertical Shock Trap
Potions
(Carries 12 of each, can craft more when running out)
~Large Health Potions
~Large Stamina Potions
~Health Boost Potions
~Full Health Potions
~Resist Fire Potions
~Resist Freeze Potions
~Resist Shock Potions
~Antidote
~Cleanse Potions
~Overdraw Potions
Food
~Land and Lake
~The Great MRE
~Land-god's Gift
~Sun-King's Delight
~Shaved Salted Haunch
~Milduf's Treat
Coils
(Max buffs for all are +25% unless otherwise specified)
~Melee Follow-Up
~Damage Over Time
~Aerial Enemy Damage
~Stealth Damage
~Impact Damage
~Critical Hit Chance
~Agility Damage
~Instant Brittle Chance 4%
~Purgewater and Frost
~Acid
~High Ground Damage
~Frost
~Reload Speed
~Explosive
~Sharpshot Tear Damage +100%
~Adhesive
~Multiple Enemy Damage
~Purgewater
~Drenched Enemy Damage 4%
~Shock
~Concentration Damage
~Close Range Damage
~Plasma
~Component Tear
~Instant Slowed Chance 4%
~Shocked Enemy Damage
~Draw Speed
~Knockdown Damage
~Overdraw Damage
~Tear Damage
~Instant Confused Chance 4%
~Burning Enemy Damage
~Instant Drenched Chance 4%
~Corroding Enemy Damage
~Instant Corroding Chance 4%
~Knockdown Power
~Fire
~Instant Burning Chance 4%
~Long-Range Damage
~Plasma and Shock
~Elite Acid
~Elite Berserk
~Elite Fire
~Elite Frost
~Elite Plasma
~Elite Purgewater
~Elite Shock
~Elite Tear
~Elite Overdraw
~Elite Knockdown
~Elite Critical Hits
~Drummer's Weapon Coil (Specialized)
~Hidebound Weapon Coil (Specialized)
~Painted Weapon Coil (Specialized)
~Pristine Weapon Coil (Specialized)
~Untested Weapon Coil (Specialized)
~Veteran's Weapon Coil (Specialized)
Healing Smoke Bombs
Drop Shields
Rocks
Golden Fast Travel Pack
Shieldwing
Hephaestus
Feats:
Defeated Redmaw, The Claws Beneath, The Vanishing Dread, Regalla, The Sons of Prometheus, Hephaestus, Erik Visser, Walter Londra, Specter Prime, The Enduring, Hades
Destroyed Thunderjaws, Scorchers, Sawtooths, Stormbirds, Dreadwings, Corruptors, Deathbringers, Tramplers, Tiderippers, Clawstriders, Bileguts, Slitherfangs, Slaughterspines, Stalkers, Tremortusks, Fireclaws, as well as Corrupted/Daemonic/Apex versions
Outmuscled Behemoths that can bring down mountains
Easily defeats Rockbreakers that create earthquakes felt several miles away
Easily defeats Stormbirds that can create entire thunderstorms
Survived an explosion that could blow a hole in a mountain
Survived being inside of Yellowstone as it began erupting, then diverted the energy that was meant to erupt it
Waded through lava and molten steel
Superior to Kotallo, whose metal arm could smash through the armor of a Scorcher
Superior to Talanah, who dodged the light-speed EM burst of an Apex Shellsnapper
Far superior to Tenakth Rebel Soldiers that could push and control Tremortusks
Practically single-handedly ended both the Shadow Carja and Regalla's Rebellion
Has dodged light-speed attacks
Swims at the bottom of the ocean and in deep caverns with no discernable discomfort
Focus absorbed enough data to keep an entire country busy for years
Outsmarted Londra, who can brainwash people using sciences he hasn't studied while working with tools millenia previous to what he is used to working with
~ This may just be bad writing
Flies on the Wings of the Ten
Healed the Utaru Land-gods
Master Override and Omega-Level Clearance can even capture Hephaestsus, who had world-spanning activity
Climbed snow-capped mountains thousands of feet high with no gear or prep
Another Sobeck clone's intelligence was compared to the supercomputer of Gaia
Unlocked the secrets of Leviathan
Broke through the Bulwark's impenetrable walls
Dodged the space-collapsing blasts of Londra's sentries
Completed the Chieftain Trials of the Banuk, defeating Aratak
Solved all those ruins puzzles, including the one with the water levels and the ladder you can't hit, man that was tough, and I beat Baba is You
Survived hits from a Horus and took it down from the inside
Convinced an emotionally broken girl not to commit suicide
Weaknesses:
Can be outsmarted and tricked
No good without her weapons, armor, and items
Ammo and healing is technically limited, some time mid-battle must be taken to craft more
Focus can be fooled and hacked by technology specifically designed to circumvent it
Useless at fighting underwater
Special Notes:
[1] In the beginning of Horizon Forbidden West, Aloy comments that she lost most of her gear from Horizon Zero Dawn in the months between the games (obviously for gameplay purposes). This raises the question of whether these weapons, outfits, and items should be included in this analysis. However, do remember that these are fan-made Death Battles, and so we follow Death Battle's rules and logic. By the way the official episodes interpret Rule #3, it seems we should include these as part of the character's maximum potential. See: Goku having the Power Pole, Boba Fett having all of his old weapons and equipment in addition to his Gaffi Stick, Thor having Jarnbjorn, DIO using his old vampire powers with his new body, Sonic being able to go Hyper Sonic, among many, many other examples. Additionally, as this is equipment that is all sold by tribes she is intimately familiar with, she could reasonably receive new ones at any point.
[2] Dialogue and in-game text refer to Concentration as a technique used by machine hunters, suggesting it is a canonical ability, not just a gameplay mechanic. The Golden Fast Travel Pack she carries also allows her to fast-travel to any campfire in gameplay. How this applies lore-wise is uncertain, especially as she is unable to use it during story missions or combat, but some NPCs have noted her ability to get around the world "surprisingly" quickly.
[3] While Aloy can only store a limited amount of these healing items and traps, she is able to craft more using loose items in her inventory. Similarly, she has limited ammo for many of her weapons, but with only a few seconds of downtime, she can use materials to make as many as she needs. In Zero Dawn, her inventory has a size limit and can be expanded with pouch upgrades, suggesting this to be not a gameplay mechanic, but an active inventory she can draw from. Fully upgraded, it's expansive enough to last through hours of fighting. In Forbidden West, this inventory size is shrunk down, but Aloy also has many stashes set up around the world that contain more of any material she needs, and methods of accessing them given the necessary time.
[4] It was technically another Sobeck clone, Beta, who unleashed Hephaestus in this manner. However, it was Aloy who instructed her to do so and explained how to do it. As Beta was supposed to be assisting with Hephaestus' convergence at the time, it's possible she was only able to do so because of specific circumstances. However, this seems unlikely, as these instructions were given hours after the given timetable for how long Hephaestsus' matrix transformation would have taken, and Aloy assumed he was already absorbed. As a result, she should be able to perform this action herself, so long as she has digital access to a Cauldron or a suitable substitute.
[5] The Focus has replayed specific memories without being asked as they were needed, stabilized Beta's neural network after she was removed from years in Virtualist Scenarios, and, at times, simply downloaded information into Aloy's mind when she needed it. It downloaded the entire library of the Greenhouse, and, using a Focus of the same model, Alva stated she was able to easily work through and absorb this data, which would have taken the combined efforts of her entire country years, even with their own computer systems. It can also function as a flashlight, radio, and phone network. While in gameplay it can only scan up to 75 meters in a radius, in cutscenes she regularly uses it on objects much farther away, once at a distance of nearly 700 meters. Additionally, strong signals, or signals that Aloy puts into priority, can be located and directed towards from several kilometers away. At various parts of her life, Aloy has accessed and scanned great libraries of both modern and old times in forms both digital and physical, including those accessed by Project Zero Dawn and Meridian Scholars. She can likely bring up any basic knowledge she needs to at any point.
[6] Far Zenith was one of the projects constructed to save humanity from Faro's machines. It was a consortium composed of seventy-seven of the wealthiest and smartest people on the planet, and eventually became an effort to escape and settle a new Earth near Sirius One. When many of them attempted to upload their consciousness to a digital landscape, granting pseudo-immortality, their digital minds merged and awoke with sentience. Codenamed "Nemesis", this collection of thoughts began to hunt and attempt to kill the Far Zeniths one thousand years after they left Earth. This led to the Far Zeniths invading Earth to gain a copy of Gaia and its subroutines, leaving the planet to die at Nemesis' hands as they escaped to a planet they could terraform where Nemesis could not find them. This is all important story information for the games, but wholly unnecessary for this analysis. That's why I have these notes now!
[7] Measuring by the size and amount of barrels, the explosion Aloy survived could have been worth 4 Megatons of TNT, more than enough to blow a hole in a mountain. Meanwhile, to fully "bring down a mountain," assuming Aloy was speaking of the taller peaks found in Utah and California, a Behemoth would require energy outputs of 5.83 Gigatons of TNT!
[8] The Shield-Weaver armor was deconstructed by Aloy after its Power Cell ran out prior to Forbidden West. She uses parts of its technology to power some of her Valor Surges, including temporarily giving the shield to other pieces of armor. In accordance with our interpretation of Death Battle's rules as discussed in Note #1, we're giving Aloy the armor at its fullest. Additionally, Aloy has every remaining piece of the armor set still on hand and has found more Power Cells since that point. She could reasonably reconstruct the armor whenever she wishes.
…
Link
LZ: At the beginning of time, three goddesses set upon a dark and formless land and shaped it, creating forests, deserts, rivers, and, of course, life, before returning to heaven and leaving several gifts and a representation of their powers: the Triforce, an incredibly powerful relic made up of three parts capable of granting wishes to those who bore great levels of power, wisdom, and courage.
TWO: And they dropped off their little sis, Hylia, the Goddess of Light, to protect the thing from evil. 'Cuz this new land, for some reason, sat on top of the Depths, a place full of dark magic and thousands of monsters. Eh, it'll be fine, look, little baby goddess has her first mission! What could possibly go wrong?
LZ: Everything, it turns out. It wasn't long before the demon Demise rose from the Depths with a monster army and set out to claim the Triforce for his own. Demise was absurdly powerful, easily a match for the goddess, but she and a warrior named Link were eventually able to seal Demise away. Knowing that the demon would one day return, Hylia crafted a spell that would cause another hero to rise up when the world needed him most. And, as goddesses cannot use the Triforce, she chose to reincarnate into a mortal form to better fight this evil.
TWO: That's maybe in the Top 10 Worst Plans to Deal With An Incoming Dark Lord I Have Ever Heard.
LZ: It worked, though. Link and Hylia would return as skyborn people known as Hylians to defeat Demise again, and they actually did it. But Demise used his godly power to curse the three of them into an eternal cycle of destruction. Link and Hylia would form the country of Hyrule, and lead their race into the future. But Demise would return. He would forever reincarnate to take the Triforce, and there would forever be a reincarnated Link and Hylia who needed to devote their lives to stopping him. Even after the Triforce split into thirds with their own powers, this cycle would happen, oh, a few hundred times or so. Well, sort of, Prime Ganondorf is technically the same incarnation fighting multiple-
TWO: Fast forward a bunch of millenia, and one kingdom decided they were kinda sick of letting the two heroes do all the work. So they used their hyper-advanced Sheikah tech to make an army of big robot war spiders called Guardians to fight Demise for them. And they brutalized the sucker! Fast forward ten thousand more years, we meet our final versions of these characters. Demise was prophesied to return again. All that tech was long gone, now people were living like it was medieval times, but the royal family found out about the old Sheikah stuff, and immediately started excavating it to give Demise the second punch of the ol' 1-2.
LZ: Five Champions were selected among the strongest warriors in the world to wield ancient weapons the size of factories known as Divine Beasts against the forces of evil. They were led by Princess Zelda, the latest reincarnation of Hylia. One of these five was the Hylian soldier Link, who pretty much everyone figured was the latest reincarnation of the hero.[1]
TWO: Well, I mean, the glowing Triforce of Courage on his hand shoulda made it obvious.
LZ: Well, no, actually. The Triforce really isn't mentioned much at all in Breath of the Wild or Tears of the Kingdom. The most we get is seeing the Triforce of Wisdom on Zelda after she unlocks her goddess powers. Calamity Ganon (the Demise re-release everyone's preparing for) doesn't seem to have any connection to any piece of the relic, and nothing of the kind is mentioned in regards to Link.
TWO: Wait, are you telling me that this version of Link doesn't have that big triangle in his soul?
LZ: Probably not. It's one of the reasons we separated this version from the others. Normally the Triforce of Courage gives every Link all memories, skills, and sometimes weapons of their previous versions, but this one rose to where he is alone.
TWO: I guess it makes sense, that's why he doesn't have much magic, can't tell good from evil at a glance, has to prove his worthiness to use holy weapons, and can be affected by Demise's hax abilities. Normally the big golden spiritual nugget takes care of all that for him, but this one's like any other mortal. Huh.
LZ: Not any other mortal. He's a Hylian, which means superhuman stats, some magical power, and he can hear the voices of spirits and deities.
TWO: Because of the pointy ears, right.
LZ: Back to the story, prepare as they might, they couldn't do enough. See, although she might be the reincarnation of a goddess, Zelda was just a geeky teenage girl without either goddess powers or goddess memories. And this time, the apocalypse had prepared back. When Calamity Ganon arose, he infected their machines, including the Divine Beasts, and used them to raze the world and kill all five Champions, including Link.
TWO: But thanks to a literal last-second power-awakening, Zelda was able to stop Link from being perma-dead, and put him into the one place Ganon hadn't infested: the Shrine of Awakening, where Link would take a hundred years to recover while Zelda solo'd the final boss for a century straight.
LZ: When Link awoke, the world of Hyrule looked quite different. A post-apocalyptic planet reclaimed by nature, with those who remained having formed small villages and tribes to keep the endless monsters and deadly machines at bay. From the beginning, though, his mission was clear: become powerful enough to fight and kill Calamity Ganon before it defeated a waning-in-power Zelda.
TWO: Holy crap, and I thought Aloy's introduction was long! That was almost a thousand words!
LZ: Well… there's a lot to cover! They had to know about the cycle, how it started, in what ways we can compare this Link to previous ones, and he has more story than almost any other-
TWO: WHAT. EVER. Anyway, Link started out with nothing but his underwear and a little tablet called a Sheikah Slate, but would solve most of the world's problems and eventually get enough stuff to make that guy from Terraria perk his head up.[2] Starting with the ancient Sheikah Paraglider, a gliding tool that lets him sail the winds. And, it being magic, he can fall from the second cloud layer, open up the glider less than a second before hitting the ground, and be completely fine. But that Sheikah Slate is actually still the best thing he's got, especially once he upgraded it and got the world's smartest scientists, Purah and Robbie, to study it and make him another, the Purah Pad! Then he got his arm replaced by a dead king, and for some reason that upgraded his smartphone, whatever, more power!
LZ: While I have some issues with your understanding of these games, yes, these devices are amazingly useful. By activating them one at a time, Link can access several "runes" that essentially function as superpowers. He can manipulate inanimate objects with Ulltrahand, picking them up and turning them around regardless of weight, and even attaching them to each other. So long as he has the time and materials, his imagination is the limit. And thanks to Zonai capsules-
TWO: Which are pokéballs, but for specific pieces of ancient tech.
LZ: …he can craft things like hot air balloons, water-based hoverboards, propelled gliders, and even turrets to shoot energy beams at opponents. Given the necessary tools and time, Link can make virtually any machine he can imagine. Ultrahand does, however, take a fair amount of time and focus, and is hardly ideal to use in a fight.
TWO: Which is why he picked up Autobuild, an app that re-creates a few of those inventions way faster, like the four you just said![3] There's also Ascend, which lets him go straight up into the air, and if something's in his way, he'll just phase through!
LZ: So long as it's a flat surface, and not too high.
TWO: He can pull out and remotely detonate an endless amount of Sheikah bombs!
LZ: But only two can exist at once.
TWO: He can stop things in time with Stasis and all attacks he makes are combined when it wears off!
LZ: But it has to recharge for ten seconds with every use, and how long it works is dependent on the willpower or magic of the foe. Strong foes, while under attack, are barely held in place for four full seconds.
TWO: He can fuse his weapons together to make them stronger or fuse materials to them to give them other powers, like a Star Fragment to make the sword light up the dark, or a Light Dragon Scale to make it heal him while he attacks!
LZ: One fuse per-item, and no defusing without destroying one item.
TWO: Cryonis, which freezes water into ice blocks!
LZ: Has to be of a specific volume, and the ice can't be manipulated afterwards.
TWO: And Recall, which, um… this one's complicated. I'm not sure I even know what this means. "Sends an inanimate object back in time?"
LZ: Allow me to explain. Say you're walking down the road, and a chunk of a sky island falls in front of you and craters the ground. You could climb up onto the chunk and use Recall on it. This would cause the chunk to go back up to the sky island the same way it came down, but the crater still exists, and now you're riding the chunk to the island.
TWO: Oh, so it uno reverses something's motion!
LZ: It's more like it's selecting a single thing to reverse its movement through time across about twenty seconds. This makes the applications potentially incredible. Unlocking doors that were previously locked, bringing thrown weapons back to hand, using Ultrahand to move a vehicle through the air for several seconds then Recall to give yourself a sky platform, even returning enemy projectiles back to sender. Especially useful is that Link can cancel the Recall at any time and any and all momentum on the object will cease, and whenever it's activated, Recall causes Link to see time as if it has stopped, giving him however long he wants to plan how to dodge an attack, or what have you.
TWO: Whoa. That sounds… broken.
LZ: From an in-game perspective, absolutely. But it doesn't work on anything living, and it has to be within Link's immediate line of sight. That freezing time thing happens to Link too, remember.
TWO: Still. Oh yeah, there's also a camera, but whatever.
LZ: Not "whatever!" If Link takes a picture of something or someone, he can set his Sheikah Slate to warn him when it's nearby. Though… that's all it does. Makes an increasingly loud sound the closer that chosen object is.
TWO: That sounds, um, irritating.
LZ: …Yeah. It is.
TWO: But the best thing these iPads give him is the ability to teleport! After finding ancient shrines and lightroots all around Hyrule, Link can select any of some hundreds of places across the world or even in the Depths to immediately turn into light and appear at. Plus, he has four Travel Medallions that he can throw down anywhere to make four more travel points.
LZ: All these powers form a solid base that he can build an arsenal around.
TWO: And what an arsenal it is! Spears, boomerangs, claymores, and Magic Rods. He might not have the spells of the Links of old, but these Rods let him still throw fireballs, freeze foes into ice sculptures, and send a shock to their nervous system with electricity. Oh, and he has swords. Link loves his swords.[4]
LZ: As he should. Even at four years old, he was besting adults in duels, and when arguably the most powerful weapon in his arsenal is a holy sword, you better hope he likes using them.
TWO: The Master Sword is as famous as Hylia herself. Created by the original goddess to fight Demise and reforged by that first skyborn Link, it's an unbreakable holy blade with the power to slice through anything! Fully-powered, the thing can chop off the heads of dragons with scales stronger than diamond, repel kinetic energy, and shoot beams that one-shot armies! A previous Link literally said that just holding the thing was like holding a bolt of lightning!
LZ: Key word there: Fully-Powered. Tens of thousands of years of fighting evil have taken their toll on the blade, and, while still strong, it's nowhere near the level it once was. It'll kill basic monsters in one hit, sure, but try that on the likes of dragons today and you'll be disappointed. In fact, use it for too long, and it has to recharge for ten full minutes before it can be used again. It regains much of its power in the presence of dark magic, but still isn't perfect.
TWO: Yeah, I mean, Ganondorf somehow broke this indestructible sword by basically sneezing on it. Then it had to spend a few dozen millennia in a dragon's head to get better. Wait, Ganon, Ganondorf? Huh?
LZ: He's a different reincarnation of Demise that was sealed away forever ago and woke up when Calamity Ganon was still around.
TWO: But… then wouldn't there be another reincarnation already? Did he do it twice? Is that a thing?
LZ: No, it's not. In fact, other incarnations of Link have very specifically attempted to seal Demise incarnations away to cease the cycle. So, how did this happen? No one knows.
TWO: And if he's Demise, and the sword was made to fight Demise, shouldn't he not be able to break it? I mean, Calamity and Harbinger Ganon couldn't do anything to the thing, and other versions have tried to break it and couldn't, and-
LZ: No one knows.
TWO: And shouldn't it have regained its power because of the whole Demise thing? So the age thing wouldn't come into eff-
LZ: No one knows, it's dumb, can we please move on.
TWO: Uh, well, he's not limited to that stick of metal! He can carry a bunch of weapons on him, including a Korok Leaf that Fus-Ro-Dahs enemies off cliffs, and some of the loot from previous Link generations was hidden around Hyrule for him to find! Like the Sea-Breeze Boomerang, which can target and hit multiple enemies in one throw, Biggoron's Sword, which is a massive hunk of Goron craftsmanship that'll cleave anyone in half, and the Sword of Six Sages, a holy sword that can make wounds that never heal. Hey, wait, I'm pretty sure two of those are from different timelines.
LZ: Er, right, the Zelda timeline split into three branches with Ocarina of Time as a result of time travel. These weapons all being in the same game was fine when they were non-canon in Breath of the Wild, but now with Tears of the Kingdom… no one knows.
TWO: There's also the Goddess Sword, which is the original sword that would one day become the Master Sword… what?
LZ: No one knows.
TWO: And if that's the OG version, shouldn't it be better than the current broken-down Master Sword? But it's breakable, and way wea-
LZ: No one knows.
TWO: Um, there's also elemental weapons, like Thunderspears and Flameblades, and the Ancient Weapons that Robbie made. Designed after the same tech that made those Guardians and Divine Beasts, these are hard-light constructs that are super strong and durable and built to kill other ancient tech. Spears and swords are fine, but there's also a hard-light chainsaw and a bow that bypasses shields! Oh, did I forget to mention that Link is an archer of the highest quality? His selection of bows include the Phrenic Bow's crazy distance, the Royal Guard Bow's high attack power, and, naturally, the Ancient Bow's ability to get past shielding.
LZ: Highest quality is right. He's the only living creature to have duplicated Revali's feat of shooting four targets so fast, the spirits themselves thought he only shot once. A previous Link was good enough to make it within centimeters of a bullseye even while being cursed by dark magic to miss every shot he took.
TWO: He has thousands of arrows, and can use his Fuse ability to on-the-fly fuse any material onto the arrows, making them electric or fire or freezing or homing or glowing or explosive or just crazy-strong. Even if he runs out of materials, no worries, he also has about a thousand of all elemental arrows and bomb arrows just sitting about. Also, Ancient Arrows, which use ancient blade tech to instantly kill any monster without enough willpower to resist it, and also disrupts technology similar to itself, making it perfect to fight the calamity-overidden Guardian robots. He also has the Twilight Bow, a magic bow from the past that makes its own arrows out of light! The damage is just okay, but the arrows go in a straight line until they hit something and move at the speed of light!
LZ: He's fought manifestations of Ganon's dark magic named Phantom Ganons, and took their Gloom-based weapons. These are exceptionally strong, but drain his life when he uses them. He can also take down Lynels, minotaur-like monsters, and steal their weapons, including bows that magically turn one arrow into three as they're fired.
TWO: Don't forget the shields! He has plenty of great ones, and can fuse those Zonai capsules to them to turn them into things like laser guns, flamethrowers, and rocket jumps to skip really annoying dungeon puzzles. The Ancient Shield is a hard-light shield that instantly sends all light-based projectiles back to the guy firing them, and the Sea-Breeze Shield is a legendary shield from another Link that can block almost any attack. But his best is still the Hylian Shield.
LZ: Originally forged for the skyborn Link by the Thunder God, the Hylian Shield was thought to be completely indestructible. Like the Master Sword, age and generations of fighting Demise have worn its magic down, so it's not quite as indestructible, but you'll find it easier to put a camel through the eye of a needle than to break through this piece of metal.
TWO: Why didn't he take it with him when the big sneeze-
LZ: NO ONE KNOWS. Stop asking questions.
TWO: Ugh. Well, all these weapons are technically breakable, but even if the worst happens, Link does have one trick up his sleeve.
LZ: True. After pretending to be an initiate and infiltrating the Yiga Clan, which are basically a cult of magic ninjas who dedicated their life to killing Link-
TWO: He joined a cult dedicated to killing him. What. A. Legend.
LZ: Yes, anyway, he learned the magical Earthquake technique from them, in which he strikes the ground and forms a fissure, which homes in on and chases his foe until exploding into deadly spikes underneath them. This is, however, all he's got when unarmed.
TWO: See, he does have magic! That's how he can store sixty full-health-restoring-magically–temporarily-increases-stats meals on him at once!
LZ: Relatively little of it compared to other Links, but, yes, he does have some magic. His abilities to store near-endless amounts of materials, slow down his perception of time when aiming a bow, and quick-changing outfits in a moment's notice have all been acknowledged in NPC dialogue, suggesting these are canon abilities, rather than gameplay conveniences.
TWO: And that outfit one is amazing once you hear about the stuff these outfits can do!
LZ: Link's been all over Hyrule and collected many of its most magical armors, then further upgraded them using Great Fairies. These range from the Miner Outfit allowing him to glow in the dark to the Champion's Tunic allowing him to see the amount of "health" his enemies have.
TWO: Some outfits make him more powerful with specific weapons, or keep him safe from the elements. Like the Snowquill Armor making him freezeproof and immune to frost damage, the Flamebreaker Armor making him fireproof and immune to fire damage, and the Thunder Helm, the legendary helmet passed down the Gerudo tribe, making it impossible to injure him at all with any sort of electricity or lightning!
LZ: This even blocks the divine lightning of Vah Naboris, the Divine Beast of the desert. Considering other Divine Beasts can destroy entire mountain ranges, this is incredibly impressive.
TWO: And don't think you're overpowering the resistances of the basic armors! Remember that these are magical buffs from Great Fairies, the things that, in another timeline, buffed the Master Sword to be strong enough to outmatch the completed Triforce!
LZ: These armors aren't that crazy, but they do offer extraordinary defense along with other abilities. The Zora Armor allows him to swim better than fish, even up waterfalls, the Sheikah Armor silences his movement for stealth, the Glide Armor lets him, um, glide (and not take fall damage), and the Mystic Armor magically blocks incoming damage, causing Link to lose money instead of health.
TWO: Then there's the best, the Fierce Deity Armor. Remember that mask that was a god that one of the older Links could let possess his body from LZ's old Death Battle long ago?
LZ: Supposedly, this is that same armor the godlike being wore, and wearing it now gives Link that same enormous power without losing his mind. With the armor also came the legendary Double Helix Sword, one of the most powerful heavy weapons in his arsenal. It's almost undoubtedly his best armor, considering that the original Fierce Deity could two-shot Majora, a demon with enough power to move a small moon. A very, very small moon. More of a mountain, really.
TWO: I mean, it works for him, and he didn't even need it to kick Calamity Ganon's butt! He went out and used his Sheikah Slate to override the Divine Beasts, forcing the pieces of Ganon's evil that infested them, the Blights, to manifest and fight him. Then he beat 'em! All of 'em! And since they reacted to data entering the Divine Beasts, that's light-speed reaction, right?
LZ: Maybeee? Sheikah tech is quite different to our own, so it's hard to tell. But one of them, Windblight, uses drones in his second phase to reflect and bounce his laser gun bullets in a very similar manner to light, and another, Thunderblight, could move as fast as the electricity he makes, and Link has to respond to his flurry rushes and even used the Slate to move a metal pole up to Thunderblight after electricity conducts but before it finishes bringing through the lightning. That's almost certainly light-speed. Plus, all the Blights, as well as the Guardians, have explosive laser attacks that can be sent back with a perfectly-timed shield bash. Since timing this is an intended element to winning the game, and is incredibly common in Age of Calamity, Link is almost certainly capable of reacting to attacks moving at the speed of light.
TWO: Freeing the Divine Beasts didn't just mean gaining control over giant mechanical monsters, it also meant meeting the spirits of his dead friends, the Champions, and taking their superpowers for himself!
LZ: Revali's Gale creates a burst of wind wherever Link wants that sends him rocketing into the sky, Mipha's Grace will heal his wounds in small amounts, or in one big burst if he's near death, Daruk's Protection is a forcefield that blocks and reflects any and all enemy attacks, and Urbosa's Fury summons magical lightning, which can cover a small town and is both faster and stronger than regular lightning, able to one-shot most monsters Link wants to fight.
TWO: Bad news is, he can only use them three times each (once for Mipha's big burst heal) before they have to recharge, and even after upgrading them, a battle would have to be real slow for any recharges to actually happen. Good news is, those aren't the only friends he's got! When he went out to fight that Sneezeblight guy, he got the help of five sages, who heard the call of their ancestors- wait, wasn't hearing spirits exclusive to Hylians? How come-
LZ: NO. ONE. KNOWS.
TWO: Anyway, after getting their powers enhanced, they each gave Link a ring to wear on his dead king hand that summons spirit avatars of them to fight with him. Tulin is a Rito who can make his own wind, Yunobo is a Goron who can be a living cannonball, Sidon is a Zora who can shield Link with water, Riju is a Gerudo who can summon lightning (but it has to be directed by Link and isn't as strong as Urbosa's Fury), and Mineru is a Zonai spirit inside a Mech that Link can ride. And it's not like these guys are newbies to combat, some of them even went back in time to stop an alternate universe Calamity Ganon!
LZ: These avatars have physical presence, full sentience, and are sworn to protect Link. However, while they can't be killed, they can be dealt with in most other ways you can think of, from trapping them to dispelling magic to just removing the rings.
TWO: Oh, yeah, and Link got the Champions' signature weapons! Like the mountain-breaking Stone Smasher, the magical Lightscale Trident, and the best one, the Great Eagle Bow. This Bow magics the three arrows thing, too, but shoots way farther and faster and is way more durable. Wow, this Link sure has a lot of mountain-breaking stuff, huh?[5]
LZ: It's certainly not an outlier. A previous version of Link once found himself inside a mountain-sized pyramid literally stuffed to the brim with explosives, and promptly blew himself up. The resulting explosion devastated the land and reduced the mountain to rubble. Link was in the center of that… and survived.
TWO: Whoa, that must be, like, SO many tons of TNT. Wait, we can't compare that to this guy! He doesn't have that Triforce thing!
LZ: Technically, the Triforce grants Link magical abilities, so all his purely physical feats, minus maybe magical durability, should be comparable. Regardless, this was done by a Link who also didn't yet have access to the Triforce of Courage.[6]
TWO: Whew. But, I mean, he's proven it anyway. Remember those Divine Beasts that can blow up mountain ranges? Yeah, Link… survived being hit by one. Actually, by two, arguably all of 'em.
LZ: Vah Medoh's lasers have melted holes in the Hebra mountains, turning them into glass. Since we know the size of Breath of the Wild's map is almost exactly 69.3 square km and Link's height is 172 cm (based on a Gerudo woman who claims to be eight feet tall), we can actually measure the exact volume of the cylinder that was melted out. Based on the size of the hole and the energy vaporization of rock like this takes, that would be around 5.3 Megatons of TNT!
TWO: And Vah Medoh's the main one Link can take a faceful of and get back up from, no problem, even without any armor!
LZ: Not a surprise when Vah Ruta could produce enough water to flood the entire landmass of Hyrule, and Vah Rudania could erupt Death Mountain. After Link took control of Rudania, Death Mountain cooled off and the lava collapsed until it was only left in the Depths. This means that Rudania was not just responsible for the volcano's eruption, but also all of its lavaflow that was reaching up all the way from the Depths. Considering the Flame Ward effect is required across almost all of Eldin, and the speed at which Vah Rudania could cause fireballs to spew, the amount of energy Vah Rudania needed to keep up would be in excess of 17.82 Gigatons of TNT!
TWO: And remember the Fierce Deity? Well, that moon may have been small, but it was also being pulled with enough magical energy to destroy all of Termina, a mirror dimension to Hyrule itself.
LZ: In fact, it's suggested that, were it not for Zelda keeping him occupied, Calamity Ganon could do the same. I mean, he already respawns all the monsters in the country every Blood Moon. And causes Blood Moons.
TWO: And get this, after freeing the Divine Beasts, Link underwent a bunch of trials to become worthy of being their master. He did them all (including a bunch where a single mistake would instantly kill him) and got his own Divine Beast: the motorcycle Master Cycle Zero!
LZ: It's… not a traditional Divine Beast, but it should be comparable in durability, and does have a similarly-powerful laser gun hidden under the hood. But this also technically means that the four regular Divine Beasts now respond to Link's wishes in the same way the previous Champions piloted them to kill literally thousands of monsters back in the initial war. So he could absolutely just call them over if he was desperate enough.
TWO: Link's accomplished way more than just that. He singlehandedly beat the entire monster force in Lurelin Village. He survived being hit with Naboris' lightning with no protection or armor, eating Goron Rock Roast literally made with lava, and the fires of Death Mountain, a place so hot, the Sheikah Sensor burns out when trying to read the temperature! He's considered the greatest swordsman in the world, including by high official guys who actually know what they're talking about. He trained against all the other Champions, and fought Revali to a standstill before even unlocking his Hero powers and stuff! And that guy's a Rito, a literal bird! He always has the high ground!
LZ: He defeated Colgera, who could create a blizzard that spanned a mountain range, completed the mystical Trial of the Sword, disabled both Vah Medoh and Vah Naboris with nothing but his bomb arrows, and defeated five hundred soldiers of Hyrule in under four minutes. Granted, it was a training mission, so they might have been holding back.
TWO: You saw him kill evil incarnate and take mountain-breaking laser blasts to the face and THAT'S unreasonable to you?
LZ: Well, he definitely beat nine of the strongest Yiga assassins in less than a minute, and fought off Master Kohga, the leader of the Yiga Clan, at least six times. And Kohga is revered by the rest of the clan as basically a demigod.
TWO: Yeah, jury's out on whether he deserves that one or not. But Link also defeated the strongest Yiga guy, Sooga. At one point, Sooga launched a surprise attack on Zelda when Link was about three meters away, but Link still got there in time to block the attack. That's kind of crazy, since Sooga can also do all the same electricity and laser-dodging Link can![7]
LZ: Previous Links were well-known as puzzle-solvers and mid-combat detectives, and while this one may have a more defined personality and be a bit more gung-ho-swords-blazing-oops-Ganondorf-ripped-off-my-arm than those in the past, he can still turn on the brain when need be. He did solve almost three hundred Shrine Trials designed to test his wits, as well as close to two thousand Korok puzzles, after all. Plus, every battlefield is a playground when you can build Zonai devices like he can.
TWO: With all this power and plenty of friends, Link defeated Ganon and saved Zelda, even when Demise "gave up on reincarnation" and focused all his power on just killing everything! And then he found Sneezeblight, and killed him too- hey, wait a second, if he gave up on-
LZ: NO ONE KNOWS.[8] Ahem, by using a Secret Stone that amplified his powers, Ganondorf became a Demon Dragon, but still lost to the power of the Master Sword's darkness-sealing abilities.[9] And with the defeat of the re-un-incarnated Ganondorf, he fulfilled the ancient prophecy of the Zonai, allowing all the sages to fulfill their duties to their ancestors who swore their people would help when Ganondorf came back again, and set the first king of Hyrule, the Zonai Rauru, who had sealed Ganondorf long ago, to peace. He might not have the same advantages as his previous selves, but he found his own brand of heroism, and became a legend all the same. Both gods and mortals know: the Hero of the Wild is not someone to be taken lightly.
TWO: Wait, wait, wait, wait. The first king of Hyrule? So, like, before Hylia fought OG Demise? But then Ganondorf wouldn't exist, so it has to be after, um, after Skyward Sword? But then he wouldn't be the first king, and wouldn't there be a Link and Hylia to fight with him? That's how the curse works, right? And how were the Rito an ancient race? They evolved from a subset of the Zora according to that pirate game I played. And wait, all these races all this time were waiting for Ganondorf to return? And this never came up in Ocarina of Time, with the real "Prime" Ganondorf?! And the Gerudo, who are big on history and tradition, didn't see repeating history as a problem? What happened to the sages? Why didn't they respond all those times Hyrule asked the spirits for help against Demise redos? Why is Rauru the Sage of Light in Ocarina of Time? Shouldn't the sky people from Minish Cap or the Picori, who come from the sky, or the Hylians, who come from the sky, know about the Zonai? And why hasn't-
LZ: NO ONE KNOWS, I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO TELL YOU! I LOVE TEARS OF THE KINGDOM BUT ITS STORY IS SOLELY COMPOSED OF TWENTY GLOOM HANDS WHICH ALL ONLY HAVE MIDDLE FINGERS ALL STICKING STRAIGHT UP AT THE LORE OF EVERY OTHER GAME IN THE SERIES, INCLUDING BREATH OF THE WILD! IT DOESN'T MAKE SENSE AND IT NEVER WILL! ARE YOU HAPPY NOW?!
TWO: …
LZ: …
TWO: Yeah, I don't think bias is a problem anymore.
In the Lost Woods, Link fights desperately against four Malice versions of his fellow champions. He barely blocks a blow from Urbosa before Mipha catches his typical broadsword in her Trident and snaps it in half. Link bounces away from a volley of arrows before being flung across the opening by Daruk. He comes to a crashing stop against a stone pedestal, and struggles to get back up.
"Link!" Zelda calls out worriedly.
Astor, leader of the dark army, smiles at her.
At this, the false champions all turn to the reincarnated goddess. As she backs away, they move to encircle the depowered princess.
As Link barely manages to stand, he notices that the pedestal behind him is glowing.
In an instant, all four champions fall and fade away into dust.
Link turns curiously, and sees that resing within the pedestal is a sword. A sword that he is drawn to.
He grips its handle with both hands and, with some trouble, pulls it out of the pedestal. At that instant, the sword's glow increases.
Astor falls to the ground, fear in his eyes, and edges himself backward. Link turns to face him, and tests the weight of the Master Sword for a few seconds. Astor crosses his hands and four new false champions are created, but with his first swings of the holy sword, Link cuts through each one without even having to think.
As he battles Astor directly, the forces of light and dark collide. And each time, a burst of light eradicates Astor's dark magic. Eventually, the dark mage is forced to flee for his life. He must, for the war's tide has taken a drastic turn.
The Master Sword has chosen a wielder, and Link has become the next Hero of Hyrule.
Link:
Name: Link
Species: Hylian
Height: 5'8 /172 cm
Weight: For gameplay purposes, 1450 grams
Age: 122+
Occupation: Royal Champion, Swordmaster of Hyrule, Professor of Hateno, Hero of the Wild, The Knight Who Seals The Darkness
Reincarnation of the Spirit of the Hero
Likes cooking, racing, eavesdropping, being right-handed
Looks good in drag
Abilities:
Superhuman Physique
~Strength, Speed, Reaction, Durability
Master Sworsdman, Expert in most other weapons
Excellent Puzzle-Solver
Concentration
~Slows perception of time while aiming weapons
Earthquake Technique
Dimensional Storage
Outfit Quick-Change
Parry
Perfect Dodge/Flurry Rush
Champion Abilities
~Revali's Gale+
~Daruk's Protection+
~Mipha's Grace+
~Urbosa's Fury+
Outfits:
Hylian Set
~Defense: 60
Soldier's Set
~Defense: 84
Depths Set
~Defense: 60
~High Gloom Resistance
Snowquill Set
~Defense: 60
~High Cold Resistance
~Unfreezable
Flamebreaker Set
~Defense: 60
~High Flame Guard
~Fireproof
Zora Set
~Defense: 60
~Swimming ability "equal to a Zora"
Desert Voe Set
~Defense: 60
~High Heat Resistance
~Shock Damage Resistance
Rubber Armor
~Defense: 60
~High Shock Resist
~Lightning Proof
Sheikah Set
~Defense: 48
~High Stealth Up [silences non-running/attacking movement]
~Night Speed Up
Yiga Set
~Defense: 36
~High Stealth Up [silences non-running/attacking movement]
~Night Speed Up
~Yiga Clan Disguise
Climbing Set
~Defense: 60
~Climb Speed Up
~Climbing Jump Stamina Up
Barbarian Set
~Defense: 60
~High Attack Up
~Charge Attack Stamina Up
Radiant Set
~Defense: 60
~Glows in the Dark
~Bone Weapon Attack Up
~Stalfos Disguise
Royal Guard Set
~Defense: 72
~Charge Attack Stamina Up
Froggy Set
~Defense: 60
~Slip Proof
Glide Set
~Defense: 48
~High Skydive Mobility Up
~Impact Proof [no fall damage]
Miner's Set
~Defense: 60
~High Glow [lights up heavily in the dark]
~Shining Steps [footsteps leave glowing prints]
Mystic Set
~Defense: 9
~Rupee Padding [lose Rupees instead of health]
Ember Set
~Defense: 48
~High Hot Weather Attack Up
~Hot Weather Charge [Fire Damage on Charged Attacks]
Charged Set
~Defense: 48
~High Stormy Weather Attack Up
~Stormy Weather Charge [Electric Damage on Charged Attacks]
Frostbite Set
~Defense: 48
~High Cold Weather Attack Up
~Cold Weather Charge [Freezing Damage on Charged Attacks]
Zonaite Set
~Defense: 84
~Zonai Device Energy Up
~Power Cell Recharge Up
Tingle's Set
~Defense: 6
~Night Speed Up
Phantom Set
~Defense: 24
~High Attack Up
Evil Spirit Set
~Defense: 12
~High Stealth Up [silences non-running/attacking movement]
~Bone Weapon Attack Up
~Stalfos Disguise
Ancient Set
~Defense: 84
~High Guardian Resist Up [takes less damage from Sheikah technology]
~Ancient Weapon Proficiency [heavily increases power of hard-light weapons]
Dark Hero Set:
~Defense: 9
~Night Speed Up
Armor of the Hero Set
~Defense: 60
~Attack Up
Hero of Awakening Set
~Defense: 60
~Attack Up
Hero of Time Set
~Defense: 60
~Attack Up
Hero of Wind Set
~Defense: 60
~Attack Up
Hero of Twilight Set
~Defense: 60
~Attack Up
Hero of the Sky Set
~Defense: 60
~Attack Up
Hero of the Wild Set
~Defense: 84
~Attack Up
~Master Sword Beam Up
Fierce Deity Set
~Defense: 60
~"Godlike Power"
~Charge Attack Stamina Up
Individual Armor Pieces:
Champion's Tunic/Leathers
~Defense: 32
~Enemy Health Sight
Snow Boots
~Defense: 20
~Snow Speed Up
Sand Boots
~Defense: 20
~Sand Speed Up
Zant's Helmet
~Defense: 3
~Immunity to cold damage
~Unfreezable
Sheik's Mask
~Defense: 16
~Stealth Up
Korok Mask
~Defense: 1
~Shakes when Koroks are near
Midna's Helmet
~Defense: 7
~Gloom Resistance
Diamond Circlet
~Defense: 28
~Attack Up
Divine Helms
~Vah Medoh, Vah Rudania, Vah Ruta, Vah Naboris
~Defense: 16 each
~Grant small elemental resistances
~Increases Sage Avatar Attack Power by 50%
Monster Disguise Masks
~Bokoblin, Moblin, Horriblin, Lizalfos, Lynel, Majora's Mask
~Defense: 3 each, Majora's Mask: 1
~Makes it harder for those specific enemies to spot Link
~Majora's Mask does this for all enemies
Thunder Helm
~Defense: 3
~Complete Lightning and Electrical Invulnerability
~Optional Radius of 7 Meters
Ancient Hero's Aspect
~Defense: 84
~Master Sword Beam Up
~Encompasses entire body
~Gives wearer the body and "aura" of a previous Zonai reincarnation of Link
~Yet another middle finger to Zelda lore
Misc. Armor Pieces
~Warm Doublet, Warm Archaic Greaves, Gerudo Vai Set, Ruby Circlet, Sapphire Circlet, Amber Earrings, Topaz Earrings, Opal Earrings, Hair Band, Cece Hat, Island Lobster Shirt, Ravio's Hood, Archaic Set, Worn Set, Nintendo Switch Shirt, Salvager's Set
Arsenal:
Paraglider
Torch
Sheikah Slate
Purah Pad
Rauru's Arm
Runes
~Magnesis
~Cryonis
~Stasis
~Remote Bombs
~Camera
~Map
~Ultrahand
~Ascend
~Fuse
~Recall
~Autobuild
~Instant Travel
~Master Cycle Zero
~Sensor+
Travel Medallions
~Four magical runes that can be placed on the ground
~Functions with Instant Travel
Schema Stones/Yiga Schematics
~Fanplane
~Hot Air Balloon
~Dirigible
~Beam Cycle
~Bridge
~Bolt Boat
~Rocket Platform
~Automated Ally
~Hovercraft
Vows
~Solemn Vow of Tulin, Sage of Wind
~Solemn Vow of Yunobo, Sage of Fire
~Solemn Vow of Sidon, Sage of Water
~Solemn Vow of Riju, Sage of Lightning
~Solemn Vow of Mineru, Sage of Spirit
~Tied to magical rings, used to summon avatars of the sages
Zonai Capsules
~Balloon, Battery, Big Battery, Beam Emitter, Small Wheel, Big Wheel, Cannon, Cart, Construct Head, Fan, Flame Emitter, Frost Emitter, Shock Emitter, Homing Cart, Hover Stone, Hydrant, Light, Mirror, Portable Pot, Rocket, Sled, Spring, Stabilizer, Stake, Steering Stick, Time Bomb, Wing
~99 Each
~Runs on 24 Energy Cells, can be overcharged with Zonai Charges
Food
~60 Meals, can make more at cooking pots
~Full Health restore
~Various possible buffs include Attack Up, Defense Up, Elemental Resistances, Speed Up, Stealth Up, Extra Stamina/Health, etc.
Near-endless amounts of monster parts, elemental materials, and ingredients to be fused or made into food/elixirs
Shields
~Max. Carrying Capacity: 20 Fused Shields
~Hylian Shield
~Daybreaker
~Sea-Breeze Shield
~Savage Lynel Shield
~Ancient Shield
~Mighty Zonaite Shield
~Royal Shield
~Shield of the Mind's Eye
~Pot Lid
Bows/Arrows
~Max Carrying Capacity: 14 Bows, 999 Arrows of each kind
~Great Eagle Bow
~Twilight Bow
~Demon King's Bow
~Zonaite Bow
~Ancient Bow
~Savage Lynel Bow
~Phrenic Bow
~Golden Bow
~Royal Guard's Bow
~Duplex Bow
~Arrows: Normal Arrows, Fire Arrows, Ice Arrows, Shock Arrows, Bomb Arrows, Ancient Arrows
Divine Beasts
~Vah Medoh
~Vah Rudania
~Vah Ruta
~Vah Naboris
Melee Weapons:
(Total Weapons Max. Carrying Capacity: 20 Fused Weapons)
Master Sword
~One-handed
~Sword that Seals the Darkness
~Worn down across millennium, was broken and repaired with Light Magic
~When it "breaks", becomes unusable for 10 minutes
~Throws sword beams
~Vastly increases power against dark magic and evil incarnate
~When empowered, can deflect energy attacks, absorb souls, repel kinetic energy, seal magic, cast spells, bypass defenses, and kill immortal beings
~Sentient, will communicate psychically to Link or Hylia in desperate situations
~When a material/weapon is fused to this, an avatar of it appears when attacking
One-Handed Weapons
~Scimitar of the Seven
~Sword of the Hero
~Goddess Sword
~Gloom Sword
~Savage Lynel Sword
~Ancient Short Sword
~Flameblade/Frostblade/Thunderblade
Two-Handed Weapons
~Stone Smasher
~Sword of the Six Sages
~Biggoron's Sword
~Gloom Club
~Royal Claymore
~Windcleaver
~Edge of Duality
~Savage Lynel Crusher
~Ancient Battle Axe++
~Ancient Bladesaw
~Great Flameblade/Frostblade/Thunderblade
~Fierce Deity Sword/Double Helix Sword
Spears
~Lightscale Trident
~Ceremonial Trident
~Gloom Spear
~Zora Spear (Pristine)
~Royal Halberd
~Savage Lynel Spear
~Ancient Spear
~Drill Shaft
~Flamespear/Frostspear/Thunderspear
Boomerangs
~Sea-Breeze Boomerang
~Giant Boomerang
~Tri-Lizal Boomerang
Magic Rods/Staffs
~Meteor Rod
~Blizzard Rod
~Thunder Rod
~Opal Rod
~Star Fragment Rod
Korok Leaf
~Produces heavy blasts of wind that overpower even magic wind
~No damage, but quite literally sends foes flying through the air
Feats:
Defeated Master Kohga, Sooga, Molduking, Vah Naboris, Vah Medoh, Thunderblight Ganon, Monk Maz Koshia, Colgera, Queen Ghibdo, Yunobo, Revali, Daruk, Impa, Astor, Naydra, Demon Dragon, Harbinger Ganon, Calamity Ganon
Destroyed King Gleeoks, Guardians, Black Hinoxes, Stalnoxes, Captain Construct IVs, Guardian Scout IVs, Flux Construct IIIs, Battle Taluses, Obsidian Froxes, Moraigas, Phantom Ganons, Boss Bokoblins, Wizzrobes, Lynels, as well as Malice/Gloom versions of most
Outmuscled the Light Dragon
Defeated 500 Soldiers of Hyrule in four minutes
Ate Lava-Based Rock Roast
Tamed several legendary steeds, including the Giant White Stallion, Stalhorses, Ganondorf's Horse, and the Lord of the Mountain
Completed the Champion Trials, including wading through lava and shooting four targets "at once"
Survived Medoh's lasers, Naboris' lightning, Ruta's cryonis, and Rudania's fireballs
Completed an enormous amount of combat trials where his equipment and powers were taken away
Comparable to a previous Link who survived a multi-gigaton explosion
Infiltrated the Yiga Clan thrice, once completing their trials and becoming the greatest Yiga of them all
Helped build Tarrey Town and rebuild Lurelin Village
The only voe [male] allowed in Gerudo Town
Was compared in power to a Goddess-Powered Zelda
Navigated the Lost Woods
Fought through the Coliseums of the Depths, including the Lynel Gauntlet
With the full power of the Master Sword, created a 282 Gigaton explosion
Likely superior to Vah Rudania, who controlled all the lava of the Depths, and Vah Ruta, who could flood a country
Regularly reacts to light-speed attacks and outspeeds others who also do so
Toured the entire Great Sky Island without touching the ground
Superior to Selmie in shield-surfing, who is known as the best in history
Using Paraglider, completed Rito training course better than any Rito
Completed literally thousands of puzzles, including those awful motion-control shrines
W/ Fierce Deity Outfit, is stronger than Majora, who moved a small moon and threatened a continent
Defeated Secret Stone Ganondorf when six empowered sages could not
Harbinger and Calamity Ganon threatened to destroy all Hyrule and could cause Blood Moons, Link defeated both
Weaknesses:
Can be tricked, at least more than previous Links
All weapons/shields have limited durability and can be broken
Cannot climb in rain or survive harsh environments without special gear
Brash and childish at times
Doesn't practice gun safety
Too compliant, like dude, they're just flowers
Prone to accidentally destroying his Zonai creations when trying to activate them with a weapon
Lacks the Triforce of Courage, and is therefore vulnerable to dark magic, including hax moves
Special Notes:
[1] Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity is directly specified in-universe to be an alternative timeline to Breath of the Wild as a result of time-traveling by Terrako and Astor. Such timeline changes and splits have occurred multiple times in previous Zelda games and have always been accountable for proper scaling. While the events themselves are not canon, it is supposed to be a legitimate "What If" scenario, and as such all abilities and feats should translate to our modern Link.
[2] In the beginning of Tears of the Kingdom, even before his encounter with Ganondorf, Link does not have almost any of his weapons, armors, abilities, or tech. There is no given explanation for this, and both the primary story and further character dialogue implies he canonically had it all, so this must be treated as attempted gameplay balance, rather than Link not having any of it. Even if it were the case that he somehow lost it all, Rule #3 of Death Battle comes into effect and tells us to combine his arsenal regardless.
[3] Using Autobuild requires the use of the battery-like zonaite. However, our characters today are at their maximum potential, and have as many as they can physically store of any consumable, including zonaite, arrows, capsules, monster parts, energy cells, and food. Even if Link runs out at some point, he can always leave using a Travel Medallion to get more.
[4] Both the Bow of Light and the One-Hit Obliterator were temporary weapons Link held for specific purposes. The Bow of Light is Zelda's primary weapon for use with her light magic, and was only lent to Link to deal the finishing blows on Dark Beast Ganon. The One-Hit Obliterator was used as part of the Divine Beast Tamer's Trials, only functions within the Great Plateau, and expended its power to create the tests Link later completed. He only uses these weapons once, and they are not his weapons; ergo, he does not get them in the Death Battle.
[5] Multiple Shiekah Monks contained within Shrines were able to create everlasting storms in large areas surrounding them, some of which are up to 3 square kilometers, reach higher than sky islands, and can dissipate in less than a second. This would require energy of upwards of 5.41 Megatons of TNT. Simple enemy Wizzrobes are also capable of creating thunderstorms in a moment, and the Ghibdo Queen could cause desert-spanning sandstorms just by flapping its wings.
[6] We see the explosion expand past the pyramid, becoming so large it no longer fits on the pages. We know it actually expands even further, as it destroys the pyramid, rather than blowing the top off. Assuming that the author took inspiration from the bricks of the pyramids of Egypt and then geometrically estimating the distance of the farthest debris in the art, we can measure the size of the temple and approximate the potential maximum size of the explosion. To create a fireball that huge would have required around 22.5 Gigatons of TNT! Earlier in the comic, a single grenade from the temple exploded with enough power to be seen from the horizon, so this actually tracks with the amount of explosives we see inside.
[7] While the power level of Age of Calamity's Link initially appears to be far greater than his mainline self in gameplay, cutscenes taking place in the past in both Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom show similar levels of power. The most likely explanation (implied by character dialogue in both games) is that Demise's dark magic and Gloom enhances modern monsters to be far stronger than they used to be. Mipha's spirit also states in the endgame of Breath of the Wild that Link is "so much stronger than before," referring to their time one hundred years ago, confirming that anything Age of Calamity Link can do, modern Tears of the Kingdom Link can as well. This is, of course, with exception to the Sheikah Runes, which Terrako enhanced.
[8] The original Japanese text reads "This form was born from his obsessive refusal to give up on revival," which is in reference to Calamity Ganon attempting to create itself a proper body, as revealed in the in-game compendium. The Japanese dialogue for the final cutscene also implies that this was to be the final incarnation of Demise, and the English translation was overseen by Japanese writers. All this to say that the common internet belief that Dark Beast Ganon being the final Demise was a mistranslation is relatively unfounded.
[9] Link killed the Demon Dragon by cracking its Secret Stone and filling it with light magic from the Master Sword, causing the dragon to explode in a beam of light that parted the clouds. The Master Sword was empowered due to the dragon's dark magic, and would not be this powerful normally, but the magical explosion was worth an overwhelming 282.72 Gigatons of TNT!
…
All right, the combatants are set, and we've run the data through all possibilities. It's time for a…
Death Battle!
…
Atop her Sunwing, Aloy peered down past the tops of a forest, finding the tracks that guided her path. She frowned as the Sunwing rose too high for her to make out any broken branches, and tapped her Focus to have it do the work for her. Immediately, the required trail was laid out in her sight, as well as a 93% predictory trail heading northwest.
Aloy sighed. Sometimes, the Focus was too helpful. Recently, it felt like it made the skills she had honed for many years feel irrelevant.
She tapped the Focus again. "Beta, sending trail information now. Can we tell what it is yet?"
"Hold on," came a voice from the other side. "Receiving."
Less than three seconds later, she had her answer. "Aloy, you're not going to…" the voice trailed off.
"What? Not going to like it?"
"I don't know. It's unusual, that's for sure."
"Will you just tell me, already?"
"I cross-referenced it with the Greenhouse Database, and the tracks line up with a device the Zeniths call a 'motorcycle.' It's like a horse, but with two wh- actually, I'll just send you an image."
Immediately, the Focus lodged a memory in Aloy's head. It was of a thin, sleek machine, riding atop two wheels, called a "Milwaukee-Eight 107 Stage 2" with "99 Horsepower."
"Is a machine built like this what I can expect to find?"
"According to the groove marks, something like that. But there's something else. Some sort of energy your Focus has never picked up before."
"Is it similar to Daemonic? Another AI?"
"No, it's completely different. We need you to find and scan that machine. An energy that Nemesis has never been exposed to could be, well, helpful."
"Right. Do we have an extrapolation yet?"
"Hold on."
Predicting a portion of her response, Aloy guided the Sunwing upwards, nearly reaching the lower clouds. From here, she could see over fifty kilometers. This entire area was strange; she'd never been this far south before. To her right, silver spires rose above waterfalls; likely a former rocket launch site that had been adapted into a tribe's base. To the far north, a forest covered in unnatural fog. If Gaia hadn't told her otherwise, she would have immediately assumed it to be a former site of Aether. To the northeast, the hint of a dormant volcano that was active no more than eight years ago, or so the Focus said.
But the most noticeable, and troubling, sight was to the northwest. There, a large castle surrounded by a large moat floated on an island above a deep pit. The Focus claimed it was kept afloat through a gravity matrix not dissimilar to those found on the Odyssey. But that didn't do much to keep Aloy's heart still. Something was wrong with that castle. Her Focus insisted nothing lived within, but it couldn't read into the pit, and every single time she looked at the structure, she felt fear and despair rise up a little. It was as if it were emitting a signal to pull all her insecurities forward.
Beta came back. "Got it. It should be right here."
A string of numbers appeared, overlaying Aloy's vision. -0253, 1060, 0335
Of course.
"All I have to do is find it and scan it, right?"
"Yes? Why, does it scare you?"
"If I were afraid of the unknown, I wouldn't be talking to you," Aloy quipped. She clicked her tongue, driving the Sunwing forward. It folded its wings back, allowing the air to stream more easily, and dove towards the castle in the sky.
…
Link stepped off the Master Cycle Zero, and it faded into strings of light. He was back in the throne room, where he and the sages had fought so many Phantom Ganons not terribly long ago. He'd discovered a secret journal Zelda kept where she mentioned a replacement for his former tunic. That tunic had been magically blessed and among the strongest armors he wore; if he were to face Ganondorf soon, a replacement would be a good idea.
Let's see. Two torches… there.
Link took aim with the Great Eagle Bow and shot three flaming arrows at the throne. It was a perfect shot; the left and right arrows struck the two beacons, alighting them, and the third struck the crown of the throne, stabbing into the stone and putting itself out. It was an unnecessary flex, but Link still half-wished someone had been there to see it.
The statute behind the throne rumbled and ground against the stone it was attached to before sliding to the right.
Link jumped up, climbed to the top of the stairs in a second, and saw the chest underneath. The instincts of his past lives kicking in, he pulled open the lid without any hesitation and saw inside what he'd been looking for: a blue, leathered tunic with the symbol of the royal family embroidered into it.
He lightly touched the tunic, and, with a flash of magic, his green one was replaced by the new spell-woven leathers.
The sound of a wire cord being pulled caused him to turn around.
Someone was climbing up to meet him.
…
Aloy held on tightly to her pullcaster. According to the coordinates, the machine had stopped in the room right above her. She'd already made a rope. Now, to climb it without thinking about the thousands of meters leading to darkness and death awaiting her if she made a misstep.
She really didn't like this place. There were skeletons everywhere, of creatures that neither she nor her Focus recognized. The air was thick, but her Focus claimed it was normal. She was unbalanced, but her Focus claimed she was still. Aloy didn't believe in magic. Not anymore. But if Varl were here, she knew exactly what creatures he would claim lived here.
Dammit. Of course, of every superstitious person she could have thought of, this place made her think of him.
'This place'? Ugh, I'm getting too engaged with this. Think logically. Something here killed those creatures. Whatever it is has some relation to that machine, and that energy. You don't know what you're walking into. Focus. Take it slow.
She pulled herself up the last leg and grasped the top of the opening with one hand. As she used it to pull herself into the room, she caught sight of something. No, someone.
She instantly ducked down onto the rope again. She tapped her Focus. "No life signs. Confirm."
She saw overlaid on her vision: No recognized life.
What about unrecognized?
The Focus heard her thoughts, and she suddenly very much wished she had never thought of it. Eleven thousand different readings suddenly popped up, divided into categories. 10,829 forms of microorganisms the system had never encountered. 92 forms of potential insects and wildlife. 110 unknown variable creatures displaying some form of intelligence. And, in that room, one creature with 72% Human DNA.
Aloy felt her lungs rise into her throat. "Machines," she quickly said, not even realizing she was saying it aloud, "how many unrecognized machines?"
548 unrecognized machines within scanning range.
Aloy closed her eyes. "How many in that room?"
2.
"Well, at least there's an upside."
Where the hell am I? What happened here?
Attempting to extrapolate.
"Cancel." Aloy set her teeth. She would explore this later. One thing at a time. One thing that was 72% human. Chances of genetic modification?
Cellular degradation altered. Organ tissue 100% match for Human. Speed of neurological energy transfer strengthened through natural micro-evolution. Right arm surgically replaced with unknown species. 92% chance of genetic modification within the last 900 generations.
Nine hundred?! Did they survive the plague?
Unknown. Lack of necessary information.
"Okay. Let's see how much of that information I can get." Aloy calmed her nerves and reached up again. When she pulled herself up for a second time, though, the creature was no longer there.
…
Link had seen the red hair rise into the room, and his first thought was, of course, that Ganondorf had left another puppet to guard the chamber. He immediately threw down a Travel Medallion, switched to his Sheikah outfit, and swung around the outside of one of the pillars. From there, he silently climbed up to the top of one of the window holes and peeked in. There was nothing.
He took out the Sheikah Slate and turned the camera on. Immediately, right below the opening he had seen the hair, an orange box appeared, a series of question marks above them.
Something is here. But it doesn't want me to know that.
If there was one thing he knew about this castle, it was that nobody came here for pleasure. And nothing that lived here wanted him alive.
Still grasping onto the wall, he silently drew his Phrenic Bow and notched an arrow.
Then the woman climbed back up.
That doesn't look like any monster. Link set his bow to one hand and took the Slate back out. He took a picture of the flame-haired woman, but the Slate still didn't recognize it. But Ganondorf can make constructs just as realistic. If it's not in the Compendium, I should be careful.
"Where is he?" he heard her ask.
He didn't know how she knew, but as soon as the question left her lips, she sharply turned and locked eyes with him.
In less than a second, she'd drawn a sharpshot bow and fired.
Link spun his bow and fired to meet the arrow.
-FIGHT!-
Aloy saw the masked man hanging upside-down behind a window-like opening. He was holding a notched bow.
In an instant, the feeling of dread she'd been experiencing this entire time, the memories of Varl, the unknown creatures and machines her Focus had scanned, the gunfire-pace of her heart, it all came to a head with two words:
A TRAP!
She pulled out Iriv's Downfall and fired without thinking.
Only for the masked man to shoot her arrow out of the air without so much as blinking.
He fired another arrow, just as quickly, catching Aloy off-guard. The hit would have pierced her skull and may have been fatal, but it bounced off the Shield-Weaver Armor without a ripple.
Focus!
How can I help?
Not you!
Aloy notched a Braced Shot and shot the figure. His bow seemingly changed in his hands to be much larger and darker, and the arrow it shot had… what appeared to be a large piece of candy at the end.
Aloy's confusion didn't last, as the two arrows met mid-air.
The resulting explosion collapsed half the ceiling and sent Aloy flying out the opening she had entered from.
She managed to recover her senses mid-air; the shock rattled her, but her armor had taken all the damage. She shot her pullcaster at the opening again, and it latched perfectly, pulling Aloy back into the room at speeds almost matching how she'd been launched out.
As she braced her knees on the ground, the masked warrior appeared before her in a mass of swirling lights.
What?
Matter-displacement technology recognized. Unknown power source.
With another flash of light, his outfit changed. The white and deep blue skin-tight suit changed to a much more comfortable-looking cargo trousers, boots, and a blue leathered shirt with a tribal design. At the same time, his dark bow shifted into an engraved silver sword with a royal blue hilt, and in his other hand was a diverted couche shield; blue, lined with silver, and more tribal symbols painted on.
Not even the Zeniths had matter-displacement abilities this advanced. Why is he here? What's he after?
Warning: Extreme energy output. Warning: Extreme energy output. Warn-
"Identify!" Aloy interrupted as Link swung the Master Sword at her. She bounced the blunt side off the tip of the Champion's Spear, causing the swing to miss.
Unknown power source. Energy output exceeds recognized parameters.
Over her vision, Aloy saw the sword the warrior held enveloped in purple, being read and tracked by her Focus.
Can my armor withstand it?
Aloy ducked under another swing, but was caught by a swing of the shield, knocking her down. The Master Sword was instantly plunged down, but stopped a centimeter above her skin as the forcefield kept it from injuring her.
Ultraweave stability confirmed. Unknown Energy does not apply.
"So much for all the warnings," Aloy muttered. She grabbed the sword, Shield-Weaver Armor keeping it from cutting her hand, and struck the ground with her spear, activating the Radial Blast Valor Surge. Link was knocked back and the sword went flying out of his hands. As Aloy got up, though, he brought out a device she didn't recognize, and she heard a strange sound; like chains crashing in front of her.
When she next blinked, her armor bounded with waves of energy, as if it had been struck several times, and her opponent was behind her, sword back in hand, making another swing. Aloy turned while swinging with her spear, but the lighter sword glanced past it and hit her armor once more.
Error: Timetable matrix does not confirm with primary operating system.
Analyze his fighting pattern.
Analyzing.
Aloy noticed he still had the device in his hand. She tapped the Focus. Scan.
Scanning. Uploading data.
Link parried one of her spear thrusts and backflipped away, launching a sword beam at her. Aloy spun, barely guiding it past her with the back end of the spear.
Then her mind went fuzzy. Her Focus sparked and cracked its case. The information on that device was unbelievable; more than even most other Focuses she'd found.
bluebossbokoblintheseheavyweightmonstersareleadersofthebokoblinstheyhavevegotmorestaminathantheredvarietyandtheyexecutepowerfulpunchesandweaponattacksthehornsontheirheadsaresharpercommonlocationshyrulefieldlanayrugreatspringrecoverablematerialsbossbokoblinfangbluebossbokoblinhornbossbokoblingutslizalfosarmthearmofastalizalfosthatcontinuestostruggleevenindeathitcanbeusedasaweaponbutitsverybrittleyoucanfeelitwigglingwhenyoustrapittoyourbackblupeetheymaylooklikemererabbitsatafleetingglancebutthesestrangeandaptlynamedcreaturesglowwithamysteriousbluelightwhilethedetailsoftheiroriginsareentirelyunknownthereisonethingwedoknowthesepeculiarlittlethingshaveapenchantforcollectingrupeescommonlocationsunknownrecoverablematerialsunknownheroofhyrulechosenbytheswordthatsealsthedarknessyouhaveshownunflinchingbraveryandskillinthefaceofdarknessandadversityandhaveprovenyourselfworthyoftheblessingsofthegoddesshyliawhetherskywardboundadriftintimeorsteepedintheglowingembersoftwilightthesacredbladeisforeverboundtothesouloftheheroweprayforyourprotectionandwehopethatthetwoofyouwillgrowstrongertogetherasoneforgedinthelongdistantpasttheswordthatsealsthedarknessguardianofhyruleancientsteelforeverboundtotheherointhenameofthegoddesshyliaiblessyouandyourchosenheroovertheseasoftimeanddistancewhenweneedthegoldenpowerofthegoddessourhoperestsinyoutobeforeverbythehero'ssideagainwepraythatthetwoofyouwillbestrongertogeth—
Aloy clutched her head, ignoring the strike from the white sword. "BETA!" she shouted, activating a link back to home base.
"Huh?" Beta's voice again came to her, though it was hard to dilute from everything else that was being imprinted into her mind. "What's going on?"
"I'm sending a scan to Gaia! Sort it out!" Normally, Aloy would have left very detailed instructions, but she was currently too busy trying to stop herself from automatically memorizing the mating habits of Hearty Bass. She tapped the Focus once more, diverting the information flow into Beta and Gaia's network.
"What do you- HOLY-"
That was the last she heard, as the Focus fizzled and popped off her temple, smoking and spent.
…
This was a very confusing day for Link.
He was almost certain that this enemy was no construction of Gloom or Malice, as the Master Sword rested in its depowered state, but she had unusual powers all the same. The shielding that coated her body appeared to be a more advanced version of the Ancient Sheikah technology Purah and Robbie worked with, and she was clearly in communication with someone he could not hear. Her skill as a fighter was nothing to scoff at, either. She had her own explosive arrows, and right now, even distracted, her spearmanship was managing to mostly keep him at bay.
But what most interested him right now was the piece of metal that had fallen off the side of her head. From her concerned look, he knew it was important. Why was it important? Why did it break?
And why had she shot at him?
Link didn't know if she was another attempting member of the Yiga clan, or if she had just decided she wanted to pick a fight, but her technology was frightening, and her spear was holding off the Master Sword. Something told him that if he just let her go, he'd come to regret it.
He made a break for the piece of metal. If he could snag that, then he could still leave and feel better about his chances in the future. Whatever this important thing was, he was sure Purah could find out.
Aloy noticed his trajectory and met him halfway there. She dove at him, spear outstretched. Link parried the top quarter with his blade while shuffling to the left. He tried to catch her underneath the spear, but she let go with one hand and twisted it, forcing the blade up and turning Link's wrist. He drove his entire left side forwards, hoping to catch her with a shield bash again, but she was wary this time. She caught the center of the Hylian Shield with the shoe of her spear, knocking Link off-balance and allowing her to get a wide swing in.
Link scooted backwards, but the swing knocked the shield further back. Aloy immediately followed it up with a second wide-arc swing coming from the other side, striking Link's tunic with the extra range. As soon as the spear was drawn backwards halfway past her waist, she switched momentum, driving the shoe forward. This caught Link off-guard and dropped him to the ground.
Aloy launched herself at his chest, and Link instantly threw his shield over his torso to block the incoming attack, but Aloy's leap was prepared for this. She landed on the shield, and bounced directly off, into the air. There, in a move that seemed too fast to perceive, she drew a warrior's bow and shot at his chest. Link blocked the arrow with his shield, but rather than deflecting, the arrow stuck with some form of adhesive.
As Link stood up, Aloy dropped from the air with a slamming attack from her spear, which struck the arrow and caused it to detonate. The explosion rocked the room and sent the Hylian Shield out of Link's grasp. No shield to protect him, Aloy was able to get in another arrow with her hunter bow while he was still recovering. This one struck his torso, and while the arrow itself bounced off the magical tunic, it caused a sudden explosion of force that threw Link to the ground again.
Link groaned as he pulled himself back up. Not keep at bay. Keep up.
Aloy was on him in a second, spear at the ready.
But I have something she doesn't.
As he steadied himself, the Master Sword was switched out for the Lightscale Trident.
When Aloy struck forwards, he saw what she would do. He'd been getting hit by the thing's reach more than long enough to see where this jab was headed. He jutted out the trident, not just forwards, but slightly upwards, too. This caught the middle of the Champion's Spear, and, also, caught Aloy by surprise. With a shove and a twist of his body, all her momentum was suddenly a sling that threw her body past him and into a stone wall. The impact caused Aloy to drop her spear and stare, stunned.
Years and years of training with Mipha.
Aloy stood up, drew her bow, and shot a volley of arrows as she charged forward again. Link saw their paths perfectly. Concentrate. Just like Revali.
He spun the trident in circles, passing it from hand to hand, catching each arrow on the handle, knocking every one of them out of the way. Then he shifted hands to meet a heavy blow to his right from the Champion's Spear. The two legendary spears clashed a moment, and Aloy drew back for two short jabs.
Right. I recognize this technique. Jab, jab, arc swing, hand switch, and… there.
As Aloy went to slide her spear down in her hand, Link interrupted with a kick to the leg, a part of the body this particular combo left wide open. Aloy stuttered backwards a few centimeters, enough for the Lightscale Trident to swing up without breaking Link's arm.
She'll try for a block breaking combination attack. Thrust, thrust, overhead swing.
Indeed, he saw, thrust, thrust, both of which he blocked, and the overhead swing. For any less-experienced fighter, that swing would have come out of nowhere and broken any defense they had. But Link just saw an opening.
He stepped forward, turned with the swing, and rammed the trident into her torso.
If she didn't have that forcefield, she would be dead.
As it was, she staggered back, wind knocked out of her body. She dropped to one knee.
Link spun the trident once more, just to show off. He picked up the Hylian Shield, it vanishing into streams of light. He walked toward Aloy with an idea for getting past that armor.
Only for Aloy to raise up a warrior bow and shoot him.
Link barely reacted in time, blocking the arrow with the trident, but this was no ordinary arrow. It froze the Lightscale Trident into ice where it touched, including freezing one of his hands to the weapon.
Link stepped backwards, quickly, but Aloy had already lined up several arrows for a burst of fire. One fired at his feet, releasing a wave of electricity that bound him to his spot and caused him to drop the trident with his free hand. The rest hit his chest and arms, coating them in ice. Link was stuck.
That was all Aloy needed, as she pulled out her Icerail and blew a gust of freezing air over Link's body, encasing him entirely in ice.
Aloy put down several motion traps in front of Link and dove to the side, taking advantage of the fighter's immobility to reach into her backpack and equip another Focus. As soon as she booted it up, she heard a voice on the other side.
"Aloy! Aloy, are you there?"
"Yes, I'm here, Beta," Aloy quickly responded. "Have you worked through the data yet?"
"Oh, thank- I've been trying to contact you."
"My Focus broke. Have you worked through the data yet?"
"Oh, good, that's all. The replacements work, then?"
Aloy paused. "Beta. I am going to ask you a question. I want you to pay attention to that question. When I am finished asking the question, you may respond with only one of two things: Yes and No."
"Oh, we haven't worked through all the data yet."
"Great, I don't even know why I bother." Aloy rolled her eyes. "Well, do you at least have anything I can use?"
"That's the problem; there's too much! Hundreds of new species, every aspect of their life and history recorded. Ancient weapons, entire civilizations, Aloy, we have nearly-complete histories of the last fifteen thousand years! Have you ever heard of the Zonai? Neither have the Zeniths! Combined with Apollo, this could change-"
"Beta."
"Right, right. We have a match on the device you tracked. It's called a 'Master Cycle Zero.' Apparently, it can be summoned using an object called a 'Sheikah Slate.' We're still figuring out what that is."
Aloy peered over at the frozen Link. "I think I might have an idea."
"The Cycle is part of a set. Something called the 'Divine Beasts.' I'm still having trouble accessing those files.'"
"Would it help if I brought back the 'Sheikah Slate'?"
"Seriously? It would be incredible! Is that the machine you found?"
"No. What I found is another hunter. He's, well, I can explain later. But he has one."
"Oh, that must be the guy in all these pictures! 'Link' something. Great! Bring him back to us! Who knows what we can learn from him?"
"Um," Aloy scanned Link's frozen body. "I'll do my best. He was after my Focus earlier. Why would someone like him take a basic Focus?"
There was a short pause before Beta responded. "Aloy, listen to me. Do not let him get your Focus. Escape if you have to. If he's against you, that's really bad. If someone with this level of tech finds out about Gaia, the entire planet could be destroyed far before Nemesis ever gets here."
Aloy scoffed. "It won't be a problem. I have him contained. For a while, at least."
"I'll try to get Alva on a line. With all of us working together, we should be able to streamline this data to you in just a few minutes."
Aloy clicked her tongue. "Great. I'll just clean up the mess. Sheikah Slate. Divine Beasts. Not the weirdest shopping list I've seen."
Aloy tapped her Focus and cut the call. She stepped toward the sculpture in front of her.
And then the sculpture glowed.
Instinctually, Aloy dived backwards, and she was right to do so, as every motion trap she set off exploded at once.
The floor gave way, and Aloy found herself falling into a far wider, rounder arena, with no windows to speak of. Mid-air, she pulled out her pullcaster and used it to grab onto a stable ledge, saving herself from the fall.
But when she looked down, there was the warrior, Link, his name apparently was, wearing a full set of what appeared to be winter gear made with down feathers. But even as she watched, he switched again, to a set of full, horned dark armor. In that, he barely looked human.
Link, meanwhile, raised his right hand and activated Recall. His Snowquill Armor had been very handy on the ice arrows (and… other magic) she had shot him with, and a quick draught of Fairy Tonic undid everything those traps could have done, but even that ice hadn't prevented him from hearing what she'd said. Whoever she was working for on the other side of that earpiece, they wanted the Sheikah Slate and control over the Divine Beasts. It didn't matter what they wanted to use them for; they were dangerous enough in his hands, much less anybody else's.
So, as he changed to his Phantom Armor and the rocks returned back to create the floor above him once again, he opened up the Sheikah Slate and activated all four Divine Beasts. Converge on the hills around the castle, he told them, in case something goes wrong.
He could feel the continent begin to rumble and hear the roar-like footsteps of one of them already.
He welled his spirit deep within himself, and activated his long-dormant Champion Abilities. Revali's Gale, Daruk's Protection, Mipha's Grace, and Urbosa's Fury. If there was ever a time to use them, well, it was to defeat Ganondorf, but now worked, too.
The former floor, now ceiling, cracked. A point stuck out in the middle, as if it had been pierced from above. Then another. And another. And there these three blinking points were.
Blinking.
Link dove and raised his shield above his head.
The ceiling was rocked with explosions a moment later, again collapsing it, and this time, Aloy was there, Ropecaster at the ready, shooting nets at the crouching Link. One caught him, instantly tying his hands to the floor. Link tried to muscle out, but these ropes were clearly designed for creatures much larger than him. He tried to teleport to his medallion, but the waypoint had been lost with the floor.
Aloy landed safely on the ground, put away The Tie That Binds, and brought out the Forgefire.
Link grimaced, not that she could see it beyond his helmet, and clenched his right hand.
Five rings of light began to glow, one around each of his fingers. Aloy backed up, but hadn't taken two steps before the lights burst into armed creatures.
A bird-like being with a bow, a fish-like man wielding a spear just like the one Link had used, a child in ornate dress with twin cutlasses, an almost-human-shaped machine, and what she could only describe as a living boulder. All turquoise, all facing her, weapons drawn.
Identify!
Subject is composed of 72% Human DNA, 172 centimeters tall, and approximately-
Aloy didn't bother reading the rest. Identify the other creatures in this room!
There are only two living creatures in this room above nine centimeters in height.
Oh. Illusion technology. That made sense. Aloy was quite thankful for her Focus-
And quite taken aback when the child cut Link's bonds with her "illusory" cutlass.
Aloy turned her Forgefire to the newly-freed Link and immediately let loose, but the living rock got in the way and activated some sort of red barrier. Upon contact, even the flaming Forgefire's power was dispersed.
Link pointed at Aloy, and all five sages began to attack.
Aloy dodged a hit from Yunobo's greatsword, scraped under Sidon's trident, and her armor took a hit as Tulin launched three arrows at one of its power modules. She had only managed to put away the Forgefire when Link shot her in the back.
Aloy felt the arrow stab underneath her shoulder. It was a familiar feeling, but it ached all the same. I've taken too much damage. The armor must be- she reached to take the arrow, only to be stopped by a skintight forcefield. A forcefield that the arrow had ignored.
"That's-"
Link pointed at the arrow, and with a burst of golden energy from Riju, lightning came down from the sky. It passed the opening they'd made in the roof and in the ceiling and struck Aloy dead-on.
Aloy screamed out. It felt exactly like getting hit by the Stormslinger. This kind of weaponry, technology… Beta was right. It was so far beyond what she could understand. Even her Focus couldn't see these new fighters, and every one was seemingly as dangerous as Link himself.
There were no windows. There was only one corridor, one exit, and it was guarded by all five of her opponents.
Biting her lip, Aloy tapped her Focus. "Beta…" she coughed once. "Activate Hephaestus."
"What?!" came Beta's voice. "What- what happened?"
"Just shut up and do it!" Aloy shouted back. "If we wait any longer, he'll have my Focus, and everything we've been doing is done!"
"I don't think-"
"You never do." Aloy tapped the Focus again. She just had to believe that Beta would do it. Maybe she'd been a bit harsh; she'd been a bit harsh to everyone recently. If she survived this, she'd have to apologize. If she survived this.
Link's pointed ears caught every word of her side of the conversation. He didn't know what "Hephaestus" was, but he certainly didn't want to find out. Whatever she was doing, whatever she was planning, it clearly centered around the device on her temple; this "Focus." If he wanted to stop it, he needed to take that device. The one upstairs was definitely broken, if not from when it fell off, from all the exploding bolts that had been set off.
Aloy reached behind her back and threw a large spike at Link, aiming very specifically for him.
Right. Exploding bolts.
Sidon reacted in time, raising a water barrier that broke against the projectile's explosion, but was enough to contain its damage. Link didn't waste time. He saw that she was reaching for another and raised his Ancient Bow. His right arm glowed blue for a moment, and Link fired off another arrow, this one with a Silver Lynel Horn fused to it. The previous arrow had managed to get past that armor, so being hit by this one should, hopefully, put her down before she could make more trouble.
Aloy saw it coming, but instead of dodging, she crouched slightly, let it come…
Then reached out and snatched it out of the air.
Huh.
She blocked an attempted overhead swing from Yunobo with the arrow, the lynel-horn head keeping the spiritual Stone Smasher at bay, and flicked the explosive spike at Mineru, who had come in swinging with her extendable arms. The explosion sent the mech staggering back, and Aloy rolled out from under the Stone Smasher to perform a follow-up attack. Link saw it in her muscle movement; somehow, she knew exactly where to strike this machine to disable it. Had she fought against Zonai tech before?
Link didn't know if such an attack would work on the spiritual form of a sage, but he wasn't about to let it happen so he could find out. With no arrows able to reach that far in time, Link instead snapped his finger, using Urbosa's Fury to call another lightning bolt from the sky and catch Aloy mid-swing.
The lightning struck the anointed, and the blast propelled her into the side of a stone staircase. There was another shout, even louder this time, and as she slumped to the ground, the metal frame around her invisible armor crackled. The blue appeared for a moment and fizzled out.
When Mineru flung out an arm wielding a spiked ball, it hit her.
And she bled.
The armor is broken.
Aloy coughed again, harder, and multiple times, now. That hit from the mech had hurt, yeah, she was pretty sure she was bleeding in multiple places, but it was the lightning that really hurt. That first blast? That had been nothing compared to what she'd just felt. She'd been struck by lightning before (a few times, actually), but whatever Link was doing was no ordinary lightning.
That last blast had taken out her Shield-Weaver Armor for a few seconds. She was vulnerable. But she also hurt.
She heard another arrow sailing her way and managed to roll. Just enough where it didn't hit. She struggled, but, having been through great pain before, she was able to lift an arm to find a potion. She saw in her peripheral the young girl glowing yellow, and quickly downed the brew.
The healing spread quickly, and only barely quickly enough. Another of the weaker strikes of lightning hit her, and without any armor to protect her, she was lucky the crazy alchemists of her own world had figured out how to make drinks that heal over time. Even after the lightning sent another shock through her body and burned the top layer of skin off her back, it regrew and restored her vigor.
She tapped her Focus, only for it to make no noise. Right. Lightning. She stood up, using all her rapidly-returning strength, and plunged her spear down, using a Berserk Module to send out a blast of energy. She'd already used her only other Radial Module; this would have to do.
Relieved to see the, for lack of a better terms, "spirits," fall back at the blast, Aloy immediately dug into her pack and retrieved another Focus. Upon reattaching, she reestablished a connection to her previous data network, dodged another arrow, and saw immediately on her vision:
Radial Berserk status: Completed
Number of Affected: 0
What?
Aloy turned around, and saw the five… "spirits" attacking each other.
The Berserk Blast was meant for that, yes, but it was specifically made to affect humans and machinery. She hadn't thought for a second it would work on these creatures.
Well, as the old saying went, don't look an unscientific principal that's staring you in the face in the mouth until it's done saving your life and you have plenty of time alone with your supercomputer.
Aloy switched to the Skyhammer and began launching.
Link was caught off-guard when the red energy turned the sages against each other. It wasn't as though he was unused to dark magic, but he'd never experienced it quite like this. The girl wasn't just wielding ancient, advanced technology, she was a magician as well.
Link turned the Ancient Bow into the Savage Lynel Sword and blocked a slice from Riju. Even though Sidon had been closest to him, Riju went for him first. He had been the last one to interact with her, he supposed. Interesting; the magic must affect individuals by transforming their mem-
Daruk's Protection saved Link as a firebomb nearly struck his head.
Link whispered to himself angrily. He had to stop getting so distracted so easily. Especially by really cool new powers and weapons. It always-
Daruk's Protection saved Link as Riju blasted him with lightning.
Link bounded backwards and surveyed the situation. Riju was fighting him, Sidon and Tulin were having a long-range duel with arrows and water, and Yunobo and Mineru were locked in a contest of strength. And the girl was launching bombs all around the battlefield with a slingshot.
Four blue bombs struck Sidon right as he had gathered up enough water to fill a well, and he was frozen solid, encased entirely in ice, just as Link had been. Three orange bombs hit Mineru and Yunobo, tearing them apart and setting the area around them aflame.
And seven purple bombs were falling at him and Riju.
Link threw his right arm and hit them with Recall, blocking a slice from Riju with the Hylian Shield as he did it. Immediately, the bombs turned back and struck an unready Aloy, coating her with a purple fluid that smelled of Zora grease. Link wasn't sure what the intention had been, but if it didn't hurt someone directly, and smelled of Zora grease…
Link blocked another swing and turned his sword into a thunderspear. He struck Riju's spiritual metal blades, shocking her, and launched the spear over his shoulder in a perfect arc at Aloy. Of course, she dodged.
And, of course, the purgewater meant landing the spear within half a meter of her caused her to be electrocuted anyway.
Theory confirmed, Link snapped his fingers again, causing Urbosa's Fury to fly from the sky in the form of lightning and strike Aloy.
But once Aloy had given her Focus the job half a minute ago, it had created several possible solutions to circumvent such an attack. One of which presented itself now with the thunderspear. Aloy grabbed the spear, ignored the pain, and launched it back at Link.
And, continuing on the trail of ionized energy attached to a metal spear, the lightning followed. Straight to the metal armor that it was aiming for.
Daruk's Protection saved Link one last time.
A new line displayed over Aloy's eyesight:
Data Stream Initiated. Transfer begun. Information available: 14.212%
The number increased with every second. And, even better, the power modules around her body hummed, and a wave of blue washed over Aloy. Her armor was restored.
Link shifted armor again, this time to the Ancient Armor. He immediately used Revali's Gale, forming a sudden tornado of wind that launched him upwards, from which he formed the Ancient Bow.
As soon as she saw it begin to form, the Focus had all the data on the Ancient Bow ready and available. Aloy pulled out Iriv's Downfall. Both fired, time slowing down for both. Link's arrow struck Aloy in the chest.
And Aloy's arrow snapped the Ancient Bow's bowstring.
The Ancient Armor hid Link's eyes, but the surprise and slight fear of facing a foe that might be smarter than him shone through his flushed chin and neck.
As Aloy pulled out the arrow by the fletching and downed a potion, Link formed his Blizzard Rod and scattered frost throughout the winds below him. The cold put out the fires and froze all the enraged sages into statues, but, more importantly, it naturally gravitated to and froze over the purgewater-covered Aloy. But every time it froze, the ice broke a second later under the pulse of her reinvigorated forcefield. Aloy took those seconds to shoot purgewater arrows at Link. Using the Sheikah Glider, he was able to dodge most of them, but once finally struck the spinning rod, and canceled its effects.
Link shook his head. Questioning these sort of things could get him killed here. He formed the Ancient Bladesaw and dove at Aloy. If the Ancient Bow had ignored that forcefield, maybe other Ancient weapons would work, too.
Aloy dodged to the left, barely missing the first swing, but Link landed perfectly and immediately went for a follow-up that she wasn't fast enough to block. The Shield-Weaver armor rippled; to Aloy, it was immediately clear that whatever this blue hard-light tech was, it was far more effective on her armor than regular weapons. Unlike the bow, however, it didn't ignore it entirely. Aloy stepped back and blocked an attack with the Champion's Spear. Something was off; Link seemed stronger somehow now.
Information available: 19.766%
Aloy saw some new immediate information selections that seemed extremely noteworthy: something regarding stored memories on the device, and an entire section about "Divine Champion Abilities."
Let's see these two.
The memories were immediately troublesome. Aloy was blasted with the image of several people in some sort of ceremony. She paused that immediately; it would definitely need to be seen later, but right now she was fighting for her life. The Champion Abilities, on the other hand…
Revali's Gale+: Champion Revali's divine gift. Creates a directional draft that carries you through the sky. Holds the power of the Champion Revali, commander of the skies and Divine Beast Vah Medoh. [3] Charges. Recharges in [2:00].
Distracted by this, Aloy took a hit from the Bladesaw. She fell backwards.
Urbosa's Fury+: Champion Urbosa's divine gift. Summons powerful lightning to the surrounding area. Holds the power of the Champion Urbosa, commander of the storm and Divine Beast Vah Naboris. [3] Charges. Recharges in [4:00].
Aloy jumped back and shot thrice with Eye of the Storm, all of which Link dodged while closing distance and struck her again. Her forcefield faded slightly.
Daruk's Protection+: [data not found] [data not found] [3] Charges. Recharges in [6:00].
Mipha's Grace+: [data not found] [data not found] [data not found]
Aloy blocked another blow, and the chainsaw whirred to life, creating a line of sparks as it tried to cut through her spear. She pushed back, throwing Link off long enough to escape the corner he was pushing her into.
It looked like she had to wait for more data to transfer through if she wanted full information. But a few of Link's abilities made more sense now, though the information was through his own superstitious lens. At least, it seemed that she wouldn't have to worry about these too much if she could finish this fight quickly.
Which it seemed Link was intending to do, as she had to duck out of the way of this futuristic chainsaw. Whirring like the strongest engines she had ever heard, it swung past her and through one of the stone pillars, slicing through it and reducing every centimeter that touched the saw into a fine dust. Aloy backed up and shot a sticky bomb at him. Link tried to cut the bomb with the chainsaw, but it stuck to the blade, refusing to give. As it ticked twice, Link figured out what was going on and tossed the saw at Aloy. She ducked and it flew over her head before exploding somewhere behind her. The room shook once.
Link pulled out the Sheikah Slate and pulled two pins, forming blue bombs that he tossed at Aloy. She seemed to recognize this, and prepared to dash backwards before he could detonate them. So, Link punched the ground, and spiked the ground behind Aloy, causing her to trip and fall on top of the bombs. When he detonated them, she was thrown high into the air and slammed into a wall that was all the way up where this fight had started. When she fell, it was only a meter, onto the stairs. But that was enough, as the Shield-Weaver armor broke once more, the many hits of Sheikah technology too much for it to bear.
Link switched to the Twilight Bow. He charged up a light arrow at the shaky Aloy and fired. It was a shot so fast, Aloy wouldn't be able to dodge in her exhausted state.
But a whirl of blue and silver meant she didn't have to.
The Sunwing took the hit for Aloy and snatched her in its claws. It threw her into the air, perfectly positioned to land on its back, and sank a little to meet Link's covered eyes.
Link stepped back, unseen eyes wide. What kind of Guardian is that?! Is she controlling it with her magic?
Aloy inhaled deeply as she sat up. She patted the Sunwing on the neck. "Thank you, little one."
The Sunwing cawed as best it could and tilted its head, as if to say "look up."
Aloy did.
And above her, each slowly lowering themselves, were Sunwings, Stormbirds, Waterwings, Skydrifters, and Glinthawks thick enough to form fog.
Hephaestus.
Aloy looked down at Link, who was backing up and silently glancing back and forth from the exit.
24 Combat-Class Machines identified surrounding castle walls.
The sages all occupied, Link in a corner, Aloy finally allowed herself to breathe a bit more easily. Maybe she did have this.
Her Sunwing lined up every plasma cannon it had, and Aloy herself pulled out and aimed the Stormslinger at Link. She used the Focus to relay constant instructions, updates, and coordinates into the machines descending around her. It took a few seconds, but eventually, all of them had a lock on the Hero of the Wild. In this time, her armor warmed up, and the shield returned.
Aloy blew a line of air out. "Ready."
There was an echoing, near-deafening sound of machines locking in their guns.
"Aim."
Several laser-like points appeared on Link's head.
Link looked up, and smirked.
"Fire."
Link said.
And four beams of unparalleled destructive energy smashed through the castle and converged on Aloy's location.
…
When Aloy came to, she was on the ground, surrounded by metal. Her ears were ringing, her forcefield was broken, and the clear sky above seemed to be mocking her.
Clear?
She instinctively felt for her Focus.
Gone.
No. Stolen.
Aloy pushed the metal scraps above her head out of the way and crawled out. She immediately replaced the Focus and activated the new one.
"Defy Death" Critical Potion activated. Time elapsed: 34 Seconds.
This entire section of the castle was ruined. The room above her was disintegrated, and the ice of this entire floor had melted, along with most of the stone. And there wasn't a single machine to be seen. Not that there wasn't metal; if anything, there was more scrap metal than there had been ice. Where did it-
The Focus heard her thoughts and replayed a scene in her mind.
A scene of every single flying machine diving at her, coating her in a giant ball of metal, right before being struck by four lasers multiple meters in diameter.
Aloy sank to one knee, feeling, for the first time in a while, a flicker of respect to the creatures she fought.
Divine Beasts Vah Medoh, Vah Rudania, Vah Ruta, Vah Naboris engaged in combat with 84 HEPHAESTUS-type Combat-Class Machines.
Aloy shook her head to sort her thoughts.
Priorities. Where's Link?
Through the Focus, she saw him, moving at inhuman speeds, down a trail leading out of the castle.
Aloy stood up and whistled. Almost immediately, one of the waiting machines outside ran in; a Strider, huffing as though it were alive. Aloy swung a leg over, mounting the Strider neatly, and tapped its neck. The Focus helped guide her energy and intention. The Strider took off, at maximum speed, to follow Link.
As Aloy broke through the opening and into the sun, she saw all sorts of machines: Clamberjaws, Leaplashers, Spikesnouts, Striders, and more. All small-types; they must have been carried onto the island by the flying machines earlier. And every one of them was in battle against the now-unfrozen five creatures that were previously defending Link. Clearly, that was how he escaped the machines so easily.
And it also meant this was her best chance at catching him before he escaped with all of Gaia's secrets.
Update on requested information:
Daruk's Protection+: Champion Daruk's divine gift. Automatically protects from all manner of attacks. Holds the power of the Champion Daruk, commander of the flames and Divine Beast Vah Rudania. [3] Charges. Recharges in [6:00].
How long has it been since he last used that?
[data not found]
Aloy clicked, and the Strider increased speed. Metal bits flew off its legs, but, as far as Aloy was concerned, it only had to last until she caught up to Link.
…
Link, now back in his Champion Leathers, was nearly at the other side of the interior moat when his Hylian ears heard the world's heaviest horse behind him.
He hit the brakes on the Master Cycle Zero and turned in his seat. He focused his ears; the clomping was growing closer. It sounded like one of those machines he saw outside the room; he was quite lucky that the dark magic the girl (Aloy, the Focus told him) cast hadn't been permanent. He would have been stuck in a fierce battle if the sages weren't there for him.
What IS that?
Small PSI GAIA-Type Acquisition Machine approaching. Designation: Strider
A memory of a robot-like horse appeared in Link's head, along with the sudden knowledge of it being a herd machine, having a weakness to fire, connections to blaze canisters, sparkers, the blood tasting light and milky-
"STOP!" Link shouted, rubbing his temples.
The Focus obeyed.
It's going to be weird getting used to this thing.
Would you like to run the tutorial program? This tutorial program is intended to instruct non-certified personnel. Let's begin with-
"Later!" Link beat his head with his fist. "Can you just… not work right now?"
The glow on the Focus died down, Link's vision returned to normal, and, thank Hylia, he wouldn't be having all these spirits in his brain for now.
Huh. He wasn't used to talking this much.
Above the bend, the blue and black head of the Strider raised itself. And riding atop, a red-haired warrior he was getting far too familiar with.
Link swung back in his seat, hit the gas, and tore off towards the edge of the island.
An arrow sailed past his right ear and melted a hole into the ground.
Okay. Fine.
Link pulled back hard, pulling the front wheel off the ground, and whirled the bike around, facing Aloy directly. She was already aiming another shot. She fired, but Link used Recall to send it back at her. She expected it this time; she steered the Strider to the left, missing the arrow.
The Strider could be a problem.
Link activated Ultrahand and saw that the entire Strider was completely inorganic.
Oh. Nevermind.
With a wave of his hand, the Strider was lifted off the ground, Aloy was thrown off, and Link threw the howling Strider into the Chasm below.
Aloy saw the machine she'd been chasing this entire time with her own eyes for the first time. Somehow, after all this, that simple of a device didn't seem particularly important. Not as important as the warrior who could move machines with just a thought.
They were at the edge now.
The edge of the abyss.
Nowhere to run.
Aloy pulled out the Stormslinger. She shot several times at Link, who casually activated Recall. But although the world seemed stopped, he couldn't move the balls of electricity. Worse, he could feel the edges of the ball attracting themselves to his Zonai fingers. It was powerful electricity; perhaps on par with Vah Naboris.
Thank Hylia he still had the Thunder Helm.
When time resumed, the electricity struck Link, and was completely nullified by the golden helmet he now wore on his head. Aloy kept firing, seemingly unable to believe he could just stand there and take it, until she herself dropped the weapon, clutching her right hand in pain.
Let's just finish this.
Link opened the fuel hatch of the Master Cycle Zero, and dropped in a Star Fragment, along with a few Ancient Gears. With the cycle refueled and Aloy still clutching her arm, he tapped his right hand to the bike, and it gathered a ball of blue energy at its horn. After only a few seconds, it blasted an enormous beam of energy, a match for any Divine Beast, right at Aloy.
Aloy's Focus, however, saw this attack coming even when Aloy didn't. She was warned just in time, and, seeing the Focus' predictions for the size and scope of the laser, came up with the best plan she could: she jumped off the island.
Link started. There was no way that, after all this, it was that easy.
He pulled out the Sheikah Slate and scanned the area with the camera.
*beep*-*beep*...*beep*-*beep*...*beep*-*beep*
There she was. Right on the edge, Link could barely make out the claw of the pullcaster, keeping her on the side of the island.
This could be dealt with, right now.
Link drove up to where Aloy was hanging. He drank an elixir to silence his movement and heal some damage, and then he crouched, and, very slowly, crawled over to where Aloy was hanging.
He peeked over the side where she was trying to gain some footing on the rocks.
And blasted her with Revali's Gale.
The rock of the island shook under the pressure, already weakened from the recent laser beam and the Divine Beast attack before that, but it didn't quite give in. And neither did Aloy. When the tornado-like wind blasted her in the face, it caught her cheeks and rocked her rope out until it was almost a straight horizontal line, but she held on. And the pullcaster did, too.
Link sighed. He stepped back and looked at the pullcaster. He snapped his fingers, using his last Urbosa's Fury to rain lightning down on the place Aloy was attached to.
It worked; few things could withstand the fury of the storms. But Link had, in a way very much his, not thought this entirely through. Something he realized quite quickly as the entire section of the island broke underneath his feet, sending both him and Aloy into the Chasm.
Aloy's body was wracked with lightning, but the Shield-Weaver was taking most of it for her, and once she could think straight, she deployed her Shieldwing, slowing down her fall to a crawl. She looked around. She wouldn't admit it to anyone, but she was desperately trying to find a way to glide to any kind of land. Actual land, another floating island, a small crevice in the side of this one, anything. Her pullcaster had already been sent into the abyss, and she did not plan on joining it.
Especially because the sickening sense of horror that she felt the entire time she was in the castle grew stronger by the second as she lowered into the pit.
She removed one hand, keeping the Shieldwing together with the other, and raised it to her lips to whistle.
Nobody answered.
Aloy shuddered. What am I doing?! I just need to talk to Beta! This place is messing- stop, Aloy!
She tapped her Focus. "Beta, come in."
The voice on the other end was fuzzy. "Alo- we- could- if you- find-"
"Delta Mode. Increasing frequency width." That limited what her Focus could perceive for the moment, but it was necessary.
The signal immediately became clearer. "Aloy? Did you get any of that?"
"No, and I don't have time. You can tell me later. Send a Sunwing to my coordinates, as fast as it can get here."
"You should have over two dozen Sunwings! Hephaestus-"
"I don't have time for this, Beta!"
The other end paused.
Aloy sighed. "I'm sorry, look, I need-"
Aloy's Focus was struck by a yellow object, tearing it to pieces.
Aloy whirled around as best as she could, and saw Link, a few meters higher than her, one hand holding the right handle of a tilting glider, the other waiting, open.
Aloy suddenly realized what had hit her, and deactivated the Shieldwing for less than a second to get herself out of the way of the boomerang's return path. As the boomerang returned to his hand, she stuck hers behind her and came out with the Specter Gauntlet attached. She fired round after round at Link, who managed to dodge most of them through careful control of his glider, but by landing a tag bullet, she got everything she needed. She charged up the Gauntlet and blasted one powerful energy bullet, which, despite his attempts to dodge, struck Link straight in the chest and sent him, smoking, down like a stuck glinthawk.
But as he fell, his body glowed with light, and he shifted outfits into a glide suit. A suit he used to ram into Aloy, dragging her down with him. Shocked by the sudden turn, Aloy let go of the Shieldwing, and both she and Link plummeted down, full speed, into the dark depths below.
As they fell deeper into the darkness for what felt like hours, Aloy felt her stomach grow tighter and tighter. There was no doubt now; everything she had felt, every fear she had, every negative thought, somehow, this was the center of it. What was at the bottom of this chasm, she didn't know, but she…
She was afraid of it.
Fear was a powerful weapon.
And so they fell.
When Link landed, he was completely uninjured thanks to his Glide Armor, but when he heard the thud next to him, it was accompanied by a fizzling of blue light; Aloy's armor had taken the hit for her.
Link turned, formed the Sword of the Six Sages, and swung down.
He couldn't see.
He hit empty rock.
He switched armor to the Miner's Set, glowing in the dark and allowing him to see just as well as any brightbloom. He turned around. Then around. Then around again.
Aloy wasn't here.
She can't have run away so quickly. She couldn't have gotten far. Maybe she hadn't fallen down yet? He looked up, as far as he could see.
Nothing.
She had just vanished.
*beep*-*beep*...-...-...*beep*-*beep*...-...-...*beep*-*beep*
No.
She was here.
But Link didn't know where.
He spun around. There was an opening. Was she there? He ran over. His footsteps were leaving glowing footprints. But as he glanced down, he saw another deep pit, with many monsters inside, waiting for someone to fall.
No. She wouldn't. Not with her forcefield broken. Not with her glider gone.
But she wasn't here.
*beep*-*beep*...-...*beep*-*beep*...-...*beep*-*beep*
She was definitely here. And closer. But why couldn't he see her?
Link didn't like this. He began to feel like one of those boars surrounded by bokoblins. Trapped with something he didn't understand. But, he knew full well now, that Focus of hers could understand him.
*beep*-*beep*..-..*beep*-*beep*..-..*beep*-*beep*
Link switched armor back to his Sheikah outfit. Somehow, he found the dark more comfortable, especially if he was silent. There was an idea; if he couldn't find anything in the dark; neither could she.
*beep*-*beep*...*beep*-*beep*...*beep*-*beep*
Well. So much for that.
Link fused a Keese Eye to the Sword of the Six Sages and threw it, spinning through the air, into the darkness. Surely that would find her.
There was no clang.
There was no noise.
The sword didn't come back.
*beep*-*beep*..*beep*-*beep*..*beep*-*beep*
Link punched the ground. He felt the vibrations, using his magic to hone in on any life.
But there was no life.
*beep*-*beep*-*beep*-*beep*-*beep*-*beep*-*beep*-*beep*
"WHERE ARE YOU?!" Link finally shouted, every emotion collapsing in one outburst.
"Right here," a voice whispered in his left ear.
Link swung around, but nobody was there.
Then he was stabbed through the throat from behind.
The kill was quick. It was simple. It was nearly painless.
It was more than he deserved.
Aloy pulled the Champion's Spear out of the fallen hero and wiped the blood off on her boarskin pteruge as her Stealth Stalker Valor Surge wore off. She was, she admitted to herself, lucky that Link never figured out how to use her Focus. It would have picked her out instantly, just as hers did him. The sword move had been unexpected, especially when it began chasing her, but that also made it predictable. Well, to the Focus, at least. With it telling her exactly how and when to move to catch it, she didn't need to worry.
Well, Aloy mused as she took her original Focus back, that takes care of that. Now, to wait for the Sunwing.
She shuddered again as she walked back towards the opening. That bird couldn't come soon enough.
"It's my pleasure," a feminine voice said behind her.
What?
As she turned back to the body that was sure to now be in the center of a washing tub's worth of blood, something overlaid her vision.
Update on requested information:
Mipha's Grace+: Champion Mipha's divine gift. Automatically resurrects those who fall in battle stronger than they were before. Holds the power of the Champion Mipha, commander of the seas and Divine Beast Vah Ruta. [1] Charge. Recharges in [8:00].
For the first time that wasn't in disgust, Aloy felt her skin crawl.
With a burst of light, Link stood up, wearing a new outfit. It was of sea-blue cloth, with white hair, steel plating, Tenakth-like face paint, and, most haunting of all, pure white eyes. No pupils. No irises. Nothing but white void.
Warning: Extreme energy output.
Fierce Deity Link reached out one hand, and the Double Helix Sword appeared in streams of light.
Warning: Extreme energy output.
In his other hand, the Master Sword formed. It glowed brightly; down here, in the depths of evil itself, it could unleash its full, unrestrained, power.
Warning: Extreme energy output.
Aloy bounced her eyes to and from the opening rapidly. How long does one Sunwing take?!
And, with the Fuse rune, the Double Helix Sword and Master Sword became one. Link swung the Master Sword once, and a ghostly image of the Double Helix Sword extended out of it.
WarningWarningWarningWarningWarningWarningWarningWarningWarningWarningWarningWarningWarningWarningWarningWarningWarning-
Aloy practically punched her Focus.
Link stepped forward and swung.
Aloy attached a power module to the Champion's Spear, increasing its strength and damage output tenfold. She raised the spear to block Link's strike.
And Link shattered the Champion's Spear like glass.
The resulting cut struck Aloy, sent her flying across the cavern, and immediately knocked out her Shield-Weaver armor.
Shit.
Aloy switched to the Tripcaster and laid down row after row of explosive tripwire, but in that armor, Link simply walked through them. As he approached, she switched to the Tearblaster and shot at the Master Sword. It connected, and the burst of concussive energy sent the sword flying out of Link's hand. Aloy felt her heart leap.
And sink twice as quickly when Link called it back with Recall.
Okay, new plan.
Aloy turned to her blast sling, and began launching adhesive bombs. Thinking these were regular bombs, Link naturally walked through them, only to be slowed and suddenly stuck as the bombs turned to thick sap. He tried raising his feet, but found it ten times harder to move ten times less distance.
Slowing him down enough for Aloy's one chance.
She pulled out the Brawlbreaker. Link saw, and, although he didn't know exactly what it was, could tell pretty quickly that it was dangerous.
She charged it up, and Link summoned the Hylian Shield.
Aloy began shooting round after round of bolts.
Freezing bolts. Armor-piercing bolts. Explosive bolts. It didn't matter; all of them. Round after round after round, each one striking the invincible shield, each one having some effect and bouncing off. When Aloy ran out of her five hundred bolts in the weapon, she grabbed more and kept firing. She kept going, and going. Eventually, it felt as though the only sounds this hole had ever heard was that of a machine gun and the shield that stopped it.
After literal minutes, Aloy finally ran out of ammo. She dropped the weapon to the ground, gasping for breath, not daring to look at her opponent.
Link moved.
And the Hylian Shield fell to pieces.
Link stopped in his tracks, though only for a few moments. That kind of firepower… if he hadn't been in this form to withstand that, or had that particular shield to protect him, he didn't know what would have happened.
But that was all she had. And now, he had more than ever.
Aloy spun around and used her momentum to throw the useless Brawlbreaker at him. Link didn't even bother dodging.
Daruk's Protection blocked it anyway.
Aloy sunk down to her knees. She was too late.
Analysis Complete.
Link reached Aloy and swung, faster than he had ever before.
And she stepped slightly to the right. And the swing missed.
Link grit his teeth. He was done with this. This fight had gone on, far, far too long. He turned, predicated her movement options, and did a wide swing feint followed by a thrust.
She didn't stutter on the feint, and just leaned back so the thrust would miss her by a few micrometers.
Link swung. And swung. And swung.
And he couldn't hit her. It wasn't some sort of instinct; she directly, mentally knew every single thing he was going to do.
Link stepped back and pulled out the Great Eagle Bow. He loaded his arrows and began firing.
Aloy's eyes glanced at the Sword of the Six Sages. She made a break for it, or, at least, it seemed. But she apparently wasn't in any danger at all, as every arrow, even as they became three and shot faster than she had seen him do, seemed to barely miss her as she ran. She reached the sword without issue and, without missing a beat, threw it at Link as though it were a javelin. The sword bounced off of Daruk's Protection, and Aloy was right behind it. He fired a bomb arrow, but it and its two clones just whiffed right by her and hit a back wall with a powerful detonation. Aloy picked up the sword before it even hit the ground and readied a swing.
Link shot himself with triple bomb arrows.
Daruk's Protection saved him, but both he and Aloy were sent racketing and rolling to other sides of the cavern. Link smirked. Even her Focus couldn't account for plain old Hylian creativity.
Looks like he figured it out, Aloy thought.
In her vision now, she saw nearly every path Link could take, along with the percent possibilities of that path. Before every arrow was fired, she knew where it would go, how fast, and at what angles.
When this battle started, she gave her Focus one instruction: Analyze his fighting pattern.
With his skill, surprises, inhuman biology, and many inexplicable powers, it had taken an incredibly long time. But now, every step, every muscle movement, every breath, every small bodily cue he gave, it all informed her Focus of what he was going to do.
Except for that last move.
Guess there's no accounting for plain old ingenuity.
Link fired an arrow with a Keese Eye fused to it.
Aloy saw the paths. She stepped out of the way.
And the three arrows turned around and struck her.
Homing arrows?!
Aloy threw down a smoke bomb and dove away, hiding in a corner. Well, that explained the sword from before. In fact, now that she looked at it, there was an odd eyeball sticking out of the blade.
Sword of the Six Sages: The six sages are said to have forged this longsword to seal a demon king in the world where the hero fought against the beasts of twilight. This is a holy blade that creates wounds that cannot be healed, even through magic.
Aloy mentally sighed and told the superstitious popup to go away. But a moment later, she called it back. Cannot be healed?
Unknown power source. Extensive historical records indicate that this sword was used to kill creatures the society considered immortal. There are no records of any who were cut and survived. One record of a survivor for longer than one day. Record of an eight-year-old Dalton who was injured with weapon. Injury included incision on the left-hand thumb, 0.4 centimeters in length. Daltus died forty-seven days after injury. Legal Reason of Death: Blood Loss.
Too much information at the wrong time. But it did seem to confirm what she'd seen as superstition. A weapon like this was more dangerous than any other.
But exactly what she needed.
Calculate attack point. I need to strike him in the forehead with this sword. Frontal assault.
Chance of success without injury: 32.1%
Chance of success with injury?
100%.
Let's go with that one.
Aloy left her corner.
Link had taken the time to shoot brightbloom all over the cavern, giving him just as much sight as she had. So he saw her immediately, and set to fire something.
Ancient Arrow: An arrow created using ancient technology. To be struck with one is to be consigned to oblivion in an instant. It deals devastating damage, even against similar technology.
Aloy saw Link fuse a Keese Eye to it. She swallowed. Rerun chance of success with injury, no death.
100%.
Right. She saw the path.
And she ran.
When Link fired, Aloy didn't even bother trying to dodge. The arrows would just chase her down, and she'd leave the predicted path, potentially throwing the calculations out of order. She took the hit. The three Ancient Arrows slammed into her Shield-Weaver Armor. It practically absorbed each, in a small, blue explosion. Aloy felt the stability of the armor waver, and every hit felt like she herself was punched once, too. But she survived.
Link shot again. Three more arrows slammed into her. She kept going. 15 meters.
Link shot again.
She took it. 10 Meters.
Link shot again. Practically point-blank.
The armor broke.
Aloy ducked under an attempted surprise swing, rolled to the left, and kicked off the wall. She brought up the Sword of the Six Sages.
Path complete. Chance of victory: 100%
She saw.
In this brief moment, where all time slowed to a crawl, she saw his white eyes shrink in fear.
She swung her arms down.
Link swung his right arm up.
The battle ended.
With the sound of chains crashing.
…
Link gasped.
The Sword of the Six Sages was less than a centimeter away from splitting his skull open. This Nora warrior, this Aloy, was perhaps the most dangerous foe he ever fought. Not because she was powerful (though she was), not because she had amazing weapons and powers (though she did), but because she was the one thing nobody else around him was.
She was a survivor.
He saw it, even in her eyes now, frozen in time. She was completely and totally assured in her victory. Not because she was more powerful, but because she would do whatever it took to win, and he wouldn't.
But, he supposed, that was probably also where she went wrong.
She had no idea how much stronger someone was when they stopped fighting for themselves.
Link reached out and took his new Focus back. He nodded in respect to his fellow survivor, then took the Master Sword, and struck her.
He took out several Zonai capsules and threw them on the ground, then used Autobuild to turn them into many small frost-emitter constructs. They turned, waiting for a target.
Link stepped back one step as Stasis wore off.
Aloy's bloodied body fell to the ground and collapsed in system shock.
What… I was supposed… I can't-
The constructs fired.
Aloy couldn't move.
She couldn't think.
The last things she saw were Fierce Deity Link's white eyes, staring at her in… pity.
And a message.
Update on requested information:
New memories are available.
0x16: Despair / 0x17. Awakening
Would you like to access them?
Aloy felt her legs. They were cold. Then warm.
Then she didn't feel her legs.
Yes.
Link charged up the Master Sword with holy light.
And, as Aloy's face froze on a quiet expression, he plunged it into her.
She glowed.
And, with an explosion of light that lit up all the Depths, and made even Ganondorf turn in surprise all the way in his inner sanctum, the Saviour of Meridian was no more.
-KO!-
Link changed to his regular clothes and put away the Master Sword. He heard the cry of a Sunwing; Aloy's ride had finally arrived.
He calmly walked out and up to the bird, who looked at him in simple confusion. Confusion, until he reached up and touched it with his Zonai arm, forming a spiritual and technological connection with the creature of the sun.
As he rode up into the world above atop the majestic machine, he tapped his Focus.
Now. Teach me everything.
…
Conclusion
TWO: You know, between Demise and Aloy, I'm starting to think Link has a thing against redheads. Wait, is this why you invented me? To make bad jokes so you don't have to?
LZ: Aloy fought hard, but the Hero of the Wild was just too much to take on. In all fairness, though, Aloy actually had the tools, skill, and strategies needed to counter a lot of what Link would typically stomp his opponent into the ground with. The Sages, for example. A six-man party would normally wipe the floor with a single combatant.
TWO: But Aloy is super-used to fighting outnumbered, from all ranges. She also had a bunch of tools made for and experience in non-lethally taking out enemies, so she didn't even have to go too far out of her comfort zone to figure out how to deal with these avatars. She could definitely trap them, tie them down, or take them out of commission with her elemental weapons, or just keep summoning machines to keep them occupied while she dealt with the big threat.
LZ: And while four Divine Beasts capable of exploding supervolcanoes might sound overwhelming, Aloy's proven that she has both the stats and the experience taking down giant robots to survive the initial onslaught, at least long enough to activate Hephaestus.
TWO: Even monsters as powerful as the Divine Beasts would have some trouble dealing with four or five dozen Thunderjaws.
LZ: Her Focus instantly relayed Link's location, current weapon, and attack patterns at all times, meaning stealth was impossible and most of the strategies and switch-ups even previous Links would rely on in battle to fool their enemies would get nowhere with Aloy.
TWO: And the second it scanned the Sheikah Slate or his arm, Aloy'd know all about his runes and would strategize around 'em. Or the Focus would strategize for her. It's kind of crazy like that.
LZ: Her purgewater could disable Link's elemental weapons and magic rods, and, thanks to the Focus, she would always know exactly when to use it. The Focus even let her know instantly how he constructed his Zonai contraptions and what their weak points were.
TWO: And, uh, if you've never played Tears of the Kingdom, every Zonai thing, and everything fused with Ultrahand, does have specific weak points that would end up tearing the structure apart, especially with that Tearblaster. No matter how crazy or advanced the things Link built, I guarantee that Focus has dissected crazier. Zonai builds weren't helping him win this one.
LZ: And, of course, while her character may be morally questionable in Forbidden West, Aloy isn't evil. At least, not in the sense that the goddesses measure by. So none of Link's holy weapons, including the Master Sword, would be at their maximum power level.
TWO: But that's where it starts to fall apart for lil' ol' flame-hair.
LZ: To start, Link is certainly a better swordsman than she is a spearsman. Don't get me wrong, she's quite the expert, but Link was fighting experts when he was child, and received special training from recluses and other swordmasters while he was preparing for the Calamity. He's definitively the best swordsman in the world, to the point where it's an official title for him; even royal coronations become legalized just because he is there to witness them.
TWO: And with all that training, he could almost definitely keep up with her no matter his weapon, including spears. His spearmanship is better than Mipha's, who was the best in the world back in her day![1]
LZ: Which he could capitalize on with his slightly better speed. Both have light-speed reaction feats, but for Aloy, they're a big deal. For Link, they're an everyday occurrence. He has far more of them and potentially scales even higher since he can outspeed other characters who have their own light-speed reacting feats.[2] And abusing the Stasis Rune, which Aloy had no way of resisting, meant that he would be much more consistent in landing and dodging hits even if their speed was equivalent.
TWO: Not to mention his weapons were generally better. The Master Sword might not be in top shape, but it's still a legendary sword that pierces immortal dragon scales, even in its depowered state. I'm not seeing the Champion's Spear doing that.
LZ: Most of their weapons compared in this way. Iriv's Downfall could shoot far, but not as far as the Phrenic Bow. Tears of the Land-god could pierce most armor, but it couldn't bypass it like the Ancient Bow. A sling filled with bombs is powerful, but when Link can shoot three bomb arrows at once at much greater distances far more accurately, bomb arrows powerful enough to take down Divine Beasts, mind you, it doesn't really compare. And thanks to the Fuse Rune, every weapon in Link's arsenal, no matter how unique, could use any elemental attack that Link wished at any time. Pretty much any weapon that Aloy has, Link has something that can do what it can, but better.[3]
TWO: Well, except the Tripcaster and other motion traps, but let's be real, Link's not going to be running into THAT like a robot would. At least, not more than once. He could even take a picture to warn him whenever Aloy set one up. Or use Recall or Stasis to disable it. Or Ultrahand or Fuse to take it for himself.
LZ: And therein lies one of the main factors leading to his victory. No matter the move Aloy pulled, Link had a bevy of options to deal with it. Aloy may have a large and varied arsenal, but Link's is both bigger and much more varied. For as many ways as Aloy could counter specific tactics or abilities, Link could do the same, and more.[4]
TWO: He had outfits that would nullify pretty much any sort of status effect or elemental abilities she tried to pull out. The Stormslinger might be crazy powerful, but there's no way in this realm of existence that it gets past the Thunder Helm. The Icerail and Forgefire end up with similar fates. It's kind of telling that two of Aloy's strongest weapons are just things Link can pull out of Zonai Capsules by the dozen, too.
LZ: The Hydrant and Sidon have both proven they can destroy any slowing sap or glue she might use, and his Ancient Weapons would make short work of her hard-light augments, as they're specifically constructed to fight against that sort of thing. A good amount of her weapons and battle strategies rely on disarming her opponent, but even if she got the jump on Link and it worked, Recall would instantly undo any disarming or Tearblasting shenanigans.
TWO: He had multiple AOEs for if she tried to go Metal Gear stealth on him, and could even use Recall's time-stopping to give himself however long he needed to pick out where she was. Also, remember that the magic school trying to kill him is made up ENTIRELY of ninjas. And he's humiliated all of 'em more times than I can count.
LZ: Not to mention that if, at any point, he became too overwhelmed or low on resources, he could always just immediately teleport away with the Sheikah Slate or Purah Pad, then come back later, giving him complete control over the pace of the battle.
TWO: If they were both out of stuff, Aloy might survive a battle of attrition. She can go days of fighting with nothing but her will to keep going, while Link needs a good night's sleep like anybody else. But she was never winning a battle of attrition in a Death Battle format. Link holds way more meals with full stamina restoration and better effects, and can cook on the fly, with way more materials to do it. He also has Mipha's Grace in case Aloy somehow gets a surprise stab to the throat or something, and, oh yeah, all his Champion Abilities recharge over time. His weapons are breakable, but so, technically, are Aloy's, and he has way more of them. A war of attrition is the last thing Aloy wants here. As a fun bonus, he even had a few things that could completely bypass the Shield-Weaver Armor. Sheikah weapons are specifically made to mess with hard-light technology, his electric weapons could temporarily short out the shield like it does to Zonai tech, and the Ancient Bow would treat it like it didn't exist.[5]
LZ: Under normal conditions, of course, the Shield-Weaver Armor would pose a significant hurdle to overcome. This Link doesn't have all the detective skills of his previous selves, nor does he have a Focus, so he wouldn't automatically know how to bypass it. But what he does have is far, far more training than Aloy from more teachers, and significantly more experience fighting a larger variety of foes, both mechanical and magical. The shield can be shorted out by powerful attacks, and Link has plenty of weapons and abilities that would do the job. It wouldn't take him long to nail in a strategy.
TWO: Or, you know, he could always just put on his own best armor and end things right then and there.
LZ: Probably, yeah. The Fierce Deity Armor surpassing the The Moon cratering Termina is an insane feat once you take Termina's status as an alternate Hyrule into account. Going by the Breath of the Wild map, completely cratering a landmass that size would take around 320.65 Teratons of TNT.
TWO: That's, uh, eighteen thousand times more than Aloy's Yellowstone feat.
LZ: And that might even be underestimated; Hyrule used to encompass more land than it currently does, and Termina is considered a continent in official books. Scaled that high, it could reach well into the Petatons or, since cratering is a much bigger deal than destroying, even Exatons. Regardless, that's far higher than anything Aloy has done or compared to, and more than enough to kill her in one hit, Shield-Weaver Armor or not.[6]
TWO: He probably didn't even need to put on the set. Calamity Ganon was threatening this level of power already, and Link beat him just fine.
LZ: And Calamity Ganon could affect the moon. Not the small, mountain-sized moon with the big grin, we mean the actual moon of Hyrule. The only thing you could ever even consider approaching that level for Aloy would be if we scaled the Specter Prime to Gaia's terraforming abilities.[7]
TWO: Yeah, but as anybody with two brain cells to rub together will tell ya, just because a society has certain advancement levels of tech in one area doesn't mean they have it in every area. Plus, the Far Zeniths, who made the Specter Prime, couldn't replicate that kind of power, the entire reason they went to Earth was to steal it. Also, it took hundreds of years for Gaia to terraform Earth, while Ganon and Ganondorf both change the moon every week or so.
LZ: Aloy's tenacity, intelligence, and especially that incredibly powerful Focus kept her in the fight, but she really didn't have anything that could affect someone on that level, and had to give in to overwhelming power eventually. That's kind of where this matchup breaks. Both are reincarnated heroes of the post-apocalypse machine-ruled world, their field boss enemies scale similarly, and they even both scale to supervolcano feats landing at almost the exact same energy outputs. It's a very good matchup at first glance. But Aloy is a human hunter who traps and takes down machines. There might be pseudo-aliens here and evil AI there, but it really does boil down to that. But Link is a reincarnating myth that fights gods and demons. His foes are both technological and spiritual, and can affect the world around him on a semi-cosmic scale. It's not just their power levels, it's how their stories are told: Aloy is raindrops in the flood, and Link is a full-on force of nature.[8]
TWO: Ah, but can't Aloy hack the Sheikah Slate and Divine Beasts with her Focus or Master Override, like she does to all the machines of her world?
LZ: Maybe, Sheikah technology and Old Ones technology are actually quite similar in many ways. But first, Aloy has never been able to take control of machines that are currently being controlled by another master, such as Daemonic or Corrupted versions. Second, that would involve getting up close and onto a control port or terminal of said machine, which is much easier said than done. Third, Link would then be able to do the same to any of her machines, including her armor, with either the Sheikah Slate or his Zonai Arm. And Fourth, guess who else was able to hack into technology on the level of Divine Beasts remotely, across the planet, individually will and control them, but still couldn't get through the Sheikah Slate and Link was able to wrestle control from them?
TWO: Was it Calamity Ga-
LZ: It was Calamity Ganon.
TWO: Yeah. I figured.
LZ: Aloy put up more resistance than you'd expect, but Link's overwhelming power, especially in Fierce Deity form, topped with his higher levels of skill, speed, training, and experience, more unique abilities, and more legendary weapons meant that it was only a matter of time before he dealt the final blow.
TWO: When the Sundom hears about this, if you listen closely, you'll be able to hear the Tears of the Kingdom.
LZ: …
TWO: What? I've got more! "I sure hope Aloy enjoyed her last Breath of the Wild"?
LZ: I never should have invented you.
TWO: Looks like Aloy will be seeing Zero Dawns after this fight!
The winner is… Link.
…
Special Notes (For the Conclusion):
[1] Link compared to Mipha's spearmanship before the Calamity, and grew far stronger since. In the Divine Beast Tamer's Trial, he was able to best Waterblight Ganon while only using Mipha's weapons and abilities, while she herself was killed by the Blight, proving himself the superior fighter as part of the test. Mipha's spearmanship is legendary; so much so that it is world-renowned even a century after her death.
[2] Both Aloy's Yellowstone feat and Vah Rudania's Death Mountain feat were scaled close to as high as they reasonably could be. There are other interpretations of these two feats that lower the power levels dramatically. We don't know how the energy supplied to erupt Yellowstone was applied. If it were accomplished by rapid expansion of heat and pressure, it would only take about 40 Megatons of TNT. If we shrink Vah Rudania's affected area to only the center lava flow, decrease the lava density, and assume the eruption energy and speed is comparable to our real-life volcanoes rather than the incredible levels we see in-game, that lowers the output to only 196 Megatons of TNT. However, it is still far higher than Aloy's scaled-down feat and, unlike Aloy's, we had to make active decisions to ignore in-game lore to get it that low. Vah Ruta's ability to flood all of Hyrule also implies greater levels of power than even those we gave Rudania.
[3] Both have equipment for and experience in exploring unusual environments, including underwater and in the air, and both could take the fight to these environments within reason. However, Link would have a great advantage in such situations; his gliding through the air has been stated to be "better than any Rito," which are, well, birds, and with his Zora armor, his in-lore mobility and attack capabilities underwater reach levels potentially above what he can do on land. Aloy, meanwhile, is nearly nullified in combat applications as soon as either of these come into play.
[4] Even using Hephaestus right off the bat to overwhelm Link wouldn't have worked. Between the Sages, Stasis, Ultrahand, and his Zonai devices, he would always have something he could use to protect himself until the Divine Beasts arrived. He may even be able to take on the army himself, with his Ancient Weapons dealing bonus damage, meals to heal him up, and having plenty of experience taking on similarly dangerous mechs. It could perhaps be argued that Hephaestus and the Divine Beasts are factors unrelated to the characters, but even if you removed both of them, the outcome would not change.
[5] The Mystic Armor protects Link from damage and destroys his rupees instead. While wearing the full set, an attack that would normally kill Link in one hit will instead remove 1280 rupees from his wallet. With the maximum amount of rupees he can carry, he could suffer an injury of this caliber nearly eight hundred times without taking damage. Effectively, the Mystic Armor would function as a far superior version of the Shield-Weaver Armor.
[6] In the first Hyrule Warriors game, Fierce Deity Link could pull down this moon himself and cut it in half as a special attack. The moon in question is smaller, but the event is clearly intentionally reminiscent of the apocalyptic event Majora threatened, and assumed to be similar in power. While Hyrule Warriors is non-canon (in a far more major way than Age of Calamity), since the Fierce Deity so easily destroyed Majora, this level of power would not be unreasonable.
[7] Calamity Ganon's power was weakened when he battled Link as a result of his century of work against Zelda. It could be argued that he would not be capable of such destruction at this point. However, he was still capable of affecting the moon, and Link also bested Harbinger Ganon, the form Calamity Ganon took at the peak of his power. While the Master Sword certainly helps, Link does not outright need it to defeat these two, and it wouldn't protect him from their attacks. We can reasonably scale Link to these events.
[8] These feats and stats don't even take armor durability increases into account. Outside of her Shield-Weaver armor, Aloy's armor is damage-reducing, but not lifesaving except in specific circumstances, especially as they alter damage received from specific sources, not universally. The defense of Link's armors, meanwhile, are universal in addition to their bonus effects, and protect him far better. A set of 60-Defense armor will nullify attacks that would, without armor, kill him in two hits. This makes any potential damage options Aloy has minimal at best, even if we scaled their stats to similar levels.
…
Next time, on Death Battle…
A child skeleton slams a leg bone into the darkened former hero in front of them, causing him to fall to his knees.
VS
A horned shadow drives its nail into the moth goddess above them, eliciting a screech of pain.
(Skul VS The Knight)
Whew, that's all for today! This is one I've been wanting to do since I first played BOTW and Zero Dawn, but with more content always on the, ahem, horizon, it never felt like the right time. I'm actually glad I waited for both sequels, not just because a ton more information got released (and Aloy's mountain-scaling and all her Hephaestus feats made this fight much closer than it was before), but because I got better at making these things, and was able to test the absolute limits of Two. Let's see how much of 32k words this new format can help with. If THIS chapter is enjoyable, then I feel like I can do anything!
Almost anything. rvbVSRVB still isn't happening.
Anyway, our first request of the season is up next. Hope you guys stick around to see it. Like I said, this shouldn't be taking years anymore, but, uh, you should favorite and follow, just in case. Also, because it makes me feel better.
See you next time.