Quick note: I made a significant change last chapter to make Rauru suffer more. You can just skim the middle section.
Lookout Landing tried to be prepared for Link. Epona heads to town and decides to be petty on the first round of NPC torment.
It was a peaceful day at the ranch ruins and the bokoblins loved this place. They had this great little fortress of platforms and everything. They had a road too where travelers walked by to be terrorized. Ah what a good time to be a minion of evil. Red Bokoblin from the base of the little fortress waved around his stick and grunted at his friend, Other Red Bokoblin. Red Bokoblin thought he saw a deer and gave chase to catch some meat for the fire.
A composite crunch of wood and mineral accompanied by a wave of heat washed over Red Bokoblin. He turned around. Red Bokoblin saw the stack of zonaite wings, cooking pots, and wood which had crushed his little fortress home. There were jets of flame around the strange engineering abomination. As he blinked, Link sneaked up behind him, pressed a fan button, and blew the bokoblin onto the funeral pyre.
Link nodded approvingly at his handiwork. Rauru nodded slightly less approvingly. The king said "Well, I still say you would have done better just riding a wing down and avoiding this fight instead of assembling this elaborate landing gear, but I suppose this does mean they won't attack travelers? Next time use more fans and less flame emitters. I suppose it doesn't matter since you are out of emitters now. Link?" Link had not listened to Rauru while he was speaking. Link had instead used Ultrahand to slap together three intact cooking pots with a shred of platform, then continued north. Rauru followed him while protesting that physics should not work that way.
Rauru followed Link to Lookout Landing and into a lab occupied by some archaeological artifacts. He recognized that mural and-hold on. "Um, Link?"
"...hm?" Link asked. He was thinking about the best way to surprise Purah and had not been paying attention to Rauru.
"...Poes!" said the statue, starling Rauru and Link.
Rauru backed up a few steps. He recognized this statue. "Sorry, I still have important work to do. I suppose this begs the question of how you have not sent me to the afterlife."
"You... You who stand before me with this spirit attached to you..."
Link ascended into the ceiling before the statue could finish.
"...Never mind..." said the statue. "As for you, would you consider moving on? You belong in the afterlife. I'll help you."
Rauru kept his distance. "Tempting, but not yet."
Purah's spot on the landing was quiet at the moment. She frowned at Hyrule castle as if willing it to cough up her friends/research buddies. As Purah was planning her next move while standing on the flooring, something slammed the underside of her foot.
"Wah!" Purah stomped. Hard. Under her sandal it was not bare wood, but something soft. Purah saw green light and... Link?
Link, having been kicked in the face, also said "Wah!" and let go of the floor in an instinctive pain reaction.
Purah blinked at the ground that Link had popped out of like a little sundelion. She darted to the stairs.
Rauru and statue watched Link crash back down to earth. Link rubbed a fresh bruise forming on his skull.
"You who stand before me..." the statue started hopefully.
"This is what I get for trying to surprise Purah." Link muttered to himself as he picked himself up from the undignified landing. He wished he had ice fruit on him.
"What in the world is going on?! YOU! Where have you been?!," demanded Robbie as he stumbled in to see the source of the crash and found Link. He should have known a commotion like that would be Link.
Purah entered the conversation with her goggles askew and Josha following close behind. "Now where have you been and why are you popping out of floors?! Linky, you're not a ghost, are you?"
The statue tried again. "I can offer you items in exchange for poes, such as him."
"No, and no. Rauru is not for sale." Link said. Rauru appreciated the sentiment.
"What is Rauru?" both Sheikah demanded at the same time.
The statue started listing off wares. "I have muddle buds, puffshrooms..."
Link ignored the offers and turned his attention back to the living conversationalists. "Rauru is the ghost of a Zonai following me around, he's lending me a helping hand."
"...dark clumps, bomb flowers..."
Link decided to mess with Rauru a little. "How many bomb flowers?" Purah and Robbie exchanged a look.
"That is not funny." complained Rauru while the statue calculated the value of a soul in bomb flowers.
"I'll give you five bomb flowers. Will you offer this poe to me?"
Mattison saw the shadow of a horse paint the ground. "Oh! Hi, miss horse!" Epona appreciated people being polite to her. While she normally bucked anyone unauthorized from the saddle, this kid would be an exception if she wanted. Link wouldn't mind. (If he did, tough.) Mattison knew she'd seen this horse before and had the vague recollection of a man riding on this mare.
Epona listened at the girl. It did not take long for Epona to get her talking.
"I want to ride the railcar so I can get to Papa's construction site and help him get his work done. But I forgot the guy won't give me permission to ride unless I pay him. I never had to pay until he took over.
Epona nudged the little girl in encouragement. Kicking people off a cliff might scare the tiny witness in this situation. She had a saddle for a reason.
"Maybe I can get a ride from you? Oh, but your owner isn't around to ask for permission, is he..." Mattison didn't pick up on Epona's meaning. "Guess I'm gonna have to hop aboard the railcar without him noticing. But how am I gonna do that all by myself? What I need is for someone to maybe cover his eyes or something."
Well, this left Epona little option. Now how to do this without murder?
"Has to be a way..." Thought Mattison out loud as the horse trotted off. Epona looked around for suitable materials because, while she didn't need them, style mattered.
Hagie counted his profits so far. So what if the rail was set up for free use? Hagie was using it freely. To make money. It wasn't his fault no one else claimed it first and put themselves in charge.
He kept shooing away the one little girl. He didn't remember whose daughter she was. It didn't matter. No one was there from the construction company to contradict his authority. Hagie contemplated the useless giant crystal and how much he could get for it.
Hagie heard a sound to his left. Hagie saw the president out of the corner of his eye and startled. "Ah! President Hudso- Hey that's not the president." Hagie put his hands on his hips and whipped his field of vision back towards the railcar because this smelled of a prank.
"Gah!" Hagie jumped back as a second cutout appeared right behind him. There had been no sound. Everywhere he turned, there was the president.
Hagie pushed his way out of a forest of cutouts to see the railcar gone. No possible culprits were in sight. A horse watched Hagie with a stupid horsey look on her face. Epona was the picture of innocence.
Hagie glared at the horse. "Well, it couldn't have been you, that's for sure. Where's your owner? Were you abandoned?" The horse shook her head but Hagie knew horses didn't understand anything. A thought occurred to him.
Free. Horse. Hagie reached to grab the saddle. "Whoever abandoned you better pay a good finders fee." There was no bridle at the moment but Hagie would manage a well-trained beast such as this. "Or I bet a horse of your looks will fetch plenty of rupees at market."
Epona froze in place. Oh no, he did not just dare to touch her.
A loud scream echoed through Tarrey town that day as Hagie flew downwards into the lake. For good measure, Epona kicked his big green rock into the lake. Epona didn't stick around at the scene of the crime once she saw people take notice and go after the man for a rescue. Zelda would have disapproved of murder, so he lived for another day.
This is not the last we have seen of Hagie. I spent a lot of time being mean to him even before Mattison's quest and took a bit of liberty with Mattison and the presidential cutouts. Focus and chapter percentage is going to shift away from Epona as I run out of horse shenanigans. Finally have an idea of how to structure Link's adventures. I still haven't decided how to handle cats but I'll write when I feel like it!