Link was getting used to sleeping in stables. Although his sleep was still light and often fragmented, he was able to rest much more than he had in the past. During his 11 month journey around Hyrule, most nights have been spent half asleep beside a fire. A frog's croak had been enough to jerk him out of any semblance of sleep. There wasn't need for such hypervigilance now.

He woke up with the sun around 6 in the morning. Some of the other early risers were outside already, chattering away. The scent of morning dew and cooked bacon wafted through the air. A low grumble settled in Link's stomach. Although money wasn't a legitimate concern of his', he remained averse to the idea of buying breakfast from the stable. It was never as good as it smelled, anyways. Link settled on the idea of catching something instead.

Pico Pond was off to the immediate east of the stable. Perhaps he'd get lucky and find eggs to pair with fish…

"So I tells her, 'Litta, we are not having your sister over if she's gonna be such a sow'!" He heard a man retort nearby. Link, though he would never admit it, was always intrigued by gossip. It sometimes floated into his ears at stables or in towns. Little snippets of people's grievances. Sometimes, he tried to piece together a narrative in his mind. A fun game to play when hours of travel grew tedious. Perhaps Litta's sister was a yellow haired woman with thick eyebrows and a mouth full of complaints. Maybe the last time she was over, she had told Litta that she deserved better than a rotten man without a job…

Link smiled to himself, thinking of the plotline. He liked to imagine what it would be like to have a life full of such gossips and concerns. Simple things like a bickering wife or a loudmouth friend to keep one preoccupied.. It felt homely. Appealing, almost.

As he passed the tables towards the pond, he noticed a little child looking off aimlessly. A small girl with a whimsical look in her eyes. "Balloons… Floaty balloons…" she babbled, rocking back and forth on her heels.

Balloons? Link eyed her curiously.

"I sometimes see it in my dreams! Do you think that a long time people used to live in the sky? I think so…" She turned around absentmindedly. Link smiled at her. He quite liked children. Even if he hadn't exactly spent a lot of time around them, he always found them to be quite amusing whenever he did interact with them. Tiny little people with tiny little problems.

The little girl caught sight of him and waved her hand. "Hey, mister! Just once in my life, I want to see balloons float right up into the sky! If you'll help me realize my balloon dreams, I'll give you a treasure I got from the sky as thanks!" she spoke a little louder than was necessary.

Balloons?

Link frowned. He knew what the word meant, but he didn't know how. A piece of vocabulary from before. Had he seen balloons as a child? Played with them? It bothered him that he knew of something so simple, but without any amount of context as to how.

He looked at the little girl who was peering up at him expectantly. He thought for a moment, before his face brightened.

"Leave it to me," he replied.

"Thank you! Now put some balloons onto a barrel and make it float up high!"

He slung his bag off from shoulders and began to hunt through it. Strangely enough, he had something that could make the barrel 'float up high'. Octoballoons, dropped down from the aggravating octorocks that occasionally popped out of the water to hurl rocks at him. He hadn't had much use for them in the past, except for selling. But now…

He pulled out two. The little girl grinned as he approached the barrel she was gesturing at. A few slivers in the wood gave him the perfect knock to loop the octoballoons through and…

"Floaty! Balloons soaring high in the sky!" the little girl cheered as the octoballoon expanded and caught wind. The barrel was swiftly picked up into the air. She clapped excitedly, watching the balloon with enchanted eyes. "Float up and away to the land in the clouds! I want to visit the land in the sky by balloons. Then, I'm going to ride a really big bird!" She let out a squeal. Link couldn't help but laugh at her enthusiasm. It felt nice to trigger such a gleeful reaction. "Yep, that's my dream!" She yipped. She toddled over to her knapsack nearby and dug through it. She returned back to him clutching something. "Thank you, mister! This is a treasure from the sky! Here, take it!" she held open her hands to him. In her palms was a glowing crystal-like cluster. A star fragment. He'd found one before. The last one he'd sold to pay for arrows, but this one…

"Are you sure?" He asked. The fragment sparkled as the sun hit it at a different angle. "You don't need to pay me."

"Take it!" the little girl insisted. "It's so sparkly~!" She pushed it into his hands. He smiled at her.

"Well, thank you," he replied. He dropped it into his bag. He looked up at the barrel, still hanging weightlessly in the sky. He retrieved another few octoballoons from his bag and held them out. "Knock yourself out."

"Yay!" She chirped, taking the balloons from his hands. "Thank you, mister!"

Link offered the child one final smile before continuing on towards the pond.

Link was rather lucky in his search. He was able to find a handful of eggs and a Hyrule Bass in the immediate area. While waiting for Paya to wake up, he went through his inventory. He had plenty of weapons, bows, and arrows… though he wasn't sure how many of them he'd need now. They hadn't run into any trouble so far. Had all of the beasts disappeared with Ganon? Regardless, he'd keep his supplies just in case. After all, Hestu's enchantment had made the bag weightless and capable of carrying an almost endless capacity of supplies.

He pulled out a Gerudo bow that he had found in the desert of southwest Hyrule. It was rather light. Easy to hold. Paya could manage, he figured. He'd show her how, and with enough practice…

"Did you hear that the princess is back?"

The question jolted Link out of his thoughts. He was sitting in the grass to the east of the stable, but the nearby conversation of two men leaning against the fence had reached his ears. He turned his face down, as if just looking over would somehow implicate himself in something.

"Aye, I did. Apparently she's still young, too," the other man replied. A scrawny, tall man with rounded glasses. It smelled of smoking wheat and sweat.

"Young enough to bring back the monarchy, I heard," said the first. A scowling man with a round face. "I heard she's with the Zora trying to pull strings… All we need is another tax, eh?" He let out a croak of a laugh that quickly developed into a harsh cough.

"Well, apparently she killed off that demon in the castle," said the taller. Link's skin felt hot. "So maybe this is her payment, huh? A throne?"

"The demon didn't take taxes," insisted his friend. "She will. I didn't have to see the demon, but I'm sure I'll see the rupees leave my hand!"

"Well, who knows… I mean, there's no way she can take all of Hyrule, right?" he frowned and pushed up his glasses. "She'd need an army to go to every little village with her flag and laws… I don't see it happening."

"The old farts might recognize her authority, but I don't," the round faced man insisted. "I'm not paying for a fancy castle, or an army, or none of it. I like my life just the way it is."

"Yeah… I guess we'll see, huh?"

"I guess so." He tossed down his rolled smoking wheat and ground his heel into it.

Link stood up slowly with careful attention to face away from them. His face felt hot and his chest tight. He hadn't thought much about Zelda's current dilemma. His assumption had been that the monarchy would sprout from the ground like a wildflower with no resistance. But it was more complicated than that, wasn't it? It was political. It was asking for taxes and armies and laws to be abided by. He didn't envy her. Maybe it was good that she had left without him. He didn't care to demand townsfolk for their spare change. He wouldn't want to be apart of any of that. With any luck, his face wouldn't ever be recognizable.

Besides, it didn't seem like they knew of the knight who had slain the 'demon'. Part of him was insulted by that. Deeply. Was Zelda claiming full responsibility? Was she neglecting to mention the knight who had sacrificed everything for this? The knight who had risked his life over, and over, and over again? He had served unto death, and even that hadn't been enough. He had been pulled from eternal rest. He'd had a sword thrust back into his hand. He was now a shell of a person without any recollection of who he might've been. His family, who he couldn't remember, were all almost certainly dead. His mother and father… Had they mourned him? Did they know what had happened? What were their names? Did they have graves?

His eyes stung. His lip twitched. He set off past the stable to the west.

Had he had brothers and sisters? Aunts and uncles and cousins? If he had, they were all most likely dead too. Perhaps buried in a cemetery somewhere with his mother and father. All with names that he wouldn't recognize.

His hands began to tremble. His chest felt heavy. His skin burned.

He was a stranger in this century. He should've died. It would've been better to die. He could've been buried with his family. Remembered for his heroism and laid to rest. His mother could've kissed his cold head goodbye. His father could've muttered final praise into his ear. He could've been lowered down into the ground to sleep with his fathers before him. Instead, he was now a ghost passing through a world he didn't belong in. A stranger trespassing. A fragment of the past now looming in the present.

But then Hyrule would've fallen to the clutches of Evil. Everyone he'd met in these past 11 months- Paya, the little girl with her balloons, Sidon, all of them- they all would've died. All of Hyrule blotted out with a vicious rust colored ink.

Guilt began to supersede the anger that was growing within his chest. Two vicious riptides that crashed against one another. He shouldn't be so damn selfish. He wasn't entitled to a Hero's death. This was his duty. He had been knighted. He'd made a vow. He wasn't promised luxuries or even death.

And yet, it felt as though every inch of his skin was blazing with frustration and grief.

Once enveloped in the treeline, he fell to the ground. He slung off his bow and quiver apathetically. He watched as the arrows tumbled out onto the grass. He tossed his Master Sword away similarly. It disgusted him. He didn't want it. He hoped that the earth would devour the steel.

He'd thrust away his right to a family when he was knighted. He'd given that up; and yet, the knight felt water trickle from his eyes as he imagined his mother and father's gravestones covered in moss from neglect.