Kokiri Village

As the day was moving into the late hours of the evening, Guts sat himself outside atop one of the rocks that were situated in a circle right outside Saria's home. The potatoes were being slow cooked inside a mettle pot outside over a small fire pit he helped Saria build; the fire itself wasn't raging much, as the charcoals were hot enough to keep the boiling water in the pot going for at least an hour or less.

As Guts did his best to relax for a bit outside in the warm air, from the corner of his eye to his left, he saw many Kokiri exit their homes and began their trek towards the location of the largest tree of the village, many others were exiting out from the denser foliage of the surrounding trees and bushes that surrounded the village, leaving Guts to suspect there were more housing and Kokiri than he had seen during the day.

From over his shoulder, Navi floated up to stand atop Guts's left shoulder, leaving the boy to express some annoyance at the fairy using his shoulder as a place to stand; Navi herself expressed excitement as she held her hand over eyes as she views the ongoing procession of Kokiri heading towards the Great Deku Tree's grounds. "I almost forgot today was the monthly festival!" she remarked, expressing joy on her end.

Guts on the other hand, lifted a brow of confusion, while keeping a passive stoic face, "Festival?" he questioned the fairy.

Navi nodded her small head while she planted her fists into her hips, and looked over and up at Guts's face, "Yeah! Once a month, all the Kokiri, Koroks, Skull Children and fairies celebrate the coming of the full moon with our great protector!" she answered the boy, her expression stayed that of joy and excitement.

"So…like a harvest festival?" Guts asked, allowing some modicum of curiosity to pass his features, all the while, Koroks and fairies were traveling towards their destination for the festival.

From her home, Saria exited out of the entranceway while brushing her hands off together from finishing up in cleaning the utensils she used, "Almost." Saria answered for Navi, smiling all the while and planted her palms against her hips as she looked down at Guts sitting outside her home, "It is a festival to celebrate a time when us Forest Spirits were unsure of whether we would survive the next month from hordes of monsters." she answered with a calm look.

Looking around, Guts observed more around him, just barely catching the tail end of seeing small child-like forms moving through the bushes; said child-like creatures had beak-like mouths, with faces that looked like straw, all the while wearing quite the ragged worth of getups. "And those are the Skull kids?" He questioned the two, nodding towards the skull kids in question.

"Yup!" Navi responded to Guts's question, while peering over where he was looking, and looked back at his face, "They were children once, that lost their memories and forms after getting lost in the woods, so letting them join the festivities has been one of the things we've tried to welcome them into our village as part of the woodland folk." she informed the boy.

Guts hummed to himself before getting up from the rock he sat on, and made his way towards the entrance of Saria's home, "Well, have fun then." he told both Saria and Navi with a dry tone, while making an attempt to pass by Saria.

"Oh no you don't!" Saria huffed in indignation while catching Guts by the crook of his arm, the boy himself giving her an irritated look as she stared back at him with a firm gaze, before expressing a soft but encouraging look, "This a great time for you to meet everyone, even the Great Deku Tree!" she cheered for the boy.

While Navi took her cue to remove herself from Guts's shoulder, but stayed floating around the boy's head, Guts looked back at Saria with an annoyed scowl, "I can do that some other time!" he insisted, before giving a smirk, "And last I checked, I'm not a woodland folk, I'm just some stranger you picked up in the woods."

Saria rolled her eyes at the boy, and moved to push and direct Guts to head to the festival with her, "Just come on! It's a festival for everyone! Even strangers!" she insisted light heartedly with a smile, while doing her best to budge Guts along to move with her.

While the present company argued on for Guts to attend the festival with Saria and Navi, a nasally and annoyed tone broke in, "Just leave him be, Saria! We don't need outsiders here anyway, and we certainly don't need him being involved with our activities!"

While Saria stopped to glare at the owner of the voice in question, Guts simply gave the person a disinterested look. Like his fellow Kokiri, the boy wore green clothes and shoes, along with wearing a green cap atop his orange hair. The male Kokiri leveled a gaze at Guts that screamed contempt towards the Hylian boy.

Guts simply gave the Kokiri boy an annoyed look while being unbothered by the pinned stare and attitude he was being given, he barely knew the Kokiri boy at all. Saria on the other hand, took an expedition towards the boy's attitude with Guts, and stood beside the Hylian boy, while gently patting Gut's shoulder, "Oh be quiet Mido!" She glared at the Kokiri boy she said the name of.

Mido returned Saria's glare with 'harrumph', and crossed his arms while looking away with his nose up in the air, "Or what?" he challenged with a smirk, his eyes shut with a proud look, "All I'm saying, we shouldn't let this outsider get too comfortable staying here!" he insisted, and opened his eyes to turn and look at the Hylian boy. "Hey, you, once you're healed up, get out!" he ordered while thumbing at the exit and entrance of the village.

"Mido!" Saria growled in anger, and stomped towards the boy, "I don't know where you get coming off like that, but you will not be treating Guts like that!" She tried to defend her charge.

Guts meanwhile, scoffed as he leaned up against Saria's house, allowing Navi to fly down and stand atop the boy's shoulder once again, "Are they always like that?" He spoke lowly with the fairy.

Navi nodded in response to Guts's question, "Yup." she answered the boy, the both of them watching at Saria tore into Mido with her words. "Mido likes to put up a brave and bossy front, but he's all steam and bluster whenever Saria gets up into his face." she explained with a follow up of another hapless shrug.

As the two of them watched Saria poke and jab her finger into Mido's chest, and berate the other Kokiri about treating others with respect, Guts continued to talk with Navi with his arms crossed, "So what does the festival really involve?" he asked, his curiosity burgeoning him enough to know a little bit more now.

Hopping down to simply sit on Guts's shoulder, Navi discussed with the boy what entailed in the monthly festival, while using her dainty little finger digits to list off the things, "Well, there's dancing around the large bonfire." Navi began while extending out her pinky, "You have various Kokiri children playing their instruments." she extended out her next finger, and looked up in thought, before looking back at Guts's face, who gave her a sideways glance, "Some Kokiri even played with small balls made from balled up leaves to kick back and forth between each other."

For Guts, as he listened to the list of things Navi was telling him, most of the things seemed fine, but didn't really suit his interest. "Hm, quite the activities you got going on…" he mused, expressing a simply bored look.

Navi on the other hand, gave Guts a grumpy look, "Sheesh, would it kill you to at least try and have some childhood!?" she questioned him pointedly while jabbing a finger at him.

While he was still given Navi a sideways glance, he offered a simple shrug in response, "Don't know…prettty sure I'm almost eleven or something. It'd be too late for me really…" he responded blandly, his arms still crossed as he gazed back to where Saria was chewing out Mido, whom was backing away nervously from the girl.

Navi gasped at that while covering her mouth, "You mean, you don't know when your day of birth is?" she asked, aghast that Guts did not know the specific day he was born.

With a flat look on his face, Guts shifted his gaze back sideways to Navi, "Never had the time or chance to know." he answered, before getting himself up from leaning against Saria's home, and walked towards the girl, "Besides, it's just another day passing that I get to live." he added, while missing the shocked and sympathetic look he was given by Navi.

While Saria shooed Mida off to attend the festival and leave things well enough alone between him and Guts, the Hylian boy himself approached Saria in a relaxed manner, "Hey." he announced himself gruffly, earning Saria to turn and look at the boy.

"Sorry about that." Saria apologised to Guts while expressing a bashful look and rubbing the back of her head, "Mido tends to get overbearing at times, in fact, it took me five minutes to argue with him to help me and Fado carry you back to my home. He's a very stubborn boy that doesn't like outsiders compared to the rest of us." she explained to Guts.

Pocketing his hands into his worn out pockets, while Navi floated above his head, he spoke back to Saria with a tone of disinterest, "Trust me, I dealt with worse people." he somewhat griped, while showing an emotion of annoyance as he looked back into the eyes of Saria, before smirking a bit, "It'd take more than words to get rid of or bother me." he challenged.

Saria rolled his eyes at Guts's behavior, and pulled at his hand to come with her, "Now come on! No arguing! We're going to enjoy the festival with the others!" she ordered, easily pulling Guts now that he was more than curious to see the festival for himself.

"Whatever, just don't expect me to dance or play kid games." Guts warned with a gruff look, as Saria led the way to the great Deku Tree's area.

"Of course not!" Saria giggled as she pulled on Gut's hand to follow her across the dirt path and small creak that was in front of the entrance to the Great Deku Tree's area, where music began to pick up more along with cheering and laughter; Saria looked back at Guts with a look of amusement in her eyes, "Can't have you pulling any of your stitches, I just want you to enjoy the festival. Take a seat somewhere, listen to the music, whatever you like that isn't too staining!" she winked at the boy.

"Whoopee." Guts deadpanned while speaking in monotone.

The Great Deku Tree's dwelling area

While music was being played at the base of the Deku Tree's trunk, way out in the center of the area was a sizable bonfire that a variety of Kokiri danced around, many that Guts had yet seen since his impromptu tour of the village he took.

The moon was already just peaking over the trees, while night was steadily creeping over the village; the night stars shone at their brightest, but overshadowed by the moon itself in the night sky.

Guts sat away atop an incline of a hill that led down to the center of the area where most of the activities took place; Guts noted that the bonfire was situated just enough away where its smoke wouldn't reach the leaves of the Kokiri's guardian, so at the very least, there was no chance the fire would spread.

From his position, he could see Saria was playing an instrument along with the others playing theirs; jogging his memory, the thing was called an ocarina. Remembering his days back as a child soldier to the mercenary gang he was in, one of the men had one on him to play to pass the time along with whoever wanted to join in with their own pocket instruments. The other Kokiri that played their instruments had strings on them, while others used drums; it was quite the gathering of instrument players amongst the Kokiri.

Trailing his eyes up, he saw Navi was still dancing in the air, shaking her hands and hips to the rhythm of the beat, before spinning in place and flew off to dance with her fellow fairies; looking back out forward, he watched as other Kokiri danced around the bonfire. Looking elsewhere around the area, Guts saw the wooded creatures with leaves for faces, all dancing atop the large roots of the Great Deku Tree, dancing on their small digit-like feet.

Looking around a bit more, Guts saw where the supposed Skull children were, and were all dancing within the darkness behind the large roots; not fully part of the gathering, but near enough to take part in playing their own instruments and dance to their hearts content.

"So those are the Skull Children…huh, now I definitely don't want to get lost in the woods around here." A cheeky voice spoke from Behind Guts, the range of the voice made it sound like the person was speaking from up in the treetop.

Guts's body tensed up, as he did not feel or sense anyone behind him until the voice spoke up; he was prideful enough to keep himself aware throughout war, to the nights where he had to keep himself from falling too deep into sleep. Instinctively reaching for his back, only to forget that his sword was gone for now, and he had to be careful with his healing wounds.

"Easy, easy!" The voice responded to seeing Guts tense up, before the deft sound of the person dropping down from the tree to take a knee in the shadow of the tree he hopped out from. Guts glared over at the person, promising a world of hurt if he did anything funny, wounds be damned if it came to it.

The person looked around his age or so, a little bit on the short side though; said person had a blue clothed mask over his mouth that he pulled down to give Guts a cheeky grin, "Sorry, Sorry! Couldn't resist speaking up!" The boy apologized in a low tone of voice, his presence nearly hidden in the shadows.

Looking more closely, the garb the boy wore looked quite distinct, one Guts couldn't put a finger on if he saw the garb before or not, especially the eye and tear drop etched into the front of the boy's garb.

"...who are you…" Guts bit out, speaking low as well, unsure what the deal was with the other boy, who gave a placating gesture towards Guts.

"Aw. Come on!" The boy remarked, giving Guts a disarming smile, while holding his hands up in mock surrender, "I just came to check on things for my master, among other things….and no, I'm not an enemy!" he added quickly.

Guts offered the boy a smirk, "Sure, right, that's what an enemy would say." he said back, before giving a glare, "Who are you, and what do you want?" he demanded.

The boy offered a hand out to shake hands with Guts, "Sorry, how's this, My Name's Judeau, what's yours!?" he asked, some mischievousness shined in his eyes.

Glancing at the hand offer, Guts scoffed and looked back to the festivities, but kept his guard up, "Guts, just Guts." he answered, not bothering to return the handshake offering.

Judeau chuckled nervously, and swiped his thumb across his nose as an idle gesture, before eyeing what Guts was watching, "So…having fun here?"

Guts simply glared into the air, "What are you really here for?" He pressured the other boy, annoyed that the other Hylian boy was trying to get a bit too chummy with him for no reason.

"Heh, was I that easy?" Judeau asked, expressing an amused smirk, while keeping out of sight of the Kokiri and other forest spirits.

Guts leveled a flat stare ahead as he spoke with Judeau, "I don't know why, but it just feels like you're not here for small talk." he answered Judeau in a frank tone.

"Ah, I guess you got me there, good instincts!" Judeau remarked, eyeing Guts from behind the tree he stood in the shadow of, while leaning up sideways against it with his arms crossed. "No, but you're right! I'm just here to confirm some things." he nodded to himself.

Guts, while he still sat with his legs up a bit, rested his arm over one of his knees as he conversed more with Judeau, "Well, whatever it is, leave me out of it, at least until next week…or whenever…" He told the other boy.

"Sure thing!" Judeau responded to Guts in a cheeky tone, before expressing more of a serious look and tone as he glanced to where Guts was looking, the Great Deku Tree, who was expressing a wide and joyous smile with his wooden mouth and brows as he watch his Kokiri and Korok dancing and playing, "You should enjoy this while you can…my Master believes things aren't fully over from the war…" he warned Guts.

Giving Judeau a sideways glance, Guts spoke with an apathetic tone, "Good, gives me more work to do if things heat up…" He assured the other boy, before looking back at towards the bonfire.

Looking over at Guts with his own sideways glance, Judeau lifted a brow of incredulity, "You'd choose war over peace?" he questioned.

Guts shrugged, "Never knew what peace feels like…and I'm pretty sure you don't either." He remarked, earning a warm chuckle from Judeau.

"No, I suppose you're right." Judeau responded back, before gazing onward with Guts at the bonfire, "Peace does feel a bit foreign." he commented, remembering back to the many training periods of sprinting across the battlefield while trying his best to not be seen.

"Look." Judeau spoke up again, bringing conversation more to a close between him and Guts, "Listen, it's probably best you stick around this place for a year or so, wait till the heat of the war actually dies down…who knows might come for your head for past grievances." he warned Guts.

Guts, unsure why the boy was saying such a thing, glanced once more over at Judeau, expressing a flat look of disbelief, "And what's a stranger like you, saying a thing like to me? We barely just met." he remarked, his tone full of snark and some spite.

Judeau simply offered a placating gesture with his hands, while giving Guts a disarming smile "Just some friendly advice, nothing more, I only came here cause I remember seeing you escape into the woods after seeing you fight off a pack of wolves!" he admitted, earning a hard glare from Guts.

"Honest! I was on my way back home at the time! It's just good to see you recovered in one piece!" Judeau confessed, Guts lightening his glare to a simple one as he focused his line of sight back to the festival with a soft 'whatever' leaving his lips.

"Well, here I am, all patched up, I'm Guts, You're Judeau, end of story, piss off." Guts attempted to brush off Judeau to leave him alone, his personality gave him the feeling of a sketchy person, notwithstanding that the other boy was able to conceal himself well enough to not be heard until he spoke up to Guts.

Judeau, nonetheless, chuckled back, "Just a bundle of sun shine, aren't you?" he asked, getting no response, "Well, it was great meeting you in person, I'll be seeing myself off!" Judeau bid Guts his farewell, before he leapt into the treetops with nary a sound

As Guts took the chance to actually enjoy the silence for a bit, he watched as Saria finished playing her ocarina for a bit, and jogged over to him with a joyous behavior; once she passed the bonfire and ran up the incline, she approached Guts with a brimming smile, "Hey, I just got an idea of a hobby you can take up! You know, to mark the occasion!" she urged Guts.

While Saria stood away from Guts, he looked up at her with a raised brow, "Yeah? Like what?" he asked her, before she held out her ocarina for Guts

"Here! While you're healing, you can take up playing the ocarina!" She encouraged him, her eyes shined expectantly for him to try her favorite hobby out.

Guts stared at the Ocarina in question, and weighed his options; realistically, he had nothing else to do than try something to pass the time, and Sara was nice enough to give him the opportunity to learn the Ocarina. Looking back up at Saria's eyes, he offered a hapless shrug. "I suppose it's worth a try…" he remarked, earning a cheer from Saria, and she moved to sit beside Guts, and show him how to play.

While Saria showed what holes for what notes to start for the basics, a passing thought ran through Guts's mind from his conversation with that Judeau, what really was peace? Was it anything like this?