World 4-2: Hail to the King

If you asked the average Hylian what the difference between a frog and a toad is, they probably wouldn't be able to tell you. Maybe they may say that a toad is slightly larger or more wrinkly, or maybe they even think those are two names for the same thing. To an amphibian, however, that was like comparing a Hylian to a Gerudo. Sure, they may look similar and have some things in common, but they were not the same. One was a noble, dignified race while the other were lowly bottom feeders to be looked down upon and never trusted.

It was a bright, sunny morning in the peaceful land of Hyrule. A few friendly clouds dotted the sky and sunlight sparkled off the clear blue waters of the Zora River. It was the kind of day that could make someone completely forget the horrors of the big folk's war that had only so recently ended. A perfect day for a concert by the renowned Fabulous Five Froggish Tenors, the most popular and celebrated frog singers in the country, if not the world. Amphibians, fish and even a few land animals gathered around to listen and enjoy the harmonious croaking of the finest singers of their generation.

And sitting in that crowd was one hopeful tadpole who had always dreamed of joining their ranks since the days before his legs had finally started to grow out. This was the day. The day that young Mamu would finally get his chance.

After the concert had ended and the crowd of gathered listeners dispersed, that plucky young polliwog lingered behind to get a word with his idols.

"That was amazing!" Mamu hopped up to them excitedly, taking a seat on a rock beside the old branch that served as their stage.

"Thanks, kid," Gray said dismissively, stretching his long, slender legs as he got ready to swim home for the evening.

"You guys have got to be the best singers ever," the tadpole cheered. "How did you learn to get so good?"

"Lots of practice." Blue rolled his eyes.

"And a kid in green teaching us new songs certainly didn't hurt," Yellow added.

"But that was only recently," Purple pointed out. "We'd already been training together for years before then."

"And I dare say that natural talent played a part as well," Pink said.

"Whoa, that sounds so cool," Mamu gasped, blissfully tuning out how unenthused the frog singers seemed to be to talk to him. "I want to be just like you guys when I grow up! If I try hard enough, do you think I could be part of your band?"

That was exactly the wrong thing to say. Five sets of bulging, beady eyes narrowed, glaring at the child with nothing but disdain.

"Fabulous."

"Five."

"Froggish."

"Tenors."

"What part of that makes you think that you would fit in?" Yellow asked after the others had taken turns each saying part of their name.

"There are only five of us," Purple pointed out coldly. "No more, no less."

"And what makes you think that you could ever be a tenor?" Pink asked. "You haven't even lost your tail and you already speak with a bass."

"And we are frogs," Gray declared haughtily. "A toad like you could never sing with us, you little Wart!"

Then, before Mamu could even get a word in, the five frogs hopped into the river and swam off, leaving him entirely alone.

Mamu just sat there quietly, doing his best not to cry. He didn't even notice the endless dark clouds swirling overhead from the direction of Hyrule Castle. The world was about to get dragged into a new era, and Mamu along with it.

A large green toad looked over the dried-up riverbed that he had once called home. Seven years if darkness had destroyed any semblance of peace that there had once been. It was a world of hardship, one where only the strong could survive while the weak were ground into dust at their heels. Mamu had been too weak to face the hardships this new order would bring. In his place, Wart had risen.

The other animals of the river had fled long ago, at least those who had survived. Looking down from the nearby cliffside, the only signs of life were the monsters who now inhabited the place and a lone Hylian in green who was foolish enough to attempt the trip up to what was left of the Zora's Domain upriver. This was not a unique situation. It seemed that more and more of the land and its inhabitants died with each passing day, unable to survive their grim reality.

But Wart was not so weak. With one last glance of the place he had been raised, Wart shrugged to readjust the red cape he now adorned in imitation of the king, the only being left in Hyrule worthy of his respect, and hopped away. There was nothing there for him anymore. There never was.

"You seem to be in a hurry to get somewhere. That's rare, these days. Most folks don't have anywhere left to go."

Wart stopped and turned, finding a frail-looking man looking down on him from a high rock, covered in a dark purple cloak that showed nothing of his face save for an ominous red glow. He looked almost more like a Poe than a living Hylian and was carrying a long stick which he used to swat the wooden cage sitting beside him.

"Most people are fools," Wart replied.

"Maybe, or perhaps we're the fools?" the stranger cackled before giving the cage another whack. "Doesn't make a difference to me. Either way, lost souls are good for business. If you ever find yourself lost one of these days, why don't you come find me? I could always use a thing like you in my collection."

The stranger swatted his cage again and Wart shuddered as he finally realized what was inside. The market for spirits was an unusual one but no doubt profitable in the world they now lived in.

"No thank you," Wart replied. "I have no intention of ever going down that path."

"What path?" the stranger asked. "No matter which way we go, everyone ends up at the same place eventually. It's only a question of how lost we get along the way."

"Not me," Wart said, turning his chin up in disdain. "Death is for the weak and powerless. I am above such things."

"Really?" The stranger sounded intrigued but was clearly just humoring him. "Well, then I guess I've never met anyone strong before. Except perhaps the young man down there but he seems to be a special case."

Wart ignored that, deciding that he was done with this worthless conversation.

Given everything that the toad had been through, it might be expected that he would have given up on his dreams of being a singer. But he'd seen, through the king's example, that magic was power and power was everything. And there were few magics in Hyrule as powerful as music.

Wart began to sing one of the many magical songs that he had learned on his journeys, the Ballad of Gales. As his notes croaked melodically through the air, a whirlwind picked up and carried him off into the sky. Perhaps not the most elegant way to travel but effective.

The last thing that Wart could remember, he had boarded a ship headed for Labrynna. There was nothing left for him in Hyrule so he decided it was time to start exploring the world. A storm had picked up along the way and a Big Octo had risen from the sea to attack their ship as they tried to navigate out of it. Then black.

Wart picked himself up out of the sand and looked around. He had somehow managed to safely wash ashore on an unfamiliar beach. In the distance, he could see a forest of palm trees. That wasn't what caught his attention, however. No, that would be the tall mountain on what must have been the other side of the island he now found himself stranded on, and the giant white egg sitting atop it, covered in pink spots that were visible even from such a distance.

"Whoah, there, stranger!"

Wart was snapped out of his thoughts, turning to see a blue crocodile walking up to him on its hind legs, an old straw hat on his head. For a moment, Wart thought the reptile seemed unusually small for a member of its species before he realized that he was the one who had grown far larger than he remembered being. Once he sat up, Wart realized that he not only towered over the crocodile but that his body had changed so that he, too, could now stand on his hind legs while his forelegs had turned into arms with hands instead of webbed feet. What could have possibly done that to him?

"You look like a mess," the crocodile said. "Are you alright, stranger?"

"Yes, I'm perfectly fine," Wart insisted, wiping the sand off his belly. He quickly realized that it wasn't even a lie. Despite what he'd been through, Wart seemed none the worse for wear. "Where am I? What is this place?"

"Why, you're on Koholint Island, of course," the crocodile said as if that should have been obvious. "Where else would you be? I'm Sale, by the way. I run the House o' Bananas over there and my hobby is collecting rare and unusual canned food. My brother is an artist, so I guess strange hobbies run in the family! Who are you?"

Wart just glared at Sale before actually giving the question some thought. Who was he, really? If he was truly on some island in the middle of the ocean that he had never even heard of, then perhaps he had a chance at a fresh start. A chance to find himself, and learn who he was without the baggage of his old life.

Finally, he answered.

"My name is Mamu. I am a singer."

Wart opened his eyes. He had learned long ago that sleep was unnecessary when living in a land of dreams but it was still good to take a moment to rest every once in a while. But it could be hard when that rest came packaged with memories of a life better left forgotten. Everything he'd ever known and loved had been ripped away from him. But a smile soon crossed his face.

Soon, he would be able to return to his original homeland and crush it beneath his feet.

Something seemed off, though. It had been long enough since he had parted ways with the others that at least some of them should have been back. Yet as he looked around the room from his throne, all he saw was an empty chamber. There wasn't even any sign of the shy guy peons who would usually be cleaning around that time.

That was concerning but a problem for later. If his men wanted to spend a little extra time torturing their 'guests' then that was fine with him. The servants would be punished later for neglecting their duties, however. But for now, Wart decided that it was time to check the progress of his latest acquisition. Ridley's corruption should have been coming along nicely.

The old toad clambered out of his throne and made his way to the castle dungeons. It was a path he'd trod countless times, making his way through the labyrinthian palace hallways decorated with murals and tapestries depicting all manner of fantastical scenarios and imagery. At last, he came to the doorway leading down into the depths where he'd unleashed the former space pirate upon the denizens of the so-called 'Mushroom Kingdom' but he stopped before opening the door and turned around.

A grand mural spread across the far wall, depicting a gnarled old wizard with graying purple skin, his dark robes spreading out like an endless sea of stars. The wizard's arms were outstretched, wingers spread like he was pulling a marionette by the strings. Instead of a puppet, though, the object he seemed to stare down out through his black visor was a swirling ball of cloudy darkness.

Wart blinked and wondered why he was staring at an empty wall. In stark contrast to most of the castle he'd taken from the local subcons when he'd first invaded their kingdom, the hallway outside the dungeons had always remained bare. He briefly remembered the first time he'd been to this part of the castle when he'd ordered the shy guys under his command to lock up the residents of the castle in those very same dungeons. The odd thing was, though, that he couldn't seem to remember what had happened to the subcons after that.

"Oh, well," Wart muttered to himself as he turned back to the door to the dungeons. "Let's see how Ridley is doing.

The self-made King of Dreams unlocked the door and made his way down the dark staircase, which always felt just a bit longer than he remembered every time he went down there. He expected to see a dragon, the ace in his sleeve for when he finally invaded the waking world, chewing on the eviscerated remains of the people he had once considered his friends and neighbors. Instead, he found a bunch of scared mushroom people shaking in their cages, with no sign of Ridley in sight.

"What happened?" Wart bellowed, suddenly finding himself engulfed with rage that his plans were falling astray. When no answer came, he marched over to a cage where and elderly-looking mushroom person with a mustache and brown cap was gripping an old walking stick tightly in his hands. "Where is Ridley? What's going on!"

"I-I don't know!" the old man stammered. "Master Ridley was here, crawling around and snarling like a ravenous beast when he suddenly flew away. We haven't seen him since! Oh, how I wish Master Mario was still with us. He'd be able to stop you and rescue all of us."

That didn't make sense. The drugs he'd slipped the space dragon in the meal he'd so 'generously' shared with him earlier should have lowered his inhibitions, causing him to revert to his most primal, bestial instincts. By this point, Ridley should be nothing but Wart's vicious attack dog after unleashing his violent impulses on these pathetic people. How could he have simply wandered off? And where would he have gone to? There shouldn't have been any other way in or out besides the locked door that he had just come in through! Unless…

Wart sang the Ballad of Gales, kicking up a powerful whirlwind under his feet which picked him up and carried him up to the ceiling so that he could get a closer look at the air vents. The iron bars that normally blocked them off to prevent escape had been completely melted away, leaving a convenient tunnel that a being of Ridley's size would just barely be able to slip through.

"Oh, no," Wart gasped before directing his whirlwind back to the ground. "He's loose!"

A pair of red-robed shy guys walked along one of the castle's many long hallways, headed to the kitchens for a well-earned snack after a long shift of guarding the front gates. The castle seemed oddly quiet, though. It was unusual to not run into any other shy guys along the way but they figured that King Wart had pulled everyone away for one of his lectures on why taking over the waking world was so important. As if anyone wouldn't be content living in a literal dream where they could have pretty much anything they wanted.

At last, they reached their destination and the pair walked into the empty kitchens. That seemed even stranger but at least it meant that they could get away with grabbing whatever they wanted without getting caught. Like that giant cake that they'd seen the last time they were there but hadn't been allowed to touch. One of the shy guys headed straight to where they'd seen the delectable desert only to let out a cry of horror as they found a messy pile of splattered confectionary and icing that was all that was left of the cake. It looked like someone had dropped an anvil on the cake, which then exploded. How could anyone do that to something so tasty?

Meanwhile, the other shy guy looked around and realized that the entire kitchen was a complete mess. Pots and pans were strewn about everywhere, it looked like someone had sprayed ketchup all over the walls and counters, and a pot of stew was boiling over on the stove. Chef Guy would never allow his kitchen to end up in a state of such disrepair. Where had he gone?

That was about when the first shy guy finally found the pile of masks neatly stacked on the floor by the door to the walk-in freezer. Shy guys never took off their masks. He let out an alarmed shout and turned to find his companion when a clatter of breaking dishes caught his attention, followed by a horrid scream that was suddenly cut off.

Panicked, the shy guy made a run for it only to trip over something and fall flat on his face. Picking himself up, the shy guy turned around and he had tripped over another mask. To a non-shy guy, it would have looked like any other shy guy mask, a completely indistinguishable blank white disk with three oval-shaped black holes for the eyes and mouth. To a shy guy, however, every mask was distinct in its subtle details and he could tell even at a glance that it was his friend's mask. But the other shy guy was nowhere to be seen.

The shy guy caught a flash of movement out of the corner of his eye and instinctively turned to see what it was but there was nothing there. Then there was a loud crash as a light fixture suddenly fell to the floor next to him and shattered on the ground. But when he looked up, there was still nothing. Then a giant hand suddenly grabbed him by the back of the neck and the shy guy found himself being pulled up into the air before getting slammed face-first into the tiled floor.

The last thing the shy guy saw was a long mouth full of sharp fangs, thin lips of brown, leathery skin pulled back into a smile before a long tongue flittered out and licked the side of his mask. Then, everything went dark.

Author's Notes: I was planning on waiting until later before revealing Wart's backstory but decided that now was as good a time as any to include it. The idea of having Wart grow up in Hyrule around the time of Ocarina of Time, including his having wanted to be a part of the Fabulous Five Froggish Tenors only to have his dreams ripped out from under him was one of the first ideas I had for this storyline. Though, I was originally planning on having Wart go straight from Hyrule to Subcon, with him waking up on Koholint Island after his defeat at the end of this story. However, when I started writing Cruel Dragon's Thesis I realized that I would have to change that around because if that story happens at roughly the same time as the main Super Ridley 'verse storylines that means that Link's Awakening would have happened thousands of years ago. Also, I should note that this Wart is from the fic's version of the Adult Timeline, though must have shifted into the Downfall Timeline when he ended up getting stuck in the Wind Fish's dream since that's where Link's Awakening is set and also happens to be the timeline that the Link from Cruel Dragon's Thesis lived through. This means that Link is the one that Wart has a grudge against for taking away his life on Koholint where he'd been able to live his dream of being a professional singer. That detail likely won't be relevant to either story, though.

Ridley going feral and wreaking havoc was also one of the first ideas I had for this story. He spent the first story learning to reject who he once was and become a new person. Now he finds himself forced back into the monster he once was. But how will this affect himself and those around them? After all, most of his friends have never truly seen this side of him before. Also, his normally purple skin has shifted to brown while he's in this berserker state, in case you were confused by the description at the end. I thought it would be an interesting visual contrast as brown Ridley is used in games like Zero Mission and Super Metroid where he's in a more direct villain role, in contrast to the usual purple which allows him to blend in better in the bright, vibrant Mushroom Kingdom. I even introduced his camouflage abilities back in the Nightmare Cave sequence to set this up.

If you had the ability to change colors at will like Ridley, what colors would you want to be? I think I'd go for pale blue skin and maybe really dark blue hair. Though I'd probably change a lot depending on whatever I feel like being at any given moment.