#v; continue

The young blacksmith had grown accustomed to the new state of Hyrule, though unnerved by its drastic changes. He traveled far to find something familiar to hold onto and his mind drifted to the elusive picori who lived to aid the humans and hylians of the land. Yet wherever he searched, there was no sign no word of their existence. 

Tired, Link sought refuge on the root of a tree that pulled itself from the earth in an arc. Nature’s bench for the small and weary. And with his arm propped over his knee with his chin resting in his hand, he listlessly watched the deer grazing in the misty woods. If they weren’t so skittish, he would have asked them if they knew of his old friends. Before he could take in a breath to follow through, the deer scattered in a hurry leaving the boy on his lonesome. Puzzled, he frowned as they pranced further into the fog before his ears caught the noise that alerted them: footsteps. A soft crunch of fallen leaves and twigs from behind, Link looked over his shoulder at the approaching stranger and cast a friendly smile in greeting. 

“Dead ts’en’,” the younger hero spoke softly, knocking his hand against the old stone wall of the structure. Not even a mouse hole was apparent for him to travel alone through and relay his findings of what lies ahead.

He turned to the engineer and gave him a half shrug indicating they may as well turn back and find the others. Something was off about this whole place, and Mini couldn’t help but dart eyes darted to look past Spirit for a split second. For the fifth time. Once again, seeing nothing, though the feeling of being watched never left him.

Nothing short of a grimace was upon Father Gascoigne’s face. His initial response to the child’s non-answer was a growl, of all things. How reckless. How foolish. A child all by his lonesome would be torn apart by something or another, sooner or later. If he hadn’t known any better, he would have mistaken the kid for a beast and tried to hack him open before it could him. His axe had been picked up, his blunderbuss retrieved and his shovel discarded for naught. The gun was returned to its holster. Didn’t the boy’s parents tell him to stay home at night, lock the door, and answer it for no one? The kid was all too lucky he’d wandered to Oedon Tomb, then. Considering its groundskeeper, it was currently one of the safest places in Yharnam on a night like this, save for, of course, one’s own home.

“Nothing to say for yourself, eh?”

“Hm-nn,” he shook his head. The action drawn more out of habit than an answer.

He’d noticed the odd weaponry, a trait that many people of this strange town sported---but given the hostile locals, it wasn’t something to draw too much alarm from the boy. Even now, he was still on edge teetering on suspicions and doubts. Without his usual way of communication, a dizzying anxiety tainted the mix. 

“MONSTER!” a guard on patrol outside of Castle Town sounded the alarm. Or in his mind he did, yelling before abandoning his post in a cowardly display of what Hyrule’s finest soldiers had to offer.

The town wasn’t in much of a panic over this. They merely looked the soldier’s way and shrugged, continuing with their business. Last time he ran off a chuchu lunged at him.

To be fair, it was technically a ‘time of peace’ excluding the whole event with Vaati. And the soldiers didn’t do much then either. It was up to the little green hero to investigate as he casually strolled past the town’s gate. A short distance to travel before looking rather unimpressed with this ‘monster.’ 

The young hylian was off exploring again, kicking sands over his boots from his beach-side stroll. Strange ruins and husks of large creatures decorated the sands behind him, but the boy’s eyes were set on the serene waters ahead.

So entranced was he that as a husk of one of the creatures he’d passed lit up with red and blue light, he didn’t register it until it went off scurrying and making strange mechanical noises. Curious, Link watched it set its blazing eye on him following a red dot that bore into his green tunic. 

Thunder crashed and lightning struck. The poor boy was inevitably soaked to the bone despite using his shield as a makeshift umbrella to keep the heavy rain from pelting him into oblivion. There appeared to be no sign of the storm letting up as the ground flooded with large puddles spanning long distances. Only shallow enough to sink him to his ankles, but a deep ocean for smaller companions with whom the boy was acquainted.

Blending into the fog, was a dingy old building that promised solace from the weather. Link made a quick assumption that it was abandoned before crawling in through the broken window. Any place was better than outside. Even when his face met concrete, he was just happy it was dry concrete.

The young hero sat up while rubbing the pain out of his nose. Surprised to find that the place didn’t look as abandoned at this perspective as it did before---rather, someone actually seemed to live there. His suspicions were confirmed when he heard the voice of a man. Or two men? And their conversations promised a third.

Nighttime had some awful evil power to make everything scarier than its daylight counterparts. Even with Link’s small lantern, the parts of the woods unseen were haunting the back of his mind with hideous ideas of what may be lurking. 

It was counterproductive, but he slowly shuffled his way over the trail, taking his time and assessing every noise: owls, frogs, crickets, SNAP---the boy flinched at this one before he looked down---a stick he’d stepped on. Then another ‘SNAP’ and he flinched again. That couldn’t have been him. He hadn’t moved since the last one.

Link has walked the halls of Hyrule Castle many times in his young life, but this time was strangely different. The royal vassals must have switched up the decorations, he thought, but the overall feel of the castle was just off. A different air, a different lighting. It was puzzling to say the least.

To add to this oddity, Link had been running down the halls this day. Guards don’t usually yell at him or try to stop him from seeing the princess. These guys must be new.

He skid around the corner, dragging the long carpet with him. The sounds of chaos, guards shouting, clanking armor, and a little hylian shouting for his best friend: