(hey, guys! welcome to the next installment in the tale of Linka and her princess! I've been working on this while uploading the first story, and now we can pick up where we left off! good thing YOU don't have to wait for five years, huh? XD Enjoy!)

 

Five years. That’s how long it’s been since I defeated Calamity Ganon with Zelda’s help, and saved Hyrule, the Rito, the Zora, the Gerudo, including our good friend Ganondora, a descendant of the King of Thieves, and the Gorons, avenging my fallen comrades, Mipha, Revali, Daruk and Urbosa.

In the half-decade since peace returned, I’ve become more open and confident thanks to my identity being accepted by those around me, and Zel moved in with me, living in my house in Hateno village. Ganondora also lives with us, and works with us on our efforts to restore the kingdom.  Without Ganon’s Malice, the Guardians have all ceased functioning, and have been dismantled, their materials repurposed for other things. The Sheikah Shrines, too, have just… disappeared. The Towers, too, as if they’ve achieved their goal and returned to their slumber. The kingdom has gradually started to recover, after a century of despair and torment.

However, in the last few months, a strange illness has been spreading, seemingly randomly, and without a cure. The monsters have grown much more vicious, too, strangely. It’s like there’s something driving them. They’ve begun to band together, forming camps scattered throughout the kingdom. Ganondora spends most of her time heading the monster extermination squads, her Scimitar of the Seven and Daybreaker shield flashing as she leads the charge, the topazes studding her black steel armour glinting radiantly.

Meanwhile, I continue my previous role from a century past, protecting my girlfriend from monsters and the occasional overzealous Yiga clan assassin. We started dating shortly after we met again upon the defeat of Darkbeast Ganon, and I couldn’t be happier. My beloved Zel and I, living together in relative peace, with friends surrounding us… Although, I’M the one who does the cooking. Ganondora likes really spicy food, and Zel, well… much as I adore my girlfriend, gastronomics are not one of her many skills…

 

However, the mysterious plague spreading through the kingdom has both of us worried. Zel can’t bear seeing her people suffer, and I can’t stand watching her hurting. It’s taken the majority of the last half-year, and many sleepless nights filled with research, but we’ve finally managed to piece together where the source of the pestilence originates from: Hyrule castle. More specifically, BENEATH Hyrule castle.

Now, Zel and I have made our way into the deepest passages of Hyrule castle, and, through some secret methods, even deeper than that, into long-forgotten and even-longer-abandoned tunnels beneath the citadel.

Holding a flaming torch, Zelda leads the way, with my hand resting on the hilt of the Master Sword. I stay close, my skirts fluttering in the stale breeze. The air is… thick, here, with a strong scent-taste of dust, stagnant water, and age. The walls appear to be half sculpted, and half rough-hewn tunnel, with pillars bracing the walls as the old steps descend into the bowels of the most ancient part of the citadel. Zel’s short blonde hair shifts slightly.

“The strange gloom keeps getting thicker…” she looks back at me. There are indeed tendrils of a smoky, insubstantial miasma drifting through the air. As we reach a small landing, with the stairs continuing down at a right angle, she pauses, turning to me.

“We’ve been descending for a while now… these tunnels are deeper than I thought. What could be down here?”

I shrug, eyes scanning the darkness ahead. There are glowing deposits of Luminous Stone embedded in the rock, but their light is not enough to break the hold the darkness has on these passages. I step forward, with Zel’s torch at my back, hand tightening on the hilt of my weapon. I don’t like this. This place feels wrong; it’s setting my teeth on edge. Maybe we shouldn’t be here… who knows what we might disturb…?

  There’s water here, a large puddle on the left side of the passage, the greenish-blue glow from the Luminous Stone deposits shining dimly on the liquid’s surface. The dark mist seems to grow stronger up ahead, almost flowing like a river, pooling and swelling…

Zel joins me at my side, my hand seeking out hers. She murmurs, “People have been falling ill after coming into contact with the gloom drifting through these caverns. Though here, it seems almost misty, not concentrated enough to harm us…”

She squeezes my hand. “We’ll keep going. With it coming up from beneath Hyrule castle… we do not know what waits below, so we need to be ready for anything. But I know I’ll be okay with you, Linka…”

I smile, squeezing her hand back. My Zel… I’ll protect you, no matter what.

“Let’s go solve this mystery, Zel.”

The passageway continues downward and to the right, the flickering torchlight casting shadows and playing over the walls as I pause at what looks like a doorway, Zelda gasps.

“Linka! The Master Sword… it must be sensing something!”

Drawing the blade, I immediately understand her reaction. The sword that seals the darkness… the weapon forged by the Goddess Hylia… is glowing.

I swallow. “You’re right. It only lit up like this when I was facing the Blight Ganons, the Calamity, or the Darkbeast. I knew we had reason for concern…”

Zel nods. “Ever since the end of the Calamity, the castle’s fallen into neglect. But I never could have imagined anything like these tunnels… we must be careful as we proceed, Linka…”

I nod. “Of course, my princess.”

Stepping through the ‘doorway’, I find the rough stone floor changing into neatly laid brickwork. This is clearly not a natural occurrence! SOMEONE definitively built this place. But… for what purpose? What could be so important, or dangerous, to have been hidden, and then to be ‘forgotten’? Or… maybe it was forgotten deliberately…

The stonework is higher here, much higher, like a grand hallway. Pillars line both sides of the hall, with sconces at head-height. Each contains no reservoir of oil or a bracket for a torch. Instead, a strange, egg-shaped object, maybe some ancient lantern.

Every single one is dark and cold, no trace of use in recent centuries. If these had been active, there would be some trace, but… nothing. Parts of the hall have collapsed inward, and Zelda gasps in amazement.

“Linka! Look here!” she kneels beside a fallen chunk of masonry, the torchlight playing over the carved surface.

“These aren’t Hylian; they’re ruins from an ancient civilization! Wait… something is written here… might these ruins be… from the Zonai??”

I blink. “The Zonai?”

Zelda has mentioned that name before. Supposedly, long before Hyrule as we knew it was founded, there existed a tribe of beings known as the Zonai. This wasn’t from the time of the First Calamity, 10,000 years ago. No, the Zonai were hypothesized to have lived much, MUCH further back in the history of the land.

We move on a few paces, and Zelda squeaks again. “Oh! Look at this…”

She approaches an ornate carving between two of the pillars, snapping a few pictures with the Sheikah device she carries. “These carvings… I’m SURE they’re Zonai in origin. I’ve seen designs like this in my studies. ”

I smile, unable to help myself. Zel’s so cute when she geeks out over history!

“The Zonai existed during the time of earliest legend, did you know? They possessed godlike powers, and had a prosperous civilization in the sky. Many history books tell us about the Zonai, but none gives us a full picture. So much is still unknown about them!”

She places the Sheikah tool back on her belt, and we resume our patrol. At the end of the hallway, there are effigies, flanking either side of the doorway. Zel’s reactions make me smile again. She’s like a child in a candy store!

“Those statues there!”

Each remarkably-well-preserved sculpture is humanoid in shape, with two arms and legs, but much taller. Their faces are animalistic, but not bestial, with long, backswept ears, much larger than the delicately-pointed ears of Hylians like me and Zel. The statues are clad in robes, with detailed markings running down the centrepiece. Their arms are very long, almost to where their knees would be.

Snapping more pictures, the princess asks in wonder, “How did ruins from a civilization in the sky end up here beneath the castle?”

I wait for her to finish. “Princess, it looks like the path ahead goes deeper. We should press on.”

Down a short flight of stairs, there are another half-dozen statues, three on each side, and, just beyond them, a trio of batlike Keese, which I defeat in a single blow each.

Zel hurries over, her boots clicking on the stone bricks.

“You’re not hurt, are you, Linka?”

I shake my head, sliding the Master Sword back into its sheathe with a clean ‘snick’. Zel still scans me, making sure. She’s such an amazing woman; I’m so blessed to have her in my life!

Once she’s satisfied I’m unhurt, she turns to examine the room we’ve ended up in, her torch illuminating the walls… where a huge carved fresco dominates the stone.

“Look at these murals…the written histories of the royal family includes stories of a great war fought long ago. It was a conflict between allied tribes and… an entity only ever referred to as the Demon King.”

I stare up at the frieze. There are carvings that I recognize as Moblins, Bokoblins, and a huge, imposing shape that might be that entity Zel made mention of.

She muses, “Is it possible? Is this a depiction of the same legend?” she moves across to the other wall, to the first panel. A figure, much like the statues, one of the mysterious Zonai, on a platform or hovering stone slab, with figures lined up beneath. Six comma-shaped objects surround the figure.

“This is similar to the statues we saw back there- a Zonai! And these…” Zel gestures to the shapes below. “These figures resemble Hylians. This certainly suggests that the Zonai descended from the heavens…”

The next panel catches her eye. The Zonai from the first one, seemingly entwining a hand with a carved depiction of a Hylian woman. Two of the comma-shaped objects are suspended above the pair, seemingly glowing. Zelda murmurs, “It is said that my ancestors- the first of Hyrule’s royal family… were born from a union with gods who had descended from on high... these murals tell a similar story, and, if they are accurate, then… then the gods mentioned WERE the Zonai. They must have forged a relationship with the Hylians of that time, working together to establish… The kingdom of Hyrule!”

Zel moves to the third panel, where that ominous being from the war image seems to be central. It’s surrounded by a wave of what appears to be Malice, cresting behind and over it, as the ancient Hylian woman seems to be being lifted into the air by some means of levitation. One of the comma-shaped things is being surrounded by the very peak of the wave, as if… corrupted by it.

“This figure… he seems to be… stealing something of incredible power from the young kingdom! This all aligns with what I’ve read during my studies… and then this!” she paces quickly to the next, back to the panel we’d first seen.

“It shows the Demon King! And a fierce battle against him.”

She steps back four feet, almost against me.

“If the creature depicted here really does represent the Demon king, then… incredible! This mural must depict the great war recorded in the royal histories! This is the Imprisoning War, and the events that led up to it!”

She whirls, eyes sparkling. “Linka! This is a HUGE discovery!”

As she fumbles at her belt for the Sheikah device, I take the torch from her hand, freeing her up to do what she needs to.

“Alright, then. Now to use this invention of Purah’s .I’m glad I brought it with me.”

She begins snapping lithographic images once more.

“It’s so easy to record. You just aim it and click!”

Suddenly, Zel lowers the device the next panel is covered, by a large heap of rocks.

“Oh… it looks as though the rest of the mural’s obscured…”

Zel places Purah’s device back on her hip, and I return her torch to her. “Here you go, Zel.”

She turns slowly, raising her torch high. “Just what is this place?”

I point towards where the wispy mist seems to be concentrating. “Maybe we’ll find more answers if we keep going?”

She nods, and I take the lead again. Running into the Keese wasn’t a problem, but the feeling that something was fundamentally wrong here was growing stronger. I REALLY didn’t like this. There was something down here, and I wasn’t at all convinced WE were going to find IT. I had the sneaking suspicion that IT, whatever IT was, was waiting for US…

Drawing the Master Sword, I knew I was right. If the Keese had been the end of it, the Blade of Evil’s Bane would have gone dark, the glow fading. But, to my silent consternation, the glow has gotten brighter… more intense. Not good.

 

I proceed, my royal girlfriend behind me, the miasma of dark fog starting to thicken, little crimson embers of light drifting aimlessly through the stale air. More stairs, still leading down. I wait for Zel’s torch to light my way, the Master Sword in hand, my skirt rustling against my thighs as I step down slowly. At the end of the short hallway at the very bottom of the stairs, the statues have been… broken, scattered across the stone, and the sealed end of the path looks like it’s been smashed.  I step through, turning to the left at the end of the hallway, and continuing, the Master Sword ready to swing at a moment’s notice.

Another entrance, smashed open like the last. This is SERIOUSLY creeping me out! I wanna go home!  Down the sloped, narrow stone tunnel, and we come to a vast, dark chamber. Something is there, in the centre, a swirling spiral of blue-green energy rising from it. The gloom is oppressive here, almost alive, and I shiver a little. Not from cold, but from the realization that this… is the source of the gloom. Even Zel’s presence isn’t helping. Not even when I faced down the Calamity have I felt fear like this…

Slowly, I inch my way down the stairs at the edge of the room, the torch barely repelling the darkness around us. Zel’s hushed voice breaks the dead silence.

“What… is this place…?”

I shrug. As we creep closer, we can see the bottom of the strange spiral of turquoise energy. A humanoid form, bent backwards in a position of agony, with a dully-glowing hand embedded in its chest.

As we reach the bottom of the dais this ill-omened tableau is set upon…the glowing hand… falls away, no longer pressed to the chest of the arched figure. A small, comma-shaped jewel skitters from a fixing on the back, rolling and clinking over the stone to rest at Zelda’s feet. She kneels to pick it up, examining it closely for a moment. Her hand starts to glow with the warm light of Hylia’s power, before the sound of a long-dormant heart beating breaks the hush.

The figure’s outstretched arms begin to crack and tremble, the body shifting as it rises into a more upright stance, before toppling back, feet still planted firmly. Its lolling head…snaps round to face us with blazing red eyes, slit pupils glaring towards us. An explosion of Malice boils outwards in multiple directions, and I intervene, darting in front of my girlfriend and parrying the first tendril, the Master Sword shining radiantly.

Instead of retreating, the tendril lashes out, engulfing the Blade of Evil’s Bane, as well as my arm, all the way up to my bicep, most of the way to my shoulder. My Champion’s Dress sleeve is just… gone, and my arm looks like I’d submerged it in Death Mountain’s volcanic lava. The pain is excruciating, like nothing I’ve ever experienced. The memories of the wounds I’d sustained during the battle that led to my ‘death’ over a hundred years ago doesn’t even come close. Neither did the agony of retrieving the Master Sword from the Korok Forest.

Another tendril of Malice erupts from the moving corpse, and, when I swing my ruined arm, the Master Sword… breaks, shattering and flying apart halfway along the sacred blade, the tip flying towards the shuddering cadaver on the dais, cutting it across the cheek with a tiny glint of blue light.

Zelda screams, “Linka!”

The wound on its cheek bubbling with Malice, the corpse speaks in a hushed, rasping whisper.

“Was that the sword that seals the darkness? A blade that shatters so easily against my power cannot save you from me.”

The spine creaking, the figure hauls itself back into an upright position, the smoking wound on its cheek.

“Zelda….”

My princess flinches back, and I narrow my eyes despite my personal suffering, stepping in front of her. The figure’s eyes switch to me.

“You, the girl who carries that fragile sword… are Linka.”

Twisting to face us more directly, the figure continues, the voice growing louder.

“Rauru placed his faith in you…and that was all you could do?”

The wound has completely healed. Zelda asks from behind me, “How do you… know our names?”

Instead of answering, the being calls forth an orb of Malice, purer and darker than anything I’ve faced before. With a grating howl, the person fires it straight up, the wave of dark power pushing the massive landmass over our heads up, into the air. The ground around us shudders and protests as, almost a mile above, Hyrule Castle lifts into the sky, the foul energy suspending it. The figure of the withered, mummified being collapses back as the ground beneath us gives way, falling into further darkness below. I fall to my knees, as the pulsing, incomprehensible agony washes over me, as Zel calls my name in desperate worry.

“Linka!”

As she steps forward, the ground beneath her feet crumbles away, and she loses her grip on the torch. Forgetting my pain, I dive, reaching for her, my blackened, destroyed arm out. She reaches up towards me, and our fingers brush, fresh waves of fire shooting up my arm, and…she falls out of reach. With a gleam of golden light, she vanishes before my eyes.

MY fall, however, halts in a different way. Looking back up, I see the arm that had sealed that malevolent entity gripping my left arm by the wrist. It pulls me upwards, and into a ring of blue-green light. And, for an unknown length of time… I knew nothing more….

 

When next my eyes open, strange, swirling symbols of green-blue light are drifting through the air, forming and reforming into different shapes. I sit up, and wince, before my eyes fly open. ZEL!

I’m… alone, sitting, on a circular platform on the floor of a cave, thick roots breaking through the ceiling and walls. Looking down, I gasp for two reasons. My right arm… is different. The strange glowing one is in its place, and seems to be attached! There are bands of a dull gold metal fixed to it, as though part of the skin, and the nails are both a faded green and more like claws.

The second reason is because it started glowing and I could hear a voice. It’s a nice voice, warm and calming, with a faint accent.

“Ah, Linka. Finally, you wake. I’ve heard a great deal about you from Zelda.”

I rocket to my feet, looking around for the source of the voice. There’s no-one there, but the voice continues.

“Your wounds were severe… I am relieved to see you escaped death. Your arm, however, was… beyond saving.  I had to replace it, lest the injury endanger you further.”

As I keep looking around, I spot something familiar. The Master Sword! I rush to it, but, when I get closer, I see the truth. Where once had been a flawless, pristine length of metal… is now pitted, rusted, and broken. It’s… heart-breaking, to see my trusted partner in such a state. And then I realise I’m in my underwear. “Ack!”

Okay, Linka. First, get out of here. Second, find the voice. Third… find some clothes!

The way out is blocked by thin roots, but, even in such poor condition, the Master Sword slices through them with ease. I exit into another room, larger than the small alcove I’d come to consciousness in, and a ring of stone lights up with green energy, a handprint floating in the centre of it. I reach out and touch it, and the light ripples before fading. A blue disk lights up behind me, and then a series of massive gears start to spin, and a door on an upper level opens. Through the door, I find a pool of water below me. I jump into the pool, and the cold sears my flesh in an instant. Across the pool, I climb out and then have to climb the stone where a set of stairs WOULD be if they weren’t long-destroyed.

Through another doorway, and now I have to jump into MORE freezing cold cave-water. Blegh. And then, a THIRD diving point. Oh, come on! Stop turning me into an ice cube!

Upon hauling myself out of the chill, I spot a glowing box. Opening it, I find a skirt and some sandals.  Not much, but it’s better than going almost naked.

As soon as I’m dry enough, I tug the clothing on. It fits okay, but I’d prefer more coverage… then, turning myself towards a bright patch of sunlight, I head outside… where another HYLIA-DAMNED JUMP IS. “Stop making me do this, you assholes!” I shriek, removing my borrowed clothing, before throwing myself off the jump point.

 

I fall for what must be a couple hundred metres, but splash down safely, if not exactly pleased. Swimming over to the edge, I get out, thinking about what I’d seen during my dive.

This place was… high up. REALLY high up. Even after my fall, I was still above the clouds.  There’s not a single mountain in Hyrule that reaches THIS height. That must mean, somehow… I’m standing where the Zonai lived. Their long-undiscovered civilization…

 

Thankfully, it’s warm and sunny, so my underwear dries quickly, and I pull the skirt and sandals back on. Once I’m dried off, I head down the stairs, gathering some mushrooms that seem edible, before getting ambushed by a strange, Guardian-like machine. It doesn’t have any legs, though, seeming to float through the air. It has weird, wavy arms, and comes swinging at me with a stick.

 I attack using my poor Master Sword, but it doesn’t have enough energy to spare, forcing me to grab a branch of my own, breaking the construct down. I grab the blade-like horn jutting from its ‘head’. It’s sharp, and I grin. Maybe I can use this for something…

Turning my back on the newly-busted machine, I head towards another one that looks different. It seems inactive, but stirs to a facsimile of life when I approach. A long neck and arms extend from it, and it leans in to examine me, making odd beeps and chimes.

Then, it speaks.

“Linka. I have waited for you. Princess Zelda left something for you in my care.”

I watch as a drawer slides open in the chest region of the construct, revealing the device that my girlfriend had been carrying. HOW-?!

“This is the Purah Pad. I am told it is an invaluable tool that will provide you with direction.”

I reach out and take it, the device blinking to life, before attaching it to the belt of my skirt. The construct beeps again.

“I received it from Princess Zelda. I have now passed it on to you. My records indicate that Princess Zelda is waiting at the location marked on its map. My message has been delivered.”