Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

A golden light pierces the fuzz.

"Wake up."

What?

"Wake up!"

Their mind stirs.

"You need to

WAKE

UP."

Their eyes open.

Chapter Text

Liquid recedes as they open their eyes, blue light forcing them closed again.

They can feel cool, smooth stone underneath them, contoured to their body. They try opening their eyes again, it doesn't hurt as much this time.

They can see an almost flower-like structure above them, the source of the blue light. Their chest burns, they open their mouth to breathe in but instead cough up blue, glowing liquid. They retch and cough until they can breathe properly, the force of it bringing them to sit upright in the basin.

They take a look around the room, its smooth black stone walls decorated with constellation-like sets of orange lights connected by sand-coloured lines. The walls are broken up by pillars with strange swirling patterns of that same sandy colour.

There's a door in the far wall, barely visible through the light blue haze in the air, with a pedestal next to it glowing blue.

They start to stand up, put their hands on the floor behind them and push-

PAIN

They fall on their side as their right arm buckles, hissing with pain as their shoulder hits the floor, hard.

After laying down for a bit, waiting for the pain to leave, they try again, this time using just their left arm, and stand up. They look at their right arm and see that it's bright red with an intricate, vine-like pattern all along its length which continues down that side of their body and, with some careful touching, up their neck and onto the right half of their face. Some more feeling around reveals that they are missing an eyebrow on that side.

Their investigations complete, they walk over to the pedestal and see that it's a holder for a small slate. As they approach the pedestal, the slate pops out of its recession, swinging towards them so that the handle is pointing towards them, like an invitation.

"Take it."

They start as the voice in their mind calls out, then pull the slate out of its slot. A resonating chime rings out as the door pulls into the ceiling, beyond it they can see a stone chest which they open to find a set of threadbare, too-small clothing with some leather straps and a pouch.

Better than nothing. They put it on, the shirt stinging as it rubs against the red skin. They use the straps to make a set of belts, hands moving on autopilot as they loop two around their waist and one across their right shoulder, satisfied with the belts and the correctness they instill, they loop the pouch on one hip and the slate on the other, with the hard slate away from the red where it could knock and hurt.

With their modesty now intact, they walk down the corridor to a second door with another pedestal beside it, this one lit up orange. Experimentally, they touch the slate to the pedestal which then gives a resonating chime, pulsing blue as it does so. A symbol on the door glows blue as bars retract into the walls and the door itself pulls up, blinding them with bright light before they screw their eyes shut, throwing up their hand to block out the light, arm stinging as cloth rubs against it.

After their eyes adjust, they see a staircase and at the top is a puddle in front of a boulder blocking their ascent. Bother. They hop towards the rock face, digging their feet into cracks and gripping tiny outcrops with their hands.

Ow.

Oh, right, red hand. They pick their way up the boulder with one hand, though not without significant struggle, and walk into the golden light.

Chapter Text

It was... beautiful.

A forest stretched out below them, framed against a magnificent castle in the distance that was surrounded by pillars jutting out of the earth while a distant mountain to the right spewed smoke as glowing orange ran down its sides. They looked further to the right and saw a mountain split into halves, as if someone had taken a great knife and sliced it down the middle. A man waved, grabbing their attention before making a beckoning motion and walking away to a small alcove in the stone face beside a staircase from where they stood to the level of the forest.

Spotting a sturdy branch on the ground, they crouched to pick it up. It was roughly the right proportions for... something. They stripped off the twigs and leaves attached to it and looped it through their belt before wandering over to the man who had beckoned them, some red mushrooms caught their eye on the way and so they picked them, storing them in the pouch. As they approached the alcove, they spotted some perfectly red, shiny apples hanging from a tree branch. With a jump, they plucked one off of its stem, their arm protesting with a lance of pain. They plucked the second apple with another jump and their left hand this time, their efforts rewarded with a pain-free apple in their palm.

As they entered the alcove, a heavenly scent filled the air as they saw a browned apple sitting in the stones of a campfire, its skin dull-gold. As they reached to pick it up the man spoke up from the other side of the small fire.

"I do beg your pardon! That baked apple is mine, irreverent thief!"

They flinched backwards at the outburst, landing squarely on their arse as the man burst out laughing, his tough-leather face crinkling with merriment as his laughter boomed out of his snow-white beard.

"OH HO HO HO HO! I do beg your pardon young man, I simply couldn't resist the joke. The apple is yours for the taking, you will find it quite succulent."

They stood back up, their ego bruised as their butt as they took the apple, biting through the crispy flesh and into the soft, juicy flesh. They seated themself opposite the old man as they devoured the apple, juice running down their chin as they savoured the delectable treat. The old man watched with kindly grey eyes out from underneath a black woolen hood before speaking up, reminding them of his existence and pulling them out of the baked apple-fueled bacchanal.

"I must say it's rather rare to see someone else around here, what brings you here, stranger?"

They tried to speak but all that came out of their throat was a rasp that felt like sandpaper as it traveled through. Their hands flew to their neck as their eyes watered from the pain.

"Oh dear, are you quite alright young man? You shouldn't strain your throat, I'm sorry for having asked you. Can you sign?"

Yes. They made the gesture almost without thinking.

"Very good, we can't have you reduced to communicating with pointing and head movements can we? Now then back to the matter at hand, what brings you here my boy?"

Being called 'my boy' didn't sit right with them.

"I don't know."

The man harrumphed, "Well if you wish to keep secrets, very well. You are welcome to the fire regardless."

"Where is 'here'?"

"This is the Great Plateau, located just south of the center of Hyrule," He pulled himself to his feet using his lantern, then used it to point at a run-down stone building, "And that is the Temple of Time, sadly left abandoned in the century since the kingdom's fall, a mere ghost of its former self." He chuckled mirthlessly at his words. "Why don't you take a look around? I shall be waiting here once you are familiar with the surroundings." He gestured to a torch leant against the stone wall, "The torch is also yours, should you want it."

They did want it.

A short way down the path was an axe embedded in a tree stump, it came out easily enough but their right arm ached with the effort, holding it with both hands caused their right arm to ache significantly so it was replaced. Across the path was another apple tree, they caught two more apples out of a low branch, which were put in their pouch for later baking, before continuing along the path.

They scrounged up some more mushrooms under a great wide tree, wondering how they would taste toasted before spotting an orange, pig-like creature approaching them. It made a squealing battle-cry of sorts before launching itself at them, a tree branch held above its head. Their arm moved on its own, drawing the branch from where it sat at their hip and holding it between themself and the pig-man, right hand over left as they braced for the hit. When the branches connected-

When they came to, they could hear the old man shouting.

"Get away you beast! Begone!" He was swinging an axe like the one in the stump.

Since when were they laying on the floor? The pain in their right side hit them just after the question did.

Chapter Text

The pain pushed out all else from their mind, blinding them and forcing them to focus on it.

The first thing they saw after it receded enough to let them see was the old man standing over them, concern written all over his tough-leather face.

"Are you alright my boy? You passed out when you blocked that bokoblin's strike. I frightened it off, and thankfully you seem to have escaped injury."

Their arm was throbbing, the pain waxing and waning with the rhythm of waves lapping at a shoreline. They turned their head to look, their arm was in fact unharmed. They wondered how they had received such an injury, and why they couldn't remember it. Their arm and hand stung as they signed out,

"Help me up?"

"If you are sure." He hoisted them to their feet by their left arm, waiting until they were steady before letting go. They decided to bring up something bothering them.

"Please stop calling me 'My boy'."

The old man blinked in confusion before responding with a puzzled tone, "Very well, young... one."

They dusted themself off, noting that their right arm hurt more than before as they did so, looped the stick back into its correct place at their hip and made to set off, the old man made no move to stop them.

"Be more careful, I will not always be able to save you."

They decided to investigate the Temple of Time, as the elder had called it. On the way they encountered a small blue blob sporting yellow eyes, a firm kick caused it to pop and leave behind a glob of blue jelly that kept its shape and didn't run. Into the pouch it went, which was starting to get full.

At the bottom of the slope was a dried up fountain and to the right a path, the end of which split with one side leading to the staircase up to the Temple and the other to a ruined stone building with... what did he call them? A bokoblin guarding the split. The bokoblin was rooting around in the grass growing between the cracked paving stones and gave a start as they approached before advancing. This one held a crude club rather than a simple tree branch, which it wound back with exaggerated movements as they drew the sword stick with their left arm, using which they swatted aside the club then drove it into the creature's purplish blue eye.

The bokoblin screeched and dropped its club as both of its hands flew to its eye, purple blood flowing freely from the ruined eyeball from which the stick protruded like a wooden antenna. They picked up the discarded club and brought it round the thing's head with a sickening crunch, the club proving to be surprisingly well weighted. The monster keened on the floor in a fetal position as the club descended towards its ribs. There was a snapping crunch as its flesh darkened before bursting into black-purple smoke with a boomph, leaving behind its stubby horn which was deposited in their pouch, as they did so they saw their hands were shaking.

They took a deep breath to steady themself before continuing.

In the mossy former walls were some barrels which proved to contain nothing but rusted scraps, and so they ascended the staircase.

At the top was another path, another was-building off to the side of. There was another bokoblin in this one, it swung downwards so they twisted out of the way, spinning around and delivering the momentum into its head, this one also left behind its horn. There was a blob hiding in a barrel, a kick yielded another blue glob. They continued forwards.

Inside another used-to-be-a-building was a great... thing that resembled an upturned pot with segmented legs, it was coated in moss. Outside the front of the Temple proper was a few more of the strange pot-things buried in a landslide, all covered in moss like the first. There was also a bokoblin. It leapt at them, club raised aloft.

They hopped aside and bashed its head into the bricks of the ground, another horn for the pouch.

The Temple was grand even in decline, with one wall reduced to rubble along with half the roof, moss colouring the stonework green. At the back, a statue of a winged woman stood tall at at least thrice their height, She was ringed by smaller, less detailed statues of roughly their height. Her face may have been worn away by time but they could still feel the crushing weight of her gaze, as if she were saying 'is this it? is this all you are?'.

They fled.

They decided they'd prefer the woods they had seen spread out below them after walking out of... wherever it was they woke up.

Walking in, birds flew away at their approach as boars rooted around further off. Spotting a boar facing away from them, they carefully approached it, hoping that it wouldn't turn around and spot them. They crept closer, and closer... The boar's ears picked up and it began to run. They gave chase, their feet pounding against the forest floor in chase of the surprisingly swift boar, over underbrush and soil and fallen branches, past trees and rocks and bushes as they kept their eyes locked on the fleeing brown rump of their meal-to-be, however it turned out to be not such a meal-to-be as their legs gave out and they collapsed to their knees as their panting pained their right side while the boar was lost to the thicket past the stone half-arch... stone half-arch?

The crumbling doorway seemed to mark a campsite of some kind, if the cooking pot and hunting supplies were anything to go by. Only one went un-filched for its weight.

The hunting bow found its place on the belt across their torso, fitting the curve of their back as water fits a bowl while the leather quiver, with its eyelike pattern, hung by the base of their spine from another of their belts. The weight felt like an old friend newly reunited with.

Properly equipped, they go a-hunting once more.

Chapter Text

They stalked through the underbrush, arrow nocked but not yet drawn as their eyes flicked around searching for prey, head snapping around at each rustle in the undergrowth before at last they spotted it, their prey.

It was a majestic ruddy boar looking to be in its prime rooting at the base of a tree in clear view, yet unable to see them. They pulled back on the bowstring, arm retaliating with a lance of pain that almost made them loose the arrow too soon.

They pulled back again, this time anticipating the pain, and loosed the arrow towards their prey as their fingertips burnt white-hot. The boar's scream accompanied a wet thwack as the arrow found its home in its neck, not a lethal would but sure to impair. The prey turned towards their hiding place, its gaze baleful as it fixed on their hiding spot. No, on them.

The boar charges as their hand finds the club hanging at their belt, drawing it while their eyes never leave the now charging swine with tusks poised to gore their guts from their rightful place. Their hand tightens around the rag-wrapped handle.

Not yet.

The boar bears down on them.

Not yet.

They can see the Malice in its eyes.

Now.

He falls, his flesh alight. He has failed.

They step to the side, swinging the club in an upwards arc to collide with the prey's face and cave in its snout, flesh crumpling before ungiving wood and its own momentum.

The boar falls and lies still.

He They were frozen in place such that a stiff breeze could topple them, staring at the dead boar. Its water-blue eye stared right back.

They sat on a log by the archway, mindlessly skinning their prey with the small knife that was sheathed on the inner-side of the quiver. They ignored its gaze that penetrated their heart and judged them for its demise as the moments of the kill raced through their mind time after time after time after time after time after time after time after time after time after-

The old man cleared his throat from across the fire, making them nearly jump out of their skin.

When did he get here!?

"That is quite a hearty boar you have felled my bo- ...friend." His kindly expression strained as he caught himself.

They didn't know what to make of it.

"Though you may want to skin it properly rather than simply cut it open, rather thoroughly might I say."

They looked down to see a single deep cut from the remains of the boar's snout to its tail, his tail they noted absently.

They butchered the boar, removing the piercing eyes as soon as possible.

The old man watched them work, face inscrutable in the flickering light of the fire.

Once butchered, they make a cut of particularly juicy meat and put it in the pan over the fire, the cheerful sizzling sound lifting their heart. They use a fire-blackened stick to make sure it doesn't stick and flip it once one side is properly done.

The seared pork is divine, the slight charcoal taste from the stick not enough to ruin the rich flavour. They barely notice the juices running down their chin as they feast and soon enough they are looking at their hands blankly, trying to sus out where the meat had gone.

"My, you must be starving!" Boomed the old man as his laughter filled the small clearing.

They guiltily begin cutting another chunk of pork.

"Oh no need, it is your kill after all."

No it isn't, he failed. They shrugged and stopped cutting, they'd had enough.

"I see you helped yourself to my hunting equipment."

Oh!

He raised his hands placatingly, "Oh you may keep it, I do not doubt it shall see more use in your hands than mine."

Their hands stopped unslinging the bow on their back. When had they started?

"Well, I shan't keep you, please enjoy your explorations. Oh, and do not hesitate to visit my cabin, you shall find it to the south of the temple of time." He pulled himself up and was off, striding out of the forest away from the sunset as they sat there stunned, equally at his generosity and at their own reaction.

Chapter Text

The old man's directions took them up a slope where each step met dirt and stone step by turn, across a bridge lacking its middle, the jump across which made the bottom of their stomach drop before their feet hit stone, and through a field scattered with birch trees, not dense enough to truly be a wood but close enough to cover the grass with a leaf-dapple pattern of morning sunlight.

At the end of these mottled shadows stood a cabin, its log walls laying on a foundation of stacked stone and supporting a peaked canvas roof. The old man was waiting outside, seated on a half-log near a cooking pot.

"Ah excellent, you're here! Come inside, I have something for you." Without waiting for a response, he strode through the doorway into what they assumed was his home and they followed him inside, taking it as an invitation.

The cabin interior was spartan, to put it lightly. The only furniture was a simple table, what could generously be called a shelf but was more just a flat outcrop of the rock that made up one wall, and a bed comprised of a single sheet and a pillow on a flat wooden board. On the "shelf" was a set of clothing that the old man gestured towards.

"I believe that these should fit you better than your... current attire."

They looked down at the faded sleeves that reached up to their elbow, he might have had a point.

The deep green doublet was a bit scratchy and the gloves a touch tough, though they had to admit that they paired quite nicely with the sturdy tan trousers and as-yet unbroken in boots. They almost wished they could see themself. Almost.

They leaned out of the doorway and waved at the old man to let him know they had finished changing, quickly moving out of sight once he noticed.

"I feel confident in saying that I was right, young one."

They squirmed under his gaze.

"Though I would suggest updating your wardrobe at the earliest opportunity, they do not fit you as well as I had hoped." Regret flashed across his time-worn features, just long enough to be noticed.

They chose to ignore it.

"What's that?" They gestured to a small book on the table, spotted whilst avoiding the old man's eye.

"Why that would be my journal, had I written a single word in it. As it is, it is nothing but a paperweight."

"Can I... have it?" Their hands rushed the motions to near-unintelligibility.

Relief bloomed across his face, "By all means, my friend. I hardly have any use for it, and you will find a quill underneath my bed. I would find it myself but my back is not what it used to be."

Sure enough, there was a quill in a box where he had said, along with a few ink bottles.

"I do hope you use it more than I did, though that is not a high bar to clear."

They chuckled at that.

"I have one final gift for you, though this one must be earned."

"Earned how?"

"I wish to make a beloved recipe of mine, I shall grant you my gift if you are able to gather the final ingredient."

They looked at him blankly.

"I only require a handful of spicy peppers, but I am afraid that I cannot gather them myself anymore. You shall find them near the colder region of this plateau." He waited a moment. "Well off you trot, those peppers shall hardly pick themselves!"

To the right of the temple of time was another half-buried staircase leading up to a dilapidated but mostly intact wall and archway, wider than the one in the forest. To its right was a small camp of bokoblins around a campfire in a copse that quickly noticed them and moved in to attack, two exchanging roasted meat for long sticks held like spears while a third brandished a shortsword.

They drew their club and readied themself.

The first to attack is a spear-holder, they twist out of the way and dash its head against a nearby tree. The second spear bokoblin rushes them and they bat the spear-stick down, it digging in to the ground as its wielder's momentum carries it forward to topple over. They stomp on its head and it dissolves into that thick black fog.

The swords-bokoblin thrusts at them with little warning, but not none. They push the sword aside and thrust their sword club at its face, bruising its snout before it recovers and makes a slow downward swing. They step aside and break its knee, forcing it to collapse as it screeches in the seconds before the club silences it.

They collected their trophies and headed through the archway in search of those peppers, after sheathing their new sword in the scabbard that had lain discarded by the fire.

Past the archway they became incredibly grateful for the doublet, while its warmth was slightly uncomfortable in the warmer plateau, it was a goddess-send up in these mountains. They did have firewood from the shell of a cabin not ten feet from the entrance arch, next to a jetty into an ice-cold river, but they could make no progress huddled at a fireside, never mind the time it would take to start the thing. No, this thick doublet was the far superior option.

So engrossed by their lovely shirt, they tripped over another of those blob creatures, their foot being swallowed by a fanged chill the instant they did. This blob was white, unlike the previous blue one and was covered in mist.

They elected to stab this one instead of kicking it, their sword turning to ice the moment they did. The jelly this one left behind kept its colouration and produced a chill when squeezed, they decided to pull out their new journal and jot this down as they waited for their foot to warm up.

Following the wide river further, they spotted a tree in the distance with what looked like a platform in its branches and decided to take a look at it, walking slightly faster past the pot-things half-buried in the snow bank.

As they approached the tree they spotted a cluster of red fruits hanging from a plant growing in its shade, they also spotted a bokoblin aiming an arrow at them from the platform and leapt out of its path, said arrow burying itself in the ground where they were just stood. They drew their sword, considering their options. They couldn't see any way up to the platform so approaching was out of the question, though that also meant the bokoblin couldn't reach them underneath it.

Their thoughts were interrupted by another arrow flying towards them, their left arm moving on its own to intercept, forearm catching the arrow mid-air. They cried out, sword slipping from startled fingers. Brilliant.

They bolted for the tree, a third arrow brushing against their face and leaving a shallow gash before they reached the cover of the platform. They gathered the peppers, wincing slightly from the force needed to pluck them, and placed them in their pouch before staring at their injured arm in their lap, the arrow head just barely poking out the other side, glinting in the midday sun.

Walking through the cabin's doorway, they were glad only one arrow hit them in the end. They sat down on the bed and took a look at their left arm, the blood having dried and stained the shirtsleeve a dark red-brown. They snapped the shaft in two and cried out in pain, their hand lanced with pain from the effort as the arrowhead cut into their forearm. They then pushed the arrow in until the head was fully through their arm, barely able to see what they were doing through the pain, and pulled it the rest of the way through, the hardest part was over. They tore a strip off the old shirt and wrapped it as a bandage to stem the flowing-anew blood.

Only after they were done did they notice the note on the table. Picking it up, it read "See me atop the temple for your reward."