The ambience was immediately different inside the temple. Its mostly ruined state overrun by the vegetation of the forest gave it a mysterious and mystical feeling, but the atmosphere of the place made Sweetie Belle, Rota, Marko and Link absolutely anxious and uncomfortable with a constant feeling of danger and... wrongness. It was crushing!
In the first room, the grass had totally covered the ground, vines and ivy were everywhere on the walls, and there were two trees. The four heroes barely took a few steps before they were suddenly attacked by four wolf-like creatures that Navi identified as Wolfos. The wolves were easy to defeat, but they weren't dumb beasts; if attacked from the front, they protected themselves with their sharp and solid claws, forcing Link to attack when they had their back turned. Beside that, they used the usual tactic of wolves: walk around the target and strike from their blind spot. Too bad for the wolves that Link wasn't alone, so the four heroes each took a Wolfo, ensuring that they wouldn’t get overwhelmed.
Or rather, Sweetie played with hers while Rota and Marko dealt with theirs with a single strike each and Link fought his opponent. Sweetie jumped on its head while avoiding its claws and turned the fight into a rodeo. When Link finished off his, Rota appeared in front of Sweetie’s Wolfo and jabbed a finger through its throat, piercing it, and leaving it to fall, Sweetie Belle snapping its neck to minimize the creature's suffering.
“You could’ve at least killed it quickly,” the filly scolded.
“I didn’t want to risk hitting you,” the Saiyan replied.
Either way, with the Wolfos dead, nothing stopped them from continuing to the next room, but instead, Link went to climb on the vines.
“Thinkin’ there’s something worth the trouble up there?” Marko asked
“That’s been the case, so far,” Link answered.
“Lemme check it out, flight will be faster than climbing,” Rota interjected.
She did so and found out that there was indeed a small treasure chest at the top of one of the trees which would have forced Link to use the Hookshot to reach it. Inside, she found a small silver key that Link immediately put away in one of his seemingly bottomless pouches on his belt.
They then passed the door, traversed the hallway that followed (killing a giant Skulltula, a spider with its back looking like a skull), and entered what seemed to be the main room of the temple. There, they witnessed four colored flames (red, blue, green, and purple) disappearing before Poes of corresponding colors appeared and exited the room in four different directions. The disappearance of the flames caused a small elevator in the center of the room to move into the ground, becoming unusable.
“Welp, time for a Poe hunt, I suppose,” Rota mused.
“Seems like it,” Navi agreed.
“The hard part is going to be finding the Poes. You and I can’t sense undead due to them lacking Ki, and I doubt it’ll be a short task, considering most of the doors in this room are either blocked off or out of conventional reach,” Marko retorted.
Indeed, beside where they came from, the room had five other entrances, but most of them were blocked or couldn't be reached in the case of the East door (not without flying, at least) as it was on a ledge without any way to get on it. The West door had chains with a lock, the Northwest door was behind one of these time cubes like in the tomb, and the Northeast door was blocked by bars. For this last one, an interrupter looking like an eye was present on the wall above, and it was easy to understand that they had to fire something at it. Link attempted the Hookshot, but it didn't work. Only the North door, on top of a staircase, was already open.
“While we could bypass the majority of them and unblock the Northwest door with the Song of Time, I think we should go through the North door, which- Hey, it’s unlocked!” Link said from beside the door in question.
“His quest, his decision,” Sweetie Belle said, wanting to get a move on.
Meeting up with Link at the North door, the group passed through, entering another hallway with a flying skull that Navi identified as a Blue Bubble.
"What the heck is that name? Why name flying skulls 'Bubbles'? It totally ruins their creepy nature, and they look nothing like bubbles," said Sweetie Belle after they dealt with the skull.
Link shrugged. "No idea."
They then entered a round room, only for bars to drop and block the door behind them, trapping them inside. The next instant, a set of four Stalfos appeared, armed with strangely shaped orange/red swords and simple shields. They each took one on and learned they were fierce warriors, more than capable of keeping up with three of the four warriors, blocking or parrying their attacks, but Link was smart and waited for them to open their guard to hit them.
Rota blasted the shield of her opponent and used the smoke to cover her approach, allowing her to deliver an energized punch that blew through the creature's shield, then unleashing a burst of energy that vaporized the upper portion of its body, causing the rest of the bones to fall apart.
Marko summoned a sword into his hands and gave an overhand swing, a torrent of flame obscuring the Stalfos vision. Marko then flicker-stepped in front of them and gave a rising slash that was parried, then gave a kick to the shield, knocking it away as he cut the Stalfos from shoulder to hip, then let out a burst of energy that blew the skeletal creature apart.
And Sweetie Belle just knocked her target's shield away before slicing it vertically in half. She then simply watched the others dealing with their Stalfos.
When the last one was dead, the bars blocking the door disappeared, and a chest with another key appeared in the center of the room.
"Is there even anything challenging to you?" asked Navi to Sweetie Belle.
"Of course. There is always something stronger than you. But definitely not these Stalfos. They were good, but nothing compared to Meta Knight or Galacta Knight. Now these ones are challenging warriors that would kick Link's butt in a few seconds even in a simple sword fight. But I'm sure that Link would be able to fight them with some training, he is a natural with a sword."
"Uh, thanks. How strong are they?" asked Link.
Sweetie Belle grinned. "To give you an idea, their strikes are so fast that they break the sound barrier. By the time you register that you have been hit, they have turned you into little cubes."
".....Wow... Yeah, I will need a LOT of training if I want to face them. But since they certainly live in another dimension, I don't think this will happen."
"Galacta can slice space open to jump through dimensions. He could perfectly come here if he wanted, and if he knew where this universe is in the multiverse. Or I could lead you to them."
Link shook his head. "No thanks."
“I’m game, if they are. I’ve been meaning to work on my swordsmanship, anyway,” Marko said, once more summoning the sword he used to his back.
At this, the group returned to the main room, and this time, chose to see what was behind the cube blocking the Northwest path. After making the cube disappear with the Song of Time, they passed the door that was behind and entered some outdoor area with some ruins and a small stream with a bridge.
After slicing one of these carnivorous plants named Big Deku Baba and dealing with an Octoroc (the octopus thing) in the water, they looked around and saw a well at the left as well as a path in the upper level that couldn't be reached (again, not without flying). However, there were some vines covering a wall in the right that Link could climb to reach another passage, but Sweetie and the Bage Siblings had to deal first with a few smaller Skulltulas (named Skullwalltulas, because they needed a different name because they simply walked on the wall) that were on the way.
There was a door in the passage that led to a small room where they had to kill a Blue Bubble to continue. By killing it, they also made a big chest appear, the chest revealing to contain the map of the temple.
"Already?" asked Navi in wonder.
Link shrugged as he looked at the map. "I'm not complaining. This place seems vast. The inside of the Great Deku Tree, the Dodongo's cavern, and the Great Jabu-Jabu were nothing compared to it. I hope we will find the compass quickly too."
"I smell a routine," remarked Sweetie Belle.
"You are right. In all dungeons, there are always three items in common beside the keys: the map, the compass, and the big key to the room where the big bad guy of the dungeon awaits. The compass indicates the position of all the treasures and other important elements inside the dungeon where it is found. So finding the map and the compass early is very useful."
"Seems like we made the right choice taking this path first," said Rota to this before they continued.
They reached another outdoor area that was behind the Northeast door of the main room. Positioned on a balcony in the upper area, they could see to their left another balcony that had a target above it that might as well have told them to go across. Link used the Hookshot and was pulled across to the other balcony, landing on a pressure switch, draining the wells below. While he did that, Sweetie and the siblings cleared the room of monsters, namely Deku Babas (normal and big) Skulltulas, and Octorocs in the water, as well. Link then jumped from the balcony and landed with a roll to keep from getting hurt while Rota jumped up to a chest on another balcony and opened it, finding some rupees that she gave to the Hylian.
With the well drained, they guessed that they had to go there next, and so, Sweetie jumped in it while Link used a ladder and the Bage siblings decided to wait up top, arriving in a sewer where they found another small chest with a key.
"That makes three keys," said Sweetie Belle. "Seems like there's nowhere else to go in this part of the temple."
"Let's return in the main hall, then," said Link before he began to climb the vines here to return in the West outdoor area, followed by the filly and the siblings.
From there, they returned to the main room and used the first key to open the West door. After traversing another hallway with a Skulltula, they entered a room where they had to pull and push two giant colored blocks (one blue and one red) into holes to reach upper levels. Instead of simply carrying Link, they decided to place the blocks so Sweetie Belle, Rota and/or Marko wouldn't have to carry Link each time they returned to this room.
It was really easy. They just had to follow the arrows. And Sweetie Belle and the Bage Siblings even kicked the blocks to make them slide into the holes instead of pushing them. Placing the red block opened the way to a ladder that led to the top level of the room where there was a locked door under an eye-interrupter that was guarded by two Blue Bubbles. After killing the skulls, they unlocked the door with one of the keys.
“Woah!” Sweetie Belle shouted when she saw what was next while Rota rubbed her eyes as if to clear them.
A Twisted corridor!
Link scratched his head while Marko raised an eyebrow as they looked at the corridor in wonder. “Well…. That’s new…” The Hylian said.
“No kidding. I’ve been on a lot of adventures, but I’ve never seen anything like this,” Sweetie said before smiling excitedly. “This is one of the big reasons I started to explore new worlds! To discover new wonders like this!”
Marko then spoke up. “Well, Rota and I have seen this a couple times, but it’s still weird to look at.”
“And it is really confusing to walk through for the unprepared,” Rota interjected, before striding forward. “The trick is to not think about it. Something I think you can manage.”
The Saiyan’s words proved true as she kept walking forward on the ground despite the warping of the room making it become the wall.
So they advanced in the twisted hallway until reaching a weird room with a pillar at the center. There, Navi warned about a monster hanging from the ceiling and Sweetie used one of her cannons to fire a beam right above her without even looking before stepping to the side, killing some disembodied monstrous hand that fell where she had been.
"A Wallmaster! Be careful! If it grabs you, it transports you back at the entrance of the temple!" warned Navi. "More will probably come to take its place. Look at the shadow at your feet or hooves."
"Thanks. Link, step aside," instructed Sweetie Belle before she fired another beam, killing another Wallmaster. Link quickly moved aside to avoid it as it fell from the ceiling. "As nice as it is to kill these abominations of nature, we should continue." Another pair of Wallmasters hit the floor as Rota and Marko killed them with beams of their own.
So they jumped on the central pillar, and jumped toward the next door at their right, which was also locked. They quickly unlocked it as Sweetie killed a last Wallmaster.
They entered a room with a staircase and a painting of the red Poe beside it. When they approached the stairs, the red Poe disappeared from the painting with a laugh.
"Oh! It thinks it's smart, hiding in a painting!" said Sweetie Belle as she frowned at the now empty painting. She then cut the painting to shreds with one of her beam swords. As they moved down the stairs, they saw more paintings, and Sweetie and Rota fired a beam at the one with the red Poe in it. The painting burned, but the Poe moved to the last painting. With nowhere else to go, the Poe was forced to go out of the painting when Marko jumped and slashed at it. The Poe was then easily sent to the afterlife, freeing the red flame and materializing a small chest with a key.
“One down, three to go.” Marko said as he dispelled his blade.
“I really don’t know how I would have done this without you guys,” Link said.
“I’m sure you’d have had to find something to force it out,” Navi proposed.
“The dungeon item,” Link replied with a nod. Seeing the curious looks from his companions, he explained. “In some dungeons, there’s an item somewhere that helps in progressing in the dungeon. Inside the Deku Tree, it was a slingshot. Inside Jabu-Jabu, it was a boomerang. And in this dungeon, I’m willing to guess that it’ll be something to fire at these eye-interrupters and the paintings.”
“So that’s something else to find besides the big key and the compass. I doubt it’ll be long considering the number of those interrupters around,” Sweetie said.
The group then moved toward the exit door at the bottom level of the room. The next room was a circular room just above the one they had fought the four Stalfos, visible through the hole in the center of the floor. Bars blocked the exit and another Stalfos came to challenge them only to be near-instantly defeated. A platform carrying four more Stalfos descended from the ceiling, covering the hole in the floor and battle resumed. Sweetie and the Bage siblings dealt with theirs only for Sweetie and Rota’s to start reforming. Rota leveled her palm at the skeletal creature, charging a sparking ball of purple energy, then launching it at the Stalfos, completely disintegrating its skull, while Sweetie used a shield to crush hers as Link finished dealing with his, Marko having burnt his to ashes. Once the four were all dead, a large chest appeared in the center of the room.
Inside it, Link found a bow and a quiver full of arrows.
“Perfect. Now you have a reliable means of ranged combat for this era. Doubt that slingshot you mentioned is big enough to use comfortably,” Rota said with a cheeky smirk, to which Link deadpanned.
“Let’s just backtrack and check out what those eye-interrupters are blocking, alright?” Link asked, receiving a confirmation from the rest.
"There was one in the main hall and two in the room with the blocks. The one in the hall should be just a shortcut to reach the East outdoor area if needed," said Navi.
The group nodded before they exited the room through the West door, making a quick trip to the main hall to activate the interrupter there. They then went to the block room and to activate another that dropped a chest with more arrows out of seemingly nowhere. Finally, they activated the last interrupter above the door in the twisted hallway.
This had the effect of untwisting the hallway, turning it back to normal. Thanks to this, they were able to enter the room with the Wallmasters with a different angle, letting them reach a very well decorated chest that contained the big key that they were looking for.
“All that remains to be found is the compass,” Sweetie said as Rota raised her hand above herself and fired an energy blast, a Wallmaster falling onto her uplifted palm a second after that she tossed off to the side.
"The compass isn't really needed anymore now that we have the big key," said Link. He then looked at the hole that previously led to the door to the red Poe's room. "I think that we should jump in it. It probably leads somewhere new now."
“Question,” Rota said while raising her hand. “How do we get back to the room you got the bow in? The hallway leading there is untwisted, leaving it inaccessible.”
"Good point, but I may have an idea. Have you remarked that the interrupter above the door to the hallway was silver while all the others were golden?"
“Yeah, what abo-OH! You’re thinking that it could be used again?"
"Maybe."
"Nice thinking! Hmm... Maybe one of us should go down the hole first to see if this isn't a trap."
Link agreed, and Sweetie Belle flew down the hole. She discovered that it led to a room with two Blue Bubbles that she quickly killed, unlocking a door. Seeing that there was a path, she flew back up to the group and told them about it. She then carefully levitated the Hylian down the hole, while the Bage siblings floated down under their own power, into the room where they passed the unlocked door.
The door led back to the West outdoor area, in one of the alcoves on the path in the upper level. Following the path, they dealt with a Big Deku Baba that blocked the way and entered a door in another alcove that led, according to the map, to a room without other exits, meaning that it probably contained a treasure. There, they had to fight a cousin of the Wallmaster named Floormaster (so it just walked on the floor with its fingers). It wasn't hard to kill, but once it was defeated, it separated into three smaller Floormasters that Rota quickly destroyed with beams. This materialized a chest with a key.
They then returned in the outdoor area and passed the last door at the end of the pathway which led back to the room with the blocks, on a ledge that made it inaccessible from this side. Returning to the top level of the room, they used the bow on the silver interrupter, which had for effect to open it again, twisting back the hallway so they were able to return to the room where they found the bow. From there, they passed the East door to continue the exploration of the temple.
The next room was exactly like the room of the red Poe, but this time, the paintings were of the blue Poe. Using his bow, Link helped Sweetie and the siblings in destroying the paintings one by one until the Poe was forced out, and the heroes quickly dealt with it, freeing the blue flame and materializing a big chest containing the compass.
“That’s two,” Rota said.
“About time…” Link grumbled.
They climbed to the upper level of the room and used one of their two keys to unlock the door there, entering a room similar to the one with the Wallmasters. Speaking of, Sweetie Belle immediately killed one above Link. From the angle they were, nothing could be done in this room, so they had no choice but to jump down and climb back up to the only exit at the right leading to the hallway which wasn't twisted. After dealing with two Green Bubbles (same as blue, but with green flames and just flying back and forth in a path without minding the heroes as long as they weren't in the way), they unlocked and passed the door at the end and entered a room that had a pit filled with lava with moving platforms on it.
They could tell that, under normal circumstances, Link would have had to position himself to shoot an arrow through the torch to thaw out the frozen over interrupter. Under the current circumstances, Marko decided to show off by simply scooping a blob of the molten rock up and tossing it on the ice, allowing Link to spend only one arrow to activate it without worry for the rest. As expected, this made the twisted hallway orient so the heroes could reach the previous room in the right angle to reach a hole they (Link) couldn’t previously.
Jumping into the hole, the group landed onto a checkerboard floor with a staircase leading to the East outdoor area, on a ledge. There was also a path south, but a ceiling crusher made it dangerous. There were holes in it that let them escape getting crushed (at worst), but Skulltulas lurked in them, forcing the heroes to be ready to swing, at least. On the way, they had to walk on a pressure switch to unlock the door at the end, and they opened a small chest with more arrows for Link.
Passing the door, they entered the room where the green Poe awaited them in its portrait. Link fired at it with his bow, but instead of forcing the Poe to come out, it caused a bunch of blocks to drop from the ceiling. The blocks formed an image of the green Poe, and they had to push them to reconstitute it. With some teamwork, they managed to do it very rapidly, starting with Sweetie kicking away a blue block that had nothing to do among the others. Once the image was reconstituted, the blocks disappeared in the floor and the green Poe appeared and quickly joined the other two in the afterlife.
"One left," said Link. "But where could the last one be? We explored all that we could access in this part of the temple."
"I only see one possibility: the purple Poe probably appeared in one of the already explored rooms now that the three others are gone," guessed Navi.
"Which leaves us to explore the temple again until we find said room," Sweetie Belle said with a sigh while Rota groaned and dragged her hands down her face.
Thankfully, they didn't have to go far to find the purple Poe. After passing a door and traversing another hallway with a Skulltula, they returned in the main hall from the East door on the ledge. There, they found the purple Poe in the center of the room, doing they-weren't-sure what.
“Why do I feel like it was waiting for us?” Marko asked.
This drew the Poe’s attention. Upon looking at them, it laughed and created three duplicates that turned out to be illusions. With a growl of impatience, Marko flicker-stepped to the center of the room, level with the Poes, and unleashed a horizontal ring of flaming energy outward, damaging the real one and destroying the illusions, then Link took the opportunity to fire an arrow at it. The Poe disappeared and tried to repeat the process, but Rota sent it to the afterlife early with a drilling energy beam between its eyes before it could. The flame it bore surged to the empty torch.
With the four flames back in place, the elevator lifted back up from the ground.
"Finally! Now, we can reach the big bad guy and save your friend!" Sweetie Belle said.
Link nodded. "Let's hurry."
They walked on the elevator, and it led them to the basement of the temple, in a somewhat circular room where they discovered that they could make the wall spin by pushing the 'handles'. They had to do it to open the way to alcoves where they had to walk on switches to raise grids that blocked said alcoves as well as the path to the final room. Three switches for three grids. In one of the alcoves was also a chest guarded by a Skulltula, the chest containing arrows.
Once the way was open, they unlocked the final door with the big key and passed it. In the last room, they climbed stairs to an arena with the Triforce symbol in the center and surrounded by six pictures, and Sweetie Belle had a feeling of how the coming fight would play out. Rota shared the sentiment, saying, “Keep an eye on the paintings.”
However, nothing came to attack them. Frowning, Rota walked to the exit of the arena, only to be blocked.
“That’s more like it.”
She, Sweetie and Link then heard Marko yell from behind them and turned around as the 6 foot tall man was tossed at the 5 '7 Hylian, knocking them both to the ground.
The attacker was revealed to be a dark-skinned man on a huge black horse that had appeared out of nowhere. The man had red hair and a large pointed nose, and was wearing some black and brown leather outfit that didn't seem to be quite an armor but still seemed solid enough. He still had pieces of black armor that covered the shoulders, the knees, and the back of the hands, and he also had armored brown boots. Said black armor pieces even had yellow gems encrusted in it with spikes on the knees. Finally, the guy had a jewel on his forehead. As for a weapon, the man used a three-bladed spear.
Marko and Link recovered while Rota made a comment. “If that isn’t at least what Ganondorf looks like, I’ll eat vegan for a week.”
“That’s it,” Link confirmed as he drew the Master Sword.
Then, after a small chuckle, the man put on some skull mask that let out blue fire from the eyes before they began to glow.
And the horse began to float in the air.
Definitely not magic, the filly thought with a frown as she felt the energy used by the guy. The energy felt more like the energy the Poes used. Supernatural.
Rota and Marko seemed to have similar thoughts from the looks on their faces.
Ganondorf then entered one of the pictures with his horse as he let loose a deep, dark cackle.
Sweetie, Link and the siblings went back to back, each one keeping at least 2 of the portraits in their sight.
Sweetie Belle saw Ganondorf appear in one of the pictures, his horse galloping down the path in it, and she readied a beam for when he would start to come out. However, to her surprise, the man turned around.
At this instant, Link fired an arrow at another picture, and Sweetie Belle looked and saw that he hit another Ganondorf who had been in the process of exiting the picture. Ganondorf then retreated into the picture and disappeared in it.
She had been facing an illusion. Too bad for him, it could have worked if Link had been alone, which wasn't the case here.
Ganondorf still tried his luck with this, only he used more illusions to trick the two heroes, three this time plus the real one. It still wasn't enough however as Sweetie Belle still managed to fire at the real one as he was exiting one of the pictures. Ganondorf then tried a third time with five illusions, meaning that there was a rider in all the pictures. It was Rota's quick reactions that let her fire at the real Ganondorf just before he managed to fully exit one of the pictures.
Ganondorf then left his horse as it disappeared back into the picture, the man floating around them as they surrounded him. Rota took to the air and tried simply blasting him behind his back with an energy ball, but he quickly spun around and bashed it back at her with a swing of his spear. Rota deflected the blast back, turning it into a high speed game of pong. Eventually, Ganondorf missed and was struck out of the air by the blast, stunning him long enough for the rest to get some blows in. However, he didn’t remain stunned for long, and after unleashing a burst of energy to force the heroes away, he began to levitate again as he raised his spear.
Lightning erupted from the spear, forcing the heroes to move in order to dodge the bombardment. The warlock eventually sent another energy blast at Link, who barely dodged it as he was still running from the lightning. As Ganondorf began to cackle, Sweetie materialized and used her whip to wrap his ankle and slam him into the ground, forcing him to stop and allowing Link to jump at him and slash him with his sword, only to receive a punch in return that sent the Hylian onto his back as Ganondorf recovered. The warlock then grabbed the whip still wrapped around his leg and yanked to send Sweetie into the air before returning her slam with one of his own. Sweetie Belle managed to protect herself by turning into metal, but it still hurt.
Marko slammed a punch into the back of Gaondorf’s head, sending him stumbling. The warlock then slashed the tip of his spear at the sorcerous Bage sibling, who summoned his sword to parry and counter with a spinning slash as he circled around his opponent. Ganondorf recovered from the attack and floated back into the air and sent an energy ball at Marko, who knocked it back with a baseball swing of his sword. The warlock avoided the energy ball as well as Link’s arrow before sending fireballs all around the arena. Upon seeing the heroes avoid them, he prepared to send another energy ball, only for Rota to flicker-step in front of him, knocking the ball towards the wall and slamming a punch into the man’s masked face, forcing him to drop the spear. The Saiyan woman then followed with a punch to the gut, sending him up, where Marko appeared and slammed his balled fists into his back, sending him crashing into the ground.
Link then jumped over to Ganondorf and impaled him with his sword, Sweetie following suit right after, followed by Marko. When the man moved to lift himself, Rota Instant Transmissioned in front of his head and stomped hard enough to crack the floor beneath it.
With little more than a quiet gurgle, Ganondorf’s body burst into blue flame as it began to crumble to dust.
Then, a portal appeared in the center of the arena, and the burning man slowly began to float toward it as a voice was heard.
"Mmh... That looked a little too easy for the four of you. I should have put more power in this phantom. At least, you all showed some good skills. Just know that it won't be as easy against the real me!"
"I should have known..." muttered Sweetie Belle.
The fake Ganondorf then began to disappear into the portal. "What a worthless ghost that was! I will banish it to the gap between dimensions!!" shouted the real Ganondorf as the ghost finally disappeared and the portal closed.
And then, everything was silent until a blue light appeared in the center of the arena where the portal had been.
"Yeah, that guy seemed far too weak for being an evil overlord worthy of the title," commented Sweetie Belle. "Just a pale copy. This Ganondorf may actually be a real piece of work, especially if he can open portals to the void just like that. And apparently, he's watching us."
Link nodded before he walked into the blue light, quickly joined by the filly and siblings. A crystal then appeared around them and transported them to the Chamber of Sages, in the middle of the Temple of Light in the Sacred Realm.
It was a seemingly endless blue chamber with several blue pillars. They were on one such pillar, on a symbol of the Triforce, surrounded by six pedestals, green, red, blue, orange, purple, and yellow. Each pedestal was emblazoned with a symbol.
Another blue light then appeared on the green pedestal, and out of it came a young green-haired girl in Kokiri clothing.
Seeing how Link looked at her with fondness, it was obvious that the girl was Saria. So Sweetie Belle, Rota and Marko remained behind as Saria began to talk.
"Thank you... Because of you, I could awaken as a Sage... As the Sage of the Forest Temple..."
"Saria..." muttered Link as he knelt to be at the same height as the girl. "I'm so glad you are alright. I... I missed you."
Saria smiled back at him. "I missed you too. I always believed that you would come back, although this is not to stay like I would hope. This is just not your destiny. And this is not my destiny to remain at your side. We can't live in the same world... But it is nice to see you again."
"I'm sorry..."
"And I'm sorry too. At least... As the Forest Sage, I will help you. Please, take this medallion." Saria then raised her arms, and in a flash of light, a green medallion appeared above Link, slowly floating down until he took it. The Forest Medallion.
While he took it, Saria looked at Sweetie Belle and the Bage siblings before saying, "Please, take care of him," before the area was plunged into light.
"Saria will always be... your friend..."
The next thing they knew, they were back in front of the Great Deku Tree. Sweetie Belle looked up at Link just in time to see him swiping tears. She put a hoof on his leg while Rota put a hand on his shoulder.
"This may be a goodbye, but remember, Friendship is eternal, no matter the distances, just as long as you don't forget her."
Link looked down at the filly and smiled before he knelt to pet her in thanks.
It was then that they spotted a little tree sprout now present just in front of them. The next instant, it fully came out of the ground, knocking the three of them on their back as the sprout revealed to be much bigger and possessing a face. When they recovered, they looked at the sprout in astonishment.
"Hi there!" began the sprout. "I'm the Deku Tree sprout! Because you four and Saria broke the curse on the Forest Temple, I can grow and flourish! Thanks a lot!"
"Oh... Hey! We had been talking about you! We were wondering why you hadn't sprouted! That was as we thought, in the end," Sweetie Belle said.
"Indeed. The curse placed by Ganondorf was stopping me, and because of this, I couldn't do my duty. But now, at least, I will be able to protect the Kokiris and keep the monsters away. I am sadly not as powerful yet as my father, so my influence won't spread far."
"At least, the Kokiris will be safe as long as they remain in the village," said Link. "Then, I will defeat Ganondorf, and they will be able to wander the forest like before."
"I know you can do it, especially with the help of your friends. I can feel a great power in her. Ganondorf should be worried." The sprout laughed at this before he proceeded to reveal to Link his origins.
Link knew that he was Hylian, but he didn't know how he ended up in the forest under the care of the Deku Tree and the Kokiris. Apparently, before the King of Hyrule managed to unify the country, there had been a great war. To escape it, a Hylian mother came into the forest with her baby boy. However, the mother was gravely injured and had no choice but to entrust the baby to the Deku Tree before giving her last breath. The Tree accepted, sensing the great destiny of the boy, and so, the child was raised as a Kokiri.
This child was Link, whose destiny was to save Hyrule by breaking the curses on all the temples before defeating the source of the evil: Ganondorf.
The sprout then wished them good luck before they left him to continue their quest, their job in the forest done.
However, it was starting to get pretty late, and they hadn't eaten anything since they respectively arrived in this world and woke up from the seven-year-long sleep. So they decided to spend the night in the village where the thankful Kokiris didn't mind giving them some food (Sweetie had left her Pokemon in Equestria, by accident, and the Saibamen were more interested in sleeping than eating, though Rota’s appetite sure shocked them). Link still had his home here, but it was rather small now, leaving Link no choice but to sleep on the floor while he left his old bed to Sweetie Belle. The filly at least gave him a sleeping bag that she had in her pocket dimension, making it bigger because it was too small for him. The Bage siblings, meanwhile, were fine sleeping on the floor, though Rota was curled up like a cat at the foot of Link’s old bed while Marko sat in a meditation pose.
And so, they all spent the night in peace and relative comfort.