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The Calamity came and went with the force of a hurricane, and a death toll ten times that. The dead outnumbered the living, outnumbered the grief that could be given. Many were buried together, and those that could not be, burned in the fires that raged across the landscape for months.
For a long time, nothing could be done to honor the fallen. The living already had to do all they could to keep themselves from joining their ancestors. (Though, admittedly, some decided to depart early as they stared into the sky, dark from smoke and ash).
But as the months and years moved by, Hyrule could finally reconcile. Could finally mourn their dead.
It began small. A traveller and mourner leaving a stone at the crest of a hill overlooking Central Hyrule, where it remained too dangerous to approach. A memorial to those who had been slain, whose bodies rested below.
And it grew.
Across Hyrule, small piles of stone grew to towers, a cairn built by a thousand hands. Slips of brightly colored fabric waved in the breeze, beckoning the eye to where they were tied to trees and left among the rocks. And color blossomed in the ash, as thousands of wildflowers bloomed.
Statues appeared in Hyrule's nooks and crannies, carved from stone by unknown hands. At their feet, stone bowls filled with offerings of fruit. While some remained unfound for years, passing travellers would often stop to clean them, wiping dirt tears from stone faces and filling the bowls with food once more.
The ravens and crows that circled the land were gifted berries and prayers, things for the dead. "Give my husband my love," whispers a wife to the raven at her doorstep, intelligence gleaming in its dark eyes.
The scavengers are revered, for they are the guides of the God of the Wilderness. They ensure the bodies of the dead do not fall to monsters, carry messages to the ancestors, and guide the spirits into the Beyond.
They are Satori's children.
...
While the Living mourned, the Dead stood sentinel.
From the wisps of fallen and broken bodies, silver and teal flames of unearthly fire condensed, shaping into the forms of those who'd left. Unseen and unheard to those still of flesh and bone, silver spirits drifted across Hyrule.
From Akkala came a battalion, clanking armor that was as soft as a kitten's footsteps. From Eldin came an earthquake as still as silence, a rocky wall encircling those who remained. In Hebra flew a tornado, no more than the flutter of a leaf, descending to perch in the cliffs. In Lanayru the waters rippled, teeming with shoals of teal fire. And in Gerudo the sands shifted and swirled from a thousand unseen footsteps.
Across Hyrule, silver spirits followed in the footsteps of those who’d left them.
Some were family. A husband watched over his wife and son, smiling as the child played with frogs and gave his mother a gap-toothed grin. A woman and her wife, reuniting in a hug filled with flames.
Some were strangers. A ghostly knight trailing behind a traveller, some assurance that the traveller might make it to their destination. Two people who had never met, sharing stories of family and regrets as they spent a thousandth night unsleeping.
And some, they gathered.
A child sat at the feet of a mother who could not see her, her grandmother wrapping a silver arm around her shoulders, and pressing a kiss to the mother's, child's, head. A ghostly parade mingled in a village, gathered at a shrine, taking the offerings and pressing their forehead to the gifters’.
Thank you and be well, sung from both sides of life.
...
Though the Dead were gone, they had not forgotten.
Whispers began to carry on Hyrule's winds, barely heard, but sometimes — just sometimes — you could catch words within. Words of guidance and words of warning. Words of love and words of soothing. Words, perhaps just of the imagination, but no less real.
For though Guardians may have taken their lives, the Dead did not stay silent.
They became Protectors all their own.
As travellers began to brave the wilds, and farmers took up arms against what lingered in the woods, ghostly wind followed. Across Hyrule, colored flags began to wave in the breeze, and the ravens soared higher.
Beware the path ahead, monsters lie in ambush.
Raise your pitchfork, stab forwards to the stomach.
Watch the fish closely… strike now!
Those berries aren't ripe, go for the red.
Tell her a story, she needs her father.
Words filled Hyrule's wind, and people turned their faces to it. Fruits and flags filled the cairns and statues of Hyrule, and people turned their heads down in prayer. Thank you Ancestors, they called. May your wisdom guide me. And, unseen but almost felt, ghostly hands cradled heads, and pressed words of love into their ears.
And as weapons were raised and the Living emerged into Hyrule once more, into the world that was beginning to show spears of green from the ash, so too went the Dead.
The Living walked Hyrule, and the winds did follow.
A traveller, venturing down the path, ran afoul of monsters. A lingering silver soldier, seeing the monster's falling blade that would assuredly lead to another in her ranks, blocked the monster’s hit with a sword made of mist. The traveller walked away, injured but alive, marvelling at the wind that had pushed a deadly blow a little to the left, a blow to the arm instead of the heart.
A child, exploring away from the village, slipped into a stone quarry. Bleeding and alone, they cried to the wind, to a town too far away. But the wind carried the cries, until a farmer followed the call. They found the child, and brought them home to waiting arms. And the village marveled and whispered thanks, that the wind had carried the call for miles.
A sailor drifted far from the safety of shore, with no wind to fill his sails. They lay, languid and exhausted in the heat. Until a bird perched upon the hull, bill clacking. With widened eyes, the sailor watched the bird take flight. Taking up a paddle, the sailor followed the vanishing dot. Upon their return, the village would wonder at what a raven was doing so far from shore.
And so did the Dead protect the Living, with words and winds of guidance.
Across Hyrule was a never ending fire, made of silver and teal, and shaped into a million figures. And these fires, never hot and never cold, but only warm, trailed like comet tails after travellers and children and family and strangers.
Thousands of watchful eyes, unseen and unknown, but almost felt.
Beyond the lingering fire that adorned Hyrule's fields, paths, and towns, a few more flickering flames could be found.
Atop a great plateau in the southwest of Hyrule, inside a sealed cavern, three teal spirits watched over the one that lay within. There had been only two for several decades, but a third had joined in their watch. And so did it pass for a hundred years, with three that were Dead and one Nearly So. Until the one that was Not-Yet-Dead stirred, and a voice spoke to them in shades of gold.
Wake up.
A hundred years after Death touched the kingdom, a single soul stirred from Its loosened grip… and awoke.
Three silver spirits watched in relief and nervousness as the awakened soul moved about, taking up a strange Slate and pulling on ragged clothes. Darling, look what they left for him, a mother worried, unheard. It's so little. The spirits followed their charge, who emerged into bright light, to a view of a wild and windswept kingdom. One that was full of the Dead, yet oh so Alive.
The new soul stared at the world with curiosity, a newness that the spirits were startled to see. They followed their charge to an Old Man, and one spirit in particular expressed surprise. You! What are you doing here?! a father asked, but did not bow, for he had left such courtesies behind. The other spirit's eyes flickered to them, but he focused on the new soul.
"It is a bit strange to see another in these parts," the Old Man said.
The spirits watched and listened as another spirit, one with countless aching regrets, told their charge of a kingdom once called Hyrule. And the spirits realized that their charge could not remember, for they did not recognize what they saw, nor the Old Man who spoke to them. When the charge had scurried off, the spirits narrowed their gazes at the King of Nothing.
Why are you here?
To atone for what I caused.
...
A few weeks passed atop a great plateau, with three silver spirits, one not-quite-so, and one not-quite-dead. The one that was not-quite-dead often conversed with the King of Nothing, though they did not know he was once a king. And as the spirits’ watched their charge, watched them slip over rocks, climb over trees, and gather every mushroom in the forest, the spirits were filled with equal anxiety and endearment.
He’s free, whispered the sister. She giggled as the sibling, dressed in only their underwear, slipped and fell headfirst into the pond. The fish they'd sought to catch scattered, and the sibling's head burst above the water, scowling.
I hate that this is what had to come for it to be so… but I'm happy for him, a father whispered to the wind, and a wife leaned into his shoulder. You're right Arya… he's free.
But while the spirits watched with love, they also watched with fear.
Because their charge's memories were not what they once were, and they did not always recognize danger for what it was. And when a razored toothed creature approached, wielding a corroded metal blade, the new soul just stared at it with curiosity, only to cry out and scramble back as a blade flew at them.
Pick up the stick! the sister named Arya yelled. The words were only a whisper, carried on the breeze.
But it was enough.
The sibling's eyes darted to a nearby stick, and they grabbed it, slamming it into the head of their opponent. The monster went down in a few hits until the wood splintered to pieces, and the spirits' charge was left panting heavily, staring at the downed creature with wide eyes.
Good job, Link, the wind whispered.
Link blinked, looking up to the sky with wide eyes, ears twitching as almost-words flitted past. The wind played with his hair, brushing the sticks and leaves from the tangled strands. Link shivered as the wind kissed his face, an almost-hand brushing his cheek.
We're here, the wind whispered in the voices of the dead. We'll guide you.
...
Eventually, the one named Link began to discover the Shrines, though his frustration at the one known as the Old Man continued. His spirits eyed the Regretful One with distaste, vitriol on their tongues. Why do you make him play this game? hissed the mother. Making him run to and fro across the Plateau?
To ensure he is strong enough for what's to come.
You would send him out again?! He died at the hands of that thing!
I, of all people, do not deserve to beg this of him… but he is our last hope.
So Link continued to explore, delving into the forests and Shrines, until his bag was full of food, his hands deft with weapons, and four gleaming Runes shown from his Slate. It was then that he scaled a derelict temple and met the King of Nothing. He was given the story of the raging hurricane that twisted in the distance, of a Calamity that had befallen this wild kingdom a century ago.
And, he was given a request: Save us.
A plea of a hundred years ago, carried in the whispers of the dead, but now for the wildlands that lived.
Save us. Save them. Protect where we cannot.
Link was unsure at first, but he followed the King of Nothing's plea, to seek out an elder named Impa. He followed the roads to a stone bridge, where someone walked the length, spear in hand and sharp eyes scanning the road. He approached the walker, curious about this one that looked like him.
What are you doing?
"Just patrolling. This bridge is an important route. I keep really busy making sure monsters don't rest here by chasing them off the bridge and stuff. Name's Brigo. What's yours?"
Link.
"Well met, Link. By the by, those strange things that popped out of the ground… Did you see them? I'm not talking about mushrooms here! I'm talking about those towers! They seem to have popped up all over the place!" The man named Brigo continued, speaking of the dangers of the land as he waved to a strange rock across the waters. Upon questioning, the watchman reared back in shock. "I'm talking about a Guardian, of course! Haven't you heard the old stories about Hyrule?"
And so Link learned of the dangers of Central Hyrule, and resolved to stay clear of it. He'd encountered one of the glowing-eyed beasts upon the Plateau, and it made his scars burn and his insides turn to lead. He asked where Kakariko was, and the watchman pointed him towards a pair of split twin peaks.
Link continued onwards, until he'd met an elder named Impa, and learned more of Hyrule's history.
He learned of the Great Calamity, of the Abomination that had laid waste to Hyrule. He learned of the Guardians that had killed him, that had swept across the center of the kingdom and left only ruins and Death in their wake. He learned of the Divine Beasts, that had carved canyons into Hyrule's surface, that had cleaved the top of a mountain away and let ash rain upon the land, that had poisoned the water and altered the landscape, that had buried towns beneath a hundred feet of sand.
He learned of the Dead, and of the luminous nova, the one called Zelda, that gleamed in shades of gold within Hyrule Castle.
Within Link, something hardened and strengthened.
I'll do it.
You don't have to, whispered the three spirits that circled him. You've already done more than was asked of you.
I must, Link whispered to the voices on the wind. Because I love this land.
And as he ventured into every corner of Hyrule, blocking the hits of a Bokoblin's sword, and bringing medicinal herbs to those in the villages, Link found that love grow stronger. The children played under his feet, and he picked them up and carried them on his hip, wind like a parent's touch whispering nearby.
Link travelled into the depths of the wilderness, into the places where few dared go. He left fruit in the bowls of forgotten statues, and wiped them clean with a careful hand. He left ocean-smoothed stones in the cairns in the far north of Hebra, and brightly woven Gerudo flags in the shrines of Akkala.
And after him, the spirits trailed.
Link went to the four corners of Hyrule, and released the Beasts from the control of their false pilots. The Champions, freed from a prison of malice, gifted him their strength, parts of their soul, in hopes that he may succeed. And then those spirits, bearing more regrets than could be counted and a grief unfathomably deep for the destruction their Beasts had wrought, set the Beasts to do their intended tasks.
From the four corners of Hyrule, four Divine Beasts set their sights on the Castle and the Calamity within.
And Link travelled to the four corners of Hyrule, ever more spirits following in his footsteps.
He stole silently into Hyrule Castle, and the spirits watched nervously. Link's ears twitched as not-quite-whispers spoke of danger and of monsters, and the wind carried the clanks and beeps of Guardians a little bit further. He ghosted down the Castle halls, taking weapons, killing monsters, and poking into secret halls.
And, on cairns only a few pebbles high, left by the few travellers as reckless as he, Link placed his own stones. He slipped brightly colored flags into the lingering skeletons of the castle, those who could not be buried and whose bones had not been picked away by the roaming monsters. Link travelled through Hyrule Castle's halls, and left little pieces of memoriam in his footsteps.
And so he continued, leaving pieces of himself and pieces in memory of those who had fallen.
Across Hyrule and through the Castle, Link walked. And behind him, the spirits that followed grew in number.
Hylians stood with spears and swords at the ready, some with soundless clanking armor. Gerudo with bared teeth and the desert sands in their steps lent their fury and vengeance. Gorons formed an immovable barricade, strength and protection to all of Hyrule. Rito archers rode a frostbitten breeze, guiding arrows to their targets and gifting wind under his sail. Zora pressed vitality and speed into his steps, razored teeth and claws bared. Sheikah danced among the shadows, offering stealth, silence and a swift defeat.
Link stood at the foot of Hyrule Castle, and looked into the eye of the Calamity.
Behind him was a sea of silver and teal fire, a battle begun a century ago, that all of Hyrule would finish. And at the front were three spirits, each with a steadying, unfelt hand upon the shoulder of their Living family.
Our blessings with you, the wind whispered.
Link set foot towards the Calamity, and the Dead walked with him.
…
The Calamity's roar was a shrieking cry that made all who heard it freeze, be they Living or Dead. It was the death knell that had sounded across the kingdom a century ago, but now, it was being sounded once more.
In Hyrule Castle, a small Hylian stared Death in the eye.
Link bared his teeth, the Sword in his hand humming with power, a burning glow against the sickly malice that dripped from the Abomination in front of him.
Let's end this.
In Hyrule Castle, the battle began.
From the four corners of Hyrule, four spirits sent their attack, one a century in the making. Bright light tore across Hyrule's skies, a w h i t e that blinded and burned. It ripped through the calamitous monstrosity, a power that could tear through mountains battering against it.
My turn.
With a roar of his own, one echoed by a million spirits, the Champion of Hyrule tore into the Calamity. The Sword that Seals the Darkness was a gleaming whirl of holy steel, burning through the malice. And, beside him, a million spirits offered their aid. The wind guided him forward, ensuring his blade landed squarely. It pushed him aside, giving a bit more space from the devastating blows.
Little by little, the abomination known as the Calamity was whittled away, until it was left collapsed and seeping malice onto the ground. But hate does not give up so easily.
The Calamity screamed, clawing its way from the depths of the Castle. A swirling hurricane took shape in Hyrule Field, and Link followed, guided by gold and teal. He looked up, up, up into the raging fire, tusks and teeth, into the eyes of malice that gazed down upon his tiny form.
Gold glimmered above him, and light descended, shaping into a bow. A voice carried to Link's ears, one familiar and touched with holy power.
Save Hyrule.
Gripping the bow made of light, the Hero of the Wild roared, and a million spirits did so with him.
The Calamity screamed, but this time, the death knell was its own.
A supernova blazed in Central Hyrule, and the Calamity was burned away, left to dust and ash and creeping malice upon the ground. From the sky, Link watched a goddess incarnate descend, the one who had protected all of Hyrule, the one that had saved him. Zelda smiled at him, a tired and achingly happy thing.
"Do you remember me?"
Link ran to her.
Two century-old survivors embraced, tears of grief and joy streaking through the blood and grime that painted their faces. When their breath had settled, they looked out into Hyrule Field, only to see a million flickering flames smiling at them. They both felt further tears gather, as four familiar spirits, one a once-king aching with his regrets, came to the front.
We love you, whispered their family. Go, live, and be free.
Across Hyrule, the wind howled in a gale. It lifted the sands of the desert and the leaves of the forest. It filled the sails of fishermen and rose under the wings of Rito.
Thank you, the wind cried in joy. Thank you.
A hundred years later, and the pleas of the Dead were answered.
Across Hyrule, a million brightly colored flags flapped in the wind atop memorials of stone.