Breath of the Wild, Part 16: Shrine, Shrine, Everywhere A Shrine

This was a very eventful day, so strap in. I know yesterday I suggested I’d be going to the Great Fairy Fountain OR going to Hateno Village, but haha! I did both. But we’ll get there.

Where we begin is Kakariko Village at night, which is something I haven’t really taken a close look at. So that’s what I did, and I learned a lot.

First, I ran into Olkin the pumpkin farmer, who was running to train. He tells me defense is important and points me toward the shrine I recently went to and told me it would be a good place to train...or so he thinks. He hasn’t actually been there because he can’t get in. His parting words were something about how some savage old men will tell you offense is the best defense, but they’re wrong and stupid (paraphrased, but barely). But after I finished talking to him, I ran into Steen the carrot farmer, and literally the first words out of his mouth were "Offense is the best defense"! It's very funny character work made all the better by good timing on my part. For the record, he also pointed me toward the shrine and also has never been, but he did tell me about focusing (what the N64 games called Z-Targeting), jump attacks, and sneakstrikes.  All things I've figured out on my own, but much obliged anyway.

Next, I wanted to see what would happen if I cut down the Mellie's plum trees. She got really sad, that's what. I didn't know if they'd regrow, so I went to a previous save state. That's the first time I've done that, and I don't expect to do it often.

Then I went to find the Great Fairy Fountain, and I did, and it's much different from most other Great Fairy Fountains. This one had a giant pod, and a hand came out to ask for 100 rupees. When I gave it to her, the pod opened up and a Great Fairy named Cotera was inside. This Great Fairy will upgrade my clothes. She tells me there are other Great Fairies around Hyrule, and it sounds like each one does something different. She also pointed out that clothes come in sets - pants, shirt, hat - and sets can have a bonus if all the pieces are upgraded. But not every set does.

Before I ventured out some more, I took the time to explore Kakariko more at night, so I learned more about the villagers. Dorian, Impa's second guard, is the father of Koko and her sister. Their mother was killed by the Yiga Clan, which is why Koko tries to be a mom to Cottla. I'm not sure Cottla understands what happened to her mom, because look at this screenshot. I tell you, Zelda games can get dark.

Olkin and Mellie are married, and you can wake Mellie up at night. She says Olkin does that sometimes. I'm sure there's something else going on here, but I'm not sure what.

Lasli (the barker at Enchanted) is Nanna's granddaughter. She likes to collect fireflies, but can't anymore because it's too dangerous to go out at night. I know there's something I can do about this, but I haven't figured it out yet.

Paya stays up all night praying. She's basically a shrine maiden for Impa's house. She also doesn't like me walking around with no clothes on.

From here, I was going to take a closer look at Necluda, but I decided that before I do that, I should go get my sensor fixed. After all, I wouldn't want to miss any memories. And boy am I glad I did that.

It didn't take long to get to Hateno Village, partly because there was a shrine to guide my way (although I didn't know that when I started heading toward it). The shrine was called “Myahm Agana Apparatus”, and it was fun. The apparatus in question is a Shiekah machine that lets you control a free floating platform. The platform is a Labyrinth game, so you have to guide the ball through the maze. That took some playing around with to get right, but wasn't too difficult. The hard part was getting the ball from the platform across the gap to where it needed to be. Good thing I've done the "Timing is Critical" shrine!

Back in Hateno, I didn't talk to that many people because I wanted to go through it more thoroughly later, but I did meet a woman named Toma who was kind of a jerk (she didn't like my clothes) and a man named Manny, who's in love with a woman named Prima and wants me to help him find a present for her. He's a charmer.

But I was here for the lab, so I got there as quickly as I could. Inside were two people: a little girl named Purah and an adult man named Symin. Purah told me Symin was in charge, while Symin said Purah was. Symin was correct. And Purah's an interesting character. She's over 100 years old, and only looks the way she does because of an experiment that went awry. She's also the one that brought me to the Shrine of Resurrection, so she's a little miffed I don't remember her. (Side note: this lab is very reminiscent of the Lakeside Laboratory from Ocarina of Time, at least to me.) 

She tells me she can fix my Shiekah Slate to help me remember things, but to do that, I need to get the blue flame from the furnace in town and bring it to fire up her technology. The distance is long, but thankfully there are lanterns along the way, so if your torch or stick or whatever burns out, you can just go to the last lantern you lit. I noticed there are lanterns all throughout town, so I wonder what happens when you light them all?

As I was getting the flame, I found a small Hylia statue and was able to pray to it since I had four Spirit Orbs. I got an extra heart this time, bringing me up to four. I marked my map to remember this spot.

I guess this is a good time to talk about pins and stamps. Since the world is so large, the maps has different ways of marking things. You get five pins, which put a colored beam of light in the overworld. They're a good way to help direct you, and I've used them so far for towers. Stamps only make a mark on your map, but they're a good way to help you remember where things are. There are several kinds as you can see below, and there's a limit to how many you can use, but the limit is 100. So far, I have leaves marking where I can find rafts, swords marking enemies I haven't defeated yet, shields marking Korok puzzles I haven't finished, skulls marking Hylia statues, gems marking towers (because there are more towers than I have pins for), and stars for other things I have to come back for (usually shrines or interactions).

Anyway, back at the lab, Purah is able to upgrade my Slate and she does so in several ways. The main thing is that she adds the Camera, Album, and Hyrule Compendium. The camera is a camera. The album stores pictures you take, and includes pictures of places that will unlock memories. And the Compendium is a catalog of the weapons, wildlife, monsters, and more that you come across. You have to take a picture of them to register. This is the main reason I did this before exploring: I've already come across a lot of stuff that I'll have to find again, so I'm glad to mitigate that as much as I can. I was also able to purchase upgrades for my sensor (it can now search for things in my Compendium, in addition to shrines as before) and bombs (they recharge faster). There's a Stasis upgrade too, but I didn't have the materials for it.

I would've gone back to exploring Necluda at this point, but I get distracted too easily. From the hilltop the lab is on, I could see two shrines in the distance: one high up on a cliff, and one very low in the middle of nowhere. I wanted to go to both of them, but I chose to go to the cliff one first, reasoning that I could probably sail from there to the one below. This was the right call, as you'll see.

But first I had to get there. It was mostly easy going. I didn't run into many enemies, though I did take pictures of the ones I did for the Compendium. And for the most part, I didn't fight them. I didn't have time for that. When I finally reached the slope the shrine sat on, there was a Bokoblin camp in front of me. I tried to get close to take a picture, but the scout saw me and alerted his crew. I didn't see them, but I did see about a million yellow exclamation points of attention suddenly appear.

It was probably closer to a dozen.

Either way, I was slaughtered, so the next time I avoided that camp altogether. I learned the blue cattle I've been seeing around are water buffalo, and then I entered the shrine: "A Modest Test of Strength." You may remember when I did A Minor Test of Strength, and this was that but moreso. It took a couple of tries, but thanks to my Royal Claymore and the ton of shock arrows I got from those Lizalfos, I was able to take it down. I retrieved its Guardian Battle Ax+ and Guardian Shield +, along with an Ancient Core (only one more to get the Stasis upgrade!), and there was also a chest with a Knight's Bow inside.

Unfortunately, I lost that bow. And another one. See, my bow stash was full so I had to drop one to pick up the Knight's Bow. And then I had to drop the Knight's Bow to take a picture of it. And then, like a dum dum, I left the shrine. I tried entering it again but they were gone. Whoops.

So I sailed on down to the other one, which turned out to be on an island in the middle of the sea, and found “A Major Test of Strength”! Same basic thing, except whereas the Guardian in the previous shrine had a giant sword and giant shield, this one just had three giant weapons. But again, a clever mixture of shock arrows and powerful swords did the trick...eventually. For my trouble, I got a Guardian Sword++, a Guardian Spear++, and a Guardian Battle Ax++. The chest in this shrine contained Climbing Gear, which makes it easier to climb when it's raining (VERY helpful). 

And you know what I just realized? Guardians look an awful lot like a particular version of Beamos.

That's VERY interesting to me because this Beamos is from Twilight Princess. Until now, the only references have been to Wind Waker, which made me think this game officially took place in the "Adult Timeline", regardless of where I placed it in my personal timeline. But if this is really a Twilight Princess reference, a game from the "Child Timeline", that...that's unprecedented. And it emboldens me. (If all this timeline talk confuses you, check out my timeline primer.)

Anyway, now I'm more than equipped to go exploring Necluda for a bit, and this is a good time for it since I have a whole Compendium to fill out. Because of that, tomorrow's entry probably won't be that exciting, but you never know what I'll come across!