The sky was the first to surrender. Long before the sun had set, a strange, unhealthy color had begun to bleed into the edges of the world, a sickly, bruised purple that swallowed the familiar blue of the afternoon. Now, with the sun long gone, the sky was a dome of deep, oppressive violet, a color so unnatural it made the very air feel thin and hard to breathe.
Inside Ordon Village, a frantic, fearful silence had taken hold. Doors were barred, heavy wooden shutters were closed and locked, and the usual comforting plumes of smoke from the chimneys were absent, no one daring to draw attention with the light of a fire. The animals knew. The goats in Fado's ranch were a bleating, panicked mass, crashing against the fences of their pen. The cuccos were silent, huddled in their coops, refusing to move. It was a silence not of peace, but of a world holding its breath before the coming of an executioner.
Fado stood by his shuttered window, a heavy wood axe in his hands, and peered through a small crack. He could see them now, at the edges of the forest, just beyond the pastures. Figures. Tall, silent, clad in armor as black as a starless night. They were not a rushing horde. They were moving with a slow, deliberate, and terrifying efficiency, forming a perfect, encircling perimeter around the valley. They were not monsters. They were soldiers. And they were caging them in.
In the center of the village, Impa, the elder, moved from house to house, her presence a small, frail bastion of calm in a sea of rising terror. "Stay in your homes," she commanded, her voice raspy but firm. "Keep your lights low. Do not lose hope. The Goddesses have not forgotten us." But as she retreated to her own home, the deep, worried lines on her face betrayed a fear she had not felt in a century.
In the blacksmith's house, the air was thick with a different kind of dread. Elara lay in her bed, her face pale and beaded with sweat, her breathing a shallow, ragged whisper. The sickness had come on suddenly a few days ago, a wasting ailment that seemed to drain the very life from her, leaving her weak and feverish. It was a sickness of the spirit, a physical manifestation of the creeping despair that had taken root in the land.
Ilia sat by her bedside, gently dabbing her forehead with a cool, damp cloth. "He should be back soon, Elara," she whispered, her own voice trembling as she tried to project a hope she did not feel. "Rohm is the strongest man in the valley. He'll get the Sun-blossom and be back before you know it."
Elara's eyes fluttered open, a flicker of fear in their depths. Not for herself, but for her husband, alone on the treacherous mountain paths on a night when the world itself felt like it was holding a vigil for the dead.
It was into this atmosphere of quiet, mounting terror that Link arrived.
He did not come charging down the main road. He came as a ghost, a whisper of green and brown that slipped from the familiar woods of his childhood. He had seen the black-armored sentinels, the Gloom Knights, their methodical movements a chilling testament to their purpose. He had seen the unnatural sky. He moved through the ravines and creek beds he knew so well, his body a silent shadow, bypassing the enemy's perimeter with an ease that spoke of his Sheikah blood.
He slipped into the village, a phantom in his own home. The place was a ghost town, every door barred, every window a dark, vacant eye. He made his way through the back lanes to his house and entered through a loose window board in the back, a secret entrance from his boyhood.
The sight that greeted him stole the breath from his lungs. Ilia, her face stained with tears, looked up with a gasp of pure, unadulterated shock. And in the bed, his mother, who had been a pillar of warmth and strength his entire life, looked so small, so fragile, so close to fading away completely.
"Link!" Ilia's whisper was a choked cry of relief. She rushed to him, throwing her arms around him in a desperate hug. "You're home. Oh, Goddesses, you're home."
Elara's eyes filled with weak, joyful tears. "My boy," she breathed, her voice barely audible.
Link gently returned Ilia's hug, his eyes locked on his mother, a cold, terrible dread gripping his heart. He went to her bedside, kneeling and taking her hot, frail hand in his own. Her skin was almost translucent. He knew this sickness. He had felt its touch in the fading Dryads, in the despair of the Great Bear.
"He went for the cure," Ilia explained in a hushed, frantic whisper, seeing the unspoken question in his eyes. "The Sun-blossom herb, from the peaks of the Taryon Pass. It's the only thing Impa said could fight this. He took the cart… he left hours ago. He said he'd be back by morning."
Link's heart sank. The Taryon Pass was a dangerous, full-day's journey for a man on foot. His father was gone. The village's strongest defender was gone. And his mother was dying.
He stood up and walked to the door, his face a mask of grim resolve. He was no longer a boy searching for himself. He was a son, a protector, and the only shield this village had left. He looked out the window. The moon was now fully risen. It was not the gentle, silver moon of his childhood memories. It was a monstrous, swollen, and hateful crimson orb. The Blood Moon. Its light washed over the valley, painting the familiar green pastures in the color of a fresh wound. The light seemed to empower the very shadows, making them writhe and lengthen, and a low, hungry growl seemed to emanate from the land itself.
Then, a horn blew. A single, mournful, unholy note that echoed from the ridge where the enemy commander stood. It was not a call to charge. It was a call to begin.
The attack had started.
Link turned from the window. He looked at his sick mother, at his terrified friend. He drew the Master Sword.
Its holy, azure light flared to life, a single point of pure, defiant blue in a world that had been plunged into a nightmare of blood-red.