A philosophy, to a soul in torment, is a map. The Great Deku Tree had offered Link a map to a distant, difficult shore of peace. The old man, the gardener of grief, had offered him a different map—a shortcut, a dark and intoxicating path that led not to peace, but to power. And Link, a boy whose world had been burned to the ground, was in no mood for a long and patient pilgrimage. He chose the shortcut.
The week following his encounter in the valley was a week of transformation. The aimless, self-punishing penance of his journey was gone, replaced by a cold, sharp, and terrifying new purpose. The old man's words had not healed his grief, but had instead given it a shape and an edge. His sorrow was no longer a weight to be carried; it was a blade to be honed.
His training regimen changed. He was no longer just building strength; he was cultivating the darkness within him. He would meditate, not on the quiet stillness of the earth, but on the searing, vivid memory of his losses. He would stoke the fires of his own hatred, calling forth the image of Asmodeus's mocking smile, letting the rage burn through him until it was a familiar, controllable furnace. He believed he was forging a will of steel. He did not realize he was poisoning his own well.
He sought out conflict, drawn to the pockets of shadow that now infested the Hyrulean landscape like a plague. He found a small band of Moblins, their hulking forms corrupted, their eyes glowing with the familiar red of the shadow's taint, as they terrorized a trade road.
He engaged them, and his fighting style was terrifyingly different. The boy who had fought defensively in Ordon, the student who had learned the balance of the mountain and the lizard from Korgon, was gone. In his place was a predator. He was aggressive, brutal, and ruthlessly efficient. He moved with his Sheikah silence, a ghost of green, but he struck with a Goron's fury, his father's simple steel sword a blur of vengeful motion.
In the heat of the battle, he tried the old man's theory. He drew the Master Sword, and as a Moblin charged, he poured all of his focused, cultivated rage into the hilt. The blade did not awaken with its holy blue light. Instead, it reacted as it had before, but with more intensity. A dissonant, angry hum vibrated up his arm, and a sickly, violet aura flickered around the Triforce crest, hot and wrong. The blade resisted him, its divine spirit recoiling from the poison in his heart.
Frustrated, Link threw the Master Sword aside and finished the battle with his father's blade, his fury giving him a strength that left the last, dying Moblin looking up at him with something akin to fear. He stood over the creature, his chest heaving, not with exhaustion, but with the exhilarating, intoxicating rush of power. He did not see the Master Sword's resistance as a warning. He saw it only as proof that his will was still not absolute enough. He needed more.
As the last of the monsters dissolved into black smoke, a small, timid figure emerged from a nearby cluster of rocks. A farmer, his face pale with terror but shining with gratitude. "You… you saved us," the man stammered, his wife and small child peering out from behind him. "We thought we were done for. Please, come back to our homestead. We have so little, but we can offer you a hot meal and a safe place to rest."
It was the classic reward for a hero. The old Link, the shepherd, would have accepted with a quiet, grateful nod. But the boy who stood there now was a different creature. He looked at the farmer, at his wife, at his child. He saw their weakness, their fragility. And he felt nothing. No pity. No kinship. They were a distraction from his path.
He gave a single, cold, dismissive shake of his head, turned his back on the stunned and grateful family, and walked away without a second glance.
That night, as he made his cold camp, the feeling of the family's hopeful, grateful eyes on him was a faint, irritating itch under his skin. He pushed it away, focusing instead on the cold, hard logic of his new purpose. Attachments were a weakness. Hope was an illusion. Only power was real.
He felt a strange tingling from the pouch at his belt. He took out the Keaton Mask. He had not intended to use it, but his heightened, volatile emotional state seemed to have awakened it. He put it on, and the world dissolved into a grey, whispering vision.
It was not a memory. It was the present. He saw the grand, sun-drenched gates of Hyrule Castle. He saw the delegations arriving for the King's Council. He saw a proud Zora prince, a stoic Goron champion with a familiar, familial crest, and a formidable Gerudo warrior—Captain Teela—at the head of her honor guard. He saw them being greeted by the smirking, obsequious Chancellor Valerius.
The vision was tinged with an overwhelming sense of futility. He saw the pomp, the ceremony, the gathering of proud, naive fools, and a wave of contempt washed over him. They were talking. They were debating. They were playing at politics while the world burned.
The vision faded, leaving Link kneeling in the dirt, a bitter taste in his mouth. The King, the champions, the Princess he was supposed to be serving—they were all children playing a game he no longer had the patience for. The old man had been right. The world was broken, and its leaders were blind.
He looked north, towards the distant, unseen capital. He felt no desire to join them, to warn them. They were a part of the problem. His path was the true path. He would find his strength alone, in the harsh, honest reality of the wild. He would master the sword on his own terms. And when he was finally strong enough, he would solve the problem himself.
He was a hero, he knew. But he was beginning to believe he was the only one. And that lonely, arrogant thought was the most dangerous poison of all.