Whatever had caused it, there was an air of blatant caution assailing Prince Sidon's senses, heightening them for however brief it would turn out to be, or so he chose to think. He was in a place he had been before, many times in fact, but he was sensing more of its attributes than he ever remembered. The location, a wide corridor he had been trekking down for but three long minutes, was not as lengthy as it seemed, but it was dark and winding and lonely. Somewhere, echoing all around him, a droplet of water sonorously plinked.

He knew there was something provoking him at least. Excitement, most likely. Being truthful to himself, Sidon could scarcely wait to again visit Vah Ruta. Upon the arrival of Link and Zelda the day prior, he felt assured that the answers behind this entire mystery would quickly reveal themselves.

Even after the first day's conclusion, with nothing of major importance having yet been discovered, his hope did not waver. Zelda had proposed numerous promising theories she wished to test out come today. For the night the two Hylians had reclined within the walls of the kingdom. As morning opened they quickly roused themselves from their peaceful slumber and readied themselves for the continuing investigation. Now, all was nearly set for the coming trials that were promised. Sidon was to meet them at the entrance of the city come noon, but there were other matters he needed to tend to before the moment arrived.

One of those matters was why he was here. He was sauntering now through a complex hosting training chambers, ones utilized by the Zora knighthood. Here was where they, and their initiates or hopefuls, refined their skill in battle and defense. Though time was of the essence for Sidon and the chambers were many, it was a brief journey that permitted him to keep his cool, helped by the convenient layout of the structure. Itself being a corridor spiraling downward into the deep waters below the city, the main passageway graced each chamber evenly. Here he had apparently urgent business to attend to, as disclosed from a message sent to him by a close friend earlier in the morning.

Sidon glanced into every chamber he passed, currently treading from the fourth of the several that were installed in the structure. Each was a great wide cosm all its own, some filled with contraptions purposed to train specific aspects of combat and defense, others without anything to be noted. Not a soul inhabited any thus far, all of their normal occupants most likely patrolling the city or borders of the domain after the troubling reports of a great massing of dark creatures loyal to the passed Calamity came the night prior. The most sharp-eyed of sentinels stated that the many beast-creatures were closing in on the position of the inert Divine Beast Vah Ruta, as though drawn to it. Grim news, but somehow unsurprising, thought Sidon.

For all it's features, the apparent emptiness of the complex was its most noticeable attribute at the moment. If anything Sidon appreciated it, in a way. Treading through the depths of this twisting pathway gave him time to think about what this day might hold. His ready mind strayed far, inevitably falling back to his concerns toward the current condition of Vah Ruta.

Other than the dubious shadow surrounding the mystery itself, Sidon did not have any doubts about his allies' capability in solving this conundrum. With Princess Zelda's knowledge of the great constructs, and Link's blade to keep back potential foes, he knew they would figure out what ailed the divine beast. Happy with that, he was just sending his thoughts away from that image and to the second visitation he planned, when he heard something up ahead of himself.

"That's it, that's it! Good! Yes, yes, perfect!"

Sidon stopped, his head leaning forward. He listened well to the sounds of praise from just up ahead, smiling when he recognized the throaty voice. It was, without a doubt, the voice of Seggin.

There was a stunning rarity of anyone in the kingdom who didn't know of him. Having earned himself a fierce reputation back in the days of his prime, Seggin was the Zoras' own, great 'Demon Sergeant'. Those days having long since passed, the old knight's hoarse tone was as aged and wispy in sound as he was in shape. That was not at all to say he had lost his touch in forging other, younger Zora warriors into model knights.

Sidon stifled a hearty laugh, resuming his journey with the image of sneaking up on him in what seemed to be the middle of a drilling session popping into his head. As per his summons, Seggin was just the Zora he was looking for. The messenger stated that he sought Sidon's presence down here before his departure, as he had someone he personally wanted to accompany the prince while he went off with his Hylian allies. While the thought of having a bodyguard seemed somewhat superfluous, given he had the likes of the champion Link to ward off what few malevolent creatures might disturb their investigation, Seggin made special note of how this particular individual was not simply qualified, but thirsting to perform so important a duty. As to who this individual was, Sidon did not yet know, though he did have a modest suspicion.

Soon Sidon was closing the paltry distance between the location and himself when Seggin's voice went out again, close enough now that he could have heard him whisper if that was the tone he chose. While it was low, and dare he say amiable, it was no whisper, but a firm order.

"Now, for something I've seen you struggle with in the past: the Sepredian Lunge. You know how it goes, Scuta; try to disarm and fell your foe in one leap. Do it in exactly four blows, perform them all before you again touch ground. Remember, even in the air, make sure to keep your posture completely unbreakable in light of every- yes! Yes, excellent! It seems you truly have mastered the technique."

Treading softly now, the Zora prince rounded the corner to come upon the tall doorless entrance of the final training chamber. Truly a vast thing, it was a wide and circular area with a high ceiling. As spoken of in hushed tones by some of his friends in the guard, this room was often blanketed in near-total darkness so that aspiring knights could learn to learn to properly fight even in the murkiest of waters or the blackest of nights. As of now there was actually some illumination to go by, provided by the single bioluminescent chandelier above. The pale blue textures of the light were crudely dim, but just bright enough to reveal the features of the room and all who were in it wholly.

By this light, Sidon spotted Seggin first, standing but four paces from him. His shape was gaunt and haggard and ancient. Scars were etched all over his bony frame like grim tattoos, all honest trophies taken from fights and battles long since fought and endured in the name of his king and kingdom. His arms were folded behind his wiry back, one finger tapping rhythmically upon the wrist of the joined hand. He had yet to notice his prince, as his gaze was held strictly forward, to his student. Who he had been drilling this whole time, the only other living being in this rough place, stood twelve meters away. It was an armored, female shape. It was his niece, Scuta.

With the exception of Seggin's son, the adroit and capable captain of the guard Bazz, Sidon did not see much of the Demon Sargent's kin. They were few in number and resided in the territories outside of the kingdom, but he still recognized this one from memory. A mature Zora of an exceptionally firm build, Scuta's form was queerly short, but sinewy with lithe muscle built from years of training and firsthand combat. The sturdy armor she wore covered only her waist and legs, expressing a smooth sapphire gleam outlined by ruby-studded silver. Her rough skin was tinted pallid azure, her underbelly lighter in color only by virtue of being colorless. Her crooked teeth glittered pearly and sharp even in the modest light of the room. And then there was the scar that distinguished her most amongst her fellow Zora — a long, white, diagonal streak of maimed flesh starting at the rightmost base of her chin, running over her mouth until halting just under her left eye's lid.

Her stance was currently bent and compact. Save a wide and ready grin, every fabric of her visage was emotionless, unreadable, yet still full of a vivid life. Evidently from the tattered remnants of her past "opponents", she had been practicing her current technique against a series of training dummies. Molded of wood and a series of knitted sacks filled with straw and grass, her latest foe, standing several feet from her now, bore the porcine likeness of a savage moblin. Scuta looked it down with wide, glassy red eyes, seeking only the key points of its tall shape she could exploit. A trident rested at the ready in one off and eager hand. Its design was a spiraling silver paragon of Zora art, its forging indubitably of master quality. Three points made its end, each long and barbed and sharp.

Silence rang supreme throughout the chamber for almost a minute. Seggin gave a single nod of his head, and Scuta killed the quiet with a sudden spring of lighting-quick motion that very nearly made Sidon blink. She hissed and lunged, making it within fighting distance in a single bound, opening with a flurry of stabs from the trident that targeted the hands of the dummy. Swiftly knocking loose the makeshift club the dummy possessed, she disarmed her opponent. Her movements evolved into a wild but elegant series of twists and twirling of the trident, concluding with a sudden low sweeping blow of the weapon that opened up the sack-skin legs just above the feet. Damp grass and straw spilled over the wet floor in two small piles. With her enemy rendered helpless by the assault, had it been a living creature of flesh and blood anyway, she closed in for the kill, starting with another intricate display of her physical capabilities.

Sidon's brow raised. With immense determination lining every dexterous stroke, vault and kick, Scuta's form was of nearly unrivaled quality. Honing her skills to perfection under her famed uncle's tutelage, there were few, if any Zora of any age or rank today who could compare to her capability. Whatever Seggin had been teaching her, the efforts put into the training had clearly born fruit.

Whatever the moment shared currently between the two was, Scuta's attention also proved the first to fall to him. Her eyes locked on Sidon the second they chanced a glimpse his way, catching his shape from the corner of her vision. The moment her head turned to fully view the prince, Scuta's posture lowered. Her head tilted and she blinked but once.

"Uncle," she calmly said before Seggin could ask why she had halted, "It seems we have company."

"Is there now?" Seggin's old wrinkled cranium shifted in direction until it spied the shape of the one she spoke of. "Ah, Prince Sidon! I had no idea you were there. I'm glad you came here before your departure."

"How could I not? In the infrequent moments where you seek my presence personally, I tend to suspect an invaluable reasoning behind it." Sidon's arms folded and he turned a welcoming grin to Seggin's niece. "And it seems my suspicions were again founded. It's a pleasure to meet you again, Scuta," he greeted, giving his regal head a light, respectful nod to her.

"The pleasure is all mine, my prince," she responded back with a close-eyed bow of her own. When she lifted her face to meet his again, there was an immense, proud smile adorning her rugged face. "And I would like to apologize for thrusting this proposition upon you on such short notice. My uncle thought there might be a chance you would accept me into your company, to make sure that you suffer no ill inconveniences while investigating our Divine Beast's malfunction this day. Will you have me join you as your personal enforcer?"

"The apology is unnecessary, my friend. It would be my honor to have a Zora of your disposition at my side." With his response came a great grin that mirrored her own. "Though I know not yet what you may have to enforce on my part."

"Oh, there are numerous creatures of malevolent intent one could happen by, my prince," she cheerily mentioned. "Bokoblins, moblins, lizalfos... The sentries have stated numerous creatures of ill intent have steadily progressed toward Vah Ruta's location. If it was enough to prompt the guard to hold back any citizens from approaching our divine beast, then as my reasoning goes..."

As her hand waved about for emphasis on the very real encroaching threat, Sidon tittered gently, amused. "And you think I could not handle such beasts as those?"

Scuta's smile flickered for a moment. "No, I believe you could, my prince," she reaffirmed her future liege. Her gaze fell away for a moment before returning. "It's just that... one can never tell what manner of monster might show themselves at this delicate moment. I would be remiss to allow any sort of harm, potential or otherwise, to have so much as a chance to come to you."

As if sensing the fragments of perturbation in her words, Sidon let ease flow through his tone when next he spoke. "Don't worry about those trivial thoughts. Should any such beast approach me, I have little doubt the two of us could not handle them. The only thing I would worry about if I was you is your preparations for our departure. I was planning on meeting my friends in a very short time, you see..."

A glint of excitement entered Scuta's eyes, but that was all the hint of it she displayed. "How soon will we be leaving?"

"Within the next half hour, of course."

"Then I shall be ready by then! If you'll allow me a few moments to gather myself, my prince..." With two bows, one to Sidon and one to Seggin respectively, Scuta quickly scuttled past the two and left the chamber. When she had exited through where Sidon entered and left their sight, the Zora prince looked to Seggin, who still had his old eyes set on where he last saw his neice.

"She indeed has quite a thirst to prove herself," Sidon said with admiration fresh and ripe in his voice. He gently nudged the older Zora's shoulder. "And I've spied her flaunting her moves under your tutelage many times before. They are impressive."

"Hmf. Much of it she learned by living on the frontier settlements, you know. I only showed her some of my personal techniques, ones I myself cannot replicate any longer. Regardless, for her prince, such approval is the highest honor she could hope to attain as of now. Gods below know she already has mine."

Seggin coughed into his curled and wrinkled fist and fixed his gaunt form into as much an upright shape as he could muster. "That thirst, however, worries me, my prince. While my son Bazz overcame his a long time ago, Scuta has not fully done so herself. For my efforts to temper my neice's yearning for glory, so far I've had only some success." He briefly rocked his crown left and right no sooner had he voiced that speck of doubt. "But, I have faith that she will pull through, should the circumstance call for it. If there's anything I've disciplined her in more than combat, it's to value duty over desire. Proper restraint, and all that."

"Of that, I believe we can agree. And worry you should not." A toothy smirk came over Sidon's mouth as he looked down at the Demon Sergeant. "We are merely attempting to solve the mystery behind Vah Ruta's deactivation. We'll have to deal with minor encampments of beasts at most. We're not hunting for hinox."

"And even in the case a hinox should somehow come into the picture, she knows well on how to deal with one," Seggin informed his prince with a throaty chuckle. He lifted a finger and waved it about, his memory ever keen to recite his well-honed words of wisdom. "'Keep away from it for a fair distance while it attacks, go for the eye with a ranged weapon, attack its most vital points with the trident when it's attempting to recuperate, rinse and repeat'. And that is but one of several methods she knows."

Sidon scarcely doubted the efficiency of the lent morsel of knowledge. With a raised arm and without words he beckoned his elder friend to follow him. Returning off a close-eyed shrug, Seggin happily agreed.

Walking at a pace that was comfortable for the old sergeant, Sidon and Seggin sauntered out of the chamber, through the winding pathway that took them out of the training complex and into the expanse of the Zora city. They walked on, through small crowds and marketplaces, across great bridges and platforms lined with luminescent lights, and past many a vast spiraling piece of architecture etched with symbols of historical significance their artisans had erected in years long since gone by. The prince and sergeant's journey concluded only as they drew into the great city's heart, whereupon they came to a spot both often visited by both of them. Here, tall and proud and sculpted after the appearance of their late, beloved princess, was a great statue of Sidon's sister, Mipha.

It may have been over one-hundred years since the day, but Mipha's sacrifice was still a subject not spoken of lightly. Her death hit the Zora in ways none alive at the time could have ever thought feasible. She was a kind, gentle soul, and also a warrior without peer, whose recorded feats provoked awe from even the current generation. What little hope some of them held onto of her potential survival was a small candle against an encroaching wave. It was finally snuffed out when the truth of her ultimate fate came to their ears by way of Link in his journey to purge the corruption enthralling the four divine beasts and end the Great Calamity.

Terrible as the truth was, this knowledge brought with it a melancholy peace of mind. Even when the dreaded news regarding her demise came to them, the Zoras' hope in light of what their Lady had stood for remained steadfast. Even in death she instilled hope and compassion into the souls of all who would hear her tale, immortalized now in this stone form by only the greatest of Zora craftsmen.

Seggin sighed as his old eyes came upon it. Every time he saw it, Sidon sensed him thinking to better days, and all the bitter regret that came with it when his view focused back to the present. Memories surely flooded through his mind like reopened wounds, filling it with a numb pain he had gotten quite used to in this day and age. Be that as it was, Sidon knew the torment still constantly assaulted him without restraint.

"You taught Mipha everything she knew." The prince turned to his trusted ally, his voice evidently picking Seggin up out of the thick of his thoughts. "Tell me; do you see any traces of the Zora my sister was within Scuta?"

"Your... sister? No. No, no, no..." Seggin quickly shook his aged head several times. A small frown appeared on his wrinkled mouth and his expression hardened. Inhaling slowly, he looked up at the statue, allowing it to again remind him of the time in his younger life when he trained his Lady in all the ways of combat and defense he knew. His old glare hardened for a brief second, but quickly mollified.

"I would be lying if I said I chose to train my niece to perhaps relive that feeling, and I will say that she shows as much skill with the trident as Lady Mipha. But Scuta has been living a life of her own. She is her own Zora. I've seen to it that that's who she remains as."

Emitting a forlorn breath, the Demon Sergeant turned his view back onto Sidon. "If there's any bit of wisdom I've cared to collect during all the years my heart's been beating, it's that the past is something to be remembered, young master. To be looked back on, to be reflected upon, and to learn from. But never to be replicated, if for memory's sake alone. If one tries to do so, that memory, and all the splendor it posed, might be forever tarnished. However well replicated it may become, it quickly stagnates and it... sometimes hurts its creator more than any future injury could ever accomplish."

"I believe that," Sidon nodded, after a moment. No matter the pain behind a lesson, he was ever appreciative of the teachings of someone his elder. In fact, the old sergeant's talk of memories provoked one of his own, one of his most treasured memories concerning his sister. It was well over a century ago now, back when he was but a child still wary to life's less simple things, but he still remembered Mipha clear as day. He remembered her kind voice, her calm smile, and her soft gold eyes. Above all, he remembered the responsibilities she entrusted to him in the chance that fate were to cruelly part them; words that would turn terribly prophetic. When Sidon exited the brief, bittersweet reverie, he placed an understanding hand on Seggin's easing shoulder.

"Whatever should happen to us, come our mission's end, Scuta shall return here. I'll make sure no harm befalls her."

Seggin rolled his old eyes and shook his dark wrinkled cranium again, though in a jesting manner this time. A dense chuckle accompanied the motion. "Oh, my prince, I believe that is her duty to you," he said, flashing him an amused grin made up of sharp, worn teeth that hadn't been shed for far too many years. "And don't you forget it. Why, I'd bet my left hand she could best you in an even duel, if given the chance. And that's assuming she finds the will to strike at her prince and future king..."

Sidon laughed with his old friend, savoring the moment as best he could. Seggin was beaming his way soon after stopping.

"Noon will soon be upon us, Sidon. I believe, as you said yourself, that your friends and allies are waiting for you outside of the kingdom," he advised. "I suggest you gather my niece and see to them at the time scheduled before they grow impatient for your radiant presence, my prince."

"And I will, after I pay one more important individual a quick visit," Sidon said, with a pulsation of intimate warmth filling his heart and mind. Turning about, he started walking away from the Demon Sergeant, but kept an eye looking to him over his crimson shoulder. "Farewell, Knight Seggin. 'Til next our paths cross."

"And farewell to you, Prince Sidon," Seggin bid from behind his prince. "Farewell, and good luck."