(Art by @Kikiospirit)
"How are you ahead?!"
I turned back to Link after he yelled to me, my eyebrow raising in slight amusement as I watched him drag himself up the steep path. He was already a sweaty and heaving mess, which was a surprise since he could climb mountains with ease... I gotta tell you, though, seeing as I was more resistant to something compared to the hero - it did boost my confidence a slight bit.
"Back in my world, I trekked a mountain trail with a few buddies on a regular basis - it was sorta our thing, so that might play some part." I stated with a shrug, slowing my pace to give Link a chance to catch up. Sighing, I placed my hands behind my head and stared up at the rest of the mountain "I might not be saying that for long, though... I can already feel temperatures rising."
"I'm not the only one, then." Link wiped some sweat from his forehead, pointing to his pouch of elixirs after "When do you think we'll need these?"
"I don't know... wait," I dropped my arms down as soon as an idea popped up "That stable hand said equipment made of wood burns easily in the heat, right? If we keep something wooden on us, and it starts to burn, we'll know when the elixirs are needed."
"That's... not a bad idea." Link hummed out, impressed "Got anything like that on you?"
"Yeah, my - well, your bow."
"That'll work." He nodded, seemingly ignoring the fact I still had his bow, "We're going to want to savour these as much as possible, we don't know when we'll find better heat protection."
"Or whether we'll even get to Goron city with the time they'll give us," I held my hand over my eyes as I stared up at the rocky winding path, shielding them from the late morning sunlight "It looks like we'll at least still be on the road until sunset."
"Are you kidding me?!" Link yelled out, not on board with that idea, only to turn away from me and begin to walk down the path instead "Nope, I resign as hero!"
I rolled my eyes, and pulled the boy back by the collar of his tunic "Oh no you don't. If I'm doing this, so are you."
Link groaned, walking backwards as I pulled him along. Glancing back at him, my face fell into a deadpan at his childish behaviour - which I somehow learned to expect with Link. Sometimes he was the strong, hardened-eyed knight that didn't let fear define him... and at other times he was simply a boy that complained and messed around, despite the crushing responsibility hanging over his head.
"Link," I spoke up "We both know I wouldn't actually be able to drag you like this, so stop messing around."
"Fine..." My shoulder jolted back when Link halted his feet, only to remove my hand from his tunic and return to my side. Heh. He was pouting, how cute. We were walking for a little bit, enjoying the silence, but Link turned his head when he felt my gaze linger and raised an eyebrow "What is it?"
My face heated up, and my gaze fell forward "Nothing! I wasn't looking at you, I was looking at the scenery your big head's blocking, obviously!!!"
"...Right."
"What, are you calling me a liar?"
Link's mouth opened for him to retort, but then he paused as if thinking back on something. After a moment, his lips curled up into a small smirk as he leaned towards me slightly.
Oh no.
"I'm not calling you a truther~,"
"Ya know what Limp noodle!!"
He laughed out loud "You walked right into that one! Also your bow's one fire."
"I didn't walk into shi— wait what?" Frowning, I slowly turned my head towards where he was pointing, only to see smoke trailing up from my back. My eyes shot wide open in shock "Oh Quiznak!!!"
"Haha! Okay hold on, I got it." Link's hands grabbed my arms, stopping them from thrashing around to reach my bow, before removing it himself and dropping it onto the floor. There was no use putting it out, so we just watched it burn at our feet. The boy whistled and reached into his pouch "I think now may be a good time to take them."
"Agreed."
The two of us took a bottle each. I popped off the cork and stared at the substance, my nose scrunching at the slimy, unappetising grey sludge I was to drink. Even Link didn't seem too fond of it, and he was the biggest glutton I know!
"That lady didn't tell you what was in this stuff, did she?"
"No, but I don't think it's anything sweet... "
We looked at each other with a grimace. Link held his potion out to me, which I clinked mine against, and the two of us held our breath to brace ourselves.
Well, bottoms up.
Consuming the potion was hardly pleasant. I could practically feel the sludge run down my throat and into my stomach, and the taste it left behind was even less delightful. However, it did work. I instantly felt my body relieve itself from the burning heat of the mountain. I grimaced, my tongue sticking out as I tried to wipe the taste off it with the back of my hand.
"We really need to find an alternative..." Link shivered, every bit as disgusted as I was, and I couldn't agree more.
"Amen, my good sir."
We continued down the path. The smell of fire and molten rock got stronger with every step we took, but luckily we were unaffected. Even our clothing seemed to stay intact. However, I didn't take any chances with the beautiful Rito hairpin I was gifted, and therefore tucked it away where I knew it would be unaffected. Soon enough, we came across a canyon of sorts, which was decorated with ores and cooling igneous rock. Link and I allowed our eyes to wonder while we walked by; I suppose even an active volcano held its beauty.
"It's so pretty..." Link murmured, stopping for a slight moment to admire a rather large molten boulder before walking by, "Maybe this won't be so bad—,"
The ground began to rumble.
Link and I jumped as two loud crashes came from behind us. We exchanged glances, and slowly turned around to see what was going on. A large, molten rock beast stood over us, it's stony arms pounded the ground either side of us as a warming.
"Uhhh, it's getting less pretty." My voice shook as I slowly backed away "I think we should run."
The creature raised an arm overhead, obviously targeting us.
"Yep, run. Definitely run." Link grabbed my wrist and bolted in the opposite direction, his head turned back to watch the lava titan behind us. Multiple rocks were launched in our direction, but Link was able to maneuver around them in time. We might actually be able to escape this— "Oh sh*t!!"
Link abruptly skidded to a stop, which caused me to uncomfortably crash into his back. It was a dead end - the only way out was to climb or use Revali's Gale, but with all the boulders flying at us, I doubted we would be given a chance to succeed or even attempt that. Link sighed and turned to me, and reached back to receive his Steel Lizal bow.
"Okay Y/N," he murmured to me "You've never fought a Talus before, have you?"
"If you're referring to Dwayne the rock Johnson over there, then no I haven't."
He nodded with a hum, and pushed the bow into my hands along with a few arrows "Then I need you to do something. See the ore on top of its head?"
I looked back at the monster, my eyes fixed on the sparkling black stone that stuck out of it "You mean that tumour thing?"
