The Legend of Zelda: Goddess of Secrecy

Dungeon Chapter 23 - Warming Things Up

            …that was the kitchen. A pair of rats skated across the ice and into a hole in the wall on the far side of the room. Link had a bad feeling about the empty room. He kept his sword out, ready in his hand for whatever may appear.

            “That looks like a furnace,” Bruce commented, walking into the room. Link looked at the large frosted over iron furnace. He wasn’t sure how to get it started with the amount of ice on it. Putting a bomb in there would not be a good idea, so they needed to find another way to start the fire.

            There was a pile of logs set back in the back of the room. With his sword at the ready, Link walked over towards the pile. There was an echo across the room. Link raised his shield as an orb of ice hit his shield. The sphere shattered against the metal sheild. Link looked up at where the attack had come from.

            Hovering overhead was a figure with a wide brimmed hat. It swung something in its black hand as it floated above them. A long, curved nose stuck out from beneath its pointed hat. Just as suddenly as it appeared, it vanished.

            When Link heard the noise again, he turned to face it. Before the monster had a chance to attack, Link launched an attack at it. The creature flaled about as it was hit before it vanished to get away from the attack.

            This time, it appeared behind Bruce, hoping for a more vulnerable target. But the knight was ready for it after it vanished. His sword hit harder than Link’s, and harder than the creature was expecting when it had targeted Bruce. It shuddered, before collapsing beneath its hat and disappeared. For good this time though.

            Bruce kept a weary eye at the ceiling. “You think anything else is going to appear?”

            Link shook his head. “I don’t think they would expect us to get passed that freezard, to be honest. Besides, they’re probably guarding the rest of the building more than this small furnace.” He wasn't sure how he knew that, but he did and it made sense.

            “Can we get this thing lit then?” Bruce asked. “I’m freezing.”

            The two grabbed some of the logs and tossed them into the furnace. Link hit his sword against the furnace, trying to make a spark. A log caught, and Link helped the fire along the best he could. Eventually, the fire began to blaze and grow. The ice melted off the outside of the furnace as the heat expanded out from its source. Steam began to climb out of the grates of the fire as it melted the ice around it. Heat traveled up the vent at the top of the furnace, and continued on through a series of pipes on the ceiling. Link was glad that the inside of the pipe hadn't frozen.

            “What do you think that is?” Link asked.

            Bruce replied, “It seems like some kind of heating system. It must go through the whole place. I suppose that's pretty smart.”

            Link looked around the room as the rest of it began to thaw out. Water began to pool on the floor, before it drained out the side of the room through the hole. The rats that had gone to hide inside the walls scrambled out. Link took the chance to kill them. Rats usually had large numbers, and Link had a guess about who the rats preferred. He rather get rid of them while he could.

            “We should go and see what’s thawed out,” Link said, heading back out down the hall. They came out in the large room with the grand staircase. Heat was pooling the air and water was gathering in huge pools around the room. The door headed towards the front of the building had thawed out.