The Legend of Zelda: The Ocarina of Time

Bottom of the Well

Link turned around and faced the windmill. That windmill may have been the one thing that remained unchanged, its massive sails drifting in the breeze, inexorably spinning around and around in the same fashion. He entered the structure. Inside was the same machinery chugging away, but this time, the sloshing of water was audible below him.

He looked to the right side. Sure enough, a short bald man in bare feet was there, crouching over something he was intently focused on. It looked like he was tinkering with something... a box with a crank.

Link approached him. The man giggled as he made a few accordion-like notes toot out with the wheeze of an air bladder. "Go around! Go around and around and around! What fun! I'm so happy!"

"Excuse me," Link said to the man.

Startled, the man jumped, sending out dissident tones from his tin whistles and tines. "Oh, hello! Don't mind me... I'm just a music man who loves to go around and around! I'm trying to come up with a musical theme inspired by this windmill...going around and around and around!"

"A musical theme, you say," Link said to the man, who was a cheery bloke this time around, making what he was about to do difficult to carry out. "I have a song... on my ocarina... would you like to hear it?"

"Kid, I take inspiration from anywhere I can... let's hear it!"

Link sluggishly cupped his lips around the light blue mouthpiece, and played the song that brings storms. D F d, D F d.

"Yes, yes it fits... go around, go around..." he sang gaily to the melody.

Then, like clockwork, the wind outside started howling into the windows high above, and they brought with them a heavy rain, which began as suddenly as it did seven years later.

"Go around, go around... What? It's going way to fast!"

He was correct. The massive wheel platform, which occupied most of the space in the tower, spun swiftly, almost violently. The sloshing grew louder and louder, as presumably, the water level in the chamber below rose higher and higher. That is, until the noise stopped altogether, at which point water started to seep up from the rim around the perimeter of the spinning wheel.

"What have you done!?" The bald, bearded man was now back to the way Link had met him, as he scrambled to pick up the pieces of his future crank organ, before the puddle of water could reach them. Link ran out without saying anything, not even an apology, which he was tempted to give.

Despite the sheets of rain, Link could still see the well. There was no more glimmer, for there was, at this point, not a lot of direct light to hit it. Upon a closer inspection down at the well, Link could see nothing but darkness down the shaft. He looked to Navi, as if he had pulled off something genius.

He climbed in, beginning to shuffle down the same wooden rungs. It was noticeably more difficult in his boy body, especially with the compromised wet grip. But he made it down, splashing into a puddle that had already formed from the downpour depositing into the well. The dim amount of daylight he had this time around revealed no boulder... just a small tunnel, that was not yet blocked. Link recalled the sheer terror he experienced from the monster that escaped from there. He really had no idea what could be on the other side of the hole. But he took the courage he had, and squeezed on through the tight passage.

Inside, the dank and musty air hit Link's nostrils, reminding him of past ventures. Only this time, there was a stench that was almost unbearable. The tunnel opened up to a chamber filled with this air. It was pitch black... until a set of torches lining the walls were suddenly set ablaze.

"I can hear the spirits whispering in this room..." said Navi.

"Spirits..." Link retorted. The torches had indeed just mysteriously lit themselves.