Born a Weapon: Twilight Princess

Distraction

The gates to Castle Town rumbled as they slowly lowered to reveal a single man dressed in green, who slowly and calmly walked out the gates and onto the battle-scarred field. Behind him, the gate stayed open despite the obvious vulnerability it presented. Link continued walking unopposed for a surprising amount of time, prompting his shadow to speak.

"Are they going to do anything?"

"In a minute. I don't think they expected someone to walk out alone."

Soon after Link said that a portal appeared in the sky, sending down several black squares that formed into four bulbins riding bulbos. The bulbins charged straight for Link, drawing swords as they approached the hero who remained in place. Once the bulbin was close enough, the one in front swung his sword. Before the metal could cleave flesh, a brown blur flew across their sight, and the hero was gone. The front bulbins head slowly fell from his steed, and his body soon followed. The three remaining bulbins turned their heads to see Link on Epona's back. An arrow reduced their number to two, and the farther bulbin retrieved a horn from its pack and blew into it. The loud noise was silenced by another arrow striking the bulbin's throat, and more portals began to open.

Link steered Epona away from Castle Town as the booming sound of hooves behind him slowly grew louder. He looked over his shoulder to see a cart shoot out from castle town escorted by several riders before the gate closed. More portals appeared, forming more bulbins that pursued the cart, but it was almost nothing compared to the number Link had amassed. Just as he'd hoped.

The bulbins pursued the hero in vain, their mounts unable to compete with Epona's speed, and their arrows dodged or blocked. Despite how well Link was doing, he knew it was foolish to fight all the bulbins chasing him, so he altered his path to enter a nearby forest where he planned to lose his pursuers. Ducking and weaving through trees, the number of bulbins chasing Link slowly decreased. Just as Link thought he had lost them all, an unusually large bulbo emerged from the treed, forcing Link to turn suddenly before a slab of metal sent him tumbling from Epona. With ringing ears and blurry vision, he saw Epona try to reach him but got intercepted and chased off by the large bulbo. Giant clanging footsteps told Link its rider had remained behind, and the hero rolled out of the path of another piece of metal smashing the ground and quickly got to his feet to see his attacker and was met with a familiar face.

"You?!" Link grunted in anger, "I threw you into a canyon!" King bulbin, clad in armor and wielding two massive shields, his large axe on his back, merely let out a long laugh of sick joy. He seemed unscathed from his fall, aside from the missing half of his left horn.

"A little tumble will not kill the KING," he emphasized the word king as he slammed his fist into his chest, "of bulbins!" The massive bulbin began approaching the hero, "and there is no canyon to save you this time, little human." His threat complete, the king again tried to crush Link with a shield. The hero rolled behind him, but the king swiftly spun around, swinging his other shield, forcing Link to duck. After the spin, Link thrust his sword forward, but the king's second shield blocked the metal. "WEAK!" the king shouted as he threw another metal-enforced punch, which Link blocked with his shield. This exchange lasted for several minutes, with Link unable to penetrate the bulbin king's defense and taking several hits as he tried.

"I thought you were strong!" the king ranted as he pushed Link back with a flurry of blows. "Worthy of being my opponent! I should have known better! No human could ever challenge me!" The final uppercut of the flurry of attacks struck Link's shield with enough force to send the hero several feet through the air and away from the king, landing on his feet. "And stupid, too! You still stand against me in a vain attempt to protect the prince, no matter how much of a beating you take."

He knew. And if the king knew about the prince, Link was sure that the small force he had seen chasing the cart was not all that was sent. He needed to take the king out for good this time and make his way to the cart. The only problem was his seemingly impenetrable defense. He needed a way to get past it.

"New plan," Link whispered as he lowered his sword and shield and walked backward, disappearing behind a tree. The King swiftly followed, rounding the tree mere seconds after Link, only to see air where the hero once was.

"COWARD!" the king shouted, and he looked in all directions, "the great hero of Hyrule cowering behind a tree! You are pathe-!" the king was interrupted by a stinging pain in his side, causing him to scream and swing his massive shield to crush the source, but there was nothing there. He lifted his shield from the ground only for an arrow to wedge itself into his shoulder. The king growled in anger, charging towards the arrow's source with both his shields raised. He finally stopped charging when he rammed a tree, not seeing the hero anywhere. An arrow suddenly embedded into the side of his neck, causing him to stagger and fall to his knees for a second before he snapped it off and stood up with a roar of anger. He had seen where the arrow came from. "Hiding in the trees, coward! I'll fix that!" the king threw down his shields and drew the massive axe from his back, swinging it with both hands and cleaving the tree in one blow. The tree's leaves rustled, and a green figure jumped from the doomed tree to one nearby. The king went on a rampage, felling tree after tree in pursuit of the hero. Several trees later, Link dropped from his current hiding spot as king bulbin reared back for another swing. The king felt the human reach under his armor, likely to try to remove it, but he grabbed Link and threw him into a tree before he could. He prepared to move in and finish his victim, only to pause when he registered a hissing sound. Looking down, the king saw two bombs wedged into his chest plate.

The explosion sent metal, wood, and dirt flying in all directions, forcing Link to duck behind the tree he had been thrown into. Once the hail of debris stopped, Link emerged from the tree to see the smoldering figure of king bulbin, unmoving in a slowly growing pool of blood.

The sound of hooves slowly grew louder, and Link was relieved when Epona emerged from the trees. His relief was short-lived as the sound continued to grow. The other bulbins in the area must have heard the explosion and were coming to investigate. Link quickly mounted Epona and sped off toward the cart carrying Prince Ralis, leaving the defeated king behind.

Despite the massive distance she needed to cover, Epona handled the rushed journey well. Link's concern grew as he passed several corpses, many of which were bulbins, but some were the guards escorting the cart. After an agonizing amount of time, the cart was in sight. For a moment, Link allowed himself to hope the threat had passed when he didn't see any bulbos, but then he realized that two of the people riding horses were fighting the others. One of the figures flipped from their horse onto a soldier's, impaling them with two daggers before jumping back to their horse and landing in a standing position on top of the saddle, throwing a dagger into another guard. The figure turned their head to look at Link, and the hero saw a black mask adorning the figure's face.