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Once the waters of the Great Bay stretched out far beyond the Desert Colossus to the land of the Poe and further still. And every inch of that water was teeming and sparkling with life. The air from the tides’ lazy breath brought forth the most beautiful sonnets and flora and other little crawling things, each with their charm, from sunrise to sunset each day. Truly, it was the most enchanted of places, and these must of have been the children of the Goddesses, closer to them than even the Hylians with their stoicism.

Far be it for the Zora of the Great Ocean to restrict themselves to Lake Hylia, sacred as it is, but instead took the doctrine most high in Zora code, to be as one with the water, the most favored medium of Nayru, and to honor Nayru with triumphs in learned wisdom. Also, to honor all the Goddesses with their solidarity with the whole of their creation is of the utmost importance to them.

And so the peaceful kingdom of the open ocean became a vital hub of culture, spirit, and economy for all to visit, for the welcoming arms of the Great Ocean Zora were long. Many of the Zora made careers as navigators, and the royal guards often pinned to one day patrol the open ocean and live out a peaceful life of directing shipping traffic. The Goron and Deku scholars and merchants flocked to the shore of the Great Bay to do good for their families and to make it or break it in the bustling metropolis. The humans brought their farms closer to the shore, and eventually the Hylians began to follow with their artisans and artists, poets and bards.

Soon it seemed like the entire map of Hyrule was drawing in to the great shore, and the castle was no exception. The crown knew that it should be the center of economy for the kingdom, and before long the difficult decision was made to leave the Temple of Time to be closer to the hot wave of economic upturn rolling into the Bay. The most noble Zoras would not stand for their kingdom being left behind, as they felt themselves to have the king’s ear. And indeed they did on most issues, but this time the king’s hands were tied for he could not move Lake Hylia. But the Sapphire could, and so the decision was made and was ratified by all members of the Great Ocean Zora parliament. The Sapphire was taken from its place at the old Lake Hylia’s temple and transfer to a desolate flat near the Gerudo Escarpment, Southwest of the New Castle Town.

The reason the Great Ocean Zoras went for the move was that they wanted to be closer to their brothers, who they never considered to be separated from. What they didn’t know was that malicious intent was driving the Noble Zoras’ moves. More specifically jealously, and in their envy the Noble Zoras resolved to assimilate the Great Ocean Zoras.

And it was a good idea. The Great Ocean Zoras had all sectors of economy down pat. The agriculture was unstoppable as wave after wave of immigrants rushed in for the fertile land overlooking the bay, and of course staying for the promise of an American Dream-esque life. The processing plants were a triumph of Zora ingenuity as being both hugely productive in refining precious metals and rubbers and things that made them indispensable in the Hyrulean economy as well as being clean, cementing their status as a safehaven for those wishing to escape the dirty practices of economies trying to compete. As a result of their appeal to the more conscientious Hyruleans, the schools in the Great Ocean area flourished like a rainforest full of flowers choreographed to all bloom at once.

From the surprisingly adept sociologists molded from would-be criminal Gerudo to the stunning scientific achievements reached by studying Poe and Re-dead flesh more closely, the greatest minds seemed to be riding the wave of eurekas rolling into the Bay. And of course the artists came nest, with their thirst for culture only to be quenched by the cool ocean breeze and the rich, if not a tad bitter, Goron coffee. They were mostly human and Hylian, though they say it takes all kinds. And if the Hylians weren’t artists they were most likely magicians, wowing crowds with magic bestowed upon them from knowledge of sacred scrolls as well as trips to the Great Fairy Fountain nearby, which the Great Ocean Zoras so kindly left open for the public to come and learn from the Fairy, if they were worthy.

The Great Ocean Zoras had built marvels of technology. Their water treatment plant was a triumph of engineering, and allowed for mass desalination. Soon the homes of immigrants became permanent. Along with this was the mining facility, which was revived from days of old to bring the seas back to certain areas without disrupting the territory of the Gerudo. This was the first move the Zoras made.

From their new Temple the Noble Zoras began trying to influence the Great Ocean Zoras and otherwise convince them of the fact that all Zoras should live close to the Sapphire. The Great Ocean Zora respectfully declined. The Noble Zoras, however, had another card to play. They went to the king, and bent his ear. They had convinced the king of Hyrule that the Great Ocean Zoras were a threat economically and that the only way to secure a power like that for the crown would be to have a change in control from a democracy that served the Goddesses to a Nobility that would serve the kingdom.

The king agreed, but did not want the land to be taken by force. He was still a benevolent king for the most part, and it was important that his subjects respect him. (He also wanted to keep the Fountain on tap for his army.) A Zora people ravaged by war wouldn’t, so he formed a new plan. The current king of the Zoras had three sons, and the king of Hyrule decided that it would be best to introduce their royalty into the Great Ocean Domain. So with the help and agreement of both parties, for their own reasons, the king granted the youngest of the sons to the Great Ocean Zoras in exchange for building a means of easy transit in and out of their domain, an embassy near the Bay, and complete transparency of parliamentary actions from the Zoras.

It also went without saying that the Great Ocean Zoras held an audience with the king on two fronts now, the economic front and the nobility front. This did not sit well the Noble Zoras, who wanted to see the Great Ocean Zoras as below them, not equal or even greater. So, rather than wait for the king to act, the Noble Zoras took matters into their own hands. They knew that the mines were a cornerstone of their economy, and made a pact with some of the Gerudo nearby. Full citizenship for anyone who brings the king a timestone from the Lanayru mines. The king said that his plan with them was to reopen the old Lake Hylia, and it wasn’t necessarily a lie, for they needed more resources if they were going to compete with a people who had an ocean at their disposal. But they knew the Zoras of Great Bay could only turn the desert into sea if they had the timestones. The more they took, the more their empire would shrink and the more the Noble Zora could expand.

Phase two of the plan was not to put the blame on the Gerudo when the Great Ocean Zoras asked about the timestones missing, but rather to put the blame on the Deku and Goron, saying the Deku wanted to expand their marshland, and the Goron wanted to restore some of the springs to their former glory.

The Great Ocean Zora were livid, and with legions of the king’s armies set out to punish the greed of the Goron and Deku. When asked why they would do such a thing, the Great Ocean Zora simply replied, “You know what you’ve done.” And they retaliated, pulling out of the Great Bay economy all together and launching a joint assault on their former trading partners. The Goron, with their mighty warriors, were one thing, but the Deku trappers assisting in the fight added a new layer of strategy and craftiness to the “anti-oppression” forces.

“Brothers! Help us!” They cried out to their brothers, but their cries for help in the war were only answered with the cold swish of steel through the air. Arrows, swords, maces, all the refined killing tools of the more warlike Noble Zoras were unleashed in a time when the Great Ocean Zora least expected it and were most vulnerable, taking full advantage of their trust and trampling the gates of the peaceful empire.

In the commotion the Great Ocean Zoras only had time to take the young prince out of the area. They sent him out on a ship into the desert with a timestone, so that he could sail quickly, but not be easily caught or tracked. It was here that he learned the hard way to survive: looking out for bandits in the day, and fighting off Poes at night. He became hardened, and his resolve was no longer that of a boy, but that of a king with no crown.

Eventually he won over a group of Gerudo, wishing to end the war so that they could return to university. They ended up attracting a small weapons stash from soldiers fighting near the escarpment, for the Gerudo knew the cavernous walls of the land better than anyone, and were able to start a rebellion force.

The rebellion found tracks when a Goron group was intercepted on their way to deliver goods to their comrades on the front lines. Rather than killing them, the Prince and his troupe told them that the Great Ocean Zoras did not want the war to start in the first place. At first they didn’t believe them, but they started to notice certain marks on the boy that were characteristic of battle, and at once they believed he had been ejected out of the Bay.

These Goron were more devout to the temple, and believed the doctrine of the Goddesses just as the Great Bay Zoras did. So, it wasn’t long before word began to spread to the south, the Kokiri people promising to keep playing dumb, as kids are so good at, and the Deku closest to the Forest Temple promising a safe place for the rebels and a marshland to give the Zora Prince enough water to thrive in.

And so it was that the war had divided itself not into states but God Vs. country, and the third son of King Ralis found himself on the side of the dying divine. But the resolve of those who hold the law of the Goddesses is strong, and it would take more than what they were doing to keep the Prince from bringing peace to the Zora people.

And that’s exactly what the Noble Zoras did, more. They pressured the Zora of the Great Bay until they broke and told them they’d sent the boy out into the desert. From there it was only a matter of time until they’d retraced the Prince’s steps. After the torture of some of the Deku of the Lost Woods, they had found their way to the Forest Temple.

The rebels were ready for a fight, but not for the full forces of the new Zora-Hyrule joint army. With magic and more experienced fighters on their side, as well as numbers, the rebels were easily crushed. Many died, but a few from each species were allowed to live because of their ties to their respective temples. And the Prince was allowed to live as well, not because of his significance, as it would be easier for the other sons of Ralis to inherit the throne without him, but because it would be far more humiliating to make a traitor live in shame. So, the Noble Zoras took the boy, and with the help of the magic of the most skilled Hylian magis, opened a portal to a realm with a well known slave market.

This is where the story begins. What will Prince Rheaus do now?

A crash through the double door of the aquatic floor of the slave market shook the attention of many away from what they were doing and brought it the shouting of a young Zora in the grip of a Goron and another Zora soldier. A Hylian legionnaire strode behind in judicial fashion, not looking at the slaves and not blinking at the scum who would own them.

Indeed he despised the idea of the slave market, which is why he relished the thought of this treasonous prince being cooped up in this place and later subjected to the perverse will of some other being he would no doubt consider less than himself. He was mildly impressed, despite himself, at the tidiness with which the place was run. Such a hive, so clean! He could hardly believe it.

There was a manager at the center and a few feet above the rows of tanks and damp padded rooms, and the captain surmised that this was the right place for the little miscreant, and also that there was a sort of laissez faire government here as the sellers seemed to drop in periodically, the bustle keeping the time between those periods short, and taking good care of the enclosures and the enclosed.


"That makes sense," he said aloud.
"What does, Cap'n?" Asked Deumo-Goro, who liked to take wisdom from the captain like a wandering horse in a lawn waiting for apples to hang low.

"The masters are just sellers, watch, their coming to take care of their products." He said it without looking, as he was just that kind of snooty.

"I see what you mean, Cap'n! They're right smart with their assets I reckon."

At this the Zora captain chimed in. He was walking behind all of them, and had scooted up to the front of the procession.

"Which is the problem, Goro. We don't need the princess in a nice tank... He needs to know true humiliation." His face was an inch away from the Prince's when he said this last part, but the young Zora was determined not to acknowledge him.

"Trust me, boy, there is no way for you to know happiness now, so why not embrace it? Unbridled misery! Isn't it grand?"

"These cages, tanks, whatever else that is," he said pointing to a marsh enclosure, "are entirely too good for you."

"What you need is a nice, dry, hot place. A place where all those nights in the desert would have seemed like a frozen hell had you not stolen a timestone for your trip; a place where the muck and fungus will comfort your skin with the affection of acid; a place where ever shadow, every guilty glance tightens an invisible hand around your throat, waiting for you to wish for death to let go." The whole time he was walking, now leading the group, he was heading for a vent at the far right corner of the floor. It appeared to be a heating vent.

Underneath it sat a decrepit old cell. It had water in it once, or at least the ceiling had a leak, because there were musty old puddles on the floor. The gates made a line of red snow on the ground as the rust flew off them on their opening. They made the worst sound imaginable as they closed.

More yelling and wailing could be heard in an incomprehensible and haunting language. It eventually died with the laugh of the Zora captain piercing through the young prince's heart. He knew there was no way out for him now. His head hung, and he watched from the top of his sight as the new king of the Zoras walked off with the new chieftain of the Goron and the knew general of Hyrule, all of them godless bastards.

He looked up at the flag they carried. It was the Lanayru providence symbol turned upside down, and it confirmed that the new state these Zoras came from was one with no regard for the Goddesses. The prince turned away in time to hear the entrance doors shutting again, and found himself looking at a puddle, found himself staring at a slave wearing the same perverse crest around his neck as those militants. He spat at ripped off the collar and threw it across the cell.

Then he sat there, looking at stone and how foreign and cold it looked, trying to make it look like the rocks of the castles he knew and failing miserably.
This is it... This place... Is my home. No...
This is no home. Look at these people, listen to them!
I was in line to be king! ... Now I'm in line to be owned.

What the hell am I supposed to do? I could have stayed
at the camp at home. It wasn't such a bad life... But this... I can't even.

Theodwin was raised in a Sheikah training camp, being raised to become the elite guard to some future royalty. Even from a young age he showed great promise with a blade, easily taking down even the older children in training. As he grew older he was eventually made into a junior trainer, being allowed to train some of the youngest Seikah. But even as he seemed content on the outside, on the inside he was bored. Feeling that he had reached the limit of his training the camp could give him, so he went to outside methods of training. Doing a more intense training outside the camp he set up for himself, one day he came across an elderly woman being attacked by the monster. After dispatching the monster, the elderly woman thanked him by giving him a magical amulet. That she told him would enhanced any training he did, Theodwin accepted it eagerly, eager to see how well it would work.

However, what Theodwin didn't know was this elderly woman was actually an evil witch, sent by the forces of darkness to destroy the Sheikah camp. When Theodwin used the amulet, it did increase how effective his training was. But the longer he wore it, the more the darkness within the amulet filtered into him. Until one day the darkness had taken full control of Theodwin and made him to attack the camp, several of the younger Sheikah fell to his blade before several of the elder trainees distracted him away from them. Just barely fending off his attacks before a few of the trainers got the younger ones away then returned to help the trainees, it took the elder trainees and trainers working together to knock him off balance enough to cut the amulet away from him.

As it fell away from his body and the darkness cut off away from him, he passed out hitting the ground hard. When he had finally come to, he found himself laying on a bed in a cell. Even though it was known that it wasn't his choice to attack the camp and the amulet had been destroyed, it was unknown how much darkness was still within him and if it could take control of him again. So the camp elders had made the decision that he had to be banished from the camp, a punishment he accepted willingly after hearing what he had done while under the amulet's control. He was given a sword and some basic supplies before leaving the training camp, he has since then been traveling across the lands alone. Even to this day he can feel the darkness from the amulet within him, he stays clear of populated areas in case the darkness within him takes over his body again, only venturing into towns long enough to get any supplies he can't get in the wilds.

It was a cold dark night and a hard storm was raging, near freezing rain pelted the occupants of the lonely field of land it was over. One of which was a Sheikah warrior in a tattered black hooded cloak, the wind whipped the frayed edges about behind and around the man. The hood shielded his face from view as he stood there surrounded by several moblins and darknuts, lightning cut through the sky lighting up the field. The moblins growled and roared as they brandished their clubs, spears and crude swords. The darknuts groan as their hollow bodies move about, brandishing their large swords and spiked maces. A huge bolt of lightning flashed brightly across the plains, blinding several of the moblins for a moment. It is in this moment that the Sheikah makes his move, charging in at the nearest moblin. Jumping at it and driving his knee hard into the moblin's face, while it staggered he wrestled the blade from it's hand. Before bringing it down upon the very same moblin's head, when an arrow suddenly shot into the cloak. But the moblin arrow only hit air and cloth of his cloak, three throwing knives cut through the rain and found their mark in the chest of the archer moblin.

The Sheikah warrior landed on the ground and drew the sword on his hip, "You'll have to do better then that to stop me." The warrior said before charging in at a group of moblins, quickly killing one before deflecting the strike of another and kicking it hard in the chest making it stagger back into another, tripping it. He jumped quickly out of the way, just as a large spiked mace slammed into the ground where he was standing. He pulled a small black sphere off the back of his belt, swiftly striking it along the armor on his one arm. There was a flash of sparks before he threw it at the darknut, just as the sphere rolled to the feet of it, it exploded violently. Sending the darknut flying into pieces, before the warrior did a spinning strike severing the head off a moblin trying to sneak up behind him. The rest of the mobins amble about uneasily looking at each other, grunting at each other. The warrior swings his sword down to his side looking around at them, gripping the handle of his sword tightly. "Are you going to planning to make me die of boredem or do you wish to continue to try your luck?" He said as he narrowed his eyes, the moblins looked at each other then roared and all charged in at him. The warrior smirked as they did this, "This'll be fun." He said darkly.

Nearly a half hour later all the moblins lay dead on the plains, the darknuts have been destroyed and scattered about too. The warrior stood in the middle of the field breathing heavily as he looked up at the sky, his sword and body stained with moblin blood and was laughing insanely. "It's been too long since I've had that much fun." He says wickedly, before closing his eyes and standing there for a few more minutes before moving over to where his cloak was. Sticking his sword into the ground before pulling the arrows pinning his cloak to the ground out, then picking it up and looking at it. "Looks like a few new tears for it." He said before throwing it back over his choulders, then pulling his sword from the ground and resheathing it. He looked around some, before walking away from there, leaving the field of death to his back.