Well, crap.
The salesman explains that the mask he wants is indeed Majora’s Mask, which is said to have been used in witchcraft and now gives its wearer “an evil and wicked power.” Like, the ability to crash the moon into the world. So, Link intends to honor the original quest and get the mask back. After all, he got the ocarina, and thanks to the Song of Time, he’s got as long as he needs. How much harder can the mask be?
As Link leaves the clock tower again, Tatl says that the four areas Tael mentioned lie to the north, east, south, and west of Clock Town. She has no idea what he meant by “the four who are there,” but we’ll figure that out when we go. She first points Link to the swamp south of town, but Link just got his human form back and is a little freer to explore Clock Town, plus the Song of Time pretty much kills any urgency no matter how close the moon gets, so let’s take a three-day vacation to explore the city and a little of its surrounding environments, and heck, use the inverted Song of Time to make those three days more like… I don’t know, it felt like forever, to be honest. In hindsight, it may have been a bit overkill. On the bright side, Tatl has stopped bugging Link about what to do next.
Link’s lost the deed to the deku flower, so he goes to the astral laboratory, lets the Skull Kid wiggle his butt at him again, and claims another Moon’s Tear. On the way out, the leader of the gang of kids asks how he figured out their code, and figures if he did that he should be in the gang, and formally inducts Link into the Bombers Secret Society of Justice. It turns out the group’s main purpose is to help people with problems, so Link should fit right in. He gets a notebook to help keep track of
The Great Fairy offered further help to Link if he ever returned to human form, so that’s the next stop. Except, oops, she’s back to being exploded, so Link needs to round up the stray fairy again, return her to the Great Fairy’s pond to be reassembled. She gives Link a Great Fairy’s Mask, which will help him find other stray fairies. It’s also worth revisiting the Deku Scrub Playground, as it turns out part of my difficulty was that it gets harder each day, so I was jumping right into Hard Mode without having a chance to familiarize myself with Easy Mode. Link gets 50 rupees each time he sets a record, and a piece of heart (and banned from playing further… at least for that cycle) if he does it all three days. And finally for this area, there’s a heart piece in a tree that Link can get now that he’s human again.
With the Inverted Song of Time running, I had a lot of time to kill on this cycle, so Link spent a good deal of time out in Termina Field. Most of that was headed to the entrance of the Milk Road and fighting the takkuri, a big bird that made its home there. The takkuri knocks rupees loose from Link when it hits, but that’s okay because when it dies it drops more rupees than Link can hold (max 99) [1]. So, I’d take these back to the bank and come back for another round. After Link deposits 200 rupees, he gets the Adult’s Wallet, increasing his rupee capacity to 200 – still not more than the takkuri drops. I got the bank account up over 1000 this cycle, which rewarded Link with a measly 5 extra rupees in interest.
In West Clock Town, there are a couple more heart pieces Link can get now. One involves mastery of a Z-targeting swordsmanship game, cutting ten logs in half before they despawn. The second involves talking to the postman, who’s playing a game where he tries to stop at exactly 10 seconds. I used a stopwatch to help me with this, and got it on the third try, which is better luck than I usually have even with a stopwatch. (My cat was not impressed, glaring at me when I shouted in triumph.)
Next: A helping hand.
[1] I've since discovered it can steal Link's sword or a bottle, which is less okay, and I was just lucky the first several times I killed it.
