The King of Red Lions and the Sail
Link floats in the sea, after his attempt to rescue Aryll and the other girls failed. A boat pulls up alongside him, and then Link wakes to a voice calling his name. After coming to his feet, Link looks around for the source of the voice, which turns out to be the boat itself. The boat says it’s the only one that can speak human language and introduces itself as the King of Red Lions. He commends Link on his courage, but says his rescue attempt was foolhardy. He also confirms that the mysterious figure Link saw give the order to the bird to throw him into the sea is indeed Ganon – the same Ganon the Hero of Time fought before disappearing back to his own time all those years ago.
The King of Red Lions asks if Link intends to continue his quest, and offers to help him along. He says the key to defeating Ganon is locked away and will require significant effort to get. But before they can set off on their quest, the King of Red Lions needs something else – a sail so they can travel the seas. To that end, he’s brought Link to Windfall Island, where Link should be able to acquire a sail from somebody. Despite the King of Red Lions’ assertion that Link has no time to waste here, I’m sure there will be other distractions that keep Link from his true quest.
Actually getting a sail is simply a matter of finding the right guy, and realizing his odd behavior keeping Link from traveling through a certain opening is his way of directing Link to the front of his stall. There, he tells his story: he came to Windfall Island hoping to make his fortune, but lost everything but his ship’s sail in a shipwreck. No one on the island seems interested in buying the sail, so he sells it to Link for 80 rupees to help him start his business. Also, there are two parents here who have lost their daughters to Ganon and the bird: one very rich, one very not. The poor father hangs out by the docks and bothers Link about saving his daughter every time he sees him, and it gets old fast, especially when he distracts Link’s attention from other things. It’s like, dude, I sympathize, but if rescuing your daughter was easy, I’d have done it already – and assuming she’s one of the other girls in the cell with Aryll, I mean that literally.
Introductory Pictography
Most of the people on the Island greet Link kindly when he enters their homes, but there’s one who’s a little skeptical, remembering another stranger who stole his pictograph box. The Killer Bees, a group of kids who hang out in the area, tell Link that the stranger got arrested, and didn’t have the box when he left the jail. Link visits the jail, and Tingle is there. Link lets him out, and Tingle promises to be Link’s friend, giving him a sea chart with directions to his home island. He also gives Link a Tingle Tuner, which seems to be some sort of multiplayer thing that I’m glad is in my inventory because otherwise there would be a blank spot there. With Tingle gone, Link is able to explore the cell, discovering a hole in the back that leads to a series of tunnels. Eventually, Link finds his way to the room where the prisoner hid the pictograph box and claims it.
When Link takes the box back to its creator, the creator doesn’t seem to recognize it as the same box that was stolen from him, and instead assumes Link shares his love of pictography. He takes Link to see his gallery, which probably foreshadows things Link will find on his adventure – that ghost ship definitely sounds like the kind of thing that wouldn’t get mentioned if it weren’t going to come up again. He invites Link to be his apprentice, but first challenges Link to get three pictographs.
The first is of a man who’s incessantly sending love notes to his crush; the man is the one who’s very interested in the workings of the mailbox and whose default dialogue is wondering if the mail has been collected. Link needs to stand back to get a picture, because otherwise the man will enter his path and glare at him until he moves. The second is of the island’s most cowardly inhabitant, who hangs out in the cafe. Link needs to startle him and quickly take a picture while he’s still shaken up, which isn’t easy. Finally, there’s two people on the island who are interested in each other but afraid to say it, and the man wants a picture of the two of them looking at one another. One of them is the man running circles around the island, who stops to look at a woman near his path. Link gets the picture, and is awarded a Joy Pendant for his efforts.
Next: Conducting the wind.
