Before entering the Temple of Droplets, there are three heart pieces Link can get in the Lake Hylia area with the flippers. One is hidden in a pond by Stockwell’s house, and another on a patch of land Link can swim to. The third is in a dojo, whose master, Waveblade, teaches Link the next sword attack, the Peril Beam: Link can shoot sword beams when he’s down to a single heart. There’s also a Minish in the area link can fuse Kinstones with, causing a beanstalk to grow in a currently inaccessible part of the area. After that, it’s time to check out the temple entrance. It’s an ice structure with a hole resembling the ones in the portals Link uses to shrink, and sure enough, that’s exactly what Link needs to do to enter the dungeon.
The inside of the Temple of Droplets isn’t any warmer; Ezlo complains about the cold, then warns Link about how slippery the ice is. The way south is locked off to start, so Link heads north, where there’s a couple of puzzles involving opening trap doors to bring sunlight into the dungeon, then push an ice block with a key frozen inside into the light so it melts. The first one’s fairly simple, but the second is considerably more complicated. The second puzzle does reward the Big Key, however, allowing Link to head to the south, where he finds the Water Element, only it’s encased in a huge ice block with no apparent way to get it out. There’s also an Octorok (who appears giant, but that’s only because Link is tiny here) frozen below it, so obviously it’s not going to be a simple matter of unfreeze the element and go home. There’s a door to the southwest, which is the only avenue available to continue exploring.
Most of this path involves riding a lily pad over a waterfall, then using it to explore the watery areas in the basement. Madderpillar shows up again on this path, and while it hasn’t gotten any harder itself, the fact that Link has to fight it on slippery ice, while blocks make it hard for him to move between the boss’ head and tail make the fight longer than the original one. Near the end, there’s a room where Link finds himself in darkness, but he can’t do anything about it just yet. Then, after a fight with three Scissors Beetles, Link comes back to the element room, with a large switch it takes summoning a duplicate to push open. Once opened, the sun shines in on the east half of the element’s ice block and Octorok, and melts the ice block blocking the way to the southeast.
On the second path, Link finds himself up against the dungeon’s actual miniboss, a Large Blue ChuChu. The ChuChu’s electric aura didn’t seem to add anything to the fight, but the hitbox for sucking the jelly out of its base seemed smaller, or harder to hit at any rate, and after a couple rounds of knocking it over, it hopped around practically nonstop for a minute, so it was a harder fight than its green cousin. When it dies, it leaves behind a treasure chest containing a Flame Lantern. It differs from the Lamp from A Link to the Past in that it needs to be equipped to an item slot and activated to give light, and it stays on until deactivated or removed from the item slot. While active, it can melt ice, light torches, and damage certain enemies by proximity. Other notable encounters on this path include an icy room with nine torches which stay lit barely long enough for Link to slide his way across the ice to each of them, and a dark fight against two Madderpillars that is still easier than the fight against just one earlier.
When Link reaches the end and flips the switch to open the other half of the element room’s roof, the ice blocks containing the element and Octorok both melt. The Octorok snarfs up the element and runs off to the south, as everybody but Ezlo saw coming. The fight against the Big Octorok has two alternating phases. In the first, the Octorok spits rocks at Link, tries to snarf him up, and charges into the wall knocking rocks loose from the ceiling. Link needs to bounce the rocks the Octorok spits back at it to start the second phase, which is where the Lantern comes in. The room freezes over, but this brings the Octorok’s tail within reach of the lantern so Link can set it on fire. The rock deflection phase can be frustrating, because it’s generally dangerous to stand in front of the Octorok’s snout, but that’s exactly where Link needs to be to reflect the rocks. The third time the rock phase comes up, the Octorok gains one additional attack: sucking the light out of the room. After it’s hit a few more times, it dies, finally allowing Link to claim the Water Element.
As Link leaves the dungeon, the spirit of an old King of Hyrule contacts him, telling Link to seek him out to open the path. He marks his location on Link’s map and vanishes. Before Link can investigate that, however, he needs to upgrade his sword. The palace guards won’t let him in, so he needs to sneak in through the garden and dungeon, but once inside, he makes his way to the Elemental Sanctuary, sets the third element on its pedestal, and the Two Sword becomes the Three Sword. Also in the garden, Link can visit the dark dojo and light it up so he can learn to shoot sword beams at full health from Grimblade.
Next: Ghosts in the graveyard.
