From the Thrill Digger minigame, the way to the temple is fairly short: cross the fallen tower/bridge, climb a vine wall, defeat a Red ChuChu, hop across a gap, and run up a large hill with several platforms and Bokoblins to deal with along the way. At the top of the hill are three Bokoblins tossing boulders down at Link, so Link needs to pop them with the Slingshot to make them drop the rock on their head. Then it’s all the way to the top of the hill and up a short wall and Link’s in front of the dungeon entrance. The first to Mogmas Link met are out front discussing the key to the temple – it’s been broken into five pieces and scattered across the mountaintop. Also, Zelda was apparently taken into the temple. Their goal is to get the key, get into the temple, and liberate any treasure they can find – but then they realize they don’t need the key, they can just tunnel in.
Fi pops up to ask Link who he thinks the person taken into the temple is, and agrees with the guess of Zelda. She also points to the lock and says the key is probably made of the same material, so dowsing for the key is an option. The first piece of the key is buried nearby. The second piece is buried under a Bokoblin watchtower at the bottom of a hill Link can roll bombs down. Accuracy is hard because the hill is uneven, but eventually he hits it, it falls over, and he slides down to dig up the key piece. Near the top of that hill is a steam geyser Link can toss a bomb into to reveal a Goddess Cube. The third key piece is buried in a cave partway down the giant hill Link climbed to reach the top.
East of the dungeon entrance is another Bokoblin camp, complete with a watchtower that needs to be blown up to create a bridge. There’s also a Goddess Cube at the bottom of a slope. The next obstacle is another retracted bridge, and our ninja friend isn’t around to help, so Link has to work his way across by shimmying across a narrow ledge, jumping across a gap, and climbing on a vine wall. He then comes to a cave that’s too hot for him to stay in long, but it’s okay, he only needs to pass through en route to a large hill he slides down. The fourth piece of the key is found about halfway down the slope, across a jump that requires timing two steam geysers to cross. The fifth is in a cave at the bottom, and requires blowing up a lava plug and rolling a bomb across a hill without it falling into the lava at the bottom of the hill to get. There’s a large steam geyser at the bottom that sends him back to before the hot cave, which is nice because there was a Goddess Cube on the slope.
Once again, there’s a bird statue outside the dungeon, so this is a good opportunity to return to the sky and take care of stuff. Of the six Goddess Cubes Link found in the Eldin region, four corresponding chests can be claimed right now. The fifth is in an area of Skyloft Link can’t get to yet, and the sixth is nowhere to be found. The rewards are 400 rupees, a medal to be stored in the Adventure Pouch that makes treasure appear more often, and another small Seed Satchel. And… maybe it’s still early in the game and it’ll get better, but I have to say, the sky is boring. There’s Skyloft, the Lumpy Pumpkin, a couple minigames (one of which isn’t open for business yet), and bunch of floating rocks that only get interesting when Link finds something on the surface. And flying is tedious – the only obstacles are occasional tornados, but you need to watch the controls to keep the Loftwing from stalling. This comes from someone whose favorite element is air and would choose flight as his one and only superpower (I mean, I wouldn’t say no to Storm’s full suite of powers, but if I had to choose one thing – flight). And they’ve just about lost me on this. Like, take all the complaints about Wind Waker’s sailing, only they’re accurate [1].
Between the treasure medal and the Thrill Digger minigame, now’s also a good time to farm treasure and rupees and build up gear. Link can upgrade Seed Satchels to max size (adding 30 to a base 20); I only did one because I wish I hadn’t even bought the others, which will languish in item check forevermore. He can also improve his Iron Shield to a Reinforced Shield. From Beedle, he can buy the third and final extra wallet (total current capacity: 1400 = 500 + 300 × 3), two more Adventure Pouch upgrades (total capacity: 8, which seems to be the maximum), the Bug Medal that shows the locations of bugs on the map, and the Life Medal that adds an extra heart to Link's lifeline. The last thing Beedle has for sale is a heart piece for 1600 rupees, more than Link can currently afford. With that, it’s time to configure an Adventure Pouch loadout (3 bottles with Heart Potion, Treasure Medal, Life Medal, Bug Medal, Big Seed Satchel, and the Reinforced Shield – so I’m not making tradeoffs yet, but I know they’re coming) and head back to Eldin to tackle the Earth Temple.
Next: If this is an earth dungeon, I’d hate to see a fire one.
[1] Ironically, the one complaint I personally have about Wind Waker’s sailing [2] – naval combat isn’t fun – doesn’t apply here, although the total lack of aerial combat is somehow not an improvement.
[2] This does not include having to pay thousands of rupees to Tingle to be able to complete the game.
