Link uses the sailcloth to avoid landing in a bloody heap, and Fi pops out to officially welcome him to the surface world. Link has landed in an area known as the Sealed Grounds, which have a helical hill leading down to a seal at the center. Link starts making his way down the hill and is attacked by a couple Deku Babas, and here the motion control swordplay becomes important. The Babas open their mouths parallel to the ground or perpendicular to the ground, and Link needs to slash along the opening to damage them. The vertical Babas were little trouble, but the horizontal ones usually took a few tries – I think I tend to tilt the Wiimote as I swing so it interprets the slash as diagonal, which bounces off the Baba’s hide. At least, I assume that's what I'm doing wrong.
Link jumps off a ledge and the sky turns threatening. Link looks down at the center, where black smoke is coming out of the seal. Link has a vision of the black worm coming out of the seal and eating him; it passes, but the black smoke is still coming. He makes his way down the hill, and as he approaches the seal, a voice speaks to him, telling him to use a Skyward Strike to hit the pillar [1] at the center. Link does so, and the pillar glows with light as the black smoke subsides, and the seal returns to its natural state. Steam geysers pop up all over the hill, which Fi pops up to note.
Fi also says she’s sensing an aura similar to that on the sailcloth Zelda gave Link nearby, and teaches him to seek out auras via dowsing, which is basically an addition to the camera free-look mode. Link detects the aura up the hill and uses the steam geysers and sailcloth to make it back up the hill, and near the point where Link noticed that the seal at the bottom was weakening, a door’s seal stops glowing, allowing Link to open the door and enter.
Inside the Sealed Temple, Link finds an old woman sitting in the spot where the sun shines through the temple’s roof. She has been waiting for Link for a long time, and his mastery of the Skyward Strike indicates that he is the destined bearer of the Goddess Sword. Zelda arrived at the temple before Link did, but she wasn’t supposed to fall from a black tornado – the work of some evil power trying to disrupt what Link and Zelda are meant to do. Right now, that destiny led Zelda to Faron Woods, and Link needs to follow her. The woman teaches Link to create his own beacons on the map. She tells Link there’s a treasure chest which has a useful item and unlocks the temple door leading in to Faron Woods. The item in the treasure chest is a bottle full of Revitalizing Potion, which can repair damage to a shield and restore four hearts.
Not far down the road into the woods, Link finds a Goron being pestered by a bunch of Bokoblins, and jumps to the rescue. The Bokoblins… I think they’re blocking with their swords so Link’s supposed to have to attack from a different direction, but I came in with the Wiimote flailing and they all took hits and eventually died. The Goron thanks Link for the rescue and introduces himself as Gorko, an archaeologist researching the woods. To him, Skyloft is a legend known as the Isle of the Goddess. He points out a nearby bird statue, apparently one of many in the woods. This one is apparently a master statue that can activate others nearby.
After checking to make sure Link’s interested, Gorko talks about what the texts say about the Isle of the Goddess: people actually live there, using huge birds to get around. They worship the goddess, and have a perfect, conflict-free society. Well… pretty good, up till that last bit. Gorko’s descriptions go a bit into the fantastical, talking about buildings made of gold and a mystical river that grants eternal life, but Link continues to indulge his beliefs about his home. Gorko eventually runs out of things to say, so Link approaches the statue, which glows to life, to Gorko’s astoundment.
Next: Fi, quit scaring the Kikwis.
[1] In my introduction I said the Imprisoned has a sword stuck in its head. In Hyrule Warriors, I never really got a good look at it, and apparently, when you’re more concerned with fighting the boss than examining the thing stuck in its head, a triangular prism can look a lot like a flat blade.
