(I play a game every Sunday and write what happens inaccurately. Currently I'm playing through Majora's Mask. See previous parts here.)
Last time, we ventured through a swamp to find an old lady witch in need and an boat cruise we hadn’t been on, so let’s fix both those things, in that order!
The old witch wants something to replenish her energy, so my thought was, naturally, we need to head back into town to find somehow to buy a bottle of health juice or something? Right? That’s logical.
…I think we found the most roundabout way to get a bottle in the world, folks! Stick around and let me tell you a tale.
When I get back to town, it’s night, so most of the shops are closed, which isn’t a great start. So I wander around and find the back-entrance to the inn. Which is always fun.
Not all agree.
But these boys don’t seem to mind me barging in and standing rudely on their table as they play cards.
I’m with them.
I wander a bit more around, and am just about to leave when, nearby the kitchen, I find a little attic with—
Aaah! What the fuck is that?!
Okay, the spooky hand wants paper. Well, I don’t’ have any paper, spooky hand, so leave me be.
The hand leaves me be, and I think up the next best place to get something rejuvenating: The Great Fairy! She can heal me, why not an old lady?
Oh, right, I rewound time, so now the Fairy is fucked again. Spend two minutes unfucking her and she’s pretty pleased.
Link, however, is not. Let me present to you, one of Link’s many great expressions:
I call this the “put-me-the-fuck-down-mom-im-13”-look.
Anyways, she also tells me important lore: It’s apparently 4 Stray Fairies that are trapped in each corner of the world, so now we need to go assemble them, like we did this one. And to help:
A Fairy Mask…
It’s just Link’s style. I think she hit it perfectly.
All right, that was also a bust. Next up, shops, proper. There’s a trading post, that oughta have what we need.
Fairy! That sounds good! I’ll take—Oh I need an empty bottle?
And you… don’t sell those?
Right. Well, tell your Boss that you’re missing a key business opportunity there. I have money. I’m willing to pay anyone in this town for an empty bottle. But no one is willing to sell one to me.
Dejected, I find the only person willing to talk to me in the street: A Bomber’s Gang kid. Who, now that I’m not a Deku, is apparently willing to tell me something.
He’s willing to tell me the Bomber’s Guide to Their Notebook, presented here in image form:
(Yes, that Dawn stinger literally appeared right as I was done talking to him, which gave that a pretty ominous undertone.)
All right, another bust. Let’s go to the top: The Mayor’s House. He’ll know what to do.
Oh, right, they’re still in their squabble and the Mayor’s all like
So, no, he’s no help. But Link’s not above a little sneaking around the Mayor’s Residence to find dirt, and what have we here!
A diary! Don’t mind if I do!
A wedding? With someone named Anju? Ok, noted. And a mask too, that’s probably something I can stea—I mean borrow.
But no bottles in the Mayor’s Residence, either, so almost out of ideas I have one final one: The two brothers at the ranch were selling milk. They MUST include a bottle in that sale.
I run south out of town again, but just before I make the turn to Gorman’s Track, I notice an absence of something big:
The boulder is gone! It’s the final day! The boy cleared it in three days! Good job boy!
That you did. I hope this was the song that played in your
head, in the meantime.
So, let’s go check out this Romani Ranch while we’re here, eh? Maybe they have bottles.
But then, the Cutscene Operator decides that there’s something more important:
MY horse??!?
Excuse me! So the game has decided, without my consent, that I have a horse.
I do not have a horse.
Link runs up to the strange creature and it whinnies a bit and then I’m given control again. It’s still behind bars and I can’t get to it.
All right, let’s just walk away and ignore that that ever happened…
Are you okay?
What if I put on this mask?
No? Okay. Well, worth a shot.
I go in the barn and there’s someone else:
Okay, seems like there’s some problems at this ranch. Meanwhile, the music has also cut out and all we hear is the rumbling of the moon, inching closer to the surface.
Oh. You lost all your cows? Did they fall down canyons, too? (this is an Ocarina reference)
But I’m on a deadline that’s getting really close so I hustle into the main house, where there’s some people too.
Oh, a ceremony? Wait…
Oh, shit. Anju? That’s… the one from wedding the diary talked about. She’s the…. Huh.
Okay, okay game. Damn.
Things are pretty grim here at the Ranch, gotta say.
Pretty much every person is crying or desperate. And meanwhile, the world is ending.
Let me just be clear. While the rumbling of the moon is getting ever louder and the final hours are approaching, while everyone around me is crying as their livelihood is destroyed and marriages are broken apart, I, Courage Incarnate, am searching for a bottle of fucking milk.
And look here:
Bottles! Ripe for the taking! But, Link suddenly had to grow a conscience now!
But yeah, this is a little too much for poor lil’ Link to handle, so…
Retry!
I never got to the Gorman’s to buy their milk so…
Oh. All my money’s gone. Apparently rewinding time also empties my pockets. (Except for all my items…)
So I run around bushes a bit until I get 50 rupees and then go down to the Ranch:
Yes, please!
OH YOU F---
Of course. I should’ve known.
Apparently everyone in this world already has empty bottles, except Link.
So, I ask Ruto (this means looking it up online).
And apparently… the other Witch sells it. In the Potion Shop.
In the Swamp.
Back to the swamp, and a hop and a skip and
Wait, hold on, now even the guide is lying to me?
But no, it’s right. But apparently I need to first talk to the witch who’s hurt. Because I rewound time, remember? So Link apparently is incapable of saying her sister is hurt until he’s just confirmed it for himself again. Great.
Run out through the woods, run back, finally get the bottle (for free, too!), run back out the woods and hand it over.
Either, this means that Link forgets what he did every time we rewind, which must mean this is a very confusing experience for him, or he just doesn’t want to say it until he’s seen her again, in which case he’s just cruel.
But I hand over the bottle of orange juice and she is rejuvenated
Oh, are you now? Well, that’s what I’m here for in the first place! You could’ve just said so!
I’m so ready for the boat!
And just as I head out the woods again, the monkeys from before surround me.
Yeah, they are strange. Thank you for noticing.
So, your brother went to the temple above the waterfall, and got captured, and now he’s in the palace? That’s too much geography for me, you have to find someone else.
Oh, well, when you put it like that…
I guess we’re going on a boat cruise AND rescuing a monkey! Phew. That was a surprisingly long episode for what can be summarized as: We found bottle, we gave bottle away.
Hope you didn’t come here for clean, efficient gameplay!
Read part 6 here.