A few minutes later Link marched into the warrior's abode. Most of the warriors were asleep. The rest were either drunk or lazing about. At first he was not noticed, but after one elbowed another, he was. He met the anger coolly and waited. Before long the centurion marched in at the behest of a messenger, walked right up to Link, and slapped Link to the floor. Link spit out blood and rubbed his jaw. The blasted fish's skin was like sandpaper.

"You dare return after attacking one of our own!?" The centurion hissed in Qin's tongue.

'Careful.' Link reminded himself. He could not lose his temper or lose control of his tongue, not at least do so and hope to make it out of this. He needed to speak as Prise told him to. "Yes." Link said. "I attacked one of your men -err- warriors. I bit off a piece of his shoulder. He was drunk and crude and insulted my pride. So I took it back."

It was naturally a half-lie. Link did feel his pride insulted, but the trigger was seeing an innocent person hurt. Unfortunately these Zora understood pride, but would not be able to relate to the latter.

The centurion scoffed. "So you did." He looked to another warrior. Link recognized him as the one he bit. The Zora was clutching his shoulder where he was bandaged in a skin. "Is it true, were you dishonourable?"

The warrior in question replied in Zora-tongue, and Link could not understand the conversation any further. But he could tell by the warrior's hint of fear and hesitation, that he was either lying or caught in a lie or was making excuses for some part of this.

When the centurion rounded on the warrior and roared in his face, Link knew it was working. These people's currency was blood and honor. The warrior backed down. The centurion returned to speaking in the tongue of Qin, "He will have to live with the dishonour of challenging and losing to a child-huma. Your duel is accepted as a victory, such as it was. However... I cannot merely allow this taint to go without recompense. It was not a sanctioned duel, despite your response to insult. Two lashings for you."

'Great.' Link sighed. He despaired of the lashings, but hoped that he had drawn the attention of the matter away from Ruto.

"Is that alright with you, Siren?" The centurion asked. Link looked up to see Prise and Ruto were both in the entrance. Ruto yawned inside her face-clamp and rubbed her head sleepily.

Prise nodded.

Link did not resist as warriors took him and put him up against the wall. Warriors presented the centurion with a whip, and they tore his shirt. Everyone gasped, and Ruto squeaked in horror.

"Have you already whipped him?" Prise asked.

"I-no. I haven't." The centurion replied. Link turned around to note the centurion's surprise and shock.

"Have you now? Because that was not there before when he arrived. It looks to me like you have already made an example out of him." Prise walked up and touched Link's back. Link hissed in pain as the Siren dug a finger directly into a wound. "The blood is fresh, and the scabbing has only started."

A few of the warriors whispered amongst each other. Openly shocked, the centurion yelled something in Zora, then said in Qin, "Boy, did you sneak in and whip yourself?!"

"Why in the realms would a huma child whip himself?" Prise asked in reply. He looked around the room and spoke in Zora.

The talk was brief, and after he had spoken, the warriors looked to each other and backed down. The centurion nodded and handed off his whip. The warriors who held Link up let him go. Link rubbed his shoulders, for they had lifted him off the ground by his shoulders.

Ruto immediately rushed to his side and stopped. From how close she was to touching his back, as well as the open horror and fear in her eyes, she wanted to touch his back but at the same time didn't want to hurt him. It was quite a dilemma. Ironically, seeing it amused him. Link laughed. "Princess, I am okay! I'm okay! I mean, it hurts like Din fire, but it's all good now. Right?" He asked Prise. "Did you actually use your Gift on them?"

"No." Prise replied. "I reasoned with them. We Zora are prideful and divided, but we still are capable of reason."

"No offense, but that is a side I have yet to see."

"You did start off in seeing our culture poorly." Prise smiled. "Not the best first impression from either side."

"I tend to do that..." Link sighed.

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So the year passed quickly.

Link took some time to recover, but before long he was recovered and returned to his training. The scars diminished, leaving behind only a shadow of their former form. He trained with anything and everything he could get a hold of. He ran, he lifted rocks, he swung practice weapons, and he swam. Ruto taught him to swim when there was no one at an underground pool. He found it to be amazing fun and the sound of her laughter was infectious. She also seemed to develop a fever, as she was always changing color and was anxious... but only around him for some reason. He stayed attention incase she collapsed from the disease.

Between the constant exercise and the return of his bursting energy, Link developed physically. The swimming reached muscles he never knew he had, and he reached the age where his body started to grow quickly. He worked where he could help, extending himself to everyone he could when he wasn't training, provided they didn't give him poor looks. It seemed no matter the nation, race, or culture, there were racists.

Before long he started challenging the warriors to duels. They took him up on the challenge eagerly. They saw him as weak, and they were not far off. Zora were naturally developed to be very strong and fast. Link was defeated every time for the first several months.

Link learned quickly how the Zora fought, and his developing body surprised them. The centurion most of all noticed and became wary. No one truly believed it possible, but Link defeated his first warrior four months in. It was not even close. Link learned how to fight with his feet in water, and developed a strong, stable core muscle structure, and his lower foundation became solid as stone (in comparison to where he started). Combined with his daily training, his experience from multiple battles and years of training with Midna; once he passed the first massive obstacle of fighting the Zora, Linked dominated.

Link would challenge warrior after warrior until it was almost a daily routine. At times Link would lose, but the loss was always close and he would return the next day and win with little effort.

Unlike the warriors who made no effort to train or learn to fight beyond the basics, the centurion was a trained warrior... and seeing Link train every day inspired the officer to keep up himself. At least for the sake of his pride.

Once Link was done with every other warrior, he challenged the centurion. He would lose. Each time he would lose. At times he would need to recover, but each battle was so close it was effectively a stalemate. The other Zora heard of it and the daily duels between the huma Link and the centurion became an almost spectated sport complete with betting and crowds. Link was not fast with his feet in water up to his shin, in fact he moved like an armoured turtle, and he was not as strong as the Zora, but he had vast experience for his age and was scarily adaptive and intuitive. He almost seem to have a sixth sense just for fighting, able to discern attacks from blindspots and at times seem to know just before an attack was coming.

For Link was not just training his body, but meditated on his Gift. Link remembered the feeling behind his power when it was used and he worked to replicate it, to repeat it, to learn it and master it. Or at the very least he wanted to access his Gift at will, rather than being spoonfed by Farore, as he had no way of knowing if she would save him every time. It was frustratingly difficult for him, and he may have yelled and screamed and ranted and been highly volatile more than a few times with the struggle.

He took it out on Ruto once, and apologized later after making her cry. She was a constant source of encouragement, friendship, and familiarity he depended on. Most of the time she just watched or went about her usual tasks, being unable to talk openly. After he defeated a number of warriors, though, he was relieved to see the Zora treated her less poorly with him near. He didn't take kindly to how she was treated otherwise and stuck to her. Her bruises lessened, her sadness lessened, and her fears also lessened. It helped that he regularly took a break to talk in peace and quiet. He found it relaxing, and it brought her comfort and strength from her plight. It became a routine she seemed to depend on, and he may have (maybe) not always wanted to, but he kept it up for her sake. He would have wanted someone to be there for him to let him have the freedom to express himself, were he in her position.

So it was that one day Link learned to tap into his Gift, if only for seconds at a time in short bursts. He could slow time and even reverse it by a few seconds. It gave him the control he needed to keep up with the centurion, and though it would rank the Zora's pride heavily, Link held back towards the end of the year.

When the end of the year was upon them, Link remembered his promise to return to Qin. He challenged the centurion one final time, and, using his full potential, knocked him on his butt with ease. The entire room was quiet in shock, even the centurion was openly gaping while looking up at the teenager that bested him. No one said a word as Link bowed, picked up the scabbard for Midna, placed the sword on his side, thanked Len for always taking care of him, and left.

Link swam out of the Zora underwater cave to the surface and laughed joyfully, even maddeningly, to see the sun again. His skin had grown incredibly pale with a lack of sun, while before his skin was deeply tanned from constant sunlight. He was almost unrecognizable now. His hair was longer, his body was taller and built. He stepped out of the water and noted that he would need new clothes, as his height had rocketed up, leaving his clothes short in comparison, and it was full of holes and cuts. What he wore could barely be considered clothes anymore.

Link left, only stopping long enough to turn and see Ruto from the lake. He didn't need to be close to know she was quietly crying his departure. She knew he would leave at this time, and he did too. But it made it no less hard. He had hoped to leave quietly, but girls... He sighed.

Link yelled, "Take care of yourself, Princess! Don't let those shitters do what they want with you! You're stronger than them! Also, keep your ears out. Next time you hear of me, I'll be a general! So you better not let me down, and let me hear that the princess of Zora has gone soft! If I do I'll come back and kick your ass!" He saw her nod in the distance, and he turned his back and left more confidently.

With the promised year passed, Link headed back to the capital.