Journey's End

Third and final entry for theRainbowOverlord's "Champions of Hyrule" Pageant. I was supposed to work today but someone offered to cover my night shift and my roommate covered my morning shift. So I worked my behind off to finish this. Since there's still some time, I may return to this during the extension period and clean it up a bit.

The outfit she's wearing is brand new and I wanted to reflect the Great Fairy theme for her. Anthea is the spirit of the Great Fairy's Sword after all, even though it only became known as such in her story and isn't actually a fairy created weapon, whoops. But she pulls in references to the OoT/MM, WW, and BotW great fairies here. I wanted to change her hairstyle more, but when you get rid of her bangs there it just... doesn't look like her. So I kept it as is. But damn, the dress was the hardest thing to design. I went through like five or six other concepts for it but Anthea just doesn't look good in dresses. It clashes with her personality, imo. But for this dress I think it worked out well enough and she doesn't look awful, lmao. I'll probably keep this as an alternate look for her, honestly. ...So weird to see her without the black and brown of her normal outfit.

At the end of her journey Anthea is saved and restored. Link cracked her gem in their final fight, but after Ghirahim betrayed her and left her for dead she used the remainder of her power to contest him. Unfortunately he has always been stronger than her and she was kicked aside rather easily despite the fight she put up. From there she was reduced to immobility on the ground off to the side as her magic had all but leaked out of her gem. Anthea suffered through conflicting feelings as she watched Link fight and defeat Ghirahim, then worse when Demise was resurrected.

Now as to explain the picture. Anthea has fought tooth and nail since her forced partnership began. Why? To ensure she could once again serve her purpose. This drives her as a character. She wanted to fulfill her purpose and needed a master to do so. Throughout her adventure with Ghirahim, she's seen Fi help Link and guide him. She's been continually upset by that fact. Fi has tried to sway her a few times away from Ghirahim's side and she always took it out on her (and Link). Anthea thought of Fi as inferior and weak and thus never believed her attempts. It's not like she knew what it was to exist with a purpose and have no master to help fulfill it. But despite all that, at the end of her journey, Fi had served her purpose and it was acknowledged by her being sealed away.

It bothers Anthea that an "inferior" spirit who didn't have to "do anything" managed to get what she worked so hard to try and obtain. The entire time she was opposing Link and Fi, Anthea was only doing so on the promise that she'd be given a suitable master to help her serve her purpose. Not one thing she did wasn't with the intent to work towards that goal. Anthea had been so desperate that it blinded her... and she paid the price for it. So to see this spirit that only seemed to spout off information reach this end just left Anthea bitter. Why Fi? Why not her? Why did she fail when she tried so hard?

Another thing that makes her sour is the fact that technically, in the end, Anthea was the only one to not get what she wanted. Yes, Ghirahim may have been defeated as well as his Master, but he succeeded in reviving Demise and served him in battle up until then. His plan came through and he fulfilled his duty to his master (though it was short lived as mentioned). It frustrates her a lot more than she'd like to admit. This particular thing I referenced in the shape of the "background".

But while living among the Skyloftians that moved to the Surface, Anthea continually visits Fi's place of rest. She cannot get over how things ended and can sense that Fi is still around within the Master Sword. This is why she returns to the blade. She speaks about what happened, gives questions, even lashes out and the like but Fi will never respond. Anthea's there talking to the Master Sword in frustration treating Fi's presence as though she can hear her and respond. Anthea causes herself a bit of misery with this but she's always had a hard time letting go. At least she gets past blaming Fi for ruining her chances at getting a new master and taking away the only one that seemed to understand her.

Despite her new position, Anthea ends up alone, unfulfilled and miserable. She stays around out of obligation to Lorie alone. Otherwise she'd have left sooner. And unfortunately while she's thankful for Rii's companionship... that just isn't enough.


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Anthea and art (C) Me
Pose reference from Asteltainn here on dA.
Legend of Zelda and all related (C) Nintendo