After months of not touching my save file in Breath of the Wild, I decided to spend an hour or so playing the game before turning off the lights and going to sleep. I didn’t have a plan or goal really since I finished the game years ago, I simply wandered across Hyrule to enjoy the views and maybe discover another hidden Korok I had missed. I never replayed the game so there’s not much left to discover after hundreds of hours of gameplay, but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t spots that make me stop and think. Deya Village Ruins is one of those places.
Deya Village Ruins is located in beautiful West Necluda, in between hilltops and a giant, hollow tree trunk lying against the grass. Before the Calamity struck Hyrule and its people, the village must have been a really pretty place to live in. All that the player and Link gets to see, though, is the remains of the village; broken houses, abandoned wagons, and a well that looks relatively good considering it must have been a hundred years since someone last looked after it. In a way, Deya Village Ruins looks similar to other abandoned villages scattered across this post-apocalyptic Hyrule, but it’s the location which puzzles me a tiny bit.
I know what we see in the game must surely have looked very different when people used to live in all the currently empty villages. Yet Deya Village Ruins is located inside Deya Lake and the rotting wood is sinking slowly into the water. It makes me wonder why someone thought it was a good idea to build a village inside a lake. Surely, it must be easier to build a home on the surrounding hills instead? If anyone used to live outside of the water, there’s no evidence left to hint that.
With the current condition of the village, there’s little left to show who used to live in there and the place is mostly filled with various animals or monsters now. But if Link has time to explore the ruins, he’ll find treasure chests with an opal, 50 rupees, and weapons such as arrows, a Phrenic bow and an Eightfold Blade. If they’ve remained in the village since it was abandoned, I think the items tell that the village had at least a little bit of defense and maybe some treasured valuables as well. There’s a road nearby which links to Central Hyrule, with Hyrule Castle and eastern Necluda, and connects to Kakariko Village and Hateno Village. It’s not too far-fetched for me to imagine that Deya Village was a nice spot to do some trade. Since the Phrenic Bow and the Eightfold Blade are crafted by the Sheikah, I believe I might be right.
If you have the Champions’ Ballad DLC pack for the game, Link can find one of the great thief Misko’s journal entries. If you know of Misko, you can be sure that he has some great tresures to be found across Hyrule. In Deya Village Ruins, Misko’s journal will hint where Link needs to go to find some cool outfits, or “priceless relics” as he calls them. If Link figures out where they’re hidden, he’ll find a beautiful hood with purple bunny ears, an odd-looking helmet, another blue tunic (but with a fun nautical print instead of Link’s burden-heavy Champion’s tunic), and an outfit fit for a(n evil) king. Finding them is definitely worth it if you’ve played older Zelda games and can recognize who these relics used to belong to.
While there’s not much to see or do in Deya Village Ruins because of the state it’s in, I still think it’s a great place in the game which makes me really stop and wonder what happened a hundred years prior. Some have criticized Breath of the Wild for its lack of story, but it’s places like this which makes me appreciate the game so much. Sometimes, it’s good to let the player’s surroundings tell the story too.
Oh, and finding cute, hidden Korok’s at such an empty place like Deya Village Ruins definitely makes it easy to apprecite the game as well.
