Gerudo - Blog Posts

Please pm me. I would love to rp LOZ with someone!

Link, coming back from the gerudo desert: If I had a rupee for every time I had to rescue a gerudo from heat exhaustion by giving them something they were craving, I’d have two rupees. Which isn’t a lot, but it’s weird that it happened twice.

Okay so I have a lot of thoughts about the whole thing of the Gerudo being a race of entirely women, with the only exception being one man born every hundred years, and that man automatically being their king. Now this worldbuilding comes from Ocarina of Time, and there's obviously a metric fuckton of unfortunate implications there, because it was 1998. And it seems that Tears of the Kingdom is sticking with the lore of Gerudo men being extremely rare and becoming the King of their people, which once again has a metric fuckton of unfortunate implications because it's 2023 and Nintendo has somehow gotten even worse about this shit.

But let's set aside the whole... everything, and look at this from just the in-universe perspective. How does it work? I mean, it's pretty clear that there is no overlap between the kings; the old ones are normally long gone by the time a new one is born, but the Gerudo manage to take care of themselves during the hangtime. So they must have an established system of government and leadership that doesn't involve a king, and somehow that system is set up in a way that does a smooth transfer of power once a new king is born and old enough to take the throne. But why bother always declaring a random guy to be your King when you already have a perfectly functional system in place?

I mean again, the whole thing has a lot of sexist implications, but we're not looking at this from a real world context, we're examining it in-universe. And we could just go the lazy route and say that their king is in charge just because he's the only man, but I don't like that. I mean come on, the Gerudo are a race of entirely women, and most of their outside problems come from Hylian men being creepy about it. They are entirely a matriarchy; there is literally no reason for their culture to have an inherent respect for men, even if the man in question is one of them. And they're desert people; they live in an extremely harsh and dangerous landscape, if they don't have their shit together, they will die. By sheer necessity, their culture needs to put a lot of value in being practical, because if they're stupid about things, people die. They really can't afford to have a shitty leader take over, and just letting some guy take the wheel doesn't really fit with the way their culture must otherwise work.

So again, why the fuck do they bother having a King?

I think it's mainly just a ceremonial position. Yes, if the guy is a good leader he'll be in charge, but if he isn't good at being a King or isn't interested in the job... fuck it, they've already got a functional government system that's been leading their people the whole time, why fix what isn't broken? The title of Gerudo King isn't about leadership or power. I think it's more about belonging. Because the Gerudo are a culture where every single one of them can be defined in the same way... and there is exactly one exception once a century. Men are considered to be inherently outsiders at the best of times, and more often they're enemies. A man born into this culture is a natural outsider; he is completely unique, and that means he doesn't really fit into his community. And well... when someone is fundamentally different from the rest of their community, they tend to be ostracized.

So I think that's why the position of Gerudo King exists. It isn't about them needing or even wanting a man to lead them. The title of King doesn't need to involve any leadership at all. It's about giving the man born every century a place in their society. It's a way of saying yes, you are one of us, you are a Gerudo, you belong here, you are wanted and you are loved.

The Gerudo know that every hundred years, one of their children will be fundamentally different from all of his peers. And so their society is built to ensure that a child who is completely different from them will still be loved and accepted. He will always have a place in their society. He doesn't need to earn their love, he has it just for existing. These are his people.

The title of Gerudo King isn't an inherent position of authority. It's a promise of acceptance.

love it when half awake thoughts are actually pretty cool ideas

so in a lot of legend of zelda fanworks and aus i've found, the creator has link speaking in sign language which is pretty cool in my opinion

But that's got me thinking; what about the other denizens of Hyrule? Not all languages on earth use a universal sign language, so i imagine with such exaggerated diversity (completely different species) in Hyrule, they wouldn't either. Therefore I have come up with some vague-ish ideas of what the other peoples of Hyrule might use as a method of nonverbal communication. I'm using Breath of the Wild/Tears of the Kingdom as the base for this.

also note I'm not versed in sign language at all, so there will be mistakes.

I'll start simple, Gerudo.

The Gerudo people are most similar to Hylians in appearance, both are basically humans though they are treated as a different 'species' as far as I can tell. But it still makes sense to me that their sign would be most similar to Hylian sign, just some words might get a bit lost in translation.

Next up, Gorons.

Due to their bulkier appearance and larger hands, their sign might include their arms more prominently. Certain motions and swings might be dangerous for the other species, but other Gorons would be able to take an accidental hit. They do still use their hands and fingers, but less so than the more human-like species, and the motions would be more like a game of charades.

My favorite, Rito.

Due to their fingers also being feathers, Rito use their feet by tapping their claws, clenching toes, or stomping. For more complicated words they lower their wings so their feather-fingers are in view of the person already looking down and combine motions alongside their feet. Rito sign isn't very common however due to the difficulty of standing, signing, and focusing on what they're even trying to say without stumbling. It's even more difficult to understand while in the air. Only those with impeccable balance even bother unless necessary.

And finally, Zora.

If you look at the Zora's design, their gills are along/near the latissimus dorsi, an easy place to see both on land and in water. Due to this and how water can get extremely dark the further you dive, I imagine it would be pretty cool if the Zora could activate some sort of bioluminescence in their gills to flash in sequences similar to morse code. This would make it easy to see even underwater, and the ability to essentially shut the light off would keep them safe from underwater threats. This idea also comes from how I think it would be difficult to verbally communicate underwater and while swimming at fast speeds.

Like I said, I've limited this to botw/totk for simplicity's sake, but I know there's all sorts of different species in the other games, so it might be cool to explore their nonverbality one day.

More gerudo

I do art sometimes.

Nabooru!! This was originally going to be a design for my AU, but I'm already too obsessed with her original design in OoT.lonlonmilkfan

Some pre-Hyrule Ganondorfs. I wonder sometimes if he was good to his people.

I've seen your dragons! Oh so lovely and nice, good art and all! And ive seen you do others in dragon forms, Zelda, that shadow girl I can't remember her name(srry) and I wondered... what would other species look like as dragons? Gorons, gurudo, the bird people and fish people. I'd say it be interesting to see it all!

DRAGONS DRAGONS DRAGONS

A bunch of dragons based off of not-so-unfamiliar people :))

Holy moly, Okay, I finally found the origin of my TLOZ AU idea, it all started with my spooky little skull kid / kokiri (skullori) idea. I imagine after some time there would be blended variations or kokiri would eventually have to be tougher. See that little spike knee bracer? He totally stole it from Ganondorf and is going home to show all of his friends. Then above is some early concept designs for zurudo people (they're so unpolished ;w; ) also I had to sensor my name on these before I did my little MA signature. I hope peeps can trust me on that that these are in fact my drawings and all that but I really didn't want to leave these unshared today <3

Some more older art from 2020 that has been going on in my TLOZ AU, what an average zurudo woman looks like. Maybe sometime I'll redo this since I was really trying to dive into doing traditional color with marker and colored penil.

A windwaker AU I've thought up where a portion of the Zora are left behind in Hyrule as Ganon takes over before the great flood. Their culture and the gerudo's blend and their tribes become one. Even the evolution of 'the silent princess' flower takes a turn thanks to the magical influence of the legendary Twin Rovas. The culture freely practices magic and always known the sky to wave.

Linktober day Four!! I know Urbosa technically doesn't count as a sage but Gerudo Sages are amazing

Tbh I would love to see a Zelda game where the main group in charge ISN'T the Hyrule royal family. Like, how cool would a game be if the Zora royal family or Gerudo, or maybe even Rito was centered, because I mostly feel like all of the races' leaders (mostly pre calamity) are just puppeted by the Hylian royal family - and be damned if they do ANYTHING that could be seen as a threat against the hylian royal family.

I get that they're all united under Hyrule, however that doesn't stop me from feeling like there's no point in having the leaders of all the races if they're all united under HYRULE (it's OWN kingdom). Kind of like having the biggest kid on the playground coming up to you and telling you that you're part of his group now and how he's your friend, however, when the time comes to have your own autonomy after him micromanaging your actions, he just interprets it as being a threat.

Especially since (at least in botw/pre calamity) neither the elders of the Sheikah, Goron or Rito, the Gerudo chief, or even the royal Zora family have much authority over the other races as the Hylian royal family does.

Rating how comfortable all the beds in botw look

PART THREE

Side note - wow, 2 posts in one day?? anyways, I've been thinking about writing a fic that's been on my mind lately and posting it here

Rito Village Bed 2

8/10 - would recommend

◍Comfy

◍Cute

◍would still smell like bird seed (bird food 👁️👁️) tho

◍Reliable bedframe

Cabin beds

3/10 - would recommend if desperate

◍Safety issue because random ass people could just walk in at any time

◍would be warm and cozy, though

◍Cute bedsheets but NOT fresh

◍Smells like sweat and mud

◍Bed bug and lice breeding ground

Korok Bed

100000/10 - WOULD ALWAYS RECOMMEND

◍PERFECT BED

◍10/10

◍FREE

◍THANK YOU PEPP

Gerudo Town Bed

9/10 - would highly recommend

◍Firm but comfortable mattress

◍bedsheets always fresh

◍A gerudo would realistically be able to fit on here

◍only one point deduction because of no duvet

Riju's Bed

0/10 - would not wish on my worst enemy

◍It's not that the bed itself is uncomfortable, it's actually the best bed in gerudo town

◍but omg if Buliara catches you

◍start praying

◍seriously

◍she would kill you in your sleep, no hesitation

◍very small though, so definitely did not belong to Urbosa or Ganondorf

◍rijus bed would be like a goddamn footrest to Ganondorf

Isn't he like 10'5 in totk? Nobody tell me, I don't want spoilers pls 😭😭

Princess Zelda's Bed

0/10 - would not recommend in the slightest

◍It's broken.

◍Why would you want to sleep on a broken bed??

◍Unless you want a silver moblin bestie, don't.

◍Just dont.