Since I love Skyward Sword, I thought I’d try and integrate the Zonai with the Skyloftians! Here’s some doodles of Link, Zelda, and a little bit of Groose.
The plot would begin in much the same way, I think. Link traveling the world and meeting the dragons trying to find Zelda, learning lessons and gathering the stones to use to defeat the evil god Demise bent on taking the power of the original Three Golden Goddesses for himself to rule all creation. Zelda is sealed in the Depths and using her power to drive away the rot slowly killing the light roots used to stabilize the land above so it doesn’t fall into the abyss.
The regions and the dragons would need some shuffling, but it’s a fun concept!
I gotta admit, the reward for completing all the shrines is pretty neat. I wish the tail and face had animations though. Still super cool! I wonder if there are just different kinds of Zonai and that’s why the ancient hero looks a bit different compared to the others we see.
For as much as people were theorizing about the Zonai's relation to TotK, I haven't seen many posts pointing out how there's a lot of very Zonai-related things in the new trailer.
For one, multiple Zonai structures are notably affected.
Such as the North Lomai Labyrinth being a hundred miles in the air! I believe the three Lomai Labyrinths are one of the only things canonically attributed to the Zonai. Though, some people believe they were made by impersonating groups, but either way, there's still a connection there.
The Typhlo Ruins aren't shrouded in a permanent darkness anymore, either. And since these share a lot of design elements and architectural details with the remains of ruins in the Faron region, these are also attributed to the Zonai.
But it isn't just structures! The Zonai are related a lot to design motifs involving Owls (wisdom), Boars (power), and Dragons (courage). And we do see a couple dragon motifs!
There's one on this sick-ass weapon Link is using. It's kinda hard to see due to the dramatic lighting and fast motion, but the cylindrical part is actually coming out of a dragon's mouth.
ALSO! It has some letters from the wall-carvings from the other Direct Trailer back in October.
The reason we don't recognize this language might be because this is Zonai script!
But there's another Dragon-motif, too! One that you might be a bit more familiar with.
The front wheels of Link's equally sick-ass ride! I can't make out any more script on these, but if you compare them to other Zonai structures, you can tell this is definitely of the same architecture.
At this point it's pretty damn definitive that the Zonai are gonna be related to the lore of this game somehow.
Masks or faces seem to be a common thing in zonai jewelry, and the Hero’s Aspect item in totk looks like some sort of mask itself! There are plenty of interesting things that seem shrouded in mystery, from the Salesman with his many masks, the keatons whose faces are popular masks for children, the zonai sages and their masks, all the way to the twili with their fused shadow helm.
If the zonai were the ones raised to Skyloft, perhaps some of them never made it to the safety of the island and thus had to survive the devastation of the Surface in a different way.
Perhaps in Hyrule there have long been interlopers among the people, hiding their true forms with strange magic…
is the fact like can do those dive chalange things kind of meaning that he would be a zonai "youth" cos the construct said it was for "zonai youths to show their courage and enter adulthood" and to be honest they can likely tell link is technically in his hundred so when do the zonai consider one at the age of an adult? or is it like judged on the things they've done?