What ACTUALLY happens if the Demon Tribe "wins"?

[u/LoCal_GwJ]

This is referring to scenarios like the following:

• Demise defeats Link in SS
• Ganondorf defeats Link in TP
• Malladus defeats Link in ST
• Ganondorf defeats Link in TotK
• Vaati defeats Link in TMC/FS/FSA
• Ganondorf is allowed to wish in WW

Some of these are a little different than others with a Vaati victory maybe just meaning that you have a kind of demonic tyrant occupying part of Hyrule maybe while some others like Demise winning may mean the end of the world itself. Some of these guys talk about ruling the world under darkness; would this manifest by everyone turning into demons? Would demons and non-demons remain separate and the non-demons are just enslaved or otherwise marginalized?

If Ganondorf in WW was able to make his wish, what next? Does Hyrule just unflood and he gets to rule over it? Does it instead turn into a Dark World?

If Demise is able to claim the Triforce after defeating Link in SS, does he destroy the world? Does he make it into a Dark World?

This is an open ended discussion, I think the answer probably depends on who the villain is and the circumstances around their victory.

The answer may literally also just be "it cannot happen because the gods will intervene if that would ever happen"

[u/Logical_Leaps]

The Dark World basically is what happens mostly for any Ganon villain.

There is nuance there though;

WW Ganondorf probably would make a very Authoritarian ruled world though potentially remain 'Hyrule' in a way.

Demise would just rule the land and no race other than the Demon Tribe would be around.

A few would just end the world; NULL, Bellum, Yuga, Majora

Vaati (FS/FSA) would probably just be a thing that exists and would have a harem of women people must give him.
Vaati (MC) would probably end up stronger and actually become a Demon King. He simply seeks power the world be damned, it doesn't matter to him. So I guess end result is no life, but also could be fine once he has absolute power dude could be content and not bother killing anymore or making monsters or anything like that.

Ganondorf in TOTK sucks. I don't even know his motive. Power? Who knows what would happen if he won, Demons just roam the world? No thought villain.

Malladus I can't remember his lore but probably similar to Demise and Ganon.

Tough question for sure.

Edit: Answering the other questions:

1. Hyrule would unflood and likely revert to before the flooding completely as he craved that land not the new one.

2. Demise can't use the Triforce. Literally the plot of the game is divine beings can't use the Triforce hence Hylia shedding her immortal coil. I guess Demise could do the same or use an underling. But also was the even the goal? Been a while. Feel he just wanted the land. Hylia was the one that sought the Triforce to break the stalemate.

[u/LoCal_GwJ → u/Logical_Leaps]

Small point on the Demise Triforce point but we don't actually know Demise can't use it, and we have good reason to think he can considering the Triforce is his goal. Demise isn't a divine being and isn't part of the "Gods Tribe" that gets mentioned in SS

[u/Logical_Leaps → u/LoCal_GwJ]

Oh how interesting. I've kind of just always accepted Demise as Hylia's equal. He is a God in all but status. He is a being beyond time just like Hylia after all.

I suppose unlike Hylia who is a being beyond the world Demise is a being of the world, perhaps created by Nayru's Law needing good and evil. An equal to Hylia. This allowing a loophole so he can use the Triforce as all on Hyrule can. Dunno.

"For while the supreme power of the Triforce was created by gods, all of its power can never be wielded by one. Knowing this power was her last and only hope, the goddess gave up her divine powers and her immortal form."

I mean this just straight up makes no sense. Null can use the Triforce and Demise can. Maybe this isn't even a rule and Hylia was just lying that this stipulation existed to manipulate Link. Or maybe they can't use "all its power" but some, and Demise seeks that little power he can use.

Hard to know. Thanks for pointing that out, need to reframe my mind of Demise again.

[u/LoCal_GwJ → u/Logical_Leaps]

Yeah the whole idea is a little confusing still. It kinda makes sense for the GGs not to be able to use the Triforce since the Triforce is basically just a vessel for a fragment of the GGs power. Hylia not being able to use the Triforce is a little trickier because we don't know why she can't use it. It could be that some divine "rule" the GGs made establishes it. It could be that Hylia is a product of the Triforce (in the sense that both Hylia and the Triforce are direct creations of the GGs and we go back to the first point). It could be that she CAN use it and she lied in order to make sure the world wasn't dependent on a god which allows the mortals to shape their own destiny.

But I think it's fairly reasonable to think if Null can wield the Triforce and Ganon can wield the Triforce, then Demise should be able to as well.

[u/Cloudhiddentao → u/Logical_Leaps]

This gets a bit headcanony, but the reason I think “gods” can’t use the triforce is because they’re not alive.

If you look at things made by the gods we have Fi, Tris, the tower of the Gods, Gohdan. They all seem to be machines, robots, AIs, whatever. I think that extends to the Gods themselves too. The Golden Goddesses and Hylia can’t use the Triforce because they’re not really alive, unlike cosmic entities like Null, which are.

[u/tiglionabbit]

Ganon had the whole triforce in A Link to the Past. This is a representation of what happens if Ganon wins in Ocarina of Time.

[u/LoCal_GwJ → u/tiglionabbit]

I left that one out because that's the one example we have already (and the full consequences were held off via the Sages) so I didn't bother mentioning that one. This is moreso for OTHER instances where we don't already know what would happen. The WW example may go this way but it's hard to say if the same thing would happen because in WW there is no Seven Sages to seal him, just 2 other sages who are busy empowering the Master Sword with prayer.

[u/Ingweron]

I think that the Sacred Realm represents something similar to Plato's "The World of Forms". So, when Ganon transforms the Sacred Realm into the Dark World, he is deforming the cosmic order according to his dark heart. But for that to be complete he must be able to use the full complete Triforce to manifest all his wishes.

For some reason that I can't explain, somehow Ganon wasn't able to use the Triforce in A Link to the Past. He just held it there in his dark temple as a relic. So, when Link is able to retrieve the full Triforce, in the end of ALttP, he restored the Sacred Realm, and I think that means restoring the cosmic order as well. And that's why I think that ALttP has a perfect ending for the whole saga.

Now, what would have happened if Ganon was able to reshape the cosmic order completely according to his dark heart? Well, I guess that he would be able reshape, in a cosmic level, Hope into Terror, Justice into Power and Good into Evil. So, if Ganon wins, he objectively makes what is Wrong to become Right.

[u/CommercialPop128 → u/Ingweron]

I agree that the Sacred Realm seems similar to Plato's realm of form, here's an old (kinda wordy 😬) post about that I wrote for anyone interested.

I think the villains either seek this notion of "deformation" of the cosmic order, or just defilement of it since Demise and his successors aren't as powerful as the creator gods. Honestly, many of them are pretty self explanatory:

• Null, as the spirit of the void, wants to undo creation.
• Demise, as the malevolent enemy of Hylia, a goddess of benevolence, wants to end life (with "life" being defined as the spirits dwelling in the light world; demons seem to be more "ghostly").
• Ganondorf, as a warlord, wants to take over Hyrule and rule it, but not necessarily kill everyone. However, as Ganon he seems to be imbued with the same murderously destructive will as Demise.
• Vaati and Yuga, as evil sorcerers, are power hungry like Ganondorf.
• Others seem to be spirits which embody negative aspects of people.
  • Deathl / Death Eye / the nightmares from LA: fear of death (and maybe also PTSD).
  • Majora: despair, up to and including ensuing madness and nihilism.
  • Bellum: war??? "Bellum" literally means "war" in latin but I suspect the name is also a pun on "bell", referring both to the body part of jellyfish and possibly "diving bell". The helmet of "Bellumbeck" somewhat resembles a diving helmet, which maybe got mixed up with diving bells?
  • Malladus: …uh, the postindustrial angst of a disgraced aristocracy recapitulating feudalism through control of infrastructure? (IE, robber barons, railroad magnates, technocratic platform owners…)

[u/FunnyDislike]

Atleast for Demise; he hated the golden goddesses, would that extend onto their creation? While he talks about taking the world for the demon tribe, it has a certain undertone of destroying things for the sake of destroying. Sounds somewhat Null-coded.

Im still not sure if the demon tribe was a "logical consequence" of the universe trying to balance itself against the folks of Hyrule; Hylia, the Hylians, Gorons, Zora, Gerudo etc. or if it was deliberately created by the golden goddesses in the first place so that the people of Hylia would never get too advanced.

Or maybe eternal war between those two sides is needed to maintain the seal on Null.

My gut feeling really is that the golden goddesses are far from what we would call "good". Even Hylia doesnt really know what their plans are.

That TP Ganondorfs Triforce "activated" so conveniently at his executiom? The gods wanted to help him.

I dont think that any Ganondorf winning would cause the world to vanish, he really makes it clear that he still wants the world to persist so that he can rule over it.

I do still hope tho to one day have a game in which the people of Hyrule and the demon tribe have to team up against something BAD. Be it aliens or really just three ladies with a god complex.

[u/Viralklahm → u/FunnyDislike]

That's a interesting point maybe all the bloodshed between good and evil constantly renews the seal, and with how eow was implying a era of peace and prosperity happening leading to no war, thus the seal weakening and the voids to happen in mass  Large scale blood sacrifice gonna have to use this in head canon now lol

[u/Emri_error404]

SS: kiss your ass goodbye. The goddess is gone and her hero defeated, so Demise is pretty much unopposed on the surface.
TP: both Hyrule and the Twilight realm is screwed. I thought maybe the Twilight realm would be safe, but only Midna can break the mirror, and she’s dead until the light spirits revive her.
ST: the Locomo could maybe clean up the mess and re-seal Malladus?
MC: not sure bc we don’t know exactly what Vaati wants other than the light force
FS: idk but Hyrule’s probably screwed
FSA: Hyrule’s mega screwed
WW: what’s left of Hyrule is screwed

[u/hamrspace]

I thought the idea was that there always would be a hero chosen by the gods to rise to the occasion and intervene even in instances where the evil has "won" like at the beginning of the Adult and Downfall Timelines. Just like how when the hero wins, the curse of Demise is never truly broken, just sealed or delayed. It's a tug-of-war that goes on throughout the ages in Hyrule.

[u/LoCal_GwJ → u/hamrspace]

That certainly does seem to be the case which is why I added that little bit at the end basically saying "the gods probably won't even let this happen" since we're given a couple examples of the gods intervening (WW + EoW, although it's still unknown WHO intervened in WW). It's entirely possible and probably consistent with the series that if Link somehow failed in SS, it would result in some form of divine intervention.

It is still a bit of a mystery though because we don't actually know the condition that can prompt the GGs into action. We saw in EoW they did it, but that was responding to the threat of Null obtaining the Triforce which almost certainly WOULD result in the end of all existence. But if someone like Ganon obtains the Triforce, that may not be the consequence and therefore they might not intervene.

[u/Drafonni]

In case you haven't heard of it, there's a rom hack called Sands of Time that has its own interpretation of what could happen if Ganon won after OoT. It doesn't take itself too seriously and has some grammar issues, but is still really fun to explore.