Breath of the Wild Champions' Ballad: Every Trial in Order

The Champions' Ballad is the only quest in Breath of the Wild that takes your hearts away. Not chips at them — takes them. Pick up the One-Hit Obliterator off its pedestal in the Shrine of Resurrection and your life gauge collapses to a quarter of a single heart, and it stays there until you have cleared four monster camps on the Great Plateau with a weapon that kills anything in one swing and gets you killed in one swing.

That is the opening move of DLC Pack 2, released December 7, 2017. What follows is 16 new shrines, a genuine dungeon, a 4,000 HP Sheikah monk, and a motorcycle. It is also, functionally, the real ending of Breath of the Wild: Zelda's last line to you afterward is that you are now strong enough to beat Calamity Ganon.

Here is the whole run, in the order the game gives it to you, with the numbers that actually change how you play it.

What The Champions' Ballad actually adds

The quest will not trigger until all four Divine Beasts are calmed. Once they are, Zelda's voice reaches you the next time the overworld reloads — warp somewhere, load a save, exit a shrine, or die. If you install the DLC after freeing all four, you hear her the moment you boot the game.

Only the four Great Plateau shrines pay out Spirit Orbs. The other twelve hand you Emblems instead, so the entire pack is worth exactly one extra Heart Container or Stamina Vessel — not four. Plan your last upgrade accordingly, and see the shrine guide for where the base game's 120 sit.

Both DLC packs come bundled in the Expansion Pass, $19.99 in the US, released alongside the game on March 3, 2017. It is not included with the Nintendo Switch 2 Edition — that is still a separate purchase.

Do not confuse this pack with The Master Trials, which is DLC Pack 1. That one gave you Master Mode, Hero's Path, the Travel Medallion, the Korok Mask, Majora's Mask, and the Trial of the Sword covered in the Master Sword guide. Champions' Ballad is the story pack.

The One-Hit Obliterator turns you into glass

Return the Sheikah Slate to its pedestal in the Restoration Room and Monk Maz Koshia introduces himself, hands you an unbreakable club, and marks four spots on the Great Plateau. The rules are strict and most of them are not explained twice:

• It only kills in one hit while it is glowing. You get two swings, then the sheen drops and its attack power falls to 1 while it recharges. It will not recharge while you are swinging it, so stop flailing and wait.
• You die to a single hit. Any enemy, any hazard, any fall you would normally shrug off.
• You cannot heal. Food and materials appear to restore hearts on the inventory screen, then the hearts vanish the moment you close the menu.
• You cannot switch to another melee weapon. Bows and runes still work, and they are the real answer — a Bomb Arrow does not need the Obliterator to be charged.
• Hitting an enemy's shield does not burn a charge. Useful against the Bokoblins who block.
• Leaving the Great Plateau ends the trial. The Obliterator returns to its pedestal and you start the whole thing again.

Play it like a stealth mission, not a brawl. Sneakstrikes and Bomb Arrows matter far more here than parry timing, because there is no parrying your way out of a Silver Lizalfos at a quarter heart.

The four Plateau shrines and what is in them

Clear a camp and the shrine rises out of the ground where it stood.

Ruvo Korbah is a Major Test of Strength, so you are fighting a Guardian Scout inside a shrine — but you enter it at full health, because the Obliterator's penalty only applies outside. That Giant Ancient Core is worth the detour on its own.

Finish all four and the Obliterator splits into four glowing orbs and scatters across Hyrule, raising four Monuments. The weapon returns to its pedestal for good.

Four monuments, twelve shrines, one set per Champion

Each Monument plays you a Kass verse and marks three trials. Each set of three trials unlocks three shrines, and three shrine Emblems open the Illusory Realm rematch for that Divine Beast.

Two of those need prep rather than skill. Darb Pond wants Flamebreaker gear or a Fireproof Elixir before you step onto lava — the armor guide covers which set to bring. Dinraal's horn means catching a dragon on its schedule, so know the flight window before you commit an evening to it.

The twelve Champion shrines sit in one region each, which makes the pack far easier to route than it looks:

Pick the region you already have towers and stables in and do that Champion first. There is no required order.

The Illusory Realm hands you the loadout

Bring three Emblems back to the Divine Beast and Maz Koshia drops you into the Illusory Realm — a replica interior where you fight that Beast's Phantom Ganon again. Ruta means Waterblight, Medoh means Windblight, Rudania means Fireblight, Naboris means Thunderblight.

The twist: your inventory is confiscated. You fight with a fixed kit the game chooses, which means a maxed-out save gets no advantage and an underequipped one gets no punishment.

Note the arrow counts. Medoh gives you 100 and Ruta gives you 10 — Waterblight is a melee problem whether you like it or not, and the Ceremonial Tridents are there because the Lightscale Trident will break.

The game quietly helps you lose. After three attempts it adds a Fairy to your kit, and after six it adds meals and elixirs. If a Blight keeps wiping you, the honest move is to keep throwing yourself at it.

You can replay any Illusory Realm fight after finishing its quest, and the Champion spirit has unique dialogue if you win the rematch. Those repeats do not raise your World Level, so this is one of the few ways to farm boss practice without making the overworld harder. If you want the base-game versions of these fights refreshed first, the Divine Beasts guide has the moveset breakdowns.

The EX abilities are a cooldown cut, not a damage buff

This is the part everyone gets wrong. Revali's Gale + does not launch you higher. Urbosa's Fury + does not hit harder. Every upgrade is purely a recharge time cut to one third, and it stacks with the discount Hyrule Castle already applies.

Mipha's Grace is the headline. A free full heal plus five temporary hearts every 24 minutes is a nice safety net; the same thing every 8 minutes is a completely different resource, and inside Hyrule Castle it comes back every 2 minutes and 40 seconds. That single change is why finishing Champions' Ballad before the Calamity Ganon run is worth more than any weapon you could farm in the same time.

Daruk's Protection + at six minutes is the other one that matters, because Guardian beams bounce off it. And a Perfect Guard performed while the barrier is up does not consume a charge at all.

The Final Trial is a real dungeon with Champion weapon parts in it

Finish all four Champion songs and the Shrine of Resurrection seals behind you and descends. What is down there looks like the inside of an engine, which is a deliberate hint about what you get for clearing it.

The layout is a central gear chamber with four wings themed on wind, water, fire, and electricity. Grab the map from the Guidance Stone first, then rotate the central gears clockwise or counter-clockwise — the side chambers only move if you have physically connected them to the central mechanism with metal or stone. Each wing holds a terminal, and each terminal you authenticate drops one of four locks on the back door.

The dungeon fights back as you progress:

Loot the chests before you touch the back door, because they are not random. The thunder wing holds a Gerudo Scimitar, the fire wing a Cobble Crusher, the wind wing a Swallow Bow, and the water wing a Zora Spear. There is also a Gerudo Shield and a Diamond, plus five Bomb Arrows. Those are exactly the base items you need to commission the Champions' weapons — the Scimitar of the Seven, the Boulder Breaker, the Great Eagle Bow, the Lightscale Trident, and Urbosa's Daybreaker shield. The dungeon is a restock run for every replacement you will ever need.

The Final Trial is the only dungeon in Breath of the Wild you can re-enter after clearing it. Every Divine Beast locks behind you; this one stays open, which makes it a permanent, repeatable source of Champion weapon components.

Monk Maz Koshia has 4,000 HP and four phases

He fights like a greatest-hits compilation of everything that has killed you. He teleports and dives at you like a Yiga Footsoldier, shoots fire, ice, and shock arrows from the air with a unique Phrenic Bow, and dashes at you the way Thunderblight Ganon does. His Earthwake Technique throws geysers that chase you — they hurt on a direct hit, but they also generate updrafts, so paraglide them and shoot down at him.

Three specifics worth memorising. Lightning is his listed weakness, so Urbosa's Fury and shock arrows both land. Mighty Bananas distract him and leave him open — during the copy phase only the genuine article takes the bait — but this works exactly once per fight, so save it for a phase you are struggling with. And in Master Mode he does not regenerate health during the copy phase, which is the one mercy that mode offers.

Master Cycle Zero and the six EX side quests

Beat Maz Koshia and he hands over a Rune, not a mount. The Master Cycle Zero is summonable almost anywhere, runs on materials as fuel poured into its tank, has a working headlight for night riding, and lets you swing weapons from the saddle exactly like horseback combat. Ramming enemies damages them, it performs jumps, and you take no fall damage while riding it.

The limitations are real and unlisted in-game:

• Water despawns it. Drop it in a lake and you resummon from scratch.
• Solid obstacles despawn it and hurt you, scaled to your armor.
• It cannot be registered at a stable — it vanishes the second you talk to a stable owner. Your registered horses are still the mounts you actually keep.
• No Octo Balloons, no music, and it will not spawn in most of the Gerudo Desert or in the burning areas of Eldin.
• Try to enter a foot race on it and you are disqualified for riding a "horse."

Kass finds you afterward, plays the finished ballad, and gives you the Picture of the Champions, which you can hang on the wall of Link's House in Hateno Village.

Before you start any of this, sweep the six EX side quests. Their diaries are planted at the Deya Village Ruins and Riverside Stable, and they are pure loot with no boss attached:

More Hyrule breakdowns live on the Breath of the Wild coverage hub, and when you are genuinely finished with this Hyrule, the Tears of the Kingdom beginner guide is the next stop.

Quick Action Checklist

• Calm all four Divine Beasts, then warp or exit a shrine to trigger Zelda's voice and start the quest.
• Read the diaries at Deya Village Ruins and Riverside Stable first and clear the six EX side quests for free armor.
• Treat the One-Hit Obliterator run as stealth. You cannot heal, you cannot swap melee weapons, and one hit kills you — use Bomb Arrows and sneakstrikes.
• Never leave the Great Plateau mid-trial. The Obliterator returns to its pedestal and you restart the whole sequence.
• Pick one region for your first Champion. All three of that Champion's shrines sit inside it.
• Pack Flamebreaker gear or a Fireproof Elixir before attempting Daruk's Darb Pond lava trial.
• Do not gear up for the Illusory Realm fights. Your inventory is replaced with a fixed kit, and a Fairy appears after three failed attempts.
• Finish Champions' Ballad before assaulting Hyrule Castle. Mipha's Grace + recharges every 2 minutes 40 seconds inside the castle instead of every 8.
• Loot all four Final Trial wings before opening the back door — the Gerudo Scimitar, Cobble Crusher, Swallow Bow, Zora Spear, Gerudo Shield, and Diamond are Champion weapon components.
• Bring the Camera rune to Maz Koshia. During his nine-copy phase it flags the real one instantly.
• Save your one Mighty Bananas distraction for whichever phase is beating you. It only works once.