ReWritten Script <2025

# Start
Legend
location
npc
quote
item
Boss
enemy
Game reference

 The Arbiter's grounds has multiple names depending on the language 
 In the english version of the game it is known as the Arbiter's Grounds 
 However In Japanese It is known as 砂漠の処刑場 _Sabaku no Shokeijō_ Which translates to Desert execution grounds. 
 
This Dungeon originating in Twilight princess, can also be found in Breath of the wild and Tears of The Kingdom,  is a large Coliseum Structure Made with mostly gerudo style archecture. The most prominent feature of the arbiters grounds  are the Six pillars each having a symbol of a sage from Ocarina of Time. 
Inside there are many rooms flooded with sand and A few statues that bear resemblance to the Sand goddess Statue from Ocarina of time's Spirit Temple.
The enemies in this dungeon are Ghoul rats, Gibdo, Moldorms A few po's And 3 variants of Stalfos, the Stalfos itself, Stalchildren and Staltroops. As well as Bubble's Yes that is the actual name of the skull bat enemies in twilight princess.

The Miniboss in the dungeon is Death Sword A malevolent Spirit that haunts the sword it supposedly wielded in life, In Japanese this bosses name is Gobera no Ken Or the Sword of Gobella.

The Main boss In the dungeon is Twilit fossil:Stallord Which is a large Skeleton of what seems to be a dragon. His true origins are not known. He has two phases, one where you use the spinner to take out pieces of his spine and a second phase where you fight the disembodied head using the spinner to spiral up a pillar.

We do also have an Npc description for the dungeon. Auru can be found in the western part of Lake Hylia and He says "The Gerudo Desert once held a prison built to hold the worst criminals this land has ever known... The criminals who were sentenced to death were sent directly to the underworld by a cursed mirror that was kept in the prison... Now that prison is condemned, and even the road leading to the desert is impassable. This desert at the world's end... It still holds the cursed mirror and the malice of the doomed inmates..." 
We do know the underworld he speaks of Is the Twili Realm, Due to the events of Ganondorf's imprisonment.

The Hyrule Historia has a nice bit of concept art

This is the BEST quality i could get…

 

 

 

 

 

From this description we can tell this is where threats to Any royal family were sent, Be it Zora Hylian or a threat to the Gerudo race.

Now that ive laid out what the arbiters grounds is I'll explain what we will be doing in this video, I'm wanting to dive into the lore surrounding Arbiter's grounds, Discuss theories on what Stallord, and Death sword truly are, And then lead into another video Discussing Issues with the breath of the wild map.

First im going to put something that doesn't fully fit into the video but is worth talking about in this video,

The description Given by Auru sounds very Similar to another dungeon In the franchise, A place where threats to the royal family are sent? Like, The Shadow temple?
TheShadow temple was a dungeon underneath Kakoriko Village Both the graveyard and the Bottom of the well, Where any threats to the Hylian Royal family were sent to rot By the Sheikah.
So you might ask why would you bring this up at all?
Because there is also another Dungeon in Ocarina of time that bears alot of similarities to the Arbiters grounds, Remember how I mentioned the statues? 
Many have theorized that the Arbiters grounds was once the Spirit temple. 
Some Even claiming the mirror shield and the Twilight Mirror being the same, I however Do not believe this to be the case. There are many reasons the main one being Location, The spirit temple is located in the southwest of the Desert While the Arbiters grounds is in the northwest of the desert If you want a deeper dive into this I will direct you to this site

Now lets talk about
## Death Sword

Death Sword is an Miniboss, that is A spirit possessing a sword.
When you first enter the room you find a sword bound by rope and ofuda, a type of Japanese household amulet, or talisman It is typically issued by a shinto shrine and hung in a house for protection from general harm like disease, accidental fire or other things. 
Upon starting the fight by striking the sword, The ropes burn away summoning the Death Sword, 
A small fun fact is that This creature shares its french name Faucheur with the Gomess Boss from Majoras Mask, and the name is an allusion to the Grim reaper.

The death sword looks to have been some kind of executioner, With how he swings his weapon and where he is located, so close to the execution chambers, But it is Also possible he was just a Powerfull warrior who was banished to the Arbiter's Grounds, 
His japanese Name translates to Sword of Gobera, 

Which is interesting as the sword Phantom Ganon uses in Wind waker has hylian text on it that when translated says Zoburu Gabora, 
Many have used this to try and say that the Deathsword is Ganons sword, with a deadly spirit attached to help him kill.

It would make sense for it to be found here and separated from its owner,

A few things support this theory alongside the hylian text, Such as how death sword attacks, Flying around and sending magic Orbs out to fight, the same way Ganondorf, And phantom Ganons attack.

Another theory i uncovered while researching was that He is infact some kind of Zonai, which makes no sense unless you look at his concept art, which depicts him as something akin to a Zonai, But this theory is a far stretch with nothing else backing it, But it was interesting so I'm including it.

Now lets talk about the Big main event

# Twilit Fossil: Stallord
This creature was actually the reason for the videos existence, He is genuinely my Favourite creature in the series, We have almost no information about it as it only appears twice in the series, The first time being here in the Arbiter's Grounds in twilight princess and A second time in a game I doubt any of you played or remember, Links Crossbow training, Yeah He is the Final boss in that game!

This section is putting forth my own Theories of what He is and Looking at other theories. _{editor from the future i do not know why this is here.}

First Lets look at His arena, 
Its a large circular room with a pit of sand with a large half skeleton in the center, as you enter this rises and starts the fight.

The skeleton seems to be humanoid and draconic, and we never do see the other half, With five fingered hands, four horns and large fangs and teeth, we can assume it was some carnivorous dragon-like creature, similar to volvagia or even a dodongo.

This however is His look In game In concept art he looks quite different, Having a much smaller head, more eye-holes and much longer fangs, with moss like fur, he even has more bones sticking out from his back like fins on dinosaurs, and even has wings, His horns are also quite different, instead of being 4 horns pointing up and back he has 2 horns curving down, different from every dragon-like creatures we see in the series. While interesting and helps us narrow down what he could be inspired by it causes a multitude of issues.

 

 

On a thread Where people were discussing him being the Thunder dragon of lanayru from skyward sword, mentions of him being a dodongo erupted, Which is a theory i quite like, Many point to the head shape and size of king dodongo as being a match But dodongos predominantly have a horn in the center of their forehead, discussions go further where a user states :It is also worth mentioning stallord has a curious patch on his forehead, this could be a place where there was a horn, dodongos overtime commonly had sort of bony shields or protrusions form there face, something that could have evolved into or been interpreted as the horns stallord has"

But this theory crumbles the second we mention the fact that Twilight princess has dodongos, And they are pretty much just fiery angry geckos.
I love them

Another theory brought up in many threads including this one was Volvagia, The lava dragon from Fire temple in Ocarina Of Time, This is what he bears the most resemblance to in his concept art, Which means he could be a successor to Volvagia, Stallords music is even a remix of King Dodongo and Volvagias themes.

One user mentions that "the fire on Volvagia is in the same place as the fur on Stallord." The issue with mentions of fur is that fur is one of the first things to decay, meaning the fur on Stallord is likely some kind of moss.

So then what is he? 
Well We don't actually know, None of the books have confirmed it and the games don't mention him ever again.

Now for
## Breath of the wild
Oh GOD do i have many bones to pick for this section and a lot will be in their own video

In BOTW and TOTK maps there is infact a Arbiters ground, However its in entirely the wrong location, and is only a few ruins.

Lets discuss the ruins
The ruins are so small that its near impossible to be the same, A structure as large of arbiters ground would take alot to have toppled into a few barely taller than link archways and a few hallways.

Now lets look at location, To get to arbiters ground in twilight princess you go west and then NORTH.
In BOTW you go west, west, west, then south
Now it could be explained by the fact that the hylians seemed to have moved further north, Except we are forgetting that, Arbiters grounds was surrounded by a mountain! WHERE IS THE MOUNTAINS NINTENDO.

Now there is actually a location that is in the correct location and surrounded by a mountain in the gerudo desert, Known as the East gerudo Ruins. IT has a mountain Giant walls even looking similar to the walls of Tp's arbiter's ground, Not to mention the 7 (actually 8) heroin statues could be built after twilight princess in reference to the the sages  the missing statue being a reference to the now dead water sage ganon kills.  

Well with all that discussed id Love to hear your guys input on these theories and topics down in the description  or in our discord!