You’re standing there. Naked. Well, Link is. No Master Sword, no Hylian Shield, and definitely no Mipha’s Grace to bail you out when a Blue Bokoblin decides your skull looks like a golf ball. This is how the Trial of the Sword in Breath of the Wild begins, and honestly, it’s the moment most players realize they’ve been playing the game on easy mode for the last sixty hours.
It’s brutal.
The DLC challenge, tucked away inside the Master Trials expansion, isn't just a combat gauntlet; it’s a total stripping away of the "god mode" you’ve built up through gear and upgrades. You enter the Korok Forest, shove the Master Sword back into its pedestal, and get transported into a sterile, dream-like void. The goal? Survive 45-plus floors of increasingly nightmare-inducing encounters to "awaken" the true power of your blade.
Most people think it’s just about hitting things. It isn't. It’s about resource management, environmental awareness, and not panicking when a Guardian Scout starts charging its laser and you realize your only shield is a pot lid you found in a crate two floors ago.
The Three Tiers of Suffering
The Trial of the Sword in Breath of the Wild is split into three distinct sections: Beginning, Middle, and Final Trials. If you die, you go back to the start of that specific section. There are no mid-run saves. No safety nets.
The Beginning Trials are, ironically, often considered the hardest by the community. Why? Because your health is usually lower when you first attempt it, and the weapons you find are basically toothpicks. You’re fighting through 12 floors of forests and coastal settings. Floor 10 is legendary for being a literal run-killer. You’ve got two Black Lizalfos on a wooden pier that will spit water at you and knock you into the drink before you can even blink. If you don't have a plan for those two, you’re done. You’re back at the pedestal.
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Middle Trials give you a bit more breathing room with verticality. It’s 16 floors of updrafts and dark rooms. It feels more like a puzzle. You’re using the paraglider to rain down arrows, and by now, you’ve probably figured out that the Sheikah Slate runes are your best friends. Bombs are free. Use them.
Then you hit the Final Trials. 23 floors. It sounds daunting, but by this point, the game starts giving you the heavy machinery. Ancient Arrows. Elemental blades. You’re dealing with extreme weather—lava, snow, lightning—and eventually, a literal army of Guardians. It’s an endurance test of your patience.
The Floor 10 Lizalfos Problem
Let’s talk about those Lizalfos. Seriously. In Master Mode, the Trial of the Sword in Breath of the Wild becomes a completely different beast because of health regeneration. On Floor 10 of the Beginning Trials, you can’t just chip away at them. If you knock them into the water, they just sit there, regenerating health while you watch helplessly from the dock.
The "pro" move? Sneakstrikes.
If you can chain sneakstrikes by walking behind them while they’re startled, you can loop the animation and kill them without them ever sounding the alarm. It feels like cheese, but in the Trial, cheese is the main course. You have to use every dirty trick in the book because the game isn't playing fair either.
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Why Your "Cooking" Strategy is Wrong
Most players go into the trial having eaten a hearty meal to get 20 extra yellow hearts. That’s smart. But what people forget is the 30-minute buff.
Before you pull that sword, cook four Ironshrooms and a Dragon Horn. That gives you a Level 3 Defense buff for 30 minutes. Or do the same with Mighty Bananas for an Attack buff. This timer stays active inside the trial. It is the single most important advantage you can give yourself.
Once you’re inside, the cooking changes. You’ll find "Rest Floors" where you can catch fairies and cook the measly ingredients you’ve scavenged. Here’s the trick: cook your wood. Seriously. If you’re desperate, you can blow up trees, gather the wood, and cook them one by one to create "Rock-Hard Food." It only heals a quarter of a heart, but when you’re at half a heart and facing a Hinox, that quarter heart is the difference between glory and a "Game Over" screen.
Scavenging is the Meta
Don't just run to the exit. Every crate matters.
- Arrows: Break every box.
- Ancient Arrows: Save these for the Lynels in the Final Trials. Do not waste them on anything else.
- Rusty Weapons: In the Middle Trials, there are Octoroks. If you drop a rusty broadsword in front of them while they’re inhaling, they’ll spit out a shiny, brand-new weapon.
The Psychology of the Void
What makes the Trial of the Sword in Breath of the Wild so memorable isn't just the difficulty; it’s the silence. There’s no sprawling Hyrule Field music. Just the sound of your footsteps and the wind. It forces you to look at the game mechanics through a microscope.
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You start noticing how enemy AI reacts to fire. You learn exactly how many hits a Boko Bat can take before it shatters. You become a master of the "Perfect Guard" because you can't afford to lose your shield durability. It’s a combat masterclass hidden inside a survival challenge.
When you finally finish—when you hear that chime and Link stands in the center of the monks—the reward is a Master Sword that is permanently glowing and powered up to 60 damage. It never "runs out of energy" in the traditional sense; it just has massive durability. But the real reward is the fact that you did it. You beat the game’s hardest content without your fancy armor or your hoard of 999 bomb arrows.
Actionable Strategies for Your Next Run
If you’re stuck, stop trying to fight "fair." The Trial is a test of your ingenuity, not your honor.
- Set your Sheikah Sensor to search for Treasure Chests. There are hidden chests in almost every few floors, often tucked underwater or high up on pillars. They contain the gear that makes the later floors trivial.
- Use Cryonis as cover. In water floors, a block of ice is a bulletproof wall. Use it to break the line of sight against archers.
- Fire is your best friend. In the cold floors of the Final Trial, holding a fire weapon keeps you warm. You don't even have to swing it. It saves you from wasting food on cold resistance.
- Save your best bows. Durability is the real enemy. Use your weakest weapons on the weakest enemies. Never use a Knight’s Bow on a Red Chuchu.
The Trial of the Sword in Breath of the Wild remains one of the most balanced, punishing, and rewarding pieces of DLC in Nintendo’s history. It turns Link back into a vulnerable survivor, and in doing so, reminds us why we fell in love with the game’s systems in the first place. Go back in. Eat your dragon-horn meal. Cook your wood. Get your sword back.