Just because I feel like talking about OCs today, I’ve decided to bust out the one I came up with (and dug very deep into) while first playing Pokemon Legends Arceus. Since I, like every Nintendo player at the time, made the connection of it being like BotW. Because of that, I made him based around the idea of writing a crossover (kinda) with him.
His name is Matwilo and he’s a Gerudo. But despite being the sole male born in his generation, he is NOT the King. And the tribe he was born to live in the Unova Desert. (This will make sense in a second I promise.)
The Gerudo in Unova are survivors of the Great Flood. (aka the Adult timeline for Legend of Zelda. The same timeline as Winwaker, Phantom Hourglass, and Spirit Tracks.)
They managed to escape drowning thanks to the prophetic warning given by the goddesses, though they were separated from a large number of their fellow tribeswomen. (At least, many hoped they had all just been separated and not, well, I’m sure you can guess the alternative.) The flash floods and torrential rains frightened them all but they’d managed to survive them.
However, they quickly realized that there was something wrong with the seas. Eventually, some of the braver women took a chance and dove below the surface of the waters. And, in doing so, they figured out what the problem was.
There were no plants beneath the waves, the land was completely barren. Just like the mesa’s they’d climbed to escape the rising waters.
If there were no plants, then there was nothing for sea animals to eat. Sea animals wouldn’t go to any place where there was no food. And if there were no animals, there would be nothing for their tribe to eat either. And the mesa top’s soil quality was too low to grow food on. And even if they could, there wasn’t enough room for their tribe to live off of for very long.
Simply put, they couldn’t stay there if they wanted to survive. And the same went for the other races of Hyrule.
But the Gerudo were already somewhat nomadic (despite the presence of their Fortress/Tower), so they were unfazed by the idea of packing up and leaving everything behind. Something that wasn’t true for the other races, who were all very anchored to their homes and wouldn’t leave them easily.
So they built a ship from the little wood/supplies they had and could get their hands on and went looking for a place to settle down and build a new life and lifestyle for their daughters.
(Yes, they do the pirate thing for a bit. They collect treasure, improve their ship, and get better supplies. Not to mention build a new well of tricks and skills for their culture to thrive on.)
During a serious storm, one that could have potentially sunk them, they (unknowingly) traveled through a portal that brought them to the coast of Unova, right on the edge of the desert.
Seeing a place that was so much like their lost home, but now with the good things from their sea travels and the best things about being by the sea as well, they settled there right away and quickly established a new home for themselves. (Full set up! Fishing, smithing, farming, anything and everything to make a stable life for them all.)
They later connected with the Kingdoms to the north and built trade routes (and neutrality should their wars ever start up again. (Or if they were happening at the time?)) Also to help ensure future Gerudo tribe members. They kind of intimidated the Kingdoms when they first met, since they were trained warriors and were practically armed to the teeth, but the fear/worry is eased by the openness/friendliness the Gerudo presented.
(Being hostile/isolated was one of the things that hurt them so badly in the Flood and with Hyrule in general, so they were trying to shed that by opening themselves up to outsiders more.)
Fast forward to the Modern Era of Unova, where the Gerodo have become widespread and no one thinks twice about them.
(They also still maintain their traditions, including intense survival and combat training from a young age and teaching all their children how to pick locks and get out of traps/bindings without issue.)
Matwilo was the first son born to the tribes in centuries, but they no-one had a need/place for a King anymore. (They used a Cheif-system now, one that was earned by the potential Cheif’s own merits and not by a birthright.) So he was raised as just another member of the tribes, aside from some special training he’s given based on the few remaining knowledge of things a male Gerudo needed to know/be able to do. (Mostly magic and combat stuff their ancestors managed to write down before they could be forgotten.)
Matwilo lives at home on a smallish Equine Pokemon Ranch with his mother (who has very poor health) and a few of his Aunts and cousins. He never went on his “official” Pokemon journey, choosing to forgo it to help his family around the ranch instead. The only Pokemon he has are a Mudbray gifted to him by a cousin and a Yamask he caught in the sands.
And he’s perfectly happy with all of that.
Until, one rainy night, he wakes to (what he’s sure is) the sound of a strange voice calling his name.
He grabs his hunting knife from its spot on his bedside table, lets out his yamask, and creeps out to investigate.
If asked, he’ll never be able to say what happened next, just that the next thing he could remember was waking up on a strange beach with a professor he’d never seen or heard of before asking him if he was alive and a trio of Pokemon hovering nearby.
‘This can’t be right,’ Matwilo thought to himself. ‘Hyrulians are the ones who’re supposed to get kidnapped for Godly missions. Not Gerudo!‘
Anyway, that’s the base of the idea! Please comment or ask if you want to know more! (Please send me asks and comments about this. I have spent WAY too much time world building about this so I could write it before I was consumed by Sningo stuff. Give me the chance to babble about it!! Like how I got Matwilo’s name!)