while Link challenges Demise: Link triumphs and absorbs Demise's essence into the sword, but not before Demise curses Link and Zelda's bloodlines to be haunted by his reincarnated rage. To complete the sword's seal, Link drives it into a pedestal in the Sealed Temple, with Fi accepting eternal slumber as a result. Groose, Link and Zelda return to their time while Impa remains behind and destroys the Gate of Time, as she is a person of that time and must watch over the Master Sword. In the present, the old woman greets them one last time before she dies and vanishes, revealing that she was Impa. The game ends with the surface now freely accessible to the residents of Skyloft, while Zelda decides to remain there to watch over the Triforce; she and Link together establish the kingdom of Hyrule. Development Skyward Swords development began in 2006, after the release of The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess for GameCube and Wii. It was developed by Nintendo Entertainment Analysis & Development, a development division of series publisher Nintendo. They were assisted in development by the Kyoto branch of Monolith Soft. Its producer was Eiji Aonuma, a major contributor to the Legend of Zelda series. His main preoccupation during these early stages was whether the developers could continue creating The Legend of Zelda games using the same development mindset that had been used up to Twilight Princess. The game's director was Hidemaro Fujibayashi: previously working as assistant director on The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass for the Nintendo DS, Skyward Sword was his first project for home consoles. He began work on Skyward Sword after finishing Phantom Hourglass, and continued working on the game alongside his work on The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks. When Spirit Tracks was finished, Fujibayashi and the game's development team transferred back to working on Skyward Sword. According to Aonuma, the team's starting point for development was the Wii version of Twilight Princess: feeling they had not fully realized their goal of creating a vast and realistic world with Twilight Princess, they used their previous work as a foundation for the next game. They also sought to create a memorable experience equivalent to The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, by that time considered the series' most memorable game. Development lasted around five years, and according to series producer Shigeru Miyamoto, the game's budget was considered quite