Welcome to the Deepwood Shrine, the first dungeon of The Minish Cap. Now that you’ve shrunk to Minish size, you can enter this ancient temple hidden in the Minish Woods. Your goal here is to obtain the Earth Element, but there are plenty of treasures to find along the way. Keep your sword at the ready, solve some clever puzzles, and prepare to face the dungeon’s gooey guardian. Good luck!
Entering the Shrine
As you step inside Deepwood Shrine, you find yourself in a dim entry chamber wrapped in thick roots and spider webs. There’s only one way forward for now. Two side doors are blocked by sticky webs, so push the lone carved statue in the center to the left to clear a path and head through the north door.
In the next room, flickering torches illuminate a few slug-like creatures called Sluggulas clinging to the ceiling. Watch for their shadows and slice them down with your sword as they drop, or simply avoid them. Four unlit switches surround the room. Step on all four floor switches (the ones by the torches) to ignite them. With a burst of flame, a treasure chest materializes in the center. Open it to claim a Small Key. This will come in handy immediately – use it to unlock the door to the north, and step through.
The Barrel Room and Dungeon Map
You emerge into a large chamber divided by a pool of water. A giant wooden barrel sits in the middle, suspended by vines. To your right is a lever on the wall. Two Sluggulas plop down as you approach, so take them out. Then grab the lever (press R) and pull it southwards. It’s a heavy tug, but once it clicks into place, a wooden bridge extends over the water. Cross over to the barrel platform on the left side.
There’s a strange red-and-white mushroom cap growing here. Approach it, hold it (R button) and pull it back as far as you can, stretching it like a slingshot. Release, and Link will be flung across the water to the south ledge! (If nothing happens, remember to let go of the directional input while still holding R). A Sluggula drops down on this side; deal with it, then go through the door to the north.
In this room, you encounter a walking mushroom enemy called a Puffstool. It waddles around and occasionally hops to release clouds of poisonous spores, which settle as dusty piles on the floor. You don’t have the means to defeat it directly yet (your sword only flips it over temporarily), so it’s best to avoid or ignore the Puffstool for now. Instead, climb the ladder on the right wall to a ledge. Step on the floor switch at the top – this lights a torch and burns away a vine wrapped around the giant barrel in the previous room. Progress! Head back down the ladder and enter the now-accessible door in the side of the barrel (it’s on the south side of the barrel structure).
You push through the opening and emerge into a narrow side chamber. Here, mushrooms dot the floor and the air feels thicker. You skirt past another Puffstool, then notice stairs leading up on your left. Climbing them, you come across two floor switches and a stone statue beside them. With a gentle push, you slide the statue onto the eastern switch, then step onto the western one yourself. Instantly, a torch ignites, burning away the remaining vines that once held the barrel’s left side—now the barrel can freely rotate at both ends.
Inside the huge barrel, the world tilts beneath your feet – you can actually walk along the inner rim of the barrel, causing it to rotate. Use the ramps inside to navigate. Roll the barrel by walking until you align its western opening with a platform (look for an opening at the northwest). Exit through that opening to reach the southeast section of the room and proceed west.
This next area has shallow water and a raised section in the northwest. A red bug called a Mulldozer charges at you as soon as it spots you. Keep your shield up or sidestep quickly, and strike it a few times when it passes to defeat it. Now head to the northwest corner, where another stretchable mushroom awaits. Pull the mushroom as far south as it goes, then let go to fling yourself over the water and up onto the north ledge. Here you’ll find a big chest. Open it to obtain the Dungeon Map, which will illuminate the rooms you’ve visited and the ones yet to explore.
More Keys and the Compass
Hop off the ledge to the south to return near the mushroom. Use it again, but this time don’t pull it all the way – just enough to land on the narrow strip of land between the two pools of water below. From this middle strip, go through the door to the west (left).
In the new room, a pair of Sluggulas drop down and a green Pesto (a pesky flying bug) may swoop at you. Take them out carefully. You’ll see a lonely floor switch on a high ledge and a heavy pot in the upper left. Instead of breaking the pot, push it to the right so that it slides onto the floor switch in the top-right corner. This triggers a small bridge to extend over the water. Cross the bridge to the south side and exit through the door there.
You find yourself in a chamber with two stone statues and two floor switches on the ground. Your task is to get both statues onto those switches. Push and pull the statues one at a time: for the left statue, simply push it right onto the left switch. For the right statue, you’ll need to pull it out and around the blocks so you can line it up with the switch and then drag it into place. Once both statues depress the switches, a chest appears in the center of the room. Open it to get another Small Key!
With your new key, backtrack: go north one room, then east two rooms to return to the big barrel chamber. Back in the barrel room, climb inside the barrel again. Now you want to roll it until an opening appears at the northeast side of the room (the top-right exit). When the barrel’s door lines up, step out to find a locked door. Use your small key to unlock it, then go through into the east wing of the shrine.
This next room features another water gap and a pair of those stretchy mushrooms. Climb the ladder and head north at the top (to the north) to find yourself on a higher ledge. Walk off the ledge to drop down – head through the path under the path you just dropped from and head down the stairs on the north wall.
Push a jar on the switch to the east to make a treasure chest appear. You’ll also find a large chest behind some blocks. Push the rightmost block up and the leftmost block left, clearing a path. Open the chest to obtain the Compass, which will help you locate unopened chests and the boss room on your map.
With the compass in hand, head back up the stairs on the north wall, then west into a dust filled room. Go through the south door and then east door in the next room. You should be back in the room we unlocked with our small key.
Use the first mushroom on the right to fling yourself over the small water pool. Aim to land on the raised platform in the middle of the water. Here, step on the floor switch to create a bridge connecting the central platform back to the entrance. Now pull the second mushroom on this platform all the way, and launch across the remaining water to the solid ground on the south side of the room. Break the pots for any hearts or rupees if needed, then head through the door to the east.
In this corridor-like room, more Sluggulas drop from above. Clear them out, then look at the arrangement of statues in the upper half. There are two stone statues and one floor switch in sight. Pull the northern statue to the right until it’s just to the right of the switch (not on it, just yet). Then loop around clockwise to the other side and push the second statue (on the left) onto the floor switch. This unlocks the door to the north. Go through that door into a new chamber.
Immediately upon entering, three red Mulldozers burrow out of the ground to attack. It’s a small arena, so keep moving to avoid getting hit by their charges. Take them out one by one with a few sword strikes each. When the last one falls, you’ll hear a jingle – a small key drops from the ceiling as your reward. Pick up this Third Small Key. You’ve now collected three keys in total.
There’s a staircase at the upper right of this room. Make your way to the northwest corner of the dust-filled room and use your small key to unlock the door and proceed through it.
This creature crawls quickly around the room, bouncing off the elastic spider webs along the walls. Stay alert and avoid contact while it’s moving fast (it will hurt if it hits you).
To defeat Madderpillar, strike its red nose with your sword when it charges or passes by. A successful hit will stun the beast momentarily, causing the flower-like segment on its tail to open up and reveal a glowing heart-shaped core. Quickly run around to its tail end and slash the exposed heart as many times as possible.
After a few seconds, the Madderpillar turns angry red and speeds up in a frenzy – you can’t harm it during this tantrum, so focus on dodging until it calms back down to its normal color and speed. Try not to get knocked into the sticky webs on the walls while evading (the webs will bounce you away). Repeat the cycle: hit the nose, then attack the tail’s weak point. It takes several rounds (around 16 hits to the tail in total) to defeat the Madderpillar. With patience and persistence, the giant bug will eventually collapse.
When the Madderpillar is defeated, the door opens and a large blue chest appears in the center of the room. Open it to claim the dungeon’s special item: the Gust Jar!
Item: Gust Jar
This mystical jar can suck in air and shoot it out. Assign it to a button and try it out: hold the button to draw objects and enemies in, and release to fire a blast of air.
The Gust Jar can clear away those dust piles and cobwebs you’ve been seeing, and it even pulls certain objects (like mushrooms or lilypads) towards you. It’s also very effective against pesky enemies like Puffstools – using it on them will suck the mushroom cap right off, stunning them for an easy finish.
Heart Piece #3
Now that you have the Gust Jar, you can grab a Piece of Heart hidden in the dungeon. From the mini-boss room, head south through the door that was previously blocked by webbing (use the Gust Jar to vacuum up the spider web covering it).
In this small chamber, you’ll see a shining Piece of Heart waiting for you on a pedestal – this is Heart Piece #3 of the game’s 44 pieces. Pick it up to increase your Heart Piece count (only four pieces make a new heart container). With this collectible in hand, go back north to the mini-boss room and then east to return to the large dusty chamber.
Optional: Hidden Mysterious Shells
Back in the dust-filled room, it’s time to put the Gust Jar to work on all those dusty piles. Use the Gust Jar to suck up all the dust covering the floor. As you clear the dirt, you’ll uncover several floor switches that were hidden underneath. Step on each switch you reveal. Two of them will make small chests appear, each containing 10 Mysterious Shells. These shells aren’t needed to beat the dungeon, but they will be useful later in your quest (they’re used for a figurine collecting side quest).
Another one of the switches causes a blue, glowing portal tile to appear in the center of the room. This is a warp portal – but it’s currently one-way and on a high ledge, so you can’t use it just yet. (We’ll come back to it later after obtaining the Big Key.)
Once you’ve revealed and collected the shell chests in this room, head through the door on the east side (clear its cobweb with the Gust Jar first). In the next room, use the Gust Jar to vacuum the sand piles in the northwest corner. You’ll reveal two switches on the floor. Step on both and two chests will pop into existence – inside are more Mysterious Shells (one of these chests holds 20 shells).
After grabbing them, suck up the remaining sand in the lower area to find another floor switch. This one makes a warp tile (red) appear, but it’s on a ledge you can’t reach from here. Don’t worry – this red warp is the paired portal that will eventually take you to that blue portal in the previous room, effectively creating a shortcut. You’ll activate it soon.
When you’re done looting the shells, go west back into the dusty room, make sure you stepped on all the switches there (to ensure the blue portal appeared), then head south to return to the barrel room where you started.
The Flooded Basement and Fourth Key
Now we venture into the lower level of the shrine. In the barrel room, use the Gust Jar on the last remaining spider web – it’s covering a hole in the center of the barrel’s floor. With the web gone, jump into the hole to drop down to the floor below.
You land with a splash in an underground water-filled grotto. A big green lilypad bobs nearby on the water’s surface. Time to use the Gust Jar in a new way: face opposite the direction you want to move, and fire the Gust Jar to blow a stream of air. This will propel the lilypad like a boat. Step onto the lilypad and practice by blowing air in the opposite direction of where you want to go, effectively sailing the lilypad around.
Navigate the lilypad down the small waterfall to the south. The current takes you into a wider flooded area. Steer the lilypad to the right (east) first. You’ll come to a solid ledge with a staircase. Hop off the lilypad here and climb the stairs onto the platform. Four pots line the wall; pick up and smash a couple to clear space.
Then push one of the remaining pots onto the floor switch at the center. This will keep the nearby gate permanently open. Now hop back on the lilypad and sail through the opened gate into the next room to the east. Glide the lilypad to the far north end of this waterlogged chamber. Here, you can disembark onto dry land where a chest sits on a low ledge. Open it to find a Small Key (this is your fourth and final small key in Deepwood Shrine). If the chest isn’t there, it means you might need to trigger something first: ensure you pushed a pot onto the switch on the northwest side of the room.
With the key in hand, ride the lilypad back west through the gate, then north at the split (backtracking to where you dropped in). You’ll pass the waterfall and can now explore the north side of this basement area. Beware of a few Sluggulas dropping from the ceiling as you go. At the far north end, there’s a locked door on a ledge. Park your lilypad near the steps, hop off, and use your new small key to unlock the north door. Go through to return to the upper level
The Big Key and a Hidden Heart Piece
This upper room is filled with deep chasms and a series of springy mushrooms. You need to traverse a tricky path using both your legs and your new Gust Jar. First, pull the mushroom straight south (downwards) as far as it stretches, then let go to catapult Link across the first gap to the upper side. You’ll land on a safe ledge. Now you’ll see another mushroom to the east across a gap. Use the Gust Jar on that distant mushroom – the powerful suction will pull the mushroom towards you like a rubber band. When it’s fully stretched, it will snap you across the gap to the east.
Continue this way through a gauntlet of mushrooms: each time, use the Gust Jar to grab and fling yourself from one platform to the next. After a few fun launches, you’ll reach a big ornate chest on the far side. Open it to obtain the Big Key, the master key that opens the boss’s door!
With the Big Key in hand, step on the floor switch next to the chest. A glowing red portal appears nearby. Step into this red warp tile, and it will teleport you back to the dungeon’s entrance in an instant. (This is a convenient shortcut out, but we’re not done here yet!)
Heart Piece #4
From the entrance, you can now finally access that mysterious blue portal we created earlier. Step onto the blue warp tile on the floor here at the entrance, and you’ll be whisked to a high ledge in a previously unreachable part of the shrine.
Right in front of you is a prize: Piece of Heart #4! Grab that Heart Piece – if you’ve collected all pieces available so far, this will complete a new Heart Container, giving you an extra heart in your life meter. Nicely done! Once you’ve picked it up, step back on the blue portal to return to the entrance.
Optional: Hidden Rupee Chest
Before heading to the boss, there’s one last treasure you can snag. From the entrance room, now that you have the Gust Jar, clear the spider webs in the northwest corner. This reveals a staircase going down on the left side. Go down those stairs to a small room below. Push the lone block out of your way and open the chest behind it to collect 20 Rupees (a little reward for the thorough explorer). Once you have your rupees, climb back upstairs.
Note: If you’re low on health, break some pots or backtrack to any hearts you left behind. The upcoming boss fight will also drop hearts from jelly bits, but it’s best to be prepared.
Now, when you’re ready, it’s time to face the boss. Return to the main chamber at the entrance and go down the staircase on the right side this time. You’ll be in a room with a big locked door on the far side and a couple of those spring mushrooms. Use the Gust Jar on the mushroom across the pit to launch yourself over to the left side. Then use the lower mushroom to fling yourself to the raised platform with the boss door. If needed, break the pots here for hearts. Stand in front of the large door and use the Big Key to open the boss door. Take a deep breath, and step inside.
Boss: Big Green Chuchu
As you enter, a cutscene plays: a regular Green Chuchu (a bouncy jelly-like blob) hops into the shrine, but to tiny Minish-sized Link, it looks gigantic! The door seals shut behind you, and the Big Green Chuchu oozes toward you, ready for battle. The arena is a simple, circular room with no hazards – it’s just you and the slime, toe to toe.
Attacks: The Big Green Chuchu is relatively slow, but its size makes it dangerous. It will slither toward you to collide and deal contact damage. Sometimes it rears up high and then hops, attempting to slam down on your position. Watch its shadow on the floor and be prepared to run aside when it jumps. After you’ve weakened it once, it may also wobble and try to crush you by body-slamming straight down with its upper half – again, keep moving to avoid being flattened.
Strategy: This oversized ChuChu might tower over you, but it has a weak point: its squishy base. Immediately equip your Gust Jar. Stay relatively close to the boss (if you stray too far, it tends to start jumping more often) and face its jelly feet. Use the Gust Jar to suck up the Chuchu’s base (its “foot”) whenever you get an opening. As you continuously vacuum the green jelly, you’ll notice the base shrinking in size. The Chuchu will wobble more and more, struggling to keep its balance. Keep an eye on its movements: if it starts a jumping attack, quickly dodge aside, then resume using the Gust Jar. After enough suction, the Big Green Chuchu loses stability and topples over, landing on its side with a thud.
This is your chance! While the Chuchu is stunned on its side, rush in and strike its exposed head with your sword as many times as you can. You should be able to land several hits before the gooey giant pulls itself upright again. Once it recovers, it will regrow its jelly foot and the cycle repeats. Back off and prepare the Gust Jar again.
After a couple of rounds of this, the Big Green Chuchu becomes more frantic – it might start hopping around more frequently, but don’t panic. The strategy remains the same: keep moving to avoid its jumps and body slams, stay close enough that it doesn’t start an endless hopping spree, and use the Gust Jar to shrink and flip it. Then slash away during each knockdown phase. It should take roughly three knockdowns worth of sword strikes to finish off the boss.
Maintain the pattern, and soon the gigantic slime will be defeated in a cartoonish burst of jelly. Congratulations, you’ve felled the Big Green Chuchu!
As the boss disintegrates, it leaves behind two critical items. From above, the sacred Earth Element drifts down into your hands. This earth-infused crystal is the proof of your triumph in Deepwood Shrine, and one of the four elements you need to restore the Picori Blade. Then, a full Heart Container drops onto the floor – pick it up to increase your maximum health by one heart. Savor the moment!
With the Earth Element secured, step into the green warp portal that appears. It will transport you out of the Deepwood Shrine, back to the Minish Woods entrance of the dungeon. Take a moment to appreciate how far you’ve come – not long ago you were human-sized at a festival, and now you’re emerging victorious from the Minish’s hidden temple with a mystical artifact in hand.
Congratulations on completing Deepwood Shrine! Next stop: the wise Minish Elder will point you toward Mt. Crenel, where the second element awaits. But for now, enjoy your expanded health and new Gust Jar as you venture back into the Minish Woods. The journey has only just begun…
