Starting totk again has reminded me that Links gloom infection, that he has until he visits all the shrines and defeats all the dungeon bosses, has to hurt him so bad all the time. Normal people, when they just touch gloom are bedridden or just noticeably ill. Link got attacked with it, he has to live with it for practically as long as the game lasts.
Especially early game when Purah won’t let him continue without resting and he’s as physically weak as he was after a 100yr coma. I think he’s in so much pain constantly that it affects his memory and people who he has definitely met have to reintroduce themselves and he has to relearn things he should already know.
I can see him pushing through it until he collapses at the emergency shelter in lookout landing or whichever free bed is easiest to get to. On the worst of days he has to try to sleep through it because even just trying to get up is too agonizing to consider.
Blood moons cause flare ups and it hurts more when wandering the depths and encountering gloom hands, and the only treatment is light magic. From Rauru’s condensed shrine orbs to just pure sunlight and the plants infused with it, to the light dragons ability to heal despite that not really being part of her power set.
I think even after the infection itself is gone, the pain and scars linger. There’s nerve damage and a deep burn that spans his whole arm as the impact site. He may be as physically healed as he possibly can be but it still hurts. Long dips in hot springs help, salt baths and soft beds and massages meant for rock people help, simply being around Zelda and her eternally radiating light magic helps the most.
He’s decorated in pieces of the light dragon for this reason, her hair woven into cloth, her scales and spikes carved into armor and jewelry, the sword she imbued her power into for all those years constantly strapped to his back even though it was going to be there anyway. He would lie on her back for hours just to rest for a moment in a way he can’t anywhere else.
It just hurts, it has to. It certainly looks like it does.