84 days and counting....

Tigress looked out in shock as she saw Kai coming towards her, an unnatural green glow illuminating from the pendant he wore around his neck. Kai grinned nastily. "My, my," he sneered. "You've certainly sprouted. I think you were a lot shorter the last time I saw you."

Tigress managed to get to her feet, just a mere foot or so shorter than the bull standing in front of her. He was a little taller than she remembered, but she was also seventeen years old the last time that they had crossed paths. She would obviously be somewhat shorter. "What are you doing here?" she demanded icily. "You were supposed to completely leave China and never return!"

Kai rolled his eyes and laughed. "And let you get away with banishing me?" he asked coolly. "Not likely. I deserved none of your mistreatment."

"You tried to combine the Element Stones together when Oogway specifically told you not to!"

"Simply to gain more fighting power."

"Which if combined can blow up almost all of the land in China?"

"Oh come now," Kai said dismissively. "Now you're overreacting."

Tigress gave him a look. "I'm the one overreacting?" she asked nastily. "Says the guy standing in front of me calling down revenge upon everyone."

Kai gave her a harsh stare. "You denied me my rightful power!" he snapped. "So I'm simply returning the favor!"

Tigress eyed the glowing pendant around the bull's neck, trying to not let any panic rise up within her. "Where did you get that?" she questioned suspiciously.

Kai glanced at his necklace and grinned. "Ah, you did notice," he remarked smugly. "I'm glad. I had to dig down to the core of the planet to get it."

"What is it?"

"Why, Tigress, you astonish me. I would have thought that you of all people would know about this pendant. Of course, then again Shifu does tend to keep the best things to himself."

"What...is it....."

Kai gave her a smirk and twirled his blades threateningly at her. "Why don't you come and find out for yourself, plum blossom?"

Tigress snarled and came charging at the bull. Kai lifted up a sword to strike her, but Tigress dodged out of the way, allowing a trail of sparks to go scampering away. She rammed into his back, sending him flying forward with dust following close behind him. The master ran back for another round, but Kai rolled out of the way and flung a sword at her arm. Tigress felt the chains wrap tightly around her and she was pulled to the ground where she skidded over to the villain. Kai tried to swing her over his head, but Tigress quickly grabbed onto the chain and pulled back, creating a tug-of-war between them. Kai grinned. "I see your skills have improved," he noted admirably.

Tigress responded with a quick and hard yank backwards, causing Kai go flying into a nearby building. He groaned and stood up with a scowl on his face. "But in case you haven't noticed, my dear," he added. "So have my skills."

With that, Kai's pendent began to glow and a large blast of green light suddenly erupted from his hooves. Startled, Tigress had no time to react as she was sent hurling backwards into the stairs where she hit her head hard on the steps. Kai laughed and sent another green blast out, knocking her back even farther and not giving her a chance to stand up and defend herself. Tigress weakly held her head up, seeing another green blast come charging at her. At the last second however, she was shoved out of the way and the blast hit the stairs instead.

"I got you!" Crane assured her, plopping her gently on the ground near a sturdy building.

The rest of the Furious Five came down alongside Master Shifu who had heard the commotion from within the Hall of Heroes and alerted the masters.

"Kai!" Shifu snapped, getting into a fighting stance. "I don't recall you being allowed here. Or even in China!"

Kai laughed. "In case you've forgotten, little Shifu," he responded. "I don't take kindly to rules. I make my own."

"Yes, I see not following protocol has gotten you far...."

The bull laughed again. "How noble of you," he jeered. "And how absolutely stupid!"

"I beg your pardon?!"

"Honestly, Shifu.... Do you really think I came to the Jade Palace to learn how to be an honorable kung fu master? Learning under Oogway was the only way to make up for losing this pendant over forty years ago. But now that I have it back, I'm stronger than ever! I quite amazed that the grand and wise Oogway didn't pick up on it. But I suppose that's the price of being an old, mad turtle."

Shifu lost his cool and came charging at Kai, dodging a green blast that was hurled at him. The Furious Five then proceeded to surround the bull, Monkey saying, "Even with a pendent, you're not threatening! We've defeated villains tougher than you!"

"Is that so?" Kai retorted with a smirk. "Well then, I suppose I'll have to have some help."

The pendent glowed again and suddenly, a bunch of green people came out from behind buildings and the nearby river under the bridge and even in people's houses. Their eyes glowed brightly and their bodies looked almost solid, like Jade Statues that you would see in front of palaces. The masters gasped in shock as Kai let out a devious laugh. "This is one of many benefits of this Jade Pendent," he told them. "I get minions anytime I want."    To the Jade henchmen, he called out, "ATTACK!!!!!"

The henchmen immediately launched themselves at the masters, wielding Jade weapons and and moving at an alarmingly fast speed. The masters quickly moved to counterattack, trying their best to fight and keep an eye out for Kai at the same time. Viper looked at the fighting warriors, recognizing one of them as Master Croc.

"Master Croc?!" she cried in shock.

Master Croc didn't answer her though. He simply kept on trying to attack her and destroy anything that he got his hands on. Viper, alarmed, quickly yelled over to her teammates, "These are all kung fu masters!!!!"

"I noticed!" Tigress yelled back, fighting back against a master she recognized as Master Hedgehog. More of the jade masters fought back against the Furious Five, but there were so many that they had some trouble keeping track of who went where. Tigress was the first to notice them start turning their attacks over to the citizens of the valley. After blocking a few from entering a cramped house, she yelled out, "We need to get everyone out first! There's too many to fight!"

Mantis tried (and failed) to paralyze a master, getting quickly grabbed by Viper when the jade master tried to attack him. "Sounds good," he assured her. "Who's doing what?"

"Viper and Monkey, you two escort everyone out! We'll hold the masters off the best we can."

"On it!" Monkey told her. He and Viper proceeded to dart away from the battle and over to the various buildings to help everyone evacuate. Mr. Ping, not willing to leave his noodle shop, offered to hold down the fort with some of his wok pans.

"Mr. Ping," Viper told him as she got the rest of the villagers out of the noodle shop. "You can't stay here! It's far too dangerous! And I don't think Po would forgive us if he found you dead when he comes back."

"With my son gone, you'll need an extra set of paws...or wings I suppose...to help you defend this valley!" Mr. Ping protested. "Besides...I'm not about to let some green masters under some type of mind control necklace take away my shop! If they want to take it, they'll have to go through me first!"

"Mr. Ping..."

"The answer is no! Speaking of kung fu, have you seen Scorpion?"

"She's helping to move some of her sick patients," Viper told him. "Now can we please-"

Mr. Ping interrupted her by swinging the wok pan in front of him and clobbering a Jade master on the head, denting his wok pan and giving the jade master a minor headache. The old goose looked at his pan and then gave the master a nasty look. "Do you know  how much that wok pan cost?!" he yelled. "Do you think I can cook noodles properly in a dented wok pan?! I am going to make you wish that you never messed with the property of Teqiao Ping! GET OVER HERE!!!!!!!"

Mr. Ping then leaped onto the jade master, covering his eyes and causing him to blindly stumble around the noodle shop. The master finally collapsed into a table and fell over, allowing Mr. Ping to hop off of him and pick up a chair and hurl it at his head. The jade master went sailing across the noodle shop where Viper promptly grabbed him and sent him hurling outside.

"Well that takes care of him," Mr. Ping said. "Now I need to fix up my shop!"

He proceeded to head back inside of the noodle shop while Viper headed back outside to help having given up on getting the goose to leave the valley. As she came outside, Monkey approached her and asked, "Where's Mr. Ping?"

"He's not coming," Viper replied. "He's insisting on staying in the noodle shop to defend it."

"It can be rebuilt!" Monkey exclaimed.

"What's going on?" came a voice from behind them.

The two warriors spun around, coming face to face with Mei Ling who had a look of concern plastered across her face.

"Mei Ling?!' Viper exclaimed. "What are you doing here?!"

"I was passing by to get something at the market when I saw all of this commotion going on," the fox answered. "And I came in to see what was going on."

A loud eruption from behind the three caused them to turn around and see Tigress and Crane hurl eight of the jade masters into a building, leaving a massive dent and revealing more villagers who quickly took to fleeing the scene.

"There's your answer," Viper told her.

"Hey, aren't you supposed to be in Chorh-Gom?" Monkey asked.

"I'll explain that later," Mei-Ling assured him. "In the meantime, is there anything I can do to help?"

"If it's not too much trouble," Viper said. "Could you maybe keep an eye on Kai?"

"Who?"

"He's the bull with the weird horns and the glowing pendant," Monkey told her.

Mei-Ling glanced around the valley. "Where?" she asked. "I don't see him."

"He should be roaming around controlling those jade masters," Viper said glancing around, but like Mei-Ling said, there was no sign of him.

"Where'd he go?!" Monkey cried. "He was right there?!"

"Is Shifu fighting him?" Mei-Ling suggested.

"Shifu's helping to fight the ma-"

Shifu was missing too. A single thought flew across all three of the masters minds: Kai and Shifu were engaged in a deadly fight somewhere.

"I have to find him!" Mei-Ling cried, running through the battlefield of masters.

"Mei-Ling wait!" Viper called out.

The fox didn't listen however and went diving  right into the battle field in search of her boyfriend and the villain that was being fought. 

Shifu had been trying to fight off the jade masters and go after Kai at the same time, but this task hadn't proven easy for him as there were too many mind-controlled masters to fight off. During the battle, Kai had commanded some of the masters to corner Shifu whereupon Kai took advantage of the situation and grabbed the master and blasted them to the top of the Jade Palace for some one-on-one fighting. Shifu, not too happy with Kai returning, wasted no time going after him and held up remarkably well despite Kai's new and improved skills. Seeing the Jade Pendent around Kai's neck, Shifu thought that he could easily solve the problem at hand by snatching it off his neck, but Kai soon proved to be a lot harder to combat than previously thought and all of Shifu's attempts at getting the necklace were soon thwarted when Kai repeatedly blasted him with the necklace's energy and soon knocked him into a weak state of helplessness. Shifu tried to fight back, but with most of his energy wasted in the fight, he knew there was no point in going on.

Kai let out a laugh as he knocked Shifu once more into the side of a nearby rock that had made its way into the arena. "Well this is quite a pity," he mocked. "Seeing as you appear to be the new grandmaster of the Jade Palace, I naturally assumed you'd be able to defeat me. Or at the very least, be able to hold well against me. But I see you're as weak as you ever were."

Shifu tried to get up but Kai kicked him into the side of the arena where he hit his head against one of the seating areas. Spotting an Oogway statue nearby, the bull smirked nastily and added, "But perhaps I can be of some assistance. For example, lets start with this tempe. It could use a few...improvements...."

He let out an evil laugh and threw his chained swords at the Oogway statue, wrapping them tightly around it and swinging it somewhat easily into the air. Unable to do anything, Shifu watched on in horror as Kai flung the statue at the Sacred Hall of Warriors, ripping the entire temple in two and causing it to collapse in a flash of blinding green light.....

Mei-Ling reached the stairs, barely managing to avoid the chaos Tigress, Crane, and Mantis were fighting.

"Mei-Ling?!" Crane exclaimed in shock. "How'd you get out of Chorh-Gom prison?"

"Long story," Mei-Ling told him. "I'll explain after I find Shifu."

"What do mean 'find Shifu'?" Mantis asked. "He's helping to fight off these masters."

Tigress glanced around at the battle's chaos, seeing that Mei-Ling was, unfortunately, right. "Now he's not," she informed her comrades. "He's not here."

"Then where is he?!" the bug explained.

A loud crash from the Sacred Hall of Warriors accompanied by a bright flash of green got everyone's attention.

"Up there?" Crane offered.

Parts of the temple came crashing down slowly towards the valley, debris knocking into buildings and demolishing them almost instantly. Viper, remembering Mr. Ping staying put in the noodle shop, immediately exclaimed, "Mr. Ping!"

"Is he still here?!" Tigress yelled, dodging a part of the temple wall. "I told you to evacuate everyone!!!!"

"He wouldn't budge!!!!"

The girls both went darting towards the noodle shop to get the goose out of harm's way while Mei-Ling dodged some of the debris and went dashing up the stairs in search of Shifu.

"Crane, go with Mei-Ling. We got this," Mantis told his friend.

Crane nodded and flew after Mei-Ling, trying to not get hit with any temple shards that came flying down the stairs.

Shifu laid weakly in shock and horror as he watched the Jade Palace's sacred temple being completely demolished before his very eyes. There were many things accomplished in that temple. There were many ancient traditions first performed in that temple. There were precious memories attached to it. And above all things, it was the first thing that Master Oogway himself had constructed. And now...now it was gone. Kai, having no remorse for destroying such a sacred building, turned his attention to Master Shifu.

"How are we holding up, oh-so-special Grandmaster Shifu?" he mocked. "Enjoying the show?"

"You...monster..." Shifu managed to choke out angrily.

"Oh, calm down. It's just a building. It can be rebuilt. If any of these masters can find the time to  rebuild it, that is."       The bull cracked his knuckles. "In the meantime though," he cackled. "I have business to attend to. Once I take away your kung fu, I'll take great pleasure in taking out this Almighty Dragon Warrior I've heard so much about."

"Po?" Shifu asked weakly.

"Yeah, the panda. So I've heard. Unless of course he's a bug and he happens to be right behind me."

"He's not...a bug," Shifu told him. "But he's...not...here...."

Kai looked at him in shock, his expression turning into one of pure aggravation. "Are you kidding me?!" he yelled. "Ugh! I hate having to make three trips!!!!!"   He took a breath and looked back at Shifu with a nonchalant expression on his face. "Oh well," he said. "At least I can work with you."

A bright green light emerged from Kai's hand, causing Shifu to try and move away. "Killing...me...won't do...anything," he warned.

"Kill you?" Kai repeated. "Oh, I don't want to kill you, Grandmaster. Killing you would be completely ineffective. You have such kung fu potential. Just like all of those other masters I stole from."

Shifu went wide-eyed in panic. "S-s-stole?" he stammered.

"Well how do you think I got so strong?" the bull asked gleefully. "I can't tell you how much I enjoy this pendent."

Shifu groaned, trying once more to get up. "You'll never get away with this, Kai," he threatened.

Kai laughed. "Oh there's no need for such a simple name," he told the red panda. He then knelt down to Shifu's level and thrust the green light into his abdomen. Shifu felt a searing pain run through him, almost like someone was trying to rip something out that was attached to every inch of his body, and let out a cry of anguish. He felt everything around him start to fade as his body, unable to take the pain, starting causing him to blackout. Right before passing out, he heard Kai's vicious laughter at his pain and he heard him say, "You can call me The Collector!!!!"

And everything went black.

Kai began to drain Shifu's kung fu skills, absorbing them into his pendent and ultimately himself. However, he was interrupted when he was viciously attacked from the side and knocked to the ground. The absorbed power, lacking his control, vanished back into Shifu with a green blast, knocking him again into the wooden seating. Kai turned around and saw a fox around Shifu's age cradling the grandmaster in her arms and holding him tightly. Before he could even attack her, he got knocked back again into the stairs. A quick glance upwards told him that it was Crane. Kai let out an angry yell. "I'm trying to conduct some business here!" he snapped. "Do you mind going  away?!"

"You can take your pendent and scram!" Crane yelled back with equal force. "Or better yet, why don't you let us hold onto it for you?!"

"Ha! Like I'd ever hand it over to you pathetic masters!"

Crane dove back down to attack him, Kai getting knocked about briefly since he did use up some of his energy trying to steal Shifu's kung fu power. (And ultimately failing at it). After taking a second to warm up though, he was quick to retaliate and wound up using one of his swords to cut Crane in the side, forcing him to fall to the ground in pain.

"Hey!" Mei-Ling exclaimed from beside Shifu. She left her boyfriend behind for a moment to attack Kai and prevent him from doing whatever she had seen him try and do to Master Shifu. Kai was hard to fight though and while she didn't get cut, she found herself getting knocked up some of the stairs. The bull then turned his attention to Crane where he put the green light in his abdomen, draining Crane of his kung fu as well. Crane was quick to pass out as well and Kai took to trying to take his kung fu. Mei-Ling went back for round two, but the bull saw it coming and blocked her long enough to steal all of Crane's kung fu skills. He then performed a quick wind blast that threw Mei-Ling back into one of the walls.

"Not one more step!" came Tigress voice as she and the rest of the masters came into the arena. They would have been down fighting the army of masters that Kai had summoned, but they had decided to run off right after the temple got destroyed and they ultimately wound up going to find Kai. 

"You got up here a little late, Tigress," Kai teased. "I thought you'd be a bit faster."

"Save it for another time! I don't have the patience for you at the moment!"

Kai laughed. "You're all going to try and stop me?" he asked. "Doubtful. I really only came for your Dragon Warrior, but I hear he's not here."

"He's somewhere you'll never find him," the master told him bitterly. "I hope that's not too big of a disappointment for you."

"Not at all, my dear. It'll just make it even better when I hunt him down and steal his kung fu."

Tigress felt a wave of fury engulf her and she gave Kai a fiery look that could kill...if looks could kill.

"I'M GOING TO KILL YOU!!!!!" she screamed, charging at him.

"Tigress, wait!" Viper called after her worriedly.

The master, however, was too occupied in trying to attack Kai to listen to her. The bull blocked Tigress' attack and used the chain from his sword to grab her arm and hurl her up the stairs where she hit her head hard and almost blacked out from the pain. The rest of the Furious Five came charging after Kai, trying to stop him and grab his pendent so that he didn't harm anyone else. The villain managed to dodge their attacks and defeat them however, injuring them just as bad as he did Tigress and Shifu. Mantis tried to freeze his chi with specific pressure points, but Kai whipped his sword around him and flung the bug off, causing him to land roughly on the floor. Seeing his knowledge in acupuncture, Kai quickly grabbed the fallen master and took his chi, causing Mantis to pass out with a cry of pain. Kai, seeing the masters starting to slowly regroup, let out a nasty laugh and announced, "Once I've defeated the Almighty Dragon Warrior, I'll return to finish you off! Especially since I'll have that panda working for me by the time I'm finished with him!"

He let out a maniacal laugh and took out his sword, nicking Mantis in the area where his chi was drained. Mantis slowly began to be covered in a jade green stillness, slowly beginning to resemble the jade masters that had been attacking the valley. He then proceeded to do the same thing to Crane, resulting with a despairing cry from Viper. Once he was done, Kai grabbed a hold of Crane's foot and ordered the avian to take him back to his hideout. The now jade Crane did what was asked, Mantis hopping onto his back to follow them. When they were out of sight, the masters that remained finally got to their feet to look at the damage that was done. The temple was gone; the Valley of Peace was almost completely wrecked minus the buildings farther away from the Jade Palace, and four of them were badly injured, the worst being Crane and Mantis since they were now under Kai's control.

Mei-Ling tended to Shifu who was still unconscious, worrying about whether or not Kai had drained his kung fu skills and his qi along with it. Viper slithered over to Tigress who was shakily sitting up and suffering from a massive headache.

"Tigress, are you okay?" she asked. "Your skull's not broken, is it?"

Tigress shook her head, wincing in slight pain. "I'm fine," she assured her. "But Po's in danger. We need to warn him."

"But we don't know where he is," Viper reminded her. "The panda village was never meant to be found!"

Tigress glanced back up at the destroyed temple. "Provided the basement artifacts are still intact," she replied. "I think there might be something we can use."

She slowly got up and climbed up the mostly intact stairs. Some parts of the building had damaged some of the steps, but Tigress could get up to the remains of the temple rather easily. There wasn't much left of it. The pillars, which had been destroyed, had caused the rood to collapse, essentially destroying everything inside of the temple along with the artifacts right on the first floor. Tigress dug through the rubble, trying to find the stairs into the basement. (Which she guessed would be covered deep within the rubble).

To think I was just in here yesterday helping Shifu polish the floors, she thought to herself, removing the rubble and debris on top of the structure. After what felt like forever, she finally removed enough of the collapsed roof to locate the stairway. Tigress dug her way to the stairs and managed to slip into the narrow opening that she created.

Here's hoping that the rest of the roof doesn't collapse on me on the way down, she thought, hurrying down the stairs the lower artifact level. There was a bit of dust and small rocks littering the hallway, but other than that, the lower levels of the Jade Palace had gone untouched much to Tigress' relief. She darted down the hallway until she finally came across a room to her left. Turning into it, she glanced around the large enclosure until her eyes rested on a medium-sized white orb attached to a light pink metal wrapped carefully around it, sprouting its sides out as if it was a flower in bloom.

The Locator Orb! the master exclaimed to herself. She quickly darted over and grabbed the delicate artifact, holding it close to her chest in relief. She then turned and raced back down the hallway to head back outside to her friends.

Hang on, Po! she thought. We're coming!!! We're coming!!!!!!!