Yay!  Finally got to 100 votes!!!  I never thought I would get this far!  Also, I haven't updated in a while because I may or may not have been working on some more projects. 👀  Eh who am I kidding it was also because of school and writer's block.

No One's POV

Misako and Wu ended up taking the bounty after the ninja entered the dark and evil territory of the Overlord. They were going to find Pixal.  They had a feeling of where she was, though.  She would most likely be at the Monastery, her home on the ground.  Misako parked the flying ship next to the large mountain, the big sails retracting from their upright position to rest beside the wooden pole holding them up. 

The siblings-in-law climb down from the deck and land onto the cold ground, their shoe prints being visible with each step into the white, powdery snow.  They were slightly surprised that snow wasn't anywhere else.  After all, it was now winter.  They had left for the Dark Island well into fall, yet the land is yet to be blanketed in the snowy precipitation.

The winds howls and whips past them as they make their way over to the great big doors of the Monastery.  They push the doors open and cross the courtyard.  The place looked uninhabited.  A ping of anxiety rises in the two.  If she isn't there, then where is she?  Wu, not wanting to startle Pixal if she was to be in the building, knocked gently on one of the doors leading inside.  "Pixal!" He yells desperately over the howling wind.  "Are you in there?"

At first, no sound is heard.  Wu turns to the silver haired woman, a grim look on his face.  Then, the sound of an unlocking door is heard.  He turns his head back to the door in surprise and hope.   The door opens gingerly to show a metallic woman with glowing green eyes.  Her eyes widen at the sight os the two.  "Master Wu!  Misako!" She says, opening the door all the way and gesturing for the two to step inside and out of the cold.  They do so, and she closes and locks the door behind them.  "Pixal, it's so good to see you!" Wu exclaims.

"As am I." She says.  "Where have you been?  I've been trying to reach you for weeks!  And what is going on in Ninjago?"

"We will explain everything to you in due time," Misako says.  "For now, we must meet the others."

She gasps slightly.  "Is Zane okay?  Did you find what you were looking for?"

"Yes, Zane is fine.  And yes, we found more than what we were looking for."  Wu says, a hint of pride showing on his face.  But, the expression only lasts for a split second.  "We must make haste," he says, his expression growing grim again.  "My brother has been overtaken by an evil entity, and the Ninja will need all the help they can get."

She nods, already piecing things together.  "Where shall we meet them?  I can try to get a hold of Zane."

"We can meet them in an old abandoned apartment a couple blocks from Borg Tower.  They're bound to be close to there." Misako says.  Pixal nods, already going through her system to try and get a hold of Zane.

Kai POV

We ninja crouch in yet another dark alleyway.  It's beginning to become a system with us.  We're waiting out for any news on Pixal.  We can't start the attack without the full team at attendance.  Jay taps his feet against the concrete street impatiently.  Cole, Nya and Zane are having a hushed conversation, but not a very secretive one.  They just don't want to make too much noise to attract any unwanted attention.  Haru has turned into a wolf and has his body pressed against Ash's, trying to warm her up.  She's using him as a pillow.  Lloyd sits against another wall, trying to hide his shivering.  I look at him.

The temperature dropped dramatically since earlier today.  After all, it is nighttime now.  The former Silent Soarers come from a tropical island, and I'm honestly surprised they made it this far without becoming really cold.  But to be fair, they haven't exactly had much time to cool down from their constant running through the city until now.  Because I'm the fire Ninja, I can function pretty well in colder temperatures, well, better than anyone else.  But, I tend to also... crash, more often.  At first, I don't really know how to function in weather lower than 60 degrees, but I manage.

Now the Silent Soarers on the other hand...

Their island was always hot and humid.  I don't think it ever went below 70 degrees.  The jungle air was sticky, and almost suffocating.  After living in a place like that all their lives, this new air, polluted and dirty, must be weird to them.  And I bet the thick dark fog isn't helping much either.  I think it's December now.  I haven't been paying much attention to the date lately, mostly because Lloyd and I got a bit "caught up" for about two weeks and lost track of time in all the action.  Now that I think about it, snow must be completely foreign to them.  Even when Lloyd and I were at that mountain village, the coldest it was was probably 60, the storm being the exception.

If it were up to me, I would have us hide in one of the buildings right next to us.  But, with the assassins and stone warriors at every turn, patrolling and keeping an eye out for any unwanted guests, alleyways are the safest place to be with such a big group like ours.  Plus, we don't want to walk in on a person who's been turned evil.  That probably wouldn't turn out well.  But on the bright side, at least it gives us a little shelter from the cold, piercing wind that has picked up.

I continue to stare at my boyfriend.  You can tell he's trying to desperately hide every tremor that hits his body, but the shaking is too strong, and surpasses his tensed mussels.  You can see his breath when he shakily exhales, and his face is rosy colored from the cold.  I move from my sitting position and over to the wall next to him.  I slide my back down the wall and touch my thigh to his when I've fully sat down.  He flinches slightly, but I can't tell if it's from his quaking body or from surprise.  Nevertheless, he leans into my warmth slightly, but not enough to become visible to the others.

I smile.  We've never cuddled in front of the others before, well, not willingly.  I can sense the hesitance in him, unsure if he wants to confirm everyone's suspicions of our relationship.  Even so, I'm not about to let him freeze to death before the big battle.  I wrap my arms around him in a warming hug, and I pull him partly onto me.  At first, he puts his hand on my chest and tries to push me away, not wanting to expose himself in front of his teammates.  But, despite his silent protests, I hold him in his position against my side, having him curled up halfway on my leg.  My arm stays wrapped around him, leaving him no room for escape.

"Kai-" he hisses through clattering teeth.  I silence him with a quick peck on the lips.

"Just deal with it." I say, channeling the warmth from my fire through my body to pretty much make myself a human heat pad.  Lloyd stops resisting and begrudgingly relaxes his body against mine.  He lets out a defeated growl as he snuggles his cold face into the crook of my neck.  I can't tell if his face is red from anger, embarrassment, or just the cold.  Probably all three.  I laugh quietly.  I catch a glance from the corner of my eye to see I've obtained an audience.  Jay has given up on tapping his foot and is now sitting next to Cole.  The two seem to be in a hushed argument, probably over something stupid.  Nya and Zane are looking at us, my sister wearing a smug and teasing look.  Zane just has his "I told you so" face on.

I give them a look that waves them off.  They giggle to themselves and return to their conversation.  I turn back to the shivering dragonkin.  "Just wait until you see snow." I say, breaking the silent barrier.

He repositions his head so his eyes are staring into mine.  "I've only seen pictures.  You can tell they were just digitally drawn though." He says.

"Well, as cold as it is, it's actually very beautiful." I say.  I notice his shivering hasn't gone down despite my abnormal body heat.  In fact, it's almost worsened.  "Lloyd, are you okay?" I ask him, a hint of worry in my voice.

He nods.  "I guess I'm just not use to this weather.  Also, I'm technically part reptile."  He says matter-of-factly.  I open my mouth to say something but before I can get another word in, Zane interrupts me.

"Guys!  It's Pixal!  She says to meet us at an abandoned apartment not too far from here!"  We all look at each other.  Lloyd unbinds himself from my grip.  "Are you sure that's her?" He asks, suspicious of our shape shifting enemies.

Zane shakes his head with a light chuckle.  "Believe me, it's her." He says with pride and love.  He hasn't seen his girlfriend in about two months.  He must be over the moon right now.  We all get to our feet, stiff from the cold.

"Well, let's get moving before we freeze to death!" Jay says.  Zane uploads a digital map in his viewport and pinpoints Pixal's location.  And just like that, we're on the move again.  We sprint along in the shadows.  Avoiding our enemies, trying not to be seen, yada yada yada, you get the drill.  Eventually, we arrive at the place we want to be.  We keep our weapons handy, just in case.  Zane slowly reaches for the apartment window, and opens it.  He climbs in and lands on silent feet inside.  When all is clear, he motions for us to follow.  One by one, we file through the window, brushing ourselves off from the dust that was rubbed on our gis.  We also try to warm up, causing me to have quite a few people huddled around me, craving the heat I'm purposely radiating. 

Zane looks around hopefully, desperately looking in every direction of the shadowed room.  Suddenly, a figure can be seen walking into the room.  We all whip our heads at the figure, drawing our weapons out of instinct.  We can see glowing green eyes illuminate from within the shadows, specs of dust lighting up in their ray of vision.  We all tense, except Zane.  Zane wears a prideful expression.  "Pixal..." he says to the figure. 

The figure reveals itself to be a robot woman.  Her long, silver hair is drawn back into a ponytail.  She had a black gi on with red and blue accents across the fabric, and black shoulder pads.  She gasps.  "Zane!" She says in disbelief.  She runs up to the nindroid and collapses into his arms.  He wraps his arms around her tightly, like she was about to fall off a cliff and was just barley hanging on.  "I missed you!" Her robotic voice says with joy.  She retracts from his embrace, her eyes filled with glittering emotion.  They put their foreheads agains each other, laughing lightly.  The whole thing was very wholesome to watch.  She sneaks a glance at the rest of us, and her eyes fall onto our three new members.  "Oh, you must be the Silent Soarers." She says.  "But I thought there were four of you?"

Lloyd's expression darkens slightly.  "One of our members... couldn't make it." He explains.  Pixal nods in understanding.

"Master Wu has told me much about you." She says.  Her calm expression fixates to realization.  "Oh, I forgot!  Come with me!" She says grabbing Zane's hand and pulling him across the room.  We all look at each other and follow her.  She leads us into a big empty room with a single rectangular light in the center of the ceiling.  Under that light, just so happens to  be Master Wu and Misako.

"Master Wu!  Misako!" Cole says upon seeing them.  We enter into the room and form a semi circle around the two, awaiting orders. 

"Okay, so we're all reunited. What now?" Ash asks, knowing that's the question we all have.  Wu turns his gaze from Ash to Lloyd.  Lloyd, realizing it's his time, let's put a shaky breath and moves from my side to stand between his relatives.  All eyes are now on him.  "Okay," he starts.  "We couldn't get much information about the Overlord other than he now has powers.  What are these powers exactly?  Well it probably has something to do with the fact he can now turn people evil."

"Wait, what-" Misako asks.  She and Master Wu wear shocked and confused faces.

"We'll fill you in as we go." Lloyd says in return.  "Anyway, we haven't seen any sign of the Overlord himself yet, so it looks like we'll be taking the fight to him again."

"I don't mean to be that guy, but what if he's ready for us?  Even if we do a surprise ambush like last time, he's had plenty of time to prepare for anything!"  Haru says

"Last time he only faced half of us.  This time, he'll be facing all of us.  We're stronger together." He says, getting more and more confident with every word.  Nods of approval go around the room.  "Whatever the Overlord has in store, we can and will rise above it!  And here's how we'll do it."

Lloyd POV

It's finally in our sights.  Borg tower.  And oh boy, it is not what I imagined it to be.  It's a lot taller up close.  The walls of the tower look like coal and the windows like black spinel.  The tower seems to be looming over us, almost leaning, like it's about to collapse on us and crush us into dust at any given moment. Looking up at it from my crouched position behind a flipped truck makes me dizzy and I feel almost sick to my stomach. No, focus Lloyd. You can do this. If you don't, all of Ninjago will pay the price. No pressure... I take a deep breath. In and out. In and out.

I look around. The place is heavily guarded, but only by stone warriors. No assassins are in sight. Suddenly, in the dead silence we were in just a moment ago, I hear a maniacal laugh sound off from atop the tower. The laugh is just like the one Overlord had when we last faced him off. Loud, raspy, dripping in evil.  It hurts my ears. I shudder, not just from the cold. His voice sends chills down my spine. I try to control my shaking from the bitter cold and now my fear. I feel a hand on my shoulder. I turn to see Nya. She rubs my shoulder in an attempt to soothe me. It helps a little. I give her a smile as she removes her hand, returning the smile.

I focus my attention on how we're going to go about this. It looks like stairs have been built into the sides of the building, leading all the way up to the top. I'm pulled from my thoughts. "Lloyd? What do we do?". It's my mother. I realize I've been silent for too long.  I look at her, take another deep breath, and turn to my team.

"Alright, there's no stealthy way to go about this. There are stone warriors everywhere, and the Overlord most likely has a clear view of the whole city from up there. We're just gonna have to brute force our way in." Looks of uncertainty rolled around the group, but, determined nods then follow.  We all know we have no choice. But even so, it doesn't deplete the nervousness.  But the adrenaline that will most likely run through our systems should be enough to get us through.

Still crouched down, I start moving from my spot, making sure to stay hidden. When I'm in position, I signal for the others to get ready. They draw their weapons. I put up my hand and keep it still for several seconds, signaling for them to wait.  Then, with a wave of my two fingers, I jump out from behind the truck and charge towards the stone warriors. I hear the others following close me. I change into my dragonkin form and jump into the air towards my first group of targets. The warriors look at me in shock but before they can react, I land in the center of the group and spin in a circle, my tail whipping them back several yards. They land on the ground with a thud, dazed by the sudden action.

I leave no time for them to get up.  I move onto the next group, and the next, and the next.  I retract my sword, blocking their attempted hits with their weapons.  I don't bother to unsheathe my claws, they would just be broken off if I tried to claw the warriors.  And trust me, that would not feel good.  I summon the ice element in my hands and blast a wave of frost bitten ice onto them, freezing them where they stand.  I stomp my foot on the ground, sending a wobbly earthquake towards the mound of frozen warriors.  A large and sharp rock emerges from a crack in the ground, piercing right through the center of them.  The warriors are broken out from the force and are thrown hard onto to the ground.  I use my fire to melt the remaining pieces of ice and then use water to lift the melted ice off the floor and use it as my very own whip, slashing anyone who dares to come near me.

I look over to see Nya taking down a group warriors and then looking over in my direction, giving me a thumbs up.  I can almost hear what her mind is saying. I taught him that, I hear her voice in my head.  I chuckle at the thought and turn back to focus on the enemy.  A warrior tries to sneak up behind me but I dodge his attack just in time.  I slap my hand onto his shoulder and electrocute him.  He falls to the ground in a daze.  Several of them surround me and begins to charge, but I extend my wings into the air and take off from the ground, leaving the warriors to collide into one another.  Bits and pieces of rock crumble from their place on the warriors and onto the ground.  Cracks are visibly seen on a few of them.  Woah, so the indestructible stone army can be defeated!

As I hover in the air over the heap of stone warriors, I take the chance to look around.  Everyone seems to be holding their own.  Haru is mopping the floor with a big group of warriors with Cole and Jay by his side, Kai and Nya are working together in a synchronized attack they most likely practiced a million times before hand, and Zane, Pixal, Master Wu and Misako are fighting the newly arrived shadow assassins.  Although we are greatly outnumbered, we seem to be holding great pace.  I turn my head to see a group of warriors ganging up on Ash.  I nose dive towards her and at the last second, kick my legs in front of me so my feet collide with the warriors, knocking them several yards to the ground in one go.

I land on the ground and summersault to my feet to regain my balance and not fall over.  I look back at her.  She gives me a grateful nod and returns to the battle, saving me once or twice as I follow her back into the heart of the battle field.  After a few minutes of tirelessly fighting and quickly maneuvering my way around the other battles around me, I find myself next to my uncle.  He hits a warrior on the head with his staff, knocking him out cold.  Huh, I didn't know they could be knocked out. 

"Master Wu!" I call to get his attention.  He turns to me, half expecting me to be an assassin, but quickly dismisses the idea after seeing me.  "Have you seen the Overlord?" I ask him, sending a roundhouse kick to an assassin, turning them into mist.

"I have not," he says, performing spinjitzu on a row is warriors.  "But he must know what he's up against by now!  You need to get to the top of the tower and find him soon!"  I nod.  I turn my back to my new master, scanning the battle field.  Everyone is busy, but I'll need help!  Who can I take-

"Lloyd!" I hear someone call from behind me.  I turn around to see Jay running up to me, his voice filled with worry and relief.  "Thank the First Spinjitzu Master I found you!"  He stops running once he's within three feet of me.

"Jay?  What's wrong?  Weren't you with Cole and Haru a moment ago?" I ask him.

"Yeah, but we got separated." He pants, trying to catch his breath.  I look around.  I can see Haru in the distance.  He's turned into a large grizzly, and Cole's riding on his back yelling like he's at a rodeo.  I blink my eyes a couple times.  Well, good to know they're good at working together-  I'm about to tell Jay I've found them but then I see the silver shine of a machete closing on on my face from the corner of my eye.  I quickly dodge the attack, the blade just cutting a few strands of my long hair.  I punch "Jay" in the face, causing him to stumble and almost trip on his own feet.

I stand my ground.  He regains his balance.  "Where is Jay!" I yell at him angrily.  He laughs.  From the corner of my eye I see the blue illumination of lightning strike into the air, followed by a high-pitched scream.  Found him...  I sigh in relief, knowing my friend was safe. My thoughts are interrupted once again as the shapeshifter lunges at me, still wielding the machete.  I dodge most of his attacks, shooting multiple elements at him.  He manages to avoid them all.  What's with his guy?!  Suddenly, I feel several arms wrap around me from behind and pull me off balance.  I stumble and fall back into the arms of several more assassins, all looking like clones of Jay with twisted expressions.  I panic.

I thrust my wings and body and I punch and kick, but it comes to no avail.  I'm way too outnumbered.  With every painful blow the assassins throw at me, I get more and more frustrated. I want to use my energy and blow them away from me so I can finally breathe, but my thoughts are so jumbled I can't think straight or get a hold of my body. With all the adrenaline running through my veins, I hardly notice how my veins are now glowing a bright green color that shines right through my skin, visible to everyone who can see me.  My arms start to burn. I want to let out an explosion but I can't. The power continues to build up more and more the longer I'm stuck in the position I am.

I feel like I'm loosing my grip on what minimal control I have on my powers, but it's almost like my powers are jammed like a bullet in a gun. No matter how much I want to release them, they just won't come out.  I tense all the mussels in my body, trying not to let out a scream as the assassins continue to beat me.  I try to ignore the pain all over my body from the several new bruises all over my torso, arms, legs, even dragon features, the unbearable burning in my arms, and the massive headache that has formed in me.

I feel like my arms are about to explode.  I feel like this is it and my ears start to ring but then I feel a single weight lifted off of me. The beating stops suddenly. I open my eyes to see an arrow has been shot with pin-point accuracy right into the assassin's heart.  Still standing up, the clone starts to disappear into mist, Jay's lifeless eyes staring hauntingly into mine.  I then feel the grips of the shapeshifters release my arms, and grunts are heard from only a single voice.  I now lay on my back, but I try to make an effort to find out what just happened.

I look over to the source of the grunting and my breath gets caught in my throat.  Black arrows lay on the ground surrounded by nothing but a purple ash-like substance.  Standing amongst the ash piles and littered arrows, is a young woman with a sleek black bow in her hand, her glassy heterochromia eyes staring right into mine with great emotion.  A smirk is plastered her face. 

"Looks like you needed me after all." Katelyn says jokingly as her tail whips playfully to the side.

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Okay, I actually REALLY liked writing this chapter.  Idk if it's because my writing has gotten better or what, but I'm hyped now.  Also, since it took me forever to update, I gift you a much longer chapter than normal.