The Imperial Battle II: The Emperor of Ninjago

Chapter 9. The Sacred Silk Road

"I can't continue like this. I just… I can't. If something's happened to Lloyd—"

"You are not the only one who simply cannot lose Lloyd," Wu said calmly, facing Kai. "Right now, Lloyd means the world to me. If anything happened to him… that would be too much for me as well. But Lloyd is tough. He is tougher than most people give him credit for. And unless I see his dead body with my own eyes, I'll keep hoping he's alive."

Kai sighed and slowly lifted his gaze to see the mountain reaching up to the skies.

🐉-🐉-🐉 

"The Primeval's Eye!"

Lloyd, Rimu and the unconscious James were making their way down the Silk Road towards the village of Tuanyuan. Lloyd had just mentioned to their new ally where they were ultimately headed while bearing his friend on his back. It appeared Rimu was something of a Primeval's Eye -fan.

"I heard the Primeval's Eye is filled with all kinds of monsters and dangerous plants. There are hungry dinosaurs and vines that can strangle you!" Her excited tone indicated she found it all fantastic.

Lloyd grinned awkwardly, not even remotely as excited as his new traveling companion. He was rather exhausted and hot, and carrying James did not help the case. He was still out cold and showed no signs of wanting to wake up from his beauty sleep.

"And nobody's ever really returned from the forest. Their dead bodies have been left in the wild jungle to be eaten by predators or decomposed by bacteria," Rimu continued, smiling.

Lloyd kept his smile on, though wondering if this girl was a little— psychotic.

"Anyway, what exactly are you trying to get from the Primeval's Eye?" Rimu asked.

Lloyd hesitated. He didn't exactly want to tell her what they were after yet. He did trust her on some level, but not enough to divulge their whole plan to her. He wanted to be careful, having learnt from the time he and Kai (mostly Kai) had blindly trusted that snake Skylor.

"Just some ancient relic. It's supposed to be in the Oni Temple," Lloyd told her.

"Oh, what is it? Does it have some mystical super powers?"

The prince shrugged. "I guess you could say that. It's just something my uncle thought would help us, especially since nobody else knows about it… well, except some people who wouldn't try to steal it anyway. And couldn't."

"And that will help you defeat Clouse?" Rimu guessed.

"At least we hope so. He needs to be stopped as soon as possible, before he brings all of Ninjago down."

Rimu frowned sadly. "You should really see Ninjago City. The people there are practically locked in their houses, starving and scared."

"Why does Clouse want to keep them there? How does that benefit him?" Lloyd asked.

The brunette shook her head. "I don't know. Maybe he thinks you won't attack the palace knowing a battle could kill many civilians."

Well, if Clouse thought that, then he was absolutely right. Lloyd knew they eventually had to return to Ninjago City and attack, but a part of him didn't want to do that. Only because of the civilians.

"And also, he does get people to serve him and work for him," Rimu added. "All men and even slightly mature boys have become his mindless little pawns, and women have become… well, something else. He's definitely benefitting from them somehow, but I never found out how. The things I was able to discover while captured by them were very limited to the dungeons."