The trip at the Cod Empire was about one and a half of an hour— longer than Lizzie had thought and realized.
They had been flying for what Lizzie assumed was twenty minutes, and the view below them had changed from ocean to vast and empty land. The wind was whipping at her face from how fast they were going, but it was cooling her off from the hot sun, so she found it hard to mind.
"We're almost there," Joel said, bringing Lizzie out of her thoughts. He turned to her, "You as nervous this time?"
Lizzie shook her head. "No, Jimmy was really kind, so I doubt Joey will be any less."
Joel hummed in agreement. "Well, that's true, but he can be very, how do I put this? Hmm, sarcastic. And sassy."
Lizzie shrugged, but she doubted that Joel could tell from the way they were positioned while flying. "Nothing I can't handle,"
Joel chuckled, "Yes, well, you were very sassy back at him. Wouldn't be surprised if it were the same now."
Lizzie smiled at his comment; her past self was pretty cool.
After another five minutes, they started approaching a jungle, which they flew into instead of flying above it. The atmosphere of the jungle was very nice. It smelled like fresh rain and the air was moist-- but in a good way. Lizzie and Joel weaved through tall jungle trees, and Lizzie admired the parrots flying around, below, and above them, and remarked the adorable pandas on the ground. Did she get a smack to the face by some leaves a few times? Well, yes (Joel laughed at her each time, but he also got a leaf to the face as well), but it was still awesome.
Soon enough, large red, blue, green, and white temples came into view; one of them was even in the sky! Lizzie stared in awe at the approaching empire-- were all of the empires this beautiful? She felt eager knowing that her question would be answered throughout the day.
They landed soon, and Lizzie didn't take too much of a tumble that time, actually managing to land on her feet. "Hey, I'm getting better!" She cheered, Joel chuckled. "You certainly are,"
Just like Lizzie's prior visit, Joey came out of the red and orange temple because of the noise. "Who's there?! Xornie?" He looked around hastily, only to meet Joel's eyes, and then take notice to Lizzie. His eagerness dropped. "Oh, it's just you guys. What are you doing here? Oh my God, Lizzie, what happened to-"
And again like Lizzie's prior visit, the emperor was cut off by Joel. "Oh, hi, Joey! Thanks for the warm welcome. We should talk inside here, yeah?" He said the first half of his sentence sarcastically, then hastily finishing and grabbing Joey's wrist to drag him inside the temple his just came out of. "Joel, unhand me! I need to know what happened to Lizz-"
The doors closed. Yet again, Lizzie stood awkwardly on the front doorstep of an empire, not knowing what to do. How would Joey take the news? Would he be angry, sad, happy? Two minutes passed, although it felt like much longer, and the two rulers stepped out of temple.
Joey looked distraught-- confused. Joel looked nervous, like he didn't trust that Joey wasn't gonna say anything bad. Lizzie glanced between them. She looked at Joel, who was looking at Joey, waiting for him to say something, and then she looked at Joey; who was just staring at her with a now unreadable expression.
"So.. you don't remember anything. Like, at all?" Joey finally said after what felt like forever. Joel rolled his eyes at Joey's stupid question, as to say, 'No, stupid! Of course she doesn't remember anything!'
"I swear that's the only question everyone has been asking me," Lizzie muttered under her breath. She cleared her throat and fixed her posture, "Uhm, no, sorry. I don't know what you were to me before..." she gestured around with her hands randomly. "all of this."
"Oh, well, that's fine! Means you forgot about all our past arguments." Joey said with a sly grin. Lizzie raised one eyebrow. "I thought we were friends before?"
"Oh, we are! Just some.. disagreements?" Joey said, trying to find the right word to say. Lizzie kept a suspicious and confused face.
Joey sighed, "Whatever! We were friends. At least, in my mind we were.." He muttered the last part, starting to doubt their friendship. After a few seconds of Lizzie being confused, and Joey deep in thinking about their friendship, he said, "Anywho! I can show you around The Lost Empire, if you want."
"Of course I want!" Lizzie smiled and slightly jogged over to Joey who started to guide her around the Lost Empire.
Joel tagged along behind them, maybe making small comments every now and then, but didn't say much because he knew that Lizzie would want to hang out with Joey.
Joey started infront of the Fire Temple, the building he had came out if. "So, this is the first temple to ever be built in the Lost Empire; the empire wouldn't exist if it weren't for this temple, actually." Joey informed, showing around the interior if the temple, which had turned out to be a storage area.
"It's very.. hot." Lizzie said, rubbing her arms as she looked around. Not that she was cold, of course not-- this place seemed hotter than Mezalea. But, she held her arms for comfort, almost. Like she was grounding herself. It felt weird to be there, she thought in the back of her mind. A place so warm.. she felt like she shouldn't be there. Like she needed to be elsewhere.
And the next temple was the Water Temple. And for reasons beyond her, Lizzie felt a lot more relaxed there, like it felt right to be there. Perfect.. almost.
"This is the Water Temple. Kind of.. empty; but it's whatever." Joey said as Lizzie admired the big space. The water made her feel better-- more energetic, like she could run a hundred miles right then and there.
"It's amazing.." Lizzie muttered in awe. Joey chuckled, "How ironic. You always did had a thing for water," He nudged Lizzie slightly, as if he was expecting her to get the joke.
Joel cleared his throat, glaring at Joey who quickly changed the subject. "Well, that's enough of the Water Temple. The next temple is my favorite," He said, dragging Lizzie to the next one.
Joey went in to deep detail about the Earth Temple. He talked about his army of velociraptos, how long it took to build it, and how amazing it was and everyone loved it, but he told Lizzie not to try to go in it, for whatever reason.
Lizzie had to admit, it was pretty cool. But not as cool as the Water Temple. Though she would never say that to Joey's face-- if Lizzie didn't know better, she would assume Joey was in love with the thing.
After what seemed like forever of Joey talking about the Earth Temple, he showed them the way to the last temple, the Air Temple. It turned out the temple was actually in the sky, and on a cloud.
They flew up there with their elytra-- of course Lizzie landed not-so gracefully. "AH-" She yelped as she almost flew straight into a pillar that held up the ceiling of the temple, but Joel caught her by her hand.
Lizzie blushed, and so did Joel, because he had accidently pulled them a little too close together when saving her.
Joey rolled his eyes, "Ugh." He said in distaste, "Lovebirds. Are you coming, or what?"
Lizzie and Joel quickly separated at his sassy remark. "We are not 'lovebirds'. He was only saving my from breaking my skull open on that pillar," Lizzie stated, as she followed Joey around.
Joey smirked at her comeback, muttering something under his breath about how Lizzie was still sassy as ever.
The Air Temple was the smallest out of the four temples, mainly because the cloud it stood on was very small. The tour was short, but Lizzie still liked the temple.
Afterwards, they flew down the village of the Lost Empire, greeting some villagers, whom were much to Lizzie's surprise-- animal hybrids. The villagers stared in awe and surprise at the presence of the three people. Then they all started coming up Joey and Joel, and bowing saying stuff that included 'Your majesty', or 'Your highness'. Joel pushed it off, telling them that just 'Joel' was fine, but Joey was clearly loving the attention; saying, "Oh, no, me? Please, I'm just your king that's all.. well if you insist on calling me it.."
But villagers also started bowing down to her, using the same royal titles, and Lizzie was, to say the least, surprised. She leaned over to Joel and muttered, "What is going on?" In his ear, and he looked a little panicked, but masked it with fake confusion. "Uhh.. I don't know. That's weird."
Lizzie shooed the villagers away, telling them she wasn't a ruler or queen or anything.
"So, Lizzie, how did you like the Lost Empire? If you ask me, it's probably the greatest empire in the realm," Joey asked as they walked back to the Fire Temple, which was basically the entrance to the Lost Empire.
Lizzie pushed off Joey's very obvious ego, saying "It was nice! The buildings are fantastic, especially the Water Temple." Lizzie smiled, Joey just stared at her with an unamused look on his face. "Oh, and the Earth Temple was lovely aswell." She added, Joey smiled.
"Yes, thank you, I know right? Honestly, my best work." Joey agreed, complimenting himself more.
Joel grabbed Lizzie's hand, "Right, well, we better get going now if we wanna visit more of the empires. It was nice seeing you, Joey."
"Of course! You guys should visit again sometime," Joey said. Lizzie and Joel both nodded.
"Yeah, it was great to see you." Lizzie added, before waving and taking off into the sky with Joel. She looked back as they flew up to see Joey waving, before the Lost Empire eventually faded away, and their surroundings were all jungle.
There was a little bit of silence before Lizzie spoke up, "Well, that was nice." Joel nodded in agreement. "Yeah, you really liked the Water Temple, didn't you?"
Lizzie blushed in embarrassment, "Yeah. I mean, it was just cool."
Joel shrugged, "Yeah, I don't blame you. It was pretty cool."
That ended their conversation for a couple minute, before Lizzie realized that she and Joel were still holding hands, and she quickly let go of his hand while blushing. A couple more minutes past, and then Lizzie asked, "So, where are we going to next?"
"I was planning that we go to Gem's but I heard that she was busy, so, we're going to Scott's, A.K.A., Rivendell." Joel answered.
"Ooh, cool! Was I close with him?"
Joel didn't reply for a couple seconds, taking a moment to remember what Lizzie and Scott were like. "Yeah. You two were close.. in your own way."
Joel's answer confused Lizzie, but she brushed it off, excited to see the next kingdom.
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Aaannd we're back! Hope you guys didn't miss me too much.. ahah. Sorry for being gone for so long, but the chapters will probably be a much better quality from now on! Or atleast.. I hope. Sorry for the somewhat short chapter, but I hope it will do for now. I wonder if I have readers still? Did you guys all disappear 😰 Let's hope not. I think im hoping too much in this A/N. Anywho, that's it for now, I hope you all enjoyed this chapter, and if you did please vote or comment to let me know!
Bye!!
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