After nearly a dozen corpses joined the Kinkou loyalist at the bottom of the stairs, Zed, Marcus, and the new recruits to the Order of the Shadow joined Syndra inside of the temple. As Zed entered he looked around at the place he once know.

A long time ago, Zed and Shen had trained side by side in this old place and then it all ended. Zed looked around the entry hall at the place where he had been brutally slashed across his chest and face. Reflexively, he raised a hand up to cover his face, stopping only as it touched the cold iron mask that hid him away, hid his weakness.

The masked ninja straightened himself up and looked around, taking in the view of the destroyed temple. Just passed the entry hall laid the main room of the temple with a row of stairs leading up to the alter. However, the floor on the left side of the room seemed to have been caved in from the destruction of the temple five years ago. Zed smirked and looked over to Syndra who was sitting on the stairs up near the top of the alter, "You'd think they would have cleaned this place up. It's been five years and they haven't so much as swept this floor." Zed kicked a pebble and listened to the sound of its bounce echo around.

"Does it matter Zed? This place is ours. We can clean house later."

Zed shrugged, "Yes, but first, the box…" Turning on his heel Zed addressed the horde of soldiers coming his way through the door. "My friends, over the coming weeks I will train you all rigorously in the Shadow Technique. These are the ways that I have learned over the last several years of having the shadows as my allies and together, you and I will master them and bring the world to peace. Now, those of you who have been with me for the last several years already know of this technique but none of you have yet mastered it. When I am able to locate the box and unleash the darkness inside, I will grant each of you the ability to control the shadows as I do."

Marcus smiled and looked back at the other ninjas who had converted, "To bring peace," he added.

Zed nodded, "Yes, for peace. Using the shadows will prevent death. Only a fool would challenge us when we can use their very own shadows against them!" With that, he reached down to where Syndra was sitting beside him and took her hand, helping her to her feet. He turned away from the ninjas and smiled, content with how things were going. Everything seemed to be happening according to plan, how it had to be for Zed and Syndra to succeed. "Fancy a tour of the temple, my queen?"

Syndra smiled and nodded, once again seeing the ambitious but kind man she loved in his eyes again, "Lead the way, my king."

As Yasuo and Riven made their way back to the boat, Riven was surprised at how high-spirited her companion seemed to be. Given that they were in the bleakest place in all of Valoran and he had just said goodbye to his mentor and friend for what was likely the last time, Yasuo seemed oddly… cheery. Yasuo was never cheery. But still, Riven would take what she could get. She shrugged it off as unusual but a welcome change and continued to follow him back to the shore, emerging from the dreary jungle and onto they grey pebble beach.

"So, back to Demacia then?" She shouted forward.

"Yes! We need to get to Demacia to return the boat and find some maps or something to get us into the desert. Going beyond the Great Barrier is uncommon but I'm sure Demacia has a map of it somewhere," Yasuo called back, continuing to move with a spring in his step.

As they reached the boat and stepped aboard, Yasuo stopped in place, staring at the deck just a few feet away. Riven paused as well, just behind Yasuo without stepping on the deck and prodded his shoulder, "You gonna keep moving so I can get on or are you leaving me here?"

"Riven," Yasuo hissed, "Look at that."

Riven stood up on her tip toes to see over the deck at what Yasuo was staring at with a look of awe on his face. Standing on eight thick, hairy legs was the largest spider she had ever seen. It was easily larger than her hand, with legs just as thick as her fingers. It stood, staring down Yasuo with it's beady eyes before scuttling to the edge of the boat.

"That's amazing," Yasuo commented, "But not time for this. We need to move." With a swish of his hand, the Ionian sent a gust of wind hurdling at the little creature, sending it flying off the boat and dropping into the water with a little splash. "Ready now?" Yasuo asked, turning to Riven and offering her a hand to help her up on to the ship.
"Uh… Sure, buddy," Riven agreed suspiciously, taking the hand and climbing up. "What's with you?"

"What's with what?"

Riven tilted her head, giving Yasuo a knowing smile, "This attitude. This isn't you."

Yasuo took a deep breath, "Well, we need to get this done fast and I'm fine."

"Really?" Riven smirked, clearly not buying it.

Yasuo glared ,"So the minute I act happy, you're upset? Last week you were talking about how selfish and harsh I was. Now that I'm trying to be nice for five minutes, that's an issue?"

"I'm wondering why you're acting nice."

"I just want to get this whole thing over with so that I can move on, Jax can rest well, and I never have to think about any of this again. I don't love the Shadow Isles, having to look at a man who died for me, or finding out that in saving the world from Thresh, I doomed it to have to face Zed. So yeah, be upset at me for trying to draw inspiration from an old friend and… I don't know, make a change." Yasuo moved up to the helm of the ship and slumped down, plucking up a fresh whiskey bottle from his bag and biting out the cork.

Riven sighed in frustration and moved to take the wheel of the ship. Turning the rudder to lead them out to sea. "Waiting on you," she growled at Yasuo, pointing at the sail. "Your move, wind guy."

Yasuo nodded and silently raised his hand, pointing at the sale. Responding to his request, the wind pushed against the cloth, and started to move the boat forward, foot by foot until they were out at sea and gaining speed. "You really ought to learn to do that yourself," Yasuo added as he sat back and took another sip of drink.

"Well we don't really have time for slow Ionian lessons, now do we? Didn't you want to be in a rush?"

"No, I want to get this done. Maybe getting it done would be easier if you learned a little bit more about the wind." Yasuo smiled and raised himself to his feet, "We can start on the way back to Demacia if you want, Riven."

Riven pondered this for a moment, still feeling angry with Yasuo for having to be such a secretive partner when it came to his feelings and motivations but eventually shrugged and nodded, "I don't see why not. What do we do?"

Yasuo smiled, "Take a deep breath."

Rived did so, but as she did, she bent her knees and brought in her arms, as if falling into a combat stance, ready to brawl. Yasuo smirked, "Stop that."

"Hm?" Riven questioned confusedly.

"Stop the whole fighting stance thing. I told you before that the wind isn't a weapon. Stop acting like you're going to wield it like one. Did you even see me using it on the sail?"

Riven nodded, "Yeah, like it was nothing. You just pointed essentially, right?"

"Right," Yasuo agreed, "It is familiarity, not strength. Once you get to know the wind, it will do as you wish and once you hone your focus, you can become truly strong with it."

With that, Yasuo stepped behind Riven and despite a slight growl of disapproval from her, he took her hand and swished it through the air the way he did with his own. "The key is to never meet an end point. The wind doesn't end so your hand shouldn't stop abruptly. We're looking for a steady flow of wind so your movements should be fluid and circular. Only make sharp movements if you want a sharp result."

Riven nodded and pulled her arm out of his hold, continuing the circular motion on her own. "Got it."

"Slower." Riven took another deep breath, more to cope with being coached by a dishonest drunk than anything else. "That's it, another deep breath, try to feel the air around you, notice the way it wafts through your fingers as you move them and then, focus on moving the wind with you. Don't force it."

Riven closed her eyes and focused for a moment, gently waving her hand through the air, concentrating. But, despite all her talent, this skill did not come easily and not even a subtle gust was produced. After twenty minutes of this, Riven grumbled and sat down on the deck where Yasuo was sipping his drink and watching.

"Just practice, you'll get it."

"This is infuriating," Riven commented.

"Why is that?" Yasuo chuckled.

"Because I'm a warrior. If I can't lift something, I train my muscles until I can. This isn't the same."

"Why not?" Yasuo inquired. "You can't move the wind, so train your spirit until you can."

"My spirit," Riven laughed.

"That's right," Yasuo said seriously. "It's obvious that you have a strong will or you wouldn't have made it this far. I may not know much of your past, Riven, but I do know that you've survived getting hunted and have a passion for your people in Noxus. You must have a strong spirit. You just have to learn to direct it and you could be better at the wind technique than I am."

Riven smiled and blushed lightly, "Thanks. That means a lot to me that you think so. You're quite strong too. Even after I, well, ruined you," Riven admitted. Yasuo nodded and shrugged. Yeah, she sort of did. "After all of that, you were so motivated and so brave. I cried for my loss but you just kept going."

Yasuo looked away, "Yeah, well a brave face doesn't mean much these days."

"It wasn't just a brave face that chased me all the way to she Shadow Isles. It was a brave man and you know it."

Yasuo couldn't help but smile a little, "Well thanks. That's something I think I sort of needed to hear. The truth is, I'm uh…"

"I know," Riven said, patting his back. "You don't have to say anything. I get it." Riven didn't feel the need to make him admit his fears. She just wanted to be someone who could understand his fears and not give him more trouble for them. After all, his life was hard enough without a partner who poked at his self esteem. Yasuo was a proud man, one who never wanted to back down and never wanted to admit weakness.

At that very moment however, Yasuo was admiring the fact that Riven was strong enough to admit her weaknesses, to know that there were flaws in her path and face those flaws head on. Yasuo himself was used to dodging any emotions unless he absolutely had to face them. That plan had worked in the past but deep down, he knew he was just holding it all in for the day it would eventually burst forth. Yasuo was not as strong as he wished he was, but with Riven by his side, maybe he could be as strong as he needed to be to see this task through to the end.

Author's notes: Sorry this chapter has been on hold for so long. As I said in a previous Author's notes, I was moving and as of yesterday, I'm settled in to my new living situation. I'll do my best to keep the chapters rolling (hopefully better speed than this) but not only do I have school going on but I have a new solo project I'm working on that should be hitting the internet relatively soon. So thanks for holding with me through this time of change, I promise to keep going even if I slow down a tad from where I was a couple months ago.

Next time: Riven and Yasuo return to Demacia in hopes of finding a map that will lead them to parts unknown in search of Zilean and answers.