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Morro stared at the former earth master with wide eyes.

"Really?" he asked. "I thought you said-"

"I know," Cole cut him off, "but I changed my mind."

Morro smiled as he looked at Cole. Maybe, just maybe he could finally make up for all the pain he caused all those years ago.

"Pack a bag then," he told his friend. "It's going to be a long journey. We'll meet at the border in a hour."

Cole nodded before he went back to his home. He went to his room and began packing everything he might need. Food to last him and Morro a couple weeks, matches since the Cursed Realm was most likely going to be pretty dark, and his mother's deep stone armor. She made it back when the Cursed and Departed Realms joined. It took a while for there to be perfect peace between the two as there was then, so Lilly had to make herself some armor to protect herself against the ghosts. After making a few minor adjustments, Cole could just squeeze into it.

"It's too tight, isn't it," Lilly said when she saw Cole walk out of his room, wearing her suit.

Cole laughed. "It's not any worse than those suits Dad put me in as a kid."

Lilly smiled at the memories. It was because of Lou's horrible purchases that she took up sewing. She just hoped that her skills would protect her son.

"Oh, I'm gonna miss you," she said as she pulled Cole into a hug.

"I know," Cole replied, "but don't worry. I'll be okay."

Lilly smiled as she pulled away. She looked at Cole and said, "I wanna say 'See you soon', but I really wish you'd have a long life with your friends."

"It's okay. I'll miss you."

Right before Cole left, he grabbed his unfinished sketch from the night before and his folder of finished ones. He wasn't sure if he could bring those things with him to Ninjago or not, but he thought they would be nice to have. To remind him of what he was fighting for.

"See you, Mom," Cole said as he gave Lilly another hug.

"Goodbye, Cole," she replied as she gave one final squeeze.

Once the two parted, Cole began making his way to the border between the two realms, but Morro was not there, despite the fact that it had already been ten minutes past when Morro said to meet. Cole just shrugged this off, though. There was no way Morro would go without telling Harumi about it, and there was even less of a chance for Harumi to let the former wind master off the hook without a fight. He liked hanging out with her, but man, could she be nasty when she wanted to be.

About an hour later, his theory was confirmed when Morro arrived with his explanation.

"Sorry I'm late. Harumi was pretty ticked off when I told her about what we were doing," Morro said.

Cole winced. "Maybe I should've been there when you told her."

"Wouldn't have mattered," Morro replied. "In fact, I think you being there would've made it worse."

"Thought so."

The two stood in silence as they looked back at the most beautiful place known to anyone.

"Are you sure about this?" Morro asked. He didn't sound like he didn't want to go, but he really wanted to make sure that Cole knew what he was doing.

"Positive," Cole replied. He didn't hesitate at all that time.

Morro nodded. He began walking towards the Cursed Realm as he said, "Let's go."

The Cursed Realm was the exact opposite of the Departed Realm. It was creepy and ugly and horrible. The forest they walked through was filled with hideous shadows, dead trees, and a strange high pitched noise that gave Cole and Morro a headache.

"Agh!" Cole yelled as it grew louder. "What is that?"

Morro held back a groan before replying. "It's the cries of the ghosts trapped in this realm. The ones who are still fighting the realm's hold."

"'Hold'?" Cole asked.

"The nature of this realm is to punish those who are here. It's way of doing that is through guilt, grief, despair, depression, you name it," Morro replied.

After a moment of silence, Cole asked, "So what exactly should we expect in this realm?"

"Upset ghosts who want to kill us, maybe a former villain or two. Oh, and there are three very large areas to this realm. The first is the place we are in now. The Endless Forest. Luckily, this is the only place we will here the cries. The second is the prisons where the cries come from," Morro explained.

"I thought you said that this was the only place we could hear them," Cole said.

"The prisons are sound proof. We can hear what goes on in there, but not if we're in the prisons ourselves. The third area is where the Preeminent lives. She is the queen of this realm but confined to the space that was provided to her. She holds the ones banished here. Like Chen."

"And where's the portal?"

"Near the Preeminent's home, but there's a backway we can use to avoid the prisons."

Cole wanted to say more, but he couldn't bring himself to when another loud cry could be heard.

As the two continued their walk, Cole began to realize that whoever named the place knew what they were talking about. The forest really did feel endless. It had been hours, and it seemed like they had not made any progress.

Once there was a break in his headache, Cole asked, "So are all the ghosts in this prison?"

"Just the ones who resist the Cursed Realm's power," Morro replied. "Most of them are in this forest somewhere."

"And you've waited until now to tell me this!" Cole asked.

Morro shrugged. The dude talked as little as Cole talked to himself when he was alone, and it definitely wasn't a good thing.

The former wind master seemed to realize that he should say more and did. "Most of them are at the tavern, though, which is where we're going. Still, be on guard."

"What?" Cole asked. "Are you crazy? If they strike us we'll become cursed ghosts! Forever!"

"I come here every week. I know what I'm doing," Morro replied in a very hushed and annoyed voice, and despite all the warnings not to ask any more questions, Cole had to ask, "Why do you come here so often?"

Morro sighed. But it wasn't an annoyed sigh. He sounded sad this time.

"Even if I made my friends during my days set on childish notions of being the green ninja, I still care about them. Bansha, Ghoultar, Wrayth, but they don't listen to me when I tell them to change their ways," Morro explained.

"I'm sorry," was Cole's simple response. He wished he could say more, but that was all he really could say. Besides, the two were startled by the sound of footsteps behind them.

Cole looked back and began scanning the dark forest, but with how little light there was and his pounding head, he could hardly see a thing.

Suddenly, Morro jumped up to a nearby ledge. Cole could hear the sounds of a struggle. He was about to go help when a ghost landed right at Cole's feet. The former earth master was quick to act. He picked the ghost up and threw him into a nearby pond, destroying him. Morro then jumped down and breathed a sigh of relief.

"We don't have much time. The Preeminent will release him soon, and he'll tell the others," Morro said.

"We better hurry then," Cole replied.

The two ran the rest of the way, which actually wasn't as far as Cole would've thought. They were there within the next half hour. The bar was crowded with ghosts (young and old unfortunately). It looked a lot like Yang's Tavern, except worse! Since the ghosts in the Cursed Realm could not die, they did not get tired, they could not get hurt by anything other than deepstone, and they could not get drunk. They were always hungry, though.

Cole gasped when he saw two ghosts looking their way. He immediately ran over to Morro and tackled him so they were now hiding behind a very large dead tree.

Morro scoffed, but Cole put a hand over his mouth to prevent anyone from finding them. Morro was too annoyed with this, though, and roughly pried Cole's hand off of his mouth before asking, "What are you doing!"

"They were about to see us! I just saved our lives!" Cole whispered as he rubbed his wrist.

"What lives?" Morro asked.

"You know what I mean!" Cole told him.

There was a moment of silence before Morro said, "Sorry about your wrist."

"It's fine. But we need a plan. We can't just walk up and expect them to let us in."

"I have plan. Get some weapons to protect us and get out."

"That's not a plan! We gotta be stealthy. Use what Master Wu taught us!"

Morro shrugged. He tried to leave and do what Cole said, but Cole stopped him.

"What now?" Morro asked.

"I wanted to give you-" Cole stopped as he took his shoulder blades off. He handed them to Morro and said, "Sorry I couldn't get you a suit as well. My mom only had time to make a few modifications to this one, and she didn't have another, but these should help."

Morro smiled as he took the shoulder plates from Cole and attached them to his own humble suit. "Thanks," he said.

Cole nodded. He then looked at the tavern from behind the dead tree and was about to tell Morro about his plan to get in, but the former wind master was already gone. Cole face palmed when he saw that Morro was already on the roof!

Cole scanned the area for a moment. Once he saw that no one was there, he quietly sprinted over to the side of the building and pressed himself against the wall. He then jumped up and grabbed a railing on the roof before pulling himself up.

"Please don't leave me alone like that again," Cole told his friend.

"Sorry," Morro responded.

The two tried to figure out what they could do to get in, but only bad ideas came.

Finally, Cole voiced one of these bad ideas when he said, "What if we got in through there?"

Morro looked over to where Cole was pointing to see the chimney.

"I'm not the biggest fan of small spaces," Morro admitted. He then looked down at the ground to see the two ghosts from earlier. "But those masks are pretty convincing."

The friends nodded to each other before they jumped down on top of the ghosts and took them down by surprise, defeating them by throwing them into another pond. They didn't forget to steal their clothes before tossing them, though. They put their disguise on and walked into the bar.

Cole wrinkled his nose at the smell of the place. It reeked of alcohol. Ghosts left and right were desperate for the effects but none came. It made Cole's head hurt just to be in the same room as that smell. Or maybe that was those cries that still rang in the back of his mind.

"Oh, I hate this," Cole mumbled under his breath.

"Eh, it's not that bad," Morro replied.

"You're kidding, right?"

"Just let me do the talking."

Cole nodded as he began looking around the tavern. It was huge! There were multiple fighting arenas in the center of the tavern, crowded tables surrounding it, a humongous bar near the stairs, and from the sound of it, there was a few fighting arenas upstairs too.

"Woah," Cole exclaimed quietly when he saw the place. But it wasn't an exclamation of awe, it was more in fear. The tavern was dark and creepy and was filled with horrible people that Cole couldn't help but be a little scared that he was so close to them. It gave him a really bad feeling. The only thing that could possibly brighten the place up was the beautifully decorated fountains, but the ghosts couldn't even come near them due to their weakness to water.

Cole followed Morro through the seemingly endless crowd of ghosts until they finally managed to make it to the bar. Once the two sat down, Cole noticed the bartender looking at them suspiciously.

"Haven't I seen you two before?" the bartender asked. Morro immediately diverted his gaze away from the fight behind them and to the ghost known as Ming.

He cleared his throat and said in a much deeper voice than usual, "Unless you're one of Rema's henchmen, I've never seen the likes of you."

"Ah," Ming said. "Another one of Kai's victims. I heard the fire ninja is pretty ticked off after what happened to his friend."

"Who told you that?" Cole asked.

Ming didn't seem to have the strength to say any more so he just pointed to a nearby table where Morro and Cole could see a lone ghost. He had a gray beard and gray hair and wore similar clothes to Rema.

Cole stood up and began walking over to the ghost, but Morro quickly grabbed his wrist to stop him.

"Don't," Morro told him. "You'll just give us away."

"I need to know what happened to him," Cole replied.

He pulled his arm away and walked over to the ghost, who was fidgeting with his cup in a defeated manner. Once Cole got a closer look at the man he saw that his face was burnt and covered in soot.

The ghost seemed nervous when he saw Cole, but he sat up straight and tried to put on a mean face.

"What do you want?" the ghost asked in a rough voice.

"I just wanna ask you a few questions," Cole put on a similar voice to Morro's and sat across from the ghost.

"I ain't tellin' you nothin'!"

"Not even to a fellow minion?" Cole asked. "I worked for Rema too."

The man seemed to relax when he heard this news.

"What do you want to know?" he asked.

"How did you get here?" Cole asked.

The man sighed before telling his story. "The fire ninja foolishly came to our base with the amber, water, and lightning ninja. He didn't come with his whole team, yet Rema refused to use this to his advantage. He said he had something bigger in mind and made me go after the four myself. It wasn't long before that stupid fire ninja cornered me and began questioning me. I was smarter, though. I wouldn't let him know Rema's plan. My mistake came when their backs were turned. I struck the amber ninja, knocking her out. Unfortunately, it didn't kill her, but the fire ninja still lost it. He punched me repeatedly with his flaming fist," the ghost sighed again before saying, "I should've gone for him."

Cole was horrified. The ninja weren't supposed to kill unless absolutely necessary. Kai knew this. His loss must had affected Kai more than he originally thought. Cole stood up from his seat and walked back over to Morro.

"You okay?" Morro asked.

"I need to get back," Cole replied.

Morro nodded. He looked around the tavern until he spotted something. He got an excited look on his face as he pointed to white blasters. One had orange highlights on it and the other had green. They were huge and...glowing?

"What?" Cole asked when he saw the blasters.

"Those are the most effective weapons against a ghost. If we can grab them, we should get you to Ninjago within the week," Morro explained.

"How do we get them?" Cole asked.

"How you get anything in this realm. Bet."

"Bet what? We don't have anything," Cole whispered.

"Then we find a challenge we can't lose," Morro told him.

Morro began scanning the room to find something he or Cole could do when Cole asked, "What about that?"

The former wind master looked where Cole was looking to see one of the fighting arena. As they watched the fight, they saw one of the fighters use a deepstone blade to strike the other down, sending him to the Preeminent in a very brutal way. Another part of the punishment was that Cursed ghosts still felt pain, and it looked like that ghost was going to feel a lot of pain for the next few months.

"Being a ninja and being a fighting arena champion are two very differing things," Morro explained.

Cole suddenly got very serious as he said, "I know what I'm doing, Morro. Trust me."

Morro nodded. "I guess we just need to find the guy who owns them then."

It didn't take too long to find the owner of the blasters, actually, because by the time they turned around, he was already there, the blasters in his hands. The ghost was humongous. He didn't wear a mask like most of the other ghosts, showing his very unique features. He had a long face and wide eyes with graying hair and an extremely dazed look. It didn't look like he died well either. He seemed tired and disheveled with red eyes, and he looked like he needed a shave.

Cole's breath caught in his throat when he saw the man. All the confidence he had before was completely drained from his body.

"You're up," Morro said as he pushed Cole towards the ghost.

The former earth elemental had to trip himself to avoid being shoved through the bigger ghost, which would've given him away in an instant.

The ghost looked down at Cole and smirked before kicking him in the face. Or, he would've if Cole didn't grab his foot to block. The ghost quickly pulled his foot away in shock while Cole stood up, trying to give off the impression that he was ready for anything this guy gave him.

"Those are some nice weapons you got there. Why don't we make a bet," Cole told him.

The Big Ghost began laughing in a very loud and annoying way before he got up real close to Cole's face and asked, "What could you possibly have that I would want?"

Cole didn't know what he could possibly say that would get this guy to agree with him. He began panicking as he tried to think of something he would want, but nothing came. Morro realized this and decided to save the day by saying, "We discovered a way back to Ninjago."

"Mor-" Cole stopped himself from saying Morro's actual name when he realized the others were listening and instead finished with, "bid! Morbid! Yep! Morbid!"

Morro seemed unfazed by Cole's name for him and reached into his pack on his belt to take out a map. The Big Ghost reached out for it, but Morro pulled his hand back.

"You only get this if you beat him in the arena," Morro told him.

Everyone's attention diverted to the former earth ninja as he crossed his arms.

The Big Ghost chuckled. "Easy," he said. "Whatcha fightin' for?"

"I'm fightin' for those," Cole answered as he pointed to the blasters.

The ghost smiled. He really didn't think he was going to lose.

"You got yourself a deal, Kid," he said.

The two shook on it and made their way over to their respective sides. Cole made Morro come with him so the two could have a chat.

"Why did you bet the map?" Cole asked. "If I lose, we're never getting back to Ninjago!"

Morro shrugged. "He wasn't going to accept anything else. Besides, it's not real."

"But I just saw you-"

Morro took the "map" out of his pack and showed it to Cole. All it was was one of Cole's sketches of the land of Ninjago.

"You stole my sketch?" Cole asked.

Morro suddenly got this sheepish look on his face as he rubbed the back of his neck. "Oh. Sorry," he said.

Suddenly, the floor began to shake. Morro backed up in a way to protect himself only to watch as some bars rose from the floor, separating the two. The bars keeping Cole separated from the arena lowered to the ground while some weapons arrived from under. The Soul Archer moved to the center of the arena to explain the rules.

"Grab your weapon from the rack. The round is over when someone is brought back to our queen or knocked out of the ring. Ready? Fight!"

Both fighters walked into the arena. The Big Ghost with his blaster gun and Cole with a dagger made of deepstone.

Both fighters hesitated a moment, looking at each other, trying to study them. The ghost was very big, so he probably wasn't very fast. Cole decided.

The Big Ghost only hesitated a second, though. He immediately lifted up his blaster and tried to shoot Cole. Cole saw this just in time and lifted his dagger to his face to reflect the shot back at him. The ghost managed to get out of the way before he tried shooting Cole again. Cole continued blocking these shots as he ran forward. Once he was close enough, he began sliding across the floor and ended up cutting the Big Ghost in the leg.

Everyone gasped. They were shocked to see that someone had landed a hit on him. No one had done that since the day he arrived.

"Now's your chance!" Morro screamed when he saw what Cole did.

Hearing this, Cole immediately began running towards the Big Ghost, but he was grabbed up into his big hands. He pointed his blaster at Cole's head, but he didn't want to end the fight just yet. He was having too much fun. He dropped the former earth ninja to the ground and hit him over the head with the blaster.

As a ninja, Cole had always been known for being able to take a lot, but it didn't stop it from hurting. Cole began curling up to try to protect his head. Eventually, there was a slight pause as the Big Ghost tried to catch his breath, which Cole used as his chance to break free. He jumped up and kicked the blasters out of the Big Ghost's hands and out of the arena. He then tried to slash at his chest, but the Big Ghost moved his arm to block this, earning scars that would last centuries, if not forever. He then grabbed Cole once again and began swinging him around before letting go. Cole flew out of the ring, but he managed to grab onto a bar to prevent him from touching the ground outside of the ring.

The Big Ghost walked over to the edge to look for Cole, but when he did, the former ninja jumped up and struck him down with his dagger, sending him back to the Preeminent in a poof.

Everyone seemed angry, though, and Cole wasn't entirely sure why. It wasn't like the Big Ghost wasn't coming back. Cole put his hand to his face in confusion, and that's when he realized what happened. He lost his mask. It fell off when the Big Ghost threw him out.

"He's one of them ninja!" a scratchy voice said.

"Get him!" another yelled.

"Uh oh!" Cole exclaimed.

Cole turned around and made a run for it, all the while the ghosts in the tavern were chasing him.

"Cole!" Morro yelled from somewhere in the crowd. Cole turned and began running towards the sound of the voice. He climbed out of the arena and jumped down to the ground to meet his friend.

"Take this," Morro instructed as he gave him the white and orange blaster.

Cole smiled as he took the blaster. "Thanks."

They began using their blasters to take out nearby ghosts. They continued blasting their way through the tavern and fighting the ghosts off until they had finally made it outside. They ran for a motorcycle with two seats on it and made a run for it. Morro drove while Cole blasted any nearing ghosts with the two blasters they took.

It wasn't long before they had lost them. During the ride, Morro tried to give Cole instructions on what to do if there was another attack like that or even start up a friendly conversation with Cole, but he seemed incredibly distracted. Morro would have usually enjoyed the silence, but Cole wasn't usually so out of it.

It had been about an hour when Morro finally found a good place to stop and rest. He hid the bike behind a dead tree, and Cole grabbed another to conceal it further. Once that was done, the two decided to camp out near a swamp, but Cole still seemed too distracted to hold on to a single conversation. While Morro spoke of what to do to prevent getting captured, Cole would interrupt him and talk about his friends and ask Morro questions about them.

"Are you okay, Cole?" Morro finally asked as Cole told the story of how he fell into the oni cloud.

"Yeah! Why?" Cole asked. He seemed enthusiastic, in a way.

"You seem distracted," Morro told him.

"I'm fine. Just feeling talkative tonight, I guess. Sorry," Cole responded with a sheepish grin. He forgot how much Morro enjoyed his silence.

"You sure you're okay?"

"Of course!"

That was what Cole said, but there was a look in the former earth master's eyes that made Morro question whether that was the full truth or not. Knowing that Cole didn't want to talk about whatever was bothering him, though, Morro dropped the matter. He didn't realize that when he would wake up the next day, Cole and the bike would be gone!

Hope everyone liked that. Leave a review, if you'd like.

Have a great day/night!

#God'sNotDead