Ninjago's magic is patient.
That is the first truth I learned once I began studying it in earnest—not as an outsider, not as a conqueror, but as something closer to a parasite nestled between its veins. Power here does not rush. It accumulates. It settles into patterns, habits, expectations. And once it believes something belongs, it stops questioning why.
That is what makes my work possible.
My current living location is unremarkable by design. A structure of stone and timber folded into the side of a low mountain ridge, masked by terrain, probability, and story alike. Travelers pass near it without ever seeing it. Animals avoid it without knowing why. Even magic glances off it, sliding away as if there were nothing worth noticing.
Inside, however, the air hums.
Three orbs float in a triangular configuration above an engraved stone dais. Each is different, subtly so, though an untrained eye might mistake them for identical constructs of crystal and runic lattice. They are not crystals. They are conduits—precision instruments carved to receive, regulate, and store power without alerting its source.
The first orb is dark, almost lightless, its surface swallowing illumination rather than reflecting it.
The Overlord.
That connection was the oldest and most delicate. His power is corrosive, cyclical, self‑devouring. Drain too much and he notices. Drain too quickly and he retaliates. So I tuned the siphon to patience—an automated system I designed years ago, keyed to moments when his essence naturally disperses during reformations and schemes. A fraction of a fraction each cycle.
Enough to matter to me.
Never enough to matter to him.
The second orb glows faintly gold, its interior swirling with raw, volatile potential that refuses to settle.
Garmadon.
I began draining him several years ago, once his training intensified and his elemental nature stabilized enough to withstand loss without immediate detection. His power is emotional—tied to ambition, anger, excess. It replenishes itself aggressively, which makes it ideal. I take what spills over, what he cannot help but produce.
He believes his growing restlessness is internal.
It is not.
The third orb is the most dangerous.
Clear. Almost innocent. Lines of soft white and pale green light drift through it like slow-moving clouds.
Wu.
Draining him required more finesse than the other two combined. His power is balanced, restrained, cultivated through discipline and philosophy rather than force. Any sudden imbalance would have alerted him immediately. So I built the siphon differently—linked not to his strength, but to his hesitation. Every moment he chooses restraint over action, every breath where power is held back rather than expressed, a sliver is redirected.
Wu believes he is learning patience.
In truth, he is feeding me.
The system is fully automated now. I do not monitor it constantly. That would be reckless. Instead, I allow it to run as part of the world's background noise, woven into leylines, ambient magic flow, and narrative expectation. To Ninjago, these losses are indistinguishable from entropy, from time itself doing what time always does.
And time has been generous.
Years have passed since I first established the drains on Wu and Garmadon. Slowly, steadily, the orbs have grown denser, heavier with contained essence. I have not absorbed their contents yet. That would be premature. Power taken too early shapes the taker more than the user intends.
I am waiting for critical mass.
In the meantime, I study.
Ninjago magic continues to fascinate me. It resists domination but welcomes adaptation. It dislikes being forced, but it responds eagerly to role. The more I align my actions with what the world expects someone like me to do—ancient hermit, forgotten watcher, lurking evil—the less resistance I encounter.
So I let the world label me without ever seeing me.
I have carved dozens of auxiliary constructs in recent years: stones that listen, stones that remember, stones that lie convincingly to other spells. My ability to animate stone has evolved beyond mere motion. I now grant it context. A wall that knows it is a wall resists differently than one that believes it is a door.
These lessons matter.
Because the First Spinjitzu Master is fading.
Not rapidly. Not yet. But the signs are there if one knows how to look. His interventions grow rarer. His creations are increasingly delegated. He trusts his sons—perhaps too much. And every year that passes is a year closer to the moment when the balance he embodies will need to exist without him.
When that happens, power will shift.
Wu and Garmadon will stand at the center of it.
And I will already be there.
The orbs pulse softly as I pass between them, my presence causing minute fluctuations that settle almost immediately. I place my hand near—but not on—them, feeling the weight of stolen divinity pressing back like restrained gravity.
Soon.
Not today.
But soon, I will decide what to do with what I have taken.
And when I do, the world will not realize it has already paid the price.