"Get it off me, Shisui!" shouted Petra, who was under what seemed to be a spirit in the shape of a hippopotamus that had taken the opportunity to sit on her.
"Wait until Mai finishes drawing you," Shisui replied, trying to hold back the laughter he felt at the moment.
Those who didn't hold back were Ty Lee and Azula, who laughed together as they watched the big spirit smile in a humanized way toward the youngsters. On the other hand, Petra kept waving the free hand she had, creating small movements in the surrounding earth, but nothing concrete in the end.
"I shouldn't have purified you, you stupid spirit," Petra shouted, causing the spirit creature on her body to simply open its mouth and make a sound similar to a laugh of amusement.
"Here, you can help her," Mai said before showing a piece of paper that depicted the embarrassment Petra suffered today.
"Mai, do you remember the time when...?" a piece of paper fell directly into Petra's mouth so that Petra was unable to tell what seemed to be an embarrassing anecdote.
"Oh? Do you two have a secret? I want to know!" Ty Lee started tugging on Mai's arm, who just covered her friend's forehead, who overreacted.
"Azula! Mai hit me!" Ty Lee hugged the princess and buried her face in her chest as she pretended to cry.
"You deserved it," Mai said before putting away the drawing she had made of Petra.
On the other hand, Zuko looked at the traces of the battle that had taken place here. The aforementioned ghost had invaded the usual battleground between the Fire Nation and Ba Sing Se, though there had been no major fighting for six months, save for a few minor skirmishes.
Zuko seemed to be reliving the battle through the tracks; Petra was the one who stepped forward, wanting to test in the flesh if her ideas could allow her to purify the corruption in a spirit.
The girl had relied on the fact that water falling on stalactites in a cave was filtered water, just as underground rivers or springs had naturally purified water.
With the help of Azula, who also wanted to experiment with the purifying nature of the fire element, the two women battled the spirit. This was the second time a corrupted spirit had appeared before them, the first being Musu years ago.
After fighting for a while, both Azula and Petra purified the spirit, but for some reason... it decided to take Petra and sit on her. Fortunately, the ethereal nature of the being only made it heavy, but not crushing, spirit stuff no doubt.
"Thank you for helping me," Petra thanked Shisui.
He had convinced the hippopotamus-shaped spirit to let her go and even helped it by sending it to the spirit world. Petra waved her hands to control the dust on her body and tossed it aside, feeling much fresher than before.
"Well, they were able to try the purification of their elements firsthand, but it was much slower than what they could achieve with more practice," Shisui explained his view of the situation in this matter.
"It's not like there are that many crazy spirits with evil, evil darkness roaming around, so, understandably, this happened," Ty Lee added, causing Shisui to nod.
Almost two years ago, Shisui awoke from his deep meditation and chatted with his friends about the things he had learned and done in the spirit world. Vaatu's existence is not hidden or anything like that.
There are records of its existence, but they are so vague, so imprecise, and even mixed in with the descriptions of other spirits, that no one knew of his existence except for the occasional bored old man or professor desperate to find a certain library.
I mean, Shisui found records about ghosts that were well known in the past, like General Old Iron, but almost nothing about Vaatu. Although he knew about this being from his previous life, Shisui did not rely so much on his memories of this world, which were certainly of no use except for certain hidden information.
Vaatu's existence caused some annoyance to the others, how could they know that there was a super-powerful spirit that seemed to want to bring chaos and evil to the world? Fortunately, he was locked away.
Although the Avatars did not tell him who Raava was, they did tell him that they were opposed to Vaatu and that its influence, though limited, would grow over time until the time of the Harmonic Convergence.
Knowing that Shisui would be able to live without problems until then, they told him about Vaatu, but for Shisui, that being was not the biggest concern in this world, it was something else, something he had suspected since he had a strange dream two years ago.
"At least we were able to prove that water control is not the only element that can purify and that at least both fire and earth can do it," Azula said, hugging Shisui's arm to her chest without any subtlety on her part.
"Yes! Imagine if Vaatu wanted to wreak havoc and saw whole armies of Elemental benders surrounding him," said Petra, who had even created Earth replicas of that very thing.
Hundreds of miniatures performed the characteristic movements of the three elements in force today, surrounding Vaatu's miniature. However, there was one that did the basic movements of all four elements and even had lines of blue earth all over its body, like a small Airbender.
"Good representation, I'm sure Aang..." When Shisui started to speak, he suddenly fell silent.
Petra stopped controlling the figures, Zuko held the hilt of his sword, and Azula narrowed her eyes as they all looked off into the distance, directly south.
A spiritual pulse ran through everyone, indicating only one thing: The Avatar had awakened.
"Why now? Couldn't he wait a few more days? He wanted to go on vacation to Ember Island!" complained Ty Lee in great pain, but both she and Mai were strained by the sudden surge of spirituality.
"The world will boil again," Zuko muttered as he removed his hand from his weapon and placed it on Mai's waist, pulling her close to him for comfort.
"He likes to show off," Shisui complained, he wanted this vacation too.
"Shisui, do you want to go to him? For sure, my father will send us to look for him, he will probably want to keep the upper hand in the future peace," Zuko said, causing everyone present to fall silent.
It was obvious that the Acting Fire Lord wanted to maintain the advantage the Fire Nation had gained in this world, especially when six months ago, a book called The Other Continent was published worldwide, a book that may have done more for peace than many people have done in nearly 100 years.
Based on real information, tangible evidence, and even records of the situation at certain times in the past, the world once again became aware of the existence of a new and vast place on the other half of the planet.
This was especially true when it was Princess Yue of the Northern Water Tribes herself who revealed the news to the world, even providing an extensive record of her travels and the data she found.
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New plants and animals, a pristine world, little used except for the constructions of the Airbenders who first arrived hundreds or even thousands of years ago.
No civilization was found, but there was no doubt that if there had been one, things would have been hectic. That's why the conflicts between the Fire Nation took a back seat.
Besides, everyone knew that the war between the two sides was just to keep things moving. But with a potential member joining the game, who would want to waste time, people, and resources on something we knew wasn't going to escalate?
Shisui already knew that this planet was a little different from Earth, for example, the gravity was 5% higher than Earth's average, indicating that this world was much larger in some ways.
So it was obvious that the Fire Nation's expansionism, which had calmed down a lot, was coming back with a vengeance, and there was even talk of peace talks among the people, although the military, the nobles, and the royal family were silent.
On the other side of the world, the newly awakened Avatar Aang dodged the spearhead of Sokka, who had attacked preemptively over what seemed to be a misunderstanding.
In the excitement of seeing Aang finally free from the ice, Katara ran toward him but was distracted and fell ugly to the icy ground. Aang ran over and grabbed her hand to help her up.
"Get away from my sister, you pervert!" yelled Sokka before swinging his spear at Aang, who felt the altered airflow and dodged the attack.
"Sokka, calm down! He's a friend!" shouted Katara, but her brother paid no attention to her, not when he wanted to put a few extra holes in the bastard who dared to touch his younger sister.
Sokka's temper was much more overprotective than it used to be; not long ago, he had to send to his next reincarnation a pirate captain who dared to attempt a peaceful 'relationship' with him, demanding his sister as a peace offering.
There was still dried blood on the man's spear, a detail Aang noticed as he moved smoothly to dodge each of Sokka's spear attacks.
'He is less skilled than Shisui, but he has a strong evil wind around him,' Aang thought, assessing the one he identified as the brother of Katara, the young woman who always spoke to him while he was trapped in ice.
"Calm down, I'm not what you think," Aang said, airbending his voice directly into Sokka's ear.
"That's what a pervert would say," even though Sokka noticed the Airbender's lack of hair and tattoos, he didn't hesitate.
He would protect his sister, even if the pervert was a nearly extinct Airbender. Sokka then directed his chi through his body, increasing his strength as he struck Aang in a vertical attack.
Aang dodged, but that was what Sokka expected. The young man's spear slammed into the ice-covered ground, and a shockwave erupted from the point of contact, taking the form of a line that sliced through the ice in a straight line.
Shards of water and ice flew, distracting Aang long enough for Sokka to close the distance on the Avatar, this time using his fist to attack. However, Aang recovered much faster than Sokka had expected and threw a punch at Sokka as well.
'Remember Aang, even if you are a pacifist and want to dialogue, there are people who will not be willing to listen the first time. In those cases, violence is not the answer, it's the question, and the answer is always yes.
After a good hit, stubborn people become wonderfully more willing to listen to what you have to say, so use your chi effectively when striking...' Shisui's words guided the inexperienced Avatar to strike effectively.
Moths of white chi erupted from Aang's body, covering his fist, and as it collided with Sokka's attack, the pirate's blue eyes glared at the airbender, who simply smiled.
Sokka was sent flying several feet into the air, but he spun around before landing on a floating chunk of ice. He looked at Aang with some fear, but his spear was no longer threatening.
The ice underneath Sokka then moved towards them at Katara's urging, seeing that the situation seemed to have been resolved strangely, but at least they were no longer fighting.
"Dude, aren't the chi dots a symbol of Sage Shisui? Who are you, why is a firebender with Air Nomad tattoos here?" asked Sokka cautiously, only to hear his sister's exasperated sigh.
"Sokka, you fool! He's been trapped in ice for...! I don't know, I found him years ago, but whatever, he can't be from the Fire Nation, a firebender would have frozen to death by now!" said Katara, causing Sokka to notice the red and orange clothing that barely fit Aang.
"You..." Sokka felt his head hurt, even more than when his father gave him a basic chi manual he had stolen from a Fire Nation shipment years ago.
The Fire Nation's basic knowledge of chi had spread many, many years ago; it wasn't much, but it was far better than the muddled versions that every major city and nation had.
Because of this, the style of every bender and non-bender seeking power in this world had changed drastically. In addition to the cultural and technological boom, there was also a boom in chi-based martial arts.
Sokka used this to narrow the gap between himself and the more experienced pirates and benders he might encounter on his raids.
Though he was more of a protector of the ocean near the South Pole than a pirate since the real pirate was undoubtedly his father.
With effort, he understood the teachings of the Chi Manual and his strength grew, but now he felt the headaches were worse than before. A person trapped in ice for years? Without food, water, or proper clothing? Not to mention the style of said clothing, the lack of hair, and those tattoos that ended in arrows.
"Don't tell me you're the damn Avatar," Sokka said rudely, but Katara slapped him on the back of the head.
"Mom doesn't like it when you say bad words," Katara scolded, and this situation made Aang laugh out loud, who nodded.
"Yeah, look," Aang leaned down and picked up several chunks of ice, twirling them in his hands in the wind as he smiled at the two brothers.
"Isn't this great, oh yeah, Appa, yip yip!" shouted Aang, his voice amplified by the wind.
"Yeah, yeah, cool airbending trick, then you're the legendary Avatar. But why are you yelling? And who is Appa? You also didn't explain why you're using the chi motes that Sage Shisui uses," Sokka touched his ear with a bad expression on his face, Aang's yelling affected him a lot but not his sister, probably a way to retaliate for his earlier attacks.
Meanwhile, Katara moved much closer to Aang, to Sokka's growing annoyance, and watched as the Avatar spun the ice with controlled gusts of wind. Her eyes weren't so much on that, though, but on Aang's body, which she could see better without the distortion caused by the ice.
"I call Appa, my friend. Shisui is my friend too. What do you think of him?" asked Aang, and knowing that Appa would soon emerge from the water, he grabbed Katara's waist, a gesture she allowed before jumping back.
"Let go of my sister!" Sokka followed, but Aang's ease meant he had to wait until his sister and the Avatar finally hit the ground before separating them.
"Shisui the Wise, or the Enlightened Shisui, also known as the Water Dragon Shisui. He is... interesting? Many people worship him, some hate him, and some say he is a traitor to the Water Tribe.
He was born to a father who was a general, and no one knows why the nobility or Fire Nation royalty did not kill him for being an undesirable existence to begin with. Still, he grew up to be a legend, though to me he's just a curious person," Katara answered the question about Shisui, though perhaps it was more of a way to distract herself and make the blush on her face disappear.
"Shisui is not a traitor, he was just born in the Fire Nation and not killed in his infancy by someone who saw him as an eyesore. Some books tell this alternate history about him.
But really, a lot of people don't know how to deal with him, especially since a lot of the delicious food people like these days is created by him, which makes people love and hate him in equal measure," Sokka said, finally able to separate his reluctant sister from the Avatar.
"Oh... here comes Appa!" Aang started to say something but soon yelped when he felt his best friend's closeness.
"Who's Appa?" asked Sokka again, and his question was answered as the water churned and rose as a large figure flew toward them.
"This is Appa. Icebergs usually have a large part of their body underwater, you should know that," Aang said as he jumped towards his friend who had just landed on the ice.
"Wait...!" cried Katara, but Aang was already on top of his friend, hugging it tightly.
The ice underneath the large flying bison cracked and gave way, allowing the large creature to land in the water, this time staying afloat.
"Hey Katara, want to go for a ride?" called Aang, making Katara blush visibly before she nodded.
But her brother Sokka followed her, looking askance at the big Appa, who seemed quite happy after waking up, and even though the two strange humans got very close to it, it didn't act defensive because Aang had invited them.
Well, except for Sokka. Who Appa growled at, making the young man feel threatened and clench his weapon, but Aang patted the flying bison.
"Relax Appa, he's familiar," Aang said, and Appa waited for Sokka to come closer so it could lick him in apology.
"I guess I forgive you," Sokka said after shaking the saliva off his body, but when he saw that the big animal was just swimming, he looked at Aang.
"Didn't those things fly?" he asked curiously.
"Um... looks like Appa is tired and hungry, how about we go for a walk tomorrow?" asked Aang sheepishly, making Sokka burst out laughing.
"Sure, buddy, we'll get you some clothes while we're at it. Just... remember, I'll be keeping an eye on you," as if they were lifelong friends, Sokka put his hand on Aang's shoulder, preventing him from getting too close to his sister.
"Sokka!" Katara exclaimed sheepishly, while Aang just laughed.
"I won't!" Aang flashed both thumbs at Sokka, leaving the young man unsure of how to react.
"Yeah... this world is about to boil over again," Sokka muttered as he looked at his sister, filled with determination.
If Katara was interested in Aang, it could lead to her being in danger, so he would have to become stronger than ever to protect her, his mother, and his tribe.
'Maybe it's time to finish that technique,' the young man thought, his blue eyes shining brightly.