(You are thinking about retreating when you have found what we were looking for. How does that make sense?) Zhao

I partly agree. After everything I have done, I do not want to go empty-handed even though I know what is going to happen in the future. Zhao is not the same person who I saw from the series. I did not like him at all. It was fitting to be imprisoned to the mist of lost souls. I know he is going to do the same thing again but I am going to stop him.

We are a group of fire and earth benders. We are top class with attacking directly. Even Zhao´s lack of discipline is positive side here. I doubt that we would lose. He actually got here and out. Most likely he must have sacrificed every private with him. No such thing had attacked Aang or the group so it must have been killed.

(Lieutenant Zhao. You must see that we can not enter the library without getting rid of, that.) Private 1

(Someone might get killed.) Oki

That danger has been present at all times here. Nothing has changed from where I am standing.) Private 2

(Then how are we going to stop that monster? None of our attacks even scratched it. What do you think will happen when we all go there? We were nothing else but toys to those things. I had a feeling that I was a doll.) Oki

(You are just pacifist. How would you know what we are capable of doing? We will burn them to ashes.) Private 2

(What is your idea about this. Was it a spirit?) Zhao

(No. It was a normal animal. You can be sure of that. It can be killed but we are going to attack it in its home territory. It will know when to strike and when to hide. As long as no one can fly then we are in grave danger out there. I do agree though that we should get there.) Shamo

(Are you mad? You are just looking away to die.) Private 1

(If I was then I would have refused to come here. You were threatening me and my close ones.)

(Exactly. You are making everyone here die so they can survive.) Private 1

(That sounds like you were always planning to get ride-off me.) Shamo

I am sure they were planning to get me killed here and now I am sure of it.

(Stop this now or get punished. You are revealing everything too easily. You were manipulated to do so.) Zhao

They found out. No matter. I got everything that I needed.

(You have an idea how we can get there.) Zhao

(I need to prove my survival. Any form is ok, but you can not go against me if you give me that.) Shamo

(What do you need?) Zhao

(Water. All of it. I will bury it somewhere and I must survive to you to find it. After that, I will leave you here. You just have to trust me to leave you alive. I will send sand benders to this location. I will not negotiate. This or nothing. I can only trust you if you are willing to give all of your trust to me. If I end up dead then you will die. Make your choice.) Shamo

The next morning we were going to the library.

(Do not dare to go against the plan?) Zhao

A group of 4 men and a boy were going in the direction of the library. Naturally, everyone knew, they were looked at. One of the children was spying on this group with interest. It normally would have come to its mother but he was interested about two of them were those from yesterday. It was sure that it could take one of them as a surprise.

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It was planning to strike to one in the middle. He was Shamo. They were uneasy to put him to side of formation since their survival was the same as his. This was planned by Zhao and Shamo though.

Shamo had noticed during running away they never attacked the easiest place. Their mother was attacking the easiest target but children were going smarter since they were not desperate. They had grown into amazing predators.

This made them predictable when making surprise attacks.

The conclusion was earth spikes trapping it. Zhao was not going to miss such a perfect chance. The rest of the spikes were protecting privates and Shamo from the strike. The sand shark did not get a chance to give even a small sound. Nothing else was silent about it.

It did not take long for two other children to arrive here. They were interested in what produced that sound. This time around only one of them was killed. Another one managed to escape and retreat to its mother.

The reason behind how they managed to locate them was not because of seismic sense. We had noticed Gilacorns were able to locate them and run away from them from yesterday. We managed to trap one last evening. It was showing their direction directly. Rest could be done by looking at the sand surface.

Mother was naturally not happy about what had happened to her children. She was furious.

We saw that gilacorn has no need for us no longer. We released it in the hope some of them might start to chase it. It did not happen. Siblings and mother were more concerned about revenge than food. It was poisonous. I do not know if they know about it.

Unlike in the past mother did not attack the moment she came to attack range. Her children were far but close enough to come to us in a few seconds.

Meanwhile, I have managed to make the ground below us solid. I am confident they can only attack us from sides now. This way we can see them before they strike. We were fighting with my favorite fighting surroundings. Surrounded by rocks and ground near me and sand from farther off. We were concluded this to be best for us. I am concentrating on the defense and others for attacks. This was the formation that was chosen to be taken.

Mother knew she was not going to be unharmed so she did not try to attack us. She was circling around us anticlockwise. As right foot was my dominant leg it went well for me. She must have a plan. We were thinking she would jump to us but it did not happen. It digs under us and started to break my formed ground. It did not work but some of us lost our balance. This was not missed by the children. One of them tried to sink its teeth into his leg. I managed to sandbend him back inside the ring. The child managed to escape without getting attacked. They were far more careful than we liked them to be.

Mother stopped as she noticed it did not bring the solution which she wanted.

She started to think and soon she revealed all of herself to us. We saw the chain behind her. It was enormous. Whoever made that change must have been an amazing being. No human could have to build anything like it. I would like to call it gleipnir.

We did not get to appreciate its beauty. She once more circled around us but this time she was planning to flip us around. This is bad. Her children were more than ready to attack those who were going to fall. Unfortunately, our feet were sunk to the ground so no one was going to fall. This did not stop mother to flip us fully around.

We were becoming desperate. Some of us started to cut the chain and others attacking sand sharks.

(Stop striking without plan.! We must strike only to one place to survive!) Zhao´s orders were going to deaf ears.

Mother sand shark was over half a kilometer away from us. We can not attack her and her children are staying away from us. The chain would be our best bet but then we would release her. She would become enormously faster than before and free to move anywhere in the desert. That can not be done either.

I have never been this afraid before in my life. I am surprised that I have managed to stay this calm so far. I am sure I will lose my cool if something is not done right now.

No matter how much I think. We are trapped. Someone has to die to let us survive but who should I choose. Lieutenant Zhao seems to look at his men. He must have same idea like me but he is not able to choose who. Could it be that this moment changed him in the series?

He could not let his men´s sacrifice go unrewarded. This would explain so much. It would explain his smile during the Agni Kai trial. I can not end things up this way. I chose to jump from the earth ring. No one was looking happy for many reasons.

The sand shark was swimming toward us at a fast speed. I managed to land my feet softly on sand. This allowed me to keep my balance and keep me above the surface. I did not have time to sandbend so I put my other hand toward the earth ring and bent pillar toward the sand shark. It collided toward it with full force. This allows both chains to get loose from the ground and get sand sharks killed. The chain went flying which hit one other sand shark. It did not notice anything since its eyes were closed which caused its death.

No surprise that sharks in my past world were opposite to these creatures.

This made other sand sharks run away from here but mother was coming to us and fastly at that.

It did not look like it was going to slow down at all. It jumped to us at full speed which allowed us to follow our original plan. We all jumped from the rock and I bent it full of earth spikes. We made sure it died by firing fire blast to it until we all were not able to move.

Our fight was over.