Lu Gun padded through the forest like some metal amalgamation of the creatures he had hunted. When the massive wall of fur and muscle before him slowed, he prodded it with a sharp speartip.
The bearmoose before him had been a slow learner; too much time on the top of the food chain, an undisputed apex predator, a king of the wilds.
But Earthbreakers weren’t just the spadetip that conquered unbroken lands. Earthbreakers weren’t just breakers of earth. Earthbreakers were trained to destabilized nations and break the hearts of their people. Earthbreakers were trained to break the will of generals and topple kings. Earthbreakers broke the minds of those who would oppose… or serve them.
The bearmoose had lost a lot of blood learning that lesson. It had cost itself a great deal of pain before it realized it couldn’t hurt the iron-clad man.
Now it responded to the spearpoint without Lu Gun having to even draw blood, only too eager to serve its new master if it meant another moment without pain.
Its chains rattled loudly, echoing through the forest. The wind was at their backs, carrying its scent down into the valley where the wolfboar pack couldn’t help but catch it.
Once, a full-grown bearmoose was the only thing that could frighten a pack of razorback wolfboar. But that was before Lu Gun had fashioned his new armor from their razor-sharp spines.
With a slashing motion, Lu Gun snapped the boarmoose's chains.
Then he drove the spear full into its flank.
He could feel the fear and pain in the beast’s roar. It rose up on its flank, howling like mad, then barreled down into the valley in a frenzy of anger and fear.
Lu Gun returned to the shadows to wait.
***
Torun Bo’s knots worked just as expected. Once the pack had scented their enemy on the wind and turned their raised snouts in the same direction, a flick of Torun’s knife released the razorbacks all at once.
A few shouts and cracks of flame from Yaosen sent the pack off in the opposite direction. No sense in laying low, when the whole point was to lure Lu Gun into the center of their encampment.
Yoasen was so relieved to see the wolfboars safely away into the forest that he almost forgot the whole point of this was to force a duel to the death.
Yoasen’s opponent however, was not what they expected.
A thousand-pound bearmoose, scarred from many battles and eyes red-rimmed with rage, came barreling down the slope knocking aside their tree trunk fortifications and snapping any traps that it happened to trigger.
All of their preparations might have been so many blades of grass before such a beast.
Yoasen’s first thought was to scare it off with a few showy bursts of flame. That was until he saw the chains. They were made of fire nation iron, the kind used for the bulkheads of ships, and Yoasen knew that this was the work of Lu Gun. This was part of his plan, and they had once again underestimated their opponent’s cunning and cruelty.
Two scything kicks sent blades of fire lancing toward the charging bearmoose’s forelimbs.
The bearmoose simply lowered its head into them, charging through with its heavy antlers, not feeling any gashes that the flames managed to inflict.
Yaosen was immediately on the defensive, leaping up and propelling himself up over the bearmoose. The beast lept and swatted at him, but with a thrust of flame through his heels, he propelled himself yet higher.
As soon as Yoasen landed he was sending great bursts of fire with every movement. They were intended to blind and confuse the bear in the darkness as much as they were intended to drive it off.
“I’ll keep him busy,” said Yaosen between attacks, “Keep an eye on the treeline for Lu Gun. He’ll show himself when we least expect it.”
Torun Bo growled. Yoasen knew their plan had gotten off to a bad start, but the trap still worked if they saw him coming. The plan was still the plan, even if Yoasen was now live bait, and the bait was jumping on the line.
***
Torun remained in the cover of the pine-bough shelter they had constructed on one of their first days. He tried not to move, even to shuffle in place, lest the metalbender sensed him hiding there.
The concept of Yaosen performing circus tricks to evade the bear seemed like an unsustainable strategy. The longer this went on, the greater the chance the firebending monk would make a mistake. And it would only take one mistake to be eviscerated by one of those claws, or shattered by those bucking antlers.
Lu Gun would know that, and he may not attack until after the bearmoose was brought down. He may not attack tonight, at all. This could have been just to tire them out so he could attack at dawn.
Torun was just about to step out of cover when he noticed the subtle shifting of the meadow they had come to know so well over the last few weeks.
What had it been that had caught his eye? A rogue wind? A shifting shadow?
He scanned their campsite.
Nothing from the treeline. Grass swaying normally. Fortifications smashed from the bearmoose’s rampage but otherwise-
There!
A slight bulge in the earth.
Damn, they hadn’t accounted for that. It was a long way to tunnel from the treeline to the camp, even for an earthbender. But even if the bearmoose hadn’t distracted the wolfboars, even if they hadn’t released all their sniffers to safety, nothing would have caught the Earthbreaker’s scent while Lu Gun remained underground.
It was the exact right countermove to their plan.
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As for Torun’s next move… He did nothing, not even a shuffle, as he tracked the subtle signs of the Earthbreaker’s tunnel. And he was right to; the Earthbreaker could sense the movement above.
Torun studied the shifting earth as it drew closer to the fighting, then watched as Yoasen’s battle with the beast took them in a different direction and the bulge beneath the earth course-corrected.
Torun would have to wait until Lu Gun showed himself to strike. He’d have to be fast. He may only get one shot at it.
Torun glanced at the monk and saw him land, set his feet, then send a powerful stream of fire at the bearmoose. Yoasen must be getting tired. It’s the only thing that could explain the sudden change in tactics.
Even so, the bear was blinded and overwhelmed, and looked to be on the verge of quitting. Fear of his master could only go so far. Yoasen’s firebending was magnificent in that moment: flurries of kicks and sweeps and punches all flowing together in an intricate pattern of fire, fire, and more fire.
It was then that the earth exploded upward like a flameless eruption.
Lu Gun landed before the shattered hole but Torun Bo was already running, closing the distance with sword ready to strike.
Even as Torun charged, he realized something didn’t make sense.
Lu Gun had known where the monk was, but hadn’t gotten within striking distance, even for a bender.
Why leave so much distance between himself and his quarry. It was then that Torun saw the Earthbreaker assassin palm a small shaft of metal and pull back in what appeared to be a slingshot motion.
In that moment it all made sense. It seemed simple. A metalbender didn’t need to send massive boulders to crush his foes. He needed only a piece of metal that he could fire at great speed. Lu Gun had fashioned himself the perfect projectile for such a purpose.
Torun Bo had the assassin’s back to him. He could strike Lu Gun down with ease, but not before the assassin fired that projectile. And there was Yaosen with his feet set, sustaining a blast of fire that was even now breaking the bearmoose’s desire to fight.
The assassin would kill the monk, then Torun would kill the assassin. And then the Meteor Knight could reclaim his place beside his Fire Lord, his orders fulfilled, his duty fulfilled.
But that was not honor, not as Torun Bo knew it.
“YAOSEN!” Torun thundered.
The assassin started even as he let the projectile go. Yoasen launched himself into the air on instinct, flipping and finding the assassin.
Lu Gun, for his part, saw his shot go wide, striking the bearmoose’s antler and shattering it.
The bearmoose fled, but the assassin snarled and turned to face Torun.
Lu Gun wore the jagged metal of the ship he had sunk as armor, and the blades of the razorbacks he had killed dangled from his belt, weapons or trophies.
Both were afronts to Torun’s honor, trophies of the nation he served and the beasts he had befriended.
Torun snarled and resumed his charge, sword aloft.
“Torun don’t!” Yoasen shouted.
Lu Gun raised a hand. It was missing several fingers, but the fingers that remained twisted into a metalbending motion that Torun didn’t recognize.
The meteorite blade jumped in his grasp, then swung down of its own volition to slam into Torun’s unarmored torso.
Torun felt blood burst from his chest and ribs crack, as he flew backward.
Yoasen sent a gout of flame at the metalbender’s back but the Earthbreaker was already raising a stony wall to protect himself.
Two more exchanges and Torun could already tell from where he lay – propped up on one elbow, struggling to breathe – that Yaosen was tiring quickly. It was only a matter of time before Lu Gun found a moment to ready another one of those metal projectiles. Torun wasn’t sure if Yoasen would even be able to see it as it took him, much less block it with a burst of fire.
Torun had to do something, but as he tried to rise he fell to the earth, breathing hard and blowing dust.
The earth beneath him began to shake and it took a moment for Torun to realize that it wasn’t the product of earthbending, but the charging of hooves.
***
Yoasen sent fist after fist of flame at Lu Gun, but the metalbender began batting them away with more and more ease. Some he didn’t even bother to deflect, but took on his armored shoulder or vambrace.
Yoasen was losing and he knew it.
It was now or never.
He placed his hands before him as a focus, cleared his mind and tapped into-
There was a hurried flick from the metalbender and something ripped through Yoasen like a spear shaft, tearing into his stomach and out the other side.
Yoasen crumpled. He tried to rise but stumbled.
The next blow would end him, he knew. He pushed himself from the dirt to at least face it with dignity, but the next blow didn’t come.
Yoasen looked up to see the metalbender facing away from him, all defenses abandoned except for his armor, as Grunt hobble-charged across the meadow, straight for Lu Gun.
Something about the way the Earthbreaker assassin stood suggested… amusement.
Lu Gun lowered himself into a fighting stance then thrust forward a palm.
Grunt stopped in his tracks with a squeal of pain and surprise.
That squealing only grew louder, more frantic as Lu Gun lifted that palm, and to Yaosen’s horror, the razorback wolfboar lifted from the ground, kicking and thrashing as if a giant hand had reached down and plucked it up by the scruff.
Yoasen’s eyes grew wide as he realized what Lu Gun was doing.
Those razors at Lu Gun’s belt hadn’t come from wolfboar he had hunted and killed. Lu Gun had ripped the razors from their backs while the wolfboars still lived!
Yaosen got his feet underneath him, but his one side wouldn’t hold him, and he fell to one knee, a fresh gush of blood soaking into the grass.
He looked up to see Lu Gun jerk his hand. With a horrible cry from the wolfboar, the shining iron of Grunt’s razorback tore free, blood and flesh trailing from it as Grunt fell to the ground and the razorback trophy flew into Lu Gun’s hand.
Lu Gun smiled, his victory complete.
“BASTARD!” the cry ripped from Yaosen’s throat as he formed the focus. Torun was dying, Grunt was dying, Yaosen was dying. What did it matter now if he failed spectacularly?
“YOU’LL PAY FOR THAT!” The beam ripped out of him, but tilted drunkenly and carved a scorched rift at the Earthbreaker’s feet. The lightbender tried to focus it but only succeeded in splitting it, once, twice, three times. There was no controlling this, but who needed control when the deadly beams covered so much ground. Yoasen thrashed the chaotic beams back and forth.
Lu Gun raised an earthen wall, but the beams cut through it with ease. He launched a metal projectile at the monk but one of the beams evaporated the metal before it reached its mark.
The beams sliced through their log cabin, the cut sizzling and catching flame even as the top half slid away clean. The beams tore up their meadow, leaving glowing liquid earth in their wake. The beams cut through the corral fence, and the furnace stones, and the trees at the edge of their clearing.
Lu Gun had no choice but to duck and roll and try to survive the onslaught.
Black blood poured from Yaosen and it wouldn’t be long now before-
Yaosen felt the beams waver, the monk’s focus and his willpower faltering.
But that was ok. Yaosen didn’t need to succeed. Not in this.
He just needed to fail spectacularly.
He allowed the focus to not only slip, but to block entirely.
He could feel what willpower he had left building up within him, but he kept fueling it. He allowed Torun to be his fuel. He allowed Grunt to be his fuel. He allowed all the people and creatures Lu Gun had already tortured and killed to be his fuel.
And the pressure built within him like an engine about to blow.
His focus-that-was-not-a-focus cracked and the flames ripped from him all at once in all directions, tinged black with his boiling lifeblood.
The last thing he saw was the surprise on Lu Gun’s face, then his futile efforts to raise walls of earth. But that would do the Earthbreaker no good. These flames would burn for days and would melt even rock. Any bunker or tunnel would become an oven. Blood would boil and evaporate. Even teeth and bone would become naught but ash.
Even as Yaosen commended himself to that fire, something gripped him by the ankle, like the rough skin of a giant serpent.
He felt himself hurtle skyward, then tumble into icy waters.