Chapter 1: The Fire learns how to burn shit.
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Part 1
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Zuko P.O.V
It’s been 5 years since Azula has been born and I am now 6 years old. The reason is starting today I can finally start my fire bending training and the one who will train me will be none other than my father.
Right now I’m standing in a field outside the palace so that my father can check the strength of my flames.
For the past 3 years I had been training in chi control and enhancement. Now all I have to do is use all my strength to conjure a fire pillar. Father says his was 33 feet tall and he was considered a prodigy seen once a century.
I did as instructed and imagined a pillar of fire in my mind without closing as that was part of the training. Suddenly as I used my chi to conjure fire a pillar about fifty feet tall made entirely out of fire appeared and burned for around 10 minutes before extinguishing.
When the fire finally disappeared and I could see my father; his jaw was almost touching the ground, his eyes wide as he stared at me.
He then snapped out of his stupor and his face immediately changed to that of pride and he rushed over to me.
“That was amazing!!!” [Ozai]
“Why, thank you, I dress to impress.”[Zuko]
“Ha-ha!! My son is a genius!!” [Ozai]
“And one that’s never been seen before.”[Ozai]
After that my father taught me many forms that I was able to learn quite easily because of my knowledge of martial arts. He taught me how to throw flames from my hands and also to increase and decrease the temperature of the fire. However, when I made various hand signs and breathed out fire with my hands in front of my face like a certain ninja my father looked at me like I was retarded.
I could pick up the basics of the techniques but was still was far from mastering them. The forms on the other hand had already been mastered due to the similarity between martial arts that I knew and the forms that my father taught.
I still had lot to learn and my father said that he would teach me the rest later.
“Originally I had planned to only train you today but now I have decided that I will train you until you eventually master fire bending.”[Ozai]
“Why did you change your decision?” [Zuko]
“Your talent for fire bending surpasses anything I have ever seen and I will not allow some fool to teach you when I can teach you techniques that far surpass theirs.” [Ozai]
“I see.” [Zuko]
After that we left for the palace. When we reached the palace servants rushed out to greet me and my father. However, they could not hide their surprise when they heard the all the praises leaking from my father’s mouth. After that day the whole palace was aware of the genius prince who far surpassed even his father with his talent.
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Part 2
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Zuko’s P.O.V
Later that night, when Zuko was asleep he entered a dream space. He looked around and noticed the colossal fire still burning fiercely. He looked around and saw Maheshvra flying towards him. Zuko was shocked because this was the first time that Maheshvra had appeared since that day he first appeared.
He was still as majestic as ever. He looked at Zuko with a gaze filled with pride and smiled at him; Zuko could not help himself from smiling back at Maheshvra.
“It has been a long time, Prince.” [Maheshvra]
“Indeed it has, hasn’t it Maheshvra. Where were you? I thought it would take only a year to meet you again.” [Zuko]
“Last time you summoned me prematurely thus it took more time than expected to regain the chi required to talk to you.” [Maheshvra]
“I see than why are you here?”[Zuko]
“Although you have become better at fire bending your body is still far too weak, I advise that you train not only your bending but also your body.”
After saying that Maheshvra disappeared. I realized that he was right, I had become too caught up in the new thing that was fire bending that I ignored the most basic thing which is to train your own body.
I suddenly felt pressure on my stomach as if someone was jumping on it. I opened my eyes to see Azula yelling at me to wake me up.
Unlike in the past the relationship between me and Azula wasn’t that of enemies but like that of a mischievous younger sister and an older brother. This was of course because unlike before I had helped her grow like this. Of course to others her personality was still the same as she would berate the servants at the smallest mistakes and would treat other people as insignificant and look at them like they were insects. But she would always be kind to her family and even mother. Like father she was also different than what was shown in the comics.
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“Azula, you don’t have to jump on me to wake me up.”[Zuko]
“But big brother doesn’t wake unless I jump on you.”[Azula]
“Okay so why did you wake me up so early.”[Zuko]
“I played a prank on uncle Iroh as he’s visiting the palace, hehehehe” [Azula]
“Azula….what did you do?”[Zuko]
“I added the glue to the water of uncles bath and a lot of it at that, hehehehe. He’s going to take a bath now so it’ll be funny when he comes out.”[Azula]
“Let’s go!! we’re going to miss it!!”[Zuko]
As soon as she told me her plan I had rushed off towards the bath with Azula running behind me.
Iroh’s P.O.V
I feel like something good is going to happen today. I need to take a bath so I head toward the baths in the palace that were made for the royal family.
I take off my clothes and enter the baths room. The bath water is nice and warm and I enter it I immediately feel its soothing affect all over my body.
After I had left the bath and was leaving the water I noticed a lot of liquid sticking to my body, I used the towel to wipe it off but instead the towel became stuck to my body. I put my foot on the bench and pulled at the towel but my foot stuck to the bench. A servant came and I reached out to him, when I grabbed him my hand became stuck to him.
“What did you do to the bath water, you buffoon” [Iroh]
“We did not do anything sire, lady Azula tampered with the water than told us to not allow anyone but you from entering saying it was reserved for lady Azula.”[Servant]
“AZULA!!!!!!”[Iroh]
The sounds of rushing footsteps could be heard as well as the stifled laughter of his niece and nephew as they ran away.
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Part 3
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Right now I was at the mountain near the palace training my body as well as my fire bending. I would do pushups, pull ups, sit ups and weighted running all while trying to hit fires conjured by a guard with my own by forming them into arrows. This would increase my control over fire as well as my aim and ability to target multiple foes. If I get tired than I would rest my body while targeting the fires with my fire arrows but in twice the amount. I would train in this method until I could go a whole day without needing to stop except for food and water.
After 1 year I could easily do all this without getting tired. My time with Azula also became limited as she started her own training, her friends Ty Lee and Mai also came often to spar with her.
After this training became ineffective I moved on to training my reflexes and dodging ability. I would tie myself to a tree while Father would throw fire balls at me and I would try to dodge and those I couldn’t dodge I would try to take control of and deflect, at first I could barely dodge or deflect and got hurt a lot.
I had gained a scar from my neck to a portion of my check and almost to my eyes. As it went towards my eyes it became thinner. As time passed the length of the rope grew shorter and shorter until I had learned to dodge with the bare minimum movement.
After this I started to re-learn all of my martial arts. I also had a katana made of a black meteorite made. It could not be melted my normal fire and my father used blue flames to melt it even then it took a while.
By the time I was finished training I was nine years old, my control over fire was equal to that of a master fire bender but I lacked skill and techniques. So for the next four years I trained under my father learning and mastering all the fire bending techniques he had to teach me.
He taught me how to make my fire take forms of animals and such; he taught me how to utilize fire bending with minimal usage of chi. My father taught that by creating the fire in a circular motion, enough force generates to block powerful projectiles. He also taught me how to prevent myself from feeling hot or cold which would come in handy inside the volcano in Roku’s Island.
But most importantly I was now able to utilize blue fire. It burned so fiercely that when I used it on a boulder not even ash was left.
Tomorrow I would go greet my grandfather for the first time and show him my current skill and try to impress him and then the day after tomorrow I would depart for Roku’s Island alone.