14 Chapter 14

When I woke up in the morning and tried to use bending, I felt a slight tension inside me, a reminder of yesterday's reckless act. It's good, very good, that my attempt to use bloodbending  ended well, and I remained alive; that's truly wonderful! Another good thing is that everything was resolved without killing the Unagi, which, in a way, protects this island.

I headed to the village again, wishing to fight the warriors.

I also saw Sokka, who was actively training, although he was being taught more about the essence of the Kyoshi warriors' fighting style. Using the opponent's strength against them. Sounds easy and understandable, but in practice, it's very hard to use, which Sokka was learning. I adopted some techniques from them, though I didn't change my own style. Actually, I don't have a style as such yet.

The fight went excellently. I managed to defeat Tina by catching her dodging from a low to high strike, as she moved aside, I was able to hit her shin, immediately knocking her down and marking the finish. Now only two warriors, Aria and Suki, remained undefeated by me. But nothing, their turn will come someday!

By noon, I headed to the village again, resting and relaxing in the water on one of the shores, but when I returned, I saw a very unpleasant scene.

"Where is the Avatar!? I know you're hiding him here!" shouted some fire warrior... no, now I clearly felt that he was a firebending, though judging by myself, being a warrior does not hinder him, on the contrary, it only helps!

"The Avatar is not here!" shouted someone from the crowd of people gathered. "Go away from here, firebenders!"

"So you don't want to do this the easy way!?" again shouted this firebenders, judging by his hairstyle and the absence of a helmet, the different style of his attire, and his demeanor, this was someone from the fire nation aristocracy. "Then we'll do it the hard way!"

With those words, he made a quick motion, extending his hand towards the crowd, and released a stream of fire.

I don't know where Aang and the rest of his company were at that moment, but I definitely didn't want any deaths among the locals. They hadn't done anything good for me, but they hadn't done anything bad either. And Aria and Suki are from here; it would be terrible if their relatives, close ones, and so on, died in the fire of benders... like my mother!

A push of the earth to my feet and my own jump gave me enough speed to intercept the firebender. My reaction and thinking accelerated, and it seemed like everything was in slow motion. Only two thoughts flashed through my mind: "Water or Earth"? Which element to use? My main element is water, and I'm much more skilled with it, with a lot of combat experience, whereas with earth, I'm not as good. My skills in this bending are also excellent, though far from water, but they would have been more than enough for me, however, in combat, I'm not used to using earth, and so now, it's dangerous to do so.

So what's the problem? Use waterbending!

But there's one catch! I don't have water with me, I don't sense any bodies of water, nor containers of water within a reasonable distance for defense against fire. Condense it from the air? I won't make it! Extract it from plants? I would manage to extract more water than from the air, but the ground around here is trampled and there's hardly any grass. Bloodbending is not suitable - I need to defend against fire now, not control the opponent.

My thoughts raced instantaneously, but it wasn't enough, and now I was in the path of the fiery charge, heading straight for me, landing on the ground. I felt my eyelids slowly closing, and the image was fading. I was about to use earth to create a stone wall, but realized I wouldn't make it in time. The speed of raising a wall from the earth wasn't fast enough to block the fire, which was already three meters away from me.

My eyelids were just about to open...

And I felt it!

I felt the flame coming towards me. I felt the bending flowing within it. I felt... fire...

I opened my eyes and saw bright flames before me. I raised my hands up and down and made a half-turn with them followed by a spiral, and the fire just dispersed, deformed, and dissipated.

Time flowed at its normal speed, and I felt my chest burning, my breathing was deep, like after a marathon at sprint speed, and my hands still felt the heat they had almost touched.

The bender who had fired at the people froze and stared at me. Now I was in front of him and could see him, having previously seen only his right side...

He was a young man my age, part of his head was bald, and only a piece of his head had hair, which was tied in a braid. Otherwise, his face had no distinctive features, if not for a huge burn scar on his face, framing his left half of the face, passing over his eye, and making it always squinted, as well as a quarter of his face.

"And who are you!?" the firebender said with barely contained anger. "A firebender!? A traitor!? A deserter!?"

"I'm not a firebender and never have been. But maybe I'll become one. And who are you, butt-faced jerk?" I calmly asked, condensing more water from the air. Thankfully, the ocean, being close by, contributes to high humidity, so in a few seconds, familiar water tentacles formed in my hands.

"You'll pay for your words!" shouted the bender, "I am Prince Zuko, the heir to Fire Lord Ozai!.."

"An exiled heir, as far as I know. Sent to find the Avatar to return to his daddy's side!" I took a combat stance and felt the water ready to respond to my will at any moment. "It will be interesting to see if royal training differs from that of the ordinary fire warriors I've killed by the hundreds and built my favorite meat compositions from."

"What?.." Zuko wanted to ask something, but I dashed forward and shot a tentacle with a tip turned into a long, sickle-shaped ice blade.

The prince dodged to the side, but it still grazed him, and the armor he wore got a cut from the blade, which also almost appeared on his chest. However, the blade continued its motion and simply bisected a fire warrior standing behind Zuko. I pulled myself with a water tentacle to that spot and, extending a second tentacle, made it sharp, and with a swing, I slashed through three more warriors who had come and immediately jumped up, dodging prince Zuko's fire projectiles. I had to roll far to the side to dodge a huge stream of flame that wanted to sweep me away with its power. However, having dodged, I did the same as Zuko had done earlier, and the fire hit one of the houses, which immediately caught fire. Two hand movements and the water flies off my hands turning into a cloud of steam. Despite the steam's temperature, it still extinguishes theflame, and in the meantime, I leap over a wave of fire sent from Zuko's foot and start closing the distance. The fiery clumps that the prince sent my way in mass were beaten and shattered against the ground, failing to find me. Excellent agility is an irreplaceable ally in this! With a final burst, I found myself right in front of the bender and delivered a spinning kick, but he ducked and tried to hit me in the shin, however, I spun and lifted my other leg off the ground, hanging in the air for a moment, then delivered a downward kick to Prince Zuko's head.

If he didn't lose consciousness, he would certainly be disoriented for a while and unable to continue the fight. He'd have trouble standing up. And though bending strengthens the body, I'm not just an ordinary person either, but a benders!

I land on the ground with a roll and look around. At this moment, the Kyoshi warriors were fighting the fire warriors, with Suki, Aria, and Tina taking on the benders, while several other warriors teamed up to attack a few more benders. I focus and extend my hands towards them, then forcefully clench my fists, and eight troublesome benders freeze, expressions of terrible agony and pain appear on their faces, and then they fall and move no more.

Now the warriors would have more strength for the rest... well...

I pick out targets and, raising my leg high, deliver a heel strike to the ground, causing a dent in the trampled earth matching the shape of a heel, and twelve fire warriors unexpectedly impale themselves on stone spikes that shot up from the ground.

Meanwhile, water began to gather in the air, and I turned around, intending to encase Zuko in ice, but upon turning, I saw an empty spot. Prince Zuko was nowhere to be seen!

How? I had lost sight of him for only about twenty seconds, I didn't feel any movement, didn't hear the sounds of a rising body... HOW!?

The battle with the fire nation's people wasn't easy, and before I killed the firebenders, they had managed to set several houses on fire, which were now actively burning, with a few neighboring ones starting to catch fire as well.

I was about to use the steam technique again, which had proven effective, but before I could do so, Unagi leaped out of the water in the bay, with Aang on its head holding the sea serpent by its whiskers, and the next second, the serpent released a stream of water towards the village, turning it into rain that quickly extinguished the fire. The Kyoshi warriors dealt with the remaining fire warriors.

I quickly learned from one of the living defeated where their ship was docked. Fortunately, these warriors had already somehow figured out who I was. More precisely, they connected rumors, fleeting descriptions, and the current me and came to disheartening conclusions for them, so one of them answered my question immediately.

I reached the required shore in just fifteen minutes but only saw the ship, already too far away, heading east.

"They escaped!"

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