Chapter 3: New Companion and arriving at the Swamp
As Kizan was walking through the forest, he started to think about what he would do to his two most hated enemies, Unalaq and Zaheer. With Unalaq, he not only destroyed the Avatar Cycle leaving a naive and rash Korra all alone, he also abandoned my parents on his mission to capture her. He got off too easy with Korra just spirit bending away the twat and Vaatu. Although she brought peace to the world for 10000 years, after that Vaatu will come back and the whole ordeal will start again. There is no way to truly kill him as he is darkness itself so the next best option is to seal him with a seal stronger than Wan's seal in the tree of time.
The problem is where to find such a seal?
There was no mention of such a seal in the show or comics so he had no reference on where to find one but something was telling him that the answer would come soon once he unlocked all his bending prowess. Nobody told him anything, it felt just like….an instinct….as if something like this happened before and the feeling felt like deja vu.
As he was pondering over the feeling he just felt, he suddenly heard bestial roars in the distance. He wanted to avoid the area but something in his gut was telling him to go towards the roars. He felt like something in the distance was calling out to him, asking for help even though he couldn't hear anyone speaking to him. He decided to trust his guts and head over to the sound. He ran through shrubs and bushes and used his earthbending to push aside any trees that were in his way just so he could make his way towards the sound faster.
Once he got there, what greeted him was a sight that could be pulled out from a horror movie. Bodies of dead animals littering the forest floor, blood painting the trees and nearby shrubbery as if it was a canvas and the disheveled ground filled with pits and scratches. In the middle of the clearing that he was in were a pack of Tigerdillo surrounding an injured and downed brown animal, as if it was protecting something. The animal had chocolate brown hair with a black stripe going down the middle. It had a big fluffy tail much like a wolf that was curled around its body, huddling around whatever it was protecting. The most distinctive feature about the animal though was it's lack of eyes and muscly snout that ended with star shaped pink tendrils that spread out in all directions. When he saw the creature his eyes widened in surprise as he started to think back on a memory where his father talked about something.
….Flashback….
"Hey Dad, what animal is that supposed to be?" a 6 year old Kizan asked his father while being taught on all the important symbols of groups and teams that bounty hunters have to show that they belong to a certain group.
His father was teaching him these symbols and markings so that if he encountered one of them someday he could take the appropriate measure to deal with them. Ghazan looked to where his son was pointing and saw the symbol. He saw the animal on that symbol and patiently explained to his son.
"That Kizan is a Shirshu, a now extinct animal for nearly 70 years now. They are ranked second in fame to the Badgermoles in the Earth Kingdom. They were famous not for their power, but for their legendary tracking ability which is said to be able to find anything, anywhere, anytime no matter the distance or the geographical terrain such as mountains and oceans. They were used by the Earth Kingdom Monarchs in the past to execute their political enemies. In short they were legendary animals that sadly went extinct due to human greed. That's why Bounty Hunter trackers use this symbol as it honours the animals usefulness and hope that the trackers can be like a Shirshu and track any of their prey." said Ghazan as Kizan listened attentively.
"Cool!" exclaimed Kizan as his father started to explain the other symbols to his son while his mom came in with food on a plate held by her ice hand that was connected to her flowing water arms.
….Flashback Ends….
Thinking of his parents and younger self, Kizan unciously smiled as he thought those were good times. Then he frowned thinking all that was ruined by a Martial Artist anarchist and a delusional and greedy Water Tribe wack job.
'I will save you Mom and Dad, wait for me' he internally thought, clenching his fist as he started to focus on the scene ahead of him.
The Shirshu noticed him almost immediately due to the different smell entering the battlefield. It turned its head in his direction and started to growl wearily and the Tigerdillo pack also started to growl at him from getting any closer to their prey. The Shirshu, being more aura and sense sensitive, started to calm down when sensing his nature aura and started to whimper and whine, almost pleading him to save it. The Tigerdillo, seeing that Kizan wasn't leaving, started to stalk towards him, aiming for the perfect chance to pounce on him and eat a pre-dinner snack.
Seeing that the pack animals were heading towards, he stomped on the ground and pushed his hands out and created a 3 meter radius lava pool around a miniature platform he created to stand. When the tigerdillo saw the lava, they became a little fearful but continued to move forward believing there was strength in numbers and they clearly outnumbered him. They started to circle the pool, finding a way to get to the human boy who controlled the molten rock. As they were circling, Kizan created two lava shurikens from the pile of stones he secretly bent and hid them in the pool. When three of the five tigerdillo came near the first shuriken, he immediately waved his arm toward them and the shuriken flew from the pool, cutting their heads off in the process as their headless bodies slowly slumped to ground while their heads slowly started to disintegrate in the lava. The other two got so frightened that they rolled up in a ball and rolled away leaving the clearing quiet unless you count the bubbling lava that was present.
Kizan solidified the lava and made a patch of black lavastone much similar to the material that his bracelet is made up of, the only difference is that while the bracelet still had rivers of lava still flowing in between the crevices, his lavastone was rapidly cooling when the bending power was taken away from it. It goes to show how powerful his father is in the art of lavabending while Kizan himself still has much to learn.
When the lava stone was safe to walk on so it wouldn't burn his shoes, he walked his way towards the injured Shirshu. The Shirshu was weary of him when he approached, but sensing his goodwill and nature aura it calmed down and allowed him to come forward, but still had its guard up. Just as Kizan approached to pet its head, it growled as if saying 'watch it' but Kizan still expressed his goodwill and unciously released more nature aura. Being the sensitive creature as it is, it clearly sensed this and finally allowed him to pet it. Kizan scratched behind its ears and he could clearly see it enjoyed it as the Shirshu started to nudge its head closer to him for more pets and scratches while making whiny noises. For some reason, he felt that Shirshu was still quite young and a female as well but he didnt know how he knew, he just knew. From observation, he could tell it was young because it was only as big as a normal horse from earth while he knew from the shows that they could reach half the size of a sky bison as well as being the same length as one.
'Perhaps her being young and the only survivor of her pack made it easy for me to comfort her, plus the nature aura also helped I believe' thought Kizan as he started to play with the young Shirshu. As he continued to play with it to relax and move to see what it was protecting, he noticed the nature aura that surrounded him started to cover the Shirshu and integrate itself within her. When that happened, he felt like a bond was established and knew that this was a strong bond as he could feel the emotions and feelings of the animal. Just like him, the Shirshu also had a much clearer understanding of Kizan and nudged herself even closer to her saviour so she could bathe in his warmth. After a few moments of staying like this, he decided to check on her injury to see how bad it was and how long it would take to heal. Like it or not, having a Shirshu as a companion would be badass and useful as well for finding his way through this strange and unknown world. Sensing his action, the Shirshu whined in happiness as it shifted its position for her new friend to come and take a look.
When he saw the injury, he couldn't help but feel bad as what he saw was horrifying. There was a foot long gash which reached bone along her hind leg, dripping with blood. Without thinking he took one of his shirts from his bag and wrapped it tightly on her wound to prevent blood loss. Then he took out some medicinal herbs which he collected at the village in case of his own injuries and started to chew it, making it into a paste before spitting it out and placing and spreading it out on the now blood soaked shirt. He then took another shirt and wrapped it again not so tightly this time, but just enough so it would squeeze the mashed up herbs and release juices into the wound so it would both numb and heal the wound.
"You should now be fine….uh I forgot to name you….well from now on you'll be known as Mira. Anyways, you should now be fine Mira, we just have to wait a couple days for the wound to heal." said Kizan as he continued to pet the beast which was now relaxing.
Sensing the injury she had gotten a slight sting, then started to feel cool and nice, Mira grunted in happiness before turning back and nudging her face onto Kizan's chest more aggressively. Kizan just laughed a little as it started to feel a little ticklish due to her fur rubbing his bare skin with how little he was wearing already.Then Kizan asked her the question he was dying to ask since he discovered her.
"Hey Mira, what are you protecting underneath you? Is it important?" asked the young earthbender as Mira just had her head in his direction and tilted her head cutely. When she felt the feeling that her friend/master wanted to know what was underneath her, she gladly shifted out of the way, though with great difficulty, revealed her treasure.
There were two items, corpses of different animals that probably the small Shirshu pack hunted and the Tigerdillo pack saw and coveted. And the other item(s) were different ores of metals that were gathered in a small pile. Seeing the corpses, Kizan didn't have to worry about food anytime soon as there was a lot. As for the metal, he curiously picked it up and when he did, he did feel a connection to it, but not enough to bend it and mold it at will. He tried with the other metals and found out some metals had a stronger connection with him while other metals, though having a connection, was much weaker then his previous connection with the element. He kept all the metal oars in his cloth bag for further experimentation while on the road and started to prepare food for himself and Mira.
(3 days later)
After constant attention and care from Kizan, Mira's injury has healed a lot to the point where she could run for a decent amount of time before succumbing to the pain. For these three days, they have been feasting on the headless Tigerdillo and to say the least, it was disgusting, well for Kizan anyway. Mira being a savage carnivore loved any type of meat that could be eaten while it tasted like thick game meat to Kizan so he had to feast on the goat like meat from the animal corpse pile that the pack hunted. In simpler terms, he had many trips to the bushes to relieve himself.
Kizan also skinned some furs of the animals to maybe sell at Republic City for some cash as well as draped over a Shirshu fur shirt that he made for himself with Mira's permission. To honor Mira's past family, he earthbent tombs for them and hid them deep in the ground so no hunters or animals could get to them as they would be valuable. After all that was done, he started to pack the leftover meat in some leaves and stored them in fur bags that he recently made with the Tigerdillo skins. There was also enough to make a makeshift saddle for him to sit on so he draped it over Mira and attached the food packs to her sides. After everything was ready, he straddled Mira and whistled sharply signalling Mira to run. She heard the whistle and started to run in a single direction leaving the clearing behind.
During the time he was taking care of Mira, Kizan taught her whistle commands in order for quick communication between each other. A high sharp whistle was used to signal to run while a low lazy whistle was used to stop. Depending on the frequency of whistle in between high and low determines her speed. It took some time to get it but by using their bond she managed to get a general understanding. He would use the bond for more complex commands as it would be heard to whistle those.
Anyways, they continued to run in a singular direction until Kizan remembered that they were heading in a random direction, either not knowing where Republic City was. Kizan quickly signaled Mira to stop and Mira did but turned her head curiously at Kizan wondering why they stopped. Kizan, rummaging through his bag, found the flying boar amulet and held it in his hand. He felt that this amulet had a connection with him, or more like his bloodline and thought that it would have the scent of the last holder, which would either be his grandfather or great grandfather. He held the amulet in front of Mira's star-shaped nose and asked her to sniff it.
"Hey Mira, could you track the scent of this amulet? This is the only thing that can lead me to my family so could you help me?" He asked and clearly got an immediate answer as Mira immediately started to sniff the amulet then started to sniff the area walking around so It could get a lead. As said before Shirshu has the greatest sense of smell and can track things across seas so if there was a scent then she absolutely could find it. After sniffing for a while she continued to sniff in three different directions, but one direction caught its direction as it continued sniffing in that direction, occasionally walking in that direction as well.
Kizan knew what was happening due to his bond. Mira currently found three scents that were not exact, but very similar to the scent present on the amulet. She found one scent almost identical, and two other scents that were weaker but one of them had a large number of people with even weaker scents. He concluded that the most identical one was Toph herself and the other two were her daughters Lin and Suyin, one living in Republic City while the other one living in Zaofu with her massive family and the Metal Clan. Since his goal was to go to Republic City, he wanted to choose the Lin path but then taught how there would be proof that he would be one of them, a Beifong? So he decided to go to Toph first, get proof that I am indeed part of her family and then go to Republic City. He could also learn seismic sense from the creator herself(for humans at least). After a plan was made, he told Mira to follow the strongest scent and Mira complied, running towards the direction of Toph.
After an hour of running, they finally reached a swamp with big enough trees where you could build ten large cabins with the wood of one tree. They started to enter a swamp and kept on following the scent, not knowing that they were already discovered when they entered the swamp. They finally saw a cave in the distance and knew this was Toph's abode as this is where Toph lived in the show after retiring from the police force.
Before he could take another step however, he was met with a giant boulder rushing towards him.