Mass

Once I got onto the shore of he beach I counted the amount of people I saw. Almost one fourth the people who were swimming were now gone. Before The officers who sat with the paddle boat spoke again I backed into the few trees that were on this island. I had a bad feeling, and when the officer spoke I knew I was right.

"Now that you are all on this island this is the island of Minth. The competition starts now, you may do whatever you need to guarantee your spot for the Royal prodigies. We will return at a later time with the princess to count the survivors. Only five positions exist. Meet back here within 8 months or be left behind."

The unnamed officer then immediately launched of by pushing the boat backwards into the deeper water with blast of fire. The paddlers then rowed away towards a small cruiser that steer out from the cover of a tree line.

I just backed away into the island's foliage as a bunch of the prodigies turned on each other. From what I could over here, most of them volunteered for this. At least those who came from noble families. I guess they wanted to win for their families honor or something. I heard one too many battle cries for me to care.

When I was out of sight and away from hearing I bent the water from my clothes and pushed it away as steam. The combination of bending techniques was incredibly useful. Lime however didn't think so as he shook water from his fur hitting me and everything around us. He had gotten down from my back at some point and with my bag still on his back I got rid of the water from it too.

"Well Lime, this has taken a turn for the worst. It's time to get walking."

He stood up and began mimicking an exaggerated walk that made me laugh. Lime wasn't an intelligent creature, but he was still fairly smart. Whether that was due to my influence or the affect of using the Eternal Life on him several times I didn't know.

Trudging through the mud was fairly slow, but I wanted to head toward the middle volcano before night time. 8 months, I didn't think that I would spend almost an entire year for a stupid competition. However on my time thinking on the ship. I had come to realize that being forced to join in on this competition was still useful. I could use Azula to go after Aang. I would be his enemy, but Zuko was once his enemy as well. So hopefully at some point I could tell Aang about bending and teach him the energy bending that was given to me by the lion turtles. I hoped teaching it would progress it though. Otherwise I would have to learn it before teaching him.

Strange thing was I didn't hear anything about Aang waking up. With being unsure of the proper date and time. With that uncertainty my ever increasing age made me worry. I did the math previously when I heard about Zuko's banishment. Which was when he was 13, my age then was 12 now that I was 15 meant he was 16. Telling I didn't hear the fire lords collapse he hasn't joined Aang which should've been when he was 15. So with the knowledge of already skewed events the time Aang would awaken was completely random.

I tripped and fell into a ditch. It was a small crevice that outlined the separation of two different areas of earth. I didn't really expect it so I ended up falling into it. Looking at it though it wasn't something special. However the continuous line it held made me want to follow it along and see where it went. It wasn't the best of my time spent, but I began walking along it. Lime had fallen in after me and balanced between the two separated masses.

When following the deviate it begun to turn into a circle line. If it was a natural formation it shouldn't have this kind of bend. I looked around the area not seeing anyone near me.

"Lime, do you hear anybody?"

He shook his head no, and I preformed simple earth bending to check the material of the two masses. However when I tried to to bend the second mass I couldn't. No matter how I tried it wouldn't budge. It then dawned on me that this was likely a much more lucky find then anything I could have imagined.

Lime signaled to me though, "Someone's near?"

He answered yes or no questions easily and signaled me by a small grumble. I removed the earth I bended and dove into the crevice with Lime. It was big enough to cover us from both tree lines. I didn't really expect anything to come from the center of the island so I kept my eyes on the direction I had came. Lime copied my pose and made small binoculars with his hands.

The girl with the red scarf stumbled out of the trees. She was bleeding out, and on the verge of death it seemed. A second person came from the trees he had a long sword. So it seemed he was the one who attacked her.

"Sorry, but this is life or death. Those who volunteered for this don't deserve one of those positions. My only save and grace was Master Piandao teachings. I'm not from a noble family I was forced into this competition. All for what! To be the princess lap dogs?"

The guy with the longsword went on a whole monologue. Talking about his own push into this mess. So it seemed I was right about some being forced into it if they were not from a noble or elite family. As he began finishing his speech, he begun raising his sword. The girl who was now laid down tried to make it to the ditch. I could see the terror in her eyes.

"This is some fucked up shit!" I had to jump out the ditch and blast the guy. He didn't even try to dodge as roasted him. It seemed he was scared as well, I didn't really try to harm him. However I didn't expect him not to dodge. So he ended up being struck by my fireball. I didn't really feel much about killing him. I checked on the girl, she was still bleeding.

With the girl unconscious, I began to heal her. I would also tie her up to make sure she didn't try to kill me when she woke. I debated about letting Lime eat the corpse of the guy. Ultimately that felt bad so opened a hole with earth bending and bury him. Lime had copied my earth bending movements, which made me slight want to remove that habit. However the habit also made great use to increase my relationship with Lime so I could let it be.

With the tied up scarfed girl, me and Lime made our way toward the center of the separated land mass. The guy with the sword was killed by me, I hadn't really felt much about killing him though. Almost like he wasn't even important. How strange it felt.