Chapter 85 - Dragons, Infiltration

Aiwei nods and grabs his backpack. Nuwa also heads off to pack her stuff for today's trip, but runs into Iroh and Bumi. There's a dreary atmosphere around them. Iroh looks at Nuwa and asks, "Stella, would it be possible for you to bring this to the Spirit Realm? It's urgent." Iroh shows a rock.

Nuwa doesn't mind. She takes it, puts it in her [Inventory], and goes into a nearby room to sit down in preparation to depart her body. June arrives to watch over them. Arriving in the Spirit Realm with Iroh and Bumi in tow, Nuwa pulls out the rock from her [Inventory]. Neither of the old men are currently interested in the novelty of the phenomenon of being able to easily smuggle items back and forth between realms.

Iroh thanks her and lets Bumi undo the rock around the blood diamond. Now inside the Spirit Realm, Moira's heartblood flows rapidly on its own and attempts to break through the diamond container. Bumi helps her by shattering the diamond open with a well-tuned resonant frequency from his finger. Nuwa watches the strange droplet of blood float up and expand into the silver-white head of a dragon.

Iroh hugs the large dragon head and sobs quietly, "Moira.."

The disembodied head of Moira rubs up and down against Iroh's thick frame and her eyes exude sadness. They hug for several minutes until Moira's head fades leaving only the droplet of blood essence that's now lost its power and disperses into the wind. With the spirit of Moira laid to rest, Iroh lets out a heavy breath, returns to the Mortal Realm, and heads back to his room.

Nuwa asks Bumi what had happened and Bumi explains their findings about the blood gem and possible ongoing dragon hunt. Dragons in Avatar are based on a mix of Western and Eastern influences. They are scaled, have a variety of types of wings, but they can always fly regardless of how many wings they have. They can breathe fire, and even understand human speech, but they cannot speak back. Dragons are highly intelligent and loyal once they bond with a human. Sozin's dragon followed him for his entire life despite the fact that he hunted other dragons for sport. On the other hand, if they live in the wild, they don't shy away from the taste of human meat.

Honestly, hearing this, Nuwa's concerns about the lack of Fire Nation offensive are temporarily settled. Nuwa has never had much contact with dragons, so she personally doesn't feel that bad. Even in canon, there was said to be only three remaining dragons alive in the Mortal Realm by the end of the show, so she was mentally prepared for such a result. If she changed to Heza, perhaps she would be heartbroken for her former husband, but she was only well acquainted with her Uncle as Nuwa. There's no way she'll put herself in danger and jeopardize the upcoming invasion for the sake of protecting dragons.

She speculates that if Willie allowed a bloody massacre to occur, then there's some deeper underlying reasoning behind it, just like when it allowed the air nomads to be wiped out down to only Aang. Maybe dragons belong in the Spirit Realm instead of the Mortal Realm? Or maybe she's making excuses for herself so she doesn't have to feel guilt about not helping. In any case, she has a feeling that she'll be seeing the last of Iroh in the Mortal Realm from now until the Day of the Black Sun.

Nuwa exits the Spirit Realm and returns to find everyone ready to leave. She picks up her pack and follows them out of the palace. This time, it'll only be Nuwa, Azula, Aiwei, and Toph on top of three eelhounds scouting a nearby known military base. This way they'll be fast enough to get away from the army if the worst case scenario happens. Also the three eelhounds will have plenty of space to carry them, their luggage, and maybe a few prisoners without issue.

Back when she used eelhounds initially, Nuwa had recently created her Dao String of Sex, so she still felt the jostling of her fetus was bad. Now, 10 days later, the Dao String has had time to passively increase the durability of her genitals and womb. Nuwa feels that she can even run or do harsh exercises without a problem. So she hops on an eelhound with Aiwei. Azula and Toph ride their own and they all set off in the direction of Fire Nation encampment 60 mi (100 km) away. The rest of the gang are either training, going on patrols, or relaxing with Mai and Katara.

The team shoots out of Omashu on the high-speed eelhounds and Nuwa directs them westward. Aiwei gets to hold onto Nuwa's waist from behind, but he came fully prepared this time. He got a jock-strap from the Mechanist! Nuwa isn't fully aware of this fact but when she teases Aiwei, his penis and balls become more sensitive.

During these moments, if he suffers an impact to them, it hurts several times more than it would otherwise. Riding on the back of an eelhound, this would mean his sensitive balls would be subject to regular unintentional abuse! Aiwei is currently feeling especially proud of himself for predicting this situation and ordering one from the Mechanist according to his measurements.

So when Nuwa feels the hard material of the jock-strap on her ass instead of Aiwei's hard dick, she puts on a weird, but understanding look. Little did she know that this was Azula's plan all along. Unlike Nuwa, Azula has real experience with having a dick and balls, so she can plan ahead! Azula had mentioned this contraption to the Mechanist in the hopes that he would spread word. Aiwei then saw it in the Mechanist's workshop and immediately asked that one be made for him. Azula smirks when she sees Nuwa unsuccessfully grind her ass on Aiwei. Two can scheme at this game!

Six hours later, crossing through land and river, they arrive outside the scouting lines of a Fire Nation encampment nestled between two mountains. They make a cave to leave their eelhounds with Toph while the less reckless part of the group sneak around to see if there are any gaps in the surveillance to sneak their eelhounds in. Nuwa and Azula leave Toph with Aiwei and the eelhounds and sneakily join a set of merchants passing through the encampment.

These merchants constantly deliver supplies and take ore mined from the prisoner-slaves within the encampment. All of this is par for the course when it comes to the military-industrial machine that is the Fire Nation. There's no way they can finance a war that goes on for 100 years otherwise. Because this is an actual military base on the frontlines though, there aren't many slaves. Even if they revolted, it would be easily put down with how outnumbered they are.

As Nuwa and Azula approach the camp, they get a better look at the number of Fire Nation troops. There should be about 1500, including military non-combat personnel, which is much less than they expected. They casually walk in and see guards posted on all corners of the walls watching out for large Earth Nation troop movements. Nuwa reasons that Toph must have done a good job scaring them when she destroyed the Drill.

Nuwa looks at Azula and they both decide they'll have to wait for nightfall to sneak in on eelhounds. They unload cargo and act like normal merchant laborers. They're fully covered in white clothes, including a white shawl over their mouth and nose not just to stave off the daytime heat, but also to make sure no one among the merchant crew recognizes that they don't belong. It helps that the merchant laborers are also dressed similarly. They exit the area with the merchants and sneak away without issue. This short trip is quite efficient, it only takes them three hours to return to the cave with the intel.

Unfortunately, three hours is too long for Toph. She tries to keep herself occupied by making rock figures of Bumi to smash to pieces, but that also gets boring quickly. She looks around and catches sight of Aiwei. Then she says, "Yo, kid. You a virgin?"

Aiwei was told to do whatever he could to keep Toph in the cave if she gets impatient, but he gets a bad feeling when he hears this. "Yes..?"

Toph crosses her arms and stomps the floor, cracking it. "What! You're judging me? I'm bored! Whose fault is that, huh?" Aiwei jumps and recoils slightly in fear of the violent loli while bemoaning his fate as the one to stay behind.

Toph continues, "Yours! You're supposed to be entertaining me. Do something funny."

Nervously adjusting his glasses, Aiwei tries to think of something funny to do, but all he can think of is to dance like a clown. So he does. Toph feels like she's bullying him and doesn't get as much fun out of it as she expects. She says, "No no no. Stop."

Then she looks him up and down and says, "I can feel something obstructing under your pants. Take that off and do it again." Aiwei whimpers as he turns around, removes his jock-strap, and replaces his underwear and pants. Now that Toph can sense things clearer, she is better entertained. "Good, dance like that. This is good exercise for you too. Otherwise, wouldn't you get beat up all the time? I'm doing you a favor." Aiwei almost tears up and prays that Nuwa and Azula rescue him.

An hour later, when Nuwa and Azula return, they find Aiwei sprawled on the ground taking deep breaths looking like he's out for the count. Azula throws a disgruntled glance at Toph, while Nuwa glares. Toph claims, "What? I had him do some exercise. He needed it."

Nuwa grumbles, "C'mon, couldn't you just have taken a nap? Never mind, we'll have to sneak in at night anyway, so get some rest."

Toph snorts, sits down, and puts on her ear mufflers so she can 'turn off her vision' as preparation to go to sleep. Of course, her feet are still bare and resting on the ground maintaining her earth sense in a state of vigilance. Toph may be brash and stubborn, but she's also a one-woman army in the making. Although she occasionally feels distress for how her mom must feel regarding her high bounty, she's truly having the time of her life fighting against the Fire Nation with her life in constant danger, and wouldn't want to live any other way.

Nuwa and Azula exit the cave shortly before returning to find Aiwei and Toph both asleep.

+15k LEE, Total: 1141k LEE

Nuwa stays up to make sure they don't miss the best window of time to sneak in and wakes up everyone about six hours later. By now, it's dark out and dim moonlight is all that they can rely on to see. Toph, on the other hand, can see everything as clearly as before. She'll be their ace for their approach due to her omni-directional visibility. Now, Nuwa can only hope she cooperates.

Four against 1500 troops is an exceedingly dangerous situation, no ifs ands or buts about it. Stealth will be the most important element of this mission. The team changes to black clothes instead of their earlier white clothes. They wake up the eelhounds and hop on. The eelhounds also appear to understand that stealth is important, because they trot quietly in the dark. The dark green skin of the eelhounds make them difficult to spot in the dim moonlight.

Nuwa summons her [Hidden Blade + Hook + Dart]. She imbues a few sex daons with opiods into her breast milk and squeezes it out of her nipples into the poison compartment of her dart gun. Now she can fire poison darts that make people drowsy and put them to sleep. Azula summons her fire and brings it close to Nuwa's nipples, which wipes away any remaining traces of opioid near Nuwa's breasts. Following these preparations, they leave cover and slowly head towards the encampment.

Toph is surprisingly cooperative atop her eelhound and points out where the least number of guards are. The team waits for Nuwa to fire darts at the two sentries at the spot that Toph points out. The sentries don't notice anything striking them and fall asleep one minute later. Nuwa's darts are designed to be very hard to spot or feel as long as they land on a part of the body that has fewer nerves. The eelhounds walk up to the wall and the team jumps off onto the walkway atop the wall to strip the guards and change into Fire Nation armor.

It's impossible to get around within the encampment with black clothes because there's torches everywhere and individuals wearing full black would be extremely suspicious. Luckily, the Fire Nation armor includes helmets which provide a convenient excuse for having to identify oneself.

The team jumps back down onto their eelhounds and have them jump over the wall so they can ride the eelhounds inside the lit corridors of the camp. It's suspicious of them to do so, but it's their safest bet to ensure their quick getaway. The encampment also has a few eelhounds in the stables which are reserved for the highest tier of military personnel for escaping and chasing purposes.

What allows them to do this is a single piece of paper. It's a scroll signed by the Zata lord that was on the Zata mercenary commander's body regarding an illegal economic partnership they have with the military commander of this outpost. This scroll is their ticket to behaving somewhat ostentatiously, riding their eelhounds through the encampment directly in the direction of the commander's lodgings. No one stops them seeing as they are dressed in full military armor, but they're still pissed off that they ride over to the lodgings instead of walking.

One checkpoint guard says, "Hey soldiers, where's your respect for the chain of command!"

Nuwa speaks in a low voice, attempting to emulate a man's voice, "Sorry, urgent missive from the northeast."

The guard is slightly influenced by [Induced Good Impression] and waves them through with a snort.

Finally, the team arrives at the commander's tent, which is surrounded by a group of guards in fiercer than normal military armor. The team gets off their eelhounds and Nuwa shows the closed, but official-looking scroll to the guards. One of the guards recognizes the Zata seal, which the Mechanist had to meticulously recreate after everyone had read it. The guard, understanding that this is an under-the-table deal, says, "Let them through. No need to check them further." He seems to be the lead guard because the rest of the guards follow his orders unquestioningly and back off.

The team internally sighs in relief and is escorted by the lead guard into the lodgings where the light is darker. People are trying to sleep after all. The lead guard knocks on the door of the Commander's room several times before it finally opens to reveal a drowsy looking middle-aged man with a handlebar mustache. He's still groaning in annoyance at being woken up until he sees the Zata seal on the document in Nuwa's hands.

The sudden onset of greed wakes him up fully and he says, "Come in, come in." The lead guard gestures for them to enter and enters with them. Nuwa remembers to activate [Acting] this time and perfectly emulates the Zata mercenary commander's voice when she says, "Message from up top."

This is actually bullshit. It's a routine accounting communication to make sure that the numbers between both commanders match, but the Zata are so pompous and nouveau riche that they include their official seal on all of these communications with no regard for the fact that their illegal actions are made more obvious by doing this. The message is actually supposed to go to the lead guard, but since Nuwa hadn't handed it to him, he assumed that it was only meant for his superior's eyes. Maybe they're expecting an update on how well the gliders work.

Azula jumps at how well Nuwa emulates the voice of the now comatose man. The lead guard looks at her questioningly and Azula replies, "Sorry, I felt a bug inside my greaves." Unfortunately, she forgets to modulate her voice, so although she has a low voice for a woman, everyone recognizes that it's a woman's voice. Nuwa is currently extending the scroll in her hand towards the Commander. The moment Azula finishes speaking, Nuwa resummons her [Hidden Blade +2] and fires opioid darts on both hostiles. Toph also does a quick earthbender dance and sends metal links over their mouths so they can't shout for help.

Due to Nuwa's closeness with the Commander, he's immediately knocked out by the drug that flowed in through the dart in his neck. Nuwa catches him so he doesn't drop to the floor. She doesn't land as effectively as a shot on the lead guard. The dart lands in between his thigh and groin where the armor is weaker, so he begins to do a fire dance. Azula grabs both of his hands, which snuffs out any fire that he is in the process of gathering, and uses his hands to thrust her body upwards in a jump and slams her knee on his chin with all of her body weight.

Nuwa winces when she sees the lead guard unconscious with a bad concussion and a broken jaw. Azula lands her jump quietly and lowers him slowly to the floor. Their plan was to drug the Commander in a private setting where it would just be him and put him in a half-drowsy state so that they could interrogate him and walk out without anyone suspecting anything other than an error in message delivery. The plan ran into some bumps and now the Fire Nation will be aware that a small Earth Kingdom group blatantly walked into their camp posing as Fire Nation soldiers and picked off two high profile characters whether or not Nuwa leaves them unharmed further or puts them in comas.

Nuwa can't think of any way to cover this up besides finding a way to destroy this camp with large-scale destructive bending. 'Damn. I promised Aang that I wouldn't kill wantonly. If only I had learned Long Feng's brainwashing methods. Even though they are sickening, they would have been able to reset this chessboard, instead of being stuck in a situation where the Fire Nation will up its vigilance.'

Azula looks at Nuwa guiltily and whispers, "Sorry babe.."

Nuwa responds casually, "It's ok. Plans are bound to go wrong at some point. Nice job, Toph."

Toph smiles smugly under her helmet at unexpectedly outdoing Azula in following the plan.

Nuwa puts the Commander on a nearby sofa and retrieves an antidote from her [Inventory] for the opioid, but gives him only a miniscule amount of it, only enough for him to very groggily wake up. Nuwa gestures to Aiwei to come closer.

(A/N: Poor Iroh T_T.)

(Nuwa's channeling her inner assassin. She's a natural!)