The Dark Age (2)

"Aagh!" Aang let out a startled yelp as the black, suspiciously clammy, and gooey substance clung to him despite its mist-like appearance and covered him entirely as his body remained caught against the floor. He tried to curl his body and breath loudly yet the air passed through this substance despite its physical feeling and a hint of shock settled in his heart. This was no firebending and the only thing that fit the bill was— Energy Bending.

Ozai's laugh from the other side sounded muffled but as Aang began to struggle just to breathe, he felt like he heard Sun, and truly, a tanned-skinned youth with jaded green eyes revealing its surprise at the sight rushed towards the entrance and growled as he only saw one end of Aang's staff sticking out, "Let him go!"

The sides of the hallways bubbled into lava as Ozai scowled and pulled back in large strides while shooting Sun a threatening glare but the dark mist oozing out of him didn't seem affected by lava.

"Do you really want to hurt your own ally, Lavabender?"

"Then why'd you retreat?" Sun grinned, taking a wide stance and instantly launching jabs that caused bursts of lava to fly towards Ozai who dodged with his expression changing constantly.

"You're being a terrible distraction and I must ask you to forfeit your life!" Ozai snorted and Sun revealed an incredulous expression.

"You think talking would stop me?" Sun questioned.

"No, but it should distract you." Ozai smiled as a sudden and powerful burst of energy blasted away the gooey 'mist' with Aang promptly floating mid-air— his eyes and tattoos glowing an infuriatingly bright blue with his gaze locked against Ozai who's sclera turned pitch-black once again.

"Nice of you to show yourself, too, Raava." Ozai smiled but he looked distinctively different. Less... royal and stoic.

Yet, Aang's expression turned to that of shock when he looked back to find Sun on his knees with his chest stabbed through by a thin arm attached to a struggling dark-skinned woman who had tears building over her blue eyes.

The glow in Aang's eyes faded as he fell onto the ground, his lips parted in surprise and his eyes wide, too.

"Rena..."

Aang muttered as barely a whimper escaped through Rena's lips before she let her lips stretch into an ugly, haunting grin as her own hand sliced against her neck with the same black mist covering her palm.

"W- What? Hey! Sun! Rena!"

Aang shrieked and ran to them, his staff flung sideways and his eyes wide in horror.

"Aang, what's going on here?" A somewhat childlike voice broke Aang out of his daze and shock as he looked up and screamed at Tom-Tom, "No, run away from here! Now!"

"What?" Tom-Tom jogged towards Aang with a smile, "You look like you saw a ghost? Oh, or maybe me dying?"

With a sweet smile, Tom-Tom stabbed one of his blades from under his jaws. His lips parted slowly as the onyx-eyed boy whispered, "You lost, Avatar... you've disappointed us for the last time."

As if this wasn't enough, a cheerfully 'smiling' but tear-stricken Katara jogged into the hallway with a bleeding Sokka, "Look! I killed my only family member! Pfft, hahaha! I- I, s-save— Oh, surprisingly resilient spirit," she was quick to recover as 'Katara' unloaded Sokka near Rena and laughed, "Oh, Aang, it looks like you saw a spirit."

The boy's eyes widened in horror, "Please, Katara, don't—"

Yet, the next second, Katara sliced off her neck, too.

Ozai watched everything from a distance with an amused expression. He watched as Mai, Suki, Toph, June, and Nyla readily killed themselves with Aang unable to stop them with any means for they would find a way to commit a gruesome suicide in front of them.

"Avatar Aang, the Spirit of Lost Travelers and the Reaper works well, don't you think?" With his eyes still darkened, Ozai questioned as an eerie chuckle escaped his lips. But Aang only stared at the corpses. He saw blood returning to their bodies. He was their wounds healing. But they didn't breathe even once.

"Freedom, Order, Chaos, and the enlightened. The four banes of my existence," 'Ozai' continued, "One consumed, the other sealed, much like me, and the last one following to this direction itself. After consuming you... nothing will stand in my way."

While Aang heard it all... he could not pay attention to any of it. He couldn't even muster tears by now, his body in THAT much shock. His shoulders shuddered as he tried to move them so his friends would wake up but they didn't.

A hand gently patted his back, "If it hurts that much... would you like me to ease your pain?"

Aang looked up at the arm holding his shoulder only to find Ozai smiling down on him kindly but his pitch-black eyes suddenly dripped a dark goop-like substance over Aang's eyes, making him issue a pained shout as he covered his face and pulled back while shouting, "Bring them back!"

His kick, for the first time, launched a sharp arc of wind unlike his passive approach only for Ozai to chuckle, "And here I wished for you to meet the Old Nomads. At least, the ones who reside within me!"

Unable to open his eyes as if darkness surrounded him completely, Aang growled, "Who are you?!"

Ozai's expression suddenly twisted into that of rage as he roared, "Did you forget me, Avatar! I don't believe that one bit else your very predecessors would not have been fighting my influence but you failed! Humanity failed you... The same humanity you once trusted, Avatar!"

*Crash*

Aang only felt his hearing numb when a tremendous bolt of lightning zapped past him and struck Ozai in his chest and making him shudder and gasp for breath. A powerful grip held Aang and entrusted the staff he lost back to him once again, "We need to leave! Now."

---

Nik blinked and sat up, finding himself in a colorless world save for black and white— and its various shades.

He barely kept himself from shouting in shock as he saw a grey-skinned Azula standing next to an equally grey Ursa as they both stared into the distance. His lips quivered but he kept himself from acting without a thought. Whenever the spirits are involved, every clue counted.

So biting his lip in frustration as he was sure that he was the odd one out in this situation because his skin still looked baked and tanned after all that training and his tunic was still red, Nik eventually sat up and noticed how he was in a vast openness. The sky was light greyish and the ground dark like coal but with the texture of the soil. He was quick to look at his left hand and found that the base of his forearm still had the ring-shaped crimson tattoo. But when he tried to enter his personal world, he failed this time. With the most obvious retreat, not an option, he needed to check his status. Literally.

His status opened up so this proved two things. He was still alive. And the validity of his status screen seemed more all-encompassing about his actual state than his ability to enter his personal world. But he still worried and looked towards Ursa and Azula. The trio of them were left stranded... somewhere.

All he observed till the horizon was the grey sky and the coal land.

Not another soul in sight.

"You guys can't hear me, right?" Nik looked at Azula and Ursa as he continued to remain seated, "Yeah... thought so... hopefully we can get out of this situation, too."

Unlike the last time when he was on the brink of returning to his homeworld against Koh, Nik was calmer. He knew more. He was stronger. He had gotten more resourceful and even if he couldn't wait to end this spirit, too, for it even pulled Ursa and Azula in its 'prank', Nik knew that he could start finding answers by recounting what happened before all of this went down and... contacting Mokshi.

The first thing to have any hints was from the red squirrel spirit and it wasn't about this exact spirit itself.

"Hmm... it said, many seek imbalance... and oppose the one who wishes the opposite. I hope Aang is safe enough so that he can help us somehow. And helping Aang is the 'humble' request of the being who comes before and after Raat... Ra, the spirit of the sun."

In reality, many spirits like Tui, La, and Flower of Fertility only had warnings about Ra and they seemed pretty sure that Ra would find him. Things only became clear once Nik met Dhi and questioned him about Ra and Raat and while they were certainly powerful primordial spirits... these kinds of spirits only wielded specific 'miracles' that started from them in the human world, unlike their spiritual world counterpart.

So, spirits that were not primordials, most probably like the one who got to Nik, were equally powerful in the human and spiritual world without any restrictions and it made them dangerous.

Understanding that there was most likely a group of 'mischievous' spirits, Nik closed his eyes and felt his chi. A good thing.

This again proved that he was alive.

But the amount available to him was too low and it didn't come from him but from a 'purer' source. Not that it mattered. This source belonged to Nik, too, technically.

Channeling chi within himself and letting it connect his body and mind— consciousness, soul, and existence, Nik felt a rather calm Mokshi within him while his eyes began to glow in a sharp purplish light that even pierced through the curtain of black and white.

Mokshi would always reveal a sense of urgency to leave this world as if afraid that Nik would die and it would be stranded for years to come once again. But in this situation, it seemed calm and for a good reason as it opened up and allowed Nik to see it. The origin of—

---

"Grim... and Reaper..." Aang whispered with his eyes covered by solidified black crust as he was hidden in an alley of Phoenix City alongside Iroh who happened to have saved him.

"Grim and Reaper? Are these the names of the spirits assisting Ozai?" Iroh questioned as Aang nodded.

"Yes... I finally saw the vision once you pulled me away... But what about other prisoners, Master Iroh?" This was the term Aang adopted since Iroh did start teaching the Avatar Firebending.

"I don't know. I felt something wasn't right and when I saw you all alone—"

"Alone?" Aang questioned as Iroh nodded, "Alone. And it would seem that... Ozai is more than what we expected."

"Master Iroh..." Aang gripped his staff as he whispered, "I know what Ozai wants... and it's worse than ruling over the world... Grim and Reaper are two spirits but one. As if two sides of one coin. One gives and the other takes but both of their actions only always cause disastrous consequences... and even the Avatar cannot defeat them alone since the previous Avatar needed assistance, too. And if I can't defeat them... Sokka, Nik... everyone else..."

He lowered his head into his curled-up knees and choked his sobs as Iroh sighed and whispered, "Everything will be alright... let's start with understanding what this... or rather, these spirits are."

***

Alternative Title: The Other Side

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