The idea of going to the front lines no longer seemed so good to me. Forty newly trained Benders, including myself, were now moving toward Ba Sing Se, one of the most impregnable cities in the Earth Kingdom. On the approaches to the city, we were supposed to link up with the army of General Iroh, the Crown Prince of the Fire Nation, and assist him with the siege.
Ba Sing Se had long been a thorn in the side of my country's high-ranking military and the Fire Lord himself. Throughout its existence, the city had clearly proven that it was indeed impregnable. For nearly a hundred years of war, no one had managed to breach even the first line of defense of Ba Sing Se: its Outer Wall.
The defensive power of the city lay precisely in its impossibly high and monstrously thick walls, as well as the Earth Kingdom soldiers participating in the defense. Ba Sing Se was protected by the best of the best. Warriors and Earthbenders who had participated in hundreds of battles and emerged alive, sometimes even victorious. This was the city I would soon be assaulting, in the company of other green, inexperienced Firebenders. Not quite the level I wished to face so quickly.
The saving grace was that Prince Iroh's army should consist of battle-hardened veterans who were equal in military experience to the defenders of the Ba Sing Se walls. There was hope that the recruits would be used to fully reinforce squads of such soldiers. If we were sent into battle with our current composition, the group would likely be buried underground very quickly.
I had no particular faith in my current comrades. Too little practical experience. They showed nothing outstanding during training. They possessed almost nothing but the raw theory of how to wage war. Many in my unit hadn't even killed anyone yet.
Now I understood the City Guard Commander's attempt, back at the training city, to send me off to, say, herd penguins. He didn't want young people to part with life so early. It seemed the plan to besiege Ba Sing Se had been known to the army's high command for a long time. It was just necessary to build up forces to carry it out—including beardless youths.
As I learned, he actually didn't have the right to independently assign Firebenders to their future posts. This was supposed to be handled by the head instructor, who would undoubtedly have sent all the recently graduated youths to the walls of Ba Sing Se, probably to certain doom. The Guard Commander had simply leveraged his superior position against the head instructor. Hence the Agni Kai that took place. The instructor was simply tired of being bossed around like a snot-nosed boy.
Upon learning that our group would be among those participating in the storming of Ba Sing Se, one of my course mates attempted to desert. The city's notoriety among the Fire Nation soldiers was so bad that attempting to storm it was equivalent to a death sentence for many. That is why the course mate tried to run away. Unsuccessfully. He was tracked down and, by order of the head instructor, publicly hanged to set an example for others of what happens to deserters.
"Hey, Long, why the long face after dinner? Are the beans giving you trouble too?"
I put my helmet on and lowered the protective mask over my face. Min, who was sitting with me on the night patrol, immediately tensed up. He repeated my actions almost instantly. The mask helped muffle my voice and prevented lip-reading.
"Do you also think we've been watched since the beginning of dinner?" he asked barely audibly, without turning his head toward me. I nodded, disguising the gesture as a weary sigh. "Damn it. I told Yu something wasn't right."
Min and Yu were the only officers in our group of Benders. Their task was to escort our squad to the rendezvous point with General Iroh. The duo had been fighting under his command for years. Min has been serving for over ten years, and it seems in that time he acquired a good sense for trouble, since he also noticed someone tracking the group.
However, he, like myself, could not pinpoint the exact location from which we had been observed all this time. The feeling of someone's presence was too vague. I literally felt a presence behind my neck, but couldn't tell where it was coming from. The enemy was hiding well. And doing a good job of bypassing the traps that had been set precisely for such intruders.
"Alright, soldier," Min addressed me in a serious, commanding tone, "we'll pretend to gradually fall asleep now to draw the enemy out. If you fall asleep for real, I'll gut you myself."
I could only nod again. Then I stretched wearily for effect, once again carefully scanning the squad's camp site. Three tanks stood around the camp. As required by regulations, they protected the squad, which was positioned in the center of the tank ring. This gave a chance for at least someone to defend themselves if, for instance, Earthbenders unexpectedly attacked.
But no strategy is perfect. Perhaps the enemy was already behind one of these machines, simply waiting for the right moment to attack. But in that case, the enemy definitely wasn't a Waterbender or an Earthbender.
A Waterbender would have attacked when the Moon appeared in the sky—that is, during the period when Firebending weakens and Waterbending strengthens. An Earthbender would have attacked sooner for the same reason. Firebenders weaken slightly after sundown. An Earthbender has no reason to wait that long.
It follows that it is not a Bender. A spy or an entire group of non-Bending soldiers. The sensation of alien attention is still very vague. It's difficult to even determine the enemy's numbers. The good news is that I managed to sense a specialist with such a high level of stealth at all.
Just as Min was faking a realistic snore, and I was slowly slipping from the log onto the ground, a sharp crash was heard. A powerful blow landed on the armor of one of the tanks. It was so strong, to my surprise, that the not-so-light machine was sent flying, nearly ending the lives of two great actors. Thankfully, Min and I instantly jumped aside the moment we heard the suspicious sound.
"Alarm!" the officer yelled, helping the group prepare for the impending battle, and then, simultaneously with me, sent a jet of flame toward the direction from which the blow had roughly come.
Our synchronized strike only dispelled the darkness for a few seconds while the flame burned. It didn't look like it reached the enemy or harmed them in any way. A huge boulder that flew into the back of one of the Firebenders proved fatal. One cannot live with a body so broken. Min and I immediately stood back-to-back, covering each other. Most of the Firebenders repeated our actions.
"Fire in all directions!" Min commanded.
The flame once again drove away the night's darkness for a few moments.
"They're there! They're there!" one of the Benders screamed, sending fireballs in the direction where he and several others saw the silhouettes of Earthbenders.
Forty Benders literally flooded a small area of ground with their fire. For a few seconds, night became day. And it remained fairly bright afterward. The dry grass continued to blaze.
"Is that it?" someone asked hopefully, only to be knocked off his feet in the very next second by another boulder sent flying. He was attacked from behind, so he had little chance to dodge.
Again, a terrible crash from something striking the tank's armor, and it flew again, as if weighing nothing at all. But this time, the genius of Fire Nation engineering didn't just fall to the ground, but onto another tank. A second later, there was an explosion, and the tanks were torn apart. Eight people standing close to the machinery died instantly. Several more were injured by the flying debris. Min and I managed to drop to the ground so that nothing hit us.
The first tank came into view. A clear impact mark was visible on its armor. And it didn't look like the kind that could be left by Earthbending. The machine looked like it had been hit by a giant, clawed paw. Min saw it too.
"Goddamn it! It's a Spirit killing us!"
And confirming Min's words, a gigantic paw flashed next to the ever-blazing fire, throwing a massive boulder that took the life of yet another one of my comrades.
"Kill the beast!" someone shouted, and it seemed unnecessarily, because a huge silhouette immediately appeared behind him and simply swallowed the Bender. He didn't even have time to scream.
Incredibly fast! And ferocious!
The Avatar. The Bender who masters all elements. The one who must maintain balance in the world at any cost. The Fire Nation propagated that the Avatar was our people's main enemy. That he would see the prosperous Fire Nation and the wild Water Tribes. He would understand the huge gulf between them and drag the Fire Nation down to the same level as the savages of the North and South. It was on this basis that the propaganda against the Avatar was built—that he would try to rebalance everything.
In the century-long absence of the Avatar, the inhabitants of the Fire Nation had even come to believe their own lies and feared the return of this immortal Bender. Only they forgot one thing: the Avatar is not only a proponent of some obscure balance for the Fire Nation but also the bridge between the human and spirit worlds.
The long absence of the master of all elements had badly affected the relationship between humans and spirits. In fact, humans were now fighting not only among themselves but also with a third party: the Spirits. Fights with them happen very rarely. A Spirit definitely has to be provoked in some way, angered, for it to decide to attack humans, but if that happens, the consequences are disastrous.
The Spirit continued to systematically deal with us. One attack, one corpse. We could do little to oppose it. It was faster, stronger, could change its shape, and was fueled by some kind of frantic rage toward us.
Although we trained together, our cohesion was poor. People were terrified by the swift execution of their comrades. Because of this, they lost their composure and became the next victims of the angry Spirit. Our skills were not enough to counter it. It seemed to anticipate the squad's actions, never once getting hit.
There were about eight or seven Benders left alive. But in the end, only three people remained on their feet: Min, Yu, and I. The rest had given up. They simply waited for their death, lying on the ground. The members of our trio understood that we, too, would soon perish.
In the very next second, I sensed the Spirit approaching. I shoved Min aside and felt myself being swallowed alive. The attempt to ignite fire using Chi was useless. The Spirit's saliva seemed to prevent me from controlling life energy. It blocked my ability to create and control fire with it. That was the secret to how it managed to swallow other Benders alive...
But Chi was not my only energy. I simultaneously used genuine magic, which drew power from my soul, and psychic power. The Spirit let out a long roar when it felt itself burning from the inside. The Spirit's flesh melted very quickly due to my actions...
One can escape from any situation in at least two ways. And it seems I found a way to effectively fight Spirits.
*********
General Iroh, to whom our surviving group of seven Benders was escorted, was clearly saddened by the news that most of the squad had perished.
"The Spirits clearly do not like the idea of storming Ba Sing Se... I must warn the Fire Lord about this," he muttered softly, with a grim look, more to himself than to us, after offering a few words of condolence.