======== 63 - Heavy Fire ==========
With all this running around, experimenting and trying to increase the potential speed of my element, I deliberately ignored the fact that mastering magma might require a special way of thinking. I just remember how I tried to be persistent in order to master stone, how I was determined to get crystals, and now I've come to believe that it's all just one big illusion.
There is no point in adapting to the element, because with open chakras, the element adapts to you. But that was the reason why magma wasn't the most useful element to master: it's almost default for Avatars in their Uber mode, and if there's a volcano or even two nearby... no army in the world, no matter how well prepared, could do anything.
It would be even worse if an Avatar learned explosive magic and started creating nuclear bombs, but that's far beyond the scope of my musings. The main point I'm getting at is that fire made from metal, or more precisely, thermite, is still more useful simply because no one in the world can control it at the moment — plus, it's hotter than magma.
I needed to think all this through, because controlling red-hot rocks is only the simplest, I would say, basic level of temperature control. Achieving the melting of metals so as not to be limited to thermite alone; using liquid iron for water elemental techniques; melting sand and delivering powerful thermal blows with it — the scope for imagination was enormous! That's why it's so important to study the style of fire mages for all this, because I consider myself to have opened up a new branch in the earth — heavy fire, which included not only magma.
While we were still in the village at the foot of the volcano, with Uncle Airo himself at hand, I had no logical reason to let him go. If that had happened, even the fox, who was apparently the sister of the toad and the hamster, would not have understood me at all.
"Come on, get all the knowledge you can," whispered the scary spirit, hiding in the darkness and folds of the sofas. Sometimes I could hear a malicious snort echoing through the room, which meant that the spirit was eagerly rubbing its paws, ready to steal the "chicken from the henhouse" and carry it all back to its lair.
In any case, after giving the team a rest after a hard day, I took Airo into the corridor and asked him if we could go on a short trip together — during which, incidentally, I could get closer to Zuko — or at least for some training and an explanation of the theory of fire magic.
"I see, you want to give Aang a basic foundation in advance. It's logical, who knows where his adventures will take him," he nodded measuredly, looking wise and understanding.
"No... I want you to explain everything to me. I want to learn the magical theory of your country," what to say - I was good at breaking down ways of thinking and seeing things in a new light. Afka had already explained why I needed this, since they could communicate freely with each other.
In short, I needed to reach the next level of self-defence. High temperatures, fire and lightning were the only things that caused me the most trouble so far — and no wonder, these are the most dangerous things you need to know how to deal with. So before meeting the next Avatar, before I learned how to block lightning in a way that was incomprehensible to me, I had to close all my other weak spots.
We started with a short lecture on something called "jing." Its existence was no big secret to me; there were eighty-five different types described in books, but the three main ones were: Positive jing — attack; Negative — evasion; Neutral — waiting. I had mastered all of them while training in the village of China, and they formed the basis of my strategies. But Airo wanted something different.
"I've noticed how much you hold back. You unleash the full potential of each jing, but your attack is too timid, as if you're afraid of hurting your enemy," I said, sitting in the lotus position in front of the old man and lowering my head.
"That is the philosophy of nomads, I cannot stray from it, otherwise...
"I already understand that," he smiled kindly and raised his index finger. "But fire magic is impossible without causing bodily harm. Your 'heavy fire' is incredibly dangerous, but are you really going to forget about such a powerful weapon forever, so as not to harm anyone? You are not a nomad to burden yourself with this.
"...You can break things with it, scare people, or in extreme cases, manipulate the situation. But direct physical damage can always backfire on me," I said, unable to share the bitterness of my situation, when Airo put his hand on my shoulder.
"That's why the best fire mages learn to control their emotions and the element so that they can be deadly dangerous without killing or burning everything around them. In the end, it's a last resort if things go wrong. Your key will be the balance between positive and negative jing. I learned it when I travelled with water mages...
Words cannot express how much I enjoyed studying with Airo. It was as if a wise man had become your friend and, through stories of his travels, taught you the basics. I even began to envy Zuko.
As it turned out, the key to mastering heavy fire was complete calmness and using the right techniques. It was not worth mindlessly attacking everything that moved around you; you had to be clearly aware of what your magic could do. Understanding led to excellent squid techniques, where a water mage would raise tentacles around himself and could both attack and defend with them, or pulling techniques, where you controlled one or more clumps of water and could return them to your hands after an attack.
In my case, I used heavy fire: raising lava clumps that turned into tentacles, I attacked stone dolls with them, trying to scald them rather than kill them. One touch of a normal one should have been enough to cause a person extraordinary pain and incapacitate them. The first couple of attempts failed miserably, even the stone turned into a lump of molten mush.
"A push should be enough to make your intentions clear, but prolonged contact is deadly. With fire, you also need to be able to control your desire to suppress," I forced myself to focus completely on the magma, formed a whip and pushed the stone doll away, knocking it off its feet. A red imprint formed on the surface; it was a powerful thermal shock, but... it didn't melt any further," "Well done. Now for defence.
Airo surprised me by standing behind the doll and starting to shoot fire from behind. I had to take the blows on my lava tentacles, and it so happened that they absorbed the insignificant flames perfectly — unlike simple stone, they could not be destroyed and simply accumulated all the heat within themselves. And I continued to strike, leaving red marks on the stone body.
However, as luck would have it, I wasn't destined to train alone. We hadn't been there for an hour when our friends began to gather in the backyard of Aunt Woo's house. First, Katara appeared, watching the spectacle with wide eyes, and then Zuko appeared beside her.
"Um... hello.
Katara said, smoothing her hair, a little scared. The guy was standing just a metre away from her, but he didn't seem hostile, and there was no emotion in his eyes.
"You're the Avatar's girl, right?
"What, sorry? - She didn't like that at all and clenched her little fists. "First of all, I'm a girl, not a 'chick', and secondly... we're not dating! "You know, I'm becoming more and more convinced that everyone in this world is constantly lying to me, but I don't understand why you're doing this now," he said, causing a wave of discontent and surprise, but he continued, "I just want to say that your boyfriend doesn't stand a chance against this Dagoth. And there's no point in me hunting him down, because the Sandbender can do everything for me at any moment, and the Avatar is bound to lose.
"...You're an idiot, aren't you? What makes you think they're even going to fight?!" But at that moment, Zuko's gaze fell on her. And then the girl saw an extremely toxic sneer.
"I saw it in Aang's eyes, he wants a fight. My father is like a stain on the clean history of the world to him. And you know what? I told him that even Dagoth would die if he faced him, that tricks like that are only good for fighting dolls or simple soldiers. Against my father or even my sister, they don't stand a chance, they'd die faster than you can blink.
"Hey, you!" He stopped abruptly, tired of listening to the depressed prince's nonsense, and turned to the man marked by flames. An oppressive silence fell around them. "Maybe you can explain why you're so confident? It seems like your dear father trembles somewhere in the capital every time he hears news about me.
"Don't get too big for your boots, you sand tribe peasant," he said through clenched teeth, "You think I can't see the lightning marks on your hands? You've already been hit by them once, so you think the most powerful mage won't destroy you with them again? Just give up, you won't last a minute. And as for my sister... she'll break through even your lava shield, the power of her flames burns everything.
Lowering my gaze and focusing on the extremely gruesome lightning marks on my hands, and, to be honest, on my neck, I had to admit that one lightning strike would take me out of the fight, probably for good. Magma would hardly protect me from that, and the only option was to hide underground... at least, that's how it might seem from the outside.
"Then let's bet that at our next stop, I'll learn how to block lightning," I said with a predatory smile, throwing this simpleton into a stupor. "No matter how fast and deadly they are, I won't give them a chance. If I win, you'll finally apologise and come over to our side. If not, I'll admit that I can't defeat your vicious family and give up hope.
"Ha, the Sand Mage will stop fighting my nation? He took a step forward and narrowed his eyes menacingly." "I agree to the bet, but if you don't keep your promise... well, it doesn't matter. If you don't, you'll just die at the hands of your father or sister."
Cracking my fingers, I turned to the agitated Airo, whose eyes showed that he had no idea how to teach an earth mage to block lightning, so I had to quickly calm him down. There was no need to teach him that. Instead, I listened to what he said about his sister and decided to learn something else.
Defence and attack, it's like my Juggernaut stone armour, when you're encased in stone from head to toe and rush at your enemy, taking all the damage yourself. The problem with this technique is that powerful temperatures can still have a negative effect on the body, especially if you encase yourself in metal. I had already made that mistake once, and a second time was unacceptable.
Just as I could suppress the temperature of magma, turning it into ordinary stone, I also needed to learn how to suppress the temperature of the substances around me. So that ordinary stone could not be melted, and metal would not become my own trap. Personal heat-resistant materials could be the key to victory over the most dangerous opponents! Well, Airo's explanation of what heat dissipation is greatly contributed to this.
After a few days of rest, we were ready to set off. Airo and Zuko had already warned their soldiers not to spread the news about the Avatar. They acted as if it was wrong, but they didn't attack because they were extremely loyal to their masters, and because I had saved them and even healed them. I was sure that they would crack under the first interrogation and some would even betray us, but that didn't matter. I planned that from now on, the Prince and the former General would travel with us. And the soldiers... would they stay behind to look after the ship? I don't know, I don't really care.
Some people definitely didn't like this news — literally everyone except me and Airo, but it was useless to say anything to such authorities.
"No, Auntie Wu's prediction definitely wasn't about him. He just annoys me," Katara said discontentedly, glancing at me. At that moment, she noticed Aang in the corner of her eye, who was approached by the fortune teller's extremely upset assistant, Meng.
"You're leaving already... I wanted to tell you that I'll miss you. I liked you," Katara's heart skipped a beat. Seeing Aang smile contentedly and take her by the nape of her neck, the waterbender quietly clenched her fists.
"Thank you, you took good care of me, and I'll miss you too.
"Maybe you'll stay then? We could bake bean pies together and help your aunt with her predictions...
"Um... I don't think that's possible. I have a big goal that I still need to think about. Anyway, thank you for your help and your pies. Goodbye!" Waving to the disappointed children, he jumped onto Appa and immediately felt embarrassed when he looked at Katara. He looked like a person who had been genuinely inspired by someone.
Then he saw Airo and Zuko sitting nearby, and his smile quickly faded.
"…Well, let's go. Appa, hip-hip.
***
"So, what do we do now? We found the Avatar, but the hunt is over? - asked the confused soldier from Prince's team with interest. They remained in the village under their own supervision. All they had left was a ship still at sea and a bounty hunter...
"I don't know about you, but I got my money and already spent some of it," said the black-haired bounty hunter June, counting her bills. "That's all for now.
She mounted her blind dog and rode away.
"Oh, what a pity, my passion has flown away, and I didn't even have time to say goodbye to her!" At that moment, a grieving man ran out onto the alley in front of the walking dog. Kneeling down, he threw his arms up towards the departing bison and cried loudly, "How am I going to live now? Who will love me?"
"Hey, get out of the way, you idiot," Jun raised her eyebrow at the hunter. "Can you even hear me? Eh, just lick him," as soon as the animal was patted on the back a few times, the searcher quickly stuck out her thin tongue and whipped the guy with it. Before he even realised what was happening, his body was paralysed, and he remained sitting on his knees.
"Oh! What a burning pain. What hot passion! - He looked at the lady passing by with eyes burning with passion. "Please, stop. What is your name? Let's get acquainted! No, my love is leaving again, and I can't even move my hands. Am I cursed?
"Hey, Auntie Wu told me that I would meet my love in this place. Maybe I should stay here? - thought the soldier watching this.
"Really? I'll go see her too.
"Good idea! Let's all go together!