Splash.
"Argh! Katara, what the hell…?"
"Yeah, yeah. Wait—what's that?" Katara's voice, though sharp, had a calming effect on her brother, Sokka.
The two Water Tribe siblings floated in the middle of a vast, icy expanse. Fragments of frozen sea drifted lazily around them, painting the waters in a jagged mosaic of cold. They were far from home, out fishing in their small, straw-woven canoe that creaked with each ripple of the frigid water.
"What is that? Is that—?"
Sokka stopped mid-sentence. His eyes widened, expression freezing in place. If one could peer into his thoughts, they'd see a torrent of memories crashing into one another—some his own, some foreign—merging into something unfamiliar and ancient.
"Katara, use your waterbending. Break that open." He pointed toward a nearby glacier—its translucent surface barely concealing the hazy silhouettes of a small child and a massive, slumbering creature trapped within.
"Huh? Why? And it's bending, not magic."
"Yeah, yeah—just do it."
Katara shot him a puzzled look but obeyed. With a fluid motion, she raised her arms, channeling the water around her. It surged forward, but the ice barely budged.
Sokka scoffed. "Guess you're only good for washing clothes."
The jab hit its mark. Katara spun on him, eyes blazing, and launched into a furious lecture. Sokka didn't listen—he didn't need to. He just needed her angry.
And it worked.
With a sharp cry of frustration, Katara lashed out. A furious wave slammed into the glacier, sending tremors through the ice.
Swash. Swash.
Both siblings turned toward the glacier. It trembled. A faint crack etched its way along the surface—but it wasn't just the sound that held them still.
There was light.
A soft, blue glow shimmered from within the ice, illuminating the trapped figure of a boy.
The glacier groaned, then split—shards of ice exploding outward in a crystalline storm.
Sokka's lips curled into a slow, knowing smile.
***********
What the hell—did I just get transmigrated?
The thought hit me like a truck. Not that I was overwhelmed with longing or confusion. To be honest, there wasn't much to miss. My last life was… hollow. I had nothing—flunked out of university, lost my parents young, and had pretty much decided to end it all the next day. Yeah. That was the plan.
But apparently, fate had a different script in mind.
"Well, guess I should get a grip on my situation, huh?" I muttered.
Right now, I was in the Southern Water Tribe. Not exactly a sprawling metropolis. Just a few igloos, a wall of snow, and the kind of cold that bites deep into your bones. Katara and Aang were off doing their cute little snow-surfing scene—just like in canon.
So. Reality check.
I'm Sokka now. Katara's older brother. Non-bender. Boomerang guy. Probably one of the most unintentionally rizz characters in fiction even above duke denise. Not a comparison .
"Too bad I'm nothing like him," I muttered internally. "Damn it—am I gonna be single even in this life?"
Moments ago—well, what felt like moments ago—I'd been a civilian living in the Central Federation on Mars. Yeah, Mars. I went to the University of New Edinburgh. Horrible name, I know. Like, seriously, we were living in what past generations would've called sci-fi, and that's the best they could come up with?
Anyway, I majored in political science and law, with minors in psychology and traditional Chinese. Not a bad student, per se, but I pissed off someone with more political clout than I could ever hope to have. Got booted out. My martial skills? Barely met basic military standards. I couldn't even enlist, thanks to being an immigrant from Earth.
"Oh, wait… does qi exist in Avatar?" I mumbled. "I think they had chi or something? Same thing. Tomato, tomahto."
I sat cross-legged on the floor of the small igloo I shared with Katara. Gran lived next door. The cold seeped up from the packed snow beneath me, biting into my thighs, but I tried to focus.
Breathe in. Breathe out.
Rhythmic. Slow. I centered myself, scanning my body with what little knowledge I had of meridians. They felt… blocked. Closed off. But I could still sense something. A stirring.
I pulled in the frigid air, tracing the cold sensation as it moved through my chest and into my gut. I tried to hold it there—tried to will it to stay, to settle.
It was like trying to keep water in your hands. Slippery. Uncooperative.
Still, after an hour—maybe more—I felt it. A bead-sized knot of energy, nestled in my stomach. My dantian. I'd done it. Sort of.
Too bad it was yin energy. Cold, passive. Most of the boot camp martial arts I'd studied were based on yang—heat, aggression, fire. This wasn't that.
And if I remembered correctly, too much yin build up could lead to, well… issues.
Impotence, to be exact. Since yin is the feminine energy and, uh, yeah—not exactly what I was hoping to gain from martial cultivation.
"Great," I sighed, falling back onto the pile of furs. "Reborn into a fantasy world, and I'm still a loser with no job, no girl, and now maybe no d—"
I cut myself off and rolled over.
At least the stars looked nice through the smoke hole in the ceiling.