From the moment Yui learned to speak decently and run around — she became a little question machine, spending all her free time following me around like a little tail. So I can safely say that I laid the foundation for a considerable part of her upbringing. No, she listened to our parents too, but my person still held slightly more authority.
In the Library, she could often be seen sitting next to me with an extremely serious little face. With that expression, she tried to understand what was written in the book, seeing only some familiar words. She even somehow managed to convince our parents to let her train, though looking at her pleading little face, it's quite hard to refuse. So now we do massage-training for her too: we stretch her body and prepare it for serious future loads.
One of my set goals was achieved by my tenth birthday. I finished with the major part of the city library — the remaining books are just copies from the palace library.
By the end of this period, frequent visitors to the temple of knowledge started looking at me with strange glances. People here read slower by nature — the lack of systematic education shows. I don't know about other nations, but in the Northern Water Tribe, parents teach their children to read and write, and that's quite enough for a comfortable life. How fast you do it doesn't matter. And in their unspoken opinion — I wasn't reading, just flipping through pages. I didn't bother convincing anyone otherwise — unnecessary hassle, as long as they don't kick me out.
The notebooks that father gave me for birthdays had to be used for writing down my knowledge for Wan Shi Tong. I remembered him to my own detriment — now I have to actively comb through all my memory for knowledge and "rack my brains" over which of it might be useful for a magical world and which hasn't been discovered yet. I think if I write it as it is, the big owl won't be too offended — after all, what I'm writing worked in my previous world.
My parents already considered me a genius born once in a century. After that incident with the birth, they started thinking that some kind spirit had blessed me. Yes, I blessed myself! Because of this, their control over me greatly weakened — the main thing was to always come on time for meals and stay safe and sound.
A few days before my tenth birthday, spirit and body completely merged. This happened right during sleep. I still remember that moment down to the smallest details. At first, I felt warmth at chest level — not paying much attention to it, I wanted to continue sleeping, but suddenly every particle of my body was washed by some energy, and where it passed, the body's cells themselves experienced something like ecstasy. A blissful moan escaped my lips by itself.
As soon as I came to my senses from the overflow of sensations, I immediately "descended" to look at my energy. My two sources pulsed in rhythm with my heartbeat. Now nothing restrained them from pouring out simply tons of magic both into my body and outward. Looking more carefully, I never found my spirit — not a single particle — and this was simply wonderful. It means it completely merged with the body, you can't even see any boundaries or "seams."
As Wan Shi Tong wrote in his observations of Chin the Conqueror. He did come to his library once, which is located in the human world, to pay his debt with books. Like me, his spirit and body merged so tightly that you couldn't see where one began and the other ended.
This, in his opinion, was very, very intriguing, since in all people, even Avatars, if you looked carefully, you could find points of contact between body and spirit. But with Chin, it was all one whole, which would allow him to travel through the spirit world in his physical incarnation, having all his powers.
But possessing considerable power, strength, and wealth in the human world, he didn't even think about interacting with the Spirit Realm somehow. As we know, even the Avatar, entering the spirit plane, left his physical body in the human world, sending some projection of his body to another plane. There's a thought that this is simply people's astral body. Iroh later in the spirit world also didn't look very material.
Plus one bonus in the piggy bank of being a hybrid.
Unable to wait for sunrise, I quickly got dressed and ran toward the nearest artificial pond to practice waterbending.
Probably some Palace residents could hear my happy laughter that night, but then I simply didn't care about everything else. Moving water through the air, I truly felt whole, as if something long lost had been returned to me. My level hadn't changed at all — I was still at the rank of lesser spirit, on the verge of medium.
The main thing was that I felt no barriers in overcoming the medium rank, but following my intuition, I decided to wait a bit — especially since all my energy had just started flowing into my body and needed time to settle.
The next day I delighted my parents with my water control, which gave me official permission to practice bending on father's personal training ground.
Having calmed down sufficiently and with a clear head, I took on a thorough check of my skills. As I found out, mastering magic in the human world is somewhat harder than in the Spirit Realm. The lower density of energy itself in the world shows.
Next comes the deterioration of energy control. Being a spirit that consists of magic itself, I controlled energy flows with my entire body. A physical body has certain channels through which magic flows, and this imposes some limitations. It's not for nothing that benders of all elements accompany their techniques with movements — these are like hand seals in Naruto, crutches that make applying techniques easier.
Next comes the deterioration of energy control. Being a spirit that consists of magic itself, I controlled energy flows with my entire body. A physical body has certain channels through which magic flows, and this imposes some limitations. It's not for nothing that benders of all elements accompany their techniques with movements — these are like hand seals in Naruto, crutches that make applying techniques easier.
Bending masters don't really need them much. Here my nature also distinguished itself — the channels that were only filled with energy yesterday became bigger and stronger the next day. In theory, this process will only accelerate, and when the channels fill my entire body — I'll be more of an energy life form, something between a spirit and a human. The same analogy from Naruto anime comes to mind — bijuu are roughly what I should become in the future.
But for now, I'll have to study stances and movements for better water control. Another plus was the removal of limits that all lesser spirits have. I'm talking about the water control range of one-two meters from your body. Now I can take control of all the water I feel — as long as I have enough strength. Finally, long and medium-range techniques will appear!
With the return of magic came spirit senses, some analog of human intuition that helped me in the Spirit Realm. Thanks to this invisible organ, I could determine an enemy's approximate strength. And the most useful function of the spiritual locator — it helps avoid the attention of unfriendly higher spirits who wouldn't mind snacking on me.
Running around the city and scanning people, I could make a rough gradation of bender strength based on spirit power. Untrained teenage benders and students just beginning to comprehend bending have the power of lesser spirits — really weak lesser ones. Students who finished training and simple benders who aren't even close to being masters have power from strong lesser to weak medium spirits. Water masters already have power from strong medium up to strong higher spirits.
Unexpectedly, the strongest in terms of energy density and quantity turned out to be the head of the healing halls — that's the granny who examined me in childhood. For her hundred and forty years, she looks very spry, and apparently she's outlived four chiefs already. There were also two grandfathers at the level of weak higher spirits — these are some of those who fought off the Fire Nation during the siege years.
However, it should be considered that I only checked energy reserves and density, but human magic power isn't about that. A mage's strength, that is, a bender's — is the quintessence of their experience, mastery, mental flexibility, and only then their energy quality and quantity. Otherwise, I wouldn't meet masters who have power reserves at the level of weak medium spirits.
The next two months I spent raising my waterbending control to my previous level, also managed to return all my signature techniques.
Another half year went into taking full control of my water within a ten-meter radius — now in this peculiar ring, simple water manipulation comes without a single body movement, but the efficiency coefficient of used energy is lost...
Another year went into mastering other aggregate states of water. Ice and steam now obey me almost as well as simple water. Many techniques were added, though I only brought some of them to automatism in creation.
The first technique I hammered into my subconscious was a water needle shooting from the mouth at high speed. To create it, you should hold saliva or drink water beforehand — I also created its analog, an ice needle, with the same effect from hitting.
Next follows the octopus style. Thick water whips are created around the body's entire perimeter, which the bender can use both for defense and to lash enemies with full force. [ image ]

Ice spears, arrows, swords, daggers — whatever fantasy desires, boldly send at the enemy. [ image ]

Ice boots/skates — allow quick movement around the battlefield.
Water/ice drill — heavy artillery in water bending, after it I spent another week restoring the hole in the training ground. [ image ]

There are also non-combat techniques that I decided to add to my arsenal without fail — water filtration, air bubble for breathing underwater, and walking on water, the last one simply because it looks cool.
The remaining time until twelve years old, I spent in battles with mom, whom I finally managed to make fight without any concessions. It's one thing when you just perfectly execute techniques, and completely different to perfectly execute them during a rapidly changing battle picture, being under great pressure.
Yes, these two years had few events — I threw myself headfirst into magic, and all because right after my twelfth birthday, a battle with a student chosen by the water masters is scheduled. But to spite these old farts, I want to challenge one of the masters to a fight after an easy victory. Hmm, let's see how they sing after my second victory!
You remember how happy I was about bending activation? Then, carried away by feelings, I ran to the waterbending training ground so they would start personally teaching me. Yes, I got a bit cheeky then, but the choice was to ask like that or go to a group with other students, where my progress would be much slower.
Usually teachers adjust the learning pace to the average of the entire group. Knowing that water would come much easier to me, I wanted to spend my time more effectively, simultaneously mastering combat waterbending experience and leaving time for healing magic.
I don't know how it happened, but even showing my huge possibilities in water bending at that time — these stubborn and unpleasant people, pressing on teaching traditions and my supposed immaturity, told me to go sign up for a group like normal people. It's my own fault — I should have "cooled down" and resolved the training question behind closed doors. Later father explained the situation to me, pointing out gross mistakes. The thing is, water masters aren't just strong people — they're also public figures who can't "lose face." And even though I'm the Chief's son, there were no significant achievements behind my back yet, meaning I couldn't tell them what and how to do.
The body, deciding to prove that hormones in a child's body aren't just words, rebelled and showed how they "handle" situations.
As a result, we made a bet — in two years I'll have a battle with a student they choose, and if I win, I can approach any master on the ground for training. If I lose and still want to learn from them, it will only be as they say. I hurt their pride badly then — they've been teaching worthy men proper bending for almost half a century, and then I, so improper, showed up.
I too, on emotions, deciding to leave the last word for myself, yelled across the entire square that I'd kick even a master's ass. Rumors spread quickly and now neither side wants to give up their position.
Of course, they didn't believe my words about defeating a master, but I won't back down from my words. Unfulfilled promises, even said emotionally, still settle in people's subconscious, and in the future your words will carry less weight — such funny human psychology.
I'm also used to keeping my word, unless it's about life and death, of course.
A week remains until my fight, which the entire city knows about. As soon as this reached Yui, she, burning with righteous anger, was ready to beat up these villains who offend her big brother herself. Father and mother took this more calmly, both thinking about their prematurely matured son bumping his own head.
It's encouraging that in about three-four years, the body will be ready to accept the full power of rank advancement to medium spirit. Of course, you could try earlier, but here I decided to play it safe. As soon as I move to the next level, I need to visit the Moon and Ocean spirits. It's long overdue to have a conversation with them. I constantly postponed my visit because... ancient spirits have equally ancient cockroaches in their heads, and that's dangerous for the lives of those around them!
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