The road to Gaoling stretched out before her like a dusty snake crossing the border of smaller towns. Suri advanced with firm, steady steps, her breathing rhythmic, her mind cooling with each kilometer as she repeated a single idea:
"Ren trusts me."
That thought was as light as a whisper… but it burned.
The idea sustained her more than the water she drank, more than the cool shade she found under a solitary tree.
The landscape slowly changed: the arid earth gave way to tilled fields, scattered adobe houses, and finally, the square, proud profile of Gaoling. But the important thing wasn't the city.
It was what Gaoling was hiding.
Atop a low hill, Suri stopped. The reddish sun of the late afternoon bathed the city walls in warm tones, but she didn't admire the beauty. She was calculating. Observing the flow of people, the passage of the guards, the southern gate, the shadows that could hide her.
She was not a traveling girl. She was the blade Ren had sent to the front.
When she reached the gate, two guards crossed in front of her. They didn't seem particularly alert; routine had dulled them.
—"Name," said one.
—"Reason for entry," added the other.
Suri didn't blink.
—"I'm here to visit some acquaintances," she replied in a neutral voice.
The guards exchanged glances. It was a vague answer, but her physical bearing, her martial posture, and the silent intensity of her gaze didn't fit the profile of a common criminal. In the end, they gestured for her to enter.
Suri advanced among the traffic of carts and merchants. The bustle of the city, though intense, didn't distract her: her eyes were attentive to every gesture, every rumor, every trace.
And soon she found it.
She was walking through the market when a seemingly casual conversation made her stop.
—"…they say the tournament is more savage than ever…"
—"…where will it be this time?"
—"Shhh! Don't say it so loud. You know it's a secret."
—"Yeah, yeah… but I heard it'll be underground again."
—"Underground where?"
—"Underground is underground. You just follow the right people."
Suri kept walking without looking at the men, but her senses sharpened.
An underground tournament.
Subterranean.
A secret even among the inhabitants of Gaoling.
It was clear they didn't want the authorities to find out.
And Ren… had said this tournament was the key point for what he was looking for within the city.
She continued on. Her steps led her to the less lit district, where the houses were closer together and the streets seemed to trace a labyrinth. Human activity diminished there, as if the area had its own rhythm, slow and expectant.
She observed. She listened.
A group of men walked hurriedly, all athletic, all with the characteristic dust of earthbenders who had been training. They wore no official armor; they looked like gladiators… or something very similar.
She followed them.
They turned into narrow alleys, then descended a passage that seemed like a simple food storage warehouse. Suri arrived just in time to see one of them tap a sequence on the wood of the doorframe: three soft knocks, one hard one, and then two slow ones.
The door opened. Without a sound.
Suri walked with normality as she passed the warehouse. She didn't stop to look, didn't lean in, didn't do anything suspicious. She just slowed her pace for an instant, mentally processing the pattern.
Then she continued on her way.
Calmly.
She would be back.
She never forced a place she hadn't fully analyzed.
She spent two hours scouting the perimeter. She observed where the gladiators gathered, where the informants dispersed, which streets were emptier as night fell, which guards seemed to be bribed.
When the sky darkened and Gaoling was lit only by low lamps, Suri returned to the warehouse.
There was only one man watching, sitting on a stool while drinking tea. His eyes were half-closed.
Suri didn't attract attention. She simply approached… and repeated the exact sequence on the door:
three soft knocks, one hard, two slow.
The watchman opened one eye.
He looked at her.
She held his gaze without blinking.
The door opened.
What she found inside was a descending ramp made of rock molded by earthbenders. The light was dim. The air was warm. And in the distance…
Voices.
Shouts.
Vibrations.
Thuds on the ground.
Earth moving.
Suri descended the steps with the pace of an assassin.
Upon reaching the lower level, the tunnel opened into a huge underground cavity: a clandestine coliseum lit with colored torches, the crowd roaring like beasts, the circular arena in the center marked with fresh fractures.
And in the center, a young earthbender fell spectacularly as a small figure launched him with an explosion of precise force.
The arena erupted in cheers.
Suri didn't know it yet, but she was seeing for the first time the Blind Bandit.
A girl.
A shadow.
A prodigy.
No one around knew her last name.
No one knew her house was in the richest part of the city.
No one knew she was the daughter of the Beifong family.
Suri, however, felt the intuitive shiver that only true warriors share:
She had found the piece Ren was looking for.
And Ren… only trusted missions like this to those who were already bound to him.
She clenched her fists gently.
Not from fear.
But from anticipation.
—"Ren…" she whispered amidst the din.
I'm already in.