Avatar Korra of the Southern Water Tribe's successor, Avatar Song of the Earth Kingdom, has himself passed away, and the cycle resumes once again. As if to balance the rapid changes that preceded his term, Sung was a voice for reconstruction and reconciliation throughout the wold, between both nation and nation and man and spirit, his philosophies emphasizing tradition, seperation, and rule of law. He lived for nearly ninety years.
But balance is always tenuous at best, old wounds difficult to forget or forgive,and now a new avatar rises to take up the mantle. Korra was a wave, Song a rock, and now Feng will be be cleansing flame....but who will get burned?
Name: Xia Feng, formally 'Avatar Feng'
Age:17
Appearance:While not without her charms, Xia is not classically 'beautiful'. Tall for a woman, well toned from years of training, but with narrow hips and only the suggestion of breasts, and a wild mop of glossy black hair that appears to defy all attempts at taming, often falling over one or both of her intense, smoke-grey eyes. Two crooked front teeth make her spare with her smiles...but she makes up for them with scowls. Her usual manner of dress is a military style, a mail shirt of burnished copper scales over a black gi, with a deep crimson scarf about her neck and a sash of the same color about her waist, both pinned with several gold medallions, her only ornamentation.
Bio: Xia was born fifth child to a family of notable Firebenders of the lower nobility, with a long history of government and military service, she was raised to be respectful and obedient when she wasn't being entirely ignored in favor of her brothers and older sisters, everything planned out for her, from tutors and boarding schools to her future career and marriage prospects. She was a lonely, quiet child who preferred books to people.
She was a late-bloomer even to firebending, not displaying any talent until she was nearly seven....but once she 'found her fire', she took to it like a moth to a, well, flame, surpassing her siblings, then her father, then her teachers in turn. As she showed herself to be a prodigy, the path laid out for her changed. Surely she would be a soldier, now, like generations of Fengs before her. She was being prepared and instructed for such a role when emissaries of the White Lotus arrived at her families manse to test her. With only the barest instruction in form, Xia was Airbending. It had been a long and exhaustive search since Song had passed, but they had finally found their Avatar.
And thus, with her parents blessing, the eleven-year old Avatar, Xia Feng was taken to Crescent Island to study under the Fire Sages and White Lotus, her life still laid out ahead of her by those who 'knew best'. She proved a quick study and diligent, if not quite ambitious student, Mastering Firebending by thirteen, and Airbending two years later, but her pace began to slow when it came to Earth and Water. She learned the basics, but gained little proficiency, always returning to the styles that came easier to her when hard-pressed in the training yard.
It was decided that she should set out into the world as so many Avatars before her, learning in their own way in their own time, for this reason, and another....while she did all that was asked of her and never gave cause for complaint from her teachers, she lacked any real passion or ambition of her own. She was still quiet, bookish, almost brooding but quick to snap and take offense at percieved slights...smiling little, laughing less, and making few friends despite attempts to socialize her. And the position of the Avatar is about more than just skilled Bending, it's become integrally political, public appearance mattering more, called upon to settle disagreements between the nations and one another, and with the spirit world, now closer than ever.
And so Avatar Feng sets out into the world in the company of her sole friends, a White Lotus initiate hailing from the Air Temples, and a golden dragon hatchling named Sunset....This is both her story, and that of those who will join her in bridging the gaps between nations and worlds.
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Name:Tsen Hei
Age:25
Appearance: An exceedingly tall, slender young man with golden tan skin, grey eyes, and no hair to speak of, shaved entirely bald. Rather than the traditional arrows, he's tattooed with different markings, pale blue spirals on his hands and forehead. He dresses in pale yellow robe that leaves one side of his chest bare, and a string of mala beads about his neck, and carries an air staff.
Bio:Tsen is a nomad in the truest since of the word, a 'child of the winds' as the monks call those still being born to non-benders since the return of the spirits. While many join the temples, and some remain with their families, still others choose a different path, bringing harmony to spirits throughout the world through astral projection and meditation. Tsen is one such, and a rarely soul, he was stepping between the physical plane and that of the spirits since before he even knew that was what he was doing.
Personality:Tsen's friendship with Xia is an unusual one, as he was not one of the myriad companions of her own age the Lotus tried to ingratiate with the Avatar, but a fellow student, studying under Guru Liin, her Airbending instructor, just finishing up his training when she began her own....and yet she caught up. The two learned side by side and she found his presence for the most part inoffensive...high praise from Xia. He's introspective intelligent, and unfailingly courteous despite her best attempts to raise his ire, for which he attained a grudging respect from the young Avatar.
Like the calm to her storm, they compliment each other well, and he became an important part of her training, able to speak difficult truths without rankling her pride. And unlike seemingly everyone else in her life, he doesn't appear to have the slightest interest in dictating her path, simply following along with whatever she decides, lending words of wisdom and and an attentive ear as needed. When the question came up as to who she would take with her on her journeys, Tsen was who Xia chose, and few could disagree owing to his affinity for the spiritual side of bending.
While she may sometimes treat him like a servant, there's a mutual care and respect there that's shared through silences rather than words, Tsen being able to grasp the true enormity of the issues she grapples with daily, hidden under with bravado, but knowing better than to try to force the conversation before she understands them herself.
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