Chapter 107
Yue was always happy to return to Omashu, despite it not being the most exciting city in the world. It didn't have many fancy restaurants, entertainment options were sparse, and the nightlife left a lot to be desired. And yet, despite the city being a little dull, it held special memories for Yue, Katara and Azula. The three of them had first gotten together in Omashu, although at that time their encounter hadn't been intended as anything beyond mere fooling around. Of course, any sort of sentimentality had to be set aside for the next three weeks, because they all had an important job to do, and it was to make sure that Azula progressed to the next stage of competition.
The weeks following the draw had been full of intense Pai Sho practice, with both Yue and Katara having to really push themselves to be able to keep up with Azula. Bumi was the focus of their practice sessions, with Azula trying out all sorts of different tactics that could serve to confound the eccentric Earth Kingdom grandmaster. By the end of it all, they had come to the conclusion that the tactic of out-crazying Bumi was still the one most likely to bring success, even if it wasn't a method of play that came naturally to Azula, or quite frankly, any of the trio. Azula didn't neglect preparing for Toph as well, knowing that their opportunities to fine tune anti-Toph tactics in Omashu would be limited, because Toph would be joining them for practice sessions. And Azula also didn't neglect the three other masters padding out the group, although they were not supposed to mount a serious challenge to the three obvious favorites.
All in all, Yue felt that Azula was as prepared as she could have realistically hoped to be. The groundwork had been put in, and now the real test would reveal whether they had done enough or not. Yue was relieved that Azula's state of mind seemed to be positive and she appeared to be feeling quite confident. It really helped that Azula had opened up to them about her doubts immediately following the draw, so that Yue and Katara could help dispel Azula's insecurities. It now also allowed Yue and Katara to snuff out any recurring doubts early, because they knew what to look for. Azula seemed to be coming into the right kind of mental shape and a rich vein of Pai Sho form in order to be successful at the tournament.
Yue herself felt a little tired following the intense practice sessions back in Ba Sing Se, but it was nothing compared to how worn out she had felt at the end of the long summer the year before. She had been doing everything on her own the previous summer, and it had nearly broken her, but with Katara back and helping Azula full time, everything seemed so much easier when she and Katara could distribute the duties between them and lighten each other's load. Yue had been worried about how Katara would react to this increased intensity of Pai Sho related activities, but so far Katara had not displayed any worrying signs. She seemed to have her PTSD securely under control, although the true test would come when Azula made it to the finals, and they would have to attend a tournament in which Ozai Nakamura was taking part. Then again, Katara wouldn't be facing Ozai at the Pai Sho board, so perhaps they would be able to avoid any setbacks.
The day before the five qualifying tournaments held all over the world got under way Toph had joined the threesome in their hotel suite for a practice session as per their earlier agreement. Both Azula and Toph were scheduled to face easy opponents in the first two rounds of the tournament, so practice sessions could be kept short and prep was mostly done just to keep themselves in shape. In the third round, Azula would be facing Toph, then in the next round Toph would go up against Bumi, and lastly, Azula would face Bumi in the fifth round. Then the entire round-robin would be repeated for the second time, until everyone had faced their competitors twice.
"I spoke with Teo earlier," Toph said after they had spent a couple of hours on a light practice, nobody feeling very eager to push themselves much harder. They were both expected to score easy victories in the first round, and exhausting themselves by doing unnecessary prep simply made no sense. Even Azula who was all about pushing herself past her comfort zone didn't insist on stretching out the practice. "He's been beating Aang regularly during their sparring matches so he's feeling quite confident about his chances," Toph said with a hint of pride to her voice.
"That's very good," Katara smiled politely. "We all want Teo to do well at the tournament."
"I mean… certainly, but do you really see him beating Aang?" Azula shrugged. "Come on, you know that Aang always shirks the prep, but then always turns it on during the tournament itself."
"Pfft, you don't know what you're talking about," Toph snapped at Azula. "Teo is going to make Aang his bitch, you'll see."
"I love that you're standing by your guy so passionately," Yue smiled at Toph. She liked both Teo and Aang a great deal, but she didn't think Teo had quite what it took to beat Aang.
"But none of you actually agree with me when I'm saying that Teo is going to win his group," Toph stated. Yue exchanged looks with her girlfriends, then shrugging helplessly when none of them seemed willing to say what Toph wanted to hear. "Ugh, you are so dumb," Toph sighed. "Alright, how about we make a bet? We all name who we think is going to progress from each group, okay? The loser pays for a fancy restaurant dinner, how does that sound?"
"Would they have to buy dinner for everyone or just for the winner?" Azula sought to clarify.
"Well, if I win, I will want to have my dinner," Toph said. "If one of you wins, I guess you can ask for something else instead, but the default prize is the restaurant dinner." Yue shrugged, nodding in agreement, as did her girlfriends. A little friendly bet never hurt and made things just a touch more exciting, as far as Yue was concerned.
"But I don't think we should bet on your group, however," Katara then spoke up.
"We don't have to," Toph shrugged. "Besides, it's pretty obvious how that would go. You three bitches would all vote Azula, and I would vote myself. And then Bumi would run away with it and make the two of us look like idiots," she added with a laugh.
"Don't say that, it's a bad omen!" Katara chided their younger friend, with Toph appearing unimpressed. Yue had to agree with Katara, though. She couldn't help being a little superstitious when it came to Pai Sho. Even if Yue was confident that Azula would win the group, she didn't want to make any bets about it. That seemed too much like tempting fate.
"Yes, let's just focus on the four other groups," Yue said decisively. "Anyway, we started with Ba Sing Se already. Toph, you're obviously sticking with Teo, right?" Toph nodded with certainty. "I'm sorry, but I'll have to go with Gyatso. It's a short tournament, perfect for him." Azula and Katara also nodded at that, going along with Yue's choice.
"Such a boring and unimaginative choice," Toph rolled her eyes. "Alright, what about Agna Qel'a?" she asked.
"I can't go against my own brother," Azula said, with what sounded like a hint of pride in her voice. "I think Zuko will do it."
"Hmm," Yue mused. "Damn it, Azula, I want to say Zuko and I really hope he makes it through, but for Pakku to lose qualifiers twice in a row on his home turf… I just don't know. I don't see that happening, I'm sorry, but I have to go with Pakku."
"I'm sorry, Zula, but my reasoning is the same as Yue's, much as I don't like it," Katara sighed. "Pakku it is."
"What are you smoking bitches, Pakku is old and a shadow of his former self, Zuko has this in the bag," Toph laughed. "What about the Fire Nation tournaments? I'm going to say Piandao and… ugh, I want to say Zhao, but I just can't bring myself to do that, I hate the guy. I'm going to say that Haru is going to blindside him."
"Haru and Piandao," Katara agreed quickly.
"Hmm," Yue mused thoughtfully. She felt quite certain about Piandao making it through, but she was less sure about Haru being able to stop Zhao. Then again, Yue couldn't stand the thought of seeing Zhao in the finals, once again propping up the fading world champion by throwing his games against Ozai. "No, I'm confident about Piandao and I hope that Haru makes it as well," she said.
"Do I have to remind you that this is about who's more likely to win and not who we want to win?" Azula shook her head, looking a little frustrated with them. "I'm sorry, but it's going to be Piandao and Zhao advancing. Also," she looked at Katara and Yue. "Did you two copy each other's answers? What is this, high school?" Azula laughed.
"Oh," Yue suddenly realized that Azula was right. "I guess we did that, didn't we?" she grinned at Katara.
"Well, you know what they say, great minds think alike," Katara laughed.
"I'm quite sure on this occasion that saying will have to be changed to losers think alike," Azula winked at them. "Also, when I win and you both lose, I'm going to ask for something else, instead of a restaurant dinner."
"Ugh, gross," Toph grunted as both Katara and Yue blushed fiercely. "Please warn me in advance if you plan to go there, I don't need nightmare inducing mental images on the eve of the first round of play," Toph complained.
"You're not being very open minded, Toph," Katara teased.
"Whatever," Toph shrugged. "Anyway, it's not like we're going to do any more practicing today, so I'll just go back to my own room."
"You don't have to run away right after we're done with the practice," Yue told their younger friend. "You can just stay and hang out with us."
"No thanks, sooner or later you three will just become too horny and disgusting for me to handle," Toph snorted. "Anyway, see you tomorrow at breakfast?" she said, making her way to the doors of the throuple's suite.
"Until tomorrow, Toph," Azula told the Earth Kingdom girl as she left the room.
"We're not horny and disgusting, are we?" Katara asked, still looking a little peeved.
"Well," Yue said in a sultry voice as she leaned in closer to Katara and placed her hand on her girlfriend's knee, slowly sliding it upwards until it reached Katara's inner thigh. "I know for certain that we're not disgusting…" she grinned, noticing the way Azula was watching them with undisguised interest.
"I thought we had agreed to make this a quiet movie evening," Katara ground out, trying to put up a token effort of resistance.
"The evening is still young, Kat," Yue smiled softly. "I'm pretty sure we can find time for everything," she added.
"Besides," Azula cut in with a wicked grin on her face. "We're supposed to be good at multitasking, right?"
Azula was not disappointed with the start to her tournament, even if she rued the missed chance in her game of the third round with Toph. She had carried a slight advantage throughout that entire encounter, but Toph had hung in there like a dachshund and Azula had been unable to shake her off. This was really why Toph was Azula's least favorite opponent from their group of peers. Her resiliency was already becoming legendary and she seemingly did not understand when to quit. Azula was rather upset with herself and had pushed the practice extremely hard following that game, until her girlfriends had been unable to take it anymore, calling for an intervention. Azula had to admit that Yue and Katara had probably made the right call. Her decision to force prep had been purely emotional and reactionary, and went against their previously agreed upon plans.
Azula had won all of her other games, but she still found herself half a point behind Bumi who had pulled into the tournament lead courtesy of his victory over Toph in the previous round. Just as Azula had expected, the local favorite was making good use of the home support, and looked to be in an excellent shape. Azula was feeling quite apprehensive ahead of her fifth round encounter with Bumi Dhawan, and it wasn't just because she was somewhat intimidated by his style of play that she had always struggled to cope with. The pressure on Azula came also from the fact that should she lose this match to Bumi, her fate in this tournament would no longer be in her own hands. It then wouldn't be enough just to defeat Bumi in their second meeting, and she would have to hope for Bumi to drop points against someone else. Toph was the likeliest candidate to get something from Bumi, but when Azula and her girlfriends had analyzed Toph's first game with Bumi, it hadn't filled any of them with confidence that Toph could escape defeat in her second game with the eccentric grandmaster. All this meant that Azula could not afford losing her upcoming game with the grandmaster from Omashu, and this knowledge was putting a lot of stress on her.
Azula was still slightly struggling with her composure as the matches of the fifth round began. The tournament official came up to her table and started the timing clock. Azula was playing with the white tiles and she had the first move. She deployed her Rose tile, pressed the button of the timing clock and then turned to look in bewilderment at the empty seat on the other side of the Pai Sho board. For some reason, Grandmaster Bumi Dhawan was not present for the start of the game, and it was making Azula increasingly nervous as she began to suspect that the wily old fox of Omashu was playing some kind of mind games with her.
Azula sat still for five minutes, which then quickly turned into ten. As a quarter of an hour expired, Azula could no longer control her nerves and so she stood from her seat and began pacing back and forth the stage while at same time trying not to disturb the other competitors. If this was some kind of trick by Bumi, then it was certainly very unorthodox. Azula wasn't sure what Bumi would gain by giving away fifteen whole minutes for… what reason exactly? This was just bizarre, but then again, Grandmaster Bumi Dhawan was a rather chaotic and eccentric old man. Azula stopped her pacing, staring at the audience until she spotted Yue and Katara in the stands. She waved at them as if to ask if they had heard or seen anything regarding Bumi, but all she got in response was confused shrugging of the shoulders.
Eventually, Azula sat back down at the table, shaking her head in disbelief as Bumi was by now twenty-five minutes late for the start of the game. It was only when Bumi was down to half an hour of time left that Azula became aware of some kind of commotion nearby, a group of people entering the hall, escorting someone up onto the stage. As the tournament officials then retreated, Azula was left gaping at the strangest sight she could have ever imagined. Grandmaster Bumi Dhawan quickly approached his seat, wearing nothing but a bathrobe and clogs, the old man still dripping water everywhere as he walked. His hair was sticking in every which direction and in his hand instead of his Pai Sho notation book and a pen, he carried a small bright yellow rubber duck.
"My apologies, young lady," Bumi said as he quickly made his first move, which was to deploy his Jasmine tile. "These untrustworthy tournament officials mislead me by making me believe that today was the tournament off-day."
"No, the off-day was yesterday," Azula replied as she activated her White Jade tile. This was such a typical weird Bumi thing to do, making a complete mess of the match days and off-days.
"Hmm, you don't say?" Bumi wondered as he now deployed the White Lotus tile. "You know, you could be right. I actually came in to play yesterday, but the officials told me that it was the off-day. And when I woke up earlier, I thought to myself… well, I was at the tournament yesterday, so today must be the off-day. And then I told Ducky, how about we take a long and soothing bath?" he said, giving the rubber duck a frighteningly fond stare.
"I see," Azula managed. "How about… how about we stop talking and focus on the game?" she suggested. This old man with his strange manner and eccentricities was throwing Azula off her game in a major way, and every time she looked at Bumi or heard him say his kooky nonsense, she felt a part of her focus slowly eroding. Because of Bumi having lost so much time already, Azula felt that she had to win this game whatever it took because such a fortunate opportunity might not present itself to her again, and yet, Bumi's appearance and behavior was so distracting that Azula was becoming seriously concerned that she might let a certain victory escape. It felt almost as if someone suffering from coulrophobia was being forced to play Pai Sho with a clown.
With the situation on the board swiftly turning from bad to worse for Azula, she felt that her only chance lay with Bumi running out of time, so Azula tried to adjust her tactics on the fly. She began to try and complicate the situation on the board, making Bumi really think hard about his next moves. Bumi had played the match almost like a game of speed Pai Sho, but once Azula had switched her tactics, Bumi was forced to slow down, only to then become starved for time. Azula's plan ended up working out, and Bumi's situation deteriorated rapidly due to poor move selection made under extreme shortage of time, but still, Bumi managed to survive until the fortieth move and the clock reset. Azula was in a superior position, but Bumi was not out of it and now both she and the eccentric old kook had their full time limit of an hour for the next forty moves. Azula was still a little distracted and now also a bit annoyed because she had failed to put Bumi away in the first forty moves, which already felt like a missed opportunity.
Azula's mood didn't improve any when around the sixty-fifth move, Bumi had clearly evened out the situation on the board. The game appeared to be heading for a draw, they both had very few tiles left and defending against the forming of a harmony ring became quite easy in this situation. Again, Azula was not happy about settling for a draw because this felt like a missed opportunity to gain a crucial win, but somehow, she had allowed it all to slip away. And Azula knew that if she was going to continue to let the opportunities slip past her, then she didn't really deserve to go through to the finals to face her father.
Bumi picked up his rubber duck and raised it up in the air, pointing it at Azula. "Ducky says I should offer the young lady a draw," he said, grinning broadly and showing plenty of missing teeth. "Would you like to accept a draw, young lady?"
Azula nodded, even if she was gritting her teeth and feeling irritated at herself. "I accept," she managed to utter stiffly.
"There, there, don't be disappointed, young lady," Bumi smiled at her, appearing earnest. He reached out towards her, as if to offer the rubber duck to her. "Would you like to hold Ducky? I always find holding Ducky very comforting."
"No, thank you, but I would rather not hold Ducky if that's alright with you," Azula said, taking a cautious step backwards.
"Are you quite sure? Here, let me-" Bumi leaned a little closer, accidently squeezing the rubber duck, and water squirted from its beak, hitting Azula in the face. "Oh my, I'm sorry about that!" Bumi looked horrified.
"Just… just don't, please! I need to go, now!" Azula exclaimed, raising her arms in frustration and then quickly rushing past the perplexed looking old grandmaster. She all but ran for the exit, wishing to be as far away as possible from this strange and embarrassing encounter with the eccentric master from Omashu. Azula knew that she had just wasted a big opportunity to take the tournament lead, all because she simply hadn't been able to get a handle on the raw chaos that Bumi brought to the Pai Sho board.
However, once the immediate embarrassment about her game with Bumi had faded, Azula began to think more rationally, realizing that there were still positives to be found. She hadn't lost to Bumi, which had been her greatest fear before the game, and it meant that when the two of them were to meet again for their second game, Azula's fate would still be in her own hands. All that was left to do was to figure out how to actually defeat Bumi once it was time to face him again.
As the first of the two tournament rotations came to an end, Katara felt like she was slowly getting back into the swing of things, starting to rediscover some of her old passion for Pai So. And it seemed like it was the same for Yue, all three of them working together brought back so many happy memories of past tournaments and largely enjoyable experiences associated with those events. Katara didn't feel as passionate as to begin entertaining thoughts of reviving her pro career, but it was enough that she could look at her duties as Azula's sparring partner and coach, and feel nothing but excitement.
Hers and Yue's charge had made a decent enough start to the tournament, although Katara could tell that Azula rued the missed opportunities against Toph, and especially against Bumi. It looked as if Azula would have to win her second game against Bumi in order to progress, and while Katara felt confident in Azula's abilities, she couldn't help being slightly worried. Whenever Bumi had been focused, he had appeared nigh unbeatable. At this point, Katara felt as if they were expecting Bumi to suffer from some kind of bout of eccentricity, like him mistaking a match day for an off-day again, and going skydiving instead of showing up for his Pai Sho match. And Azula had already been given a golden opportunity due to Bumi's eccentricity. Katara suspected that to hope for another such gift was the epitome of naivety.
Still, despite these slight setbacks, Azula was in a surprisingly good mood. Katara and Yue had at first struggled to understand why Azula was so happy, because the results hadn't all gone her way. It was only during the previous night that they had managed to force Azula into confessing that she was in such a good mood because she could tell that Yue and Katara were actually having a very good time, helping her at the tournament. Azula had apparently still been struggling with some lingering guilt, thinking that she was asking her girlfriends to do something neither of them really wanted, so to know that Yue and Katara were happy was a major source of relief for Azula. And it also made Katara feel more positive about Azula's chances. If Azula was in a good mood and could relax, she stood a much better chance against Toph and Bumi.
The tournament would resume the following day with the sixth round of play, and on their day off, Katara and her girlfriends had planned to go on a road trip, visiting some of the picturesque little villages further down the slopes of the Kolau Mountain Range. However, because of the recent persistent rain showers, one of the main passes to Omashu leading through the mountains had been taken out by a mudslide. There were warnings of more potential mudslides incoming, so the girls had decided to postpone their plans for a road trip, instead spending a lazy day in their hotel room. Since Azula would be playing an opponent that was not expected to cause her any trouble, there was no real need to do serious prep. They would probably do a few sparring matches later on when Toph showed up, just to keep themselves focused, but for now, Azula was sitting at the mirror and doing her nails, Yue had her nose up in one of her fantasy romance books, while Katara was browsing various tourism brochures, searching for an inspiration on what else they could get up to on their days off from Pai Sho.
In a move that reeked of desperation, Katara was about to suggest a visit to a local museum of clocks, when much to her relief, there was a knock on their doors. Azula rose from her seat and walked over to the doors to open them and let Toph inside. "Toph, why do you keep knocking before entering?" Yue asked, peering over the cover of her book at the younger girl. "I mean, we were expecting you."
"Sense of self-preservation," Toph said, kicking off her loafers and wriggling her toes. "I don't want to walk in on you bitches being gross with one another."
"Don't be silly, we always lock the door when we-" Yue began, but Toph cut her off immediately.
"I don't want to hear anything about that," the Earth Kingdom girl exclaimed, walking up to the bed and then tossing what looked like the morning paper at Katara, hitting her in the face with it.
"What's with the violence?" Katara huffed. The paper was heavier than usual on Saturday, so the impact had actually felt almost like a slap. They really were letting Toph get away with a lot, and Katara often wondered just how far the excuse that Toph was just affectionate in a crass and violent way would stretch.
"Hey, you're the one who wanted me to pick up the morning paper on my way to visit you," Toph shrugged, perching down at the foot of the bed. "Well, there's your paper, so stop complaining."
"I don't remember having asked to get slapped in the face with it," Katara grumbled, but then her curiosity won over as she opened the newspaper to the page of sports news to look up the latest Pai Sho scores from all the other qualifying tournaments. "Have you read it already, Toph?" Katara asked.
"Nope," Toph shook her head. "But I called Teo, so I at least know how the Ba Sing Se group is unfolding. It's all I really care about, anyway."
"Ah, don't forget our bet now, Toph," Yue finally peeled herself away from the book and crawled closer to Katara in the bed to also take a look at the newspaper. Azula was done with her nails as well, blowing on them to help the topcoat dry as she walked over to join her girlfriends and Toph. "Alright, so how are our friends in Ba Sing Se doing?" Yue asked, squinting at the fine print of Pai Sho results at the bottom of the page.
"Looks like Aang is still leading at the halfway mark," Katara remarked. "Now I feel a little silly, none of us actually bet on him." Teo had drawn his games with both Gyatso and Aang, but Aang had then defeated his foster father for the tournament lead.
"I spoke with Teo about that," Toph spoke up. "He thinks that Gyatso lost his game to his foster son a little too softly. There wasn't a lot of fight in there."
"I'm not a big fan of those arrangements," Yue frowned at that.
"Me neither," Katara nodded. "And I usually wouldn't suspect Aang of wanting to take advantage of something like that. I don't know why he would want to do it."
"I might have an idea," Azula said thoughtfully. Katara and Yue both looked up at her curiously. "Remember how during the last championship finals, Gyatso started out really strong but then ran out of steam. Well, he's two years older now, and probably even frailer than before. He might have decided that since he stands no real chance of winning at the finals, he might as well let his foster son get the ticket."
"That's exactly what Teo told me," Toph nodded. "And he wasn't really happy about it. He said that if Gyatso didn't want to go to the finals, then he should have just pulled out, instead of coming to Ba Sing Se to play kingmaker."
"I can't argue with that," Katara said, nodding. She browsed the next row of results. "Well, we already know about the Agna Qel'a scores." Azula had called Zuko earlier, only for Suki to answer the call. It seemed as if Zuko, Sokka and Suki had been celebrating Zuko's amazing first round-robin results by having way too much to drink in the hotel room of the boys, because none of those three had made much sense over the phone. The most important thing that they had learned was that Zuko was on five victories out of five games, leaving Pakku and Jeong-Jeong trailing behind him in the dust.
"Well, I don't know those scores, and I can't read the fine print, so don't be a bitch and tell me," Toph demanded.
"Oh, I'm sorry, Toph," Katara apologized hastily. "Zuko has all wins so far and it's looking good. Although Pakku could still make a comeback, I suppose."
"No, don't worry about Pakku," Azula said dismissively. "As I told you before, the old guard is on its way out. These ancient farts are fading fast, trust me."
"So, Haru apparently drew his game with Zhao," Katara continued to browse the results. "He's still half a point behind, but I think there's hope." Haru had failed to win one of his games against a weaker opponent that had set him back a little, but Katara was still desperate to see Zhao eliminated.
"I'm sorry, love, but it's not going to happen," Azula shook her head at Katara.
"How can you be so certain?" Yue asked. "Don't you want to see Zhao defeated?"
"Of course, I want to see that, and I'll be happy to oblige in the finals," Azula shrugged. "But Zhao is making it through to the next stage. My father is in the Fire Fountain City to make sure that it happens. Trust me when I say that Haru's aspirations are going to get derailed somehow."
"Ah… damn it," Katara winced. The reminder of Ozai's meddling was a painful one, but at least it wasn't triggering a panic attack anymore. "I wish I had known that Ozai would be assisting him, I would have probably changed my bet," she said, Yue nodding at her.
"Well, too late to change your mind now," Azula winked at them. "Anyway, I guess there's no point asking about the final group, I expect Piandao has it in the bag."
"Actually…" Katara peered at the fine print at the very bottom of the page, blinking at what she saw. "Uh, Piandao lost to Long Feng in the previous round."
"Oh, for fuck's sake, if Long Feng makes it through to the finals, I'm going to scream," Azula groaned. "I don't want to deal with both him and Zhao gifting Ozai all those free points… even if I know that was what you both had to deal with. Honestly, it just makes your achievement all the more remarkable."
"Well, Long Feng still has a lot of work to do if he wants to make it through," Katara said. "He's sharing the lead with both Piandao and Kori." The situation in the Caldera City group was very muddled. Piandao had defeated Kori Morishita, but Kori had then won against Long Feng. And now, Long Feng had beaten Piandao, just to make it all even more complicated. It looked like the Caldera City group was going down to the wire, and they were all hoping that Long Feng would get his just deserts and failed to qualify.
"I still think that Piandao is coming out of that group as a winner," Azula said. "But ultimately, it doesn't matter. Regardless of who I'm going to face in the finals, they will all fall before me," she stated confidently.
"First you have to make it past me and into the finals," Toph challenged.
Azula merely smirked at Toph's statement, a clear sign that her confidence was starting to soar. "Oh, I plan to do just that, Toph," Azula replied smugly and Katara couldn't stop herself becoming further encouraged by Azula's attitude. With all three of them working together once again, the passion and confidence was starting to come back big time, and it made Katara believe more and more strongly that despite Azula's precarious situation, her girlfriend would find a way to persevere on her quest to dethrone her father this coming fall.
Next chapter: We'll see how Azula does in her repeat encounters with Toph and Bumi, and we'll also discover the full lineup of Ozai's challengers in the upcoming finals.