Prince Chu was the second nephew of the Earth Queen Hou-Ting. Born in 156 AG Chu's father was an Earth Bending nobleman. Unfortunately the prince would never see his father as he was poisoned by Hou-Ting for fear he would overthrow her. Even at a young age Chu showed himself to be a powerful Earthbender, at age ten he was able to best his teachers, his brother Wu however never had such talents and preferred books and singing to government, it looked like Chu would be the next Earth King. Once again, however, Hou-Ting feared for her life so she made him commander of the Earth Kingdom Royal Army at age 15 (the youngest military officer in history), and instead gave the succession rights to Wu. Chu did not mind being stripped of succession as he preferred to fight in the army, he quickly became quite popular first as the governor of Yan and then for suppressing bandits. While Chu respected his Aunt as Queen, he did not approve of the way she ruled, caring more for extravagance than her people. It was during his time in the Army that Chu met Suyin Befong of Zoufu and became one of her friends though he disagreed with her assessment that a monarchy was outdated. This is the story of How Chu rose to be the 55th Earth King, what happened during his long reign, and how his actions earned him the epithet The Great Reformer.