Hello there, welcome to the next chapter of Avatar: Immortal Dragon.
Hope your going to enjoy it, and now on to the reviews.
Laval Asher: Yeah. I try to do different things then what I did with my other Avatar fics.
Spiral-Voltron-Zero0Q1: Amen to the Unalaq hate.
Neo: Not in this story.
Lupus: I'll be honest with you, I don't accept a lot of story requests.
JohnnySmithy31: Happy you like it. Yeah, I would have liked it to have him come back... Well I have something planned for Book 3, but that's a long way off. Korra's probably not going to learn how to subdue spirit from Unalaq.
grayfox11738: There are Dragon Age references in this story?
And now story time.
During the early morning, Genji stretched his back as he smiled proudly at his work. Having accepted the job of training Korra in the ways of a Shashou, he made a obstacle course based on the one he had been trained with.
It had swinging logs, moving platforms and a few turning log with spikes sticking out. Turning around, he wanted to grab something to eat only to run into a eager Korra.
"Someone is up early." Genji noted.
"What can I say? I'm pumped up to learn that Genji spirit fighting." Korra said before she saw the obstacle course, "When do I get my sword?"
"Not for a long time." Genji said gesturing over his shoulder, "First you will be clearing this."
"You actually set all this up all alone?" Korra said impressed, thinking it was more to her taste than the airbending tool back on Air Temple Island.
"Yeah, didn't want to take Ichiro away from you." Genji said with a knowing smirk, "So when your ready."
"Let's do this!" Korra said determined, decisively runs into the Shashou tool, rushing to the swinging log.
She ran a few feet forward before she collided against one of the swinging logs. Being thrown off balance, she slammed hard against the ground.
"That was just sad." Genji said, standing over her with his arms crossed, "Again."
She scrambles back on her feet, an annoyed and determined look across her face. She runs back in, narrowly avoiding the first two logs, but colliding into the third one.
"Pathetic!" Genji shouted, "Again."
Grinding her teeth together as she runs up. After getting slammed in the face by a log so hard, she spins around her own axis a few times before falling knocked out on the ground before Genji.
"I cleared a harder version of this course when I was eleven." Genji said, kneeling down, "Still want to be trained as a Shashou?"
Later that week, a bruised Korra was sitting at the bar in the lounge area on 'The Asami'. Her training from that week alone, she had no idea her body could be pushed to such limits.
But something about it felt right. The training of a Shashou was harsh and unforgiving, it felt natural to her, more natural than airbending training that is. Even though this training course was beginner level and she had no idea how much more difficult the others where.
If she hadn't been the Avatar, she guessed the life of a Shashou would have fitted her just as well.
"Why can't I train today?." Korra complained as a plate of food, consisting of a lot of meat, rice and vegetables, was place in front of her as she was told the next day would be a day off.
"Because you need to phase yourself. Give the body a chance to heal." Genji said placing tea, two cups and two bowl filled with food on the table in front of her, "Anything else will have diminishing returns."
"Who told you that?" Korra said as they began to eat.
"Master Roshi." Genji said, taking a flask from his pocket and pours some into his tea.
"You don't talk a lot about your past." Korra pointed out.
"I did, last week!" Genji protested, "I just don't think about the past too much."
"Why not?" Korra said, "Your over three hundred, you have a lot of it."
"I don't think about it because I'm over three hundred." Genji said, having finished his tea as he began to drink from his flask, "There was this old man I came across, he seemed to think I was the grandchild of the man who saved his village from bandits when he was but a little boy."
"That doesn't seem so..." Korra said before she realized, "You where that man, the one who saved the village, weren't you?"
"Whatever gave you that idea?" Genji said between bites, "When I first came to Ryu Basho, Master Roshi said..."
He was interrupted when he heard a knock at the door. He stood up and walked over to it. When he did he saw Unalaq standing there.
"Shashou." the Water Tribe Chief said, "I'm not interrupting, am I?", but Genji slams the door in his face.
"As I was saying, Master Roshi told me that the outside world is a dangerous place. You can't run from the world. You can't hide from it. But you can find power and purpose in it." Genji said, "A chance to survive the horror. All you have to do, is keep your sword close and keep moving."
Genji then turned around to open the door to see an irritated Unalaq standing there. "You still here?" he said.
"I am." Unalaq said barely able to contain his irritation, "I came with a job for you."
"Oh really? Been a while since the Northern Water Tribe employed me." Genji said with a tilted head, "Last time that happened, I ended up sleeping with the Princess."
"Yes... Your escapades with princess Yue are quite infamous in the North." Unalaq said with a hint of distain, "Some would say they have faded into myth."
"Did you know I once had sex with her while she was talking with her father." he said with a nostalgic laugh, "Or that we had anal at the Spirit Oasis."
"By the spirits." Unalaq muttered pinching the bridge of his nose, "Is nothing sacred to you?"
Genji put a finger on his chin his eyes drawn away from the two as he seemed to pondering about that question deeply. "No. I don't think there is." he finally said, "I could talk about my legendary sex life for hours and still not be bored. So what was this about a job?"
"I need to hire you and your... apprentice." Unalaq said rather serious.
"Official term is actually Padawan." Genji corrected him, "Who do you need Korra?"
"She has a particular skill needed for this job. For this job we will be traveling to the long neglected spiritual center of the tribe, the South Pole." Unalaq said, "May I come in?"
"You may not." Genji said crossing his arms and leaning against the door, "What are you going to do at the South Pole?"
"By neglecting the spirits, the people of the South have brought darkness upon themselves, and now it threatens to destroy our tribe." Unalaq said, "We must set things right. I might know a way to do just that, but I will need protection."
"A dangerous trip to the South Pole?" Korra said enthusiastically, "Count me in!"
"We aren't counting anything just yet." Genji said over his shoulder before turning to Unalaq, "We can't do anything if there isn't a contract. It's the Shashou Code. Are you sure you can afford my rates?"
"The Northern coffers are pretty deep." Unalaq said.
"You had my curiosity." Genji said with a smirk, "Now you have my erection."
"Don't you mean..." Unalaq said.
"You know what I'm about!" Genji shouted.
The following morning, seeing as he had near unlimited access to Unalaq's bank account, Genji had recruited Ichiro, Asami, Mako and Bolin as hired help for this expedition. Genji was laying on his back on top a snowmobile. A pair of aviators on his face and a lit cigarette in his mouth as everyone else was preparing for the trip.
"Hey, Genji." Korra said as she was saddling up Naga, "Where is Bolin?"
"Relax, Korra. We aren't going to leave for another hour." Genji said taking a hit, "I have everything we need for a safe trip."
"What?" Asami said sarcastically, "You brought your entire whisky collection?"
"Please, it wouldn't fit in a simple traveling bag, you know that." Genji said, sitting up when he hears the sound of a snowmobile coming towards them.
It was Tonraq pulling up on a snowmobile. Unalaq, who has been packing, notices Tonraq and scowls, before approaching his brother.
"Tonraq, what do you want?" Unalaq said.
"I heard you're taking Korra to the South Pole." Tonraq said, crossing his arms, "I'm coming."
"Absolutely not!" Unalaq said angrily.
"Hold on!" Genji said walking between the two brothers, "This is my gig. We could use the extra muscle."
"What!?" Unalaq said.
"Did I stutter?" Genji said confused.
"No, you didn't!" Unalaq said sharply, "It's because of men like my brother who have put the Spirit World out of balance. He's ignored my warnings in the past and hasn't learned since."
"I smell a story here." Korra said.
"Seems your training is working, my young Padawan." Genji said smugly.
"What happened in the past doesn't matter." Tonraq said, "What matters is the Everstorm."
"The massive blizzard that's battered the South Pole for decades?" Genji said, noticing the looks he was getting, "Tracked a guy through it once, it's no big whoop." he looks to his left, however, when he hears Bolin shouting from a distance.
"Guys! Hey, wait for me!"
Bolin zooms in on a snowmobile with an attached sidecar, wearing a new snowsuit before he pulls up next to them.
"Check it out, I'm traveling in style!" Bolin said he rests his elbow on the throttle, which he accidentally turns the throttle causing the vehicle to jerk forward, but promptly stops the vehicle, "Okay, uh, sorry, still getting used to that throttle."
"Did Genji buy you this ride?" Mako said.
"Nope it was Varrick! He's awesome!" Bolin said proudly, "He also gave me this fancy snowsuit! It's inflatable, with an internal heater, emergency beacon, and food ration pouches! I mean, if I get lost, I can survive in this thing for like, like a month! Who wants some freeze dried cucumberquats." Pabu pops out of Bolin's suit and eats some of the cucumberquats.
"Alright, now that Team Gambik has gathered." Genji said standing on top his snowmobile, "You know why I hired you, and where we going and what dangers we are facing. It was all in the debriefing I send you."
"He did?" Bolin said.
"Before we leave, if we somehow get stuck in the frozen wastes without any rations. I say we eat Unalaq first." Genji said, "And then Mako."
"Oh fuck you, Genji." Mako said annoyed.
"Mako, baby. I'm way out of your league." Genji said with a complete straight face, "So any questions? No questions? Alright, Let's put this show on the road. Tonraq, come if you want, but just so you know, you won't get paid." ignoring Bolin's raised hand.
He dropped down staring the ignition before driving of to lead the group.
After a day travel when night had fallen, the group was sitting around a roaring fire, huddled around it for warmth. All except for Genji, who had taken to be the watch for tonight seeing as he had less need for sleep thanks to his mutations.
Sitting there on cover, with his flask in hand and his sword laying next to him, he sensed a dark spirit staring at them in the distance but they kept away for now at least.
"Hey."
He glanced over his shoulder to see it's Asami, who had come over to him with two cups of hot tea, "Room for one more."
"For you, always." Genji said scooting aside so Asami had a place to sit.
"Why do you think the dark spirits are following us?" Asami said huddling close to Genji.
"Because their assholes?" Genji said with a shrug of his shoulders, putting some of the drink inside his flask into his tea, "As much as spirits like to pretend, they are not so different from humans. All just a different flavor of asshole... Could have phrased that better."
The two sat there for a while, just drinking their tea, enjoying each others company and talking of course.
"...So this 2-chlorobenzonitrile was reacted with the Grignard reagent cyclopentylmagnesium bromide to givea 2-chlorophenyl-cyclopentyl methanone. Then I brominated it using bromine to form a corresponding bromoketone, which I then reacted with methylamine in an aqueous solution to form the methylimino derivative, 1-2-Chloro-N-methylbenzimidoyl-cyclopentanol, with hydrolysis of the tertiary bromine atom." Genji explained what he had been doing the day before he had won his boat, "Then the final intermediate was then heated in decalin, upon which a ring-expansion rearrangement occurs, forming some new sort of drug."
"Look at you. We got an Alchemist here." Asami said with a laugh, amused by how enthusiastically he was. Her smile seemed to mesmerize him, "You know, if this deal with Varrick doesn't work out... my company will fail."
"Why are you reminding me of that?" Genji said.
"If that happens, maybe I will move to the Ember Islands, become a Drug Lord or something." Asami said with a shrug of her shoulders, "Want to come along?"
"Yeah, let's go!" Genji said with a laugh, "With your brain and my alchemy and disregard for my own and others mortality, there is nothing that could stop us!"
"You do know I'm only joking right?" Asami said amused, much to his disappointment, "Honestly I'm amazed you haven't become a Drug Lord already."
"That's only because I like killing too much." Genji said with a laugh.
Early the following morning, the groups was making their way through the Southern tundra. Korra was riding on Naga with Ichiro sitting behind her, an angry look on her face after she found out why her father had never brought her to the Northern Water Tribe.
Tonraq pulls up next to his daughter on his snowmobile, "Korra, you have every right to be mad at me. But I don't want you to make the same mistake I made." he said, "I should never have gone into that forest, and we shouldn't be going to the South Pole now. Spirits and the physical world should remain separate."
"Dad, it's my job to be the bridge between the spirits and the physical world." Korra said, "And I finally have a chance to live up to my potential."
"You don't even know if what Unalaq says is true." Tonraq said sternly.
"That maybe." Korra said, "But I'm getting paid anyway."
"...I think Genji is rubbing off on you." Ichiro muttered.
"That's my Padawan!" Genji shouted from the front, "And that's my grandson who's tapping that Padawan!"
A long ride later, the team rides through the Everstorm, their hoods up to protect their faces against the icy wind. Genji picked up roaring in the distance just audible over the wind.
"Is that what I think it is?" Bolin said fearfully as he clutches his head, "Oh man, I really don't like this."
"Bolin, just stay calm, there's no reason to..." Mako assured his brother, only to immediately be proven wrong when a dark spirit emerges from beneath his camel yak and grabs the supplies.
Another dark spirit emerges beneath Naga and lands on her face. Another dark spirit grabs Unalaq's supplies and another which grabs Korra's supplies. Naga stands on her hind legs, causing Korra and Ichiro to slide backwards, the two fall on the ice, and chases after the spirit.
Korra looks turns and sees a flying spirit emerge. Tonraq forms an ice wall to fend off the spirit but it flies above the wall.
A larger spirit is running directly at Korra but using the training she had received, she sidestepped in time and blast it with a blast of air.
Another dark spirit enters Bolin's snow mobile, making the engine explodes in gray smoke as the spirit exits. Bolin loses control of his snowmobile and speeds into the tundra.
Korra and Ichiro are fighting spirits with airbending. She somersaults out of the way and but another spirit manages to pin her down.
Before the spirit can continue its attack, it's head was pierced by Genji's sword. Removing it with a spin, he held out his hand and pulled Korra back to her feet.
"Oh, great." Mako said, looking at their destroyed supplies, "There goes our equipment."
"What are we going to do, Genji." Ichiro said turning to the party Leader.
"Eat Unalaq?" Genji suggested.
"We're so close." Unalaq urged them, "We need to go on."
"Well your paying." Genji said with a shrug, "Let's get a move on."
They arrived at the South Pole, where there are a number of trees, their trunks covered in frozen ice.
"It's just like the sacred forest Tonraq destroyed in the North." Unalaq muttered.
"So what is the next part of this job?" Genji said walking up to him.
"Korra must find her way to the heart of the forest where the dormant spirit portal lies." Unalaq said turning to his niece, "From here, you're on your own."
"Wait a second." Mako said, "There's no way she's going alone."
"Yeah!" Bolin said as Pabu emerges from his snowsuit, "If she goes, we go, too!"
"The Avatar must go alone." Unalaq insisted.
"Team Gambik, Unalaq is our client and we have too..." Genji said before his eyes widen and he pointed behind them, "Fuck! Dark Spirit!"
Unalaq turned around as Genji gave them a sign to follow him. And when the Water Tribe Chief had turned back to them, the saw them tracking down the forest.
"...I hired a child in an adult body..." Unalaq muttered to himself, "And I'm the idiot who fell for his childish trick... Fuck me..."
The Team are trudging deeper into the frozen forest with a look of uncertainty and fear. A snake-like dark spirit nears Korra and screeches, causing her to turn around. In the distance, two dark spirits charge toward Korra, causing her to gasp.
"Move." Genji ordered.
They turn and starts to run from them, but they manage to catch Korra and begin to wrap themselves around her body and legs. One of the spirits attempts to attack, but it was pierced by Genji's sword.
Korra frees herself from the spirit wrapped around her with airbending. The spirits charge back at them, but Ichiro stops them with an blast of air.
"Ichiro!" Genji shouted, "Take Korra to the center. We will hold them off."
"Okay." Ichiro said, taking a hold of his girlfriends hand and they ran deeper into the forest.
The spirits attack and they charged towards them. One of them grab Asami around the waist, only for it to be electrocuted by her glove. As it dropped, it was behanded by Genji's sword.
It wasn't long when a green beam of light rises and causes the southern lights to appear in the sky, while the Everstorm and the spirits dissipates. The team stare at the bright light that has emerged from the portal.
"That's my Padawan." Genji said with a proud smirk.
The following morning, the team was on the upper deck of 'The Asami', having a little celebration on a successful mission.
"So... Not to sounds greedy but..." Mako said drumming his finger on the wooden table, "When are we going to see our pay?"
"Should be in your account in seven days max." Genji said as he poured six glasses of his favorite brand of whisky, "To a successful mission." raising his glass.
"Isn't it a bit early to drink?" Ichiro said.
"It's five somewhere in the world." Korra said before downing her glass in one shot.
"She takes well to my teachings." Genji said with a laugh, "That is the way."
"Uh, guys." Asami said as she glanced over her shoulder.
The entire group turned around to see a large number of battleships approaching the harbor.
"What are all your Northern troops doing here?" Korra said surprised.
Fourteenth chapter, which didn't turn out as well as I would have liked. But if you enjoyed it, then I'm happy.
I'll be honest, I'm not looking forward to write the first half of Book 2. I think things will be much more interesting once we get back to Republic City. And before you ask, yes, Genji invented Ketamine.
Many thanks to everyone who reads, reviews, favorite or follows this story, you beautiful bastards!
If you liked what you read, don't forget to leave a review, for now I wish you all a fantastic day and I hope to see you ladies and gents, next time.