Book III: Spirits, Chapter 1: the past (1): Garasu no machi

"The first thing I did moments after I discovered glassbending was kill a human being. It was out of a place of weakness, anger, humiliation, sadness, and many more negative feelings. When you rage, you don't control yourself anymore, and it shows best in avatars, when they get angry and their avatar state takes on, they become destructive, violent, heartless. That is the reason I insist on the first generation of glassbenders to train spiritually way before starting material training, I need all of them to achieve neutrality, and to get rid of the blinding emotion that is anger, the benders I look up to the most in that domain are airbenders. We are bending a new item, and I don't want glassbenders to only bend glass with earthbending techniques, which is why I invented glassbending scrolls, to teach you what glassbending is about. Our benders will never dare to end any life, especially a human one. We, as glassbenders, need to act as mirrors during battle, we don't attack, we defend. New glassbending techniques are made specifically to weaken ones opponent, to the point they can't fight anymore, but still be alive. I don't want any of the benders raised under me to make the same mistake I made before, we need to learn from each other. And since we, as glassbenders, are having a different thought process, behavior, bending moves and values of what any other bending does, I think it's only fair for us to have our own land. Just like how metalbenders have Zaofu, we, glassbender, are going to be mainly living in

"Garasu no machi", the city of glass, located in the desert of the earth kingdom, next to the great river of Chi-Swa. Our fellow metalbenders are working on a railway that will connect us to the city of Ba Sing Se.

Our city isn't built yet, because I want you to build it with me, to get that sense of accomplishment. And since you guys are sandbenders, you are already used to the heat of the desert, so it won't bother you as much. I've prepared a plan for the city so that once it's finished, we are cold in hot days, and warm in cold ones, and the city will be big enough to fit up to 10.000 people. The city's architect is beautiful and the navigation system is quite stunning too, prepare yourself for a city you've never seen before. But first, you have to be able to glassbend, which is why your training starts tomorrow. Remember, your spiritual training starts tomorrow, and the time your glassbending training starts is up to you, the less obnoxious you are the closer we get to it. Also, I am learning glassbending myself, so don't forget that. And what I described about our fighting style and thought process is just a hint of what's waiting for you, you will explore it in details as we go deeper into training. And as always, patience, and neutrality, are the main keys"

And with that avatar Yin, the first ever glassbender, has finished his speech, to the first generation of glassbenders, talented sandbenders select to start a whole new era of a whole new bending art.

Garasu no machi had 3 different levels; the underground level, the ground level, and the sky level, which went above clouds. In each level, there was a community center, and the 3 community centers were linked by glass tubes, and each center is divided into sections; food and water, hygiene, farming, energy, teleportation,... and last but definitely not least, E.T (emergency tube).

When something or someone is put inside the tube, it closes and the glass ground they were put on starts going to a certain direction until it reaches the level it was heading to, the biggest one was the "teleportation" since it was meant to carry up to 5 people at a time. The E.T tube was big as well, made with 5 layers of reinforced glass, unbreakable, fast, and completely safe. The E.T section is hidden in each community center, the only people who know about it are workers who run the place and the avatar, it links to 2 secret strong hidden places, one is at the sky level and one is on the underground one. It's meant for when an attack happens on any level, the citizens will be escorted into those tubes and put into a safe place. Glass, if made right, can be very strong.

Garasu no machi is all covered with a big half sphere of glass, it had 2 entrances, for 2 main reasons, the first reason being that if something would happen and citizens wouldn't be able to get into the secret safe rooms, they could exit from the other side. Each side had a big black glass door, with 10 guards at the inside and 10 at the outside, those guards inspect who comes into the city for the second time, and close and open the doors, the first inspection happens around the perimeter, where plenty of guards are , each guards looks after the place for 8 hours, then another set of guards come, and then another. Around the city's perimeter there is a big glass circle that is buried by sand, if danger is approaching, soldiers are to lift the circle to prevent anyone from coming in before alerting the city. And to do that, there are 4 tubes built, one from each direction (south, north, west and east). If the circle was lifted, one of the soldiers had to send one of the 2 glass pieces that are set on a table next to the tube, one is red and one is black, if the community center receives the red one, they ought to send 50% of all internal soldiers as backup, if they receive the black one, the same amount of soldiers gets sent, but the earth kingdom gets alerted too and it sends backup as well. No matter what glass sphere is sent, the citizens need to stop anything they're doing and get to the community center, where they would be escorted to a safe place. The underground secret hiding place has a hidden exit, so that if the predator was able to break in, the citizens can still run away. The soldiers circles the whole area so there's no way for someone not to be seen. Soldiers have glasses made with magnifying glass, that they are to put on if they see anything coming from afar, and a belt around them full of glass spheres, ready to use in "battle" , and in each 2 steps in any direction between the city and the outside perimeter, there is a glass box buried under the sand, ready to be lifted up anytime needed, since glassbending is found only in that city, trapping predators in glass boxes is very effective. On the underground level, there's a secret room filled with weapons, that soldiers may use if the glass circle gets lifted up, indicating a possible danger.

At night, a layer of metal covers the sky and ground levels, and street lights get lit up, at day, the covers are removed to let the daylight flow. The city gets its water from the great river of Chi-swa and passes it through an underground filtration system that purifies the river water, after reaching the ground community center, it gets divided into 3 tubes, one goes to the sky water reservoir, one to the ground one, and one to the underground one, the sky and ground levels have a small part of the covering sphere poked, letting fresh air in, and they only close when the big circle closes, because then, the whole city closes, from stores to homes. The food is tested before in enters the community center, to see if it's poisoned or not, the test involves giving it to trained dogs to smell it. If it passes the test, each category gets divided into 3 portions, and each portions gets packaged, one goes to the sky community center and one to the underground one, and one stays in the ground one.

To travel in each level, people can use cars or walk, there was nothing far enough for a train to be needed, if the glassbender is good enough, they can get a license to travel with the F.G.D (floating glass disk) which is, as its name says, a thick glass disk that the bender can get on, stick their legs to and float with. If a bender messes with another bender's circle, they are to pay a fine. When the bender is done and arrived at said location, they would stick their disk into the back of a belt they have to wear around their waste. Garasu no machi police will randomly stop citizens to check their licences. If they don't stop, police can either shock them with a taser gun, or bend the colored glass sphere and wrap it around their faces to blind them and make them stop. After stopping them, their license gets taken away for 3 months.

Avatar Yin didn't want the city rules to be strict, but he wanted them to be clear and reasonable.

The training of newborn children is in a form of 2 subjects included in their school learning, S.G.T (spiritual glassbending training) to teach them how to think like a glassbender, and P.G.T (physical glassbending training) which teaches them how to act like one. If the children want to pursue their learning, there are 3 academies, one in each level, and each one teaches the same thing with adding a bit of secrets, for example the sky level academy adapted a lot of airbending techniques and morals and incorporated them into their teaching, underground one adapted some techniques and morals from earthbenders, and the ground level one adapted them from water & firebenders. Avatar Yin believed glassbending should be bendable, and change from region to region, and draw wisdom from different places, to be able to constantly improve. The academies charge no money. The city was built through 5 years, 4 years everyone building it, and the other year it was just the very trusted people and the avatar who built the secret places, such at the E.T section, secret bunkers, etc. For the last 3 years, it has been functioning very well, and producing lots of money because of their ability to bend glass onto shapes and sizes no one has seen before, therefore making good profit. 

Garasu no machi is recognized an an official city of the Earth Kingdom