book III: spirits, chapter 9: the tree of life

the tree was very, very tall and big, it was bushy, unlike the tree of time, also in the middle of its trunk there was a big inflation, Yin got close to the tree, closed his eyes and touched it, he sensed a lot of spirituality coming from it, as he opened his eyes, he found himself inside, the tree sucked him in

there were stairs leading up, it wasn't like Yin had another choice but to follow them, and that's what he did, he felt a presence of a person during his journey to the end of the stairs, and he kept turning around every time he feels or hears something but he never caught anyone. when he reached the end of the stairs, he figured the place he's at right now is that inflation he saw on the outside, and there were homes inside.

He felt someone behind him, and when he turned he saw about 30 creatures looking at him, the creatures had dark blue skin with occasional lighter blue spots, each one had one eye that closes sideways when blinking and not normally, and they also had 2 antennas sticking from their heads, except that the antennas of the one right in front of him were red, Yin guessed he's their leader, the avatar didn't want to get into "fighter" mode immediately, especially after that conversation he had with his past lives, however the creatures did attack, they had really sharp countless teeth, and they wanted to bite Yin, but he never struck back, only defended, he would keep repelling them with air, when they decided to come at him from multiple directions, he created a powerful air sphere around him that didn't let them approach him, then he said "I'm going to get rid of the sphere right now, I'm not here to harm anyone or anything, I need your help, so please stop attacking me"

he did get rid of the sphere, but did they stop? absolutely not, after a while of defending himself, he got bit in the head, which made him faint instantaneously, and when he woke up he found them looking at him

"when one of us bit your head he was able to read what's in your mind, from thoughts, to mindset, to memories, and shared them with us, you're a good person, avatar, we are sorry for the inconvenience" and with that they bowed to him as an apology.

"it's okay, I don't blame you, Yin replied with a nervous laughter, I just want to know, who are you? and how are you talking to me?"

"we're the citizens of the tree of life, we protect and take care of it, it provides shelter for us, and to answer your second question, telepathy. Now, we know you don't really know why you're here, but we do; every 100.000 years, the tree of life gives birth to the "fruit of entity", since the beginning of the universe, we were responsible of harvesting and hiding all fruits of entity the tree makes, the fruit of entity is a fruit that grants anyone outside the parallel universe that eats it one wish, but there are rules, 9 to be exact

-you can't wish for more wishes

- you can't wish for a dead person to come back to life

-you can't wish to time travel, or change the current time

-you can't wish for anything infinite

-you can't wish for anything that will grant you material gain

-you can't wish with harmful intend

-you can't wish to change people's emotions

-if the fruit doesn't like your wish, it will not realise it for you

-no matter how many fruits you can get your hands on, during your lifespan you're only allowed one wish

Raava sent you here because she wants you to get one of the fruits, but that doesn't mean we necessarily approve"

"what? didn't you just say you bit me and found out all you could, how would you not trust me when you literally got into my head?" Yin asked a bit annoyed that they were giving him a hard time

"you need to earn our confidence, avatar"

"this is bull-"

"ish, we need to stay bullish, Hiroku said"

"but how? said Naomi crying about the now dead ashy soil of the spirit world, there's no hope"

"if you go far enough you'd still find some live parts, until the very last bit of it is dead, and until Yin doesn't come back, we can't loose hope, it's what's gotten us to this in the first place"

everyone ignored him, just wishful thinking, that's what it was, Hiroku took a deep breath collected a lot of water from the air, and made it penetrate the soil, it changed nothing, he then headed towards the sphere that was covering Yin's body, Raava and the tree of time not letting the golden water escape, or was it?

the tree of time was ejecting the water strongly, some actually leaked, hiroku got out a bottle he always carries around with water, dumped it and bottled some of the golden water up, then he started touching the rest that he didn't take, trying to connect with it in hopes of bending it, he liked how the golden water felt, not texture wise because there was nothing special about it there, but he enjoyed how alive and vibrant it felt, although he felt connected to it, bending it was the hardest thing he has ever tried, harder than spiritbending, bloodbending, and everything else he learned, he couldn't do it

Yin got a sharp pain in his chest making him stop during one of the weird rituals the creatures were making him do

"the spirit world is almost fully doomed, please, the fruit" Yin pleaded

"we felt it as well avatar, I think we had enough fun, you deserve the fruit"

"fun?" Yin asked confused

"none of this was necessary, we just didn't meet you in a while and wanted to have fun, you were so desperate to get that fruit you were ready to do anything for it, we pretty much enjoyed this. now follow me"

Yin tried to keep calm, but he was boiling on the inside, he followed their leader, they went alone, walked until reaching a closed room, the door closing it had a circle in the middle, with maze looking patterns branching from it

"get on your knees" and Yin did so, the tribe's leader touched his forehead opening his third eye, a beam of light came out of it, the leader pointed toward the door and Yin directed that beam to the middle of the door, the circle, it absorbed the light, ran it through its patterns, then opened

"this door only opens once every one hundred thousand years, after cultivating the fruit, and an avatar using their third eye with the help of one of us is the only other condition it can open under, let's get inside avatar"

they did, Yin picked one of the fruits, they were aligned, and looked extremely different, but majestic in a way, it was squared with wings coming out of each of of its sides, with the 4 wings meeting and merging into a sphere

"so, do I eat it then wish? or wish then eat it? and how do I fit all of this in one bite" Yin asked

"it doesn't get eaten, and you don't need to wish for anything, the fruit knows your intentions, you don't need to mention them, and now, farewell avatar"

the fruit levitated, and entered his chest, and glowed golden inside of him, and kept glowing, Yin came back to the spirit world, he was on top of the tree in the avatar state, with his body still inside the tree, the protective sphere broke, and the air earing vanished, and the fire ring and earth necklace merged back with his body, while the but he didn't bend the water, while the water bracelet stood in front of his spirit, he extended his hand to be right beneath it, and it got split in half, Yin's eyes changed from white to golden, and a beam came out of them, it was all equally absorbed by the 2 halves of the necklace, then one half went into Yin's right hand, and one directed itself to Hiroku's left one, at first he was took off guard, but then he approached it, and extended both of his hands for it to settle on one.

one to the right, one to the left, Yin and Hiroku bended the golden water in the form of the tree of time, while naomi airbended Yin's body out of the way, the water took the tree's shape, and its wood surrounded it, it came out of nowhere. what happened caused a massive explosion that expanded and affected the entirety of the spirit world, it was extremely powerful and bright, it knocked everyone out, and redefined the shape of the spirit world.

the figure of the fruit of entity disappeared, Yin got back to his body, and the half bracelet fully merged with Hiroku. he started bloddbending the avatar to get him energized, this isn't the time to faint, there's a lot of discussion to be had. Hiroku looked around at the spirits and didn't understand one thing

"Yin, you know how I can see an element sign on top of any spirit or bender, and that sign represent the element the spirit belongs to or the element someone can bend?

-yes, do you not see them anymore?

-no, I do. But, I'm seeing some spirits with 2 elements, not one, like that one over there, it has fire and earth, both!

-what? what could that mean?