First Flame 19

From what I could see, and from a quick mental calculation, there were roughly around sixty of them.

And I noticed something almost immediately as well as they all prepared to attack me. They were much lighter on their feet compared to the general Fire Bender I had met before.

Which made sense I guess, every single one of them was trained in the Dancing Dragon Style, a fire bending style that has a lot of focus on defending and diverting other fire in a straight fire duel.

Where as, the Sozin Style, was a very rigid style, designed for ease of use and powerful attacks. It was a fire bending style made for creating mass produced fire bending soldiers to deal great damage to others, a style created specifically for war.

If I had to liken the differences more specifically, I'd say those who mastered the Dancing Dragon moved more like an Air Bender, where as, those enriched in the Sozin Style, moved more like Earth Benders.

"Hah!" with a shout, I punched both my fists out, lashing out with a pair of massive spheres of flame.

Working together, four of the Sun Warriors confronted them, two apiece and split the fire balls down the middle, diverting them safely into the air.

That was fine though, because I was already moving, expelling fire from my feet to rocket me forward, I used the cover provided by the fire balls to get in front of them before they could react and spun around, leg coming out in a low sweet and unleashing a wave of flame that clipped their ankles, drawing cries of pain and surprise from them, and dragging them to the ground.

I didn't have much time to follow up on that while they were down and finish them off. While I targeted them and they dealt with my fire balls, the rest spread out around me on the grand staircase and unleashed large and mighty blasts of flame at me from every direction.

Thinking quickly, I spun, thrusting both arms out around me and expelled a large chunk of chi from all of my chi points. Flames erupted from around me, twisting into a large dome shield just as the dozens of flame streams reached me.

My fire shield grew and expanded as the flames were absorbed into it and my grin only got wide. I crossed my arms, before lashing out with both of them outwards and wide spread, and the massive dome of flame erupted upwards and outwards, forming into a literal tornado of flame that spread across the expanse of the staircase.

I could just barely hear screams over the roar of fire surrounding me. It took a moment for it to die down after I cut off feeding my chi to it, but when it did, the stone staircase was scorched black all around me, and all the Sun Warriors that had surrounded me, were nowhere to be seen.

Well, on the staircase at least.

I could see many of them spread out on the ground at the bottom of the staircase or to the side of it, my attack had thrown them all around like ragdolls.

While they could divert flames easily enough, sheer concussive force was a different story, and that attack had not only a chunk of my own chi packed into it, but multiple dozens of theirs as well.

"Oh yeahhhh…" I groaned as a familiar feeling rushed through me, of my chi refilling, and growing and expanding, "That's the stuff man!"

Another level up already!

Hmm, actually, I think my chi grew twice the usual amount? It was hard to tell due to some of my perks and such, but I feel like it's grown quite a bit more. I probably wouldn't have even noticed it, if I didn't level up just a minute ago and compare them so quickly together.

..So did I get two levels up then?

My eyes drifted to the bottom of the stairs where the remainder of the Sun Warriors stood at the button, tense, but not backing down, and in the middle of them, a familiar, large and stocky built man with a feather headdress. The Sun Warrior Chief, with a little bit less than half of the total of warriors he brought with him.

The fire shield was a nasty move, I had to admit. Well, it was Zuko's go to choice to defend against Sparky Sparky Boom Man, and it held up against his explosions, so it's no wonder, right?

Well, whatever, I still have experience bags sitting down there waiting for me, I can think on this later.

I expelled fire from my feet and launched myself into the air, flipped and then down the same to launch myself down towards the Sun Warriors.

As one, they attacked, unleashing massive blasts of flame up to meet me. Those blasts conjoined into one massive tower of flame that blotted out my vision of everything below me.

It was impressive, I won't lie. The only time I saw blasts that big, was during Sozin's Comet.

But fire really is the worst element to fight me with.

I expelled flame from my chi points once more, forming another fire shield around me, though much more narrow this time and swept right through the flame.

My skin singed a bit and it stung, but little more than pressing the likes of a lighter into my skin before I gained these abilities, easily ignorable.

I came out of the massive tower of flame a moment later like a flaming meteor and slammed into the ground so hard I felt the ground shake and buckle beneath my impact.

I expelled the flames from around me in another huge tornado of flame in all directions. If it wasn't broken after all, don't fix it.

It was amazing for dealing with enemies surrounding me in all directions, so I don't feel the least bit sorry for spamming it.

I expanded quite a lot of chi into it, almost a full quarter of my reserves, and that was on top of absorbing much of their own fire into my shield when going through it.

But it was worth it, because-

I felt it again, the feeling of my chi filling back up to full and then expanding and growing once more.

God it's so easily to level up here! It makes me want to go take on the Fire Nation army and navy and mop them up in the bucket loads and power level like a beast!