The Feminine Rebellion

The next morning, after hastily eating breakfast and circulating life energy through my body — which served as a makeshift replacement for a proper workout — I went to check on the prisoners.

Everything was fine with them. There was some damage to the ice, but they had only managed to get halfway through the wall's thickness. Taking control of one bender and one regular soldier, I headed out to test traveling through portals. Controlling blood in people's bodies was becoming easier and simpler.

I can only take those I'm touching through the portal with me, and two people is my current limit. Now I want to see what happens if I take them to the North Pole without the protection of my energy.

The gifted one looked quite tired by the end of the journey, but nothing serious happened to him — which couldn't be said for the regular soldier, whose life was already in serious question. Too much life energy had been spent. There are only two benders in the settlement, but both Katara and Kaya are still very weak.

So now I should test the crossing with my energy's help. Directing these soldiers toward the barrier, I watched as upon contact with it, they both dissolved into thin air... What a terrifying thing this barrier is — it drained two people in mere seconds.

The next two regular people passed under my protection, and everything was fine with them. This crossing affected me more — all three of my sources, except the neutral one, were nearly empty, but it was manageable. I'll be able to transfer the village residents in two days. I don't know exactly when the Fire Nation soldiers were supposed to report on the situation, but I should hurry anyway.

It'll be interesting to see Master Pakku's face when he sees Kanna. The people accepted the relocation calmly — some had relatives at the North Pole, others didn't want to lose their lives. Everyone found a reason to leave the South Pole. Of course, everyone was sad to leave the lands where they were born, the earth that raised them, but there was no choice. Continuing to live is actually a chance to someday return to their native lands. I think I know what to do about overpopulation if the Fire Nation calms down by then. Well, or I'll calm them down. Later I can think about relocating some of the people back south.

On the first day, I managed to transport half the tribe's population, whose appearance turned the entire city upside down. Nobody expected anyone to still be there. Some met their distant relatives, others were horrified by the small number of people in our sister tribe, but no one remained indifferent.

Pakku's reaction when he saw Kanna deserves special mention... I hadn't seen such a passionate look even in young men with hot hearts. Apparently his attachment had been smoldering all these years without dying out, and as soon as he saw her, it flared up again. I even felt uncomfortable noticing this.

There was enough room for everyone. I asked father to house Katara, Sokka, and Kaya in the palace, though I had to endure looks from Katara and Yue, who between throwing lightning at each other, also glanced at me with resentment. Even without knowing each other, they had already seen rivals in their opponents. Such feminine intuition at such a young age scares me.

At first, the Southern Tribe residents marveled at how far our tribe had progressed. After all, we hadn't stood still — maybe we're still far from the Fire Nation, but there's development, and that's what matters.

I had to get rid of the remaining soldiers — I had neither the desire nor time to keep them. There would be no use from them anymore. To advance in life bending, as I decided to call the combination of bloodbending and life energy, I would need to consciously maim these people. I wasn't ready for that yet, and I hope I never will be... There are other ways to solve problems. The city has plenty of people who don't have all their limbs, twenty-five percent of the entire population are elderly — there's room to work.

The plan is this: at night I'll sneak up to sleeping people who have problems, quietly heal them, and leave. Yes, it benefits the people, and I'll build up statistics for myself — after all, I want to give only the best to my family. For some older people, I can try to remove the most troublesome spots, which should theoretically extend their lives. A bit selfish, of course, but those same waterbending masters can give much more benefit to society if they're alive and healthy. The healing process isn't always quick, but thanks to life energy influence, I can put patients into deeper sleep, from which they can only wake up after some time. Tested on Fire Nation soldiers who, waking up without injuries, didn't even suspect what had happened to them.

There are two healing methods: fast but costly, and slow but economical. In the fast method, I have to give away my life energy, like with that soldier's regrown limb. In the slow variant, I should give more specific "programs" and stretch them out over time. The patient should consume more varied food with different vitamins, which will go toward solving problems, serving as building material.

***

Today is the first joint waterbending lesson for Kaya, Katara, and Yue. I started by explaining and demonstrating waterbending basics. It'll be useful for Yue too — reviewing what's already been learned is always helpful, since my sister strives too much for large-scale and flashy techniques, overlooking precise and subtle manipulations.

It was fun watching Yue proudly demonstrate her waterbending abilities, looking at Katara with superiority, which provoked Katara to seek help from me, thereby taking my attention for herself. Even K Kaya was quietly chuckling on the sidelines. Competition is good, as long as everything stays within reason and helps them progress.

That day I also subjected myself to difficult training — after all, opening the chakra isn't far off. Usually after such training, all clothes are soaked with sweat, so I trained with them shirtless. The girls paid no attention to this, but Kaya had an interesting reaction — sometimes I felt her gaze on me, which seemed to travel over my entire body... I'd be lying if I said her attention was indifferent to me.

"I don't mind, just wait a little longer," I thought to myself.

My body hasn't yet entered that period when with the sunrise, not only it rises. Most likely, due to my training, life energy manipulations, and my strange dual nature, my body, while ahead of my real age, still has some additional "functions" unavailable. At almost sixteen, I look like a well-built twenty-year-old athlete.

Such looks from her were like a red flag to a bull. Maybe my body isn't ready yet, but I can always get positive emotions. Besides, simple looking had become insufficient — I wanted to tease her a little.

"Kaya, you're not doing this stance quite right. Let me show you how it's done," I offered help. There really were some flaws in the stance, but I'm here for something completely different...

"Look how it should be," I press close from behind, feeling Kaya shiver quietly. Then I wrap one arm around her waist, sensing how her body tensed. With the other hand, running it along her body, I took her hand in my palm. And as my bold actions continued, Kaya began to relax. Ho-ho, what an advanced stage — there wasn't even resistance. "Now do you understand?" I asked at the end, whispering into Kaya's red ear. All she could do was nod her head timidly. "Good, if there are problems, call me right away. Relearning is always harder — it's worth laying a good foundation from the start," I finished, gradually pulling away, which initially didn't go so well. Kaya simply didn't let me go for the first few seconds, and only realizing what she was doing, abruptly released my hands and stopped leaning against me with her back and appetizing bottom.

"I think Katara needs help over there. Go quickly," said Kaya with a red face, trying not to look me in the eyes, and all this time smoothing non-existent wrinkles on her clothes. It looked too cute... I think I should do this more often. [ image ]

"Yes, yes, I'm coming," I hope she didn't notice my sly smirk.

Teaching the girls quickly became my favorite activity. Yue and Katara could lift anyone's mood with their actions. Embarrassed Kaya is like a separate art form. She seems to already have two children and had a husband, but apparently such actions from me were new to her. After all, here sex most often equals child... Courtship in this world is just forming, and there's none of what was invented by the twenty-first century in my past life.

Life in the city was bustling and bubbling. The arrival of new residents, widespread teaching of healing — something was happening everywhere. Someone from the council blabbed about the future change in female benders' status. Now even the old men from the councils feel uncomfortable walking around the city. It's hard to be calm when you're being watched by ladies who aren't indifferent to this change and want reforms faster. I wonder who spread this rumor? Well, pretending to be a fool never worked well for me — they caught me the very next day.

"Son, I know you strongly advocate for this reform, but spreading such a rumor was low — you're a man after all!" father couldn't contain his emotions. Well, when there are two female waterbenders in the house, one of whom is your wife and the other your daughter, and they learn you can influence the speed of adopting this change... You could say father was under strong pressure from two sides for those two days. I don't know what Jun came up with, but now Yue can go bother father with requests to pass the new law faster at any moment. "Now deal with these 'old senile fools' yourself, as you like to call them," he finished with malice. You really got it, father — isn't mom giving you any sugar?

Father abruptly opened the door, behind which there had been a whole hubbub of familiar voices I often hear at councils. Damn, this isn't good.

"Damn you, because of you my daughter won't talk to me until we officially adopt these changes!" Master Ikazu was the first to enter the office with such words — he had a lovely daughter whom I had noticed practicing waterbending in a secluded spot.

"I can't even breathe fresh air now. Even in the outhouse I feel those stares," said some twitchy council member who apparently was responsible for training regular warriors.

"Get out writing supplies — we'll write the law now!" said one of father's advisors, cutting like an axe.

All I needed to do was spread a rumor and voilà — these lazy asses came running to me themselves. Now I should act modest and puzzled, as if I didn't know such secrecy was needed. Of course, this won't fool father, but hopefully he won't rat me out.

"Here, I always carry these with me," I pull paper, quill, and ink from my pockets... Seems like this was unnecessary — I should have gone to get them for appearance's sake.

"Carrying them with you, eh, little manipulator!" one of them said with some admiration. Well, playing dumb won't work anymore.

"Fine by me — the faster we start, the faster we finish," Master Ikazu waved his hand, already calmed down.

Despite my ugly trick, the old foxes began looking at me with even more respect. A good leader should know how to intrigue, since the council gathers very different people and you need to know how to direct all these people in the right direction.

"For your suffering, you've earned being first on my healing list," I thought.

No sooner had the previous commotion died down than a new one arose. Villagers' illnesses started disappearing! Some even regained limbs they'd lost long ago. Some began feeling ten years younger. There were some old men who, with the start of such incidents, began looking at me with suspicion. But believing that a beardless youth was doing this would mean shattering the worldview you'd carefully assembled your whole life.

It was difficult to heal more than two people per night. My life energy isn't infinite either, but after each small depletion of this energy, I felt it becoming only denser and faster. And this is exactly what I need to rejuvenate my parents' bodies. I should gain as much experience and energy as possible.

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