Hello and welcome back to another article talking about the lore behind Avatar: the Last Airbender. This release is packed to the brim with tons of fun references and nods to the story of the original show, which many players may not be familiar with! So long as you're okay with spoilers, I'm here to break it all down for you!

Previously (on Avatar), I've covered the lore of season one, aka Book One: Water. You can read those articles here:

• The Lore of Avatar: Book 1, Water - Part 1
• The Lore of Avatar: Book 1, Water - Part 2

With the later seasons, I'm going to be splitting these write-ups into three articles instead of two. They've turned out to be much longer and involved than initially expected, so my hope is this will make them easier to write and get up ASAP.

With that out of the way, let's begin, as Team Avatar starts their adventure anew following the Siege of the North.

Episode 21: The Avatar State

Following the events at the North Pole, a Northern Water Tribe ship drops off Aang, Katara, and Sokka near an Earth Kingdom fort. From there, they're to be taken to Omashu so Aang can learn earthbending from King Bumi. Pakku sees them off, giving Katara water from the Spirit Oasis and Aang scrolls to continue practicing waterbending.

The group makes it to the fort, though upon arrival, the leader - General Fong - stated that he felt Aang was ready to battle the Fire Lord as is. This is due to his marvel at Aang's accomplishments in the North Pole. The goal soon becomes about Fong trying various methods to force Aang to enter the Avatar State, only succeeding by putting Katara in grave danger. In the wake of this experience, Roku appears, and explains what the Avatar State is and how it represents the Avatar at their strongest - and most vulnerable should they be attacked. The group decides to move onward towards Omashu following this disastrous experience.

Simultaneously, Azula - Fire Lord Ozai's daughter and Zuko's sister - is tasked to bring Zuko and Iroh home to face justice for their treacherous behavior at the North Pole. Azula sweet talks Zuko to go with her, that their father wants him back from his banishment. Iroh, wary of this, tells Zuko to be careful. As they move to get on the Fire Nation ship, though, the captain accidentally reveals Azula's deceit, referring to the pair as "prisoners." Zuko and Iroh battle away from the ship with Azula hot on their tails. The two escape and cut off their top-knots to show that they are no longer of the Fire Nation.

Episode 22: The Cave of Two Lovers

The group heads for Omashu and comes across a group of traveling musicians. These musicians tell the group of a secret passage to Omashu through a series of tunnels. While initially hesitant, they find themselves unable to fly over due to Fire Nation forces, and follow the musicians through the caves. As they enter, though, the Fire Nation destroys the entrance, forcing them to continue onwards through the caves.

The group of Team Avatar and the musicians split up to find their way through. Aang and Katara discover the tomb of the two lovers that the musicians speak of in their song and the lore behind the tunnel. Here they learn of how the two were from warring groups and who met in the tunnel secretly, guided out by a secret. They learned earthbending from the badgermoles and, when the man was killed, the woman took revenge - ending the feud between the towns and establishing the city of Omashu.

Aang and Katara use the text from the memorial - "Love is brightest in the dark" - to exit the tunnel, by snuffing out their torch and allowing a natural light of glowing rocks to show them the way out. Sokka and the musicians are guided out by badgermoles. They arrive to Omashu but find it overtaken by the Fire Nation.

As all this happens, Zuko and Iroh remain on the run. They're aided by a young girl after Iroh accidentally brews tea from a poisonous flower, taking it to be something different instead. The girl talks with Zuko about the horrors incurred on her and her loved ones by the Fire Nation, which impacts Zuko. Despite the hospitality of the girl and her family, Zuko and Iroh leave in the dead of night, stealing two of her ostrich-horses in the process. The girl watches them depart, saddened by their actions.

Episode 23: Return to Omashu

With the revelation of the Fire Nation overtaking Omashu, the group sneaks into the city through the sewer system. They're immediately interrogated by Fire Nation soldiers. However, as a result of going through the sewers, Sokka found himself with a small octopus-like Pentapus and pretended to have Pentapox. The group seeks out Bumi, but get caught in a resistance ambush against the Fire Nation noblemen overlooking the city. They attack Aang, but he manages to escape and is saved by the resistance members.

Meanwhile, Azula is starting to seek out help in her pursuit of Zuko and the Avatar. Thus she finds herself at a circus where she connects with her friend Ty Lee - a chi-blocking martial artist noblewoman who left for a simpler life. Azula persuades her to join by pushing her performance to the brink, and they set off to find one last person to join their party. That person is Mai, the daughter of the nobleman overlooking Omashu who helped launch the attack on Aang.

The resistance informs Aang and the group that Bumi gave himself up willingly, and they find themselves with the Fire Nation nobleman's infant son. The resistance members all escape the city by faking Pentapox while Aang seeks to trade the child for Bumi. The trade is set, but when Azula shows up and takes matters into her own hands, she refuses the trade, and they do battle with Katara, Sokka, Ty Lee, and Mai joining in.

Aang manages to get Bumi alone, away from the fight, and Bumi says he did it because an earthbender waits and listens for the right moment to strike. He tells Aang he must seek out an earthbender who meets these qualities and train with them. Bumi then returns to his captivity with him and the rest of the group escaping, but not before returning the child to his family.

Episode 24: The Swamp

This episode is a much more straightforward one. The group flies over a swamp, only to find themselves being pulled in - both by a combination of a spiritual inkling and then a tornado. The group is separated and finds their way through the swamp. As they do so, they're haunted by visions of past, present, and future - often seeing loved ones in the process.

It's not long before they run into the locals of the swamp - a group of hillbilly-like people who live within the swamp. They turn out to be waterbenders and help guide the group toward the direction of the Banyan Grove Tree at the center. There, they're attacked by a huge monster, who turns out to be made of vines with a man inside that is bending the water within said vines.

He tells them of how they're all connected and how the tree is a great example of this connectivity - its roots spanning out far across the world. Aang uses this connection to locate Appa and Momo so they can leave. They mention their visions to the man, who imparts wisdom on them, including that Aang's vision - a young girl with a flying boar - was likely meant to be someone he had yet to meet. The group then heads out to try finding an earthbender to train Aang.

Meanwhile, Zuko and Iroh begin living their lives in hiding by pretending to be common peasants. This irritates Zuko, who is not used to this way of life, humiliated by the way Iroh dances for spare change to get by. At the end of the episode, Zuko dons his Blue Spirit disguise once more, taking matters into his own hands to try living the good life once more.

Episode 25: Avatar Day

This episode mainly serves as a means of providing backstory for one of Aang's past lives that we've not explored much yet: Avatar Kyoshi. The group runs afoul of a Fire Nation group known as the Rough Rhinos - known for riding large Komodo Rhinos. They escape and while getting supplies are told they should check out the Avatar Day festival.

When the group arrives, they're initially excited to see the townspeople celebrating the avatars of the past and present. It's not long before these emotions give way to horror as the avatar statues are burned. It turns out the villagers are angered by the history where Avatar Kyoshi killed their great leader Chin. Katara and Sokka seek to clear Aang's (and Kyoshi's) name or else he'll be sentenced by a kangaroo court from the people in the village.

The two go to Kyoshi island, where the villagers are eager to clear Kyoshi's name. They take Kyoshi's clothing in an attempt to channel the earthbending avatar through Aang. The efforts pay off despite initially doing nothing, but Kyoshi ends up confessing to killing Chin, who was in reality the brutal tyrant Chin the Conqueror. Not willing to succumb to him, Kyoshi split the land and in turn created Kyoshi Island, which in turn killed Chin.

Aang is to be sentenced, but the Rough Riders attack the village. Rather than hurting Aang, they sentence him to community service by dealing with the attackers. He does, and this time the village celebrates the avatar properly.

Episode 26: The Blind Bandit

Aang and the group come to a village where Aang comes across an earthbending school. Aang attempts to take lessons, but struggles immensely. This is both due to his difficulties as an airbender - the opposite of earth - but also finding the teacher's methods ineffective. However, they hear some of the students talking about Earth Rumble, an earthbending wrestling-style event.

The group goes, and finds themselves enamored with the various characters - including the charismatic The Boulder (an obvious riff on The Rock). As The Boulder progresses through the ranks, he has the opportunity to face the champion: the Blind Bandit. Aang, noticing how she waits and listens - as Bumi told him to seek out - takes the amateur challenge to battle her and wins, leaving the Blind Bandit to storm off in a rage.

The group hunts her down, with the flying boar from his vision in the swamp leading them to her home. The flying boar is her family's symbol, and she's revealed to be Toph Beifong - a blind noblewoman. She practices her earthbending in secret, not wanting her parents to know how skilled she is, as she uses her earthbending to see the world around her.

Aang and Toph are captured by the Earth Rumble wrestlers as they believe Toph threw the match to Aang so they could split the winnings. Katara and Sokka agree to pay their ransom, which releases Toph, but they must fight for Aang's freedom. Toph, wanting to get away from her family, runs away with Aang and agrees to teach him earthbending. Toph's family, however, feels that Aang has kidnapped Toph and they hire both the earthbending teacher - Master Yu - and the wrestling organizer - Xin Fu - to retrieve her.

Episode 27: Zuko Alone

As the name of this episode implies, this episode focuses on Zuko and only Zuko. No Aang, Katara or Sokka, no Toph, no Iroh, and no Azula...well mostly. It's all Zuko all the way down.

During one of the previous episodes - Avatar Day - Zuko steals as The Blue Spirit. Iroh chastises him for his deeds, and following a disagreement, Zuko feels it better to go it alone. He takes his ostrich-horse and begins on his solitary journey.

On his own, Zuko struggles. He is assaulted by a group of thuggish Earth Kingdom soldiers as he tries to buy supplies due to them thinking he attacked them. In reality, it was a local kid who threw an egg at them, but who hid out of sight and pinned the blame on Zuko. To make up for this, the kid - named Lee - takes Zuko to stay with his family.

As Zuko stays with the family, he finds himself reflecting on his own past. How he tried to please his grandfather Azulon, how Azula would tease him, and how his mother looked out for him. When Ozai suggested that he should take the throne as Iroh was no longer fit, he was threatened by Azulon to put Zuko to death. Instead, Azulon was killed, with Zuko's mother taking the blame and being banished for it.

Zuko gives Lee a knife that was given to him by Iroh with an inscription that says "never give up without a fight." Lee, however, pulls the knife on the Earth Kingdom soldiers. Zuko attacks them to save Lee, but gives up his identity as a firebender and as the crown prince. This leads to the villagers - including Lee and his family - turning on Zuko. And so, Zuko leaves again, to continue his solemn journey alone.

Paige Smith

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