The ruins of Taku were a graveyard of forgotten empires.
Collapsed bridges. Overgrown spires. Giant stone heads, weathered down to jagged silhouettes of kings no one remembered.
And now, they were alive with shadow.
Veilborn filled the hollowed halls like echoes given shape. Some were young, barely more than children. Others were hardened, armored, trained. All of them bore the mark—spirals burned into skin, violet veins running like lightning beneath their flesh.
Garu stood at the highest tower, flanked by his lieutenants.
His cloak whipped in the wind. His voice, amplified by spiritual resonance, rang across the valley.
"You were cast out.Hunted.Feared.Now, you stand in the same halls that kings once ruled from.And when they see us rise, they'll remember who truly inherited the earth—not the benders.Not the sages.But the broken."
Below, the crowd roared.
Above, the sky darkened.
And in the distance, Appa's bellow answered like thunder.
Aang landed first.
Katara, Toph, Zuko, Kyra, and Sokka jumped down behind him. Dozens of eyes turned to face them. Some Veilborn drew their weapons. Others simply watched. Many looked confused.
"Let's be clear," Sokka muttered. "I vote we don't fight an army of trauma-powered super-benders."
"Then we don't fight," Aang said. "Not unless we have to."
Kyra stepped forward. "Let me speak first."
Zuko narrowed his eyes. "You sure that's a good idea?"
She looked back at him—not defensive. Steady.
"No. But it's necessary."
The crowd parted as Kyra walked forward, unarmed. The Veilborn reacted in waves—some bowing, others whispering her name with awe… or doubt.
Garu stepped down from the tower.
He wore layered spiritual armor—threads of obsidian and soulsteel. At his hip, a double-curved blade laced with shadowglass.
They stopped a few feet from each other.
"You've come to stop me," he said plainly.
"I've come to talk," Kyra replied.
Garu tilted his head. "That sounds like you've already forgotten how the world treated us."
"I haven't. I just haven't let it turn me into the very thing that hurt me."
He stepped forward.
"These children?" he said, motioning to the ranks. "They were abandoned. Forgotten. They only learned to use their power because I taught them."
"By turning them into weapons," Kyra said.
"By giving them purpose."
Aang stepped beside Kyra. The air shimmered slightly around him—unstable, drawn toward the emotional weight of the valley.
"You're not helping them," Aang said. "You're repeating the cycle."
Garu's eyes narrowed.
"Coming from the one who let the old cycle keep spinning for decades, that's rich."
The Veilborn murmured.
Aang stood his ground.
"I made mistakes. I let pain hide beneath peace. But I'm not here to erase your truth. I'm here to build something new—with you, not above you."
Kyra turned to the crowd.
"I walked the same path. I burned the world with memory. But memory is a bridge—not a weapon. It shows us what we were. Not what we have to be."
A child Veilborn girl—no older than ten—stepped forward from the ranks. Her eyes flickered violet-blue.
"I don't want to fight," she whispered. "I just want… to breathe without seeing it all again."
Garu looked at her, and for a brief moment, his expression broke. Something old. Something human.
But the moment passed.
He raised his blade.
And the ground trembled.
The first clash was not bending—but emotion.
A wave of spiritual anguish rolled outward from the ruins like an invisible storm. Kyra shielded the team, summoning a dome of muted shadow, soft like smoke.
"I can't hold this forever!" she shouted.
Veilborn began to split—some attacking, some retreating, some falling to their knees in confusion.
Zuko and Toph rushed to intercept a group of aggressive followers, using nonlethal moves to disable and pin them.
Katara spun a ring of water, forming a protective shell around a group of children trying to flee the chaos.
Aang soared skyward.
From above, he saw what the battlefield truly was: not a warzone, but a wound. The whole valley shimmered with broken memories and twisted spiritual energy.
And in the distance—
The clouds cracked.
A scream echoed from the sky.
The Spirit of Pain was coming.
Garu clashed blades with Kyra.
Their shadowbending erupted in a storm of raw memory—his forged through discipline, hers through empathy. Each strike was a conversation between their pasts.
"You think they'll accept your forgiveness?" he growled.
"I don't need them to!" Kyra snapped. "I only need to stop you!"
Their shadows intertwined—then exploded.
Aang landed between them, staff extended.
"Enough!" he shouted.
The ground stilled.
Everyone stopped.
A figure descended from the sky, draped in a cloak of pulsing, flickering emotion. No face. No eyes. Just a mask made of screaming mouths, constantly shifting.
The Spirit of Pain landed gently in the center of the battlefield.
Veilborn fell silent.
Kyra dropped her stance.
Even Garu hesitated.
The spirit raised its arms.
And every person on the field saw their worst memory—at once.
Children wept.
Soldiers screamed.
Sokka fell to his knees, clutching his head. "Make it stop—make it—"
Toph gasped, visionless but feeling the crushing tide of sadness pulsing through the ground.
Aang held fast, one hand glowing with white air, the other pulsing black.
He faced the spirit.
"I know you," he said.
"You're the pain we all carry."
The spirit tilted its head.
Aang stepped forward.
"But we don't carry it alone."
Kyra joined him.
So did Katara. Zuko. Toph. Sokka, trembling but standing.
Even Garu lowered his blade.
The Veilborn moved in.
Not to fight.
To remember together.
Aang reached into the spirit's core—into the billions of echoes—and released his own:
The monks he lost.The friends he failed.The lives he couldn't save.
Kyra added hers.
Then Zuko.
Then all.
And the Spirit of Pain screamed once more—but this time, not with rage.
With release.
It shattered into a rain of starlight.
Silence followed.
Then—breathing.
For the first time in years, the Veilborn could breathe without choking on the past.
Later that night, the ruins were calm.
Small fires burned for warmth, not war.
Veilborn slept peacefully.
Garu stood on the edge of the ruins, arms crossed.
Kyra approached.
"You were wrong," she said softly.
"I know," he replied. "But I meant to protect them."
"You still can."
He nodded once.
"Then let's try."
Behind them, Aang sat quietly, gazing at the stars.
And for the first time in years…
They didn't feel so heavy.
End of Chapter 22
Next Chapter Preview: Chapter 23 – Beneath Still WatersAs the world begins to recover, mysterious tremors beneath the Northern Water Tribe signal a new disturbance. Something sleeps beneath the ice—something that remembers the First Avatar.