Chapter 57: Crescent Island – The Forgotten Avatar
Roku crossed his arms within his robes, silent, waiting.
Zuko pressed forward. "For weeks now… I've been having episodes. Moments where I wake up in… a place. A void. Black. No earth. No sky. Nothing but silence. And in there, I met someone. A man. Middle-aged. An airbender with tattoos, but not like Aang. Not like you. His robes were a chaos of colors, patched from every nation. Fire, water, earth, air… even armor."
Roku's brow furrowed.
"He wielded a staff. Not a glider like Aang's, sharper. Ancient. He spoke like… like he'd been alive since before the sky learned how to thunder. He asked me questions, about the year, about who ruled, about someone named Raya."
The name hung heavy in the clouded air.
Roku's lips parted slightly. "Raya…" he repeated, as though tasting the syllables of a fruit he hadn't eaten in centuries. "That is a name I have not heard."
"He knew Wan," Zuko pressed, voice sharp. "He asked me if I knew the first Avatar. And when I answered, he tested me. He pushed me out of that abyss, like I wasn't ready to hear more. But he knew. He knew Raava. He knew everything."
Roku's stern mask flickered. "That cannot be."
"It is," Zuko cut in. "I've seen him more than once. He knew I wasn't from here. He called me a foreign soul. He said someone pulled me into this universe."
Silence. Clouds shifted. Roku's expression was grave, unreadable.
Before Zuko could continue, a sudden rush of wind swirled the mists, tugging at his robes. A second figure burst through, stumbling slightly before finding his footing.
"Aang," Roku said.
The boy looked around wildly, staff in hand, until his eyes fell upon Roku and Zuko, or rather Victor's form. His recognition was immediate.
"Zuko?!" Aang blinked, stunned. "That's… you right?"
Zuko grimaced. "Don't start. We don't have time."
Aang turned to Roku, desperation in his voice. "I've seen him too. The man in the black void. He called me a vessel. Said I'd ruin his return. He shoved me out before I could ask more."
Roku's eyes widened slightly, not in recognition, but in unease. "You both…"
Zuko leaned forward, voice like steel. "You don't know him, do you?"
"No," Roku admitted quietly. "The Spirit World is vast. Older than any Avatar. Older than even Raava's bond. I have known of spirits forgotten by time… but this…"
Zuko's lips curled in a thin smile. "Exactly. Not even you know. But I do."
Aang flinched at the name. "He never told me his name."
"Because I'm not bound by the river of time like you are," Zuko snapped. His fists trembled. "I remember things. I've seen things. He knew Wan. And he asked about Raya. Tell me, Roku. Who is she? A lost Avatar? A forgotten one?"
Roku's gaze turned to the shifting horizon, as if trying to pull memory from mist. "Raya… I recall the name only faintly. Not as an Avatar. Perhaps a spirit. Perhaps more. There are gaps, even in my knowledge. But the way you speak…"
"She was real," Zuko said, almost growling. "And she mattered. He asked about her like she was alive."
Aang looked between them, wide-eyed. "Roku… if he knew Wan, then that means…"
"It means nothing good," Roku cut sharply, though the calm in his voice couldn't hide the unease. "Wan existed nearly ten thousand years ago. No being should survive from that age into ours."
"And yet he has," Zuko countered, his tone relentless. "Not only survived, he knows me. He called me foreign. He knows I don't belong."
Roku studied him closely. "And perhaps that is why you were drawn into this world. Not by accident, but by design."
Aang's breath caught. "Then… then who pulled him here?"
Zuko's jaw tightened. He looked away. "That's what I want to know."
The three stood in silence for a long while, clouds curling around them.
Finally, Roku spoke again, slow and heavy:
"Be careful, both of you. There are secrets buried deeper than even the Avatar Spirit can reach. The mysterious man… Raya… if they are stirring now, then something long forgotten is pressing against the veil of our world. And neither of you are ready for it."
Zuko's eyes narrowed. "Then make me ready."
The clouds rippled.
A cold wind swept across the endless sky, tugging at their robes. Zuko stiffened immediately, the hair at the back of his neck rising. Aang gripped his staff tighter, eyes darting to the horizon. Roku's composure faltered for the first time, his gaze narrowing as though he, too, felt the disturbance pressing into this space.
Then she appeared.
Out of the curling mist stepped a woman, her gait slow but unshaken, her back straight as though she carried the weight of centuries with her posture alone. She was dressed in traditional water tribe furs, dyed deep blue and stitched with white patterns of waves and moons. But her face… her face betrayed her age. Wrinkles carved like frozen rivers across her cheeks, her hair a silver-white braid that fell over her shoulder. She looked no younger than seventy, perhaps older, yet her eyes burned sharp and piercing, like shards of ice that had never melted.
"Who are you?" Zuko demanded at once, his voice sharp, his stance braced.
Her eyes cut to him with disdain. "Shut up, foreigner."
The word slammed against him, heavier than expected. Not "boy." Not "prince." Not "Zuko." Foreigner. She knew.
Her gaze lingered only briefly on him before sweeping over Aang and Roku. "The man you speak of," she said slowly, her tone harsh and brittle like ice cracking on a lake, "is very dangerous. I advise the two of you to stay away from him."
Zuko's lips pulled into a scowl, but she ignored it.
"There is a reason you know nothing of him. Because I made sure his legacy was erased. Do not speak to him again. Do not return to that place where he is bound. To even brush against it is to risk the wrath of something you stand no chance against."
Roku's brow furrowed deeply. His voice carried its usual calm, but there was steel beneath it. "Is this man truly so powerful?"
The woman's expression hardened, and she shook her head. "Yogan is not the problem."
Zuko stepped forward, eyes narrowed upon hearing the name. "Then what is?"
Her sharp gaze snapped to him again, cutting through him as though he were glass. "The one who trapped him there. That is the true danger."
Zuko's fists clenched. "And why," his voice cut sharp, relentless, "why was his legacy erased? By you?"
For the first time, her lips pressed thin, annoyed. Not shaken. Not ashamed. Just irritated at his persistence.
"I'm not playing word games with you, old woman," Zuko growled. "Answer my damn questions."
That was when she turned to him fully. The wrinkles and the years did nothing to soften her glare. Her presence was suffocating, towering, as if the very Spirit World bent to acknowledge her authority.
"I am Avatar Raya," she declared.
The air seemed to still. Even the rolling clouds hesitated. Aang gasped, wide-eyed, stepping back. Roku's eyes narrowed with shock, his composure faltering.
"The one who erased Yogan," Raya continued, voice like a storm pulling through frozen seas. "Not the one who trapped him. But I am the reason no history remembers him. His name, his deeds, his legacy, all cast into silence by my will. And it will remain that way."
Her eyes locked onto Zuko, onto Victor, standing here in his true form. Her voice grew sharper, colder. "I am warning you, foreigner. Stay away from Yogan. Trust me when I say, he is not someone you should entangle yourself with. You meddle in forces you do not understand, and will not survive."
Zuko's teeth ground together, but he held her gaze. His bloodied face twisted into a stubborn sneer.
"You think I'll just walk away just because some ancient Avatar said so?" he spat.
Her lips curved into the faintest shadow of a smirk, not of amusement, but of condescension. "You are reckless. Arrogant. And foreign. You do not belong to this cycle. You are already an anomaly."
Aang stepped forward, confusion and desperation on his face. "But if you're really an Avatar, then why hide this? Why erase him? Why keep us blind?"
Raya's head turned, her old eyes softening for the briefest heartbeat. "Because knowledge of Yogan invites ruin. His name alone is enough to summon curiosity. And curiosity… leads to doors that should remain closed."
Her stare returned to Zuko, cold once more. "You should know that better than anyone, foreigner. Your kind never know when to stop."
"Then why appear at all?" Zuko snapped. "Why come here if not to answer?"
"Because I had to warn you," she said simply. "Walk away. End the war. Play your part in this world. That is all. Do not seek Yogan. Do not seek his prison. Do nothing" her eyes narrowed "… not speaking his name again."
She drew closer, her presence towering though she was small and bent with age. The clouds seemed to draw away from her, the air chilled with her words. "Focus on ending the war. That is your place. Isn't that right… foreigner?"
The way she said it this time felt like venom. A blade pressed to his throat.
Then, without another word, her body shimmered. Her furs rippled as if made of water, her braid unwound into mist, and her entire form dissipated into the smoke and clouds. Gone. As if she had never been there at all.
The silence that followed was crushing.
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