The following day dawned bright and warm over Grimmauld Place.
For the first time in weeks, the atmosphere throughout the headquarters felt strangely productive rather than fearful.
Not relaxed.
Nobody was relaxed anymore.
Not after learning what Voldemort had become.
But there was purpose.
Direction.
A goal.
Every member of the Order knew exactly what they were working toward.
If Voldemort was growing stronger, then they needed to grow stronger faster.
Simple.
Harry had spent most of the morning in the training chamber.
Sweat dripped from his forehead as he landed lightly on the reinforced floor.
The session had started before sunrise.
Hours later he was finally winding down.
Around him the chamber bore the evidence of another intense workout.
Scorch marks covered sections of the walls.
Chunks of stone lay scattered where earthbending practice had shattered targets.
Several craters marked the floor from ki-enhanced sparring.
Harry exhaled slowly.
His tail flicked behind him.
Not agitated this time.
Content.
Training always helped clear his head.
Especially recently.
Ever since seeing Voldemort's memories, a knot of tension had settled somewhere deep in his chest.
The Dark Lord had become something far more dangerous than before.
That fact wasn't going away.
But sitting around worrying wouldn't help anyone.
Getting stronger would.
Harry grabbed a towel and headed upstairs.
Lunch was already being served.
The dining room was packed.
Members of the Order filled nearly every chair.
The Weasleys occupied one side of the table.
Kingsley and Tonks were discussing patrol reports.
Moody appeared to be criticizing everyone's training simultaneously.
An impressive feat.
Dumbledore sat at the head of the table listening quietly.
Vale and Amelia were reviewing several documents together.
Harry slid into an empty chair between Ron and Hermione.
Immediately a plate appeared in front of him.
Mrs Weasley had somehow developed the ability to know exactly when someone needed feeding.
Harry suspected it might actually be a supernatural gift.
"Morning," Ron said.
"It's lunchtime."
"Exactly."
Harry rolled his eyes.
Across the table Fred pointed a fork at him.
"You missed George trying to fly through a window."
"I did not."
"You absolutely did."
George looked offended.
"The window moved."
"It was closed."
"Exactly."
Laughter rippled around the table.
For a few minutes conversation remained light.
Then eventually training became the main topic again.
It always did these days.
"Bill managed a sustained hover this morning," Charlie said.
Bill looked pleased.
"Nearly three minutes."
"Then he crashed into a tree."
"One tree."
"The same tree three times."
The room laughed again.
Amelia shook her head.
"I never thought I'd see Aurors voluntarily learning something from a teenager."
"To be fair," Kingsley replied, "most teenagers haven't defeated Voldemort, fought aliens, battled gods and accidentally become royalty several times."
Harry buried his face in his hands.
Across the table Sirius grinned.
"Fair point."
The conversation gradually shifted.
From training.
To strategy.
To Voldemort.
The mood immediately became more serious.
"What do you think he's doing?" Remus asked quietly.
Nobody needed clarification.
Everyone knew who he meant.
Snape folded his arms.
"Research."
"Obsessively."
"He always has."
Dumbledore nodded.
"Tom fears weakness."
"Particularly his own."
"He will be seeking ways to master whatever abilities he acquired."
Kingsley frowned.
"And potential targets?"
The room became thoughtful.
Several possibilities were discussed.
Ministry officials.
Ancient magical sites.
Hidden repositories of knowledge.
Former Death Eaters who had fallen out of favour.
Harry listened more than he spoke.
His instincts told him Voldemort wouldn't rush.
Not yet.
The Dark Lord would spend time understanding his new abilities first.
That made him more dangerous.
Not less.
Eventually the discussion slowed.
People returned to eating.
For several minutes only the sounds of cutlery and quiet conversation filled the room.
Then Susan Bones spoke.
"Harry?"
Harry glanced up.
"Yeah?"
She hesitated.
Then asked the question.
"Do you know when you're going back to Avatar?"
The entire room fell silent.
Instantly.
Forks stopped moving.
Conversations died.
Even Moody looked interested.
Everyone turned toward Harry.
Waiting.
Listening.
Hoping.
After all, every journey Harry undertook seemed to bring back something useful.
Knowledge.
Power.
Experience.
Perhaps Avatar would provide the edge they needed.
Harry finished chewing.
Swallowed.
Took a sip of water.
Then stood up.
"Now."
Silence.
Absolute silence.
Susan blinked.
"What?"
Harry smiled faintly.
"Now."
Several people nearly choked.
Ron dropped his fork.
Hermione's eyes widened.
Sirius actually swore.
Mrs Weasley looked torn between concern and excitement.
Vale recovered first.
"How do you know?"
Harry shrugged.
"The feeling."
That earned understanding from those who had witnessed previous journeys.
Over the years there had always been signs.
The calling.
The visions.
The whispers.
The certainty.
When it happened,
Harry simply knew.
Dumbledore studied him carefully.
Then nodded.
"Then it is time."
Harry nodded back.
No dramatic speeches were needed.
Everyone understood.
Another journey was beginning.
One by one people offered their farewells.
"Good luck."
"Try not to start any wars."
"Or end any accidentally."
"Learn something useful."
"Come back alive."
Harry smiled at each one.
Eventually Sirius pulled him into a quick hug.
"See you soon."
Remus clasped his shoulder.
"Take care of yourself."
Harry nodded.
"I'll try."
Then he turned and headed upstairs.
The house seemed unusually quiet.
Every step felt familiar.
Expected.
This had happened enough times now that fear no longer accompanied it.
Curiosity did.
Excitement.
Maybe a little nervousness.
But not fear.
Harry reached his room.
Opened the door.
Stepped inside.
The afternoon sunlight streamed through the window.
Dust danced in the beams.
His bed waited exactly where he had left it.
Simple.
Ordinary.
For a moment Harry stood there.
Thinking.
Remembering.
Pandora.
Narnia.
Hogwarts Legacy.
Dragon Ball.
Avatar.
So many lives.
So many worlds.
And yet each one had somehow become part of him.
Part of who he was.
Harry Potter.
Saiyan.
Na'vi.
King.
Warrior.
Wizard.
Bender.
Friend.
Brother.
All of it.
He smiled softly.
Then lay down.
Closed his eyes.
And surrendered to sleep.
The transition felt familiar.
Light.
Warmth.
Movement.
Voices in the distance.
A breeze against his skin.
Harry opened his eyes.
Blue sky stretched above him.
Bright.
Clear.
Beautiful.
The scent of the ocean filled the air.
Salt.
Ice.
Snow.
Home.
For a brief moment he simply stared upward.
Listening.
Waves crashing against frozen shores.
Children laughing somewhere nearby.
The distant cries of seabirds.
Then memories settled into place.
Recognition.
Understanding.
The morning after his previous departure.
Exactly where he had left.
Exactly when he had left.
Harry sat up slowly.
The familiar fur-lined clothing of the Southern Water Tribe covered his body.
His hands were larger.
Older.
The body of the twenty-four-year-old warrior returned once more.
Nearby he heard footsteps.
Then a familiar voice.
"You're up early."
Harry turned.
Katara stood there holding a waterskin.
Young.
Determined.
Stubborn.
His little sister.
The sight brought an unexpected smile to his face.
Katara frowned.
"What's that look for?"
Harry chuckled.
"Nothing."
"You're being weird."
"Says the girl who talks to water."
Katara immediately threw a small splash at him.
Harry caught it effortlessly.
The water spun around his hand.
Then returned to her waterskin.
She grinned.
"There he is."
Harry stood.
Stretching slightly.
Looking out across the village.
Beyond it.
Toward the horizon.
Toward the future.
Toward Team Avatar's next journey.
Somewhere far away a war continued.
A war that would shape the fate of the entire world.
And this time,
Harry would be there from the beginning.
The eldest brother of the Southern Water Tribe.
The blade that stood beside the heart and the strategist.
The protector of Team Avatar.
And as the morning sun rose over the frozen ocean, Harry knew one thing with absolute certainty.
His next adventure had finally begun.
After speaking with Paku about instructions Harry, Sokka, Katara and Aang set off on their mission to find Aang an earthbending master. Aang and his friends travel to an Earth Kingdom base from which they are to be escorted to Omashu, where Aang intends for King Bumi to teach him earthbending. At the base, General Fong suggests that Aang can defeat the Fire Lord and end the war immediately by using the Avatar State. After many failed attempts, General Fong finally succeeds in triggering the Avatar State by faking Katara's death, which leads to Aang nearly destroying the base in rage. The spirit of Avatar Roku warns Aang that the Avatar State is a defense mechanism that empowers Aang with the skills and knowledge of all his past lives, though there is a catch: if he is killed in the Avatar State, the reincarnation cycle will be broken, causing the Avatar to cease to exist. The group decides to travel to Omashu alone. Meanwhile, Zuko and Iroh are visited by Zuko's younger sister Azula, who comes bearing a message from Ozai requesting their return home. The captain accidentally reveals the summons is a ruse in order to imprison them as traitors. Iroh and Zuko manage to escape, but are forced to become fugitives and cut off their topknots. While on the way to Omashu, Aang and the group meet a group of carefree traveling bards, who take them through a vast labyrinth of tunnels known as the Cave of Two Lovers. Zuko and Iroh are sheltered by kind villagers after Iroh accidentally drinks tea made of a poisonous plant. Song, a young and compassionate healer, shows Zuko the effects of war from a normal citizen's perspective. The group is separated in the tunnels by a cave-in, with Aang and Katara growing closer as they discover the origins of the cave, which includes the tombs of the first two earthbenders, who are the namesake of Omashu. Their torch burns out, plunging them into darkness and seemingly resulting in a kiss. Glowing lights are revealed in the ceiling, allowing the group to escape and make it to Omashu, which they discover has been conquered by the Fire Nation. Aang and his friends sneak into Omashu to find Bumi, with Sokka faking a deadly illness to scare off the guards. They meet a resistance movement who tells them that King Bumi surrendered on the day of the invasion. Meanwhile, Princess Azula decides that in order to catch Zuko and Iroh, she needs to stop traveling with the royal procession in favor of "a small, elite team." Aang Katara and Sokka help the city's entire population escape by faking an epidemic of Sokka's invented sickness Pentapox. The Fire Nation governor's toddler son Tom-Tom accidentally leaves with the citizens, mistaken for a kidnapping. The governor attempts to trade Tom-Tom for King Bumi, but Azula calls off the trade; she is now backed up by her childhood friends Mai, Tom-Tom's older sister, and Ty Lee, both skilled fighters. Aang manages to rescue Bumi after a fight with Azula, but Bumi refuses to leave, saying that the proper time for his escape has not arrived. He instructs Aang to find an earthbending teacher who "waits and listens before striking". Azula, Mai and Ty Lee set out on their mission, having now added Aang as their third target, while Aang returns Tom-Tom to his parents. While flying, Aang and his friends are attracted to a mysterious swamp and are separated from one another. They begin to see unique illusions in the swamp: Harry sees his parents and death smiling at him, Sokka sees Princess Yue, Katara sees her late mother, and Aang sees a mysterious giggling girl and a flying boar. They are reunited and attacked by a swamp monster who turns out to be a wise man from a tribe of swamp waterbenders who use the moisture inside the swamp's plants to manipulate the plants and hide their identities. He explains that all beings in the world are connected much like the swamp, as the swamp is a single large tree, and the visions are of people they have met or will meet, believing that time and death are illusions. Meanwhile Zuko, disgusted with having to live as a beggar, dons the mask of the Blue Spirit once again. Aang and friends stumble upon a town celebrating an Anti-Avatar Day. The villagers blame Avatar Kyoshi, one of Aang's previous incarnations, for killing their leader, Chin the Great. Aang reveals his identity and is arrested for Kyoshi's supposed crimes. Zuko disguises himself as the Blue Spirit to steal food for himself and his uncle. Iroh is not happy with what Zuko is doing, and Zuko decides it is best that they part ways. Katara and Sokka investigate and find evidence that seems to support Kyoshi's innocence. However, at Aang's trial, Kyoshi's spirit appears and recounts the events that led to Chin the Great's death: a "horrible tyrant", he was confronted by Kyoshi defending her home, who ultimately split Kyoshi Island from the mainland herself, causing Chin to die from a fall when he refused to back away from the cliff Kyoshi created. Aang is convicted but subsequently pardoned after he and Harry defeat a group of Fire Nation soldiers attacking the village, and the town changes the anti-Avatar celebration to a pro-Avatar celebration. Aang is still searching for an earthbending teacher, but with little success. At an underground earthbending tournament, the group witnesses a fighter named The Boulder defeat most of the other fighters but then is bested by a young girl named "The Blind Bandit", whom Aang recognizes as the girl from his vision in the swamp. She uses earthbending to sense her environment, perceiving the lay of the land around her; fitting Bumi's advice that Aang's earthbending instructor should be someone who "waits and listens before striking." Aang tells two earthbending students about his vision in the swamp of a girl with a flying boar, who tell him that a flying boar is the symbol of the wealthy Beifong family. Aang, Katara, and Sokka find the girl, Toph, at her estate, but she cannot become Aang's teacher due to her overprotective parents, who only allow local earthbending teacher Master Yu to teach her moves well below her skill level. The tournament's host Xin Fu and several earthbending fighters kidnap Aang and Toph, thinking they collaborated to cheat the other fighters out of the prize money. Toph reveals her power by defeating Xin Fu's gang singlehandedly, but her parents become even more restrictive. She runs away from home and joins the group. Toph's father, believing Aang has kidnapped her, promise Xin Fu and Master Yu a chest of gold if they bring her back.
After leaving Iroh, Zuko continues his journey through an Earth Kingdom town where a young boy named Lee befriends him. Zuko remembers his childhood, including Azula's chilling and callous behavior towards the death of Iroh's only child Lu Ten and his own perseverance through lack of support from his father. Finally he recalls his mother's last words of encouragement to him, followed by the announcement that his grandfather Azulon has died and his mother has suddenly disappeared. Ozai became the new Fire Lord in accordance with Azulon's supposed dying wish. Lee is kidnapped by abusive Earth Kingdom soldiers after pulling a knife that Zuko gave him. While saving Lee, Zuko inadvertently reveals his identity as the prince of the Fire Nation. Lee, his family, and the townspeople furiously turn against him because of it. Aang and his friends are relentlessly chased by Azula, Mai, and Ty Lee, which makes it impossible for the group to stop and sleep. The lack of sleep makes everyone irritable, and fuels a quarrel between Katara and Toph. Toph realizes they are being tracked by means of Appa's shed fur. Aang lashes out at Toph for criticizing Appa, causing Toph to leave the group. Aang takes some of Appa's fur to act as a decoy to lure their pursuers away from Katara and Sokka, but he is found by Azula in an abandoned village. Toph meanwhile runs into Iroh, who reminds her that it is not a sign of weakness to accept help from others the way she believes. He also reveals that he is tracking his nephew, trying to let him discover his own path. Aang battles Azula and later Zuko, but is joined by his friends just in time, as well as by Iroh. Azula feigns surrender when she is cornered six-on-one, but wounds Iroh and utilizes the ensuing chaos to escape. Katara and the group offer to help Zuko, but he furiously rebuffs them and lashes out at them to leave. The group finally get some much-needed sleep as Zuko tends to his severely-wounded uncle. Aang begins his earthbending training with Toph, but grows frustrated when he encounters difficulty with earth, the natural opposite of air. Aang's inclination towards agility and evasion puts him at a disadvantage with earthbending, which requires a more direct, resolute form of combat. Elsewhere, Zuko struggles with a similar dilemma as Iroh tries to teach him lightning-bending, an advanced form of firebending; Zuko's anger keeps him from having the cold precision lightning-bending requires. When Sokka is endangered by a saber-toothed Moose-Lion, Aang is able to save him by firmly standing his ground as an earthbender would, leading to his first successful try at earthbending. After being taught by Iroh the significance of drawing wisdom from all four nations, much like the Avatar, Zuko claims he's ready to try and re-direct real lightning, a technique Iroh invented by studying the waterbenders. Iroh staunchly refuses, with Zuko resorting to standing on a mountaintop during a storm while tearfully screaming at the heavens to strike him like they have in the past. Sokka decides the group needs some intelligence to defeat the Fire Nation. At an oasis, the group encounters Professor Zei from Ba Sing Se University, who tells them of Wan Shi Tong's library in the Si Wong desert, said to contain a vast collection of knowledge. The professor and the group eventually locate the library nearly buried, but intact inside. Toph refuses to descend with the others and stays outside with Appa. Wan Shi Tong, a large spirit owl, tells the group that humans are no longer permitted in the library, as they only seek knowledge to gain an advantage over other humans. The group convinces him otherwise, and begin searching for information. Sokka discovers a crucial weakness of the Fire Nation that could end the war: an upcoming solar eclipse will prevent firebending for its duration. Wan Shi Tong catches them in their lie and refuses to allow them to leave with the knowledge. He begins sinking the library before chasing the group. Outside, while Toph is busy keeping the library afloat, Appa is kidnapped by a gang of sandbenders. As Professor Zei stays behind, too fascinated by the knowledge in the sinking library, the others escape but Aang is devastated by the loss of Appa.