Greetings, internet! I'm back uploading yet another story that I really shouldn't when I've got several others that I need to be working on. Welp, once again I said to hell with it and decided to put it up.

I do not, in any way, shape, or form own Legend of Korra.

Life is like a road. It has it's ups and downs, it's pot holes, it's crossroads. Sometimes you travel alone, sometimes with companions at your side. Most people prefer to have a few companions in their life. A spouse, a lover, a good friend or two. But when you've walked it as long as I have, the road known as life can make you weary and lonely, no matter how many companions you may have.

My name is Ryou, and there is something highly unusual about me. You see, my body, aside from a few scars here and there, is the same as it was when I turned twenty.

Four hundred and sixty six years ago.

That's right, I'm four hundred and eighty six years old. I've lived a very long and active life, and I must say, I look damn good for being almost five hundred. But my life wasn't always like this. In fact, I had a fairly quiet childhood.

I grew up in a small village on the Katso Peninsula in the southern Earth Kingdom. Like my father and grandfather before me, I became a fisherman when I turned seventeen. For three years, all I ever knew was the nets and the boat I worked on. Like everyone else, we fished for the elephant coy that lived in the waters off shore. It was dangerous work, but it payed well.

Then came my twentieth birthday, and my life changed forever. For half that day, the crew and I battled what we thought was particularity feisty elephant coy. By the time all was said and done, the boat was a wreck on the ocean floor due to the damage done to it's hull, but the we'd managed to beach the creature responsible and get it ashore.

It wasn't an elephant coy like we thought, but rather a Ningyo. A creature the head of a monkey and the body of a huge goldfish. It's also so rare that even the most superstitious fishermen had dismissed it as legend. Now tradition held that if a boat was lost to a catch, the crew was allowed to eat the catch as a form of revenge of sorts. Several of the older fishermen demanded that we throw the creature back, claiming that catching a Ningyo brought bad luck.

But I was young, and brash. I dismissed the warnings as more superstition, cut myself a section of meat and went home. I cooked it up and ate it for my evening meal and went to bed quite satisfied with a belly full of food. The next day, I awoke to discover that bad luck had not, in fact, descended upon me like it was warned. In fact, quite the opposite happened.

That was the day I met Kyoshi.

I was in the Market, looking for a new job when I first saw her. She stood out, being an incredibly tall and well built young woman. The fact that she was the only woman in the Market wearing armor didn't help matters. But she walked with her head held high, ignoring the stunned and even disapproving looks being sent her way. She was breaking almost every aspect of the traditional way women dressed, and it was pretty evident that she didn't care.

Looking back now, I'm not really surprised. Kyoshi was never one for blending in, and this was before she wore the makeup and head band. Still, I found myself drawn to her in a way I can't explain. I followed her for a short distance, hoping to muster enough courage to talk to her.

She wound up beating the tar out of a drunken dock hand who tried forcing himself on a teenage girl. After leaving the man in a pool of his own blood and piss, Kyoshi offered to teach her how to defend herself so she would never have to fear anyone again. The girl, Lily happily accepted. I remember her well. She was Kyoshi's first student, and years later she would become the first Lieutenant of the Kyoshi Warriors.

After that, I finally mustered the courage to talk to her. We hit off pretty well, becoming fast friends. I was surprised to learn that she was the Avatar. She had just finished her firebending training, and making a quick stop home as she headed to the Air Temples to learn airbending.

Before she left, Kyoshi convinced to me to join the Katso Guard, our home providence's defense militia. She said that my life was being wasted as a fisherman, that she saw both the heart of a warrior and a good man in me. I joined the Guard, and was trained in the way of the sword. I quickly rose through the ranks, becoming a commander within a few short years.

It was many years before I saw Kyoshi again, and this time it wasn't under good circumstances. A warlord named Chin the Conqueror emerged from the north and began to sweep across the Kingdom. The Army of the Earth King retreated behind the high walls of Ba Sing Se, leaving the Providences to fend for themselves.

One by one, the Providences fell to Chin, until Katso was the only free place left. The Guard marched out to meet them, prepared to fight to the death in order to protect our home. To our surprise, we weren't the first ones out there on the neck of the peninsula to meet Chin. Kyoshi, now a fully realized Avatar, faced down his army by herself. Rather then use her power to destroy the invaders, she severed the peninsula from the mainland and created an Island.

Chin fell to his death from a cliff, and his army disbanded shortly afterward. Kyoshi was hailed as a hero, and the new island was renamed after her in her honor. Although her duties as the Avatar called her away from time to time, she remained on the island. She began to train the Kyoshi Warriors in earnest, building them into a formidable force.

Despite this, there were still some lingering prejudices in the Guard ranks, so she turned to me to train them in the way of the sword. I happily took the job, leaving the Guard behind and becoming an unofficial commander in the Warrior's ranks. From there, our relationship grew, and our daughter Koko was born a few years later.

It wasn't until my forty fifth birthday that I started to realize that something wasn't right. Everyone around me was beginning to show the signs and effects of growing older, while I remained as youthful as ever. For a while, I dismissed it as the fruits of having an active life and healthy diet. But as I entered my sixties, and then seventies, I knew that whatever was happening wasn't natural.

As curious as I was, I wasn't about to leave my family to go wandering the world in search of an answer. Years passed, and friends passed away from old age. Not even my beloved Kyoshi could stave off time forever. She gave it one hell of a fight though, lasting until the ripe age of two hundred and twenty six before time finally won out. I oversaw the transfer of power to Koko before leaving to travel the world and maybe find out why time seemed to ignore me.

Eventually I learned more about the creature I had fought on my twentieth birthday. According to legend, eating the flesh of a Ningyo will bless (or curse, depending on your point of view) a person with agelessness. Unless felled in battle, I would continue to walk the Earth as if not a day had passed, while those around me would age and die.

After several years of wandering aimlessly, I met the next Avatar; Roku. He was really nothing like Kyoshi was. He came from nobility, while Kyoshi had been born dirt pour. But we became good friends all the same. Roku was a good man, and a fair Avatar. I was deeply saddened when I learned of his death on his small island in the Fire Nation.

I decided to go looking for the next Avatar, and offer my services in training he or she in a defense art that didn't involve one of the bending elements. Seeing as the next Avatar would be an Air Nomad, I set out to locate the Air Temples. One by one, over the course of twelve years I found them, hidden away in extreme places in the four corners of the Earth. Finally, I learned of his identity. It was a boy named Aang who lived at the Southern Temple.

But fate is a cruel mistress. As I was journeying there, Fire Lord Sozin enacted his genocide and wiped out the Temples. For a few years afterward, I clung to the hope that Aang had somehow survived. And when that seemed like it wasn't the case, I turned to the Water Tribes in hopes of finding the next incarnation. For a decade I scoured both the Northern and Southern Tribes, but to no avail. I began to lose hope, so I threw myself into the war between the Fire Nation and the rest of the world.

For a hundred years I fought, hoping to find death on the end of a spear or sword. But clash after clash, battle after battle, siege after siege, no matter how many times I entered the fray, death spared me again and again. By the time the final year of the war arrived, I had grown suicidal in my battles. But then, something happened that restored my hope.

The Avatar returned.

It turns out that Aang had managed to escape the Air Nomad Genocide, and had spent these past hundred years frozen in an iceberg. He had gathered a group of friends and was working to stop the Fire Lord. By the time news reached me of Aang's return, the Fire Nation had already captured Ba Sing Se and any remaining holdouts were fighting a desperate resistance. I made my way to the Capital, and joined the Order of the White Lotus in their liberation of the city.

After the war ended, I helped Aang and the new Fire Lord, Zuko, restore peace and establish a new nation out of the Fire Nation colonies. We built the capital of this new nation on the shores of a bay near the city of Taku. It didn't take long for Republic City to blossom from a small settlement into a full blown metropolis.

Time passed, and eventually I found myself wandering again. Four years ago, I got word that Aang had passed away. I was saddened by my long time friend's passing, but it was time to start the search all over again. Recently, I heard that the Avatar had been found again, this time in the form of a young girl in the Southern Water Tribe.

There was only one way to see if the roamers were true or not.

White Lotus Compound. South Pole.

A light snow fell from a dull gray sky. Katara stood watching the flakes lightly float to the ground. The aged waterbending master took a moment to reflect all she had accomplished in her life, all the ups and downs. She'd traveled the world, taught the Avatar waterbending, and raised a family, just to name a few things.

Then, four years ago, her husband Aang had passed away. Katara grieved heavily for him, which was helped when her daughter Kya returned. After a while, she'd managed to accept Aang's death. She still missed him dearly, but she found some solace in her new task in life: training the next Avatar.

In front of her, a four year old girl ran through the snow, laughing as she chased the polar bear dog pup. Katara smiled at the sight of the girl. She was wearing a dark blue parka that was about two sizes too big and hung off of her like a dress. Tripping, the girl landed face down in the snow, but was back up on her feet in a flash like nothing had ever happened.

The sound of shouting turned Katara's attention away from the girl to the gates of the compound. Several White Lotus guards were standing around a lone figure, all of them poised to attack. Curious, she made her way over to the commotion. The figure, a man, was wearing a charcoal gray coat with its hood up. A scarf covered his nose and mouth, leaving only his eyes visible. A pack of supplies was slung over his shoulder, and a black katana rested on his hip.

"What's going on here?" she asked.

"Master, this man was trying to enter the Compound without proper clearance," one of the Sentries answered. Katara studied the man in more detail. He reached up and pulled the scarf down, reveling his face. His face was had a tan complexion, suggesting a possible Water Tribe ancestry. Although his face suggested that he was no older then twenty, his eyes said that he was much older.

"Hello, Katara," he said, giving a small smile and a respectful bow of his head. Katara returned the smile.

"It's okay. This man is a friend," she said. The Sentries stood down, but remained tense. He strode forward and embraced Katara in a hug, and she happily returned it.

"It's good to see you Ryou," she said when they pulled back.

"You as well. You look good, Katara."

"Not like you. You haven't aged a day, I'm jealous." Ryou snorted at that. The Sentries stole glances at each other with confusion. There was obviously some kind of inside joke there.

"I'm guessing this isn't a social call," Katara said as they began to walk, her voice containing a hint of seriousness. Ryou nodded.

"I heard roamers that 'the one' had been found. If you're here, I'm guessing they're true," he said. Katara gave another smile to her old friend before she turned toward the girl and the polar bear dog pup.

"Korra, please come here for a moment," she called. The girl, Korra, slid to a halt and turned her head toward the waterbending master. She looked back at her pet for a moment before trotting over.

"What is it, Master Katara?" she asked got close.

"There is someone I want you to meet. Korra, this is Ryou." Ryou bowed his head slightly out of respect.

"Hello," he said pleasantly. Korra cocked her head to the side, the small pony tails that dangled down the side of her head falling out of the hood she had up.

"You look familiar, have you been here before?" she asked.

"Ryou was a good friend of Aang's," Katara explained.

"Oh. Well, hello again. Sorry for not remembering you fully," Korra said. Ryou smiled at the girl.

"That is okay, little one. You are a whole new person now, after all," he said.

"You can go back to playing now," Katara said. Korra broke into a grin and sprinted back toward her polar bear dog. Both of them watched her go in silence.

"She's only four, Ryou. She's still to young for training," Katara said.

"I have no intention of teaching her this early. The whole point of this visit was to see old friends," he said before casting a glance toward the girl, "all of them."

"She knows about Aang. Do you want me to tell her about the others as well?"

"No. I will do that when the time comes. The world is a very complex place. For now, let her have some innocence," Ryou said.

"Will you stay?" Katara asked. Silence fell between the two as he pondered his answer.

"For the night. I was filled in on this group that tried to kidnap her. I'm headed to the Earth Kingdom to track down a few leads."

"You never stay in one place for very long," Katara commented, a hint of sadness in her voice. Ryou remained silent as he watched the girl continue to play as if they weren't even there. Even now, as a small child, he could already tell that she was different from her predecessors. The cycle of the Avatar, like the cycle of the seasons, had began anew. And like he was facing the new year, Ryou couldn't help but wonder what this new Avatar had in store for the world.

And done. I had this idea bouncing around in my head and figured I had to get it out. Hopefully you guys found it enjoyable. Drop a review, leave a pm, let me know what you liked or didn't like and I'll see you all in the next one.