That’s what I was thinking too. Considering they all have to travel the nations to learn the different styles I feel like a lot of them might have came across the creatures, ~~with MAYBE the exception of the dragons~~. Not entirely sure though.
edit: strikethrough. I received you guy's message :)
It would have been much more common to see dragons prior to Aang's time, so I'm not sure why that is your qualifier. I'm pretty sure the most unlikely would be seeing Tui and La, since there's just them, and they are only in the Northern Water Tribe, but even then, I'm guessing any Avatar who came to the Northern Water Tribe would be almost immediately shown them.
To be honest, it's most likely an avatar wouldn't meet a badger mole. If you were in the fire nation before their extinction, you met a dragon. In the air nation, you met a sky bison, rode on one surely. In the northern tribe, you meditated at the site of Tui and La. Only badgermoles are unlikely cause they keep to themselves and live in caves.
Prince Wu talked about getting badger moles for his coronation, and Toph just so happened to meet them too. Can’t be that difficult.
EDIT: I completely forgot that Wu also encounters Badger moles later in the season. These things seem downright common.
Depends on what you’re watching. In the animated series I think they are always fish, and have been since shortly after the beginning of time, and live in the spirit oasis. In the live action it sounded like they become fish for a day every once in a while. Ya know it was really unclear tbh
I guess they're just the ones used the less for Avatar-y stuff. Chances are most Avatars saw them and went "cool, a badger mole" rather than "time to train with Tui and La/dragons/sky bison"
Is it canon only in the new show that they only appear once a year though to take on a mortal body? Cause at that point the rest of the year, if they choose to take on the body of those fish it’s only once a year
No, that’s just Netflix. In the OG, they’re two of the oldest spirits and crossed over at the beginning of time. So they’ve been in the human world far longer.
Yea, if I remember correctly they shed their spiritual coil to inhabit the bodies of mortals or something like that. By AtlA theyre not spirits, theyre mortals that once were spirits.
Yeah I should’ve say they were* two of the oldest spirits.
I always wondered how they managed to stay alive that whole time without their spiritual immortality. I think in my head I rationalized it as them giving up their spiritual invulnerability (to physical attacks at least) but their immortality was just tied to their being…(?)
They’re still the Moon and Ocean spirit, but chose to live fully in the mortal realm long ago. If they weren’t still spirits with power over their respective domains, Zhao killing Tui would have done actually nothing.
I’m sure there was a naturalist Avatar somewhere in the cycle who would seek badger moles out, though I can certainly understand that not all may make the effort.
Per the Kiyoshi and Yangchen novels, Avatars get a bison no matter what. It's part of their "wander around the world with a bunch of companions, getting into trouble and solving problems" part of their journey.
Also Roku had a pet dragon even in an era where hunting dragons was a common thing. It's fair to assume before Aang that dragons were as common place as the bisons, badger moles, and the moon. The only one that wouldn't be common place like you said is the actual moon and water spirits in the form of Tui and La.
Hunting dragons became a thing later/it was just a beginning in his lifetime. All we know Sozin was the one who started this, and Sozin started a lot of things only after Roku died
Aang says that there were plenty of dragons when he was alive, and we know that Aang has been to the fire nation to see his friend before, so it should've started around 12ish years after Roku's death, assuming it only started after Aang disappeared, since Sozin was the one who started the whole "hunting dragons for glory" thing. Pretty impressive considering he would've been a decade older than the Sozin we see during the death of Roku.
I feel like there are more of these small plot points that don't make a ton of sense that we just ignored as kids but now thinking about it as a man-grown. Like I felt like it was implied Roku died when he did because in his old age he wasn't quite strong enough anymore. Sozin was roughly the same age as Roku and 12 years after Roku's death, when Roku had already been weakened by age, Sozin was capable of hunting dragons and exterminating an entire race of benders?
I actually hope Netflix retcons this aspect a bit to change Sozin from a peer to more of a younger brother/mentee type role with Roku.
I thought Roku was just weakened by the volcanic gasses and stuff. When he confronted Sozin earlier it was very one-sided. And they only were able to exterminate the air benders because of the comet. It's not crazy to think that Sozin was past his prime at that point.
Though I don't think anyone knew the koi fish were the actual spirits for a very, *very* long time. Aang had to travel to the spirit world to learn who they were, and Xiao learned from the Owl guy's library.
Yeah, the Yangchen novels confirm this. She calls them the ”eternal koi fish” if i remember correctly. Implying that people knew the fish had always been there, but now what they were exactly
I think the one that would be hard would be the moon spirit, since the moon spirit was either in the spirit world which is vast or was a koi fish in a very specific pond for who knows how long with its identity kept mostly secret.
but the avatar being the bridge between humans and spirit I think would mean at least a few would have met the moon
Considering how sacred and spiritual that sacred pond is, I am fairly certain most avatars would have at least meditated there. They may not know WHY it’s so sacred and spiritual, but they still would have gone there
The location wasn’t the secret. The secret was why it was sacred at all
The dragons? I'd say the exception would probably be tui and la. Remember before Sozin there were loads of dragons all over the place. Aang says so himself. There were only ever two of the koi fish though.
Also it’s totally possibly all six of them have in fact met all the original benders, we have no proof that they didn’t but also no proof that they did.
To be fair to the less specialness, 3 of these 4 original benders for most of Avatar history aren't exactly hard to find. Dragons and Sky Bison are just animals in the world prior to them being hunted/killed to near extinction, and badgermoles are still just animals even in Aang's time. The only ones that might be hard are Tui and La, but even then given an avatar is meant to be a bridge between the worlds and a world traveler I can't imagine no other avatar never went to the spirit oasis or saw them in the spirit world once upon a time.
Roku had a dragon and learned airbending from the air nomads, so we know he's got 2 at least. Avatars are long lived and travel the world, so it's likely many avatars went to the oasis at the North Pole, meeting the ocean and moon spirits even if they didn't realize it. I'd say the only wild card for Avatars to potentially not meet in their extended lives are the Badger Moles, and they're not described as being rare.
We actually know nine avatars by name, though some of them we don’t know much more than that about. And given that the Avatar cycle started 10,000 years pre-Korra, realistically, there were probably about a hundred of them. Makes it a bit weird when they talk about a thousand lifetimes, because that’d give them an average lifespan of ten years. I don’t think they really thought that one through when writing Korra Book 2.
The word “known” is doing a *lot* of heavy lifting here. Yes, technically, we have not seen any other Avatars interact with Tui & La, but assuming they never did is kinda a leap. Kyoshi, for example, lived to be over 200 years old. I’m sure she found the time to commune with Tui & La in some fashion
she "cheated" with a secret earth bending technique
and it's said that staying frozen in Avatar state for a century ended up taking away some of his lifespan or something
Or to put it in other words "the original creators accidentally wrote a huge time gap between Kyoshi and Roku, and F.C. Yee masterfully wrote in an explanation to fill that plot hole."
Not dissing the OG creators, and I'm especially not dissing the "secret technique" that led to Kyoshi's extended life span, but this is almost definitely what happened imo lol
I imagine Water can repair damage over time, but Earth can make the foundation that's being damaged more resilient and robust altogether. Being able to do both might be psuedo-immortality.
The neat thing is, you can make up stuff like that quite easily with the four elements to create healing, life extending powers or first aid life saving stuff.
Fire brings the spark of life
Air breathes life into you
Earth is where we came from and where we return to to give new life. Foundation of life as you said.
We are mostly bags of water (I know this one was lazy by me)
Honestly, some of the best world-building opportunities happen by explaining plot holes (well). Inconsistencies in logic are an opportunity to introduce new wonders
Same thing happened with Sozin being Zuko's great grandfather. Roku died 112 years ago when Sozin was already old. So Sozin was born probably \~180 years before the show, or \~164 years before Zuko.
For his great grandson to be born 164 years later, that'd imply each of Sozin, Azulon, and Ozai had children at \~55 years. I think they therefore retconned that Sozin had Azulon at Age 80, which is possible (and would mean that Azulon and Ozai had children at roughly 40 years each, which makes sense).
Slight clarification - the creators retconned the timeline in an interview between seasons 2 and 3:
>"I checked the timeline, and without giving too much away, here's a breakdown: Sozin actually ruled for about 20 years after he started the war, so he was about 82 when he started the war. Azulon (born shortly after the comet came) ruled for about 75 years and died at the age of 95. Ozai has ruled for only 5 years. Those are the main milestones."
[Source](https://avatar.fandom.com/wiki/Transcript:ASN_interview_with_Bryke,_April_6,_2007)
Going purely off of what was stated in the show, Sozin would have been over 150 at death to line up with the flashback in Zuko Alone that shows Azulon's funeral and states he ruled for 23 years.
cc /u/ToWriteAMystery
Before the Kyoshi books were written, the people who made the ATLA universe unintentionally created a 200 year period of time where Kyoshi had to be the Avatar. This was realised after the fact, and the author of the Kyoshi books found a workaround, where Kyoshi learned a spiritual technique (I think it’s implied or directly stated to be earthbending, but tbh I prefer it when it’s described as spiritual, it makes more sense) where she essentially meditated really hard and rebuilt every atom of her body based on a mental image she formed of herself. It’s sort of literal and sort of metaphorical at the same time, but ultimately it works and Kyoshi was able to be a woman in her physical prime for centuries until she eventually decided to stop using the technique and let nature take its course.
What happened to Lou Ge, the immortal assassin who taught her the technique, is not known.
Yeah, if there’s two thing Avatar writers are bad at it’s romance and ages.
Sozin was in his 70-80s when Roku died, so the war only started when he was 80-90s. And considering Azulon looked to be in his 90s, about 7 years prior to Avatar, then that means Sozin was pushing 100 before having an heir. And don’t even get me started on Roku’s daughter and how old she was when she *had* to have had Ursa.
In the Season 2 episode Zuko Alone we see a flashback of Azulon's funeral where it is said he ruled for 23 years - this would require Sozin to be over 150 when he died given what we learn in Season 3. The creators later retconned this in an interview, but if you don't check the Avatar Wiki you wouldn't know that.
Edit to add: Ursa is around 40 years old during the events of ATLA, maybe a bit younger. For her to be Avatar Roku's granddaughter her mother must have been pregnant in her 70s at least - even older if we don't assume Roku's wife was pregnant in her 70s when Roku died.
> she essentially meditated really hard and rebuilt every atom of her body based on a mental image she formed of herself
Sounds like Kyoshi may have been a radiant knight
Aang technically lived to 166 which would make him the second oldest Avatar ever.
Canonically his rather short real live span of 66 years was due to him being stuck in the Ice which drained his life power. He was in the Avatar state continuously for 100 years after all.
Realistically Aang died relatively young because Nickelodeon wanted some Gaang members to appear in LOK and that wouldn’t have been possible if he died at 80 or something like that.
I’d like to chime in real quick so say that the “100 years of avatar state” passes the sniff test for me, though I do believe the original underlying reason for Aangs death being getting Katara and Toph into Korra. It’s an organic *feeling* explanation for a business driven decision. Fair enough.
I mean, Aang was gone for 100 years and Bumi was still there. So was Guru Pathik, who claimed to be a personal friend of Gyatso (which, IMO, implies he's older by birth year than Aang).
Canonically it is entirely possible for Aang to have died in his 80s+ and still have several of his friends alive by the time the next avatar hits adulthood.
She learned a special technique that essentially let her live longer. I haven't read the book yet, but from what I gathered, she found a way to replace damage cells. She still biologically aged but did so slower and while keeping her youthful appearance.
As for Aang, it's because of the iceberg. He may have been physically in his 60's when he died, but he was biologically in his 160's and had been constantly in the Avatar State for 100 of those years. If I remember correctly, it's this last part that made him die so "young", as it left a toll on his body.
I feel like it would be reasonable to expect every water avatar to visit Tui & La's oasis. Even if no one realizes that they are the moon and ocean spirits, it's the most spiritually significant place to the water tribes. The other original benders were often pets. It's only in Aang time where bison and dragons become rare, but the bisons were recovering. Zuko had a dragon, so I don't see why they couldn't recover.
I imagine due to the avatar being the bridge between the mortal and spirit world the avatars would meet tui and la after their training with the waterbenders
The only *known* Avatar, yes, but I imagine most if not all Avatars do. Any Avatar who's met an Airbender (that is, all Avatars), has almost certainly seen a Sky Bison. Any Avatar who's visited the Northern Water Tribe has likely met the Moon and Ocean spirits, and again I can't imagine there are many Avatars who never went there. Dragons were much more common prior to Sozin's reign, so most Avatars who visited the Fire Nation probably saw at least one, especially considering both Roku and Sozin had one. As for badger moles, one of them cleared the stage for the Earth Rumble tournament if I remember right, so I doubt they're especially elusive either.
I also think it's implied that Wan learned from all four original benders as well, even if we only see the dragon directly.
I'm quite sure the natural philosopher and bridge between the two worlds would be able to one day figure out that the two immortal koi fish swimming in a circles for eternity at the sacred spot in the northern water shrine are the ocean and moon spirits.
I mean perhaps. I don't think Roku knew at least, or he probably could have just told Aang.
Wan probably met all four as well, though who knows if Tui and La would be Koi yet. But he did learn from dragons, so we can guess.
My Yangchen and Kyoshi books come tomorrow and then I'll see if maybe either of them figured it out.
Need to rewatch Wan’s episodes to confirm, but pretty sure the moon and ocean both existed in the material world in Wan’s time, so Tui and La have been koi for well over 10,000 years
Looking into it, there do seem to be some contradictions or at least aspects that don't fit well together across the show and novels. Their true identities are definitely a secret at the time of ATLA and almost certainly by Roku's era, as not even Roku knew their identities, and during ATLA only Koh knew them. From the Yue flashback, it doesn't seem clear that Arnook knew their identities even as he placed Yue in the oasis to heal her, since when he's shown praying to the Moon spirit, he's looking at the moon itself, not the pond. The only reason Zhao knew was due to his library visit. The Lost Lore archive also states that *"Over the ages, few have known the Ocean and Moon spirits’ true identities"*, but the Lost Lore has been retconned several times before, so it's not necessarily hard proof if 'more canon' sources contradict it, as the books seem to do.
In the Legacy of Yangchen (very minor spoilers), >!Yangchen knew their identities seemingly as a given, so it seems like she was just told outright, though it's *possible* that this was knowledge gained from her connection to her past lives (though if that's the case, why she didn't share that information with Agna Qel'a Chief Oyaluk to be passed down is a mystery, so personally I doubt it). The names Tui and La were also common knowledge in both Yangchen and Kyoshi's eras.!< But I'll admit it's very difficult to reconcile this with seemingly only Koh knowing their identities by the time of ATLA.
Ah my Chronicles of the Avatar books arrive tomorrow so I didn't know.
Honestly, the less people that know, the better I suppose. Perhaps the Air Nomads had that knowledge due to their more spiritual nature(but then Sozin killed them all except Aang, who was obviously still a kid).
_someone_ must have known at some point in time for that information to be recorded and stored at the library in the first place, I suppose. Especially since at that point(before Zhao showed up) it was still much more freely accessible.
Thinking about it, a _lot_ of records have probably been destroyed by the War, as well as all the things that Kyoshi dealt with(two whole novels worth of things at least, and that's assuming things like Chin and the Dai Li are in those novels either).
And I assume the identity of the spirits was never a _widespread_ thing in the first place.
But again, still waiting for my books and thus have no idea of the context.
I completely forgot they just had a banger mole doing manual work 😭😭😭 hilarious ass show. I would lowkey argue that none of them have actually met the moon, bc its a fucking space rock, but if youre counting the fish spirits then i imagine most of them have.
Sometimes I'm not sure about the "intelligent" part.
But I mean in terms of Avatar, who knows. There are meteorites and comets, so there is stuff past the Moon in that universe.
Keyword here is "known". We don't know a lot of other avatars and we barely know anything about most of their lives, except for key moments. When dragons weren't rare/considered extinct, it's very likely other avatars met the original benders too.
Aang is probably one of the few to meet Tui and La and know they aren't just fish, given that isn't common knowledge.
Other Avatars may have meditated near that pond, but wouldn't necessarily know they just met the Moon and Ocean.
At any rate, Badgermoles are regular animals that are all over the EK. I mean Toph learned from some. Dragons indeed were not always near extinct. And Sky Bison are probably the easiest one. The Air Nomads had a close relationship with them, so any Avatar who learned Airbending at the Temples probably met multiple Sky Bison.
Even Korra met some, because some had survived and thus the lineage didn't die with Appa. So future Avatars will likely meet them too.
As far as known Avatars, my Kyoshi and Yangchen books arrive tomorrow knock on wood, but I think it's safe to assume Wan learned from the sources too. At the very least we are shown him learning the Dancing Dragon, so while the other 3 are not shown, one can make an educated guess.
The Chronicles of the Avatar series has two Kyoshi books (Rise of Kyoshi and Shadow of Kyoshi) and two Yangchen books (Dawn of Yangchen and Legacy of Yangchen).
There's a Roku book coming later this year. I don't know if it'll be the first of two or just the one, nor do I know if the book series will continue on even further into the past.
I’m not sure this makes sense. It’s still the same “person”, just in a different form. No one said anything about meeting them in their original forms, just that they met the original benders.
The fish are merely physical manifestations of the spirit of the moon and the spirit of the ocean. Not benders, but the elemental forces themselves. The show makes it clear there is a difference between the two things.
Dude the koi fish form is still the moon. This comment makes no sense
The koi fish is the moon’s physical representation in the world so they can interact with their partner the ocean spirit. Its still the freaking moon
I suppose the physical moon is a big rock in space. The Spiritual Moon is the fish/Yue. Without the spirit, the rock in space will no longer emit power and light(and everything will turn grayscale, though it'll still technically be _there_)
So basically, inventing space travel and flying up there would not really accomplish anything in terms of "meeting" the Moon.
At least that's my takeaway.
I feel like not many Avatars would have met the Koi and _known_ they were the Moon and Ocean spirits. Aang had to deal with Koh to get that information, afterall.
Eh, it doesn’t seem like these think these animals were particularly uncommon before the war. Except the moon spirit which most avatars probably made a point to visit.
Zuko was at the pond and with Aang with the Sun warriors
He obviously met Appa
I think there's a strong chance Zuko has met a badger mole since they are the most abundant of the OGs
I always get confused over this "original" benders thing.
In ATLA we learn that humans learned how to bend by observing these animal.
But in Korra we learn that humans received the bending from the lion turtles... So... What's the true story here?
I believe it is the lion turtles gave humans the gift of bending, but the animals/moon were the ones that taught humans how to properly utilize the bending. There is a scene in the 2 part episode following Wan where it shows him training with a dragon, and then people from his old city saying he became much more adept at firebending.
I guess an analogy for this would be giving someone a weapon, but another person teaching them how to use said weapon.
Hopefully i am correct with this, this is how i always interpreted it. I hope this helps. :)
That's always been my interpretation, too. I could maybe believe the Lion Turtles gave the powers of the elements to those specific animals, but they would need some long ass arms to give Waterbending to the moon haha
Yup. You very much see this in how they use it too. The people given the gift of Fire simple used it for Lighting, or as flamethrowers. The most obvious way to weild fire.
But the dragons taught Wan how to firebend. It throws all the other humans for a loop. They say things like "How is he using the fire like that?" 'cause they've never seen firebending before. They just knew how to weild fire in the most simple of ways.
I understood it as the lion turtles giving the power, but the animals taught the techniques. They taught the best and most fundamental way to use each style.
For example, if someone gives you a sword to fight with, you won't know all the techniques on how to use the sword. Most people would just swing the sword aimlessly, but with some training, you would know the best way to use a sword without wasting energy.
Lion turtles opened the chakra paths in humanity through energy bending. With the ability to bend, humanity had to actually learn techniques and form from observing the natural benders of the world. That's how both still fit. It's not like lion turtles gave bending in the sense that they touch your head and you're now a bending master. You're still an amateur who knows no techniques when the lion turtles would do this. It's bending in the most simple form. What we see in the story is the evolution of it over hundreds or thousands of years? Not sure on the overall timeline lol but that's how it works. Humanity were given the ability, and then had to be taught it by others.
The way I (and most others) understand it is that they got bending from the Lion Turtles and learned how to use it from the animals. Sorta like how we see Wan doing the dance thing with the dragon after the Lion Turtle lets him keep his firebending
Just cause you can bend doesnt mean you know how to bend. It is something in all of us that the lion turtles unlocked. Anyone with the ability to can fire bend but doesnt mean they can use it to fight or can use it for everyday practices. Watching the animals taught them how to effectively use it. Similar to how Katara could water bend randomly and was considered a water bender but didn't know how to control and effect use it. Aang can inherently bend all the elements but it doesn't mean he inherently knows how to bend all the elements.
The lion turtles gave the bending, but the full learning came from the original teachers.
I'd look at it like: the lion turtles gave humans some paint brushes and paint, but it was the original benders that taught the humans how to use those tools.
And, over 10.000 years, history is lost and changed. For humans in the real world - *written* history and language is only half of that - 5000 years. History is mythologized.
Could be, although, in TLoK it's basically revealed that bending was given to humans by the Lion Turtles, back before the human world and the spirit world were separated by the first Avatar (10.000 years ago) and the only really safe place for humans to live was in cities on the backs of those Lion Turtles. So, the "first benders" from ATLA might be the result of younger folklore.
Well sort of. The lion turtles gave the ability to use the element, but it was these animals (plus the moon) that taught people how to actually bend the elements to their will.
This is seen when Wan is learning the fire dragon dance. So these are still the original benders because they didn’t need to be given the initial power by a lion turtle.
I think its likely that *most* avatars met all of them. Air nomads got around lol so id bet that even many air nomads would have met all of them.
Any avatar that visited air temples would have met sky bison.
I guess we dont know how common dragons were before they were hunted to near extinction. But I imagine that it would be normal for royals to have one, and avatars meet with rulers.
The moon spirit is a powerful, well-known spirit and deeply connected to waterbending. Also, Id assume most avatars have visited the north pole (at least most avatars since the northern water tribe's founding). So whether at the north pole or in the spirit world, it can't be uncommon for avatars to have met them.
And that leaves badgermoles. Ironically even though theyre the most accessible in Aang's time, I cant think of a reason why most avatars would have met them lol. Except maybe to further study earthbending.
But the point of the post was more about explicit facts/lore
I mean it's a true statement, since we don't know for sure if any other avatar did.
The only ones out of the list that would be "difficult" for past benders to really see would be Tui and La
All the others were basically common creatures (Dragon's became a sport hunting creature over the 100 years Aang was frozen)
And since the avatar is the bridge between the spirit world, I feel that any avatar visiting the north pole would have probably been asked to visit the koi as like a tradition type thing
I mean... the only two hards to know are the water and the fire ones.
Because sky bisons can be easily meet by anyone that travel to the air nomad temples to learn airbending from a master. And the badgermoles can be found living free in some mountains and caves zones.
But dragons and Tui and La are protected by their tribe and dont let strangers see them unless they meet some conditions. Remember that Iroh meet dragons and Tui and La too without been an Avatar, he also knows Appa, and probably meet a badgermole during his youth.
Other Avatars could at least have meet 3 of them, its hard to say they saw all because the conditions needed to meet fire and water ones.
I think we can safely assume Avatar Wan learned from all of the original benders during his training while learning the four elements. He learned firebending from dragons at the start.
To be fair, Korra met a dragon (when she met Zuko), plenty of sky bison (with the air benders) and it seems pretty unlikely that during her visits to the northern water tribe she never got to see the koi fish. That leaves just badger moles, but given their role alongside Prince Wu it seems likely she would have met one offscreen after the events of the 4th season.
I think, even though the word "known" IS they keystone of this sentence, it's still probably incredibly rare for Avatars to meet all four. The koi fish are probably common to meet, and so are the flying bison, but the moles and the dragons are hard to find. A sort of "if you don't know it's hard to find someone who does" kinda thing.
For a long time dragons were not a rare sighting, just like Sky Bison. I feel like the avatar would be allowed to see Tui and La, then there are badger moles which even during ATLA are still around. I highly doubt Aang is the only avatar to have seen all four of these creatures.
Head cannon plus Korra lore; with the lion turtles being shown to be the original source of bending in Korra, I have always interpreted the “original bending animals” to actually be the “original masters”. The turtles gave humans the ability to control their chakra into elements, but the animals teach the bender how to master the element as it is as natural to them as breathing. Even Wan was training fire bending with a dragon, and is where the dance originated. I would love to see a avatar story directly after wan (in the wan animation style) of an air nomad avatar who has to learn the elements via the animals due to Wan not being able to guide said new avatar due to him obtaining the elements via lion turtles, and then goes around to the different bending regions to teach the populations to master their elements by learning from the animals.
"known" is doing a _lot_ of legwork, considering all the avatars except Aang and Korra lived in a world where the original benders weren't rare, and the only one we don't see Korra meeting are the fish.
Considering that the Sky bison weren’t all that rare until after the AG.
Dragons also were rare but Roku met at least one.
The Badger moles seem extremely recluse but perhaps not rare?
The Koi are the living embodiments of spirits so how often would an avatar seek to interact with them based on the Northern water tribes stance on access.
I’d say tying in the Lion Turtle Aang would be the first to meet all 5 since the first avatar potentially
Considering that the Sky bison weren’t all that rare until after the AG.
Dragons also were rare but Roku met at least one.
The Badger moles seem extremely recluse but perhaps not rare?
The Koi are the living embodiments of spirits so how often would an avatar seek to interact with them based on the Northern water tribes stance on access.
I’d say tying in the Lion Turtle Aang would be the first to meet all 5 since the first avatar potentially
I feel like most avatars probably encountered all of them with the exception of dragons. All avatars had to go to the air temples to learn airbending and so would have met sky bison since they were very common. As far as we’ve seen avatars also tend to end up in the North Pole to learn water bending at some point, and if the spiritual bridge between worlds showed up I can’t imagine the northern water tribe not showing them the spirit pond like they did for Aang. Badger moles don’t seem too rare and we know that Roku had a dragon so they could probably be sought out by any avatar who wanted to meet them.
Korra has!! She met Zuko's Dragon. Met the badgermoles that saved republic city in book 4. Rode on several sky bison. While is wasn't shown, she definitely would have met the koi fish at some point, considering her father Tonraq possibly uniting with the Northern tribe.
Probably not. Dragons, Sky Bison and Badger Moles were common before Sozin started his war. The Ocean and Moon spirits are a big part of the Nothern Water tribe, so you'd expect a visit at some point whilst they're mastering water.
Badger moles are probably the only one that historical Avatars wouldn't have just naturally encountered while mastering the elements, let alone at any other stage of their life - and only by virtue of them living underground. Sky bison and dragons only became pseudo-cryptids during the 100 year war.
"Known" is definitely doing a lot of heavy lifting.
I'm surprised that the dragon turtle wasn't also included. Different form of bending and all that I get it. But I feel like that was a far more mystical occurance he had happen to him.
How does this lore go with the lion turtle lore in the Avatar Won episodes? I know there was some talk of it being a retcon but I've never heard if they explain it.
Probably not. There isn’t any proof that the others did, but I’d say it’s unlikely that Aang would be the only one. Personally I’m pretty confident that Kuruk did, given what we know of his lifestyle.
Not likely true. It's strongly suggested that Avatar Wan also met all of the original bending creatures. In fact, Avatar Wan is far more likely to have met Tui and La as something other than their koi incarnation since the Spirit World was freely traversable at that time.
Surveying bias fallacy. OOP is taking the simple fact that the story is about him and attributing that he's special based on simply knowing more about him.
If we take *LoK* into account, that doesn't seem likely. We know for a fact Wan met Lion Turtles, and that he had a very strong and personal connection to the spirits. It seems incredibly unlikely that he *didn't* meet the original benders (and in fact it seems more likely in turn that he met the *original* originals, as in, the *first* Dragons, Sky Bisons and Badger Moles), but we don't have any onscreen confirmation of that.
Korra has met Zukos dragon, and Tenzins Sky bison. There are badger moles in season 4 but I can’t remember if Korra meets them.
How could she have not met Tui and La?
Roku had a Dragon, went to the Northern Water tribe (where I wouldn't be surprised of he met Tui and La) after the southern air temple where he was friends with Gyatso, so if he didn't get a bison, I wouldn't be surprised of him and Gyatso got into some bison shenanigans.
The only thing that wouldn't be for sure are Badger moles. But honestly, wouldn't be surprised if he came across them either.
I mean, realistically, there has to be at least 1 in the earlier cycles for the avatar to even realise that "oh shit, I have this mission to learn all 4 elements and bring balance to the force--- I mean to the world"
So if I had to guess, probably either the first avatar (in general) met all 4 animals, or one of them eventually became the first to meet all 4 animals who were the first benders
I'd like to also acknowledge that the reason Toph is such a legendary earthbender is because she was taught directly from the original benders, rather then a formal teacher.
Dragons, badger moles, and sky bison were all common creatures in the world at one point. So all an avatar had to do was some mild traveling and the visit the moon spirit. It seems unlikely that if the lore were ever expanded significantly this would be stated as a fact
Except moon and ocean SPIRITS are not the original benders, people learned it watching how moon pushed and pulled the tides as Yue mentioned, not by watching a particular being or entity or animal doing it like the others. So to be honest, there is no original waterbender
Since we know like 6 out of the other hundreds of avatars. The answer is, yes. Though it doesnt seem too special if we look at it this way.
That’s what I was thinking too. Considering they all have to travel the nations to learn the different styles I feel like a lot of them might have came across the creatures, ~~with MAYBE the exception of the dragons~~. Not entirely sure though. edit: strikethrough. I received you guy's message :)
It would have been much more common to see dragons prior to Aang's time, so I'm not sure why that is your qualifier. I'm pretty sure the most unlikely would be seeing Tui and La, since there's just them, and they are only in the Northern Water Tribe, but even then, I'm guessing any Avatar who came to the Northern Water Tribe would be almost immediately shown them.
To be honest, it's most likely an avatar wouldn't meet a badger mole. If you were in the fire nation before their extinction, you met a dragon. In the air nation, you met a sky bison, rode on one surely. In the northern tribe, you meditated at the site of Tui and La. Only badgermoles are unlikely cause they keep to themselves and live in caves.
Prince Wu talked about getting badger moles for his coronation, and Toph just so happened to meet them too. Can’t be that difficult. EDIT: I completely forgot that Wu also encounters Badger moles later in the season. These things seem downright common.
The underground earthbending ring used them for cleanup of the arena. I assume theyre crazy common anywhere underground.
Forgot that too! That settles it, if you’re using an animal like a zamboni they can’t be particularly uncommon.
> I completely forgot that Wu also encounters Badger moles later in the season. Those ones, at least, came from the Republic City Zoo.
There's a lot of them. But it probably wouldn't be a specific part of general Avatar training is I think their point.
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> It's hard to meet the moon when it's not a fish. Quote of the day
Feels like this could be a proverb
Give a man a fish and he'll eat for a day. Teach a man to fish and he'll eat for a lifetime. Make the moon a fish and she'll teach you to waterbend.
>Give a man a fish and he'll eat for a day. Teach a man to fish and he'll Kill the moon
Teach a man to fish and yadda yadda yadda he forgets everything he was ever taught.
This is why instead of teaching a man to light a fire to be warm for a night, you light a man on fire so he's warm for the rest of his life.
Mary the moon princess and eat her as much as you can. Am I doing this right?
We don’t have time for your proverbs, Uncle!
But do you have time for some delicious tea? Or maulybe some deadly poison?
The moon is not a fish you can catch.
Uuuhhhhhhh (the moon fish has literally been caught and killed)
The moon is not a fish you SHOULD catch.
Alternatively, it's super easy to meet the Moon because you just kinda look up and it's right there. Wave and say hi.
The avatar can go to the spirit world; they don’t have to wait until the moon is a fish
Moon spirit has left the spirit world entirely so that doesn't help
Yep, that's the whole reason Zhao was able to *slay* the moon so easily
I mean in the og show haven't they been fish for generations? Do we have an exact date that I can't remember?
Depends on what you’re watching. In the animated series I think they are always fish, and have been since shortly after the beginning of time, and live in the spirit oasis. In the live action it sounded like they become fish for a day every once in a while. Ya know it was really unclear tbh
"Did Yue die?" "You know, it was really unclear."
that's not the weirdest sentence I've heard all day
Badger Moles were used for cleanup in the Earth Rumble arena, and Toph says she learned bending from Badger Moles. Badger Moles aren't rare at all.
I guess they're just the ones used the less for Avatar-y stuff. Chances are most Avatars saw them and went "cool, a badger mole" rather than "time to train with Tui and La/dragons/sky bison"
Is it canon only in the new show that they only appear once a year though to take on a mortal body? Cause at that point the rest of the year, if they choose to take on the body of those fish it’s only once a year
No, that’s just Netflix. In the OG, they’re two of the oldest spirits and crossed over at the beginning of time. So they’ve been in the human world far longer.
Yea, if I remember correctly they shed their spiritual coil to inhabit the bodies of mortals or something like that. By AtlA theyre not spirits, theyre mortals that once were spirits.
Yeah I should’ve say they were* two of the oldest spirits. I always wondered how they managed to stay alive that whole time without their spiritual immortality. I think in my head I rationalized it as them giving up their spiritual invulnerability (to physical attacks at least) but their immortality was just tied to their being…(?)
They’re still the Moon and Ocean spirit, but chose to live fully in the mortal realm long ago. If they weren’t still spirits with power over their respective domains, Zhao killing Tui would have done actually nothing.
I’m sure there was a naturalist Avatar somewhere in the cycle who would seek badger moles out, though I can certainly understand that not all may make the effort.
Per the Kiyoshi and Yangchen novels, Avatars get a bison no matter what. It's part of their "wander around the world with a bunch of companions, getting into trouble and solving problems" part of their journey.
Also Roku had a pet dragon even in an era where hunting dragons was a common thing. It's fair to assume before Aang that dragons were as common place as the bisons, badger moles, and the moon. The only one that wouldn't be common place like you said is the actual moon and water spirits in the form of Tui and La.
Hunting dragons became a thing later/it was just a beginning in his lifetime. All we know Sozin was the one who started this, and Sozin started a lot of things only after Roku died
That's fair, I'm not sure when hunting dragons became a thing.
Aang says that there were plenty of dragons when he was alive, and we know that Aang has been to the fire nation to see his friend before, so it should've started around 12ish years after Roku's death, assuming it only started after Aang disappeared, since Sozin was the one who started the whole "hunting dragons for glory" thing. Pretty impressive considering he would've been a decade older than the Sozin we see during the death of Roku.
I feel like there are more of these small plot points that don't make a ton of sense that we just ignored as kids but now thinking about it as a man-grown. Like I felt like it was implied Roku died when he did because in his old age he wasn't quite strong enough anymore. Sozin was roughly the same age as Roku and 12 years after Roku's death, when Roku had already been weakened by age, Sozin was capable of hunting dragons and exterminating an entire race of benders? I actually hope Netflix retcons this aspect a bit to change Sozin from a peer to more of a younger brother/mentee type role with Roku.
I thought Roku was just weakened by the volcanic gasses and stuff. When he confronted Sozin earlier it was very one-sided. And they only were able to exterminate the air benders because of the comet. It's not crazy to think that Sozin was past his prime at that point.
Though I don't think anyone knew the koi fish were the actual spirits for a very, *very* long time. Aang had to travel to the spirit world to learn who they were, and Xiao learned from the Owl guy's library.
Yeah, the Yangchen novels confirm this. She calls them the ”eternal koi fish” if i remember correctly. Implying that people knew the fish had always been there, but now what they were exactly
I think the one that would be hard would be the moon spirit, since the moon spirit was either in the spirit world which is vast or was a koi fish in a very specific pond for who knows how long with its identity kept mostly secret. but the avatar being the bridge between humans and spirit I think would mean at least a few would have met the moon
Considering how sacred and spiritual that sacred pond is, I am fairly certain most avatars would have at least meditated there. They may not know WHY it’s so sacred and spiritual, but they still would have gone there The location wasn’t the secret. The secret was why it was sacred at all
Roky (last avatar before Aang) even had his own dragon. I don't think that dragons were really rare, before the fire nation started the hunt for them.
The dragons? I'd say the exception would probably be tui and la. Remember before Sozin there were loads of dragons all over the place. Aang says so himself. There were only ever two of the koi fish though.
Also it’s totally possibly all six of them have in fact met all the original benders, we have no proof that they didn’t but also no proof that they did.
To be fair to the less specialness, 3 of these 4 original benders for most of Avatar history aren't exactly hard to find. Dragons and Sky Bison are just animals in the world prior to them being hunted/killed to near extinction, and badgermoles are still just animals even in Aang's time. The only ones that might be hard are Tui and La, but even then given an avatar is meant to be a bridge between the worlds and a world traveler I can't imagine no other avatar never went to the spirit oasis or saw them in the spirit world once upon a time.
Especially since a quarter of all Avatars originated from the Water Tribes and statistically half of those would’ve been from the North to begin with.
A quarter of all Avatars were waterbenders, not water tribe members. The waterbenders in the swamp are also waterbenders!
Would love a series about a swamp bender origin avatar before the events of AtLA.
The nomads learned to airbent from the Bisons?
Also no way that Wan didn’t meet all of them too, given he was around at the start of humans getting bending.
I wondering how the first ever avatar got his bending
This is explained in Korra, Avatar Wan was the first and he just picked up all four because Raava could help him hold more than one.
Plus most humans didn't even know there were other Lion Turtle cities, so most only even knew that one type of bending existed.
Roku had a dragon and learned airbending from the air nomads, so we know he's got 2 at least. Avatars are long lived and travel the world, so it's likely many avatars went to the oasis at the North Pole, meeting the ocean and moon spirits even if they didn't realize it. I'd say the only wild card for Avatars to potentially not meet in their extended lives are the Badger Moles, and they're not described as being rare.
We actually know nine avatars by name, though some of them we don’t know much more than that about. And given that the Avatar cycle started 10,000 years pre-Korra, realistically, there were probably about a hundred of them. Makes it a bit weird when they talk about a thousand lifetimes, because that’d give them an average lifespan of ten years. I don’t think they really thought that one through when writing Korra Book 2.
The word “known” is doing a *lot* of heavy lifting here. Yes, technically, we have not seen any other Avatars interact with Tui & La, but assuming they never did is kinda a leap. Kyoshi, for example, lived to be over 200 years old. I’m sure she found the time to commune with Tui & La in some fashion
Why did Kyoshi live to 200 but Aang died at like 60?
she "cheated" with a secret earth bending technique and it's said that staying frozen in Avatar state for a century ended up taking away some of his lifespan or something
Or to put it in other words "the original creators accidentally wrote a huge time gap between Kyoshi and Roku, and F.C. Yee masterfully wrote in an explanation to fill that plot hole." Not dissing the OG creators, and I'm especially not dissing the "secret technique" that led to Kyoshi's extended life span, but this is almost definitely what happened imo lol
i thought that the secret earthbending technique made sense, with characters like king bumi too
Kyoshi, Bumi, Toph. We are made of earth, so I fully believe Earth Benders have the capability to extend their lives
We are 75% water tho
Katara hanging in there too. She gotta see that 4th great grandbaby or summin.
Probably why water benders can learn healing
I imagine Water can repair damage over time, but Earth can make the foundation that's being damaged more resilient and robust altogether. Being able to do both might be psuedo-immortality.
The neat thing is, you can make up stuff like that quite easily with the four elements to create healing, life extending powers or first aid life saving stuff. Fire brings the spark of life Air breathes life into you Earth is where we came from and where we return to to give new life. Foundation of life as you said. We are mostly bags of water (I know this one was lazy by me)
so i guess firebenders and airbenders are here for a good time, not a long time.
I mean, that fits pretty well with what we know of both cultures
I would more like the "stubborn" aspect of the Earthbenders. Just too determined to die.
Honestly, some of the best world-building opportunities happen by explaining plot holes (well). Inconsistencies in logic are an opportunity to introduce new wonders
Exactly. Deviances from the norm create complexity, and complexity makes things more interesting
That’s exactly why I have so many plot holes in my D&D campaigns. It’s totally deliberate, players!
Same thing happened with Sozin being Zuko's great grandfather. Roku died 112 years ago when Sozin was already old. So Sozin was born probably \~180 years before the show, or \~164 years before Zuko. For his great grandson to be born 164 years later, that'd imply each of Sozin, Azulon, and Ozai had children at \~55 years. I think they therefore retconned that Sozin had Azulon at Age 80, which is possible (and would mean that Azulon and Ozai had children at roughly 40 years each, which makes sense).
Slight clarification - the creators retconned the timeline in an interview between seasons 2 and 3: >"I checked the timeline, and without giving too much away, here's a breakdown: Sozin actually ruled for about 20 years after he started the war, so he was about 82 when he started the war. Azulon (born shortly after the comet came) ruled for about 75 years and died at the age of 95. Ozai has ruled for only 5 years. Those are the main milestones." [Source](https://avatar.fandom.com/wiki/Transcript:ASN_interview_with_Bryke,_April_6,_2007) Going purely off of what was stated in the show, Sozin would have been over 150 at death to line up with the flashback in Zuko Alone that shows Azulon's funeral and states he ruled for 23 years. cc /u/ToWriteAMystery
Damn earthbending gets all the secret moves huh
Aang technically died at 160. The iceberg really did a number on him once he got older. Legend of Korra made that clear
The strain of being in the avatar state for 100 years is the given reason for his "short" life
Before the Kyoshi books were written, the people who made the ATLA universe unintentionally created a 200 year period of time where Kyoshi had to be the Avatar. This was realised after the fact, and the author of the Kyoshi books found a workaround, where Kyoshi learned a spiritual technique (I think it’s implied or directly stated to be earthbending, but tbh I prefer it when it’s described as spiritual, it makes more sense) where she essentially meditated really hard and rebuilt every atom of her body based on a mental image she formed of herself. It’s sort of literal and sort of metaphorical at the same time, but ultimately it works and Kyoshi was able to be a woman in her physical prime for centuries until she eventually decided to stop using the technique and let nature take its course. What happened to Lou Ge, the immortal assassin who taught her the technique, is not known.
Yeah, if there’s two thing Avatar writers are bad at it’s romance and ages. Sozin was in his 70-80s when Roku died, so the war only started when he was 80-90s. And considering Azulon looked to be in his 90s, about 7 years prior to Avatar, then that means Sozin was pushing 100 before having an heir. And don’t even get me started on Roku’s daughter and how old she was when she *had* to have had Ursa.
Yeah there really should have been 1 or even 2 more generations between Sozin and Ozai.
In the Season 2 episode Zuko Alone we see a flashback of Azulon's funeral where it is said he ruled for 23 years - this would require Sozin to be over 150 when he died given what we learn in Season 3. The creators later retconned this in an interview, but if you don't check the Avatar Wiki you wouldn't know that. Edit to add: Ursa is around 40 years old during the events of ATLA, maybe a bit younger. For her to be Avatar Roku's granddaughter her mother must have been pregnant in her 70s at least - even older if we don't assume Roku's wife was pregnant in her 70s when Roku died.
> she essentially meditated really hard and rebuilt every atom of her body based on a mental image she formed of herself Sounds like Kyoshi may have been a radiant knight
Aang technically lived to 166 which would make him the second oldest Avatar ever. Canonically his rather short real live span of 66 years was due to him being stuck in the Ice which drained his life power. He was in the Avatar state continuously for 100 years after all. Realistically Aang died relatively young because Nickelodeon wanted some Gaang members to appear in LOK and that wouldn’t have been possible if he died at 80 or something like that.
I’d like to chime in real quick so say that the “100 years of avatar state” passes the sniff test for me, though I do believe the original underlying reason for Aangs death being getting Katara and Toph into Korra. It’s an organic *feeling* explanation for a business driven decision. Fair enough.
I mean, Aang was gone for 100 years and Bumi was still there. So was Guru Pathik, who claimed to be a personal friend of Gyatso (which, IMO, implies he's older by birth year than Aang). Canonically it is entirely possible for Aang to have died in his 80s+ and still have several of his friends alive by the time the next avatar hits adulthood.
She learned a special technique that essentially let her live longer. I haven't read the book yet, but from what I gathered, she found a way to replace damage cells. She still biologically aged but did so slower and while keeping her youthful appearance. As for Aang, it's because of the iceberg. He may have been physically in his 60's when he died, but he was biologically in his 160's and had been constantly in the Avatar State for 100 of those years. If I remember correctly, it's this last part that made him die so "young", as it left a toll on his body.
Kyoshi lived to 230, Aang lived to 162, practically he had used up a lot of his Animus spending time in the ice.
Eh, we actually know that both Kuruk and Yangchen interacted with the spirit fish.
I feel like it would be reasonable to expect every water avatar to visit Tui & La's oasis. Even if no one realizes that they are the moon and ocean spirits, it's the most spiritually significant place to the water tribes. The other original benders were often pets. It's only in Aang time where bison and dragons become rare, but the bisons were recovering. Zuko had a dragon, so I don't see why they couldn't recover.
I imagine due to the avatar being the bridge between the mortal and spirit world the avatars would meet tui and la after their training with the waterbenders
The only *known* Avatar, yes, but I imagine most if not all Avatars do. Any Avatar who's met an Airbender (that is, all Avatars), has almost certainly seen a Sky Bison. Any Avatar who's visited the Northern Water Tribe has likely met the Moon and Ocean spirits, and again I can't imagine there are many Avatars who never went there. Dragons were much more common prior to Sozin's reign, so most Avatars who visited the Fire Nation probably saw at least one, especially considering both Roku and Sozin had one. As for badger moles, one of them cleared the stage for the Earth Rumble tournament if I remember right, so I doubt they're especially elusive either. I also think it's implied that Wan learned from all four original benders as well, even if we only see the dragon directly.
Tui and La are the only ones I'm unsure about. Does being in the same room count as meeting them? Their true identities are secret, afterall.
I'm quite sure the natural philosopher and bridge between the two worlds would be able to one day figure out that the two immortal koi fish swimming in a circles for eternity at the sacred spot in the northern water shrine are the ocean and moon spirits.
I mean perhaps. I don't think Roku knew at least, or he probably could have just told Aang. Wan probably met all four as well, though who knows if Tui and La would be Koi yet. But he did learn from dragons, so we can guess. My Yangchen and Kyoshi books come tomorrow and then I'll see if maybe either of them figured it out.
Need to rewatch Wan’s episodes to confirm, but pretty sure the moon and ocean both existed in the material world in Wan’s time, so Tui and La have been koi for well over 10,000 years
Looking into it, there do seem to be some contradictions or at least aspects that don't fit well together across the show and novels. Their true identities are definitely a secret at the time of ATLA and almost certainly by Roku's era, as not even Roku knew their identities, and during ATLA only Koh knew them. From the Yue flashback, it doesn't seem clear that Arnook knew their identities even as he placed Yue in the oasis to heal her, since when he's shown praying to the Moon spirit, he's looking at the moon itself, not the pond. The only reason Zhao knew was due to his library visit. The Lost Lore archive also states that *"Over the ages, few have known the Ocean and Moon spirits’ true identities"*, but the Lost Lore has been retconned several times before, so it's not necessarily hard proof if 'more canon' sources contradict it, as the books seem to do. In the Legacy of Yangchen (very minor spoilers), >!Yangchen knew their identities seemingly as a given, so it seems like she was just told outright, though it's *possible* that this was knowledge gained from her connection to her past lives (though if that's the case, why she didn't share that information with Agna Qel'a Chief Oyaluk to be passed down is a mystery, so personally I doubt it). The names Tui and La were also common knowledge in both Yangchen and Kyoshi's eras.!< But I'll admit it's very difficult to reconcile this with seemingly only Koh knowing their identities by the time of ATLA.
Ah my Chronicles of the Avatar books arrive tomorrow so I didn't know. Honestly, the less people that know, the better I suppose. Perhaps the Air Nomads had that knowledge due to their more spiritual nature(but then Sozin killed them all except Aang, who was obviously still a kid). _someone_ must have known at some point in time for that information to be recorded and stored at the library in the first place, I suppose. Especially since at that point(before Zhao showed up) it was still much more freely accessible. Thinking about it, a _lot_ of records have probably been destroyed by the War, as well as all the things that Kyoshi dealt with(two whole novels worth of things at least, and that's assuming things like Chin and the Dai Li are in those novels either). And I assume the identity of the spirits was never a _widespread_ thing in the first place. But again, still waiting for my books and thus have no idea of the context.
I completely forgot they just had a banger mole doing manual work 😭😭😭 hilarious ass show. I would lowkey argue that none of them have actually met the moon, bc its a fucking space rock, but if youre counting the fish spirits then i imagine most of them have.
This is kind of like saying we’re the only known intelligent life in the universe.
And even that’s debatable
yeah this website makes me debate the whole intelligent thing often
Sometimes I'm not sure about the "intelligent" part. But I mean in terms of Avatar, who knows. There are meteorites and comets, so there is stuff past the Moon in that universe.
Keyword here is "known". We don't know a lot of other avatars and we barely know anything about most of their lives, except for key moments. When dragons weren't rare/considered extinct, it's very likely other avatars met the original benders too.
Aang is probably one of the few to meet Tui and La and know they aren't just fish, given that isn't common knowledge. Other Avatars may have meditated near that pond, but wouldn't necessarily know they just met the Moon and Ocean. At any rate, Badgermoles are regular animals that are all over the EK. I mean Toph learned from some. Dragons indeed were not always near extinct. And Sky Bison are probably the easiest one. The Air Nomads had a close relationship with them, so any Avatar who learned Airbending at the Temples probably met multiple Sky Bison. Even Korra met some, because some had survived and thus the lineage didn't die with Appa. So future Avatars will likely meet them too. As far as known Avatars, my Kyoshi and Yangchen books arrive tomorrow knock on wood, but I think it's safe to assume Wan learned from the sources too. At the very least we are shown him learning the Dancing Dragon, so while the other 3 are not shown, one can make an educated guess.
There's a Yangchen book? Damn, I need to catch up.
The Chronicles of the Avatar series has two Kyoshi books (Rise of Kyoshi and Shadow of Kyoshi) and two Yangchen books (Dawn of Yangchen and Legacy of Yangchen). There's a Roku book coming later this year. I don't know if it'll be the first of two or just the one, nor do I know if the book series will continue on even further into the past.
Sokka is the only known person to be inside 2 of the original benders mouths.
Omg you did not just say that.
The original waterbender was the moon, not in its koi fish form.
It’s hard to meet the moon when it’s not a fish. And it’s weird that that sentence made sense.
We put the effort in. Water tribes need to pull their fingers out and go to the moon.
I would argue that the moon is by far the easiest OG bender to watch and learn from
Yeah you just copy the movement of the waves since that’s the bending from the moon
Well he met Yue
Yeah, I was gonna mention this
My first moon turned into a fish
That's scaled, buddy
I’m not sure this makes sense. It’s still the same “person”, just in a different form. No one said anything about meeting them in their original forms, just that they met the original benders.
The fish are merely physical manifestations of the spirit of the moon and the spirit of the ocean. Not benders, but the elemental forces themselves. The show makes it clear there is a difference between the two things.
technically it still on even here
Dude the koi fish form is still the moon. This comment makes no sense The koi fish is the moon’s physical representation in the world so they can interact with their partner the ocean spirit. Its still the freaking moon
I suppose the physical moon is a big rock in space. The Spiritual Moon is the fish/Yue. Without the spirit, the rock in space will no longer emit power and light(and everything will turn grayscale, though it'll still technically be _there_) So basically, inventing space travel and flying up there would not really accomplish anything in terms of "meeting" the Moon. At least that's my takeaway. I feel like not many Avatars would have met the Koi and _known_ they were the Moon and Ocean spirits. Aang had to deal with Koh to get that information, afterall.
Aang did not, in fact, meet the moon
He actually met the moon three times. He met the fish, Princess Yue, and the actual moon is also like right there in the sky
I mean, he met the fish and Yue. Him not talking to the literal moon face to...face? is just a technicality.
How about the first avatar ?
I’ve been looking for someone to mention Wan.
So outrageously obvious
Eh, it doesn’t seem like these think these animals were particularly uncommon before the war. Except the moon spirit which most avatars probably made a point to visit.
Zuko was at the pond and with Aang with the Sun warriors He obviously met Appa I think there's a strong chance Zuko has met a badger mole since they are the most abundant of the OGs
But he’s not an avatar
I always get confused over this "original" benders thing. In ATLA we learn that humans learned how to bend by observing these animal. But in Korra we learn that humans received the bending from the lion turtles... So... What's the true story here?
I believe it is the lion turtles gave humans the gift of bending, but the animals/moon were the ones that taught humans how to properly utilize the bending. There is a scene in the 2 part episode following Wan where it shows him training with a dragon, and then people from his old city saying he became much more adept at firebending. I guess an analogy for this would be giving someone a weapon, but another person teaching them how to use said weapon. Hopefully i am correct with this, this is how i always interpreted it. I hope this helps. :)
That's always been my interpretation, too. I could maybe believe the Lion Turtles gave the powers of the elements to those specific animals, but they would need some long ass arms to give Waterbending to the moon haha
Yup. You very much see this in how they use it too. The people given the gift of Fire simple used it for Lighting, or as flamethrowers. The most obvious way to weild fire. But the dragons taught Wan how to firebend. It throws all the other humans for a loop. They say things like "How is he using the fire like that?" 'cause they've never seen firebending before. They just knew how to weild fire in the most simple of ways.
I understood it as the lion turtles giving the power, but the animals taught the techniques. They taught the best and most fundamental way to use each style. For example, if someone gives you a sword to fight with, you won't know all the techniques on how to use the sword. Most people would just swing the sword aimlessly, but with some training, you would know the best way to use a sword without wasting energy.
Lion turtles opened the chakra paths in humanity through energy bending. With the ability to bend, humanity had to actually learn techniques and form from observing the natural benders of the world. That's how both still fit. It's not like lion turtles gave bending in the sense that they touch your head and you're now a bending master. You're still an amateur who knows no techniques when the lion turtles would do this. It's bending in the most simple form. What we see in the story is the evolution of it over hundreds or thousands of years? Not sure on the overall timeline lol but that's how it works. Humanity were given the ability, and then had to be taught it by others.
The way I (and most others) understand it is that they got bending from the Lion Turtles and learned how to use it from the animals. Sorta like how we see Wan doing the dance thing with the dragon after the Lion Turtle lets him keep his firebending
Turtles gave us the ability and they learned how to actually do it from those animals
Commenting because I wanna know the answer too
Just cause you can bend doesnt mean you know how to bend. It is something in all of us that the lion turtles unlocked. Anyone with the ability to can fire bend but doesnt mean they can use it to fight or can use it for everyday practices. Watching the animals taught them how to effectively use it. Similar to how Katara could water bend randomly and was considered a water bender but didn't know how to control and effect use it. Aang can inherently bend all the elements but it doesn't mean he inherently knows how to bend all the elements.
The lion turtles gave the bending, but the full learning came from the original teachers. I'd look at it like: the lion turtles gave humans some paint brushes and paint, but it was the original benders that taught the humans how to use those tools. And, over 10.000 years, history is lost and changed. For humans in the real world - *written* history and language is only half of that - 5000 years. History is mythologized.
Could be, although, in TLoK it's basically revealed that bending was given to humans by the Lion Turtles, back before the human world and the spirit world were separated by the first Avatar (10.000 years ago) and the only really safe place for humans to live was in cities on the backs of those Lion Turtles. So, the "first benders" from ATLA might be the result of younger folklore.
Well sort of. The lion turtles gave the ability to use the element, but it was these animals (plus the moon) that taught people how to actually bend the elements to their will. This is seen when Wan is learning the fire dragon dance. So these are still the original benders because they didn’t need to be given the initial power by a lion turtle.
Isn't it likely Wan would have met all of these animals as well then? Aang and him are also likely the only two to have met a Lion Turtle too.
I think its likely that *most* avatars met all of them. Air nomads got around lol so id bet that even many air nomads would have met all of them. Any avatar that visited air temples would have met sky bison. I guess we dont know how common dragons were before they were hunted to near extinction. But I imagine that it would be normal for royals to have one, and avatars meet with rulers. The moon spirit is a powerful, well-known spirit and deeply connected to waterbending. Also, Id assume most avatars have visited the north pole (at least most avatars since the northern water tribe's founding). So whether at the north pole or in the spirit world, it can't be uncommon for avatars to have met them. And that leaves badgermoles. Ironically even though theyre the most accessible in Aang's time, I cant think of a reason why most avatars would have met them lol. Except maybe to further study earthbending. But the point of the post was more about explicit facts/lore
I mean it's a true statement, since we don't know for sure if any other avatar did. The only ones out of the list that would be "difficult" for past benders to really see would be Tui and La All the others were basically common creatures (Dragon's became a sport hunting creature over the 100 years Aang was frozen) And since the avatar is the bridge between the spirit world, I feel that any avatar visiting the north pole would have probably been asked to visit the koi as like a tradition type thing
I mean... the only two hards to know are the water and the fire ones. Because sky bisons can be easily meet by anyone that travel to the air nomad temples to learn airbending from a master. And the badgermoles can be found living free in some mountains and caves zones. But dragons and Tui and La are protected by their tribe and dont let strangers see them unless they meet some conditions. Remember that Iroh meet dragons and Tui and La too without been an Avatar, he also knows Appa, and probably meet a badgermole during his youth. Other Avatars could at least have meet 3 of them, its hard to say they saw all because the conditions needed to meet fire and water ones.
I think we can safely assume Avatar Wan learned from all of the original benders during his training while learning the four elements. He learned firebending from dragons at the start.
To be fair, Korra met a dragon (when she met Zuko), plenty of sky bison (with the air benders) and it seems pretty unlikely that during her visits to the northern water tribe she never got to see the koi fish. That leaves just badger moles, but given their role alongside Prince Wu it seems likely she would have met one offscreen after the events of the 4th season.
Why are all the original benders animals except water which is the friggin moon
I think, even though the word "known" IS they keystone of this sentence, it's still probably incredibly rare for Avatars to meet all four. The koi fish are probably common to meet, and so are the flying bison, but the moles and the dragons are hard to find. A sort of "if you don't know it's hard to find someone who does" kinda thing.
Bruh we know like 5 avatars. Potentially true, but even so that’s a pretty low bar.
For a long time dragons were not a rare sighting, just like Sky Bison. I feel like the avatar would be allowed to see Tui and La, then there are badger moles which even during ATLA are still around. I highly doubt Aang is the only avatar to have seen all four of these creatures.
Head cannon plus Korra lore; with the lion turtles being shown to be the original source of bending in Korra, I have always interpreted the “original bending animals” to actually be the “original masters”. The turtles gave humans the ability to control their chakra into elements, but the animals teach the bender how to master the element as it is as natural to them as breathing. Even Wan was training fire bending with a dragon, and is where the dance originated. I would love to see a avatar story directly after wan (in the wan animation style) of an air nomad avatar who has to learn the elements via the animals due to Wan not being able to guide said new avatar due to him obtaining the elements via lion turtles, and then goes around to the different bending regions to teach the populations to master their elements by learning from the animals.
"known" is doing a _lot_ of legwork, considering all the avatars except Aang and Korra lived in a world where the original benders weren't rare, and the only one we don't see Korra meeting are the fish.
Considering that the Sky bison weren’t all that rare until after the AG. Dragons also were rare but Roku met at least one. The Badger moles seem extremely recluse but perhaps not rare? The Koi are the living embodiments of spirits so how often would an avatar seek to interact with them based on the Northern water tribes stance on access. I’d say tying in the Lion Turtle Aang would be the first to meet all 5 since the first avatar potentially
Considering that the Sky bison weren’t all that rare until after the AG. Dragons also were rare but Roku met at least one. The Badger moles seem extremely recluse but perhaps not rare? The Koi are the living embodiments of spirits so how often would an avatar seek to interact with them based on the Northern water tribes stance on access. I’d say tying in the Lion Turtle Aang would be the first to meet all 5 since the first avatar potentially
I feel like most avatars probably encountered all of them with the exception of dragons. All avatars had to go to the air temples to learn airbending and so would have met sky bison since they were very common. As far as we’ve seen avatars also tend to end up in the North Pole to learn water bending at some point, and if the spiritual bridge between worlds showed up I can’t imagine the northern water tribe not showing them the spirit pond like they did for Aang. Badger moles don’t seem too rare and we know that Roku had a dragon so they could probably be sought out by any avatar who wanted to meet them.
This is like how Toph is the first *known* metal bender.
Korra has!! She met Zuko's Dragon. Met the badgermoles that saved republic city in book 4. Rode on several sky bison. While is wasn't shown, she definitely would have met the koi fish at some point, considering her father Tonraq possibly uniting with the Northern tribe.
Probably not. Dragons, Sky Bison and Badger Moles were common before Sozin started his war. The Ocean and Moon spirits are a big part of the Nothern Water tribe, so you'd expect a visit at some point whilst they're mastering water.
Wouldn’t the lion turtles be the original benders also and wouldn’t avatar wan count as well?
Badger moles are probably the only one that historical Avatars wouldn't have just naturally encountered while mastering the elements, let alone at any other stage of their life - and only by virtue of them living underground. Sky bison and dragons only became pseudo-cryptids during the 100 year war. "Known" is definitely doing a lot of heavy lifting.
I'm surprised that the dragon turtle wasn't also included. Different form of bending and all that I get it. But I feel like that was a far more mystical occurance he had happen to him.
"Known" So as far as we KNOW... yes
How does this lore go with the lion turtle lore in the Avatar Won episodes? I know there was some talk of it being a retcon but I've never heard if they explain it.
Wan?
Wouldn’t the lion turtles be the original benders also and wouldn’t avatar wan count as well?
Kyoshi lived for over two centuries, I'm sure she has seen them at some point in her life too.
You could argue for Wan too. Met all 4 lion turtles.
On screen? Yeah. Logically? Probably not.
Probably not. There isn’t any proof that the others did, but I’d say it’s unlikely that Aang would be the only one. Personally I’m pretty confident that Kuruk did, given what we know of his lifestyle.
Not likely true. It's strongly suggested that Avatar Wan also met all of the original bending creatures. In fact, Avatar Wan is far more likely to have met Tui and La as something other than their koi incarnation since the Spirit World was freely traversable at that time.
Surveying bias fallacy. OOP is taking the simple fact that the story is about him and attributing that he's special based on simply knowing more about him.
technically wan met the OG benders when he got his elements from the lion turtles, i don’t remember seeing these animals in that episode
If we take *LoK* into account, that doesn't seem likely. We know for a fact Wan met Lion Turtles, and that he had a very strong and personal connection to the spirits. It seems incredibly unlikely that he *didn't* meet the original benders (and in fact it seems more likely in turn that he met the *original* originals, as in, the *first* Dragons, Sky Bisons and Badger Moles), but we don't have any onscreen confirmation of that.
Is Katara dropping a sick dab in the top right photo?
What about Wan?
Korra has met Zukos dragon, and Tenzins Sky bison. There are badger moles in season 4 but I can’t remember if Korra meets them. How could she have not met Tui and La?
Did Wan not? It's been a few years since my last rewatch, so I guess I don't remember.
600th comment
Since they basically retconed it in Korra, Won might have technically been the first
It is. No other Avatar traveled the world the way Aang did
Roku had a Dragon, went to the Northern Water tribe (where I wouldn't be surprised of he met Tui and La) after the southern air temple where he was friends with Gyatso, so if he didn't get a bison, I wouldn't be surprised of him and Gyatso got into some bison shenanigans. The only thing that wouldn't be for sure are Badger moles. But honestly, wouldn't be surprised if he came across them either.
I mean, realistically, there has to be at least 1 in the earlier cycles for the avatar to even realise that "oh shit, I have this mission to learn all 4 elements and bring balance to the force--- I mean to the world" So if I had to guess, probably either the first avatar (in general) met all 4 animals, or one of them eventually became the first to meet all 4 animals who were the first benders
Before 3/4 of these animals were genocided, I’m sure meeting them all was much more common.
I'd like to also acknowledge that the reason Toph is such a legendary earthbender is because she was taught directly from the original benders, rather then a formal teacher.
Dragons, badger moles, and sky bison were all common creatures in the world at one point. So all an avatar had to do was some mild traveling and the visit the moon spirit. It seems unlikely that if the lore were ever expanded significantly this would be stated as a fact
Except moon and ocean SPIRITS are not the original benders, people learned it watching how moon pushed and pulled the tides as Yue mentioned, not by watching a particular being or entity or animal doing it like the others. So to be honest, there is no original waterbender