Lord Ozai was an extremely harsh man. Cruel, even. I suspected—no, was outright convinced—that he believed in something akin to the famous Anglo-Saxon notion that "there's no intelligent life beyond the Channel," only applied to the Archipelago.
At the same time, however, he was also very intelligent in his own way.
Which meant that for an engineer like the Mechanist, he would have built a personal university right in the center of the Capital, bulldozing a few "unnecessary" aristocratic estates if needed.
And whoever brought such a marvel to his attention would've received a generous share of the lord's favor as well.
Instead, the colonel was busy screwing around, apparently deciding to play "brilliant engineer" himself while squeezing more and more inventions out of an actual genius, demanding increasingly greater results in less and less time.
For example, right now the Mechanist was working on… a hot-air balloon!
I remembered Ozai blasting frying some rocks from some kind of flying warship near the end of the war, but I'd always assumed that had been our own development. Turns out that wasn't quite the case.
And really, there wasn't all that much distance between a hot-air balloon and a full-fledged airship.
The problem was that the genius had gotten stuck on the issue of altitude control. He simply lacked a few bits of knowledge that came naturally both to me, thanks to my origins, and to Fire Nation engineers in general. After all, we'd been working with steam engines for decades, and we knew perfectly well what a simple valve was and why it mattered.
A quick hand-drawn sketch of the required mechanism, along with a basic explanation of how it worked—here are the flaps, here's the rope, pull the rope and the flaps bend downward, allowing hot air to escape so the balloon descends; release the rope and the hot airflow pushes the flaps shut again, allowing the balloon to fill back up and increasing lift—was enough to turn me from a "terrifying Fire Nation barbarian" into, if not the scientist's best friend, then at least something considerably closer to human in his eyes.
And then, one thing led to another, and I suggested he relocate either to the Capital or, if he was still somewhat wary of us, to Yu Dao. Better atmosphere there, more resources too.
As for Colonel Bohin, everything he'd done amounted to war crimes for which he would answer before the Fire Lord to the fullest extent of the law. On top of that, he'd attempted to deceive a Herald, which only worsened his guilt. So the next ten or fifteen years of his life would most likely be spent in the lovely and cozy place known as the Boiling Rock.
In short, I spent several more hours carefully persuading and recruiting the Mechanist, explaining that the Fire Nation was, on the whole, made up of fairly decent people, and that every nation had its share of bastards.
Oddly enough, the Mechanist agreed rather quickly.
Perhaps a little too quickly.
Which, naturally, I asked him about.
"You see, young man, there's one problem that's been worrying me greatly."
"And what might that be?"
"How do I explain this…? Come with me. It's better if you see it for yourself." Intrigued, I followed after the master engineer.
We descended into the temple's lower levels and… came to a locked door, sealed around the edges with some kind of insulating material. Incidentally, the engineer wasn't lighting the way with a normal oil lantern, but with a jar full of some sort of glowing insects. They barely gave off any light at all, so I was just about to "light up my fist" when the Mechanist practically threw himself at me.
"No firebending, for the love of all the spirits!"
Yeah… my ass immediately started warning me about incoming trouble again.
"Why?"
"Natural gas. The first time I explored the temple, I had a lit lantern with me, and I nearly blew myself sky-high! I got off lucky, but my eyebrows never grew back after that."
Ahem... Right. And here I'd thought that was the result of some experiment gone wrong.
"You're living on top of a leaking gas cavern? That thing could explode from a single spark!"
"Exactly why I'm accepting your offer. You're a good man, Chan. It's a shame our first encounter with the Fire Nation came through Bohin instead of someone like you."
"I'll do my best to justify your trust. For now, I suggest you begin packing immediately. Preferably within a day or two. That way, my squad and I can escort you safely to Yu Dao."
"And the colonel…"
"That's my concern. Trust me, he'll get what's coming to him." A grin spread across my face once more. "Everyone living in the Fire Colonies is a citizen of our nation, and I don't appreciate seeing our citizens treated like this. As for the tied-up 'envoys' from the commandant…"
My smirk widened.
"Let them stay that way. A little humility won't hurt them."
Parting ways with the engineer, I hurried back toward the camp—the eastern sky was already beginning to brighten, and if I wanted to make it back in time and avoid unnecessary problems, I needed to move fast.
The best place to grab the officer by the throat would be on the approach to the Northern Temple.
First, he and his little gang—because there was no way he'd pulled all this off alone—would be exhausted after the mountain climb. Second, the temple had a population. Most of them were little more than teenagers, sure, but there were still a couple dozen sturdy men among them. Though honestly, I doubted they'd even be necessary.
(End of Chapter)
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