One hundred million years.
I know that number because I recorded it.
Not because I felt it.
Time, at this scale, had become a statistic rather than an experience. A unit of measurement useful for cataloguing change, not for emotional reference. Entire epochs passed between moments of interest. Continents shifted. Spirits rose and faded. The Spirit World subtly restructured itself again and again around new equilibria.
And eventually—
Humans appeared.
Not suddenly. Not miraculously.
They emerged.
I observed the process with quiet attention. Many spirits interfered—some intentionally, others simply by existing too close to the material world for too long. Fear, curiosity, hunger, protection—these concepts bled across realms and condensed into something fragile and adaptive.
I helped.
A little.
Not by shaping bodies or enforcing destiny, but by introducing two crucial variables:
Intelligence.
And consciousness.
Not brilliance. Not wisdom. Just enough awareness for self-reflection. Enough pattern recognition for memory. Enough curiosity for questions to arise.
A spark.
The rest, I decided, had to be theirs.
I refused to overcorrect.
Too much guidance would have distorted balance. Knowledge forced upon a species was not knowledge—it was dependency. I had seen that mistake echoed endlessly among lesser spirits who treated mortals as extensions of their will.
I would not become that.
So I watched as humans learned to fear fire before they learned to control it. As they formed groups, then tribes. As symbols scratched into stone slowly became meaning.
Cavemen.
Primitive. Inefficient. Loud.
Not especially useful yet.
Still… promising.
I felt the world shift again tens of thousands of years later.
The Lion Turtles.
Their arrival was unmistakable—not because of force, but because of weight. They carried authority the way mountains carried gravity. Older than bending. Older than nations that did not yet exist.
I sought them out.
Conversation with a Lion Turtle was unlike speaking to spirits or mortals. It was an exchange of principles rather than words. They understood balance not as equilibrium, but as responsibility.
From them, I learned energybending.
Not as a technique, but as a framework—the manipulation of life force, identity, and spiritual alignment at their most fundamental level. It was… elegant. Dangerous. Absolute in a way even elemental bending was not.
I documented everything.
Every principle. Every limitation. Every consequence.
My library grew deeper.
Energybending was not something I intended to use freely. Power that fundamental demanded restraint bordering on reverence. Even I understood that some knowledge must be earned, not merely accessed.
Humans, for now, were nowhere near ready.
They barely understood tools.
They barely understood death.
So I waited.
Waiting was easy.
I returned to the Spirit World, to my shelves and records, watching humanity's slow ascent with distant patience. Occasionally, I nudged probability—a dream here, an instinct there—but never enough to guide, only enough to prevent stagnation.
Let them struggle.
Let them learn.
Let them invent.
Only when they began asking why instead of merely how would they become interesting.
I seated myself within my library, light bending softly around my chosen form, a book opening in my hands that documented the earliest cave markings—primitive attempts at symbolism.
A beginning.
"Take your time," I murmured, more to the future than to them.
"I'll be here when you're ready."
And I would be.
When they learned to write.
When they learned to build.
When they learned to question the sky, the spirits, and themselves.
That was when history would truly begin.