Name: Jia Bao Xue
Age: 28
Bending/Race: Earthbending, Sandbending
Personality: Normally warm, friendly, honorable, and kind, Jia is known for her easygoing nature suddenly and often without warning giving away to an explosive temper when irritated. Jia knows about this and works to increase her self-control through training and meditation, but she can still bite off heads when annoyed. Beyond this, Jia is very loyal to her nation and therefore hates traitors, and has a great love and respect for the earth and things that grow from it, which is part of the reason she finds metal buildings and factories like those in the fire nation disgusting. Her main weaknesses personality-wise is a fear of storms, particularly thunder, lightning, and hurricanes, from a bad hurricane that nearly destroyed her house as a child, and her immense insecurities about her past prior to her life as an ordinary soldier, which she is ashamed of and keeps a tightly-guarded secret. This shame has caused her to have small regard for what happens to her, but Jia has lived her entire life with the belief it is the duty of the strong to protect the weak; Jia will never allow innocent people to come to harm if she has the power to defend them, even at the cost of her life.
Bio: Jia was an ordinary girl in the Earth Kingdom, but she displayed a talent for earthbending from a young age. Her parents, encouraging their oldest child's talent, apprenticed Jia to a traveling earthbending master, who took her across the Earth nation and beyond, eventually training her for three years at his home in the desert alongside several other children that joined them on the way. Jia proved to be a star student, excelling at sandbending and hand-to-hand combat alongside the traditional earthbending forms. Her master helped her hone the mind and body as one, teaching her both how to bend the earth to her will, but also the lessons the earth could teach; patience, stoic courage in the face of adversity, and the willpower to endure all hardships without breaking. With practice, Jia learned the "breaking point" of stone that could let her break down rocks into sand with a simple gesture and application of bending, as well as developing a fighting style that let her use rock and sand to help protect her hands and feet in battle while increasing the damage from her punches and kicks. Over the years, Jia developed a friendly rivalry with another girl, Rao Xiao Fen, who specialized in crystalbending and weapons. The two remained very close friends as they grew from girls to women, and when the master declared them both ready, decided to take the long journey home together.
The journey home was not to be so peaceful as the friends had hoped. Bandits, including Fire Nation deserters from a recent raid on the Earth Kingdom, crossed paths with the women not far from their destination and attempted to rob them. Jia and Rao fought back, at first fending off the bandits without great difficulty, but Jia could see that she and Rao was growing tired and the bandits' numbers would allow them to overwhelm both of them. Despite Rao's insistance that their only chance was to stand and fight to drive the bandits off, Jia grew frightened for her friend's safety and grabbed her, trying to retreat from the battle. Unfortunately, devoting their attention to retreat allowed Rao to be struck by arrows and badly burned by several parting shots from the pursuing bandits. Jia did her best to treat her friend and quickly found the first doctor she could in Omashu to treat her, but Rao's injuries had incapacitated her; she would never walk or fight again. Rao attempted to reassure Jia that it was not her fault, but Jia blamed her decision to run away for her friend being disabled and left Rao and her family behind to join the army as a simple soldier. While both her friends and family have tried to make contact with her, Jia's shame prevents her from returning to her life and loved ones; she attempts to find peace through protecting the weak who cannot protect themselves, and has resolved never to flee and expose her loved ones to danger ever again.
Appearance:
?poop eh did srepaid ynam woh ,srepaid ytterp fo knip a depoop repiP reteP fI .depoop repiP reteP ,repaid ytterp knip A .srepaid ytterp fo knip a depoop repiP reteP
