#post by: yueqqi

[avatarfromtheashes]

[Image ID: A header image with a low opacity painted background of the Fire Nation at sunset and text that reads “So, what is Avatar: From the Ashes?” //End ID]

Hey everyone! @yueqqi here, but I respond to anything including “dumbass (friendly).” 💙 From the Ashes has been a project I’ve been working on over the course of the last 8 months, first incepted in late May 2020 as a small Dungeons & Dragons campaign between friends. After the campaign ended with the first arc, I was inspired by the awesome fancomic work by @legendofgenji, @avatarhanami, and @niikocomic (please check them out if you haven’t already!) to realize all of mine and my friend’s (massive shout out to Magpie and Josh) worldbuilding and plot building into this project starting late fall of 2020. It might not be a fully fledged comic since we’re new with only a small team of worldbuilders/writers and 1 main writer/artist, but for now we will focus on sharing our story in the form of fic writing and concept art.

This is a fun project done on our own time, first and foremost. It is also an important project, for me anyways, to build on what Avatar could be, written by POC for POC, written by LGBT for LGBT, and to be shared with people who want to learn more about our communities and support us. The story’s narrative is supposed to expand on Chinese and other Eastern cultures and address serious topics that mirror our real world problems. As a Chinese diaspora author from a family who immigrated from post-war Vietnam, those topics are what I hold with importance and I hope to be able to share it with you. I love interacting, so the askbox is officially open! ☺️

What is your story?

From the Ashes, also titled Tian Hui Yuan (天灰園, meaning “garden that grows from the sky’s ashes”), is set during the time of the second earthbending Avatar of Korra’s cycle in a world ravaged by the Great War—which, wasn’t as “great” as it says on the tin until the end of the 36 years of battles with long intermittent periods of silence, when it devolved into an all-out nuclear war between the democratic Earth Republic and the Fire Nation. Who instigated the war? If you live in the modern Earth Federation, history lessons at mandatory school left it pretty fuzzy until recent years but everywhere else, including the remaining Southern Air Temple and the Northern and Southern Water Tribes, agree that it was President Qin Namyao of the Earth Republic who first developed nuclear technology for non-peaceful purposes and his successors that dropped the first bomb, the effects rippling even today in 539 AG, the rough equivalent to the 1980s era.

The three-month-long catastrophe led to tragic losses not only in the initial blast and ensuing fallout, but the generations of famine it triggered after the decade-long nuclear winter. With the first airbending Avatar’s help, society managed to rebuild itself within a century, though still long ways away from returning to how things used to be in peace times in between turf wars and fighting over resources. With the rise of Avatar Niraq, the second waterbender, the period of warring factions was put to an end—at the great cost of destroying autonomy and bringing down the working middle class in the act of rebellion against the upper class with the creation of the (now Old) Order to unite all the nations and their factions under a single banner.

After Avatar Niraq’s assassination and the New Order taking over and returning control to world leaders, 18 years later the new Avatar is (still) missing and the original plan to take the Avatar young to prevent another tragedy becomes more loose as tensions rise and the New Order has to reconsider their game plan on how to handle the Avatar—including arrest at best, or making them “disappear” at worst.

As for our new Avatar? He has no idea what’s coming, nor that he’s even the Avatar.

FtA focuses on Leaf’s story years after all hell broke loose, where things seem better, but the picturesque peaceful times keep unraveling to reveal a very ugly truth where what seems to be the right path is one in darkness and the seemingly amoral one is the only one that can make a change.

Who is the Avatar?

[Image ID: A young man in motion appearing to be in mid brake while running, earthbending shards of grey rock and kicking up a dust cloud. He is lightly tanned with slight pink undertones to his skin, with hazel eyes that lean more deep green, and he wears his brown curly hair in mullet, sadly missing the hair spray and mousse, with a slight chin scruff and a ratty mustache. The man wears a red shirt with its sleeves ripped an a v-neck ripped to expose his collarbones and a part of his chest, paired with a silver dog tag on a chain necklace, light wash skinny jeans with a brown and brass belt, and green canvas high tops with drooping flaps that look suspiciously like Converse. //End ID]

The Avatar is this idiot right here and his name is Leaf (Ye in Chinese, but to emphasize strangeness of his name, it stays in English except for nicknames) because he never knew his birth name. He hasn’t even mastered his birth element yet, smh. (Backstory? Well, that will be revealed. :) All you need to know is that he has a stack of crimes hiding there.)

Team Avatar??

The team is called the Vine by the writers (ha, get it? Leaves from the... *crying*). You’ll see them around as I post their finished sheets! They aren’t the only main characters, though. :)

Who are the villains?

For now, all you need to know is that the Order acts as antagonists (obviously), but it gets heavily into some grey areas on who’s right and wrong here. There are bigger sharks in the sea, eventually.

Okay, so we know the rough backstory of the story. What about the plot?

Now, that would be spoilers. :) But if you want something to start guessing with, many game changing events can be described with Bon Jovi, Metallica, and Bonnie Tyler top hits. Here’s a Jon Bon Jovi pic from the 80s who may or may not have been the inspiration for Leaf’s aesthetic. 💙

[yueqqi-main]

I haven’t posted any art to this blog in like 2 years bc I use @yueqqi as my primary art blog, but here’s a WIP digital painting and new pfp

[yueqqi]

My activity over here has diminished a bit partly bc of decreasing mental health bc either my posts on my main mentioning my situation and linking my Ko-Fi and PayPal are being shadowbanned or smth, or people are really just scrolling past and at that point I’m severely tempted to drop Tumblr if ppl seriously don’t give a shit and cares more about their aes /shrug

So, if anyone actually follows me for my art, I’m more active on my ig now @/yueqqi since my art is already doing a lot better over there than on Tumblr where I’m lucky if I get 2 notes but you see I like trying to survive and reaching a wider audience where I could get tipped or get higher traffic to my Etsy store instead of dying off with unemployment giving the runaround and me still being sick but I guess Murica gives jackshit about its lower class and nonwhite citizens

[avatarfromtheashes]

art by @yueqqi and design by Yama-kun

Just four left to go on our cast of main characters! This here is Sen, the first and only character who has never committed a crime... Yet. Getting swept up in this Avatar business, even on the rival’s side, makes it very difficult to stay an upstanding citizen. He’s a bit late to the game, having avoided the mandatory draft in the North Pole for a year until he was finally tracked down by Commander Tashra just a couple months before the start of the story. He might not be allowed to carry a loaded gun (for very good reasons, namely his coworkers keeping him from shooting his foot on accident), but he makes for a loyal and valuable team member as a trained medic and having a good mastery over water healing, and lobbing a ball of solid ice at someone’s head before yelling “Sorry!” right afterwards.

Chapter 1’s Ao3 link has been posted to our blog and chapter 2 is 25% completed!

[Image ID: A dark-skinned man named Sen appears to be skating across ice using waterbending, leaving behind skate trails, while bending snow from the ground and funneling it into a ball of ice in his right hand. His eyes are heterochromatic where his right eye is brown and his left eye is ice blue, and his long, full wavy black hair is tied back with bangs, modified hair loops, and two thick locks of hair framing the sides of his eyes, tied with a twin blue hairpieces. He wears a grey and black hanyuansu military uniform with light grey-blue details designating his division, with brown leather brackets and boots plus a gun holstered to his belt. At the other side of his belt hangs a suede waterskin with the Northern Water Tribe symbol painted on its center. End ID]

[Sidebar ID: “Ensign Sen of the Northern Water Tribe, Order Skyfleet Division, Lion Turtle 1. b. 14th of the 12th Month, 519 AG. 19-20 (book 1), 22-23 (book 4). 6’0” (183 cm).” End ID]