Lugo Sergei 
Lugo Sergei (She/They) grew up in a Mosuo-like matriarchal culture called “the Lugo” which are separate and culturally distinct from most of the air-bending monasteries. Her/Their village (无处, pronounced Wú chù) is located deep in the forest in the heart of Fire Kingdom, but because outsiders didn't know about them, they are pretty much left to their own devices (with a little help from the forest’s spirit). The Lugo consider their brand of air-bending superior to that taught in the monasteries as it’s a lot more versatile. They frequently inbreed with fire-benders, so there are Lugo fire-benders too. Some Lugo, like Sergei have some mix of air and fire. Not really a fire-bender, Sergei can warm air currents mildly (like a 10-degree C difference max) and has on occasion produced smoke. She/they can pull fire toward herself (though they don't know this yet). Fire-benders among the Lugo can manipulate smoke of the fires they produce, but cannot bend anything else air-related. The History of the Lugo: Asa, the first mother of the Lugo was the daughter of the Avatar, and a talented airbender in her own right. She married an earth bender and powerful Ri Emperor Niohuru-Nara Kuazha to solidify an alliance between the emperor and the Avatar, a marriage negotiated for Kuazha by his mother, an airbender who had married an earth kingdom emperor. Asa was Kuazha’s first wife (they were both teenagers at the time, Kuazha had just come into power), and at the time of their marriage, the understanding was that the Avatar would help guide Kuazha into becoming a good emperor, and in turn, he would be a devoted and loving husband for the Avatar’s beloved only daughter. Kuazha feared and respected her father, so initially he honored these terms. Kuazha’s mother doted on and loved Asa as if she were her own, so Asa’s life as Ri Empress started off good. They had five daughters together. Not long after the birth of her fifth girl, Asa’s father and Kuazha’s mother both died in a tragic earthquake (Asa’s father the Avatar was trying to appease an angry earth spirit, but it did not go well). After that, Kuazha began to show his true colors. He was cruel, only really interested in woman for sex. He treated her more as a sex object than a human person. He raped her repeatedly, and physically abused her when she tried to resist his advances. This is how their sixth daughter came to be. He wanted a son, and she hadn’t given him that, so he started taking more and more and more wives. He preferred air nomad women and would send his soldiers on raids to kidnap brides for him. He would still come and darken her doorway from time to time. Things came to a head when their eldest daughter, Yi, turned 13. The night before Yi’s birthday, there was a huge banquet celebrating yet another of her father’s marriages. Before retiring to the wedding bed with his newest wife, he drunkenly leered at his own daughter—“tomorrow, you’ll be ready to take to my bed too. We’ll arrange another marriage feast” Horrified, Asa knew she had to leave, to protect her girls. She was up all night, praying to the spirit world for help. The sun did not rise that next day. Instead, a deep dark fog descended on Ba Sing Se, making it impossible to see anything more than about 15cm away. She heard a child’s voice calling to her. She looked around, and suddenly there was an eerie blue light. All six of her girls also heard the voice calling to them, as did about a dozen or so of Kuazha’s other unhappy wives and their daughters. All of these women were airbenders, and quite proficient in the art of airbending. Thus they were able to bend the fog away from themselves and their daughters. The blue light and its child-like voice guided them to the gates, where they found the guards fast asleep (unbeknownst to Asa, her daughters and her companions, all of Ba Sing Se apart from themselves were sound asleep, like an entire city-wide sleeping-beauty’s castle). They traveled across the earth kingdom, always in the dead of night. The fog and mass sleep following them whereever they went. It prevented Kuazha and his men from finding them (though he did make a lot of efforts to get his women back, he was never able to figure out where they went. He and his men searched the entire Earth Kingdom for over a year. He eventually gave up and continued to build his harem) Eventually they reached the coast and set sail, the blue light continuing to guide them. They reached a remote island in the fire nation. The light led them deep into the jungle, to a small clearing by a beautiful azure blue lake full of fish and waterfowl, where finally, after weeks of exhausting travel, it stopped. It told the women that if they stayed here, that it would keep them safe. The light explained to Asa that it’s name is lán and that it had been a young, rather mischievous wind spirit, who had angered one of the powerful earth spirits, sending it into a rampage (it was this rampaging spirit that killed Asa’s father, who had protected lán from the earth spirit. lán, in gratitude, promised the dying Avatar that it would protect Asa and her daughters no matter the cost. lán thus became the protector of the Lugo people) Due to the violence they had suffered at Kuazha’s hand, Asa and the other women resolved that neither they, nor her daughters would ever suffer the tyranny of men again. Thus, when their daughters came of age (16), they began the tradition of walking marriages with men from the local fire nation tribes. Cultural Practices among the Lugo: It is known on the island, that on the night of the new moon, men (usually fire nation, but occasionally traders/soldiers from the earth/water kingdoms, or air nomads passing through), occasionally disappear in the night, though they always return (with a wild tale) by mid-morning. The men that disappear find themselves woken up by a eerie almost child-like voice, which bids them to enter the forest. Upon entering the forest, a blue glowing light—like a giant firefly guides them forward. They hear a kind of creepy child’s laughter/giggles leading them deeper and deeper into the jungle. Once they’re deep enough into the jungle, the light suddenly goes out and the voice is gone. The men then find themselves at the edge of the village. Local men guide them to the hall in the center of the village, and the walking marriage ceremonies begin. After a night of passions, they wake to find themselves in their beds in town having no idea how they got there, and half-thinking it was all a dream. There tends to be mud on the bottoms of their feet and leaves in their hair, which dispels the idea that it didn’t all actually happen. Some menfolk have spent the rest of their lives searching in vain, trying to find the village again, and return to the woman they fell in love with and spent such an incredible night with. Very few are successful, and those who actually succeed, are never seen or heard from (by the outside world) ever again. (basically they join the village. One of the elders adopts them as their son, and they can try to woo the woman they’re obsessed with each month if she’ll have him). Their numbers have always been small, it’s a village of 15 households (one from each of the wives of Kuazha who fled), probably no more than ~300 people total. Each clan has its own compound (series of houses joined together around a central courtyard). They eat a varied diet and are not vegetarian. They practice an animistic religion that involves veneration of nature spirits and their ancestors, with a fair amount of Buddhism mixed in. One of the men who did successfully find the village again and joined the community was a former air nomad monk, who did his best to try to convert the villagers, but being a man, he had limited say on such things. He never could convince any one, even the most devoted Buddhist converts, to stop eating meat and other animal products. The Lugo keep a variety of livestock, with pigs being a principle part of their diet. They also have fields of soy, buckwheat and other crops. Everything is grown sustainably and done in a way that helps maintain harmony with the nature spirits. One of the reasons their numbers stay small, is that when Lugo boys reach the age of manhood (16), they are given a choice to remain in the village and serve the elders, or to leave and seek their fortunes elsewhere. The night before each boy’s 16th birthday, there is a ceremony: a curse is painted on their tongues preventing them from ever speaking the name of their village or telling anyone where it is. They drink a special tea that lets them commune with the spirit world (not in the avatar sense—more that a spirit can come and guide them on their journey). It is unknown what the spirit elder says or does, but most boys are gone by morning and are never seen or heard from (by the villagers) again. They leave the island in the night and travel far and wide (usually to the earth kingdom to seek out air temples, or to the fire kingdom, but a few have ventured north/south to join water tribes). The few that remain generally continue to live in their mothers’ houses and participate in walking marriage ceremonies. It is strictly taboo to pair off with a first cousin or a sister. Girls on the eve of their 16th birthdays also drink the special tea (which is like 90% EtOH), so that they can speak with lán, and receive guidance about their futures in the village, and how they might best serve the community. Sergei's Story: Sergei’s brother Daba is a firebender (most of the partners in the walking marriages have been from the fire nation, so over time, the village has become a blend of fire and air benders). It’s rare for a male Lugo to be a bender, virtually all of the Lugo benders are female.Sergei and their brother are unusual among the Lugo, in that their father Roku (named for the Avatar) is in their lives. He is a firebender, and was a Fire Nation Soldier under the Fire Lord Sozin. After lán lured him into the forest, and he met Sergei’s mother for their sweet night, he deserted the army and went back into the forest. He found the village quicker than anyone else ever had—in about two weeks. He prayed to lán directly to do this, pledging his life to Sergei’s mother. He and Sergei’s mom are serial monogamists, each choosing each other in the monthly ceremony. They spent a lot of their freetime together too. Upon becoming Lugo, Roku was adopted into clan Na. Growing up hearing Roku’s stories about the fire nation while tending to livestock and sowing the fields with their father led to both Sergei and Daba to have an unusual curiosity about the outside world and the Fire Nation in particular. Daba would occasionally sneak off and explore the outskirts of the local Fire Nation village at the edge of the forest. He was kidnapped during one of these exploits. When his son was kidnapped, Roku was distraught, blaming himself for his son’s foolishness in leaving the forest before manhood, before lán could guide him. Roku wants more than anything to leave to find his son, but he promised lán long ago that he would never, ever leave the village and reenter the outside world. Asa has responsibilities in the village (responsibilities Sergei is to inherit some day) and cannot leave her people. Sergei, their mother Asa, and Roku all fear for what might become of Daba. The eldest girl of each of the households (which Sergei happens to be) trains to be the next elder and matriarch for her clan. Sergei is descended from Asa’s clan, thus they are destined to be the village’s high matriarch, serving also as chief shaman for the village (in charge of exorcisms, communing with lán, being the village’s primary source of healthcare, among other responsibilities). They don’t identify as purely female, making their destiny more complicated. They also happen to be among the minority of airbenders among the Lugo that can also command some power over fire (it’s not much—they can manipulate smoke and direct flames somewhat once they’re already present, and they can warm the breezes the summon ~10-degrees, but cannot make fire or resist fire in the way a true fire-bender can). On the eve of their 16th birthday, they drink the potion to commune with the spirits, and lán came to them, and explained that they, like other non-binary Lugo that had come before them, had a choice. They could follow the spirit into the main world (though they wouldn’t carry the same curse not to tell anyone about the village that cis-men carry), or they can remain and train as matriarch. Sergei explains that they do not wish to leave the village forever, but they’re desperate to find their brother, and asks if they might have a third option: the change to leave temporarily to find their brother (who is only 14, and was kidnapped by the Fire Lord’s soldiers to join the Fire Army). lán brightens, for Sergei chose what lán hoped they would (as lán cares deeply for each and every Lugo, and considers Daba one of it's own brood). lán agrees to guide Sergei through the forest safely and advises Sergei to find the Avatar, because only with the forces of nature can they easily find Daba. Daba is too far away from lán for lán to sense his location. lán communicates with other nature spirits that reside on the forest's outskirts but none have seen Daba. As Sergei leaves the forest, lán asks these spirits to keep an eye on Sergei and make sure Sergei returns safely. (Unknown to Sergei, these spirits tell spirits they know and soon a whole network of nature spirits is watching over Sergei throughout her/their journey and while the spirits cannot intervene on Sergei's behalf, they do report back to lán Sergei's progress finding Daba and the Avatar).
Inventory: knife, clothes, bedroll, rations, and a little glass figurine her brother made her with his firebending by melting sand