Avatar:Zongying
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"I entreat you... my dear, eminent, respected, wise and, dare I say, more than a little handsome, gentlemen, to lavish upon me the tale of the Avatar... from the beginning."
Zongying was an Earth Kingdom theater director in charge of the Ba Sing Se Players. She planned to write a revised edition of The Boy in the Iceberg to commemorate Team Avatar's victory over the Fire Nation.[1]
History
Zongying arranged a meeting with Iroh so that she could confirm some details about Team Avatar's adventures with him, Master Pakku, and King Bumi, stating that she would only take a few minutes. She arrived to meet with them at the Jasmine Dragon when the three friends were just about to play Pai Sho together.
The director explained that she was well aware that the Ember Island Players' version of The Boy in the Iceberg contained severe historical inaccuracies. As Zuko was set to become the new Fire Lord very soon, she found it the appropriate time to set the record straight on Team Avatar's adventures, and believed that there was nobody better to ask than the three bending masters, since they had "seen it all". She surprised the three friends by asking for an extremely detailed version of Team Avatar's adventures, and said that she wanted to hear everything that happened, without any embellishments of any kind. She promised she would be "quiet as a lizard mouse", although she continued to make interjections at various points of the story.
Pakku told Zongying the story from the time of Avatar Aang's disappearance from the Southern Air Temple, up to the Siege of the North. Bumi told the next part of the story, up to the Coup of Ba Sing Se, while Iroh completed the story up to the return of Sozin's Comet and the end of the Hundred Year War. Despite Zongying's request for an extremely accurate version of the story, the masters' retelling did hold various deviations from the true story. When the masters finished their retelling, however, Zongying also began to muse on how she could further "improve" the story's ending. As Iroh questioned her intent, the director declared that people always wanted something new and exciting, effectively revealing that she had no intention to stick to the truth in her play. As she began to excitedly speculate on increasingly odd variations of Team Avatar's adventure, Zongying left the Jasmine Dragon to start writing her play.[1]
Personality
Zongying was a rather bold and theatrical woman. She seemed rather flirtatious, complimenting Pakku, Bumi, and Iroh for their good looks and charm. Zongying also seemed somewhat talkative, despite her insistence that she would quietly listen along to their story.[1]
Appearances
Avatar games
Trivia
- Two of Zongying's ideas on how to improve the tale of Team Avatar seem to reference inside jokes: She wanted Appa and Momo to be able to talk to each other,[1] a concept humorously explored in Nightmares and Daydreams;[2] and for Katara to become Fire Lord,[1] a concept sometimes speculated upon in the fandom due to Katara (not Zuko) being the one to defeat Azula in the Agni Kai for the throne.