Airbending

AIRBENDING

Airbending, one of the four elemental bending arts, is the aerokinetic ability to control and manipulate air. The peaceful Air Nomads utilized this type of bending in their everyday lives.
Air is the element of freedom. The Air Nomads detached themselves from worldly problems and concerns; finding peace and freedom was the key to solving their difficulties in life. Airbenders continually sought spiritual enlightenment, and, as a result, all children born into the Air Nomads were benders. The first airbenders learned their art from the flying bison.

The key to airbending is flexibility and finding and following the path of least resistance. Airbending is notable for being almost purely defensive, as well as the most dynamic of the four bending arts. Airbenders can overwhelm many opponents at once with large and powerful attacks that could prove fatal; however, due to the pacifist nature of the Air Nomads, such attacks are rarely used. Due to their aforementioned spirituality, they often adapt to the situation surrounding them and employ negative jing, preferring evasive maneuvers as opposed to direct confrontation.

Airbending Techniques

Air ball: An airbender can create a compressed ball of air by moving their hands together in a circular motion. This technique has many applications such as levitating small objects or trapping opponents.

Air blast: A more offensive maneuver involving a direct pulse or jet of strong wind from the hands, feet, or mouth. The force of the attack is generated more from the bender's own power, rather than assisted by momentum. The blast can reach further distances with greater accuracy and is used to inflict greater damage.

Air bomb: A technique which creates a powerful, outward-moving air current in all directions around the bender. Usually performed after landing on the ground from above, this airbending form has great concussive force, and the capacity to completely blow away anything within its radius.

Air funnel: Similar to an air vortex but on a smaller scale, one can inventively use this technique as a cannon by creating a small air funnel through which small rocks or other projectiles can be loaded and fired out of the opposite end

Air cushion: Airbenders can make a cushion out of air if they fall off several stories high.

Air punch/kick: Another more offensive move than is typical of airbending discipline, air punches or air kicks are small, compressed formations of air that can be fired off the fists or feet of an airbender. This is similar to many firebending abilities and the air blast, in the sense that it involves the firing of compressed or solidified air at an enemy in a disjunct fashion i.e. the bender does not create a single great stream of air.

Air scooter: The air scooter is a form of transportation invented by an unnamed airbender. It is a spherical "ball" of air that can be ridden balancing on it like a top. It allows for quick transportation for as long as the bender can maintain it on regular surfaces, temporarily allows one to scale vertical surfaces for a few seconds and can allow one to hover in mid air for about five seconds. The size of the scooter, depending on the skill of the bender, can also be controlled, starting off as a small three foot wide ball of air to up to a five meter wide sphere. A variation of this technique when employed by a skilled user of this technique can also allow one to create several air scooters at once.

Air shield: The most common defensive tactic, though less powerful than the air barrier, it involves circling enemies, suddenly changing direction when attacked and evading by physical movement rather than bending. However, an airbender can still deflect as needed by throwing up gusts of air close to their bodies as a shield. This is rarely to stop attacks directly and more often pushes the attack aside and away, conserving energy and allowing them to turn the movement into an attack at the same moment. Since air can affect almost all physical objects, it can also be used to enforce the momentum of thrown objects or manipulate other objects (though requiring a higher degree of precision).

Air swipe: The air swipe is both a defensive and offensive technique in which an airbender conjures a crescent-shaped structure of compressed air capable of deflecting colossal projectiles, such as the catapulted flaming rocks often used by the Fire Navy, and sending them off course or redirecting them back to the attacker.

Air wheel: This is a modified version of the air scooter. Air is rapidly spun around the airbender and carries the person as inside a wheel. It was shown to be able to cut through solid objects.

Breath of wind: Similar to the standard air jet, but created from the mouth and lungs. It requires extremely good breath control to employ effectively. Size and focus is more easily controlled, from narrow jets that can strike targets as small as insects, to large gale force gusts capable of cooling magma into solidified rock. By using this technique, the airbender can also magnify the sound waves generated by a whistle or another instrument.

Cloud manipulation: Since clouds are made from air and water, a skilled airbender can easily manipulate them into various shapes.

Gliding: Although all airbenders can levitate or extend jumps via airbending, most if not all airbenders possess a glider for mid range flight. These hand-crafted portable wood and canvas structures can collapse into a staff for storage and as an aid when bending. In glider form, it is used in conjunction with bending to fly as long as the bender has the strength to maintain the air currents. With stronger winds, multiple people can be carried for short distances. As a normal staff, it can be used as a weapon in battle, to aid in bending, and even as a levitation aid when spun above the head like a helicopter propeller.

Suction: A technique used to bring people or objects toward the airbender. By wrapping air around a person or object, they can bring the desired target back to them at fast speeds. It is often used by airbenders to retrieve their dropped glider or to bring another out of harm's way.

Airbending Techniques: Master Level

Air blades: A more offensive move than its typical of airbending principle, this involves a focused, slicing air current that can cut through stone or timber with relative ease. This is frequently conjured with a staff rather than the body, using the narrow profile of the object to create a more focused and precise air movement. This move could prove fatal if used on an individual.

Air cocoon: A master airbender can rotate while jumping to wrap themselves in a cocoon of wind. This technique utilizes an airbender's trademark fluid and dynamic movement style.

Air spout: Similar to the waterspout, master airbenders are able to rotate and control the direction of an air spout enough to levitate themselves off the ground and remain in the air for as long as they wish to or can maintain it.

Air vortex: A spinning funnel of air of varying size, the air vortex can be used to trap or disorient opponents as well as to deflect any objects thrown at it.

Air wake: By running in a circle and instantly building massive momentum, a master airbender can shoot a blast of highly compressed air shaped like the user's body at a target. This move seems to have extremely high concussive force.

Asphyxiation: Much like waterbenders can control the fluids inside a person's body, an airbender can manipulate the flow of air within a person's respiratory system, removing it by extracting it from the nostrils and mouth and preventing any air from entering the lungs.

Flight: The ability to fly is a technique so rare that only a couple of airbenders in history have ever achieved it. It is achieved by letting go of all earthly connections in order to achieve true and complete freedom. Being able to fly without an aid, such as a glider, grants the practitioner more stability and freedom in the sky, while also permitting the use of bending mid-flight. Although a powerful technique, the ability to fly is hindered by additional weight and the currents of the wind.

Levitation: In the same way flying bison can fly and stay aloft for extended periods of time, a master airbender can achieve this same feat by generating and controlling air currents to form a 'cloud' like board under their feet and surfing through the air, thereby emulating flight.

Spiritual projection: Master airbenders who have a strong connection with their spiritual side are capable of projecting their spirits into other locations. Through projection, an airbender is able to explore underground or sealed locations by passing through solid matter. Airbenders can also use this technique to find individuals with whom they have a strong bond.

Tornado: This is a smaller scaled version of the air vortex which airbending masters can use as a means of both combat and transport. By encircling themselves in a spiraling air current, masters can travel at high speeds and even ascend near-vertical drops. When several airbenders work together, this technique can also be used to create a much larger and more powerful tornado.

Airbending Techniques: Avatar Level

Air sphere: The Avatar generates a rapidly spinning sphere of wind around their body which they can use as a means of aerial transportation and flight. The Avatar flies at high-speeds while inside the air sphere, which also acts as a barrier to protect the bender during impacts, strong enough to withstand a high velocity impact with rock.

Strong wind: It is possible for the Avatar to unleash extremely powerful winds. This technique greatly enhances the level of any other airbending technique, allowing more simple airbending arts to send a full grown man flying a hundred yards away.

Tornadoes/hurricanes: In addition to large and powerful air movements, an Avatar level airbender can create massive tornadoes and hurricanes at will. The strong winds generated from this technique are capable of easily bending trees and uprooting them.

Airbending Special Abilities

Enhanced agility: Air movements can also be used as a levitation aid. Airbenders jump high and far by riding on strong gusts of wind. The constant movement required by this art makes airbenders naturally flexible and agile. Even without bending they can easily maneuver around an opponent by ducking, jumping, and side stepping, appearing to flow around their opponents without expending any energy at all, letting the opponent tire themselves out and thus creating exploitable openings. This conservation of energy combined with high stamina gives them an advantage in prolonged combat.

Enhanced speed: Airbenders enhance their movement in battle; they can run swiftly by decreasing air resistance around them and even sprint across or run up vertical surfaces by generating a wind current behind themselves to propel them forward. When used by a skilled airbender, this technique can enable the airbender using it to travel at a speed almost too swift for the naked eye to be able to see properly. A master airbender can use this technique to briefly run across water.

Heat regulation: Airbenders are able to warm themselves using proper breathing technique, allowing them to thrive in frigid environments with relative ease. Aang first demonstrated this in the Southern Water Tribe, maintaining his body heat without the need of a parka or any additional layers of clothing.

Hypersensitivity: Airbenders possess a high level of sensory sensitivity which enables them to detect threats and perceive their surroundings through feeling air currents and the vibrations in the air, similar to how earthbenders use seismic sense to sense their environment using earth. For this reason, the Air Nomads shaved their heads in order to "free themselves" and have a stronger connection with the wind around them, increasing the technique's effectiveness when used. Daw first demonstrated this technique during a battle with bison rustlers, when he perceived and evaded an attack behind him by sensing the oncoming threat.