Gen Zhou, the Phoenix General

Full Name: Gen Zhou
Gender: Male
Age: 59
Element: Fire
Birthplace: Shu Jing, Fire Nation
Position: Chief Strategist to Fire Lord Shula // 1st General of the Fire Nation
Prev. Pos.: Chief Strategist to the Air Nomads during the War of Tipped Scales

Personality: Gen is a man without a country. All he has left is his sense of justice and morality. For many years, he was content to follow orders and preserve the glory of his homeland. He was a true patriot. However, when he saw the lengths the new Fire Lord would go to in order to advance his own glory, he could not allow himself to follow him any longer. He chose to take on the life of a traitor rather than betray his sense of justice.

Naturally philosophical in many things, Gen is a man of action, yet a man of many regrets. Strategically, he is well known, his specialty being small unit tactics. He is a master of the hit and run and has used the light, mobile nature of his forces to incredible effect in the past. With his only remaining reason for living being the hope that he might help bring his nation into a new era of peace, he is determined to his last breath to stop the Fire Nation from losing it's way any further...

Abilities: Gen is a master firebender of great repute. He was known for his talent with lightning especially. In addition, he is an expert in hand to hand fighting and a skilled swordsman. During his days with the Phoenix Core, he even crossed blades with the infamous Tiger-General of Kyoshi, Katsumi Yu. Though he barely escaped the encounter, it was more than could be said of the vast majority of her opponents.

Appearance:
Height: 5'10"
Weight: 212 lbs.
Eyes: Gray
Hair: Black, Graying
Skin: Pale

A man of swiftly advancing years, Gen was once a handsome young man. Nowadays, he looks more and more the part of the broken man. He has a very strong body, a result of years of constant training, but even the strongest do not dodge the hand of age long. He's become more skilled, but more fragile with his years. He has been cut and burned more times than he can remember. Though he once wore his topknot proudly, he cut it off when he abandoned his nation. He kept his beard and mustache, however. Now, he simply keeps his hair cut short.

History: Born in the Fire Nation to a pair of jewellery makers, Gen was always around fire. He learned to love it's subtle hues and lively nature. Both his parents were firebenders, so it wasn't much of a surprise when he turned out to be as well. When he was thirteen, his parents made arrangements to have him sent to the capitol to be trained as an officer for the Fire Nation military. He left determined to make them proud.

Gen's years at the academy were formative to say the least. He developed a relationship with some of the Fire Nation's most prestigious youths. His talent with firebending made him popular and his good looks made him sought after. By the time of his eighteenth birthday, he had graduated from the academy and found a wife, Jia. Both were officers by then, lieutenants in a good command. The future was bright.

The couple went many years without having children. They did not want to have to choose between their work and their family. Gen climbed the ranks quickly and was a captain by age twenty-five. By age thirty-two, he was a lieutenant colonel of excellent standing. His heroism in battle had become an inspiring tale and he was heralded as a symbol of the Fire Nation's might, if only in limited military circles. It was all just as well to him. Fame was not something he enjoyed.

But his was some of the only such success they enjoyed. Jia reached a dead end in her career and decided to retire and become a housewife and a firebending teacher. The two of them had a son, Kuzal, and five years later, a daughter, Tumi. Tumi was a firebender. Kuzal was not. Gen spent his years as a father putting out fires set as jokes on his son's head and telling off his daughter for playing with fire. Nevertheless, he loved them with every fiber of his being.

All through this time, however, he had become a member of the Phoenix Core, an elite group of Fire Nation soldiers. His prowess and strategic mind had earned him command quickly and he became the Lightning-God of the Fifth, a title given to him by his men. He rejected it wholeheartedly, but they still called him by it over mugs of ale and a stout laugh.

Soon after he became the commander of the 5th Company, the most elite of the Phoenixes, he earned a promotion to Colonel and he became the personal lieutenant to General Li, the commander of the Phoenix Core. Bit by bit, he became the General's go-to on all sensitive missions. Gen did his duty, but he began to have misgivings about the missions he was being sent on. They did not seem the sort of thing that a soldier of the Fire Nation was expected to do. His long time second in command and most trusted lieutenant, Major Kaidel had finally begun a family. In the interest of giving his friend the opportunity to enjoy that family and be there for his new daughter, Gen arranged for his transfer to the Imperial Palace, where he worked for some time as an administrative officer for several generals.

By now, he was in his mid forties. His son, well into his teens, had become obsessed with the concept of becoming a soldier. He didn't care that he wasn't a firebender. Though Gen discouraged it, Kuzal was set in his mind. Eventually, Gen was forced to pull strings at the academy with old friends to get him accepted. Though he graduated with apparent distinction, the truth was that he didn't have what it took to be a soldier. Within a few years, Kuzal was little better than a desk jockey. Though he was ashamed to admit it, he was glad that his son was not on the front.

Gen, however, was. At fifty-two, he led what would be his last mission as a member of the Phoenix Core, as a loyal citizen of the Fire Nation, and as a man whose honor was intact. General Li had ordered him to go to a small village on the shores of the Earth Kingdom. There, he was to burn down all major structures and capture any intelligence of worth. Secretly, Li had instructed his company to kill all those who resisted... and all those who didn't. There were to be no witnesses.

Ignorant to this, Gen led his team to the village and carried out his mission. By now, he had become confident that Li was hiding something. Without evidence, though, there was little he could do. When he found a ledger containing records of transactions between Li and a group of pirates that made their coin in slaves, he was outraged. When he demanded an explanation of his lieutenant, the man attacked him. It would be the greatest and last mistake of his life. Within twenty minutes, the entire company was dead by Gen's hand. What was left of the villagers ran as fast as they could, leaving only a burning village in their wake.

As he cut off his topknot not long after, he came to a realization that would change his life forever -- If his children were to be free of this war, the Fire Lord had to be stopped. He made a resolution there and then to do anything in his power to aid the other nations against the Fire Nation. In this endeavor, he assisted the alliance in bringing down Novai's regime, acting as one of the chief strategists in the joint military. This successfully restored Fire Lord Shula to the throne...

Following the war, Fire Lord Shula awarded Gen the position of Chief Strategist and de-facto commander of all the Fire Nation's forces. Together with Chief Advisor Jianjun, Gen acts as Shula's right hand, ensuring the maintenance of peace and the stability of the Fire Nation in the wake of Novai's downfall...

Approved.