In the world of Avatar: The Last Airbender, the four elements aren’t just physical — they are also philosophies for combat and life. There’s a distinct difference in strategy between the antagonistic Fire Nation and the defensive Earth Kingdom, with leaders like Admiral Zhao, Princess Azula, and King Bumi thinking along the same lines as their element. However, the boundary between the elements became a fuzzy one when Azula borrowed Toph Beifong’s strategies of neutral jing and destabilizing the opponent before landing the final blow.

Azula succeeded in many arenas where Admiral Zhao failed as conquerors of foreign nations. Zhao’s grand invasion of the Northern Water Tribe went sideways when he provoked the wrath of the Avatar and the spirits, but Azula had far more success with Ba Sing Se until the city was liberated months later. Azula was patient and precise, unlike the hotheaded Zhao, and she was rewarded with the historic capture of the Earth King’s palace. In that way, Azula even emulated her great-grandfather, who also borrowed Earthbending philosophies to great effect.

How Toph’s Lessons on Neutral Jing & Final Blows Work in Avatar: The Last Airbender

Earthbenders Are the Most Patient Benders in the World

Both Toph and King Bumi taught Aang how neutral jing worked in Avatar: The Last Airbender, and Toph also taught Aang the strategy of destabilizing the opponent before delivering the knockout blow to win the fight. Some of Toph’s greatest moments were rooted in that fighting style, such as when she took on The Boulder in an underground bending arena and made a fool of him with the fundamentals of Earthbending. Toph struck the second and final blow, allowing The Boulder to go first and clumsily give himself away with his blunt attack. Earthbending seems to imply that whoever strikes first in a fight is probably going to lose, since they give the enemy information about what they are doing, allowing the other bender to react with the right strategy. Earthbenders are content to let hotheaded Earthbenders or Firebenders deal the first blow, then react.

King Bumi told Aang to find a teacher who knows how to wait and listen, using neutral jing to do nothing at all until the time comes for an attack. Toph advised Aang to throw the enemy off-balance with rapid strikes before landing the knockout blow, and Aang internalized that lesson well. Aang and Katara applied Earthbending philosophy when they tried to destroy the Fire Nation drill from the inside out, weakening its many support braces before Aang dealt a heavy blow with an earth spike on the outside to wreck the entire vehicle. Not even Azula’s best Firebending could stop Aang from demolishing her drill with those tactics, and Azula’s team ended up defeated and frustrated. Their aggressive, blunt attempt to pierce Ba Sing Se’s wall was met with a patient and wise defense rooted in earth, and Azula clearly realized she had to respond in kind.

Azula Thought Like an Earthbender to Take Ba Sing Se

Toph’s Lesson to Aang Taught Azula Something in Turn

Toph certainly never taught Azula any lessons directly, since they were mortal enemies and wouldn’t support each other if they could help it. Instead, Toph indirectly taught Azula a vital lesson by accident, with Aang being the middle party. Through Toph’s lessons, Aang learned how to defeat overwhelming odds with patient and wise tactics, which allowed him to destroy the drill just as it started boring through Ba Sing Se’s outer wall. Azula learned a hard lesson from her shocking defeat, realizing typical Fire Nation aggression would not help her claim victory. The Hundred-Year War may have been prosecuted with typical Fire Nation aggression for many decades, but that strategy had its limit. All four bending philosophies had their limits, so benders could only overcome those limits by borrowing from foreign elements, which Azula certainly did.

If Aang could use Toph’s lessons to win a fight with wise patience, then Azula can analyze the results for herself and do the same thing, which was the last thing the Gaang ever expected. Once the drill was destroyed, the Gaang all but forgot about Azula, presuming she had no more cards to play. However, Azula was nothing like the thuggish Admiral Zhao, who saw everything in terms of invasion fleets and raw power. Azula was capable of adjusting her tactics, marking her as a much smarter commander than Zhao was, which put her in a position to take down Ba Sing Se. Her new tactics were Toph’s own, employing neutral jing and working patiently to destabilize her enemies from within before the time came for the winning blow.

Azula and her friends snuck into Ba Sing Se disguised as the Kyoshi Warriors and presented themselves to Earth King Kuei. The girls didn’t retreat from the city’s defenders in wake of their earlier defeat, nor did they try to attack anyone inside Ba Sing Se with a fiery ambush. Azula, Ty Lee, and Mai played the long game, allowing the Gaang to do whatever they wished while putting the pieces in place to topple the king. Azula conspired with minister Long Feng, allowing her to take advantage of existing instability in Ba Sing Se to accelerate her plans. The Dai Li were on Azula’s side, and they captured the king’s five high-ranking generals to launch the coup while also destabilizing Ba Sing Se. Then, with the king and Long Feng both captured, Azula was ready to deliver the final blow.

Azula fought alongside her brother Zuko to take on the Gaang in the catacombs while also capturing Iroh, and once the king fled, it was over. Azula had her Dai Li open Ba Sing Se’s walls from the inside, and the Fire Nation army came pouring in without any resistance. Azula mimicked Aang’s strategy with the drill battle, knowing she couldn’t take the city with an all-or-nothing frontal assault. Interestingly enough, Firebenders thinking like Earthbenders was how the war started, with the evil Fire Lord Sozin being “as patient as he was clever,” in Azula’s own words. Sozin didn’t launch the invasion until Avatar Roku was dead and the comet was returning, waiting until everything was in place to take the Air Nomads by storm. Such a move helped the Fire Nation launch the war on favorable terms, but as the war dragged on, that advantage was lost — until Azula reclaimed it at Ba Sing Se.

Azula Lost Her Earthbending Advantage, & Ba Sing Se Was Liberated

Temporary Victory Made the Fire Nation Sloppy at the Most Critical Hour

The tides of war swung back and forth in the chronology of the Hundred-Year War, with the Fire Nation scoring a major early victory by wiping out the Air Nomads, aside from the elusive Aang himself. Then, the war became a protracted struggle, which worked in favor of the Northern Water Tribe and especially the Earth Kingdom. The Fire Nation did make steady progress but lacked the capacity to land a final blow. The Earth Kingdom could outlast the Fire Nation, and as fans saw, even the capture of Ba Sing Se didn’t actually win the war. As real-life military wisdom says, one side hasn’t truly won until the other side has acknowledged defeat. Examples exist in historical conflicts like the First Punic War and Napoleon’s invasion of the Russian Empire, with neither Carthage nor Napoleon able to deal the final blow to an enemy who was on the ropes.

The same happened to Azula, along with some overconfidence. She failed to take Ba Sing Se with brute force, succeeded in taking the city with Earthbending tactics, then lost her advantage once again. For that matter, the entire Fire Nation lost its temporary advantage, reverting to their usual brute-force tactics and thus giving the Earth Kingdom an opening. Azula, her father Fire Lord Ozai, and the rest got sloppy and overconfident with their apparent victory, and they even provoked the wrath of the Order of the White Lotus in the process. Just as Ozai tried to burn down the entire world as the Phoenix King, Aang arose to stop him at the most critical moment, and the White Lotus liberated Ba Sing Se. All of Azula’s strategic gains were wiped out when her uncle led the counterattack, proving that the White Lotus, above all, knew how to bide their time with neutral jing until they reached the best possible moment to strike.