Darkness bending is a form of air-bending made from Hiroku Kin. He noticed that darkness is similar to air, but without the physical form. He started off with simply moving the shadows, rather than creating new ones, his brother Gioko Kin grew jealous of his new bending abilities, and learned how to use this in combat. He could create and form shadows in any way he chose, but as much as he hated this all their pain was psychological. Hiroku saw this with shame. Darkness bending wasn’t supposed to be for fighting, but for entertainment and joy. Hiroku saw thought this to prove not everything is bad because of its origins. Gioko didn’t care about what it was meant for, but just wanted power. Despite being an air bender he didn’t believe in the same things the monks did, he just believed that some are born weak and other destined for greatness. Eventually Gioko left the air benders in search for more power, eventually he went to ba seng sei (sorry if I spelled it wrong) and lived there for about 3 years. Gioko still wanted to upgrade this so he started an academy for this, not to teach it to others, yet to teach himself. One of his quieter students who never did any of the training, or Oso Morio was born with Earth bending but somehow, he was able to just barely move shadows. Gioko had talked to Oso about how he did that. Oso began to talk about how darkness is similar to earth in a sense. He claimed that it was more like manipulating the light from the Sun rather than the shade. Eventually Oso was the very first Earth Bender who managed to Dark bend. He was also the only one to ever learn this. He even learned how to copy other Elements with this and was one of Gioko’s favorite students. Eventually Gioko met a women about his age named Acai Gono. These two ended up getting very close and had a son and daughter. The daughter inherited her mother’s Earth bending as the son inherited Air bending and shadow bending. To gain her father’s appreciation Akaguro went to Oso hoping that he could teach her how to shadow bend for when her father returned with her brother, Mosui. Oso told her that unlike with air benders, earth benders have to be born with shadow bending. She didn’t give up even though she couldn’t Darkness bend. While practicing Earth bending her now 14 Year old brother came with news of their father’s death. Before he even laid eyes on any family he went to Oso to practice his Darkness bending. He was one of the first shadow benders to use both dark and air bending at the same time. Thanks to Oso’s teaching Musui also learned how to Mimic other bending.

Solidifying Shadow Bending

This was made by Gerridae Kin about 200 years later. While practicing with Aang he was able to make pebbles out of his shadow bending but didn’t think much of it. He was captured by Zuuko and the fire nation not long before Aang’s coma. He escaped the fire nation by mimicking their fire bending skills and coping what had seen from katara’s water bending to escape. He had formed an Earth raft to escape. The only current elements he didn’t have was air, but he didn’t actually need it. He taught this technique to his sons Miko and Hima. Hima couldn’t actually copy air bending or water bending, he was a fire bender. From then on Miko was the last upgrade in the Darkness bending abilities.