Avatar: The Last Airbender – The Rift is a graphic novel in three parts written by Gene Yang and illustrated by Studio Gurihiru. It is a continuation of Avatar: The Last Airbender and a prequel to The Legend of Korra, both animated TV series created by Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko. Part 1 was released on March 5, 2014, Part 2 was released on July 29, 2014, and Part 3 was released on November 18, 2014. It takes place after the events of the graphic novel Avatar: The Last Airbender – The Search. It is followed by the Smoke and Shadow trilogy. Overview The Rift shifts the focus back to a 114-year-old Avatar Aang as he begins the process of creating Republic City, in contrast to The Search, which is more focused on the story of the Fire Nation royal family. Aang also plans to give a larger role to Toph, who was absent from The Search trilogy. It is followed by Smoke and Shadow. As Avatar Aang and his friends are preparing for Yangchen's Festival, an Air Nomad holiday that hasn't been celebrated in over a century, Aang starts receiving cryptic visits from the spirit of Avatar Yangchen herself. When these visits lead Aang to a refinery operating on the Air Nomads’ sacred land, the gang suspect that the refinery is responsible for polluting a nearby river. The gang decide to investigate the matter and quickly find themselves in a dangerous encounter with a malevolent spirit bent on destroying the human world. Part One At a banquet celebrating the formation of Yu Dao's new coalition government, Aang has a vision of Avatar Yangchen, the previous Air Nomad Avatar, and is inspired to celebrate Yangchen's Festival, a holiday honoring Yangchen's supposed defeat of a powerful dark spirit. He brings Katara, Sokka, Toph and the Air Acolytes along, but tensions soon start to form between Aang and Toph, after Aang's insistence of following a tradition of the festival despite not knowing its purpose reminds Toph of her life with her controlling father. Proceeding with the festival, the group discover, much to Aang's horror, that a town with a large crystal refinery has been built over a meadow where the next stage of Yangchen's Festival traditionally took place, despite the land being sacred to the Air Nomads. Exploring with the refinery's engineer, Satoru, whom Toph soon develops a crush on, the