An Owl's Rise

"Gahhh!"

Emerging from being completely submerged in water, Evelyn sucked in a deep breath of air.

Slowly and clumsily, she pushed her soaking wet body to the shore of the pool of water.

When she reached the edge of the water, she pulled herself out of the spring and used her fire and wind magic to rapidly dry herself off.

"Lady Evelyn, was it a success this time?" 

Turning towards the individual that had addressed her, Evelyn nodded her head and could not suppress a smile.

"Yes, I finally managed to reach the peak of the awakened rank using the magic spring. Thank you for being so accommodating Po and allowing me to absorb all of its energy."

"Of course. You are our savior, Lady Evelyn. I will always remember the aid you offered us in our time of greatest need, and so long as I am leader of this clan you will have our hospitality." Po said, looking up at Evelyn with an expression of reverence.

Even after she had returned and told the burrowing owls about Otis' demise, not a single one of them turned on her.

Those that had fought with her when they had retaken the burrowing owl's ancestral home had even told her that they were proud of Otis. He may have lost his life, but he was able to save Evelyn's. 

She had been ready to be scorned for leading their former leader to his death, but instead the burrowing owls celebrated his life and achievements. 

He was the leader that had reclaimed the magic spring after it had been lost to the ospreys and gone on to be one of their savior's companions. There was no way that those that knew him could be anything but proud.

Po himself had personally comforted Evelyn and explained to her just how deep Otis' devotion to her went. That he would have sacrificed his own life a million times over to protect her.

This helped Evelyn to push past her grief a bit more and look towards the future where she could avenge her fallen friend.

'It has been a hard twenty-one months since I parted ways with the others, but I've cleared the first hurdle. Now I just need to gather the catalysts necessary to evolve to the tyrant rank.'

Closing her eyes, Evelyn felt the magical energy in her body that had reached the apex that her current form could hold.

Despite having been ahead of her two siblings when they started out, she was now the last one among their group to reach the peak of the awakened rank. This was in large part owing to the Aethersphere guzzling up a great deal of the energy she had been absorbing.

Evelyn was unsure of what it was doing, but she figured that it was once again close to repairing another one of its functions by leeching off her magical energy.

Still, there was nothing she could do about it, and there was no doubt that the divine item gave her great power in return.

"Should we prepare a feast to celebrate your success?" Po asked.

"No, I need to get started right away gathering catalyst for my evolution. We can save the celebration for when I reach the tyrant rank." Evelyn responded, knowing she had no time for leisure until she achieved her current goal.

From the communication she periodically received from her companions she knew that Bylur and Rehni had already reached the tyrant rank a little under two months ago. 

And while Verrader had not sent any communications since he reached the peak of the awakened rank, Aralee apparently only needed to find one more item before she could evolve.

Evelyn did not want to fall any further behind and needed to get out and find whatever items she might need.

Unfortunately, she had no clue as to what catalyst would be necessary since she was a knew species of owl that has never existed before.

Before the Roost had been attacked and they lost access to its vast collection of information, Evelyn's compassion had obtained the information on the catalyst they would need to evolve to the tyrant rank. Giving them a leg up on Evelyn.

Nevertheless, she did have an idea of how to find the information she needed.

Last time she had been on the search for catalysts, the Aethersphere had given her the information she needed after finding one of the necessary items.

It had been a painful experience when it bombarded her with knowledge about several thousands of unrelated items within the same rank, but she didn't really have much of an option but to attempt this method again.

Luckily, she was nearly certain she already had at least one of the items she would need and could trigger the function of the Aethersphere that would bombard her with information.

Once she was in a private room within the burrowing owls' vast network of tunnels and chambers, Evelyn activated her storge cuff and pulled out a certain item.

In her claw she held the magic core of the human woman she had fought within the Verdant Warlord's domain, who was apparently a princess of the Ultak empire. 

She remembered the battle clearly and how the arcanist ranked woman had been a strong user of fire magic.

Normally a beast would need to use the magic core of a human that shared a magical affinity with them during their evolution to the tyrant rank in order to not only grow much stronger but also take on a humanoid form.

Evelyn though, was a special case. Thanks to her human soul she was able to form a magic core within her bestial body. Melisandre had already hypothesized that Evelyn would achieve a humanoid form whether she used a human's magic core or not.

Still, she figured that there was a good possibility it could still act as a catalyst for her evolution, and hopefully a trigger for the Aethersphere to give her the knowledge she needed to find the other catalysts.