An Owl's Rise

Evelyn flew over to Krunnen who was having difficulty dealing with the duplicator fire elemental copies that were swarming around him.

His magic was actually particularly effective against fire elementals but from what Evelyn could see he was not particularly adept at control. 

He was unable to seamlessly switch between offense and defense and to prevent taking damage he was focused on protecting himself.

'I suppose that is what I should expect from a tortoise.' Evelyn thought.

When she reached him, she swooped in and used her gravity magic to greatly lessen the power of gravity around her. 

Immediately the duplicator clones began to lose their intensity.

Then before the duplicators could get used to the new gravity Evelyn switched it to be increased and watched them grow larger and hotter.

Evelyn switched back and forth between heightened and lessened gravity a few times and horribly disoriented them.

"You can go ahead and attack now. They won't be able to focus their attacks very well in their current state." Evelyn said.

Yet, despite Evelyn's instructions, Krunnen just stood there and stared at Evelyn in shock. He had been in her gravity field as well and was stunned by her magic. He had seen it before, but this was the first time he was experiencing it.

'Um, is he not going to go on the offense? If he waits much longer the duplicator and its clones will regain their senses.'

Evelyn had wanted to let Krunnen get the final blows on his own opponents so that he would feel like he had contributed to the fight.

Nevertheless, Evelyn wasn't going to let her magic go to waste and let an enemy recover.

Utilizing her fire magic, she destroyed the rest of the fire elemental clones and finished off the duplicator for good.

'Well, that was easier than I thought it would be when Krunnen explained that duplicators are supposed to be dangerous. Sure, it could make a lot of copies of itself, but they were all just the same strength as the original which wasn't all that strong to begin with.' Evelyn thought, analyzing the fight.

However, while she had seen the duplicator as a useful subject to test her alchemical creations on, most beasts would find it a terrifying foe.

Even if you were stronger, its ability to make several copies and attack in a coordinated fashion made it a tough opponent for almost anyone to deal with. Evelyn simply had too many advantages against fire elementals for even hundreds of weaker ones to be a threat to her.

"You really are amazing Evelyn. I have never experienced magic like yours before. And how did you use fire magic to defeat the duplicator? Are you actually a tyrant rank and hiding your true power?" Krunnen said now that the battle was over, and he had come back to his senses.

"Oh, what I did was just a special application of wind magic. As for my fire magic, I simply used hotter flames than the duplicator and smothered it so that it was deprived of oxygen. And of course, I am not a tyrant rank beast. I came here to gather a catalyst for my evolution after all." 

Of course, Evelyn's explanations about her magic were lies. She figured that since Krunnen did not have wind magic she could pass her gravity magic as an advanced utilization of wind magic. As for fire magic, it was true the principle of smothering one fire with another would be effective, but that was not how her heavenly flame worked. 

"Yes, you told me that earlier that you were looking for a catalyst. It is just, I have never met an awakened rank beast as strong as you. Frankly it is hard for me to believe that we are the same rank." Krunnen said, a bitter expression on his face. While Evelyn had easily dealt with the situation, the only accomplishment he could claim during their recent battle was keeping some of the enemies' attention away from Evelyn. He had been hoping that she was a tyrant rank beast hiding her true abilities. 

"Hm, it is hard to say which of us is truly stronger. I just happen to have a really good matchup against fire elementals." Evelyn said, trying to comfort Krunnen.

In truth she did not believe what she had just told him, though. If she thought, he was a real threat to her she never would have teamed up with him. Evelyn was confident she would win in a fight if it came down to it.

With the battle over, Evelyn collected the duplicator's heart and examined it. Despite having made multiple copies of itself, its heart felt only a bit stronger than the ones Evelyn had collected from the lesser fire elementals.

"You said that you needed a certain fire elemental's heart as a catalyst. Do you think that this one will be acceptable?" Krunnen asked.

"No, this one is far from what I am looking for. What I need is the heart of a grand fire elemental." Evelyn said, looking intently at Keunen's reaction.

This was what she had wanted to bring up the entire time but had refrained in case he grew wary of her and clamed up. Instead, she had waited for him to bring it up or for when he felt more beholden to her after working together for three days.

Yet his reaction was a bit different than she was expecting. His eyes went wide in shock, and he stared at Evelyn like she had a few screws loose.

"Are you insane?! A grand fire elemental is far too dangerous for an awakened rank beast to go anywhere near. Even most peak tyrant rank beasts are not up to taking one on. When one of those monsters is spotted, we normally call in a sovereign rank member of the Inferno Field Rangers to deal with it. You will be killed before you can even get anywhere near such a creature."