An Owl's Rise

Evelyn waited patiently for the two owls that had tried to attack her and then subsequently attacked each other to finish their battle.

As they had made the first move, she had no qualms in returning their aggression.

Currently she was planning to wait for a victor to be decided and then take out the exhausted and injured winner before claiming the beast cores in their possession.

This would give her three of the ten items that she needed to pass this trial and put her quite ahead.

\'It is a bit of a shame that I cannot just kill them as then I would get double the cores, but I suppose that with the no killing rule it allows for even those who lose their collected resources have a chance to recover.\' Evelyn thought as she watched these two owls going at it.

Sadly, her plan soon became more of a bother than it was worth, as both owls were quite equally matched, and fighting fairly defensively while trying to provoke the other into a mistake.

This meant that she wasted five minutes just watching them when she could have simply been gathering resources elsewhere.

\'Screw it. I will just take them both down now. They are already injured and tired so it should not be a problem.\'

With her patience having worn out, Evelyn jumped into action.

She waited for just the right moment when the two owls had gotten embroiled in a close combat fight and sprung her attack.

The two of the only noticed her when she was already within just a few dozen feet, and neither one had much leeway to try and counter her.

Spinning around she created a whirlwind around herself as she had done during the fight against queen spider.

Then when she passed between the two of them, she released the wind she had accumulated around herself and smacked them both hard with more force than they could have anticipated from a mid-tier fiend beast.

For them it was like being hit by a small car, and while her control was still not the most impressive, the force behind her attacks were.

The two owls went sprawling through the air and Evelyn took off after the one that was slightly less injured.

Slamming into him she smashed him into the ground with a heavy thud just as she had done to the other owl that had been attacking her.

\'That is one.\' She thought as she looked toward the other one.

He had regained his bearings and was looking towards Evelyn with disdain. That was until he saw her eyes.

In them he could see a look he never expected a mid-tier fiend beast to look at him with. In her eyes he was already beaten. There was no look of fear, just annoyance. As if dealing with him was a waste of time she had to suffer through.

Normally this might have made him angry to be so disrespected, but he had already seen how overwhelming Evelyn was, and he was in no shape to fight her.

Therefore, he chose to retreat, hoping to escape into the jungle.

Unfortunately for him, Evelyn was not about to let him escape while he had a beast core in his possession, and she flew after him with such speed that he was absolutely astounded.

Within just a few seconds she had caught up, and she switched her gravity control from lighter to heavier and practically brought the fleeing owls she was after to a screeching halt.

With escape no longer seeming to be an option, he tired turning around to attack her by conjuring a large rock which he fired at her.

However, under the effects of nearly four times gravity, this rock had a hard time maintaining its momentum, and by the time it reached where Evelyn was it was barely moving.

She simply twisted her body around and let the rock pass harmlessly by her, and then sent out a gust of wind that sent the other owl crashing towards the ground.

With a heavy hit Evelyn smashed another owl into the ground, using it as an effective weapon along with her wind and gravity magic.

Though while this owl had taken quite a bit of damage from the fall, he did mange to get up, owing this to having softened the earth a bit before he hit it using his affinity.

Still, he was in no shape to deal with Evelyn, especially when his movements were so sluggish from being under the effects of increased gravity.

After that all it took were a few well timed body slams and a strong gust of wind for him to be taken out as Evelyn mercilessly battered him around.

\'Now for my prize.\' Evelyn thought as she took the beast core out of his bag.

She smiled quite happily at receiving it, and then flew back over to where the other owl was, as she had not had time to procure the beast core in his possession before taking off after the other one.

Though when she arrived at the location where she had left this other owl, she was surprised to see that he was gone.

Looking around she tired to search for him, but he had somehow left her field of vison.

But as she kept searching, she did find something unusual.

Around two hundred feet away stuck on a surfaced root was the bag that owl had been given.

Flying over towards it, Evelyn was being very cautious wondering if it might be a trap.

She thoroughly checked any hiding spots within the nearby area where she might be caught off guard if anything attacked her.

Nevertheless, she came up with nothing and all seemed to be clear.

\'If they have hidden any farther away, I should be able to react in time.\' She thought before approaching the bag.

As she did, she brough her caution and awareness to their max, being on the lookout for any sort of ambush.

Luckily no such attack came, and she searched through the bag and found the beast core within.

But while at first she was elated that her prize was still here, it left a big question in her mind.

\'Where did he go?\'

It made little sense to Evelyn that if the other owl had moved on his own power that he would abandon his bag and the beast core within it.

Also, if another trial goer had found him injured and unable to defend himself, certainly they would have simply taken the beast core in his possession.

With not enough information to make a logical deduction just yet she began looking around for some type of clue. Wondering what might have happened.

And not long after she did, she found the clue she was looking for.

Not far from the bag she could see a fresh indent in the ground that left a slightly winding trail.

\'It looks like something else must have found him. The examiner did say that there were still other beasts in the jungle, so I suppose he was dragged away.\'

Taking a moment to weight her options Evelyn ultimately decided to follow the path.

If she was lucky, she could ambush whatever had killed the owl she had recently beaten and take both of their beast cores.

\'I was told I could not kill other competitors. But if they die from unrelated causes then it should be acceptable for me to take the beast core from their corpse.\'

Taking off back into the air, Evelyn had a slight smile on her face as she thought about the two for one deal she was about to get that would bring her to the halfway point of passing this trial.

Quickly she flew forward, following the trail that had been left through the brush and ground.

\'Well, that must be its lair,\' she thought as she looked down at a pool of water.

The trail ended at its edge, and she could distinctly see owl feathers floating on the top, presumably from the one she had beaten and unintentionally left for dead.

Sadly, while she had located where the beast was, it was not like she could just fly under the water after it.

Still, she was not willing to give up just yet, and got a bit lower so that she could get a better look at the pool.

If she could get lucky maybe she could spot whatever manner of beast was inhabiting it.

Yet as she got closer, she noticed that something else of interest was within this pool.

At the very bottom she could see what looked like some sort of plant that was faintly glowing, and as she looked closer could see that the water was begin produced from it.

Now becoming invested in this pool as it might have just turned into a three for one deal, she lowered herself just a bit further to inspect it carefully.

But this turned out to be quite the mistake.

When she was fifteen feet from the water\'s surface it began moving and a spear made of water flew right towards her.