An Owl's Rise

Swiveling her head around while maintaining her speed Evelyn could see that the boss bat was still coming after her.

The thing was obviously livid that she had come into its home and killed its underlings. It was the only one allowed to do that.

It also did not help that bats and owls were naturally at odds and this awaken rank bat wanted to put Evelyn down before she could become more of a threat.

\'I can tell from the look in its eyes it is willing to chase me to the ends of the world.\' Evelyn thought as she felt her heart racing.

While she had fought back an awakened beast before, that came down more to luck than her overpowering it.

Her heavenly flame was just an impeccable match up against the queen spider whose webs and magic were ineffective against powerful flames.

This bat did not have that same weakness and its sound-based attacks could score heavy damage from afar, well outside the range of Evelyn\'s flames.

She had managed to cushion the blow of its first attack by thinning the air around herself by creating a vortex, but that was not something she could continuously do.

\'My only hope is to lose it somehow.\' Evelyn thought as she dove into the woods.

With her smaller frame and wind affinity she would be able to mauver better than the boss bat, and she hoped that would make up for the difference in their speed.

It also gave her obstacles to move around through to avoid its sound-based attacks.

Unfortunately, the bat was defter than she thought, and while it was not gaining on her as quickly as before, there was no doubt that it was.

Racking her mind, she began thinking of ways to deal with it.

A frontal confrontation was likely suicide.

She would probably need to hit it multiple times with everything she had to incapacitate it, while it only needed one good hit to end here.

At long range it was superior with its sound attacks, and at short range it had venomous fangs that would spell death if they so much as nicked her.

Her mind raced as she weaved in out of trees, some of which broke apart and fell over as the bat unleashed sonic blasts at her.

As a consolation, at least whenever it unleashed an attack it slowed down a bit an gave her more time to think.

\'I guess that might be my only option.\'

Remembering a strategy she had used a long time ago when she was being chased by humans after her escape from the laboratory, she had lured them to where the colossal serpent was protecting the flower that shot into the sky.

She had been lucky enough then to have the serpent kill the humans with one sweep of its whiplike tail.

This allowed her to get away as the serpent had given her a pass and dealt with her problem.

Of course, right now she doubted she would find such a convenient ally, but all she needed was another beast around the same level as the bat to attack it and get it off her back.

While flying through the woods slowly being gained on, she looked all around for any sort of marking.

\'There.\'

Not too much longer, she spotted a rock that had a smear of some sort of green substance on it which let out a pungent and honestly revolting smell.

This was some sort of beast at the awakened rank marking its territory, and Evelyn did not hesitate to fly in.

The bat in its rage did not even notice the marking and just continued to chase after Evelyn while sending out powerful attacks that had no chance of hitting in the dense woods.

Flying around with her senses reached out to the max Evelyn tried to find the awaken beast that made this area its territory.

\'There it is.\'

It turned out she did not even need to look for it.

The violent rampage the bat was on to kill her had alerted it to their presence, and it was now bounding towards them.

It was a massive frog though unlike any Evelyn had ever seen.

It had six legs instead of four, its head was a bit reminiscent of a bull frog, but it had five rows of teeth in its mouth like a shark, and a sort of slimy glop was flowing out of it.

It four eyes were also creepy, and it had trained half on Evelyn and half on the bat.

With it coming right for them even the rage filled bat noticed the new arrival, and this was something it could absolutely not ignore.

The two awaken beasts roared at each other and it seemed that Evelyn\'s plan was going to work.

However, suddenly they both turned on her as if they had collectively decided to do her in before doing battle themselves.

The bat released another sonic blast and the frog sent out a huge ball of mucus from its mouth.

With no other way out, Evelyn increased her gravity and shot down like rock. Just barely avoiding the two attacks that collided with each other.

Almost crashing into the ground Evelyn began righting herself, but not in time.

The frog had leapt towards her, and the bat was bearing down from behind her.

She was pincered in and she doubted she could avoid both of them.

In a panic she built up some wind and fire behind her and shot forward like a rocket.

She had practiced this once before while training, but it was hard to pull off, used up an immense amount of magical power, and she had almost no control where she went.

On the bright side it allowed her to avoid begin hit by either the frog or bat. On the downside she smashed through a bunch of branches, some of which pierced into her body.

It was very painful, but it had saved her for the moment.

Gritting her beak and taking the pain, she turned her head around and looked towards her enemies and felt an immense sense of relief.

The two of them had crashed into each other when she shot out of the way, and now their little alliance to kill her first was gone and they were fiercely battling it out.

\'Another potion.\'

Being too injured to really move Evelyn took out another healing potion and down it quickly.

She was currently in a tangle of branches and vies with thorns. With sticks piercing her body in multiple places as well.

Luckily with two potions she was able to heal up this new damage for the most part, but she now felt horribly tired after forcing the accepted healing on her body multiple times.

Still, she could not pass out here. Not when her life was teetering on the edge.

The frog and the bat were still duking it out, but when one of them won it would be the end for her if she stuck around.

\'So, this is what a battle between awakened rank beasts looks like.\' Evelyn thought in awe.

The power these two wielded was quite something.

They had caused a lot of destruction around them and their large sizes made them practically like mini natural disasters.

Nevertheless, as impressive as it was Evelyn knew that these two were still far from what real power looked like.

Their control over the magic was not even close to what Melisandre could do, and it was clear they could not control their raw magical energy and use magic at its best.

\'Oh, the bat managed to bite the frog with its fangs. This is probably going to end soon.\' Evelyn thought.

The bat\'s venom was definitely very strong, and it was clear that the frog was already beginning to waver.

She knew from the mission token that the fiend beast rank venom bats could kill just about any other beast of the same rank as long as they did not have a venom resistance. So, it was likely also true for the evolved awakened variant.

Yet as Evelyn was about to fly off and leave to safety, she had another thought.

The frog now knowing that its life was on the clock was fighting far more aggressively. It knew that it was already going to die so it wanted to take this bat with it.

\'Hm, nothing ventured, nothing gained.\'

Certainly, this had originally started as a mad dash to escape with her life, but she would rarely ever have such an opportune chance such as this.

She had no confidence in taking out an awakened beast by herself at this point, but two injured ones not expecting a sneak attack could end up allowing her some very valuable materials.

\'I just need to aim for the bat. The frog is already going to die, so if I can kill the bat I win.\'

Flying into the air and going straight up, Evelyn made sure to get in the bat\'s blind spot well above it.

Currently it was focused on its fight with the frog, trying to inflict more damage and wear it out faster to speed up the venom\'s damage.

It had all but forgotten Evelyn, believing her still stuck in the branches of a tree.

Of course, how could it expect her to down a bunch of healing items and get back up from that situation. Most beast at her level did not have storage amulets and access to healing items.

This gave Evelyn a once in a lifetime chance to strike a definitive blow against an awakened beast, and she was not going to pass it up.

Diving down she moved silently and prepared to hit the bat as hard as she could.

Eventually it did notice her descent and turned its head up. Surprised to see her.

It was preparing to attack her with a sound blast, but unfortunately, its lapse in attention towards the frog proved fatal.

It managed to get its teeth around one of the bat\'s wings and bit down hard.

This coupled with Evelyn spinning her body around to dodge allowed her to completely avoid the sonic attack from the bat, and she slipped by and racked her flaming claws against the bat\'s stomach.

She pierced into its flesh and seared its insides, causing it to spit up a mouthful of boiling blood.

The frog then pulled it deeper into its mouth and chomped down on its head, ending the bat\'s life.

A moment later the frog itself lost its footing and slipped down onto its stomach.

It spit the bat\'s corpse up and was breathing heavily.

The venom had done its work and the frog was now paralyzed and just a couple minutes away from death. Making Evelyn the victor in a clash between awakened rank beasts.