An Owl's Rise

Draining the contents of the strongest potion Melisandre had given her, Evelyn felt a hot burning feeling going down her throat and into her stomach.

For a moment something she had been unable to feel since assimilating the heavenly flame assaulted her. She felt like she was burning up.

Naturally the sudden spike in her power caught the monstrous empress dryad's attention, and she turned towards Evelyn with a look of astonishment.

"I see, I thought that potion in your hands felt a little strange. It is some sort of limit breaking item. Still, that will be far from enough to close the distance between us."

Reaching out her hand, Hollis aimed to capture Evelyn before the potion's powers could take full effect, and then force the heavenly flame out of her one way or another.

But as she was doing this, an unexpected interruption came her way.

'Icicle Edge.'

Having managed to make a recovery from his earlier fall, Bylur. the snowy owl. charged in with reckless abandon with the strongest attack eh could muster.

He had accelerated as fast as possible and incased himself in a large spear of ice that flew right for the monster that was about to kill Evelyn.

Yet even his full power headlong attack was unable to connect.

The empress dryad barely speared him a glance and unleashed a wave of pure magical energy that crashed into the icicle he had formed around himself.

In an instant his strongest attack was shattered, and his body blown back.

However, that single moment that he had bought Evelyn was enough for the potion she had taken to show its effects.

The world suddenly seemed to warp around her and a crimson blaze shot up from within her body.

"What the-"

Before being able to react to Evelyn's sudden burst of power, the giant plant woman was hit by an immense wave of gravitational force and blasted back away from Evelyn.

Completely caught off guard, Hollis could not anticipate that the insignificant fiend beast she had been lording over, would without notice be able to push her back.

With a loud crash her huge form smashed into the side of the mountain and created a similar crater to the one that had led Evelyn and her squad into their current situation.

Normally just using an unleashed potential potion would have been far from enough for a beast at Evelyn's level of power to exhibit this level of force. But the potion had not only affected her.

Its potent properties had also seeped into the heavenly flame and Aethersphere. Bringing more of their powers to bear.

The Aethersphere especially became far stronger, and an immense amount of magical energy that had been sealed within it was released into Evelyn. Giving her the power to create magical phenomenon well beyond her.

'I can feel it. This is closer to the real power of the heavenly flame and the Aethersphere.' Evelyn thought in a moment of clarity.

Feeling more strength than she ever had before, Evelyn turned her attention back towards her current enemy.

'Try this on for size'

Using one of the spells she had created, Evelyn conjured six javelins of her heavenly flame and wrapped a torrent of swirling wind around them.

Except unlike when she normally used this attack. With her current swelling power, they were no longer the size of normal javelins, but instead had the size of intercontinental ballistic missiles from earth.

Firring them off, they burst past the speed of sound and impacted into the mountain where the empress dryad was recovering from her dazed state.

Six huge explosions then rocked the area, and a massive heatwave expanded and melted the snow and ice on the mountain.

'Now I need to get out of here. I doubt that was enough to beat her, but it should slow her down.'

Evelyn then turned towards the barrier that was still up and prepared to break through it with the far greater power she had now.

But before she could, powerful waves of magical energy emanated off of the spot she had just bombarded.

Large roots and vines began bursting out of the ground in the wake of this magical energy and what looked like a tsunami of plant matter headed towards Evelyn.

'Give it all you've got.'

Steeling herself, Evelyn sent her thoughts to the Aethersphere, which was releasing more power than it ever had since she obtained it.

In response to her thoughts and its higher functions begin forcefully activated. The divine item bared its power for Evelyn and created an impenetrable barrier of dense gravity around her.

As the roots and vines tried to swallow her, they found that they could not force their way past Evelyn's gravity barrier and were crushed whenever they got close.

"Don't get full of yourself you insignificant insect."

Appearing back in front of Evelyn, Hollis' previously superior expression was gone, and was now replaced with one of rage.

With the wave of her hand, she sent out a blast of pure magical energy that completely engulfed Evelyn. And even with her barrier she was blown away and began bouncing off the ground where she landed.

'Take this.'

Slowing herself down she spun her body forward and compressed the gravitational barrier around her into a thin line.

Evelyn then flapped her wings forward and sent out a blade of pure gravitational force that cut through everything in its way.

Thick trees began sprouting up in its way to slow it down as Hollis tried to block the attack.

Yet the immense power from the Aethersphere, an item from the divine realm far above where Evelyn currently found herself could not be stopped so easily.

The trees in its way did not even slow it down, and when it hit the empress dryad's barrier it broke through and cut a deep scar into her body.

"AHHHHHH!"

A loud scream of pain filled with fury bellowed out from the Hollis, who for the first time since appearing had been injured.

Nevertheless, the deep cut that went from her right shoulder all the way down to her bulbous flower bottom quickly began to seal back up before Evelyn's eyes.

'Like I will let you.'

Accelerating like a jet Evelyn launched herself right above her enemy and rained down a storm of her crimson heavenly fire.

Another far more anguished scream escaped her opponent's mouth this time, and it was clear her heavenly flame was highly effective.

"Do not think this is enough to beat me!" Hollis screamed as she slammed her hands together.

Immediately a shimmering light formed around her body and blasted away Evelyn's heavenly flame.

Dozens of beams began assaulting Evelyn, and she had to rapidly fly away as fast as possible to avoid them.

However, while she was doing so, Hollis was gathering more and more power to unleash a finishing attack.

A giant tangle of plants and light energy had formed above her head in a massive amorphous shape.

'It all of nothing.'

Digging in deep, Evelyn once again activated the Aethersphere's power, and focused right above Hollis.

Following her will, the divine item created a huge pillar of increased gravity well over a hundred times the normal amount for this world.

This began crushing the empress dryad into the ground and prevented her from launching the attack she had been building up.

But this was only the precursor to Evelyn final attack, as she began building up the power of her heavenly flame and formed a huge sphere of it in front of her.

Soon it had reached a size large enough to engulf the entirety of the massive form of the empress dryad and looked like a miniature crimson sun.

'Eat this.'

Evelyn fired off her strongest possible attack, and as the massive sphere of heavenly flame flew forward, the air began to burn, and the land melted.

With an earthshattering explosion the heavenly flame impacted its target and rapidly expanded.

The force behind the attack could only remind Evelyn of a nuclear bomb, and she was blown away by the sheer tremendous force behind her own attack.

Flapping her wings rapidly, Evelyn managed to stabilize herself and gazed towards the smoldering earth where her attack had hit.

'Wow. To think I could do something like that.'

Staring in awe, Evelyn could hardly believe the attack just now had come from her. As it was easily a thousand times stronger than anything she could normally unleash.

Yet she quickly found out that there was a price to be paid for using such power well beyond her means.

The Aethersphere which had been effectively sent into overdrive by the unleashed potential potion reached its limit and began to go out of control.

The divine item was already damaged to beginning with and had only started to repair itself when Evelyn forced it to exert more of its power.

A wave of backlash from the item that had given her a fighting chanced rippled through her body, and numerous blood vessels in her body burst open and many of her bones cracked and shattered.

Blood poured out of her body at an alarming rate, and with all of her bones damaged, she lost the ability to fly and began plummeting towards the ground.

'Is this how I die again?' Evelyn thought as her consciousness started to fade.

Except the painful crash into the ground she was expecting never came.

As she was falling, a figure flew up out of the distance and caught her.

Bylur, the snowy owl had managed to use healing items to recover himself and caught Evelyn before she smashed into the earth below.

In a panic, he pulled out the best medicines he had left and began applying them over Evelyn's body to try and keep her from dying.