An Owl's Rise

As Evelyn insisted that she would go and take a look at the magic crystal deposit herself, every other member of her group vehemently protested.

Even when she stated that she would be using magic items to hide her presence, no one else was onboard with allowing her to go into enemy territory alone.

"Lady Evelyn, allow me to go in your stead. I am much smaller, and it will be easier for me to sneak in without being discovered. And even if I am, my loss would be far less impactful than if something were to happen to you." Po said, offering himself up for the task.

Naturally at his size that was under a foot, he would make the best choice for a stealth mission, especially when enhanced by the magic items Evelyn had brought.

\'Still, I need to see it for myself if I am to properly evaluate the deposit and determine if it is worth taking by force. Plus, if I am found out I have the best chance of escaping unscathed.\' Evelyn thought.

While she had been sticking pretty much to only using win magic within the Roost out her in the wild, she would hold nothing back and could use all of her different types of magic combined to escape if necessary.

"No, I will be the one to go. If I am found out I am probably the only one that can get away. It will be best if I go alone. If things get really dicey, I do have some tricks I can use." Evelyn said holding up her storge cuff.

Inside of it she had a slew of alchemical items she had made and a couple of really nasty ones that Melisandre had gifted her for self-protection.

Eventually, with how obstinate she was, Bylur, Rehni, and the squad of burrowing owls gave in.

"But if you are not back within thirty minutes, I am busting in to look for you. There is no way we are going to abandon you." Bylur asserted.

And to Evelyn\'s distress Rehni who was normally cool headed followed along and assured that she would charge in as well.

Of course, the burrowing owls were also onboard with this plan, willing to die for Evelyn if the situation called for it.

"Okay, I will be quick and careful. Just be ready to assist me in the very rare case that I am being chased on my way out." Evelyn said, giving into their fervor to help her.

With their plan settled Evelyn activated the invisibility talisman and scent dampening talisman.

In an instant she vanished from sight and for a moment Bylur, Rehni and the group of burrowing owls lost all track of her.

Only when they truly honed their already impeccable hearing to the max were they able to pick up the faint flapping of her wings as she floated there. And even then, this did not give them a precise location of where she was. Only a general awareness that she was there.

\'Looks like even when I am not trying to be particularly quiet, they can just barely tell that I am here when they focus. As long as I do not do anything conspicuous, I should be able to slip by easily enough.\' Evelyn thought after testing out her stealth on her own allies.

Now completely satisfied that it was very unlikely she would be found out she slowly descended towards the brass jackal\'s den.

When she eventually got within a dozen meters of the large opening going into the ground she stopped and floated in the air for a minute.

She wanted to gauge the guards\' reactions and see if any of them picked up on her at all.

\'Nope it does not seem that they can detect me at all as I expected. Not a single one of them reacted at all.\'

Having confirmed that she was undetected, Evelyn flew into the brass jackals\' den. With the guards completely unaware that an extremely dangerous entity had just slipped by them.

Once inside the tunnel around a hundred meters Evelyn began to notice that the magical energy in the area was getting thicker than the ambient magical energy outside in the desert.

It was only slightly greater though and nothing that would make much of a difference. But it was still a sign that this place did indeed possess properties that were greater than normal.

\'Ah, and there are some green crystals. At my rank those are pretty much worthless. Still, that proves that there really is a deposit here. Now as long as there are up to red crystals this will be worth it.\' Evelyn thought as she continued to glide along.

Soon she found that the crystals had turned blue to show that they were saturated with greater magical energy.

However, she also spotted more jackals for the first time since entering their den.

It was a group of fiend beast ranks that had a single low tier awakened rank acting as a caretaker.

They were tucked away in a branching path that opened up into a sizable chamber filled with blue magical crystals.

\'I suppose that they probably do not let them out until they have reached the awakened rank. The desert is simply too dangerous for most fiend beasts to try and get by successfully.\'

Quickly finishing her observation of the younger brass jackals Evelyn continued going deeper, staying aware that if she was too slow her allies were going to storm the place.

Continuing on, Evelyn found that the deposit did have red crystals within it, and far more than she was expecting.

\'There have to be hundreds of them in here. Yet even with all these here the jackals do not know how to properly use them. All they are doing is taking in the slightly greater ambient magical energy that slowly releases from the crystals naturally. If they had something like an advancement chamber, they could make so much more progress.\' Evelyn thought as she observed a group of mid-tier awakened rank jackals sleeping near the red crystal and sleeping.