An Owl's Rise

As the avalanche came barreling down the mountain, all of the owls began flapping their wings in a panic.

Even though they could fly, they were currently close to the ground. With a few of them having landed to retrieve the corpses of the beasts they had just beat

And the oncoming tide of snow, ice, rocks, and trees was getting larger by the moment.

'UP! UP! UP! UP! UP!.' Evelyn frantically shouted in her head.

She was using every power at her disposal to ascend higher. Wanting to get above the top of the trees that were about to be engulfed by the avalanche.

She knew that even if she got above the mass of tumbling snow many of the trees were likely to be knocked down in its path, and if she did not ascend above them, she could end up crushed by one of the massive trunks falling on her.

Thankfully with her gravity magic along with her wind magic, she was able to achieve almost perfect vertical lift and shot up high before the avalanche reached her.

Some of the other owls unfortunately, were not as quick as Evelyn. And while none of them were close enough to the ground to be swept up in the avalanche itself. A number of the nearby trees began falling and made for a precarious situation.

Watching along and unable to do anything, Evelyn saw two owls get hit by thick branches of falling trees and be pushed down into the rushing avalanche. One of which was her long-time squad mate and the owl that she had saved from the parasitic vine tangle, Osten. Who was simply too slow and bulky to escape fast enough.

'No, this is all my fault.' Evelyn thought watching two of her allies get swept away.

As strong as beasts were in this world, at their currently ranks they were still not able to content with the raw power of a natural disaster. Especially one with the ferocity of an avalanche made of several hundreds of thousands of tons of debris and moving at incredibly speeds over a hundred miles an hour.

Seeing this happen Evelyn could only look back at her brash actions. She had plowed headfirst into the strongest enemy with her most powerful attack without thinking of anything else.

Now in hindsight, it was painfully obvious that and explosive force of that magnitude was likely, if not certain to cause and avalanche on this snow-covered mountain.

With nothing to do about their companions being caught in the avalanche, all the other owls grouped up and Evelyn had a darkened expression on her face.

Certainly, she was pretty cold hearted when it came to those she viewed as enemies. But while she could not say she was very close to Osten and barely remembered the other owl's name, it did not mean she would not feel bad when causing them to be hit by an avalanche due to her negligence.

"I am so sorry. It is my fault they swallowed by that avalanche." Evelyn said while hovering in the air and bowing her head.

In response all the other owls in her squad looked over at her with confusion all over their faces.

None of them understood what Evelyn was getting at, as this was their first time seeing an avalanche and honestly had no real idea what it was.

"What do you mean Evelyn. There is no way you could have known that a snowslide was going to happen." Adolophine said to her.

However, Evelyn shook her head and told everyone that her attack caused what all of them were calling a snowslide simply for its resemblance to a landslide.

All of them just looked at her like she was crazy, and it became clear to Evelyn that they did not know anything about avalanches.

Not even the snowy owl who presumably came from a cold environment knew anything about them. Leading Evelyn to a certain conclusion.

'I guess that while the Roost does extensive research on magical plants and beasts, they are not really interested in natural disasters like people were back on Earth. It makes sense though. I doubt many owls have ever been caught up in an avalanche since we can fly above it in time in most cases. The only reason that Osten and the other owl even got caught up in one this time was because it was truly huge, moving impossibly fast, and we were already near the ground. Plus, it was really only those exceptionally large trees falling over that even pushed them into the avalanche.'

Now having her thoughts in order, Evelyn understood why none of the other owls really understood the avalanche, and that she had definitely been the cause of it.

"Anyway Evelyn, even if your attack had caused this, it is my fault as leader for ordering you to go in. Also, there is simply no way that you could have known this would happen." Adolophine said to console Evelyn.

She could tell that she was pretty frantic about her fellow owls in a far different way than ever before.

Whenever they had been in danger previously, like with the parasitic vine tangle, she had normally remined the calmest and done what she could to get them out of the situation.

This time thought, it seemed that since she perceived herself to be the cause of the incident she was far more frantic.

"There is nothing you can do by blaming yourself. Now, once this snowslide has settled down, we will begin searching for our comrades. While Braulia might not have been able to protect herself, I am almost certain that Osten's natural bulkiness in addition to his magic will have allowed him to survive." Adolophine said confidently and like a good leader.

Hearing this Evelyn did soon calm down as she thought things over more rationally.

'That is right we are not normal owls. All of us have magic and are far stronger than the beasts from Earth. At the very least, I have seen Osten take plenty of heavy hits and keep on going. It is feasible he survived this avalanche.'

Soon enough the raging rush of snow, ice, rocks, and trees came to a stop at the foot of the mountain and the eight remaining owls in Evelyn's squad split up and began combing over the area in search of their squad members.

This went on for quite some time, as they searched for hours to no avail. Until Evelyn discovered something quite unusual.

There was a thin beam of light shooting up from the piles of ice and snow that had been left in the wake of the avalanche.

Naturally Evelyn tried to see if this was some trick of the light or a reflection from the moon, but the beam was definitely shooting up out from the snow.

Getting closer Evelyn examined it and tossed something over it to test if this beam had any destructive potential.

She had heard of lasers before that could cut through steel and wanted to make sure this beam of light would not shot right though her.

Luckily the rock she tossed went by without a problem, and the beam after being broken began rapidly flashing in what looked like distress.

'Don't tell me this is Braulia's power!' Evelyn thought in astonishment.

When they had been introduced to the owls that were joining her squad, they had all gone over what each other's affinities were, and Evelyn was recalling now that Braulia was said to have a rare light affinity.

Flying over the light itself Evelyn let it hit her body, and when she did so it began flashing way more rapidly.

This all but confirmed to Evelyn that this was one of her lost squad members. Though not the one she was expecting to find alive.

Descending to the ground she closed her eyes and placed her beak right in front of the small hole about the size of a small plate.

"Hoot!"

With as loud of a sound as Evelyn could make, she called out into the hole and waited for a response.

A couple moments later she heard a strained and muffled response and was certain that an owl was trapped under the snow here.

'How far down is she that I cannot properly see her.' Evelyn thought when the light disappeared.

She tried looking down by everything just seemed white and snowy as far as the could see.

Still, this had confirmed that Braulia was alive and buried deeply.

However, this presented another problem. Evelyn was not certain how to reach her.

'I will just have to try melting it slowly and work my way down.'

Carefully Evelyn planned on how she would descend through the snow and ice to reach her trapped squad mate.

She figured that the reason that Braulia had not created a hole large enough for her to escape with her light magic was because it caused the snow and ice to collapse in on her when she tried.

This was why she had made the hole much smaller and sent up a distress signal instead.

Going about it this way Evelyn decided to create a hole in the snow carefully by using her heavenly flame.

Luckily since she was coming from the top and was able to not just melt the snow but vaporize it, the area did not collapse. And for insurance she had lowered the gravity around her to lessen the weight of the snow just in case.

Eventually she reached a point around forty feet down after she painstakingly created a large enough hole to see Braulia though the smaller one she had created.

With that the trapped owl now had enough room to blast her way out of the snow without it collapsing in on her.

In a bright flash of light Braulia shot out from the snow and a rumble followed her as the area she had been in was crushed by snow and ice filling it in.

"Thank you so much Evelyn. You really saved." Braulia said now that she was free.

She was truly ecstatic to not be buried anymore, and away from the terror and cold of being under so much snow and ice.

After that Evelyn brought out her heavenly flame to heat Braulia up since it was obvious she was incredibly cold.

She had definitely used up a large amount of her magical energy protecting herself, and that burst had drained her dry and left her no way to defend against the cold temperatures.

"Let us fly higher and I will send a signal to the others that I found you. Everyone right now is also out searching for Osten, so we are pretty scattered right now."

Nodding her head, Braulia did as Evelyn asked and soon the two of them ascended high into the sky in order to get the attention of their other squad members.

Yet, before Evelyn took out the signal talisman, she noticed something astonishing now that she was so high.

'There is a huge hole- no, a crater in the side of the mountain!'