An Owl's Rise

"Oh, how I have been waiting to be able to share this with all of you." Melisandre said excitedly.

It appeared that whatever she had been doing in secret was quite exciting and now she was finally going to tell Evelyn, Anneli, and Katrina what she had been up to.

"To start, let me tell all of you that one of our scouts discovered a small continent out in the middle of the vast ocean around three months ago." Melisandre said, dropping some very important news.

'Wait, there is a continent on this world they did not already know about?' Evelyn thought in confusion.

On Earth every continent had been discovered and documented by the eighteen hundreds, before even the rise of technologies like planes.

But on this world, even Evelyn could fly across hundreds of miles easily. And there were many entities way more powerful than her, so it seemed a bit weird that every major landmass had not been discovered.

'I suppose that this world does seem bigger than earth by a fair amount. Now that I know exactly what the measures of distance are I was able to figure out that the continent we are on is around the size of Asia, Africa, and Europe combined.'

Chalking it up to this world just being that much bigger, Evelyn figured it would eb possible for a whole continent to go unnoticed.

"Really, that is amazing Lady Melisandre! Is that why you have been busy so lately? Have you already been there?" Anneli asked in a fervor.

"Yes, it is why I have been going out for extended periods of time. And I have flown around it with some of the other leaders of the Roost and our allies to map the general shape and get a feel for the powers on the continent."

Practically vibrating in excitement, Anneli asked a few more rapid-fire questions, but Katrina slapped her with her right wing and told her to calm down.

"So, what does this have to do with us? I don't think you would be telling us if it was not important." Evelyn said, wanting to know exactly what Melisandre was planning.

At this she smiled, and said, "You caught on pretty quickly. Yes, there is quite the opportunity for the three of you. This continent is relatively weak compared to our own. With no areas of high-density magical energy necessary to nurture anything above a tyrant beast. Along with that, there were no humans there, so it could be considered a perfect place for us beasts to reap plenty of resources."

Hearing this both Anneli and Katrina looked very happy, as if Melisandre had just offered them a treasurer trove. But Evelyn picked up on something else.

"What about the beasts that are already there? You said that it could not support anything greater than tyrant beasts, but that most mean that there are some there?" Evelyn asked.

"Certainly, there were a couple hundred tyrant rank beasts there, but they are all gone now."

Eyes going wide, Evelyn asked for more details, and Melisandre said that the owls of the Roost along with their allies the crows and foxes had recruited those beasts that were the same race as them and then killed the rest.

"Yes, our Roost is soon going to have quite few more promising youngsters among them. Along with four tyrant rank owls we have another couple hundred from the awakened rank that will be joining us. Of course, most of them were more than happy and now to come over here, and now most of the strongest owls on that continent will be moving to the Roost." Melisandre said happily.

For Evelyn, though, this seemed quite deplorable morally.  The Roost and their allies had taken who they wanted from this continent and were willing to kill the rest as resources.

'No, I need to not be set in my mindset. This is a completely different world. My old feelings do not have a place here. Not to mention I have already killed a bunch of other beasts. Just because it is being done on a continent-wide scale, does not make much of a difference. In this world, only those who kill get stronger.'

Shaking off her previous sensibilities, Evelyn tried to look at this in a more positive light. Now she would have a new place to gather resources and would also not have to worry about humans there either.

"Now as I said earlier, this is going to be very beneficial to the three of you. The other sovereign rank beasts and I from the Roost, along with our allies have made a rough map of the continent. But we still need to send in teams that will thoroughly mark areas of resources and develop good training locations. This is a once in a millennia chance to have discovered such a perfect place for beasts all the way up to the tyrant rank to have a relatively safer environment to grow. To that end, I have managed to get slots for all three of you on the teams that the Roost will be sending over. If you want to?"

Immediately Anneli agreed to the proposal, and not far behind was Katrina.

However, Evelyn was a bit warry and wanted more details before she agreed to go off on a mission she knew nothing about.

"Melisandre what exactly would I be doing there? And why would they want to send in a fiend beast like me when the Roost has plenty of awaken beasts?" Evelyn asked.

"Those are some good questions, Evelyn. To answer your first one, you would be going with a group and searching out areas with specific resource deposits. Be it beasts, plants, ores, or other useful items. For your second, while certainly, we could just send awakened beasts, there are areas that are lower in magical energy that are obviously really only suitable for fiend beasts or newly evolved awakened beasts at best. Just like the Glowing Woods. If we sent in powerful awakened beasts, all for the local populations would hide in fear and it would be difficult to get and accurate assessment. Plus, there would be nothing in it for the stronger awakened beasts, so they would not want to do it. Also, for you personally there is the possibility of finding something very useful to yourself." Melisandre said with a wry smile.

In response Evelyn tilted her head. Not understanding what she might obtain there that would be that valuable to her.

'Right now, what I really need is a hellfire rose which can only be gotten from the inferno field, and a high-quality float stone, which the humans pretty much have a monopoly on. What could I possibl- wait is that what she means!?'

Eyes going in wide in realization, Evelyn understood what Melisandre was hinting at.

"I see you got what I meant. Yes, a continent without any humans on it means that the possibility of an untapped deposits of floats stones would be much easier to come across. If you say, were to happen to locate one while searching and cataloging the resources in the area. It would be no problem for you to take a bit as your right being the first to discover it."