Took a Level in Badass/Literature

"Obstructive Bureaucrat: I'm not a miracle worker, laddie!
 * Despite many of the Discworld's more iconic (and recurring) characters having a mostly constant level of badass (Vimes, Granny Weatherwax, Rincewind, Death, the Librarian) certain Discworld characters gain quite a few levels by the end of their books. Among the more notable are Brutha and the great god Om from Small Gods.
 * The Librarian becoming an orangutan.
 * Agnes levelled up quite a bit in the course of Carpe Jugulum.
 * Vimes wasn't badass in Guards Guards, but in Men At Arms he was seriously Badass. It could be argued that he took another level after Men At Arms, as well: in the other Watch books he is probably the most badass thing on the Disc.
 * Getting off the sauce probably had a lot to do with that first transformation; getting (thanks in part to Carrot working behind the scenes) some real political power in the city, which grew over time, probably had a lot to do with both (and, for that matter, with his ability to quit drinking the depression away).
 * Susan Sto Helit, Death's Granddaughter has taken more than one level in Badass over the course of the books she's involved in. Most spectacularly was against Mr. Teatime in Discworld/Hogfather. Tip: Don't piss off Susan when she's near a poker.
 * The wizards of Unseen University tend to both play this trope straight and then almost immediately subvert it. Nearly all of them, everyone from Archancellor Ridcully, down through Ponder Stibbons and his High Magic faculty to the Bursar take a level in Badass. However they will nearly always revert back to their Squishy Wizard selves in the end.
 * There is a great deal of Fridge Brilliance in this, as the entire reason for Unseen University's existence is to keep the wizards in a lulled state of well-fed stupor so they don't get bored and start destroying the world. Again. Their moments of high-powered badassery are more akin to simply choosing to let loose and get as dangerous as they are.
 * Nanny Ogg tends to have a fairly consistent level of Badassery, but, like Ridcully goes for Obfuscating Stupidity more often than not. Watch out for her Let's Get Dangerous moments.
 * Magrat takes a sequential level in Badass every book. Her finest example is in Lords and Ladies. If you don't know as to what I'm referring then please either see that page or Discworld's Awesome Moments page.
 * Nathaniel Starbuck begins the novel Rebel a jilted, humiliated, penniless son of an emancipation preacher who has been caught by a mob in Richmond and has to be rescued by his friends. The book is about his taking a level in badass after joining the Confederate Army. The definitive moment comes when he has to arrange rail transport for his regiment and the controller isn't willing to lend him the cars necessary:

Nate Starbuck: But I am. (*shoots wall beside him)"


 * Neville Longbottom of Harry Potter, previously a bit of a Butt Monkey, gets some character development in Book 4, then actually starts showing some competence in Book 5. This pays off in Book 7; the Power Trio misses out on what he's up to for much of the year, but when they see him again, he's clearly leveled up in Harry's absence and has become a leader in his own right. He's a key player in the final battle, and actually ends up destroying the last Horcrux: he pulls the Sword of Gryffindor out of the Sorting Hat and uses it to lop the head off of Nagini, leaving the way free for Harry to kick Voldemort's scaly ass one final time. Did we mention Neville was on fire during all of this?
 * Neville gets Brass-Testicle points for merely standing in front of Voldemort and telling the Dark Lord to his face, "I'll join you when hell freezes over!"
 * The fandom has turned this up to about 90, with things such as "What happens if you break the Unbreakable Vow? Neville."
 * Neville is now the series' designated Memetic Badass. That's a hell of a development from how he started.
 * A Tribute to Neville.
 * It's even better in the Jim Dale Audiobook of Order of the Phoenix, because he starts sounding tougher once he gets a BROKEN NOSE. It's as if he's bleeding not blood, but wimpiness, leaving nothing but the ultra badass left.
 * The old machismo saying of "Pain is weakness leaving the body" comes to mind. Apparently that holds true to some extent in that world.... It now makes sense that Neville is so bad ass in book 7, he bled out all his weakness in books 1-6 through various moments of pain...
 * Also, "NOT MY DAUGHTER YOU BITCH!" Give it up for Molly Weasley, everyone!
 * Harry takes one of these, going from bullied and timid kid to a pretty reasonable all round badass by book 4 at the latest. You could argue he takes a further one of these in the final book, going to his death calmly, then just as calmly offering the man who killed his parents and a lot of his friends a chance at redemption, admittedly almost certain that he wouldn't take it.
 * Hermione and Ron also take levels in badass, but less markedly than the above examples.
 * Edmond Dantes becomes The Count of Monte Cristo to get revenge on his enemies. At one point, the narration asserts that Dantes' time spent languishing in a tiny scell has given him unusual strength.
 * As does Gulliver Foyle, of The Stars My Destination. He was always an asshole, but now he's an obsessive one.
 * Happens to  from the Star Wars Expanded Universe. In her original appearances, during the 90's, she was an overblown Villain Sue, repeatedly stated as being a tactical genius, but her strategies were highly incompetent. On her return in the Legacy of the Force series, she not only lives up to the reputation she was given in-universe, but manages to kick all kinds of ass using a fleet consisting mainly of obsolete starships. On top of everything else, she has an eyepatch now, not to mention a full name.
 * However, most people contribute Daala's sudden 'competence' to the fact that the Author didn't do the research. As always, it's a Travissity. Not only that, the ultimate salt in the wound is said war criminal becoming Chief of State.
 * Partially justified in that her backstory had her being a genius in infantry tactics, which don't necessarily translate well to naval combat. That, and she suffered a severe brain injury during a battle taking place around ten years before her original introduction. Presumably, she finally recovered from that injury and spent the decades between her appearances studying up on naval combat. The idea that she'd be Chief of State (or, given her reasoning behind her handing command over to Pellaeon decades earlier, that she'd even want the job) is still a bad writing, though.
 * Pellaeon himself is also an example of this trope. In The Thrawn Trilogy he is 'merely' capable, a reliable and hard working Star Destroyer captain and little more. Yet through learning from Thrawn and Daala and through sheer weight of experience he becomes quite a wily and formidable commander until his Crowning Moment of Awesome decades later in the New Jedi Order when he defeats an enemy fleet while floating in a bacta tank. The Star Wars Expanded Universe is full of brilliant admirals and commanders but Pellaeon is probably the only one who made it to the top through sheer hard work rather than being a born genius.
 * In War and Peace, Dolokhov returns from being Put On a Bus at an opera house the Rostovs attend. Rumors fly about concerning the adventures in Persia he has been on, and the new sword sheathed at his side shows he's not just a conniving swindler anymore. Nikolai Rostov also levels up when he goes hunting with his uncle during the book's Christmas Episode, as he transforms from a coward during battle to a war hero.
 * The Lord of the Rings features a number of examples:
 * Gandalf's evolution from Gandalf the Grey to Gandalf the White. He's granted the ability to use more of his natural power while acting as Gandalf the White. In a popular parody Russian redub of the series, Gandalf in fact says, "I fell into the white and gained a levelup" upon his return.
 * All the hobbits take a level in badass throughout their adventures, going from idle country folk to heroes whose various exploits help save Middle Earth. The Scouring of the Shire shows their evolution, as they return to their old home and must give the other hobbits a quick lesson on the badass that they've learned. Hobbits as a species have a predisposition toward this trope, summoning their "hidden depths" and rising to great challenges.
 * The Hobbit contains one scene where Bilbo vanquishes a giant spider. The description of his newfound confidence afterward practically qualifies as gaining a Character Level.
 * Thorin and the dwarves, too. They spend the book getting caught by trolls, caught by goblins, caught by wolves and goblins, caught by giant spiders, and caught by elves. But when the Battle of Five Armies is going down, with thousands of combatants on both sides, Thorin and his twelve companions (one of them comically obese) make a significant difference to the battle and almost cut their way through to the freakin' Goblin King himself. True, they had the pick of the armour and weapons in Smaug's legendary hoard, but even so...
 * In the Latin textbook series Ecce Romani, Sextus spends a whole two years worth of lessons being annoying, whiny, and cowardly. Then, being his usual wimpy self, he goes back to the changing room at the public baths because the water's too hot, sees a thief stealing his clothes and chases the guy halfway across the bath complex on slippery tiles, then pushes him into a frigidarium (that's the cold pool, for you non-Latin-students). Unfortunately, he goes right back to being a wimp after this chapter.
 * Well, according to the epilogue, he joined the army after the end of the story...
 * On the subject of Latin textbooks... the Cambridge series! In the first book, Quintus has such exciting adventures like going to debates and accidentally breaking statues in the public baths... then his dad gets killed in a volcano and all of a sudden he's a world traveler, fighting rowdy Egyptians, killing crocodiles, hangin' with kings, prosecuting corrupt officials, and just generally being ridiculously kick-ass.
 * The Laughter of Dead Kings, the most recent Elizabeth Peters Vicky Bliss book, reveals that  has had a hidden level of badass all along, and actually is the Greatest Swordsman in Europe.
 * In Prince Caspian, when the Pevensies return to Narnia, they regain all the fighting skills they had learned in the fifteen years they were in Narnia the last time. They return as children, except the relatively inexperienced children you had read about in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe are now a bunch of young badasses. The difference is even more noticeable in The Film of the Book.
 * In the Malazan Book of the Fallen innocent n00b characters will invariably become demon-slaying demigods within a few dozen chapters of their first appearance, whilst the already-extant badasses will become elite super-badasses in the same timespan.
 * The Wheel of Time novels has this happen to most of the initial cast. They start out as random villagers, and slowly develop over the series.
 * Rand is consistently Leveling Up in Badass. The climaxes of the first five books, and most thereafter, are basically an expression of this leveling-up. The other primary channeling characters experience similar (though lesser) bursts of growth.
 * Magical reasons are sometimes given for the level-gaining., for example has implanted fighting and tactical planning memories turning him literally overnight into a canny warrior and general. also has memories from one of his previous incarnations to help him along.
 * The only unexplained levelling up takes place with regards to who goes from a decent swordsman to somehow being able to take down experienced Warders twice his age to later wiping out attacking bands of Aiel warriors, trained since birth to be badass, by himself.
 * Susan from The Dresden Files between Grave Peril and Death Masks. At the end of the former she turns down Dresden's proposal of marriage to leave Chicago to find a way to deal with her . When she returns, a combination of the increased physical capabilities granted by her state, and training and mystic tattoos given to her by an organisation which is a combination of a support group for people like her and covert organisation fighting against vampires leave her a competent combatant (who at one point is able to match a surprised sorcerer being powered by a fallen angel) who is a useful asset to Dresden during his case in that book. At the end, she returns to South America (where she had spent the interim between books) to take in the fight against the dominating vampire faction based there.
 * Do inanimate objects count for this trope? If so, Harry's shield bracelet between Proven Guilty and White Night took a couple of levels, going from a burnt-out talisman that only blocked kinetic energy and spat out sparks every time he used it to a shiny new trinket interlaced with several precious metals that blocks "heat, cold, electricity - even sound and light". Even, whose specialty was in subtle and varied magics, was impressed by the versatility of it.
 * As does his rings, which can unleash a single powerful kinetic attack on a foe before needing to be recharged. He starts out with a single ring, then a ring with three bands, each band as powerful as the original ring, then starts wearing a three-band ring on each finger. Giving him a total of 30 times the kinetic goodness of his original single ring.
 * Harry himself. He's been getting steadily more awesome since the start, but after Dead Beat, he's been getting EXPONENTIALLY more awesome. Especially in Turn Coat.
 * During the first few books Harry would burn out after a couple of spells. Now he can blast spells like crazy in a fight, due to his toning of his metaphysical muscles. And the firepower of his gun has gone steadily up too. Not to mention he is becoming adept at Xanatos Speed Chess.
 * He has gained better control over his spells as well. Originally defined as a 'magical bruiser' with power but little fine control he gains finer control and ability at subtler magic as the books progress, particularly after . He wouldn't even bother trying a veil before, but he had to brush up on them fast to avoid looking like an idiot in front of the Master of Illusion.
 * He's also gotten more and more help from supernatural entities over time;, then, after And then Harry  Seriously, Harry's taken more levels in badass than a Shonen hero.
 * Changes:
 * The Alphas. They go from a bunch of high-school senior/college age nerds who wear too much leather and Old Spice and just happen to be werewolves to a pack of fit, healthy young men and women who transform into a virtual army of monster-shredding fangs and claws; enough to strip a professional ghoul assassin to the bone. Mentioned by Harry in Summer Knight.
 * Murphy, though her increase in badassness has less to do with actually getting more badass and more knowing how to be badass to the latest monster of the week. Storm Front, does nothing. Fool Moon, wounds a loup-garou with a pistol. Summer Knight, defeats an ogre and a plant monster with a chainsaw.
 * Small Favor,.
 * Changes,.
 * finally takes a level in badass in changes, despite still being one of the lesser badass's on Harry's side. While good at the subtle magic her inability to use the more powerful offensive magics left her a non action girl for most of the series; relegated to veiling herself and others who need to hide. By Changes she finally takes a level by first  and later in the final climatic battle
 * Toot Toot anyone? Goes from mildly useful mildy annoying fairy to the head of Harry's self-appointed honor guard and in Turn Coat  by attacking it with a box cutter.
 * A lot of Harry's friends take a level in Ghost Story. Murphy is now experienced enough with the magical stuff to basically be as effective in taking them down as Harry was in the firs few books, and she's been taking lessons in combat from Einherjar.  Molly has gotten her illusions to the point where she can work up to six copies of herself almost instantly (something Harry has never been able to do) as well as mentally grapple with  . Her oldest younger brother Daniel has now become good enough to take on a supernaturally fast sorcerer in a knife fight. Butter's new roommate   has been teaching him about magic, so even if he can't use it, he's damn good with understanding how it works, and therefore screwing with it. And Mortimer Lindquist probably took his long before Changes but... damn. He's one powerful ectomancer.
 * Mortimer also took another one soon after that. This is the quote. It demonstrates it.


 * Ladies and gentlemen, may I present Waldo Butters: Goes from nebbish-y coroner who spent 3 months in a psych ward, to man who wore a polka suit to power a zombie t-rex, ended up as the man who
 * Kim Kinnison, in EE Doc Smith's Lensman series, does this, going in a few chapters of Galactic Patrol from relying almost wholly upon brawn and gadgets to . Lampshaded by Mentor, the Deus Ex Machina who grants him his powers, who tells him.
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 * Julie Sims goes from being an energetic high school cheerleader at the beginning of the book to a ruthless, crack shot sniper by the end. (True, as a cheerleader she'd also been training to be an Olympic markswoman, but it's still a noticeable change in attitude, if not in aptitude)
 * Jeff Higgins goes from a Dungeons and Dragons-playing nerd to being a Badass Biker and officer in one of the New United States elite regiments.
 * Tally Youngblood in Scott Westerfeld's Uglies series. She starts out as a normal Ugly kid and quickly becomes a rebel with insane hoverboarding skills who thinks her way out of brainwashing (twice) and eventually turns into something called a Special complete with crazy techno tattoos, long claw-like nails, and sharp teeth. Also she overthrows the government, unbrainwashes everyone, and then disappears into the wilderness after warning the new government to step lightly because she's watching their every move now. And apparently she wasn't kidding.
 * Shay also fits this trope pretty well.
 * Most of the major characters from Percy Jackson and The Olympians go through this, but a special mention for Nico di Angelo, son of Hades. When we first meet him, he's a somewhat nerdy little kid who's really into a collectible card trading game and is ignored in favor of his sister. By the last book, Damn.
 * Percy himself, too, takes a level in the Last Olympian.
 * As if the real Roman Republic wasn't Badass enough, John Maddox Roberts' Alternate History Hannibal's Children has them take a level or three in reaction to being exiled north of the Alps. When they come back one hundred years later, a Greek thinks that the sound of Roman laughter reminds him of swords clashing against shields. They don't swagger or bully; they're too badass for that. In one battle, an "inexperienced" Roman army under a "second-rate" general faces a veteran mercenary force twice their size and led by Carthage's best general. The Romans are wiped out -- but the Carthaginian army is wrecked, with two-thirds of its troops killed outright, and most of the rest badly battered.
 * In Stephen King's Dark Tower series, Roland's ka-tet go from regular folk to badass Gunslingers. Even the Team Pet gets in on the action.
 * In Frederik Pohl's Gateway series, the protagonist Robinette Broadhead (a male, he assures) goes from a Wyoming mold miner to a man who survies an encounter with a black hole then, after his death, saves some children from escaped convicts as a digitally stored personality.
 * In The Sword of Shannara, Menion Leah goes from ditzy prince who's constantly getting lost to savior at least two cities, defeater of Grima Wormtongue the mystic Stenmin, and rescuer of two elves, a mighty warrior, and an awesome dwarf. Oh, and he picks up a hot girl along the way.
 * Tavi, in the first book of the Codex Alera: small for his age sheepherder who is handicapped by lacking powers that everyone else has, and survives only because of his quick wits and having (and making) an assorted group of Badass friends. Tavi (sorry, ) in book 6 of Codex Alera: still wily and intelligent, has an even larger assorted group of badass friends, now a tall, physically powerful experienced warrior and wartime commander who.
 * The legion Tavi ends up leading in Cursor's Fury. The beginning of the book makes it clear these are, well, not Alera's best troops. Even the Knights are barely up to snuff, dubbed "Knights Pisces" for their resemblance more of fish flopping around than seasoned warriors. Then, at the end of the book, at the end of a grim, determined battle, they take that appellation and turn it around. Sharks are fish, too, after all...Similarly, the legionnaires are likewise wet-behind-the-ears kids, but by the end the survivors are the Battlecrow Cohort.
 * In the Dark Heavens trilogy by Kylie Chan, Emma Donahoe goes from an ordinary nanny at the beginning to being able to take down high-level demons at the end. It helps that her employer is
 * In the Dragonlance Chronicles, while the elven princess Laurana had already shown herself to be much smarter, stronger and braver than the Brainless Beauty everyone initially dismissed her as, she finally became a true badass at the Battle of the High Clerist's Tower. At that battle she Laurana's heroism at the High Clerist's Tower led to her being given command of the Whitestone Army where she would prove to be a Four Star Badass as the Golden General.
 * In The Demonata, Kirilli Kovacs goes from an incompetent loser to an insane badass over the last few books.
 * In the Mistborn series, Elend Venture increases massively in competence by the third book.
 * Also, Spook, who spends the first two books solidly Overshadowed By Awesome, finally gets a chance to shine in Hero of Ages and show off just the kind of things someone with street savvy and Super Senses can pull off.
 * Honestly, Vin herself. Our heroine begins the trilogy an emotionally scarred, scrawny teenager with mildly useful but seemingly minor Emotion Bomb-type abilities, and grows from there into the most powerful member of La Résistance, the best assassin in the world, a true Lady of War,  The best part? She does it all without turning into a God Mode Sue.
 * Robert Heinlein's Door Into Summer features Daniel Boone Davis, an engineer who loses his company to his business partner and secretary/former fiancee only to use time travel  to gain revenge
 * Teela Brown spent most of Ringworld getting into trouble through being too useless and naive to know how to stay out of it . When she reappears   in the sequel, she is intelligent enough to deduce how to hack into a Puppeteer stepping-disc system and strong enough to fight a full-grown, experienced and rejuvenated Kzin bare-handed and nearly kill him despite deliberately trying as hard as she could to lose.
 * R.A. Salvatore's Hunter's Blades trilogy features Obould Many-Arrows, who goes from being an Elite Mook leading a Zerg Rush and being manipulated by a group of drow who are causing havok for shits and giggles, to being blessed by a god with super strength, speed, agility, and increased intelligence. He starts bossing around the giants he was partnered with, the drow that were manipulating him, leading his zerg rush with dangerous tactics and foresight, tossing heroes out of the way as if they were nothing, and forcing Drizzt Do'Urden to flee from battle.
 * Inevitably for a military setting, a few characters in Honor Harrington are shown to do this. Most notably, it is one of the main plotlines in book 6 when a technician gets targeted by a much larger bully of a crewman for no reason than being in the wrong place at the wrong time. The ship's authorities know what is going on but the technician is too scared to testify, so strings are pulled and he ends up being invited to spar with a few Marines, which builds up his martial skill, so when the bully confronts him again, he loses.
 * Being a realistic military setting, he of course ends up  He gets over it.
 * Marta of the 'Dragon Slippers Trilogy'. in the first book, she's just an apprentice dressmaker with a huge romantic streak and happens to be Creels friend. by book two, she's leaping off a flying Dragon's back, landing on another dragon, killing the dragon rider( who had enslaved said dragon) and the leaping onto ANOTHER. all while other dragons/ riders are doing epic battle.
 * Mac from the Fever Series starts out as an unambitious young woman who loves pretty clothes and partying. By the second book she's a badass evil fae exterminator, and she only gets tougher from there.
 * Ludovic Leblanc in ‘’City of the Beasts’’ spends most of the novel being annoying, vain, and spouting theories that all turn out to be wrong. But when the expedition's in danger, he jumps into a firefight to save a native child, comes up with a pretty cunning plan, and then manipulates the main bad guy, distracts him, and tries to get him drunk so that they have a chance at escaping. Alex and Nadia actually do most of the day-saving, but it's still pretty awesome.
 * One of the characters in Richard C. Meredith's We All Died at Breakaway Station is Glenn, Guardian Culhaven, a destroyer captain on a mission into enemy territory to rendezvous with and rescue an admiral who's been scouting the enemy defenses. Unfortunately, he's convinced that feeling fear and being a coward are the same thing. This is his first time facing combat, and Glenn constantly tears himself up about the fact that he's so afraid, (mentally) whimpering ... while he firmly makes decisions that expose him to extreme risk. The narrative makes clear that no one watching him on this mission would dream that he's ever in his life felt fear. He doesn't so much take a level as finally begin to realize that he's a brave man after all.
 * A Song of Ice and Fire has a few of these:
 * Daenerys Targaryen spent most of her early life getting pushed around by Viserys, her crazy older brother. After getting sold off to a warlord, she starts developing self-confidence and wielding her power more effectively. By the end of the first book she's . She later finds herself facing off against sorcerers, commanding armies and ruling city-states.
 * Rhaegar Targaryen apparently underwent this in the setting's history. He was a scholarly young boy until he found something in an old book that convinced him he needed to become a warrior. He quickly became quite a notable knight.
 * Lord Manderly goes from having no notable characteristics besides obesity, and generally ignored by the fans, till he
 * In the first Dunk and Egg short story "The Hedge Knight," Dunk is a Mighty Glacier with very little actual skill at swordplay. By the third book, "The Mystery Knight," he's still a terrible jouster but has fought in a few battles and can now easily dispatch a competent swordsman.
 * And we, of course, know that
 * Pretty much every person who was part of the Italian Resistance took a level in badass in A Thread of Grace. The one who took the most levels had to be Claudia, but that's largely because she started off so low to begin with.
 * In Sean William's The Crooked Letter we have the two twins Hadrian and Seth who are inverted, with Seth being entirely normal and Hadrian being the complete mirror opposite of him in almost every way, right down to his heart being on the wrong side of his chest. Most of the book, Seth is taken on a dangerous and daring adventure where he gains new powers and allies. On the flip side, for most of the book Hadrian is beaten-up, kicked-around, dragged through mud, blood and sewers in a hellish amalgamated city that amounts to hell on earth, constantly being manipulated and thrown away as a pawn when people are done with him and continuously running for his life, eventually hunted to the ends of the earth. Then Hadrian Takes A Level In Badass by using magic from the strength of the centre of the earth to warp reality and literally out-maneouvering the god-like Big Bad wannabe. And it turns out that Seth.
 * All the kids in The Tomorrow Series. They start off as boringly-normal Australian rural high-schoolers...and end up as some of the most Badass guerrillas in the war, with an international reputation and the enemy mobilizing heavily to try to capture or kill them.
 * In Veronica Roth's novel Divergent, the entire plot is about how Tris does this.
 * In The Belgariad, Garion shifts from innocent farmboy to competent swordsman and sorcerer to Godslayer. By the sequel, he's one of the most powerful sorcerors on the planet and someone you absolutely do not want to screw with. His close friend Durnik undergoes a similar change. And oh yeah, speaking of the sequel, remember Sadi and 'Zakath? The drug-addicted eunuch and Empty Shell of an emperor? By the time The Malloreon has ended, 'Zakath has retaken the levels he lost in his time as an Evil Overlord, becoming perhaps the only fencer in the world to fight with a BFS, while Sadi has transformed his love of poisons and mind-altering drugs into a unique style of combat that leaves most of his victims dead or very, very messed-up.
 * In Dan Abnett's Gaunts Ghosts series, Ludd is diffident and in His Last Command has serious difficulty getting the New Meat to move into action. During Salvation's Reach he goes to stand down three Space Marines, ordering them to call off an attack. And gets them to obey him.
 * Time Scout: Margo Smith, from Freudian Excuse teen runaway to deadly, time-hopping, wealthy warrior.
 * Private Henry from Paul Kidd's trilogy set in the world of Greyhawk. When he first appears in Descent Into The Depths Of The Earth he's somewhat comical in his attempts to light a lantern and being insulted for his sheer incompetence by his sergeant. By the end of the book, he's mowing down Drow by the dozens with his newly acquired magical, self-loading crossbow. By the end of the next book, he's outwitting undead warlords, faerie wizards, and facing down gods without flinching.
 * In The Last Unicorn, Schmendrick the Magician has spent an indefinite number of years being useless - he has a talent for magic, but no idea how to exercise it, and it only goes off occasionally at random. Then, just in time for the climactic scene, his brain makes a significant connection, he realizes how to say the right words and how to say them differently next time and as many times thereafter as he needs, and for the rest of his career, monsters "worse than afrits surrendered at the mention of his name".
 * Authorized Peter Pan sequel Peter Pan In Scarlet evolves Slightly, once a cowardly and stupid little brat, into an intuitive and somewhat melancholy figure who fights evil in Neverland armed with a clarinet and the power of rhythm 'n' blues.
 * Verna in Margaret Atwood's short story "Stone Mattress".
 * While Septimus Heap is more of a Squishy Wizard in the early books, in Queste he manages to knock down the rather strong Toll-Man almost on his own.
 * EE Doc Smith does this for two of his heroines.
 * In the Lensmen novels, Clarissa Mac Dougall goes from being Sector Chief Nurse to the only female Lensman, justified in canon as her mental abilities have long been evident to the people responsible for her promotion. When she goes back to field work twenty years and five children later, she takes her Level 2 Arisian training (one of only five Lensmen to do this) and becomes truly formidable, controlling several extremely hostile minds simultaneously while piloting her ship, rescuing a prisoner and throwing off the aim of every enemy soldier and pilot who comes close enough to threaten her. And her enemies are all lethal telepaths by nature. It's implied that this is pretty much the supreme performance by any Lensman in the field, up until the conclusive battle.
 * In the Skylark Series, Dorothy Seaton gets a heroic upgrade in the last novel, finally putting her foot down and telling husband and protagonist Richard she'll be fighting alongside him from now, just like her Osnomian woman-friends do alongside their husbands. Though she falls down at the end, practically all the other humans do as well - the only exception is Du Quesne, whom Dorothy regards as an inhuman monster.
 * In the Lensmen novels, Clarissa Mac Dougall goes from being Sector Chief Nurse to the only female Lensman, justified in canon as her mental abilities have long been evident to the people responsible for her promotion. When she goes back to field work twenty years and five children later, she takes her Level 2 Arisian training (one of only five Lensmen to do this) and becomes truly formidable, controlling several extremely hostile minds simultaneously while piloting her ship, rescuing a prisoner and throwing off the aim of every enemy soldier and pilot who comes close enough to threaten her. And her enemies are all lethal telepaths by nature. It's implied that this is pretty much the supreme performance by any Lensman in the field, up until the conclusive battle.
 * In the Skylark Series, Dorothy Seaton gets a heroic upgrade in the last novel, finally putting her foot down and telling husband and protagonist Richard she'll be fighting alongside him from now, just like her Osnomian woman-friends do alongside their husbands. Though she falls down at the end, practically all the other humans do as well - the only exception is Du Quesne, whom Dorothy regards as an inhuman monster.