Maxine spent two weeks waiting for Michelle Baker to release the documents on Petre Andrevich and she finally saw some results. It was mostly russian politicians spouting non-sense that those documents were fake, but regardless, it was gaining traction in the public. It wouldn't be long before a serious inquiry began and by then, it would become harder and harder for the ambassador to deny it.

Emily was not a fan of Maxine's plan, but went along with it anyway. Maxine was grateful for that and promised Emily that he would be the only one that she went after like this. It helped that Petre Andrevich had hurt many others. It made Maxine's actions look more righteous than if she were simply attacking him out of a personal vendetta.

But now, she was in an excellent mood. Mostly because she was almost certain that her training to control her hydra bloodline was finished, but she wasn't entirely sure. She still felt the innate aggression and hunger while in her battle form, but she could choose to not let it bother her. She still decided to wait until later on in the day to return to her base state, but only after talking to Guan to hear his opinion on the matter first. He is the first human-hydra hybrid and probably had enough experience in the matter to know if Maxine's training was truly completed.

She walked towards his alchemy room and peeked inside. He wasn't working on any pills or potions, so Maxine figured now was the best time to talk to him. "Hey, daddy," Maxine said as she entered his alchemy room, "I have a question that I need to ask you."

"Hmm? What is it?" Guan said in a calm tone.

"I just wanted to know if there is anyway to further improve my control over this form," Maxine explained.

"As far as I can tell, there isn't and any further time in that state will render very little in the way of control," Guan said and he had a slight look of confusion on his face, "On that note, why are you still in that state? Your training should've ended last night."

"It did?" Maxine asked.

"Yes, you did," Guan said in an approving tone, "Now, if only I could figure out a means to fix your other weaknesses, I would be completely at ease."

"I'm not going to just stand there and let people hurt children," Maxine growled.

"I know, but it's only a matter of time before your love of children is used against you again, Maxine," Guan pointed out, "It's no secret at this point since someone already tried to use Lucas to draw you out. Or did you think that Horatio wasn't going to inform me?"

"I thought he might," Maxine said calmly, "But that only means that I need to get stronger or punish those that mess with me harsher to prevent that kind of thing, right?"

"Good, you're learning," Guan said approvingly.

"Just so you know, I'm still not going to be the genocidal maniac that you are," Maxine told him before walking out of his alchemy room.

"I never expected you to," Guan said softly in return, but to Maxine, it might as well have been a shout.

Maxine turned to look at him for a moment before walking towards the living room. Lucas was reading a book out loud while sitting on Hellen's lap. It looks like mom is enjoying some time with Lucas. I hate to interrupt them. I think it's okay if I just sit next to them.

"Good job, Lucas," Hellen praised Lucas as he finished reading the book and she turned her head slightly towards Maxine, "I heard that talk you had with your father."

"I didn't know we were that loud," Maxine replied.

"You weren't, but the ventilation system carries your voice quite well," Hellen said with a smirk, "Anyways, when are you going to change back to normal? And I hope your going to do it in front of Lucas. He may be smart, but it may be difficult for him to recognize you if you don't."

"Yeah, you're right," Maxine said and stood up before moving in front of both Hellen and Lucas, "Lucas, I know you've heard me and grandma talking about this before, but this is not my original shape. I'm going to change into my original shape, okay?" Lucas looked at her in confusion, but after a few moments, he nodded his head.

Maxine widened her stance and spread her arms out before she slowly began reverting back to her natural state. Lucas' eyes widened in wonder as Maxine's quills changed into her original state. She felt her scales become smooth skin, quills become hair and her claws back to fingernails. Once she finished her transformation completed, she assessed herself. This is going to feel a little weird without a tail, but I can adapt. Hmm, I may need a haircut. I don't like having my hair reach past my shoulder blades and right now it's reaching halfway down my back. Although, Emily always liked it when I let my hair when it's longer. I'll talk to her about it.

"So, what do you think?" Maxine asked Lucas.

"You're still beautiful, mama," Lucas said.

"Charmer," Maxine said happily as she ruffled Lucas' hair, "Do you want to go see Emily with me?"

"I want to see Sarah," Lucas replied.

"I see how it is. You rather see your girlfriend rather than hang out with your mom, right?" Maxine asked.

"She is my friend and she is a girl," Lucas answered.

"You're not wrong, but you will think differently when you're a little older," Maxine said knowingly, "She will too for that matter, but if you're not going to go with me, you can just stay here."

"Okay," Lucas said.

"That's great. I can get you to read me another book, Lucas," Hellen said happily.

"You two have fun," Maxine said and before she could do much else, she felt a vibration coming from her dimensional ring. She retrieved her communication disk from her ring and answered the call.

"Maxine!" Orianna greeted Maxine with a panic stricken expression, "I need your help! Patrick's group just appeared out of nowhere and they're all beat up pretty bad. Most of them look like they'll live without help, but one of them doesn't look like he will last very long."

"Opening a portal to you now," Maxine told her without any hesitation and opened up an arch directly in front of Orianna, "Bring him over as fast as you can and I'll do the rest." Orianna rode a centipede-like construct through the portal. At the tail end of that construct, there was a small bed strapped to it's back with Jason Markham laying on it. He was semi-conscious, and in tremendous pain. But she was very concerned about the bloody foam forming at the corner of his mouth.

Maxine closed the arch and swiftly went to his side to check his wounds with her spiritual sense. Fuck, his body looks like he's been through a blender. I'm not even going to try to count all of his cuts scattered throughout his body. A few of those cuts got deep enough to injure his kidneys, intestines, lungs and liver. If he wasn't a cultivator, he would be a corpse a few times over. He must've gotten swarmed by a bunch of goblins weaker than himself. No wonder he's hurt so bad. Still, these injuries are nothing to scoff at. She immediately started healing his damaged lung while scanning the rest of his body to see if there were any damaged blood vessels. To her surprise, the only major artery that needed attention was his left leg's femoral artery and it only had a small nick in it. Not enough to be immediately fatal, but enough that he would eventually bleed to death if it was left unattended. It only took a few moments to close that wound.

As for his internal organs, she had to convert her energies to the divine attribute to heal them without leaving any permanent damage and had to do it slowly to avoid putting too much stress on his already strained body. She stopped halfway and retrieved a nutritional potion from her dimensional ring.

"Drink," Maxine told him as she raised his head with one hand and held the potion to his lips with the other, "Your body is in need of extra nutrients for me to finish healing you." He drank it slowly and once he finished it off, she went back to healing the rest of his injuries. Unfortunately, there was no way she could heal him completely.

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Just as she finished, she felt a hand gently rest on her shoulder for a brief moment. "I'll take it from here, Maxine," Guan said gently and knelt down beside her to examine Jason more carefully, "You've gotten most of it already. There are a few small injuries that you overlooked, but one of my potions should heal him the rest of the way." He placed one of his potions into Maxine's hands as he finished speaking.

"Thanks, daddy," Maxine replied and after a little prodding, she got Jason Markham to drink it.

"Think nothing of it," Guan said gently, "Although, I am curious as to what he did to earn such care from you. I thought you hated men."

"I don't hate men. I just don't want them touching me. As for Jason, he tried to save me from some kidnappers far more powerful than himself," Maxine answered honestly, "It was an idiotic move on his part, but he still tried. So I trust him to a degree and as you know, I don't trust many people."

"I see," Guan said calmly, "Set him up in the guest bedroom." He started walking away before she could answer him.

"Understood," Maxine replied to Guan's back and gestured for Orianna to direct her centipede construct to the guest bedroom. By the time that she finally got him taken care of, she realized that Emily's lunchbreak had already ended. Shit, I hope she's not too angry with me that I didn't make it.

Just as Maxine returned to the living room, Hellen spoke up, "Emily called earlier wondering where you were and I told her what was going on."

"Thanks for telling her, mom," Maxine said gratefully.

"It's what I should do," Hellen replied, "And I also invited her to dinner tonight."

"Nice," Maxine said happily, "I'll make a trip to Amanda's guild to see if she has any work for me. If not, I'll take Lucas for another trip to the park."

"Sounds good to me," Hellen said, "Try to be back before dinner if nothing else and don't forget to bring Emily. She can't get here on her own just yet."

"I know. See you later, mom," Maxine replied as she created a portal that lead to the front of Amanda's guild. As soon as she walked through it, she was greeted with confused looks. They're probably wondering why this 'new girl' came out of the portal that the beastkin alchemist usually uses.

Maxine ignored them and walked inside. No one recognized her and she felt a bit of relief when she realized that Petre Andrevich wasn't around today. He had made a point of visiting this guild at least once a week to 'improve relations' as he put it. But everyone knew that it was just an excuse to try and poach more people from the Fire and Ice guild. It was no surprise when she found he has pulled a similar move to the other guilds in the area.

The receptionist at the front desk gave Maxine a strange look before her eyes widened and she dialed Amanda's office number. "Mrs. Maze, I think your alchemist friend is here, but I'm not one hundred percent it's her," the receptionist said and paused for a moment as she listened to Amanda's response before replying to it, "Yes, she looks human and has silver hair. How did you- Yes, I'll send her up right away."

Before the receptionist could say anything more, Maxine said, "I heard. Take it easy." She didn't wait for the receptionist to reply before Maxine moved to the elevators and made her way to Amanda's office.

As soon as she walked in, Amanda appraised Maxine with a smile. "I see your training finished. Did it pay off?"

"Yes, it did," Maxine admitted, "I've developed a lot more control over my aggression when I'm in my battle form. Although, it feels strange to be without my tail and I'm not sure how much control I will have if I fully transform into a hydra. But I should be good to breakthrough to gold stage."

"Awesome and you know what it means for humanity when you breakthrough, right?" Amanda asked excitedly. Maxine furrowed her brows in confusion for a moment before it struck her like a lightning bolt. For young worlds like Earth, the Alliance would provide a protector for that planet until the first native born gold stage cultivator appeared. The native born gold stage cultivator would become that planet's protector and would give a voice, albeit a small one, within the Alliance whenever laws are voted on.

"I have no intention of ever taking over daddy's job," Maxine said bluntly, "Anyways, the governments of Earth would stir up a huge fuss about not having a say over what I decide. I don't want to deal with that headache."

"You could always send a representative to speak in your place," Amanda offered.

"Yeah, I could, but you know how politicians are. They could make promises they they won't be able to keep and as the planet's protector, it would fall on me to uphold their promise. I do not want to even take a risk that scenario could happen. No matter how low the odds are that it will. And that's not even considering the schemes that the more unscrupulous Alliance members would use to trick me into selling Earth's rights away, if I were to go myself," Maxine countered, "It's easier and safer for everyone involved just to let daddy keep doing what he's been doing. No one wants to provoke a genocidal maniac."

"You've thought about this alot, haven't you?" Amanda asked.

"Yes, I have and I don't want to EVER be in a position of power," Maxine replied.

"I understand where you are coming from, but Earth needs a voice in the Alliance," Amanda pointed out, "It's worth the risk." When did Amanda get so political? Hmm, must've happened when I was away and I just haven't noticed until now.

"Yeah, but not through me," Maxine said firmly.

"Do you have any idea how long it will take before Earth will get another gold stage cultivator?" Amanda asked almost angrily.

"Another few years at the earliest, a decade at most," Maxine answered honestly.

"And I will have to deal with the complaints about this from the government until then," Amanda said with obvious irritation in her voice.

"Just give them my phone number. They can direct their complaints to me," Maxine said firmly, "I will let them know just what I think about them."

"Alright, but remember you asked for this," Amanda said in surrender, "Did you have any other reason to come down here than to give me an update?"

"I was wondering if you had any work for me," Maxine answered, "I like to keep busy."

"No, I don't," Amanda said, "The other guilds might, but that's up to you to go see them. They don't like talking to the competition."

"Well, shit. I have no idea how to advertise that I'm available," Maxine complained to herself, "Is there an auction that I could post my potions up at?"

"There is a monthly auction for cultivators at the Kavros Clan's headquarters," Amanda answered with a smirk, "As their 'young miss', I thought you would know about that." Maxine felt like an idiot, but kept her embarrassment off of her face.

"They don't keep me updated on every little thing," Maxine retorted, "Although I'm pretty sure they would buy my potions directly off of me. Thanks for the tip."

"Don't mention it," Amanda said, "Although, I wish you would reconsider becoming Earth's representative."

"Not a chance," Maxine replied, "Anyways, I'm not planning on breaking through to gold stage for at least a few years."

"What? Why?" Amanda asked.

"I want to have a couple kids and it's easier to do it while I'm still a silver stage cultivator," Maxine explained, "I originally wanted to be able to protect myself and my family, but it's not necessary anymore. There is no immediate need for me to become more powerful than I am right now and I have both the Kavros clan and my biological parents to help keep everyone safe during a pregnancy."

"So, who's the lucky guy?" Amanda asked before she followed up with, "I thought you didn't like men."

"As if I need a man to have kids," Maxine said, "Daddy developed a potion to help lesbian couples have children. It's a gender inversion potion. It basically gives a woman a dick and balls without changing their frame." I'm almost certain that I told her about it before. Did she forget?

"I'm not even going to question how that works," Amanda said while shaking her head, "Anyways, I've got a lot of work ahead of me. If you don't need anything else, I should really get to it." At least, she didn't ask about it's effect on men.

"I can't think of anything else, thanks," Maxine said gratefully and moved to leave the office, "See you later."

"See you," Amanda said just before Maxine could shut the door behind herself.

Maxine began working her way out of the building, but as she left the elevator, she saw Ambassador Andrevich. To her surprise, though, the ambassador's gaze immediately locked onto her and for an instant, she saw a look of surprise and disbelief in his eyes before it disappeared. So, he both remembers me. I would love to see his reaction when he finds out I'm the one that gave Michelle those documents, but I would rather be incognito for little longer. It shouldn't be too much longer before the reporters figure out that I'm back on Earth and still amongst the living.

Maxine didn't spare him another glance and walked out of the building. She created an arch that lead back home, but when she walked through, she was immediately infuriated. Jason Markham was out of bed and talking to Hellen on the couch. Both of them noticed her almost instantly.

Instead of locking up or showing guilt, Jason got to his feet as if in a daze and was walking towards her. "What the hell are you doing out of bed?! You're supposed to be-," Maxine's tirade was cut short when Jason sealed her lips with a kiss. His action left her completely stunned and didn't react until his tongue invaded her mouth. Without even having to think about it, she kneed him in the balls. He fell to the ground grasping at his injured testicles while groaning in pain.

Maxine was nearly blinded with rage, but she restrained herself by reminding herself that his wounds had yet to fully heal. "If you're up to pulling that kind of shit, you're healed enough that you don't need me to keep an eye on you," Maxine growled as she grabbed him by his hair as she formed an arch in front of herself and threw him into it. She heard a few surprised shouts from Patrick and the rest of his troupe from the other side of it just as she dismissed the arch.

"You must like him," Hellen commented, "I've seen you beat someone far worse for less."

"I have to agree with mom," Orianna chimed in, "I heard you beat the ever living hell out of someone for just trying to touch your butt."

Maxine only glared at the both of them before storming off to the bathroom to brush her teeth. That fucking asshole. My day was going so nice and he just had to pull something like that. I know he has a crush on me, but he should've known that kissing me like that would only piss me off. It doesn't help that mom and Orianna were right when they said I took it easy on him. Why didn't I beat the shit out of him?! I could've just patched him back up afterwards. She stopped in her tracks as she closed her eyes and took a deep calming breath. That's right. Calm the fuck down. That idiot was just thinking with his dick and didn't consider the consequences of his actions. And I have more important things to worry about than being pissed off that Jason stole a kiss from me. I need to keep an eye on the news and be ready for those damn reporters when they show up. I don't want them harassing Claudia and Nathan just to get my attention.