Maxine was walking with Emily towards the cafe that Patrick had designated as their meeting point. She was happy that Emily had agreed to go with her on such short notice. It may have been something to do with Maxine being asked to hang out by a boy. Emily knew that Maxine was afraid of men, but Maxine hadn't told her that it wasn't as much of a problem as it used to be. Unfortunately Amanda couldn't come with them as she was still busy with that petition she had put forward to the government. Something about a group of idiotic senators arguing against it.

As they progressed, Maxine relaxed greatly when she saw that quite a few other girls had dyed their hair to silver grey, the same as her own. This and the fact that she had the foresight to drop Silky off at the hospital to spend time with her mother meant that she wouldn't be swarmed by fans. 

Maxine thought about the past few days and wondered why General Jones hadn't called her yet to make peace. That asshole has alot more willpower than I gave him credit for. However she figured he was near his breaking point and would call her soon. However just in case she checked on him through one of the ravens in his shadow. He was walking with a limp through the base and she noticed he had ear plugs in his hand. Well that's one way to block out my ravens' psychological tactics and from the looks of it he hasn't been behaving. Perhaps I should up my game alittle. She added an order for the ravens to gently rub his nose with their feathers while he slept and to pull out his ear plugs whenever possible.

Maxine retracted her awareness from the ravens as the cafe came into sight. She could see Patrick, Meagan, Maxwell and Jack sitting at a table. They were talking. When they were about ten feet away, Maxwell noticed both of them. However his eyes didn't lock onto Maxine like she had expected. Instead he was staring at Emily. Huh? Maxine was curious about that. She knew that she was prettier than Emily and Maxine didn't recall any time that she wouldn't look at a more beautiful girl first. However she remembered that she loved brown hair and Maxwell shared that preference. Hence it made perfect sense why he looked at Emily first.

However Emily noticed his bold gaze and started blushing slightly. She is into him too?! Maxine got angry and looked towards Patrick. However she didn't recall telling him that Emily was Jane and immediately calmed down. It was coincidence that Maxwell was interested in Emily. However since Maxwell was basically the masculin version of herself, it didn't bother her as much as if it were someone else. 

After introductions were out of the way, Maxine and Emily started talking with everyone, However that was simply a ruse to fool anyone that might be listening. The real conversation was done through spiritual sense as she had already explained the reason why it was necessary.

"So, Patrick tells me you were working on making me a bow. Is it ready?" Meagan asked through spiritual sense. Maxine had finsihed the bow the night before and even test fired it to ensure that it was of sufficient quality. She had rated it as middle bronze bow.

"Yes, I have it on me as a matter of fact as well as some bronze essence cores. I am giving it all to Patrick for now. He can distribute that stuff later," Maxine responded as she handed Patrick a dimensional pouch under the table. She had given them twenty bronze essence cores. 

"A dimensional pouch?! Did you figure out how to make them?" Patrick asked after he recieved the dimensional pouch.

"No, I didn't. I found it," Maxine answered.

"Where?" Patrick asked. Maxine thought about it for a moment. She trusted Patrick quite a bit, but Emily was also included in this spiritual sense conversation. However she seemed to be occupied. She was conversing with Maxwell almost exclusively using spiritual sense.

"In the world that connects to my shadow," Maxine answered. 

"Any chance for getting more of those?" Patrick asked.

"Not for the moment," Maxine answered. There was a way to get more, but that would require her to find someone that could make them. Or find more bandits. However both methods would require her to disappear for at least a few days to locate them and she couldn't do that without drawing attention to herself.

"It's fine. Just having just one of them is enough for our group," Patrick said, "Although it could never hurt to have more." Maxine let out a sigh as she fished out her spare dimensional pouch.

"Here," Maxine told him as she handed him the dimensional pouch, "I have another one on me. I know you guys need this more than I do anyways."

"Thanks a bunch," Patrick said, "Anyone else have any questions for Maxine or Emily before we head out and have some fun?" 

"I do," Jack sent to Maxine using his spiritual sense, "Any chance we can meet Silky?" Maxine was startled by that question. However she found it amusing an instant later. He was obviously a fan.

"Maybe another day. I left her with my mom at the hospital," Maxine answered, "Anyone else have a questoin for me?" She waited for some time before Patrick announced they would go. Meagan insisted on going to a clothing store first. She was clearly intent on getting a new outfit today. 

While they walked around from store to store, Meagan had made a show of hanging on Patrick's arm. It was as if she was announcing that Patrick belonged to her. Maxine didn't need such a reminder and Emily didn't seem to be interested in him. She appeared to be more interested in Maxwell. 

However while they were in the clothing stores, Maxine wasn't idle. She was looking for new bras. The one she was wearing were rather tight. She looked for Emily to help her, but she was still talking with Maxwell. Maxine started to feel jealous. She thought she had been okay with this, but apparently she wasn't. Fortunately Emily noticed Maxine staring at her and came over to help her. Maxine looked at Emily out of the corner of her eye. She looked like she wanted to say something, but was thinking it over first. When Emily looked like she had made up her mind, she looked at Maxine.

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"I realized something while talking with Maxwell ealier," Emily said with her spiritual sense, "It made me think about when I first met you. You spoke very little and you were very cold to everyone. But I could tell you were just hiding how scared you were of everyone. Then you changed. I guess that was the day that you started getting those visions. You became confident and more outgoing. It was like you became a completely different person. I just have one question before I continue. Is Maxwell the one you saw the future through?" Maxine felt sweat instantly appear on her forehead as she nodded her head up and down slightly. Maxine was nervous because she was afraid Emily knew more than she was letting on. Emily continued, "I thought so. I think during your visions, you must have absorbed his personality. That's why you two almost talk the same way and it is also why you have no problems with Patrick, Maxwell and Jack even though you are afraid of men. It's because you already know them enough to know that they wouldn't ever hurt you." She isn't completely correct, but it's close enough that it doesn't matter. Wait a second. My mother is around me alot more than Emily and she isn't an idiot either. How has she not noticed my personality change? No time to think about it now. If mom says something, I will deal with it then.

"You're absolutely right, but why tell me this now? It doesn't change anything," Maxine said.

"I know it doesn't change anything, but you seemed like you were unaware of the changes to your own personality. I was worried that you had a serious problem," Emily answered with her spiritual sense. Maxine knew that Emily had every right to be worried since there were alot of diseases that were related to sudden personality change, but Emily clearly wasn't aware that essence cultivators don't suffer from the same diseases that effected normal people. 

"Fair enough," Maxine replied, "Now help me find a bra that fits." After a few minutes, Maxine finally found a bra that looked like it would fit and went to try it on in the changing room. Although she had to adjust it a few times, it still fit. She looked at the size and it was a size 34b bra. She had wanted her breasts to stay small as possible, but unfortunately that is not meant to be as she still had more growing to do. She just hopes that they don't get any bigger than C cup. Otherwise her breasts will start getting in the way of her swordsmanship.

After buying a couple bras of that size, Maxine left with everyone else to go watch a movie. However when they sat down, somehow she ended up sitting next to Patrick and Emily was sitting on the other side of Meagan with Maxwell beside her. Meagan started leaning against Patrick's shoulder at the start of the movie. Maxine wanted to lean against Patrick as well, but resisted that urge. 

The movie wasn't as good as she thought it would be. After it was over, Maxine noticed that it was almost time for dinner. She said goodbye to everyone and left with Emily. Maxine walked Emily to her house before she headed back to the hospital where Silky and her mother were at. Silky was undoubtedly hungry by now and would be wondering where Maxine was. When she got there, her mother wanted her to tell her how the outting with her friends went. Maxine told her everything that happened and showed her the new bras that she had gotten. Silky asked what they were for. Fortunately her mother explained the purpose of a bra to Silky.

After talking with her mother for awhile longer, Maxine went home with Silky. She made and ate dinner before going into the Shadow World with Silky in tow. Maxine wanted to hunt some essence beasts there. She reminded Silky to stay in the cave and ordered all of her bronze stage Shadow Wolves to follow her. She started hunting for essence beasts.

For the next hour, she killed bronze stage essence beasts and avoided the iron stage ones. She knew that she could kill one, but it would be too inefficient to kill them as it would take her over ten times longer to kill one iron stage essence beasts than ten bronze stage essence beasts.  She had collected fifteen essence cores before she went back to the cave. She checked the village on her way back and found that they were doing quite well. When she got to the cave, Silky told her about something shiny on the ground and pointed at it. It was mostly buried in the dirt, but it definitely had color to it. Maxine gently brushed the dirt off of it to get a better look at it and discovered a golden bracelet engraved with an intricate vine pattern. It was beautiful. However it wasn't really gold. It was a much more durable material. Maxine wondered where it came from.

Maxine started to dig the bracelet out of the ground. She scanned the dirt with her spiritual sense and found that the bracelet was being worn by a skeleton with a small headstone buried under a thin layer of dirt. Whoever it was a woman based on the skeletal structure. However she had an essence core and the core it had was golden with several spots eminating prismatic light. She had never seen a core with that color combination before, but she knew whoever this was must have been far more powerful than herself. However as soon as she noticed that her portal leading back home was centered over that core, she became nervous. She could only think of one way that it would act as a beacon to her portal. That was only if both of their attributes were the same and had a similar essence wavelength. It just wouldn't work otherwise, but the part that confused her was the fact that people with similar essence wavelengths tended to be related by blood. However that was impossible. She knew that she wasn't adopted ever since she found a labeled picture of her mother holding a newborn Maxine. She didn't recall ever having a missing aunt either. Even if Maxine did, there was no way that anyone from earth could attain the same level of power as this person had. 

Maxine shoved those thoughts out of her head as looked at the golden bracelet with greed in her eyes. The chances that the bracelet was an artifact rose sharply due to the fact that this person was an essence cultivator. There were very few essence cultivators in the previous timeline that simply wore something because it looked pretty. Not even the female essence cultivators would wear something like that if it didn't have some sort of use. The only exceptions were for wedding rings. However there was no knowing what that use was until she tested it out.  

Maxine hastened her speed at digging up the bracelet, but she was careful not to disturb the remains as she worked. It would be too disrespectful to the dead. It didn't matter that she was graverobbing, but the dead have no use for anything like this bracelet. She removed the bracelet from the skeleton without causing it any damage. Maxine covered the skeleton back up and thanked whoever this used to be for the bracelet. Maxine put the bracelet into her dimensional pouch so that she could figure out what it does later. There was a gem-studded ring as well on the skeleton, but since it looked like a wedding band, she left it alone. Graverobbing might not bother her too much, but she refused to take the representation of someone's love. It just felt wrong to her. Before Maxine sat down to cultivate, she walked away from her portal, so that she wouldn't be sitting down on a gravesite.