Maxine had been so worried that she stared at the ceiling the entire night and had completely forgotten to make any more Shadow Wolves the night before. It wasn't helping that Hellen had asked her several times what was wrong. Maxine would have actually welcomed the distraction of Silky sneaking into her room, but Silky hadn't done that.
She couldn't get Hellen's description of Poison Emperor Guan's eyes out of her head. It had just been too similar to how she would describe the eyes of the Shadow Cat and if the Shadow Cat is Poison Emperor Guan or at the very least something similar to what Maxine's Shadow Wolves are to her, it's presence represented the fact that Hellen's daughter was most definitely on Earth and in the area. She couldn't go out to Silky's nest because she couldn't risk being seen by it due to the golden bracelet that she is wearing and she can't just take it off since Hellen had yet to build up any reserves of essence to be away from Maxine for more than a few minutes.
Maxine turned her head to look at the clock on her nightstand. It was 7 AM. Might as well get up. Maxine quickly bathed and got ready for the day. Because her mother had been in the hospital for so long, they were running low on several things and it forced Maxine to cook essence beast meat that she had harvasted during her previous hunting trips in the forest. However while she ate, she was trying to force herself to think about something other than the danger that Poison Emperor Guan represented. She needed to find Hellen's child and make sure the kid gets the bracelet that contains the soul of their mother. It was quite possible that the government already knew about her, but due to the bad relationship she had with General Jones, she doubted that he would help her find Hellen's child. That meant that Maxine could only rely on Amanda to help her do, but she was busy negotiating with some senators to get her petition put through. Once that was out of the way, it shouldn't be that hard to narrow down who could possibly be Hellen's kid with the location and age range that Maxine knew.
A thought formed in Maxine's head. Maxine could post a video on YouTube to promote Amanda's petition for essence cultivators to police their own. That would help Amanda greatly due to Maxine's popularity. All she would have to do is greet her fans in that video and show off her abilities to give her fans an idea of why having a police force made up of essence cultivators was a good idea. If she remembered correctly, there was a camcorder in the closet along with a tripod mount for it.
Before Maxine went to the trouble of doing all of that work, she called Amanda. She didn't want to do something without first telling the person she was trying to help.
"Hello?" Amanda said.
"Hey, Amanda," Maxine said over the phone, "This is Maxine."
"Hey, Maxine. Sorry, I havn't been able to hang out lately. Those senators that I told you about last time are being idiotic and listening to General Jones rather than me," Amanda said.
"That's kind of the reason I called," Maxine said, "I have an idea that might help."
"I don't know, if anything would help. Those old codgers are very stubborn," Amanda said and let out a sigh before she continued, "It's like they think the military can handle us quite easily."
"They arn't wrong. The military can handle essence cultivators below bronze rank quite easily, but it's the stronger ones they need to worry about," Maxine said, "I think they just don't understand how powerful an essence cultivator can be and the only way to do that is to show them."
"You're probably right," Amanda said, "Was that your idea?"
"Not entirely," Maxine said, "Even if they see what an essence cultivator can do, they still might not agree with you to form a police force out of them so I was wanted to post a video online. It would either have me or Silky demonstrating just how powerful an essence cultivator can be. That way, even if the senators say no, their constituents will make those senators agree to your proposal."
"That might just work," Amanda said, "Go for it."
"Will do," Maxine said, "I will send you a video to look at before I post it. Talk to you later. Bye.
"Bye," Amanda said and Maxine ended the call.
Now that she had Amanda's go ahead, Maxine quickly went to the hallway closet and rummaged through it to look for the camcorder. She quickly found it and it's tripod mount. It needed some new batteries, but that was easily remedied. Fortunately the manual for the camcorder was with it in it's carrying case.
After putting some new batteries in it, Maxine turned it on to make sure that it still worked and noticed a few old videoes was still on it. She opened up the small panel on the side to view a small three inch screen and played the one of the more recent videos. It showed her seventh birthday. Both of her parents were smiling and happy as Maxine recieved her gifts from them and their neighbors. It had been a happy time before her father started drinking. It is a cherished memory. Maxine found herself stroking the small screen with her thumb as it played as tears started to form in her eyes.
Once the video was finished, Maxine checked to see how much recording time was left on the data card. It had roughly thirty minutes left of recording time. It was just barely enough time as long as she did it correctly the first time around. However Maxine would have some trouble finding safe place to demonstrate the physical abilities of essence cultivators. It was neccesary to make them understand the need for a police force comprised of essence cultivators. The only place she could think of was the forest that had the Shadow Cat, but she wanted to avoid that creature. She tried to think of alternate places to show off her abilities.
While coming up with places to display her abilities, Maxine realized that she would have to have Silky display most of those feats since Maxine's raw physical abilities were far greater and would give the public a false perspective. Afterall If Maxine wasn't the strongest human on Earth, she was definitely in the top ten. She started by speaking infront of the recording camera that Silky would be considered quite powerful for an essence cultivator and went onto explain the need for a police force to manage other essence cultivators while mentioning Amanda's petition a couple times.
After that was done, Maxine went out and discovered the only place that was long enough to demonstrate Silky's speed was the highway. She used the mile markers as a way to give them an idea of Silky's speed and set up the camera to show the time down to the milisecond. Maxine made Silky carry it the whole time while she ran. After Silky did the speed test, Maxine did the math and found out that Silky's top speed was roughly three hundred miles per hour. Damn she's faster than I thought. Next, she went back to her home and asked a few of her neighbors to see if Silky could lift up their car for a video. Fortunately, one of them agreed to it as long as they didn't damage his vehicle. It wasn't a problem in Maxine's opinion. It's not like they were going to play catch with the car. Maxine instructed Silky to only lift the front end of the car a couple feet off the ground. Maxine walked around the car while recording the whole thing and aimed the camcorder under the car to show that Silky was doing this all on her own. After Silky put the car back down, Maxine aimed the camera at her face. She said a reminder that Silky was stronger than the average essence cultivator. She tried to make the point that most essence cultivators were peaceful and the violent ones were in the minority.
After she finished, Maxine felt that she had failed somehow. Going by the video footage she took, most people would think that most essence cultivators were in the bronze stage when the bulk of them were actually in the copper stage. Nonetheless it would definitely reveal the need for a specialized police force, so Maxine headed home to edit the footage.
While walking down the street back to her house with Silky, Maxine saw a glimpse of the Shadow Cat out of the corner of her eye. However when she turned her head, it wasn't there anymore. She extended out her spiritual sense just in case she wasn't just seeing things. I hope that I am just being paraniod. She still didn't find anything, but stayed vigilant. After she got inside her house, Maxine quickly got the video files off of the camcorder and edited them on the computer as best she could with what she had available. She e-mailed Amanda what she had slapped together and checked the time. It was lunch time. She made lunch and headed towards the hospital where her mother was at with Silky.
When Maxine arrived there, her mother was on the phone. She was overjoyed that her mother could use her hands enough to hold a phone. That meant her mother would be getting out of the hospital in the next day or so. However it didn't appear that her mother got a good phone call. Her mother looked like she was worried. As soon as the call ended, her mother told Maxine what that call was about. Her father had gotten alot worse since yesterday and had been rushed to this hospital. Dad is that sick? Although she hated her father for abusing her, Maxine was genuinely concerned about him and asked her mother about which room he was in. Maxine spoke a few more words with her mother before leaving Silky with her and went to her father's hospital room.
She saw two guards posted outside of his room and told them who she was. Both of them looked at her in disbelief when she told them who she was. Yeah, I know what you two are thinking. How can this valiant celebrity be the abused daughter of that asshole? Unfortunately they wouldn't let her into the room. There was a chance that he was infectious, but would still let her see her father through the doorway as long as she wore a face mask. Her father was covered in vomit, his skin pale and his eyes were bloodshot. He groaning in pain even though he had a morphine drip and didn't even seem to be aware that she was there. She was horrified by how bad his condition was. This didn't look like any illness she had ever seen.
"That man has been poisoned," Hellen declared suddenly through her spiritual sense. Maxine had been wondering when Hellen would wake up. She had said the night before that she had to go into a rest state for awhile. Maxine hadn't anticipated that it would have lasted twelve hours.
"What do you mean poisoned? The doctors said he is sick," Maxine replied through her own spiritual sense.
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"Those 'doctors' are wrong. I know one of my husband's poisons at work when I see them," Hellen answered.
"How do you know it's one of his poisons?" Maxine asked.
"Look at your his hands," Hellen said, "There is a greenish hue to his fingernails. That is the most noteable side-effect of the Soul Breaker poison that my husband created." Maxine audibly gulped. That has to be a nasty poison to be called that. Hellen continued, "His current pain is mild in comparison to what is coming. It will only get worse as time progresses and if he survives for five days, the effects of the poison should disappear. He may even benefit from it with a stronger will. However that is only IF your father's soul can endure that kind of pain." Why?! Why would Poison Emperor Guan do this to my dad? Could he just really hate child abusers? No, that's not right. If he did, there would be alot more people like this in the country.
"Is there an antidote?" Maxine asked desperately.
"I am sorry. I do not know of one," Hellen responded, "You can only wait it out."
"But why did he have to poison my dad?" Maxine asked while trying to keep herself from crying.
"I'm not sure," Hellen answered, "May I ask why he was went to prison?" How did she know Dad went to prison? I never told her that. Maxine's question was answered when she noticed that her father was handcuffed to the hosptial bed. She couldn't bear to look at her father suffer any longer and started walking back towards her mother's hospital room. Her mother needed to be told how bad off he was. Although she wouldn't mention that her father had been poisoned. The less her mother knew the better.
"Since I was eight, every time he got drunk he would beat me. The police found out about it and they put him in prison," Maxine replied and immediately felt intense killing intent coming from Hellen. It had been so intense that the two guards had felt it and they reached for their guns while nervously looking around.
"THAT BASTARD!" Hellen roared, "That poison is too good for him!" Maxine was suprised by the intensity of Hellen's rage. She had a feeling that Hellen would have torn her father limb from limb if she still had a body.
"Why are you so angry?" Maxine asked curiously.
"Because I am your...," Hellen said angrily with her spiritual sense before she calmed down, "Wait, you havn't figured it out yet? That's quite surprising considering all the clues that you have." What? Does she think I'm her daughter? I know for a fact that she said that she had a baby. Wait a second. FUCK! I can't believe I forgot that she had said that she had hoped that her husband had found a suitable surrogate mother during our conversation yesterday. Those are only used when the mother either doesn't want to or can't carry their own child through a pregnancy. Maxine continued with that line of thinking and recalled her birthday was February 3rd, 2005. If Hellen was in the early stages of her pregnancy at the time of her death and was put in her mother's womb around fourteen years ago, Maxine could very well be Hellen's daughter. She hadn't considered that before because she didn't want to face the possibility that her existence was the driving force behind Poison Emperor Guan coming to Earth in the first place. However first she needed Hellen to answer just one question to be certain.
"How old was your baby when you died?" Maxine asked almost mechanically through her spiritual sense while dreading Hellen's answer.
"I was alittle more than a month into my pregnancy at the time of my death, my precious daughter," Hellen answered.
"How can you be certain that I am your daughter?" Maxine asked.
"I checked your DNA against mine and you are without a doubt my daughter," Hellen said, "Also, you look almost exactly like I did when I was your age. Although it surprised me that your hair is silver like mine was. I thought you would have had brown hair like your father's." What? When did she check my DNA? Forget that. HOW DID SHE DO IT?!
"How and when were you able to do that?" Maxine asked through her spiritual sense.
"I checked it while you were cultivating last night using my spiritual sense," Hellen replied. Maxine was dumbfounded. In her past life, the most she had been able to do was scan down the single cells using her spiritual sense. Although the details of that single cell improved as her strength did, she could never look at the genetic code directly using it. However she knew why Hellen did it. It was because Maxine's portal to the Shadow World had appeared over Hellen's essence core.
"That's impossible," Maxine said.
"It is quite possible, albeit with difficulty, once you reach silver stage," Hellen said.
"Silver stage? Is that after iron stage?" Maxine asked curiously.
"Yes, it is, but you don't have to worry about that for now," Hellen answered, "Is there anything else you would like to know?"
"Not for now," Maxine said, "Now I need to tell my mom what is wrong with dad." Maxine was just a short distance from her mother's room.
"I don't know why you still call that vile man your father," Hellen said.
"He may be an asshole, but he was still there to raise me unlike Guan, whom essentially abandoned me," Maxine said angrily through her spiritual sense and blocked off her mind to end that conversation. It was only making her angry. She needed to be at least somewhat calm when she told her mother about her father's condition. Unfortunately after Maxine described her father's condition to her mother, she clearly didn't understand how bad off her father was and was forced to recreate his exact condition using her essence. Her mother looked at it for only a couple moments and started crying. Seeing her mother cry, Maxine couldn't supress her tears either and hugged her mother as she cried with her. Silky had never met Maxine's father so she didn't cry with them. However she still tried to comfort the both of them by hugging them. After Maxine and her mother stopped crying, they simply sat in silence while trying to watch TV until Maxine had to take Silky home for dinner.
After making dinner and eating it, Maxine wanted to do something to get her mind off her father's condition and entered the Shadow World with Silky. As soon as she walked outside of the cave, Maxine knew that Hellen wanted to talk, but firmly kept her mind baracaded off to any spiritual sense. She wanted to try something new with her Shadow Wolves and summoned them from the surrounding woods. She had sent them there when she had discovered that the cave was Hellen's burial site.
When all of them arrived, Maxine formed her essence armor and ordered one of her Shadow Wolves to merge with her essence armor. She assumed that this might strengthen her defenses. The Shadow Wolf dissolved into a greyish mass as it came at her. She stood still as this greyish mass flowed all over her body and noticed that her essence armor was changing. A wolf-like tail sprouted out of her lower back, the claws on her hands became larger and greyish fur appeared on her forearms and calves. The essence core that the Shadow Wolf had was nestled between her breasts. Fortunately the tail that had formed hadn't damaged her clothes when it formed. Now this is an interesting transformation of my essence armor. She also noticed that her power had increased by a small margin and tested her speed. She had gotten thirty percent faster and could hear Silky exclaim at Maxine's current appearance. Maxine smiled to herself and wondered what would happen when she had one of her ravens merge with her essence armor. Would I get black angel wings? It was a juvenile thought, but it was appealing in it's own way. It would give her the ability of flight. Although she knew that it would require alot of practice to fly with those wings.
Maxine recalled her ravens that were still in the process of expanding her knowledge of the surrounding area. The closest one would require a few hours to return. She dissolved her essence armor and had the Shadow Wolf that had merged with her go on standby. Maxine decided to make some more Shadow Wolves and cultivate in the mean time inside of the cave. After she was finished with making the Shadow Wolves and cultivating, Maxine could feel Hellen's spiritual sense nudging her incessantly. She let out a sigh and finally lowered the spiritual sense blockade that she had erected earlier.
"What is it?" Maxine asked using her spiritual sense.
"You used three techniques that I have never seen before," Hellen responded, "I wanted to know their names." I guess she figured out how to use the techniques from watching me and I can sort of understand that she has never seen someone make a creature using a combination of an essence core and shadow essence. But how could she have never seen essence armor before?
"Essence Armor is the name of the defensive technique you saw me use earlier," Maxine answered honestly, "As for the other two techniques, I haven't come up with a name for them yet." Although when I think about it, it would make sense to name how I create the Shadow Wolves with something simplistic like Conjure Shadow Wolf. As for when I make a Shadow Wolf merge with my essence armor, I should call that Essence Armor of the Wolf.
"Incredible. I can't believe you created two techniques on your own," Hellen said, "I am I right to assume that this Essence Armor is a technique you learned from someone else?"
"Yeah, I learned it from a friend," Maxine said.
"Is this friend a boy?" Hellen asked.
"Yes," Maxine answered while knowing full well that Hellen wanted to know if Maxine had any romantic persuits and decided to make it something clear, "But before you get excited, you need to know that he already has a girlfriend and has no interest in me."
"But that doesn't mean that you are not interested in him," Hellen teased. Maxine felt heartache at that because Hellen was right. However Maxine knew that he would never be interested in her and had given up deluding herself otherwise. That had left her alot more energy to devote herself in her relationship with Emily.
"That's true enough," Maxine told her and noticed that her ravens had arrived, "Now I am going to experiment with my abilities some more and I don't want to be distracted. Alright?"
"As you wish, my daughter," Hellen said as she retracted her spiritual sense from Maxine's mind and Maxine let out a sigh. She didn't think she would ever get used to Hellen being her biological mother.
Maxine immediately formed her essence armor and took off her shirt and bra in anticipation that they would both be destroyed once the raven merged with her essence armor. Afterwards she ordered a raven to merge with her essence armor. Unfortunately the result is not what she expected. Feathers started sprouting out of her arms and hands. Her essence armor on her fingers had elongated and created webbing between them as the feathers formed on it. Her thumb was the only finger that wasn't affected. Her shoes and socks had come off her feet as her feet turned into talons. After the transformation finished, Maxine looked at herself and was disappointed. She looked like a harpy. Damn it. I was hoping that I would look like an angel. Oh, well. Although she was disappointed in how it looked, Maxine still had the capacity for flight and decided to try to take off. She flapped her arms like she had seen birds do while going at a slow run. Unfortunately, she crashed several time before she could even glide. Damn! This is hard. Rather than make a fool of herself she separated herself from the Shadow Raven and got back dressed.
Maxine had one last thing she wanted to try before she went back home and went to bed. She ordered one of the Shadow Ravens to merge with a Shadow Wolf just to see what happened. When the two merged, a pair of large wings sprouted from the back of the Shadow Wolf and it's front paws turned into talons. Maxine tilted her head in curiosity and named this new creation the Winged-Shadow Wolf. She ordered them to separate and ordered all of her creations to go back and hide in the forest. Maxine went to get Silky before she headed back home to go to bed.
After Maxine had put Silky to bed, she laid down in her own bed and remembered her father's condition. She felt her eyes start to tear up again. Part of her wanted to seek out Emily to comfort Maxine. Unfortunately, it was far too late at night for Maxine to go to Emily's house, so she tried to think about something positive to cheer herself up. At least, I don't have to worry about Poison Emperor Guan getting angry and killing me since I am his daughter. Maxine wondered briefly how Guan would have reacted to the future Maxine that Patrick had described. He would probably have dispaired and tried to fix her. Maxine heart skipped a beat at a sudden realization. Her soul may not have entered this body and fused with the original Maxine by chance.