Maxine was meditating in her room to recover her essence and mana while waiting for grandma Victoria to arrive and shehad insisted that they talk about what Orianna went through in private. It made Maxine very concerned for Orianna''s mental state. If it was too bad, Madam Neshan might not be able to rehabilitate Orianna.
When Maxine was nearly back to full strength, grandma Victoria came into her room. She looked like she was extremely stressed. "Maxine, I''m sorry for taking so long. The preparations for Orianna''s revival took me longer than I anticipated," grandma Victoria apologized, "I just want to knowsomething before Itell you anything. How much do you know about what happened to Orianna? I know Guan wouldn''t have left you entirely in the dark."
"I know she suffered similarly to me during her childhood and I know that she turned into a monster that murdered and tortured people for fun," Maxine admitted, "What I don''t know is what caused her to become like that, but I know it had to be something bad for Guan not to tell mom what it was."I really wish I hadn''t read Guan''s notes on that. Those that have damaged or broken souls go insane, but very few of them became violent. Those few suffered an extreme psychological trauma.
"You are not wrong," grandma Victoria said as she took a seat on Maxine''s bed.
"What happened to her?" Maxine asked.
"Madam Neshan wasn''t able to give me any specifics on the events in her life. She couldn''t even tell me how old she was when these events happened or in what order. But what she managed to glean from Orianna''s aura is very upsetting," grandma Victoria said and her voice started to tremble as she continued, "Orianna saw both of her parents being murdered. She was starved, beaten and raped frequently for a portion of her life. But the event that hurt her the most was... was when her baby was murdered."WHAT?! She had a baby?!How the hell did Guan allow that shit to happen?! No, he wouldn''t allowed anything like that to happen to Orianna or her baby if he could help it. He must have brokenthrough to the next stageand ascended to another plane in that timeline. Or he died. I really don''t want to think about that line of thought. I can''t imagine who or what would be able to kill him. Not unless a god descended and decided that Guan needed to die for some reason. I wonder why something like that hasn''t happened in this timeline.
As grandma Victoria broke out into tears, Maxine hugged grandma Victoria comfortingly and felta memory deep within her mind kindle to life. It was when she was still Maxwell Adams and it had beenmore than five years after the essence beasts hordes started appearing. Their group had captured a band of ruthless raiders for their bounty and there had been an insane girl clutching the mangled corpse of an infant in the bandit''s den. She had been too filthy for Maxine to remember her face clearly. But she had remembered that it had been Patrick who found her and carried her out of that place.I still feel no regret for decapitating each one of those bastards, even though it lowered the bounty we could collect. I just couldn''t stand the thought of those twisted, baby killingbastards living for another second. It''s too bad Patrick''s kind intentions got him marked by Orianna.
"And what else?" Maxine asked even though she knew what grandma Victoria hadn''t said.
"She became obsessed with someone. Her rescuer, I''m guessing.I don''t know why, butshe murdered and tortured many people. Someone must have sought vengeance against her her actions and she died by being burned to death," grandma Victoria said. Huh? That''s surprising. I know Chris fought her, but he never directly said that he beat her.
"Is she still crazy?" Maxine asked cautiously after afew minutesof silence.
"Yes, but according to Madam Neshan, she is not as bad as she was beforeher original body died," grandma Victoria said quietly, "The time she has been within Maxwell has been good for her."
"Good, that means she can be helped," Maxine said and wanted to change the subject, "Is everything ready?"
"It will be after lunch. Have you recovered your strength?" grandma Victoria asked with a depressed tone.
"Enough to make a body for Orianna," Maxine said confidently.
"Good," grandma Victoria said and wiped the tears from her eyes as she got to her feet, "I will entertain ambassador Sutton until lunch."
Grandma Victoria left her room and Maxine went to look for Emily. While she looked around, she thought about what to do with Orianna and Maxwell.I better make sure those two keep their pants on after Orianna''s revival. Orianna is clearly still too unstable for anything like that and I doubt she would even be willing to do anything of that nature considering what grandma told me.
Her train of thought was disrupted when saw Emily. Unfortunately she was with Meagan and as soon as Meagan saw Maxine, she gave Maxine an angry glare.Uh, what did I do? I thought we were on good terms the last time we spoke, but that was before I left Earth. I wonder what changed.
"I see that Maxine is here," Meagan said coldly, "I will leave you two alone to talk."
"May I ask what I have done to make you so angry, Meagan?" Maxine asked before Meagan could walk away.
"You are the daughter of that bastard who caused all of this shit to happen to Earth. Do I need any other reason?" Meagan growled.I washoping that Meagan wouldn''t bethat kind of person.
"You and I both know I had no choice on who my parents are," Maxine said sadly, "It''s not like I asked to be his daughter and don''t my actions to help Earth count for anything?"
"Bullshit, you weren''t helping Earth," Meagan snapped, "You were helping yourself and you ran like a coward when you found out that the truth of your origins would be revealed."She isn''t wrong. Most of my motivations are selfish. I just didn''t want to see my current or previous familyor friends die just because some assholes wanted to capture me. By helping Earth, I was indirectly helping everyone that I cared about. But she is wrong about one point.
"You''re right. I ran, but you are also wrong. I didn''t run just to save myself. I did it to save everyone," Maxine answered and when Meagan looked confused, she added, "Guan has a lot of enemies that just want to see him hurt and even more people that want to control him through me.Do you think any of them would even hesitate for a second to turn Earth into agraveyardjust to get their hands on me? I doubt that anything bigger thansingle celled organismwould survive and that''s assuming Earth is in any condition to sustain life at all."
"What?" Meagan said surprise and seemed to regain her senses a moment later, "You''re lying."
"What reason do I have to lie? Or do you seriously think that I am afraid of ordinary human soldiers? I''m practically bullet proof at this point and anything short of a railgun or nuke won''t do any real damage. Although it would still sting if I were to get shot," Maxine explained and continued with a series of questions, "And did it ever strike you as oddhow the Shadow Lords notified the nations of Earth about how essence was introduced toit and my heritage in the same statement without it benefiting them in some way?"
"I''ve always wondered why they did that," Emily asked, "It didn''t make any sense to me. That announcement would onlyantagonize Guan and nothing else."
"It made sense to them. They wanted my bloodline to evolve and theybelieved that a great need such as survival would have been a great trigger for such an evolution," Maxine explained.
"That''s ridiculous, but how do you explain your recent transformation," Emily asked.
"That transformation is the result of my bloodlines fusing together and had nothing to do with the interference of the Shadow Lords," Maxine said and she remembered how it made her look, "But I have to admit, I''m not a big fan of how it makes me look."
"No kidding. I can''t imagine how unsettling it is to watch your fingers change into claws," Meagan commented, "Or having a tailgrow out of your back."
"I agree with you Meagan. No matter how useful that tail of hers is, it''s unsettling just to imagine having one," Emily agreed.
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Maxine was confused for a moment.What? No mention of the scales or my skin color change? Although in Emily''s case, she wouldn''t mention the skin color change since she has seenmy Shadow Lord formbefore.She suddenly remembered that she had been wearing essence armor the whole time while transformed and it had prevented everyone from seeing her skin.
"That isn''t theworst of it. I also get these snake-like scales covering almost every inch of my bodye once I transform," Maxine admitted, "You two just didn''t see it while I had my essence armor on."
"Oh, damn," Meagan commented while Emily asked, "Could you show us?"
Maxine looked at Emily with surprise for a momentbefore she shrugged her shoulders, "Sure, why not?" Since she still hadn''t changed out of the clothes that she used for the sparring matches, she didn''t see a problem and she transformed.
AsEmily''s eyes widened with wonder, she reached out and touched Maxine''s now scale covered hand. However Meagan had retreated a few steps nervously. "Your scales areso smooth that I can''t feel the gap between your scales," Emily commented, "It''s almost like running my fingers across silk."
"Really?" Maxine asked.
"Yeah," Emily said softly as she started rubbing the back of Maxine''s left hand in earnest and Maxien noticed that Emily''s hands were drifting dangerously close to her claws.
"Be careful of my claws," Maxine warned Emily, "I think they may be envenomned. I haven''t had a chance to confirm that yet and I rather not find outby accidently scratching you." Shechecked her claws with her spiritual sense to see if there was actually venom on themjust in case. Unfortunately, there was venom along the edges of her claws, but she had no idea how lethal it was. I better be careful of these things in the future.
"Oh, then I better stop then before that happens," Emily said.
Meagan''s stomach growled without warning making the both of them to turn to face her. "I guess it is time for lunch," Maxine announced and reverted back to normal, "Let''s go get something to eat."
The three of them went to the Dining Hall and were served a pasta. While they ate, grandma Victoria and ambassador Sutton arrived with everyone else. There wasn''t much of a conversation while they ate lunch, but as Maxine finished her lunch, grandma Victoria gave her a look.
"Everything is prepared. Madam Neshan is waiting for us in the shielded guest room. Maxwell will meet us there," grandma Victoria said via spiritual sense and Maxine nodded her head in acknowledgement.
She knew where that room was. She had been to it once before. It was one of the innermost rooms meant for special guests such as visiting elders from other clans or sects and that room was shielded against spiritual sense.It seems grandma wants to make this as quiet as possible if things go badly.
"I have to go, Emily," Maxine said, "I have something that I need to take care of."
"Alright, take care," Emily said and Maxine left the Dining Hall.
She quickly made her way to the shielded guest room. She could have sworn that she saw Boreas while she was on her way there out of the corner of her eye, but when she looked, he wasn''t there. Inside of the room, she found a waiting Madam Neshan within it and saw that a strange arraywas drawn on the floor. It spaned almost the entire room. Maxine looked at Madam Neshan with a raised eyebrow.
"It''s to restrain Orianna from hurting herself or anyone else in the event that she is worse off than I thought," Madam Neshan explained.So, she is just as cautious as I am.
"I understand," Maxine saidas she took a seat in chair and took note of a set of clothes laid out on the bed.
A short while later, grandma Victoria walked into the room with Maxwell following directly behind her. "So, what dowe need to do?" Maxwell asked.
"You need to put this on andnot use your spiritual sense while in this room," Madam Neshan said as she tossed him a blindfold and Maxwell looked confused, "The blindfold is to keep you from ogling Orianna."
"Oh, right," Maxwell said as he quickly put on the blindfold, "Now what?"
"Just stand right here," Madam Neshan said as she had him stand in a corner on the outside edge of the array, "Maxine and myself will handle the rest. Just a reminder: When I remove her soul from your body, both of you will feel like you have just lost a limb since the both of you have shared a body for so long and you will probably experience at least some pain. To minimize this, the two of you must remain calm and allow me to retrieve Orianna. If you don''t, the pain that you experience will only be more intense." Maxwell nodded his head in understanding.
Maxine took it as her cue to summon her main body to the room. She couldn''t make a body for Orianna with a clone. She needed blood from her main body to use as a base. It worked under the same concept as making copies. Making a copy of a copy resulted in certain details being lost or corrupted.
She switched her focus to her main body and slashed open her hand using a knife made of essence. She used her essence to telekenetically catch her blood and create a ball of it. Next, she drew out as much essence as she could from her constructs as she began building a body for Orianna.Since she wasn''t using an essence core as it''s center, it would required much more concentration and essence to create a body for Orianna than it did to make a clone using an essence core.
Maxine felt her essence and a large portion of her blood being drained rapidly out of her body as Orianna''s body was beginning to form. First askeleton began to form followed by the internal organs and muscles. Finally skin started to coatOrianna''snewly formed body.
At that moment, the array came to life as Madam Neshan pulled Orianna out of Maxwell and placed her into her new body.Maxwell acted as if someone gut punched him and he fell to his knees while hugging his gut. However Maxine wasn''t paying much attention to him since she was almost completely focused on applying the finishing touches to Orianna''s body. She had just enough essence remaining to grow out a full head of hair for Orianna. However the hair that grew out of Orianna''s head was black instead of Maxine''s silver grey hair or her original brown hair.That''s odd. Did I mess up somewhere? No matter. A difference of hair color is a minor thing. The rest of her appears to be identical to myself.
A second later, Orianna''s eyes started to flutter open. She sat up and nervously reached up to touch her face.Her fingers explored the surface of her face and started to shed tears. "I finally have a body again!" Orianna shouted joyfully.
Maxine smiled happily even though she was about to collapse from blood loss and exhaustion. She was happy to see that Orianna''s reaction was what she had expected.
Grandma Victoria rushed over to pickOrianna up and hugged her gently with tears in her eyes.Maxine walked weaklyto them and joined in the hug to make Orianna feel more loved.
After an unknown amount of time, Maxwell broke the atmosphere by asking, "Can anyone tell me what''s going on? Kind of in the dark here."
"They are enjoying a familial embrace, young man," Madam Neshan said and when Maxwell started to reach for his blindfold, Madam Neshan grabbed his wrist, "Don''t even think about taking that off. Orianna is not decent yet."Grandma Victoria and Maxine finally released Orianna so that she could helpher to get dressed.
However as soon as they released Orianna from their embrace, Maxine felt an overwhelming fear and her heart beat accelerate rapidly as Orianna''s gaze landed on Maxwell. She only blinked and in that time, Orianna''s face had twisted intoa terrifying smile full of obsession and madness.
Maxine''s entire body started to tremble on an instinctive level as she momentarily hallucinated that Orianna was covered in blood. What is wrong with me?! Orianna has the body of an ordinary sixteen year old girl. I can literately rip her apart with my bare hands.So, why?! Why am I so terrified even though she isn''t even looking at me?!She glanced at grandma Victoria while trying to keep Orianna within her sight and she saw alesser form of her ownfear in her grand mother''s eyes.
Neesa and her sisters appeared out of thin air with weapons drawn, but Maxine could see their weapons trembling ever so slightly. Orianna ignored them as she continued to look at Maxwell with that terrifying smile.
Madam Neshan placed herself between Orianna and Maxwell, but Maxwell whispered something to Madam Neshan that caused her to move aside. He got up off the ground and slowly walked into the array with open arms while saying, "Orianna, I don''t know what happened to you. You never talked about it the few times that I asked, but I still accept and love you. So there is no reason to scare or hurt anyone. Because there is no way I would ever want to be with anyone other than you." The terrifying smile on Orianna''s facetransformed to a warm and gentle one as tears began to flow down her cheeks once more.Huh? My fear disappeared. It seems Maxwell''s speech worked to calm Orianna down. Now why were Madam Neshan and Maxwell as afraid as me and grandma? I need to figure out why later.
Oriannabarely managed to walk a handful of steps to reach Maxwell''s open arms and she planted a kiss on his lips beforeburied her face into his shoulder as Maxwell''s arms closed around her. Although Maxine was grateful that Maxwell calmed Orianna down, it bothered her that Orianna was naked in his embrace.Grandma, why the hell are you allowing this?!
As if on cue, grandma Victoria coughed awkwardly and said in an authoritive tone, "You need to get dressed, young lady."
"Can I stay like this for a little longer?" Orianna pleaded.
"Absolutely not. If you two were married, hugging him in your current state of dress wouldn''t be an issue, but you two are not," grandma Victoria asserted.Good job, grandma. Now you have put that idea of marriage into her head. It''s only a matter of time now.I need to make sure we are not spiritually connected on any level before then.
"Okay," Orianna pouted and gave Maxwell a kiss on the cheek before she parted from his embrace.
Maxwell was taken out of the room by Madam Neshanwhile grandma Victoria and Neesa blocked the view from anyone trying to peer in the room from the hallway. Since Orianna appeared as if she was about to fall over due to lack of balance, Maxine quickly moved to help her to the bed and to get her dressed.It figures that she needs my help to do this sort of thing. She has been without a body of her own for so long that she has forgotten how tokeep her balance enough to walk.
While she helped Orianna get dressed, Maxine had a strange feeling that she was forgetting something.OH! The book that Turan left me. I still need to look through that just in case it''s something important, but thatdamn thing can wait. For now, I need to spend time with Orianna using my main body. It wouldn''t be right to do otherwise. It''s not like she has the ability to hurt me and it allows my clone to keep up appearances in the meantime.