"Marice, are you okay?" Mariella asked, squeezing her daughter's hand. "How are you feeling?"

"I have a knife sticking out of my chest," Marice replied. "What do you think?"

"Oh, drop that sass for a bit. It's my job to worry about you, so let me worry about you!"

Marice closed her eyes. "Yeah, sorry..."

"Kath?"

"I already had her drink a tranquil potion to help her relax," Katherine replied, fishing out an orange-colored potion from her thigh compartment, "and I just finished applying a numbing solution into the stab wound. All that's left is to extract the blade itself."

"Oh, I can help with that."

"You're going to do it here?!" Liza said, raising her armor's visor. "At least let us take you to the nearest hospital first!"

"I can do it here," Marice replied, "I think..."

"Are you sure though?" Mariella asked. "You were very squeamish whenever you saw blood. But I guess you already got over that fear, huh? Good for you!"

Katherine and Vivianne exchanged tense looks. "Uh," the former uttered, "about that..."

Marice groaned. "No, I can do it! Come on, Mom. Do your thing already."

"Mom?!" Vivianne looked at Mariella. "Then... you really are...!"

Mariella blinked. "Hm? Is there something on my face?"

She cleared her throat and shook her head. "No, no. It's nothing. My apologies."

"Waaait a minute. You're one of my daughter's classmates, aren't you?" Her face lit up, looking back at Marice. "Why didn't you introduce her to me sooner? And you didn't even tell me she came along with you!"

"Um, no... I didn't—"

Mariella clasped her hands. "Ah, this is wonderful! It's a shame you didn't get to attend last night's party too. Don't worry, I'll make it up to you later!"

Vivianne was left flabbergasted for a moment before looking away, crossing her arms. "Y-You should tend to your daughter before anything else first!"

"O-Oh, right!"

Mariella gently wrapped her hand around the knife's handle, causing Marice to wince a bit. And with a soothing coo, she pulled out a folded handkerchief using her free hand and instantly swapped it with the knife.

As the policemen around them applauded Mariella's displacement trick, Katherine poured the syrupy potion into the stab wound. And once that was done, Marice brought her right hand over it and started patching herself up with a healing spell.

But not even a few seconds in the process, she felt her wound rapidly heating up, causing immense pain to radiate outwards from it. As she gritted her teeth and increased the potency of her spell, she could feel her limbs becoming numb while her body heat started to plummet. She thought her anxiety was getting into her nerves, but she was so focused on the spell that she didn't even notice that she was taking in shorter and shorter breaths.

Katherine grabbed Marice's wrist. "Your heart rate's increasing, Marice! Calm down and take deep breaths!"

"I knew this would happen," Mariella said, wiping the sweat off her daughter's forehead. "Relax. We'll just bring you to a hospital."

"My wound is closing up. Just a bit more and—!"

Marice tried to wrestle Katherine's hand away, only to accidentally brush her wrist against her wound. And the moment she saw that streak of blood, her consciousness rapidly faded into white nothingness.

The next thing she knew, she was already laying on a comfy bed inside what seemed to be a small clinic. Her hand instinctively went to her stab wound and she found that it was completely gone. It couldn't have been Vivianne, so probably her butler or someone from the police force did the job.

What else?

Her mother had her head rested on the bedside, her face looking rather strained. She didn't know whether it was because of her awkward posture or just plain exhaustion from walking around all day, but whatever the reason was didn't matter anyway. They were there because she was a stubborn dumbass, and that fact along with her mother's expression made a strong argument for her to hide under the covers and sleep all the guilt in her chest away until sunrise.

On the other hand though, she could hardly contain herself as she had finally met someone who knew the ultimate healing spell. 'Impossible my arse!', she thought. Now that she had seen first-hand that the spell could be cast by a human and seemingly without any repercussions, all that was left was to learn its actual prerequisites.

If she were to believe Adrian's word, then she would have to somehow convince that wraith to teach her about them first. The demon seemed reasonable enough to parley with them, so she was feeling pretty optimistic about her odds. Then again, demons were a crafty bunch, and it would be wise to observe her for a bit and see what makes her tick before making her next move.

But for now though, she couldn't help but notice several ether signatures emanating from the glass cabinet across her bed. Curious, she slipped out of her covers and took a closer look at the bottles neatly lined up on the shelves.

Inside the bottles were sirena scales, locks of tikbalang hair, and other biological samples from diwata and other powerful spirits in their animal forms. Some of them started glowing in her presence, including one of her favorite insects back when she was a kid: the tricolor firefly.

"Oh, they have these here too, huh?"

"Wah!" She clutched her chest. "C-Could you not—!"

Mariella embraced her from behind. "You don't ever see these fireflies in big cities."

"Yeah, aren't they supposed to be pets of forest diwata? Why did you catch some for me if you knew you'd piss them off?"

"Because I'd do anything for my adorable little daughter."

Feeling a bit of heat in her cheeks, Marice grumbled. "But seriously, you know how petty those tiny buggers can be."

"I know, but those sprites are jerks anyway. They actually use the fireflies to play pranks on you, like luring you over an ant nest or making you step on cow dungs. When I was a kid, I tripped over a tree branch trying to catch one, and I got a nasty scrape from that too!"

"I dunno. Knowing you, they don't even have to—ow!" She snatched the offending hand away from her waist. "You never pinched me as a kid!"

"Oh, so you're saying it isn't too late for me to give you some tough love?"

"Stop being so—" She let out a deep sigh, releasing her mother's hand. "A-Anyway, thank you."

Mariella paused for a moment, processing what she just heard. "Eh? Eh?! D-Don't tell me you're into that kind of—"

Marice suddenly spun, slapping her mother's face with her ponytail. "What?! Get your mind out of the gutter! I'm thanking you for catching those fireflies for me!"

She guffawed. "Aww, you didn't have to. It's really easy-peasy when you can stop time. And honestly, I just didn't want you to accidentally wander into the forest trying to catch one. As if those stories about landmines could stop someone as stubborn as you from trying."

Marice did a double take. "Landmines?! Who would put those in there?"

"You know, from the last world war. But it's just a story to scare kids away from the forest. I'm surprised you didn't know that." She grinned. "Then again, you were always off in your own little world, not caring in the slightest."

"Not like I had a choice at the time."

"Huh?"

"Nevermind." She shrugged and forced out a smile. "Where are we anyway?"

"In Camp Bagong Diwa."

She blinked. "And the others?"

"In the canteen across this room, but are you sure you should be moving around already?"

"I'm not that frail. Come on, it's already getting late."

Donning her cap and jacket, Marice followed her mother outside and stepped into the canteen. But with all the contemporary decors, matching wooden furniture, and the subtle classical arrangement playing in the background, it definitely felt like they stumbled upon a fancy coffee house instead.

Sitting just in front of the glass counter, Katherine noticed the pair and ran up to them. "Marice! Feeling better?"

"Yeah, sorry about earlier."

Katherine let out a sigh of relief and smiled. "Vivianne was kind enough to bring Sir Teodore here to heal you."

She looked at the table where Adrian, Richelle, Sina, and the spider familiar were seated. "Speaking of which, where are they?"

"They left half an hour ago."

"Oh, let's get a move on too. I'm hungry."

Katherine blinked. "Um, we can't."

"What do you mean we can't?"

She turned to the policewoman sitting behind Richelle. "Miss Suzy?"

"Right," she said, looking up from her phone, "Liz told us that you guys are gonna attend a press conference or something."

"Press conference? Why us?"

She tilted her head. "I'm not really sure."

"And somehow Vivianne got away with this nonsense."

"Only because she threatened to, like, level the entire building if we didn't let her go." She started twirling her side ponytail with her free hand and shrugged. "Don't sweat it though. I don't think you guys are in trouble or anything."

As she became aware of the attention she was drawing to herself, Marice just shook her head. "Fine. What about those three?"

"They're free to go along with you as long as they wear an observer band."

And as if on cue, Katherine presented a pair of the elastic band from her thigh compartment. "They said it'd be nice if all of us had one. For emergency purposes at least."

Marice narrowed her eyes. "So we're just gonna throw away what little privacy we have left, huh?"

"I personally checked every band they gave us. They only record your location and your body's vitals."

"As if that's any better."

"Well," Adrian said, "what did you expect when you agreed to work for the police?"

"We're working with them. Huge difference."

"And that's more than enough for us. I'm glad." Marice turned around and saw a couple of decorated police officers entering the canteen, prompting the other personnel to stand in salute. The most senior officer among them saluted back before facing her. "You seem to be well now. The magics of the Alcantara household sure is formidable."

"And you are?"

"National Police Chief Cuizon. It's an honor to finally meet you all."

"So you're the one in charge, right? Why are you dragging us in this theatrics of yours?"