He smiled. "Straight to the point, as expected. I apologize for the inconvenience we're causing you, but I firmly believe this is something that needs to be done for the sake of the people. Showing them the people who saved them should help assuage their fears. To help them realize that they are now in safe hands."

Marice frowned. "But do we really have to show up in person? I'm sure you got most of what happened on camera, so just show them the footage instead."

"Your appearance will only further inspire confidence in everyone. And if you so desire, you don't have to answer any questions thrown at your feet."

She fell silent for a moment. "I'll go, but leave my mother out of this. She wasn't even there when that witch lobbed that death ball at us."

"It's okay, Marice," Mariella said. "It's not the first time I've been on live tele—"

"That's exactly why. The media made a circus out of us, and the people ate it up like they were watching some soap opera. I want to make sure that doesn't happen again."

"Marice..."

She started to tear up, feeling weak in the knees. "You're just... too kind. These people don't deserve you at all."

Mariella held her hand. "Don't say that. But if that's what will put your mind at ease, then I won't go."

"Y-Yeah, it's for the best."

"I appreciate your cooperation," the police chief said. "We still have quite a while before the conference starts, so please make yourselves comfortable in the meantime. As for myself, I haven't had the chance to have dinner yet."

"We haven't had ours either," Mariella said.

"Ah, perfect timing then! I'd like to put something in my stomach first before things get hectic again!"

And they did, lining up along the counter to order their meals. The canteen offered quite a variety of dishes, but what grabbed her attention in the digital menu was the nutritional values displayed alongside each dish, from total calories to sodium and vitamin contents. When Katherine pointed it out, the police general explained that it was part of their recently developed Zen Initiative for their personnel, aiming to improve their physical and mental well-being amidst their work environment.

Marice recalled reading about said initiative some time ago, and she had to wonder if their attempts of seducing her mother into joining the force was also part of their game plan. Based on what little she had seen from the police station in Ermita, she could certainly see why it would be a morale booster for them.

In any case, she settled for a combo meal of meatball pasta and baked chicken wings, only because the looming conference took a hefty chunk of her appetite. And once they had their fill, the moment of truth was upon them.

Minutes before the conference, they were briefed by one of the organizers that all they needed to entertain were questions from their battles. They could humor other inquiries they deem fair, but they were advised to simply not answer at all if they had to second-guess their responses.

Apparently, ever since their little scuffle with Sina went viral on the internet, news outlets and content creators had been circulating stories about her and her mother officially joining the police force, which would most likely be the number one question everyone wanted to know. The most damning one that could be brought up was the rumor of Marice weaseling her way into the ranks of the national police and subsequently using all of her accumulated clout to exact revenge on her clan.

That rumor wasn't even really new! She came across articles speculating about her sudden departure from the country, and the most popular among them was exactly that revenge angle!

Mad props for them bringing that plot point back into the rumor mill, but this whole situation was shaping up to be a long exercise of her patience. She thought she wasn't exactly a patient person to begin with, so these people better pray to whatever deities they believe in to wish her a better grip of her sanity.

And so, they made their way to the conference hall where the journalists and government officials were waiting for them and sat on their designated seats. Not a minute later, the police chief and his fellow officers made their way to the front table and had the floor moderator kick off the event with little preamble.

The first part was basically set on auto-pilot as Chief Cuizon laid down a summary of the events from earlier. And while the footage of their battles played on a projected screen behind them, Marice finally got to see the man who kept Sina company. According to the priestess, he was apparently an aswang of the vampire variety, similar to the ones Marice and Katherine had fought. And by some amazing coincidence, said vampire also happened to be the uncle of the policewoman they met earlier.

She also learned that the girls they saw fighting earlier were students of a nearby university. They happened to see the green-eyed witch about to abduct Richelle, but their attempts to stop her got them all hospitalized. Thankfully, all of them were in stable condition despite the heavy beating they had received.

Based on their preliminary investigation, the police general posited that these aswang might be part of the underground crime syndicate led by the demon vampire Hiraya. Their group mostly conducted their operations in the Underworld, and they were infamous for trafficking humans to the other side and exploiting them for their own ends. And while he didn't exactly tell the audience why they would target Richelle, the attempted abduction was more than enough reason to implicate the group.

Once they moved on to their encounter with the witch and her familiar, Marice and Katherine were forced to recount the events leading up to the spell that affected roughly a third of Taguig. As she had anticipated, the disaster management council representative reported a handful of casualties still, all of them crushed under heavy debris. And based on their latest reports, at least two hundred eighty people suffered injuries from the kinetic blasts.

Seeing footage of the damages instilled some guilt in her chest, especially when they were the ones who forced the witch's hand to launch the spell in the first place. And it appeared that some of the journalists had been thinking the same thing once they moved on to the question and answer portion of the conference.

One journalist was quick to criticize their lack of coordination from the authorities, but the police general countered that the arrangement between Marice's party and theirs was done out of expediency. Richelle disappeared early in the morning, and the suspect was a powerful demon that only a few individuals within the country could possibly face on equal footing. They couldn't just rely on Sina alone, so they had Marice's party help along with the search.

Even if they were being supervised by a commission overseer, it wouldn't have made a difference anyway. Nobody could have foreseen that such a young witch could cast a disaster-level spell, much less actually commit to using it. As far as he was concerned, Marice and the others did everything they could to minimize the destruction.

The rather heated response riled up the audience as almost all of them raised their hands before he could finish his sentence.

As the floor moderator gestured at the woman sitting on the left side of the second row seats, she put on a stern expression as she received her microphone.

"Months ago, the national police expressed its desire to commission more volunteers to bolster its ability to combat supernatural threats within each region. Is the national police looking to revive the Bantay-Malasakit initiative with the two Alcantara members at the forefront?"

"Even though the initiative was dissolved due to the number of controversies associated with it, I firmly believe that the good it brought outweighed the bad. That is why the concept of enlisting help from supernatural civilians continues to persist through our contract-based collaborations with various clans, guilds, and individuals across the country.

"We're still far from finalizing our plans, but I can say with utmost confidence that the initiative will make its return, albeit in a form that heavily improves upon its foundation. Expect additional precautionary measures on our part to prevent abuse of power from this arrangement.

He turned his gaze to Marice. "As for the Alcantaras, let's not put the cart before the horse. They haven't even told me their plans beyond this one case."

"Then..." She turned her gaze to Marice. "Miss Maricel Alcantara, do you have any plans joining the police force? Or is this just a one-time commission?"

Marice received a microphone from Katherine. She paused and took a deep breath, barely containing her emotions. "The latter. I didn't return from England just to get involved in this mess."

"How about your mother? Is she going to continue to accept commissions? Based on the records we've collected, she's been credited for solving a few cases already."

"She won't."

"Any particular reason why?"

She then channeled her courage into her gaze, tightening her grip around the microphone. "Because I'm back home. Now that I'm always by her side again, I won't let anyone take advantage of her."

Her proclamation stunned the audience, not a single one of them willing to give a follow-up question. Sure, people would have a field day forming more ill-founded rumors and stories out of that thinly-veiled threat, but she didn't care. She had to draw the line somewhere, so what better way to deliver her message across than a live broadcast?

As the journalist sat back down with a smile on her face, the floor moderator glanced between his tablet and the police chief. "So," he said, "we still have time. Any more questions?"