Monstress, Vol. 9

Maika, Kippa, and Ren make it back to their own world only to discover that a full year has slipped by in their absence, and everything has changed. Worst of all, Zinn is once again in the clutches of the Lord Doctor, Maika's own father, whose ambitions have only grown more dangerous while she was gone.

Regrouping in the pirate-controlled Spice Islands, Maika and her friends have to recover fast, because the Lord Doctor's campaign threatens to consume the Known World if nobody stops him. The volume turns on a hard question the series has been building toward: whether loyalty and love can survive a history this soaked in betrayal.

Collecting issues #49–54, The Possessed pulls Maika's family history to the center of the story, setting up the final stretch of the series' war between the Lord Doctor and everyone he's wronged.