Back when Myra hit me with her skewer, I learned a new definition of pain. I hadn’t felt anything as bad as that until now. And this was way worse. That was saying something because her skewer was growing out of my stomach.

I was surprised I was able to still think clearly, but my main body was okay. Still, I didn’t like the pain. It was like somebody stuck Ento’s eye into a stove burner. And it hurt a lot. I couldn’t do much with Ento other than try and claw at her eyes. Which didn’t do anything other than dislodge the spike. The acid was still burning into her eye. Poor Ento.

SpookyErind spotted Acid Guy land a couple of inches away from Ento. She leaped towards the ground and grabbed him as he tried to jump away. He was saying something, but it got drowned out by Ento’s screams. SpookyErind lowered her face mask and threw him in her mouth and started chewing.

At least she got revenge for Ento. His body was pulverized into a sweet taste. But it was also spicy as well. I’ve never had spicy vanilla ice cream before. She swallowed and it felt like her throat was burning. But while the pain was similar to Ento’s she stood up.

SpookyErind walked over to Ento, who was squirming in pain on the ground. SpookyErind put her mask back on. The pain was so bad I couldn’t get her to move at all. I wish she was as strong as SpookyErind.

She picked up Ento and cradled her. 

It’ll be fine soon, she said. I don’t know how she thought that was going to happen given that they were still burning with acid. She began walking out the left hallway. 

I tried focusing on Ento’s left eye since her right eye was in the process of being melted.

A masked face with glowing blue eyes and white hair filled her vision. Ento started tearing up. Mom? I remember when she used to cradle me as a child. I hated it then but I wasn’t mad now. I kinda wanted to look at Mom’s face again.

Wait a minute! That’s just SpookyErind. Was Ento’s mind-affecting mine? I hope not. SpookyErind continued to cradle Ento as she leaned against the wall. 

She continued to cradle Ento and began humming. It sounded like a lullaby tune, but I couldn’t remember which one. It didn’t do much to soothe the pain, but I guess it wasn’t horrible. I tried doing choir when I was younger. It turns out my voice was not meant for singing. 

It was still impressive how she managed to hum even though her throat was covered in that acid. It was clearly stronger than Ento’s regeneration because her right eye started looking more and more like scrambled eggs. More like scrambled yolk actually. Do people do that?

Since I could see out of SpookyErind’s eyes, I became engrossed in Ento’s face. My cute child self was melting, which was terrible yet interesting to look at. She managed to scratch the acid spike out of her eye, but that just left it more deformed, with blood pouring out. I wonder if she would lose consciousness. Oh well. 

At least SpookyErind ate that acid bitch. Anger still fumed in my thoughts at him. It’d probably go away after a while - I was never one to be angry at someone for a long time. It’s just if they bothered me, I was mandated under Rule #4 to punish them.

Both Ento and SpookyErind’s eyes began tearing up. Well for Ento it was weird since her malformed eye was becoming a mess of white, blood, and tears. Isn’t this a touching moment?

I was glad my main body was okay. But I was becoming kind of bored since there was nothing to do. Johann was driving as fast as he could, but it would still take another 10 minutes to get there. Meanwhile, I couldn’t really move Ento as the pain was too much to overcome.

Just a few more moments, SpookyErind said. And I’ll have finished digesting that Adumbrae.

It was kind of weird since her voice didn’t sound raspy at all. Wait, her voice just appears in my head, so does she not even need her throat to speak? On the other hand, it’s not like Acid Bitch went down her windpipe. 

Also, wait, what did she mean about digesting?

Suddenly, a surge of energy filled all of my bodies. I could feel them all getting stronger. Huh? 

Then, a tingly feeling entered my bodies. Ento’s goggles and right eye glowed in golden liquid. Her eye and goggles began repairing themselves rapidly, and the burning in both Ento’s and SpookyErind’s bodies stopped. The golden liquid vanished and the tingly feeling disappeared.

“What happened?” I had Ento say. I could talk now! 

Did you know that Corebrings get stronger when they eat Adumbrae? SpookyErind asked.

What? That didn’t sound right. I’ve never heard of a Corebring eating an Adumbrae. But I had a strong feeling this was SpookyErind being cryptic. If so, then maybe she was hinting that my Corebring powers were doing the healing?

Why would my Corebring powers heal me randomly? Unless… she was talking about digesting Acid Guy. He was an Adumbrae after all.

I don’t think eating Adumbrae made Corebring stronger in general. I imagine some of them would have at least been caught doing that on camera if that was true. It must have something to do with Ento then. Maybe shrinking Adumbrae and eating them made it stronger.

I’m so glad you figured it out! SpookyErind cheered. Even though I couldn’t see her face behind her mask, I could feel through our shared senses that she was grinning. I was actually proud of myself that I managed to decode SpookyErind’s bullshit.

Hey! I was just complimenting you.

I had Ento stick out her tongue.

You should be glad you’re as cute as me, she said, chuckling. 

A few other things were on my mind. How was SpookyErind able to digest him so fast? Was it because her body was strong? Or was it because he was injected with the ant syringe? 

I was able to do it because of you! She said. Okay, she was being cryptic again. But she was referring to me right instead of herself? So that probably meant it was Ento’s power.

You got it right again! she cheered. At least I was getting the hang of it.

It was like when those teachers put those trick answers on tests and I got them right. I was basically able to analyze what the teacher really wanted me to put. 

Hey, so what else was on your mind? She asked.

“I just wanted to say thank you for eating Acid Guy so I didn’t have to feel the pain anymore,” I told her. I was being genuine. Which felt very weird. But I was glad the pain was over. 

Typically, most of my appreciation was automatic rather than sincere. It was just the default response I had to people doing things for me, which was nothing special. But somehow, I really felt appreciation for what SpookyErind did.

Hey, I’m just protecting you because you’re me, she beamed behind her mask.

Was it weird that I was feeling appreciation for an Adumbrae? 

Nope! She said. It just means you love me the most.

“I’m not sure if that’s true,” I said. “Also, can you put me down now?”

Aww, can I please carry you since I saved you? She asked. 

“Fine,” I groaned. She giggled and continued walking down the hallway.

“How are things going Erind?” Deen asked me. “We’re almost there.”

“We ran into some guards, drones, and Adumbrae,” I said.

“Are your clones safe?” she asked.

“Yeah, we took care of them, Mom,” I said.

“I’m not your Mom,” she said, poking me. I dodged and poked her back. “Ahh!”

“You sure act like it,” I grinned. Deen pouted, causing me to chuckle.

Maybe I should bully Deen more. It was fun to make her upset since she invaded my sacred personal space so much. She should know better than to do that. Since she decided to go be touchy-feely anyway, I should at least get some kicks out of messing with her.

“At least you're safe,” Deen said. 

She cares way too much about my safety. I guess she was my best friend, but it was kind of annoying anyways. It was getting borderline creepy.

“Oh, there was one more thing I wanted to talk to you about,” I had Ento tell SpookyErind.

What is it? She asked.

“Why aren’t there any more 2M’s?” I asked.

Maybe they got scared of us, she said.

“Would they really get scared of us so easily?” I asked. They had way stronger Adumbrae like Statue Lady. A feeling of paranoia crept into my body. What if she was coming here? We weren’t ready at all to fight her.

I don’t think we have to worry about her, SpookyErind said. I’m pretty sure she’s stuck in traffic or something.

Stuck in traffic? That sounded really stupid. The image of Statue Lady in her Titan form just waiting for cars to go by filled my mind. It was pretty funny to imagine. 

As we walked down the hallway (it was more of SpookyErind walking with Ento resting in her arms), we heard some voices down the hallway.

“We have to leave now!” A deep voice said. 

“I can’t leave now, my work is still here,” a female voice said. 

“We have to regroup with the others,” he said. “The bandits are raiding us.” Bandits? I guess SpookyErind kind of looked like a bandit. 

Oh, that probably did confirm that they were scared of us. I thought they were going to keep dumping guards and Adumbrae on us. That’s what they did at the Docks. Are they getting smarter? To be fair, they did fall for Ento. But who would suspect a child of being an Adumbrae?

On the other hand, it sounded like they cut corners when kidnapping me. If they actually checked if whatever fake name I gave existed, they’d probably have some doubts about kidnapping me. But it sounded like they were in a rush. 

If I recall from one of my ethics classes, the term for that was “Normalization of Deviance”. In an effort to cut corners, organizations will accept more deviations from their rigid rules, leading to failures.

I had fun in ethics in college. I wasn’t an ethical person by any means, but they provided a great foundation for understanding the Rules and faithfully following them. In fact, taking these classes inspired me to be a lawyer rather than a businesswoman. Even though I did have a passion for making money, the Rules were such a fundamental point in my life. And that’s how I went from majoring in Business Administration to Law School.

The scientist and the guard continued to bicker.

“Just give me more time,” she said.

“Arrogant fool, I’m leaving!” He said. Heavy footsteps went down but slowly became more and more distant. 

SpookyErind walked down the corner to a scientist standing behind a panel in an open room. She walked up to her. The scientist was tapping buttons. In front of us was a giant tube, with some kind of monstrous creature inside of it. If I remember correctly from Animal Planet, it was a giant isopod, except way bigger than a normal giant isopod. 

“I’m telling you, I’m not leaving,” Scientist Lady said.

Hello, SpookyErind said. Scientist Lady jolted and turned around.

“What the fuck?” she panicked. “Where the fuck did you go Lanzo?”

My name’s not Lanzo, SpookyErind giggled.

She took out a gun from her coat. 

It’s not a wise idea to do that, she said.

Ignoring us, Scientist Lady shot SpookyErind in the head. The bullet barely breached her skin before falling out. Her wound quickly regenerated. 

That was very rude you know, she said.

"Why the fuck didn’t that work?" Scientist Lady panicked. She fired a few more shots. 

What was truly impressive was how she kept firing even though it turned out that did absolutely nothing. I wonder what would happen if she ran out of bullets? Since none of the 2M’s were going to come to help her, I may as well have some fun time observing her behavior.

She ran out of bullets and started running off. I had Ento grab the ant syringe and throw it at her. 

She gasped but continued running. Her strides became smaller and smaller as she shrank. SpookyErind walked over to her and placed Ento on the ground. I had her pick up the Scientist Lady and walked back to the open room. SpookyErind followed behind me.

I didn’t notice it at first, but there were more tubes with mutated humans in them. None of them were as advanced as the human-sized isopod. I kind of wanted to take some of them with me to experiment on.

A brilliant idea came to my head. I could put them in battles against the other humans I captured. That would be fun to watch. Their own experiments fighting them. Hmm, I should ask the Lady Scientist first.

She was currently screaming in my hand. 

“Hey, how do you have any details of what these monsters do?” I asked.

“Let me go!” she screamed in a high pitch.

“I’ll do that if you answer my question,” I said. 

She continued shrieking. Oh my god. How loud could you be? She sounded like a banshee.

“Stop,” I lightly squeezed her. Why was she acting so different than the other humans? I guess she really did follow the fight part of flight or fight. 

The shrieking turned into sobs, but it still sounded terrible, so I squeezed some more. 

Then she popped into blood and gore.

“Oops,” I had Ento say.

That was incredibly rude of her. I just wanted some more information on the experiments I would be taking from the 2Ms. Even though we were enemies, she could have been furthering the development of scientific knowledge by helping me. I was just trying to learn more.

Are you going to eat that? SpookyErind pointed at my hands.

Oh right, it would probably taste sweet. But I didn’t feel like licking my hands right now.

I’ll do it for you, SpookyErind said.

“How about no,” I said, moving onto the panel. It was more of that sci-fi level of tech, and I couldn’t understand any of it. Sadly, the only person who did know how to operate this was now a paste of viscera on my gloves.

I tinkered with the panel for a bit. Several minutes went by and I sadly never found out how to operate it.

But at least my main body and my teammates were arriving at the 2M’s base.

“I’m going to drop you all off a few blocks away,” Johann said. “I don’t want to get to close.”

“Sure thing,” Dario said. “All right guys, let’s head out.” Blubber stood on his shoulder.

Dusk was approaching, and the sun was dipping on the horizon. It was a beautiful backdrop. 

Myra began growing her bark armor and grew in height. We all walked behind her as we headed toward the base. 

 In front of us was a set of chainlink fences, with a few guards behind them. Several large warehouses were behind them. How big was this base? And damn. These guys had a lot of money. Maybe even more than Deen. 

Myra charged towards the fence and we followed her. The guards started shooting at her, but her armor easily protected her. She crashed through the fence and pierced one of the guards with the spikes on her armor. 

Since bullets barely affected me, I was also in the front. I charged another guard and kicked him in the chest. My foot easily broke through his chest, causing his guts to spill over my leg. Ewww. Was I getting stronger now? I should check how much I could lift when I get back.

Also, this was the 2nd time I accidentally got human viscera on me. I really should get compensated for this nasty stuff.

More guards came to greet us. But instead of ordinary guns, they held neon electroshock weapons. Fuck. I couldn’t be as careless anymore with bullets. 

They began open firing on us, and I took refuge behind Myra’s back. How was I going to engage them? I had no ranged weapons. There weren’t any pebbles here. They really did housecleaning. Wait a minute. I looked back at the guard I just kicked. His chest was gone, leaving his body split into two parts - his head and his legs. I could use him as a ranged weapon.

As Myra said, I’ll need to evade their attacks while attacking from afar. And this was the best way to do this.

I ran toward his body, zigzagging to avoid the electroshock bullets. I grabbed his head and threw it at one of the guards. Continuing to run, I saw the head collide with another guard, causing him to go flying and drop his rifle. Yes!

Thankfully, it appeared both of my bodies were good shots.

I circled back around to the disembodied legs of the guard I kicked and threw them at another guard. They easily whacked into another guard. And that was my 2nd hit in a row. Could I go for a third? Wait a minute, I used up all of that guy’s body parts. Awww.

At least my teammates killed other guards, so I’d be able to use their bodies. 

We managed to clean up their outside defenses and headed inside to the closest warehouse. I really should have bought one of those bodies to throw. Sadly, my teammates might think it was weird, given how none of them copied me. Deen should really be using Myra’s lessons like me.

“All right guys,” Dario said. “Good job so far. Let’s see if we can free any of the hostages. And then, let’s trash this base!”