[@Banana]

"[color=f7941a]M-Mom!?[/color]" said Claire with surprise.

Claire had done a great many things in her existence. Most of which being music or sister-related, but there were other things too. She made friends with mortals. She played those games that Miriam loved to play so much. She deliberately avoided going to the Merged meetings, as at the time she thought that most other Merged were too close to their predecessors in terms of decision-making. She joined a swimming competition. She failed to finish the swimming competition. She was banned from joining Swimming competitions in 25 states of what used to be the U.S., because of a fight she had with the competitors that were saved on phones and sent out across the internet. in any case, this was a first for her, and not the good kind.

The shadow child, despite originally being just an idea of a weapon to combat their enemies, was now sentient. Not only that, she/he called her "mom"...Which meant that the kid was Claire and Xoxi's...Claire and Xoxi's...Claire was internally screaming at the very thought of what was going on, and it didn't help that they were under attack at the moment as well. Yuki would tear her guts out later, maybe even Xoxi's as well. Claire might have broken if not for the fact that Yuki kept telling her to snap out of it.

Claire spoke to the shadow child again.

"[color=f7941a]Yes, but please go with Yuki and...Xoxi. Make sure that they're safe...[/color]" 

Claire had to force herself to end her sentence there, as she realized that she had no idea what to call this new shadow.

[center]Meanwhile...[/center]

Clarice and Yuki nodded as Ixox went off to get her own clone.

The two sister clones looked to each other and waited. They had a feeling that if they rushed anything, they'd just speed up the inevitable, and find trouble along the way. Besides, for them it was much easier to absorb their clones one at a time. It would certainly leave one of them vulnerable, and give them much more of an easier time to trick the others, as they'd be able to disguise themselves as their counterparts perfectly after absorbing them.

So for now, they watched as the bandits and Krieg began tearing through the small army. At first it was going swimmingly, but as it went on, it seemed that the abominations were beginning to become more organized mid-battle. It seemed that their leader was finally with them, and making things much more difficult than it was.