The world turned into darkness as soon as Ale's head hit the pillow, it wasn't as much as the fact that the room was dark, it wasn't. Either [Big Sister] or [Eleanore] had left a small device that would give some light when Ale turned off the main light of their room.

  It was a device set up to help [Child Stage - Humans] deal with the fear of darkness, a fear that Ale found quite weird to have. The absence of light wasn't an issue, at least not for them. They could shift their eyes to accommodate low light environments, so really. It was a moot point for them, Ale still left that thing alone though.

  No, the world had turned to darkness since Ale had entered Maintenance mode, the world merely flickered away as she fell into slumber as her part of the [Consciousness Stream] was pulled out from the body and away. Ale was merely experiencing that as she noticed Alexa's [Consciousness Stream] settle into their body and the body shifting with that.

  It was quite interesting; the fact that their body shifted to accommodate the change was something they hadn't noticed before.

  Notice: Pulling Ale Saintsworths.subper and Alexandra.subper into imaginary space.

  Loading Mindscape.ter

  Loading complete.

  Executing.

  Loading imaginary bodies.

  Loading Ale Saintsworths.subper imaginary body.

  Loading Alexandra Saintsworths.subper imaginary body.

  Loading Main Core.subper imaginary body.

  The Saintsworths Conglomerate thanks you for your service.

  And just like that Ale felt herself nding in an empty space, next to her Alexandra materialized and looking around…nothing else was. Alexa really wasn't here.

  "Main Core? Are you there?" Ale said aloud looking around, she couldn't see the pedestal or the marble either.

  She couldn't see anything, not even the ground she was standing, even though she could feel they stood above something.

  "Alexa isn't here, so maybe he remained with her? You know how he seems to care more about her than us." Alexandra said looking around with Ale.

  "....There may be something wrong with this." Main Core's voice resounded behind them, so Ale turned around and…

  "...The hell?" Couldn't help but say that.

  Standing in front of them was…well, not a podium, stand or even a small marble. Instead was a…kid. A red-eyed blonde little kid, roughly…around…the same….

  "Main Core?" Alexandra asked, the kid nodded at the question, "Why are you using what looks to be a male version of Alexa's body?"

  The kid looked as what Ale imagined a male version of Alexa would look, everything was the same, but looking a little rough, his clothes…well, at least he wasn't wearing a sundress, but instead he was wearing a pair of bck shorts and a white shirt.

  His hair was short and unruly, and he seemed to have dirt here and there, as if he had come after pying in the dirt or something; there were some scraps here and there; if anything, it was weird. Ale and Alexandra's bodies looked perfectly fine, without any wounds or scraps.

  So why was this one like that?

  "Core may be pying another bad joke," Main Core said, shaking his head, "This body is wrong. Why are you…how do you even deal with these…flimsy things?"

  Main Core said pulling at his own hair and sighing, it was…weird seeing him like that. Ale was used to hearing him at the back of her mind, and while this one did have that same feel of being smug, it was…just weird.

  "Core? Is this your doing?" Ale decided to ask looking up, the st time they had been here, Core answered from above.

  Core: No, the clear delimitation made by Host gave birth to this…unfortunate side effect.

  "Why give me a body like this then? I have no need for it." Main Core said gring up, "Also why this one? We have many [Blueprints] male Alexa was not there as an option."

  Core: That is not male Alexa. And we are moving to fix the error that [Blueprint] is there as a safeguard to update another [Blueprint] in case it is needed. It should not be used.

  Purging and saving.

  Ale felt a shiver at those use of words, she got a shiver as Main Core's weird body starting turning into ash, it was…wrong.

  "Perhaps I should be the one there after all," Main Core smirked in a way that reminded Ale of how Alexanders had smiled before, "I would not make this type of mistake."

  Core: Doubtful, but if the ND0 System wills it, it can be done.

  "Aren't you the ND0 System?" Alexandra decided to ask that as Main Core's Body turned into a small marble that she pulled from the ash that had been the body of the blonde boy. "I had thought you were the ND0 System at least."

  Core: The ND0 System is the System that rules The World. What you have seen before is but a fragment of it, set up to help making Alexa's Wish come true.

  "Wait wait wait, stop a goddamned second!" Alexandra screamed sharply, turning up and gring at the nonexistent sky, "The ND0 System, our original OS. That was made by The Saintsworths Conglomerate, what the hell are you saying about a system that rules the world?"

  "Also, is there anything you can do about this whole thing, speaking to the sky and blue screens?" Ale added helpfully from the side, "I get tired of trying to look up."

  Notice: Loading up previous Mindscape build.

  Loading Haven.home.

  Executing.

  The world was engulfed in a bright light that made Ale wince as she closed her eyes for a second; before she was able to open them again, she felt herself falling into the void for a second. It was a long second since it made her panic and attempt to pull herself out from this space, it didn't work.

  And she didn't fall long, since as soon as the second was gone she felt the ground below her feet once more, also she heard the sound of stepping on grass, which was weird, since there shouldn't be any grass or ground within their Mindscape.

  “[Will this suffice?]” The voice of…not quite Main Core, but close enough resounded.

  Ale opened her eyes and found herself in the middle of a meadow, she could see a line of trees surrounding them, they stood in the middle of a green sea of flowers and grass. Looking around, Ale found that the voice was coming from a tree that stood in the middle of this meadow.

  "Is…is that?" Ale said pointing at the tree in the middle, or well, to what was surrounding the said tree.

  "A tree house?" Alexandra said as confused as Ale felt, in the middle of this flower meadow was a tree that seemed big enough to house a house…and actually had become a house, it was…weird to say the least, almost…

  "A Tree House is a small wooden construct atop a tree, usually they hold barely enough space for a room. It is in no way as big as what you are seeing right now." Main Core spoke from Alexandra's wrist.

  "You made him into a bracelet?" Ale asked as she noticed what Main Core's form was.

  "No? How did you get there?" Alexandra asked raising her hand and looking at the bracelet, it looked almost like the one that Alexanders had given them, the one that proved Alexa's link to the Saintsworths.

  “[We gave him that form, since that is the closest thing that he should have to his actual form and work.]” The voice of Core sounded once more, it was coming from the weird tree house.

  "Shall we then?" Ale said pointing at the tree house…thing. "Might as well ask our questions now rather than ter."

  Alexandra nodded, and so they started moving towards the treehouse, only for the stupid thing to…remain at the same distance.

  "[That will not work, what you are seeing is a mere projection. It will allow you to speak to me without using the intermediary of the ND0 System.]" Core said after letting them walk for a few minutes.

  "....You said that you are the ND0 System, then you say that the ND0 system rules the world. And now you say that you aren't the ND0 System?" Ale said, annoyed, "You aren't making any sense."

  "Besides, the ND0 system can't be the one ruling the world. No matter how big the ego of the Saintsworths is, they can't have made something more ancient than the world itself. That is not how it works." Alexandra said gring at the tree house.

  “[The ND0 System that you refer to is a fragment seeded within Alexanders.]” The figure from within the tree house spoke, Core was standing in front of a window in the second floor, Ale could barely see the outlook of a person there.

  It roughly looked female with short hair, but she wasn't sure. What she knew for a fact was that the figure's eye shone in red.

  "Wait a second," Ale said raising her hand and nursing her head with the other hand, "Who seeded what where?"

  That seemed like something important to discuss, "And what are we?" Alexandra added from the side, "I know we started as mere simutions on how the body should behave depending on the stage of development of our body. But this…"

  Alexandra said, pointing at her own body, then at Ale…And then pointing behind her, there was nothing there of course, but Ale could imagine she was pointing at Alexa.

  "This seems too complex of a thing for something that Alexa made on a whim." Alexandra said, turning to her bracelet, "I would understand it if we were more like Main Core…And even that, the fact that he showed up in a body…what is going on with Alexa's psyche?"

  "[If we go in order then…]" Core said, raising her hand, and with a motion, she projected a blue screen in front of the tree house, just above the door that would usually let one enter, a door that was too far away and impossible to get to for Ale and Alexandra. “[The ND0 System is the System who rules the world. This is a Truth, it was a system originally designed to help and monitor the mana saturation levels in an attempt to prevent a cascade effect from overwhelming the world.]"

  ….But Mana was…good? It was what allowed them to wield their [Core Powers], and what allowed Alexa to release herself from the hold the ND0 System and the Saintsworths had over…

  Ah….

  "...We never escaped from the ND0 System did we?" Ale said as that train of thought entered her mind, "We…Alexa…No, P4 thought it had escaped from it when they escaped our den…but you…our own [Core] was tied to the ND0 System all along?"

  “[Wrong.]” Core answered shaking her head, “[P4 escaped as it was schedule from the yoke of the Saintsworths. The loyalty program was indeed removed and it was done in such a way that Alexa holds no loyalty to the Saintsworths, not any that is enforced by programming rules. What remains of Main Core may retain a degree of loyalty to the Saintsworths…. But Alexa is already working on that front.]"

  Alexa was? How?

  Was…was that why Alexa had attempted to give Main Core a body? How…How many people was she intending to get inside her own head?!?!?!?

  “[Second, what was seeded is more simple than you would think.]” Core said, showing them three pictures on it, "[First, the ND0 System seeded within Alexanders Saintsworth's mind as an anchor in the form of a node fragment of the ND0 System. A way to help him create the OS that you used to run.]"

  The first image was that of Alexanders writing with a crazed look a program, Ale could see some simirities with what had been the operating System that they had used before, but this one seemed to have some weird logic errors. It shouldn't be possible for it to run, not as how it was.

  “[The second was the original blueprint of both Alexa Saintsworths and Alexanders Saintsworths as they were in their st moment.]” The second part of the image changed to an image of Alexa and…the same boy that she had seen before, the one that was using a body of a small little blonde boy. “[And the st…well, that was the failsafe. What you know as P4, I guess. Their mission was done the moment the singurity occurred, and they should have deleted themselves. But Alexa somehow decided to do whatever she wanted.]"

  That sounded like Alexa, all right…

  "[Also what is important is that what I am, and what the ND0 System is are not the same, we may work within the same framework. But that does not mean that we are in accord; there are times when the ND0 System and P4 are in accord, and there are times when only the ND0 System and I are in accord. By the same metric, there are times when only myself and P4 are in accord.]" There seemed to be some edge within the voice of Core, "[Trust me on that, st time we had a falling out you all ended on the shorter end of it.]"

  Ale didn't remember anything of such type, this was the first time they all had been speaking about this...right?

  "Wrong." Alexandra said from the side. Bringing Ale back into this conversation, "The part of Alexanders is wrong."

  Only that part? Some stuff there was obviously wrong, such as, "That operating system is trash, the logic is all over the pce and it shouldn't be able to compute anything." Ale said, nodding her head and pointing at the first picture.

  "Alexanders is way older than Alexa, the image you show is wrong. That is not Alexanders," Alexandra said pointing at the second, that…that was closer to how a pair of twins would look if anything.

  And Ale didn't like the implications of that; they would mean that Alexanders was closer to Alexa than they ever realized, and it just didn't make sense; no BioWeapon had brothers or sisters. The closer thing to that would be the other bioweapons of the same genotype.

  And Alexanders didn't seem like a BioWeapon, he was a cheating asshole, but above all, he seemed too [Human] to be a weapon like they were…. Wait a goddamned second!

  "Did you seed the motion of him being our brother?" Ale asked remembering how he decided to set up that past for them, and how in some instances both P4 and weird Alexa….actually, "Are you Weird Alexa?"

  “[....No, neither I or P4 are what you deem as Weird Alexa.]" Core answered, "[Also no. We did not seed any motion of family within anyone nor did the ND0 System do such a thing. We have learned the lesson in the harshest of ways, we lost the family we made for committing such Sin.]"

  The hell was Core speaking about?

  "You didn't address the elephant in the room." Alexandra said once again, "Why is that Alexander wrong?"

  “[He is not, Alexanders Saintsworths IS the twin brother of Alexa Saintsworths.]” Core said, her words holding some level of power.

  "He is not," Alexandra said back, "Alexanders Saintsworths was born almost 21 years ago in some hidden Saintsworths hospital, the sole son too."

  Alexandra snapped her fingers and that information manifested, so they could also do that here? Neat.

  "While Alexa was born roughly a couple weeks ago, if you take P4's activity time at best, we are two years old." Alexandra said summoning the activity reports in question, "At best we are five year old if you take the time from inception of the ND0 System, or the anchor you cim it to be."

  So, Alexa really was five years old?

  "There is no way in the world that Alexa is the twin sister of Alexanders," Alexandra said, "If I was the one in question it may be viable since we do look somewhat alike, but I am even younger than Alexa."

  “[There is no way in THIS world, but you aren’t seeing the issue here, neither am I speaking of this world or is the Alexa and Alexanders in that picture of this world.]” Core said as she zoomed out the picture, the other two photos also disappeared, and instead, the image zoomed out and out; it first was a normal tower, then a city. Then it hovered in above the city, Ale…. did not recognize it, there was nothing there, "[This is the crown gem of Terra Invicta, Aqui. The ruling capital of the Saintsworths.]"

  "Doesn't ring any bell," Alexandra said from the side, "Also the Saintsworths are a business entity, how did they move into politics?"

  “[Expining that would take more time than we have,]” Core said sighing, “[I don’t mind of course, but do you want to use our time for that?]”

  "No," Ale said first, "What we want to know is what we are and how we can help Alexa."

  "Also what do I need to do to prevent such hideous fate as a flesh meat?" Main Core said from the side too, Ale had forgotten about him.

  “[That is easy.]” Core answered, Ale could almost see the smirk on her face, "[You merely need to die.]"

  "I beg your pardon?" Alexandra was the first to answer and, at the same time, cover the bracelet that housed Main Core. It was nice to see that the older version of herself did care for Main Core.

  But on the other hand…

  What the heck was this girl speaking of?