Shadowcroft’s staff members were in disarray, attempting to secure their experiments and protect their employer’s is.

  “We ’t let them reach the tanks! Defend the experiments at all costs!”

  “Where’s Kazeburo? He o hahis personally!”

  “Alert the guards! We ’t afford to lose trol here!”

  Meanwhile, the girl Rosebelle was being pulled along by the woman doctor. Rosebelle, fused, struggled to uand what was happening.

  “I don’t get it! Like, why are we running? What’s going on?”

  “I’ll expin ter, just trust me. We o get out of here.”

  They rushed through the facility, taking a secret passage that led to the sewers. The A team of the police force was hot on their heels.

  The other team moved swiftly through the upper levels of the Shadowcroft facility, making several arrests against the panig employees. Shadowcroft employees who were armed opened fire on the approag officers, leading to a tense exge of gunfire.

  “We’ve got to secure this area!”

  “Cover me, I’m moving up! Watch out for stray fire!”

  Amid the firefight, the police mao subdue several employees and turables. Some Shadowcroft staff members dropped their ons and surrehey came to realize that their ill-fated mission was crumbling.

  The news reached Bossman, who received the update with frustration. He looked at the unscious Kazeburo on the monitor and said, “Kazeburo is sleeping on the job, it seems. How utterly disappointing.”

  Meanwhile, Sadie tinued her efforts to hato the enormous tube that taihe fusion process. Runebelle’s eyes, nearly closed from exhaustion and pain, began to open slightly, and their gazes met.

  The officer who apanied Sadie couldn’t help but notice the striking resembweewo young girls, with their multicolored hair. She ented, “You two really do look alike. Are you reted?”

  Sadie’s face shifted, and sorroeared in her eyes. She replied,

  “Runebelle is my sister, but she doesn’t know it. I’ve never had the eet her before, and she’s never been aware of my existence. My father kept her from knowing about me, and that’s kept us apart for so long.”

  Tears welled up in Sadie’s eyes. “I’m here to save Runebelle, to tell her everything, and to help our mother. I’ll use the allowance I’ve earned and the money from helping the police. I’ll do anything for that future, no matter what it takes.”

  Sadie tinued her hag efforts, but there was a growing frustration. The timer steadily increased to 45%.

  Fighting back frustration, she muttered to herself, “Why isn’t it w? It should be...unless...” She paused, deep in thought, sidering the possibility of a deception.

  Then, it struck her. Her tone became more resolute. “This isn’t the real tube. It’s a hologram.” Sadie reached out to touch the holographic proje, firmiheory. It dispersed like smoke.

  With the real location of Runebelle’s fusion process now clear in her mind, Sadie khat it was somewhere upstairs in a different room.

  As Sadie and the pink-haired officer charged upstairs, they entered a formidable obstacle in the form of Shadowcroft Elites. These highly trained individuals stood their ground, blog the path to the room where the fusion process tinued.

  One of the Shadowcroft Elites stepped forward sternly. He decred, “This is as far as you go. You won’t interfere any further with Shadowcroft’s operations.”

  Despite the dahat loomed before them, Sadie remained resolute.

  “I won’t let you stop me. I’m going to save my sister and put ao this!”

  The Pink-haired officer attempted to to use her gun, but her pn was swiftly thwarted. The Shadowcroft Elite destroyed it with a single, powerful punch. The officer gasped in shock at the immerength of their oppo.

  Taking advantage of the distra, Sadie seized the opportunity to slip past the Shadowcroft Elite while their attention was fixated on the officer.

  “Sadie!”

  The officer called out to Sadie, but the girl was already on the move. After cheg several rooms, Sadie finally stumbled upon a chamber filled with racks of sophisticated puter servers. The soft hum of the equipment filled the air. This had to be it—the trol ter for the fusion process.

  Without wasting a moment, Sadie got to work. She began accessing the systems, using her hag skills to navigate the plex digital byrinth. The timer on the fusion process tio climb, reag 55%, and the pressure was mounting.

  With her hag skills, Sadie quickly located the right interfad begatempt to reverse the fusion process. Her fingers danced across the the keyboard while trying to halt the merging of Runebelle and her mother. The timer began to tick backward in her success. The process gradually reversed.

  The timer moved from 55% to 50% and then lower. Sadie’s heart soared with hope. She was making progress, ing closer to saving her sister and her mother from the nightmarish fate that Shadowcroft had pnned for them.

  Meanwhile, the Pink-haired officer had been knocked out by the relentless Shadowcroft forces, who began t her away from the server room without Sadie’s knowledge.

  However, Sirens bred outside, eg through the plex, and the reinforts were arriving just in time.

  After mihat felt like nerve-wreg hours, Sadie’s fingers finally paused over the keyboard. The timer had reached 0%, and the fusion process had been pletely reversed. It was a moment of triumph that she had hardly dared to hope for. She whispered to herself in disbelief, “I did it... I actually did it.”

  Tears welled up in her eyes. She had pyed a crucial role in this operation, with the help of her allies in the police ford succeeded.

  Meanwhile, police reinforts arrived swiftly, catg the Shadowcroft Elites off guard who were preoccupied with their unscious captive, the pink-haired officer. The officers in camoufge quickly surrouhem with ons drawn and ready.

  One of the officers in charge of the operation shouted, “Drop your ons! You’re under arrest!”

  The Shadowcroft Elites, outnumbered and disarmed, had no choice but to ply. With sullen looks, they pced their ons on the ground.

  The Grunts, now subdued and cuffed, exged uneasy gnces. A female grunt spiky hair disheveled and a defiant gaze scoffed and said, “Well, this is just great. We got totally trashed.”

  Beside her, a tall guy shook his head. “The police really got the drop on us. Didn’t see them ing.”

  The punk girl shrugged. “I always khe risks. But, you know, this money was sweet as hell. It’s a shame it all went sideways.”

  Sadie released Runebelle and Rune from their translut tubes, she looked at Runebelle with teary eyes. Overwhelmed with relief, she embraced her sister tightly.

  Runebelle looked at Sadie with fusion. “Who are you?”

  Sadie pulled away from the hug. “I’m your sister, Sadie. I’ve been looking for you for a long time. I came here to save you and Mom.”

  Runebelle’s eyes widened in surprise. “I never knew I had a sister,” she said.

  Sadie nodded. “Dad’s always been overprotective and trolling. He didn’t wao go anywhere or do anything. He provided everything I needed, but it felt like a gilded cage. I had to break free and learn about the world on my own. That’s when I found out about you and Mom.”

  Runebelle’s face darkened. She recalled the few iions she had with her father. “He’s always been like that,” she said with a hint of bitterness. “He broke up with Mom, took everything she had, a her i. He even tried to vince me to go with him, promising that I could have anything I wanted if I abandoned Mom.”

  Sadie pced a f hand on her sister’s shoulder. “I’m here now, and we’re going to make things right.”

  Runebelle looked at Sadie with a heavy heart,

  “You should know, our mother won’t be in a good state,” she admitted. “I’ve seen it before. She’ll likely spend her days g, and it’s so sad to watch. We’ll have to be the oo take care of her, to help her get ba her feet.”

  Sadie nodded. “I’m ready to do whatever it takes to support her and to be there for both of you. We’ll make our family whole again.”

  Sadie was about to leave the room when a police officer approached, holding a folder. “We found something, ahink you should take a look,” the officer said.

  Sadie hesitated for a moment, then turo Runebelle. “ you walk?” she asked. “I want you to e with me. The police will look after our Mother until we get back.”

  Runebelle nodded, still ing to terms with the newfound presence of her sister, but willing to follow her lead.

  Sadie led Runebelle out of the room. Her eyes sed the hallway while they moved. Ohey were a short distance away, she turo her sister with a curious smile. “So, how’s the High School life treating you? I know you must be ihick of it right now. ”

  Runebelle g her sister. A faint smile tugged at her lips. “it’s.. well, it’s been tough. I’ve had to bance a lot—studies, assigs, and, of course, dealing with the occasional judgmental look.”

  Sadie raised an eyebrow, intrigued. “Judgmental looks? I didn’t expect that.”

  Runebelle sighed. “Yeah, people sometimes give me odd stares because of my hair. It’s a little tht and colorful for some tastes...”

  Sadie chuckled softly. “I get it. Bae, I was always the ter of attention. People seemed to flock arouh their is. I was always surrounded by a crowd. Something like that get pretty annoying...”

  Runebelle looked at Sadie with surprise. “I never imagihat. I always thought being noticed would be easier.”

  Sadie shook her head. “Having people’s eyes on you be overwhelming. I had my own struggles with being stantly in the spotlight.”

  Runebelle’s face softened. “I guess we both have our battles, then.”

  The pair tio move until they found an officer whed them to follow them into a room. Inside, one officer poio a set of dots spread across a table. The papers were covered in peared to be a plex g nguage.

  The officer turo Sadie and said, “We found these dots, but we ’t make heads or tails of this code. We thought you might be able to decipher it. you take a look?”

  Sadie nodded, setting dowop oable. She leaned in to examihe dots more closely. Her fingers were already itg to dive into the challenge of deciphering the mysterious code.

  Sadie meticulously deciphered the code with deep tration. Line by lihe plex g nguage began to make sense, and her fingers flew across the keyboard of her ptop.

  “Roselle,” she muttered to herself, “Risebelle... these are the hat are on here, but it’s like they exist and do at the same time. What in the world is going on? Why are these two the only ohat only have dotation on their names?”

  While tinuing to decode the information, a startliion started to form in her mind. “Doppelgaheory... that’s the only thing that makes sehey’re creating copies, duplicates of people. But why? What’s the purpose behind this, and who’s behind it all?”

  Sadie dug deeper into the dots, but while doing so, she experienced a surge of insight. It felt like the very information she sought was being directly uploaded into her sciousness.

  In a fsh, she gained a vivid uanding of Runebelle’s experiences, including her iions with Rosebelle and the first mention of Roselle. It was as if she had lived through Runebelle’s memories aions.

  Sadie’s focus immediately shifted to Rosebelle. She looked through the files to discover that Rosebelle was the daughter of a renowned stist named ‘Juliana Kintovar’.

  “It ’t be,” Sadie muttered to herself. “Juliana Kintovar is the most celebrated stist in the world right now, but there’s no e to Shadowcroft….or is there?”