Considering that Strange gets mind controlled a lot, he's not even questioning that example. And 9S's worries make sense. There's been so many times that it's been one on one or the carnival's been separated or something dumb's happened that it would be best for 9S to be able to do these things on his own.

The big question remains, how. How's he going to do this on his own?

Strange eyes the sword for a moment before looking back at 9S. "If you had a shield spell or something of that nature, you could cast it and keep you safe while you started to hack someone." It's a vague idea, but still counts.