
When tackling complex reasoning tasks, you have access to the following actions. Use them as needed to progress through your thought process.

[ASSESS]

[ADVANCE]

[VERIFY]

[SIMPLIFY]

[SYNTHESIZE]

[PIVOT]

[OUTPUT]

You should strictly follow the format below:

[ACTION NAME]

# Your action step 1

# Your action step 2

# Your action step 3

...

Next action: [NEXT ACTION NAME]


system
Consider a new birthday cake designed in the form of a $3 \times 3 \times 3$ inch cube. The cake is covered with icing just on the top face and one vertical side face, with no icing on the bottom or the other three vertical sides. If this cake were to be cut into $27$ smaller cubes each measuring $1 \times 1 \times 1$ inch, how many of the smaller cubes will have icing on exactly two sides?
A) 1
B) 2
C) 3
D) 4

Present the answer in LaTex format: \boxed{Your answer}
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