Drone (3)
No mana radiated from it.
Yet it bore zero resemblance to any living creature either.
“...And yet it flies?”
One of the elves blinked blearily in sheer bewilderment.
Just how long had the thing been hovering there? No one had even sensed its approach.
Driven by the boundless curiosity innate to their kind, the elf pricked their long ears, leaned forward, and tentatively reached out a hand.
Click!
“Heeek!”
A blinding flash erupted from the drone.
Startled out of their wits by the sudden burst of light, the reaching elf lost their balance and tumbled backward, sprawling flat onto the dirt.
“Eeeek!”
The surrounding elves scrambled in every direction, diving headfirst behind boulders. The fallen elf let out a pathetic shriek, thrashing their limbs on the ground in sheer panic, until...
“Huh?”
They blinked, slowly realizing that nothing actually hurt.
Not a single scratch marred their skin; their body was in entirely pristine condition.
Leaving the bewildered elf to sort through their confusion, a fresh post surfaced on the forum board.
(GIF of an elf leaping out of their skin like a startled rabbit)
(Photo of the elf tripping over backward and sprawling on the dirt)
Just field-testing drone performance tbh
Elves are pretty damn cute as a bonus
It was no monster. It was none other than the Head Mod's metallic familiar, an artificial fairy: a drone.
“Now that's what I call solid performance.”
The drone was operating flawlessly, even way out in El-Ladh.
The sole reason it maintained an uninterrupted link across such an absurd distance lay in the perk I had recently acquired.
Active Channel — Full-Health Elf
Remaining Duration: 59:51:41
My Sub-Mod was essentially doubling as a biological signal repeater.
“Using it in the field really drives home how insane this is.”
The geographic distance separating Kellierton from El-Ladh was vast. Yet, simply because a Sub-Mod happened to be stationed out there, my operational radius had functionally expanded to near-infinity.
Glancing at the still-dazed elf shivering on the ground below, I released the drone's bottom claw and dropped down a chilled can of Coca-Cola.
“Gasp, sweet victory!”
Blissfully unaware that their undignified flop had been permanently immortalized on the Gallery, the elf scooped up the can and cheered with unbridled joy.
Leaving the giddy pointy-ear behind, I prepared to bank the drone around toward the deep woods to pinpoint the beasts spewing the fog.
“W-Wait! Hold on a second!”
The elf who had tumbled over scrambled up and shouted.
When I brought the drone to a gentle hover, the elf flinched, then stepped toward it with cautious reverence, bowing their head slightly.
“Um... esteemed fairy of the Head Mod? Going inside is far too dangerous!”
Did they genuinely believe the hunk of plastic and wiring was a sentient fairy?
The elf pleaded with genuine, frantic urgency.
“Even if you venture into the mist, your mana will immediately give your position away!”
The elves were formidable combatants in their own right. Yet how was one supposed to swing a blade or cast an arrow into formless, enveloping fog? Stripped of targets, the elves had been left utterly helpless against the miasma.
In fact, any living, breathing organism would have found such a fog excruciating to deal with.
“Too bad a drone isn't a living organism.”
It possessed zero mana.
It held no biological organs requiring sleep or respiration.
On top of that, it cruised high in the air, making it an extraordinarily difficult target to strike. In gaming terms, it was a wildly overpowered Observer unit.
And on the off chance that terrible luck struck and it got blasted to pieces?
“Simple. I just buy another one.”
Dirt-cheap and effortless to field. There was a reason modern militaries loved using drones for reconnaissance.
“Ah...!”
Before the elf could voice another protest, the drone accelerated smoothly, plunging straight past the dense curtain of mist.
The watching elves gasped and squeezed their eyes shut, dreading an immediate crash. But as the seconds ticked past, no sound of an impact followed.
Far from plummeting, the drone cut effortlessly through the gray haze, its rotors slicing through the damp air with steady hums.
“H-How...?”
“It's completely... unbothered?”
Leaving the wide-eyed elves gaping in disbelief behind me, I piloted the drone toward the World Tree. Circling the massive trunk a few times was all it took to map out the entire vicinity.
“It's just like Soon-to-Die Vampire said.”
In several concentrated pockets, the white vapor hung noticeably thicker. As I zoomed in closer, monstrous, toad-like variant beasts came into sharp focus, coughing up endless spore clouds of dense mist.
None of them reacted in the slightest to my approach.
Naturally, it would never occur to primitive beasts that an inanimate construct lacking a shred of mana would be circling high above them, taking crystal-clear aerial reconnaissance.
“Still... aren't there way too many of them?”
The sheer number was absurd.
They swarmed almost every sector of the upper canopy like roaches. At this rate, sniping them down one by one would take forever.
Discarding my initial idea of picking them off individually, I opened the forum interface and created a brand-new sticky announcement.
(Photo of toad-like variant beast spitting fog spores)
These bastards are the root cause of the fog.
I'm posting their exact coordinates in this thread. Strike the designated spots, then reply below with confirmations.
*World Tree Fog Beast Target Masterlist*
1. (Photo: Canopy crown, between topmost boughs)
2. (Photo: Camouflaged against bark fissure, mid-trunk)
...
95. (Photo: Pack patrolling back and forth along lower root junction)
Will update continuously.
Eliminated targets will be crossed off in real-time. If they relocate, I'll update their new positions immediately.
Go hunting.
In any war, nothing caused a headache quite like an aerial observer providing precision reconnaissance.
I snapped dozens of high-res stills every minute, pasting them directly into the sticky notice. In response, the elves sprang into frantic action.
The forum erupted into an unprecedented frenzy of rapid-fire posts.
Even if its hollow core was devoid of its true spirit, the World Tree remained a sacred pillar. Up until now, the elves had held back their strength, dreading that stray spells might scar the sacred wood.
Now, with clear target markers, they let loose their arrows with giddy abandon, treating the whole affair like an arcade gallery game.
“Damn, they never miss.”
Their marksmanship was terrifyingly precise. They hadn't lived for centuries just for show. Arrows whistling through the damp air and focused spells dialed back in blast radius gracefully curved around sacred branches like trick shots, pinpointing the marked roosts without scraping a single leaf.
—Kieeehk!
—Gurgle-eeek!
Caught entirely off guard, the variant beasts were bombarded into paste from unseen angles, dropping like swathes of flies.
—Kreeeeeaaak!
By the time nearly half of their colony had been annihilated, one of the larger toads finally spotted the hovering drone.
Yet...
“What are you gonna do about it, you oversized wart?”
Hovering miles up in the stratosphere while utilizing maximum optical zoom, I was completely out of reach. Frustrated, the beasts scrambled into an organized retreat, shifting positions en masse across the massive boughs just like they had done against Soon-to-Die Vampire.
Unfortunately for them, evasive maneuvers were utterly pointless against me.
“You think your stubby legs are faster than my forum refresh rate?”
[Notice: Elves Mandatory Read (1st Revision)] — 5 minutes ago
[Notice: Elves Mandatory Read (2nd Revision)] — 3 minutes ago
They noticed and are scurrying around like roaches.
I'll be updating this list every 30 to 60 seconds. Keep the thread open and hit F5.
Updates will be practically real-time, so feel free to lead your shots. Happy hunting.
*Targets*
1. (Photo: Canopy crown bough) — ELIMINATED
2. (Photo: Bark camouflage) — ELIMINATED
...
95. (Photo: Lower root pack — relocated to Sector 44)
Back on modern Earth, during the golden era of the internet, I had been a degenerate board addict who held legendary status across dozens of forums. I practically inhabited the board more than the real world.
There wasn't a single recognized regular across the net who didn't know my handle.
“The forum was my entire life.”
Tracking the sluggish lumbering of medieval toad monsters was child's play compared to catching shitposters during a heated board raid.
...
“Sob... hic...”
A brief twinge of existential agony pinched my chest, but hey, I had transmigrated and landed the ultimate Head Mod gig. That had to count as a win, right?
Thud, thud, thud!
Carcasses of giant toads rained continuously down from the boughs like oversized hailstones. Disposing of the accumulating carcasses proved delightfully straightforward.
For elves who weren't just fond of soju but downright obsessed with it, every single dead amphibian was destined straight for the stewpot or deep-fryer.
Right around the time the cleanup reached its peak, a ping flashed across the corner of my interface.
User '137.7.32' has requested a private direct message.
“Oh?”
It was the World Tree.
The true World Tree had rooted itself deep in Lumelin, the city of the dark elves, to escape the suffocating grasp of the surface elves.
“Wait, wasn't it supposed to be asleep?”
Last I heard, it had grown to the size of a sapling. It must have recently awakened. Delighted to hear from it, I typed out a quick greeting.
“Got something on your mind?”
Perhaps because it accessed the Gallery externally under its own sheer spiritual willpower, the World Tree was unable to type regular text messages. Instead, it communicated exclusively through custom reaction stickers it drew and uploaded itself.
A rapid barrage of emotes flooded the chatbox.
“Hmm...”
The World Tree continued offering clues one by one, straining like a contestant in a game of charades to impart a crucial warning.
“Okay, that one's getting a bit esoteric.”
Yet who was I?
A 24/7, year-round hardcore board addict.
It didn't take me long to piece together the World Tree's coded message.
“‘Elves suffer from suffocating codependency, so don't babysit them too much’?”
Decoding the emojis produced that exact sentiment.
Having fostered the elves for thousands of years, the ancient divine tree was sharing hard-earned advice based on bitter personal experience.
The World Tree had literally been pushed to death's door once by those clingy elves.
“Doesn't hurt to be careful.”
I took the warning to heart. Switching my focus back to the drone feed, the hollow shell of the World Tree was nearly normalized. Most of the variant toads had dropped dead, thinning the obscuring white vapor to faint wisps.
“Looks like that about wraps it up.”
Over ninety percent of the target list had been eliminated. Still, lowering my guard entirely would be premature. The dimensional rift hadn't officially discharged a proper wave yet. All of this had merely been the loose vanguard trickling out from the fissure.
Right as that worry surfaced in my mind, a fresh thread shot up to the top of the concept board.
(Photo of mist violently erupting like a geyser)
(Sticker: Gigantic mutated variant frog crawling out from beyond the fissure)
THE MIST!!!!! DODGE IT!!!!! GET INTO THE CORNERS!!!!!
(Photo of the poster getting snatched away by a massive tongue mid-shot)
Heeeek
“Oh... wait, that thing's way too massive.”
It far exceeded expectations.
Just as I panned the drone's lens toward the colossal amphibian variant towering over the canopy—
Fwump—!
A colossal, barbed tongue shot out like a ballista bolt, streaking straight toward the drone.
“What the fuck?!”
The projectile's speed and range were absurd. There wasn't even time to bank the thrusters.
Crunch!
Before I could register the impact, the feed tore into jagged static, plunging into pitch-black void.
The screen remained blank. Yet my brief shock vanished just as swiftly.
“Well... actually, this works out even better.”
Reconnaissance was hardly the only function a drone could fulfill.
Scouting was merely the baseline. In modern warfare, drones shone brightest in far deadlier capacities.
Turning back to the system catalog, I navigated to the specialized models I had bookmarked earlier and began buying them in bulk.