Episode 76 — The Sufferings of the Testers and the Mud-Stained Protocol

"Fieldwork is ninety percent patience and wasted effort."

I remember a narration from a documentary saying that once. Back then, I was sitting in an air-conditioned room, munching on chips, thinking, "Man, that looks tough," as if it were someone else’s problem. Now, I understand the weight of those words as if lead had been poured into my stomach. Well, I’m still sitting in an air-conditioned room munching on chips, so that part hasn't changed.

I sank into my Throne of Sloth and gazed at the quiet forest outside. Four days have passed since Elishua and the others headed for the Ern Forest. All I can do is wait and trust the "raw data" they’ll eventually bring back.

(This silence is the worst for my stomach. It brings back bad memories of standing in front of a server rack all night, watching a progress bar stay stuck at 99% during a deployment.)

On my lap, Tama was flicking her tail back and forth, looking somewhat restless. This time, I didn't grant them flashy magic; I gave them a gritty, obsessive, physical debugging method called "Observation." I wondered if that protocol was functioning correctly in the depths of the despair-ridden elven village. I took a sip of my cola and stared at the ceiling fan as if offering a prayer.

***

Meanwhile, in the Ern Forest.

There stood a researcher who no longer bore any resemblance to "Felsen’s exclusive mage."

"...It is... so hot. The air... feels rotten."

Elishua wiped the greasy sweat from her forehead with the sleeve of her robe, which was stained with mud and sap. The air was filled with a cloying, pungent smell of decaying fruit. The forest, which should have been under the protection of the spirits, had become a massive "dead directory." From the trees above, the sound of something rustling rained down.

"Lady Elishua. Your hands have stopped. ...On to the next point."

At the sound of the voice from behind, Elishua moved her heavy neck. There stood Bartos. He had discarded his glittering full-plate armor and was now in a mud-stained shirt. His face was covered in stubble and his eyes were sunken, but he gripped a piece of paper—the "Spec Sheet" entrusted to him by Zect.

"...I know. ...I know, but..."

With trembling hands, Elishua spread the "white cloth" Zect had given her onto the ground. She hadn't looked in a mirror once during these past four days. Her selfie camera now hung carelessly from her neck, serving as nothing more than an "evidence collection device."

Magic hadn't worked. The elven elders were merely watching in prayer as trees that had lived far longer than themselves withered away. Every time she witnessed the depth of that despair, Elishua’s heart felt worn down, on the verge of breaking.

"Lord Bartos... can we really save the village with something that feels like... child's play?"

"Master Zect said it was the 'Spec.' What we need is not doubt, but accurate sampling. ...We cannot allow even a one-millimeter deviation, nor a single missed specimen."

Bartos knelt back down and resumed burying the plastic cups. He followed Zect’s instruction to keep the rims "flush" with the ground as if it were a knightly vow. He left not even a fingernail’s width of a gap between the earth and the cup. That abnormal obsession was the only "discipline" still functioning in this dying forest.

Elishua bit her lip and set the white cloth under the branch of a dying fruit tree. Then, she took her magic staff—the "key" that usually wove high-level formulas—and used it as a mere stick, striking the branch sharply once. She had lost count of how many times she had repeated this.

*Thwack.*

The dry sound echoed. Immediately after, something rained down onto the white cloth with a sound like pattering rain.

"---!"

Elishua swallowed a scream. What was wriggling on the cloth wasn't debris from dead leaves. They were caterpillars, some looking as if they were covered in white powder, others coated in mucus.

Thousands, tens of thousands of "bugs" were visualized as physical mass through the method Zect had granted them. Tiny life forms that had been processed as "forest background" by magical detection were now revealed before Elishua’s eyes as "clear enemies" devouring her home.

"So this... this is... the cause..."

In Elishua’s eyes, despair was replaced by a profound rage... and the light of someone who had found the "solution." She frantically began clicking the shutter of the digital camera. Parasites devouring the skin of the fruit, sipping the sap, collapsing the system from within.

But the problem started here. How could they deal with such a massive number of enemies?

Just then, Bartos looked up from the ground. Something unusual was happening in one of the pitfall traps he had buried.

"Lady Elishua. ...One has arrived over here as well."

Elishua ran over to Bartos. At the bottom of the cup, a single "reddish-brown ant" had fallen in. It was a common, tiny ant—the kind the elves usually loathed as a "nuisance to be swept away."

But Zect had said: "If you find a winner—a strong-looking ant—I want you to perform behavioral observation."

Elishua used tweezers to pick up a caterpillar from the cloth and dropped it into the cup. Faced with a giant enemy several times its own size, the tiny ant didn't retreat for even a second.

*Click.*

Small but sharp jaws clamped onto the caterpillar's neck. The caterpillar writhed and thrashed inside the cup, but the ant wouldn't let go. Not only that, but as if responding to the faint pheromones released by the ant, other ants began diving into the cup one after another from the rim.

A few seconds later. What remained was no longer a giant enemy, but a lump of meat waiting to be efficiently dismantled and carried away.

Silence. In the forest filled with the smell of decay, that tiny slaughter looked like a perfectly refined "defense program."

"This is it..."

A single tear rolled down Elishua’s cheek, drawing a white line through the mud on her skin. She peered into the cup without regard for the filth, carving the image of those tiny guardians into her heart—and into the recording device.

"Lord Bartos. ...I’ve found them. ...The ultimate patrol soldiers Master Zect spoke of."

Bartos gave a firm nod, despite being covered in mud.

"Good. Mission accomplished. ...Let us return to Felsen. To our Master."

The two of them, battered and exhausted, left the elven village clutching the "raw data meant to save the world." Their backs looked more noble and proud than they ever had in their glittering ceremonial clothes—the backs of true "testers."

***

The chime of my intercom sounded with a heavy rhythm today.

I didn't even need to check the monitor. I stood up from my throne and opened the front door myself. Standing there were two heroes, smelling of mud and sweat, but with eyes full of unwavering conviction.

"Master Zect. ...We have returned."

Elishua held out the scratched digital camera. The moment I took it, my phone’s notification tone rang out.

[L-Points: +2,000,000L (Environment Debugging Complete: Elven Village - Transitioning to Problem-Solving Phase)]

"Welcome back. ...You both did a great job."

At my words, Elishua finally smiled as if her strength had left her, and Bartos gave a quiet, deep bow.

A new "correct answer" had been brought back to Felsen.

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