I Became a Hive Mind in the Game

Immediately after my advance order was given, Theseus headed west with the monsters I provided and the sub-dragons, children of the Fire Dragon.
The primary target is the habitat of the Lizardman tribe located relatively to the north—the so-called Lizardman Jungle.
As it’s a jungle with densely growing plants and trees tens of meters high, unimaginable in the previous modern Earth, most of the forces I gave to Theseus are species specialized for the jungle.
For reconnaissance, there are small to medium-sized monsters like Hive Raptors and Drake Bats, which are about the size and shape of slightly larger bats among the Fire Dragon’s sub-dragons, and Wyverns and Drakes were also brought in large numbers to surround and burn down the jungle.
Thanks to the relatively short distance, Theseus arrived at the edge of the Lizardman Jungle before long and began to surround it by first pushing reconnaissance monsters into the jungle, but… here, something completely unexpected happened.
[Oh great one, please save us!]
‘…?’
From a Lizardman who was accidentally discovered and brought before Theseus for information gathering, a plea for salvation was suddenly heard through psychic communication.
‘…Could a mere Lizardman do this too?’
Naturally, I, who had been sharing vision with Theseus until now, was taken aback, but that surprise was just a momentary flash.
‘Theseus, I’ll handle the questioning directly.’
[Yes, Mother.]
As such sensitive matters need to be resolved directly, I mimicked Theseus’s psychic wavelength and then directly questioned the creature—the Lizardman—through psychic communication using Theseus, in a roughly dragon-like manner.
{‘I ask you.’}
[Y-Yes!]
{‘Do lowly creatures like you communicate in this way?’}
First, feeling the need to know more about this creature’s psychic communication, and further about the Lizardman race, I began interrogating him about this.
[Yes! All of our kind can use it!]
Starting with psychic communication, to their society and ecology. After asking about all sorts of things, I was able to gain information about Lizardmen by secretly peeking into their memories.
Lizardmen. A type of humanoid monster, their appearance looks like an imaginary reptile that’s a mix of lizards and crocodiles walking around.
I already knew about their communal child-rearing where they lay eggs in one place and raise them together, and their class system, but I learned a few quite interesting and useful things as well.
First, there’s a detailed division of their class system. They have a special class system in the order of Priest-King – Hierophant (royal family) – Warrior – Artisan – Worker – Slave, and interestingly, their class is determined from birth in the spawning pool where they lay eggs.
In addition, these Lizardmen communicate using innate psychic communication instead of vocal language, and the higher the class, the more powerful psychic communication ability they have.
They say that a Hierophant can use psychic communication to contact a target inside the jungle from anywhere in the jungle, so there was a possibility that this one came for reconnaissance.
Therefore, I instructed Theseus to block the psychic communication connected to him except for me (I later learned that he wasn’t communicating).
And at the same time, I changed the topic and asked this Lizardman about another subject.
{‘Good. Then the next question, why did you say such things to me, who is not even your kin?’}
[That’s because we used to serve someone of the same kind as you, great one, in the past.]
{‘The same kind… you say?’}
[Yes.]
At the Lizardman’s words, I was momentarily confused.
No matter how rational a monster might be as long as it’s not human, it felt somewhat strange that they had such a relationship with a dragon, a true dragon famous for being violent, despite being of a different species.
{‘What did this kin look like? Also, what kind of relationship did you have?’}
So, thinking I needed more detailed information, I questioned the Lizardman, and he answered diligently.
[He was one with scales like a green forest. We had a relationship where we took care of his children in exchange for protection, but… it’s said that he suddenly disappeared one day.]
‘If it’s green, it’s a Forest Dragon… could it be that one?’
And with that simple clue (that it was a Forest Dragon with green scales) and the fact that it was a monster that lived on the Korean Peninsula, I thought I knew who that dragon was.
In the 5th Lobster Subjugation, there were a total of 4 monsters that appeared on the Korean Peninsula after being controlled and strengthened by Lobster’s unique characteristic.
The Giant Killer Hawk who was the Easy difficulty boss, the Jangsan Tiger who was the Normal difficulty boss, the Burning Jagatan who was the Hard difficulty boss, and the Extreme difficulty boss—the named Forest Dragon, Guardian of the Forest, is the identity of the dragon that disappeared from this jungle that I’m thinking of.
‘Then it all makes sense… but it doesn’t matter now.’
However, even if I know this identity, it’s not like I can bring a dead dragon back to life, so it doesn’t have much significance.
Just satisfied that I could know he wasn’t lying without having to bother looking into his mind to confirm, I immediately asked the next question.
{‘I see… Then how did you come to know of my existence?’}
[Uh, Mother? I’m not that fancy in self-proclamation…]
‘Theseus, stay quiet. This is more convenient right now.’
Ignoring Theseus, who was making a fuss inwardly as if embarrassed, the answer the Lizardman gave me was more than I expected.
[My father is the Priest-King, at the top of the Lizardmen. He’s an excellent shaman (psychic user), and he foresaw the great one’s descent and instructed me to come here and wait.]
{‘…Foresight?’}
I momentarily fell into a sense of crisis upon hearing that word with such impactful implications that I couldn’t just ignore, but thinking calmly, something similar existed in the game as well.
‘Wasn’t there something like short-term future prediction at the top of space-type psychics?’
That psychic, which could be used according to some principle of physics about time and space, was so poorly performing that it wasn’t used to the point where I couldn’t even remember it.
Thanks to the limitations of the game, at best it only showed an afterimage of a few seconds later as predicted by AI, but… now that it’s become reality, if this psychic has been trained for decades, it’s ambiguous to say it’s impossible.
{‘Good. Then the next question. Why are you requesting salvation?’}
So I turned the topic again to ask about the reason why he, and the Lizardman Priest-King who would be behind this Lizardman, requested salvation from Theseus.
If the Priest-King is a psychic user capable of predicting even days—or more—into the future, he should be able to sweep away any dangerous elements occurring in this vicinity by himself.
And the answer that came back was quite unexpected.
[Actually… we are currently being invaded by Orcs led by an Orc Lord.]
{‘…Orcs?’}
[Yes. They are inferior creatures that lived in the plains south of our jungle. But they are quite strong and originally outnumbered us 10 to 1, and after their king, the Orc Lord, appeared, their numbers increased 5 times and they united, according to my father…]
Starting with those words, the Lizardman spilled out the current situation in a rambling manner.
Currently, the number of Lizardmen is about 10,000, while the number of Orcs is 50 times more. It began with the appearance of a powerful leader, the Orc Lord, who united them into a single faction in one fell swoop.
Individual combat power was slightly inferior on the Orc side due to their crude equipment and the terrible environment for outside life forms that is the jungle, but that’s old news now, he says.
As Orcs learned technology through looted equipment and started producing slightly less crude equipment, now they’ve reached a point where they can barely be on par only if they fight with lots of traps set in the jungle.
In addition, the Priest-King, the only high-grade Lizardman monster who could stop the high-grade monster Orc Lord, has been severely weakened due to advanced aging as a price for overusing foresight in the past.
Moreover, that Orc Lord was born with the ability to nullify psychic effects near himself—presumably Anti-Psychic—so they are currently in a precarious situation.
The capital where the great temple is located is barely being defended by the Priest-King, but other areas are being cheerfully plundered and ransacked by Orcs.

[Please, please I beg you!]
Thud! Thud! Thud!
{‘…’}
So now, this Lizardman, who is even a prince, is pleading with Theseus, risking the threat of being enslaved or just eaten, even to the point of banging his head on the ground.
‘Theseus, what do you think?’
[It seems we wouldn’t really need these guys, but… I feel somewhat reluctant to kill those who promise obedience.]
After hearing Theseus’s thoughts, I fell into contemplation.
While thinking we don’t really need to save them, at the same time, their actions slightly stimulate the very small amount of humanity left in me, making me feel strange about just abandoning them.
But as Theseus inwardly thinks he can’t just leave those Lizardmen alone, I opened my mouth after much deliberation.
{‘You must obey and become one with the great me. Even so, do you want salvation?’}
[Y-Y-Yes! Gladly!]
{‘Then… good. I shall save you.’}
[Thank you! Thank you! Great, great…]
{‘I am Theseus.’}
[Yes, Lord Theseus!]
The answer was acceptance.
Thinking that although their bodies will have to be reconstructed to become part of the Hive Mind anyway, it would still be better than the Dolphinmen.