I Became a Hive Mind in the Game

Anyway, having concluded to utilize cavalry, I began cultivating them according to that conclusion, and the first step of this cultivation plan was to design the monsters that the cavalry would ride.

And the basis of that design is, naturally, deciding on the monster that will be the foundation for the newly created monster.
The conditions for selecting the base monster are very strict.
It must have excellent close combat abilities, be large enough to carry others, be fast, capable of flight, and have considerably high defense.
Of course, there aren’t many monsters that satisfy all these conditions, but I have the genes of most monsters existing in northern Korean Peninsula and information on various monsters.
Therefore, by continuously narrowing down the candidates for monsters that meet these strict conditions, I was able to narrow it down to 4 species in the end.

First among these candidates is the Owlbear, or more precisely, a subspecies of Owlbear, which would be familiar to everyone.
Instead of the original Owlbear species that merely resembles an owl in its head and part of the upper body, the subspecies has owl wings enabling flight, and possesses excellent close combat abilities befitting its bear-like appearance.
But this subspecies has one fatal problem: as it’s essentially the original species with wings forcibly attached, its flight is quite slow and it’s clumsy in aerial combat.
As such, it has many shortcomings as a mount (騎獸) for cavalry that must face various enemies, so the Owlbear subspecies was eliminated from the candidates.

On the other hand, the next monster, Pegasus, unlike the Owlbear subspecies, is fast in flight and shows excellent speed on the ground as well.
Moreover, it’s similar to horses that humans have been riding for thousands of years, so existing cavalry tactics can be utilized as is, and Pegasus’s unique psychic abilities can also be used, but…
Instead, Pegasus is inferior to other monsters in close combat. No matter how strong a horse might be, it’s no match for a bear.
Therefore, I had no choice but to give up on Pegasus, and instead examined the particularly powerful monster ‘Qiongqi’ as a candidate.

Qiongqi. Unlike other candidates, it’s the only monster whose adult form grows to grade 3, and its name is taken from Qiongqi, one of the Four Fiends in mythology.
And like the Qiongqi that inspired its name, this monster has the appearance of a giant black tiger with bat wings and ox horns, and is a rare monster that mainly appears in Northeast Asia.
In terms of combat power and speed, it’s a powerful monster even among grade 3, so it would be ideal if downgraded to grade 4 appropriately, but there’s one problem.
In the game, Qiongqi shows such a poor appearance rate that the Hunter Raptor, famous for its low appearance rate, is considered just a regular monster in comparison, and even in this world where game elements are actively applied, Qiongqi is second to none in rarity.
With an appearance probability of less than 0.0001% (1/10000), the lowest among the Four Fiends (混沌, 饕餮, 檮杌, 窮奇) monsters, there are only 5 official appearance records.
Even then, there’s only one individual hunted by hunters presumed to be the protagonists of this other world.
Therefore, there’s virtually no way for me to acquire the genes of this rare monster, so Qiongqi is impossible, and thus I finally selected Griffin, the last remaining candidate, as the base monster.

Griffin. It’s a fairly popular monster among the 50 original species that have been around since the first edition, and there are numerous subspecies and variants such as Hawkgriffin and Hippogriff.
Of course, the basic original Griffin is a medium-sized monster with the upper body of an eagle and the lower body of a lion, dignified and majestic.
The sharp eagle talons on its forelimbs easily tear through the skin of medium-grade monsters, and its hind legs, closely resembling those of a lion, have powerful jumping power thanks to tremendous muscles, allowing it to run across even fairly steep cliffs without flying.
The yellow beak on its eagle head has a bite force strong enough to crush mithril, and it can store air in air sacs located in its chest and release it through gaps in its wing feathers for various uses.
It can increase speed by ejecting wind from the gaps in the feathers of its large and beautiful wings, increase power when swinging its claws by ejecting air, shoot out wind blades by swinging its wings, and demonstrate various acrobatic maneuvers.
In other words, as Griffin is virtually the monster I wanted, I finished modifying it with just moderate adjustments.

Hive Griffin
Grade :: 4
Level :: 94
Stats
Strength :: 240
Agility :: 205
Stamina :: 265
Intelligence :: 35
Resistance :: 245
Energy :: 120
Leadership :: 0
Characteristics
Monster Factor(B), Predator(B), Hive Mind(B), Subjugation(EX), Bio Core(B), Exceptional Mount(B), Psychic Resistance(B), Close Combat Expert(C), Aerial Combat Expert(C), Tireless Stamina(C), Superhuman Strength(C), Synthetic Muscle Fibers(D), Super Regeneration(D)
Skills
Gas Manipulation(B), Advanced Combat Technique(C), Gallop(C), Flight(C), Charge(C)
Bio-weapons
Energy Claw(B), Air Blaster(C)

As Griffin was evaluated as a monster with high completeness, there wasn’t much I needed to modify significantly.
However, in the process of strengthening the originally grade 5 Griffin to grade 4, I increased its stats and added modest body enhancement characteristics without greatly disrupting the balance.
Of course, it can’t be ruled out that if it goes like this, without any irregular abilities, it might become too ordinary and end up as just a punching bag monster, but that doesn’t matter particularly.
Hive Griffin only needs to be faithful to its role as a mount, and irregularity can be solved by giving various weapons to the rider.

Hive Rider
Grade :: 4
Level :: 94
Stats
Strength :: 150
Agility :: 125
Stamina :: 165
Intelligence :: 135
Resistance :: 145
Energy :: 100
Leadership :: 150
Characteristics
Monster Factor(B), Predator(B), Hive Mind(B), Subjugation(EX), Bio Core(B), Intuition(B), Mounted Combat Expert(B), Shooting Expert(C), Close Combat Expert(C), Aerial Combat Expert(C), Skilled Cavalry(C), Superhuman Strength(C), Joint Tactics(C), Regeneration(C)
Skills
Advanced Weapon Technique(B), Advanced Shooting Technique(B), Tactics(B), Advanced Combat Technique(B), Advanced Horsemanship(B)
Bio-weapons
None.

Hive Rider. This monster, created by mixing newly acquired Orc genes with Goblin, Orc, Ogre, and various other humanoid monster genes, can absolutely not be said to have a good appearance even as a white lie.
A face that looks like a human and a lizard mixed half and half then distorted, dirty mottled skin, and scales irregularly grown all over the body.
It has an appearance that seems to have had the concept of ugliness poured into it, but unexpectedly, this 3.5-meter tall humanoid monster is quite ordinary despite its appearance.
Except for being accustomed to fighting while mounted, it’s not specialized in anything, and because it was created on the premise of using various weapons, it doesn’t particularly have any special abilities.
Paradoxically, Hive Rider has the characteristic of being closer to a hunter (player) than any other monster, and therefore it’s rather suitable for applying military information collected in various ways.
Therefore, these humanoid monsters compensate for their lack of individuality by using various bio-weapons, just like hunters do.
For example, in terms of armor, the 4-meter tall powered suits that all of them will wear are packed with psychic shield functions, force field amplification, various convenience functions such as detoxification and night vision, and synthetic muscle fibers for body enhancement.
Also, each Hive Rider is issued 1 lance, 2 close combat weapons, 2 ranged weapons, and 1 heavy weapon, and as this is for responsiveness in various environments, each weapon type is different.
If plasma fists were chosen as a close combat weapon, other plasma weapons cannot be used, and conversely, if a plasma pistol was chosen as a ranged weapon, other plasma weapons cannot be used.
In a normal army, they would face supply problems because each uses different weapons, but Hive Riders are different.
As they are clearly grade 4 medium-grade monsters, all their bio-weapons receive energy from their own bio-cores, so they don’t have to worry about reloading or looting.
Theoretically, as long as the bio-core holds up and doesn’t overheat, there would be no problem even if they kept firing a laser machine gun (ranged weapon) all day long.

Anyway, now that the long-desired cavalry has been organized and the newly acquired territory is entering the final stages of stabilization, I must finally face those guys.
‘…Can I do it?’
The strongest monster in modern Korean Peninsula, settled in Pyongyang. The grade 0 Hive Mind.