Chapter 1579 - 1575: Road Elf

After closing the window, Ye Qiu asked Dong, who still had her face pressed against his chest, squinting like a cat:

"By the way, Dong, what kind of existence are you in this world…?"

Her true identity wasn't a human being. She had been born from an abnormal change in the mental state management system of the previous world, resulting in this artificial intelligence, the so‑called "AI."

In 2025 now, several research institutes have already announced "artificial intelligences extremely close to humans." Once a program's "intelligent actions" evolve to the limit, the border between simulated intelligence and real human intelligence gets more and more blurry, and the most cutting‑edge AIs today are almost no different from humans.

Ye Qiu had recently seen this kind of news online—it turned out the tech level of this world far exceeded his imagination.

Maybe Dong was something like that, or maybe she was actually the very first true AI to appear. But to Ye Qiu, none of that really mattered. He only knew that he treasured Dong deeply, and she respected him like a father. That alone was enough.

"Mm—this Fairy Fantasy also comes with a simulated personality program to assist players. It's called the 'navigation fairy'… Dong is classified under that."

"H‑hey?"

Ye Qiu hurriedly called out to her, and just as he was about to jump up, he finally noticed the little person sitting on his knees.

The little person was probably about ten centimeters tall. Slender arms and legs stretched out from a pale reddish‑purple dress shaped like flower petals, with two translucent wings on her back—she was the very image of a fairy. Her adorable face and long black hair were a little different in size, but you could tell at a glance that it was Dong.

"This is what Dong looks like in her Elf form."

Standing on Ye Qiu's knee, Dong put both hands on her waist and flicked her wings.

"Oooh…"

Ye Qiu, a bit moved, poked her cheek with his fingertip.

"That tickles!"

Dong giggled as she slipped away from his finger, then with a "clink" sound effect floated up into the air. She finally ended up sitting on Ye Qiu's shoulder.

"…So do you still have administrator permissions like before?"

"No…"

She answered in a slightly dejected voice.

"All I can do is provide query and login access to the wide‑area map files. I can confirm players' stats once I'm in contact with them, but it seems I can't get into the main database…"

"I see… actually…"

Ye Qiu's expression turned serious as he brought up the real topic.

"Fang Wushang… Mom seems to be here."

"Eh… Mom, she…?"

Dong flew up from Ye Qiu's shoulder and stopped in front of him.

"Did something happen…?"

"..."

Ye Qiu had originally intended to start explaining from the matter of Fang Wushang's fiancé, but right before speaking he changed his mind. It had been human negative emotions that almost destroyed Dong before. He didn't want her to be polluted by human malice any further.

"…After Fang Wushang erased the previous world, she never returned to the real world either. Ye Qiu got intel that someone in this world saw a person who looks like Fang Wushang, and that's why he came here. Of course, it might just be someone who looks similar… You could say Ye Qiu is grasping at straws right now…"

"…There's actually something like that… I'm really sorry—if I had permissions I could search the player data files…"

"It's fine, I already know roughly where. It's called… the World Tree, I think. Do you know where that is?"

"Ah, that I do know. It should be northeast of here. But it's really far. Converted into real‑world distance, it's about fifty kilometers."

"Ugh, that's really far. That's five times the diameter of the city of Einte Bottom… Speaking of which, why did Ye Qiu appear in some empty forest like this anyway?"

When Ye Qiu voiced the question that had suddenly occurred to him, Dong answered with the same puzzled look:

"That I don't know either… Maybe the location data got corrupted, or maybe you got mixed up with a player stealth‑logging in from a nearby route—Dong can't be sure…"

"If that's the case, they might as well have dropped me near the World Tree. Mm—I heard you can fly in this world."

Ye Qiu stood up and turned his head to look over his shoulder.

"Oh, yep, there are wings."

On his back, a pair of light‑gray, streamlined transparent wings—or more like insect wings—had unfolded. But Ye Qiu had absolutely no idea how to move them.

"How do I fly?"

"There seems to be an auxiliary joystick. Please hold out your left hand and make a fist."

Dong sat down on Ye Qiu's shoulder again, and he followed her instructions, stretching out his left hand. The moment he clenched his fist, a simple stick‑shaped joystick appeared.

"Okay, pull your hand forward to ascend, pull it back to descend, left and right to turn, press the button to accelerate, let go to decelerate."

"Mm‑hm…"

Ye Qiu slowly tilted the joystick forward. His wings immediately spread open, then began to gently emit phosphorescence. Ye Qiu kept pulling the stick.

"Oh…"

His body suddenly floated up, slowly rising from the forest. When he reached about a meter off the ground, Ye Qiu returned the stick to neutral and pressed the spherical button on the tip. His body glided forward at once.

After he experimented with descending and turning, he'd more or less gotten used to the controls. Compared to the flight‑type VR games he'd played before, this was a very simple control system.

"Got it. Ye Qiu basically understands now. But I'd still like to get some basic info first… Where's the closest town from here?"

Dong suddenly lifted her head.

"What is it?"

"A player is approaching. Looks like three people chasing one person…"

"Oh? A fight? Let's go take a look."

"Ye Qiu, why are you always so laid‑back."

Ye Qiu poked Dong's head, then opened a window and equipped the Early Period single‑handed straight sword from his starter items on his back. He drew the sword and swung it a few times.

"Whoa, this sword sure is tiny. And so light… Guess I'll make do with it for now…"

After sliding it back into the scabbard, Ye Qiu summoned the joystick again and gripped it.

"Dong, I'm counting on you to lead the way."

"Got it."

Dong answered in a voice like silver bells, then flew up from Ye Qiu's shoulder. Ye Qiu followed, flying after her.

The Flame Magic fired by the Fire Elf finally struck Qiuya's back.