Chapter 106
Dragons could distinguish living beings by their colors.
Like black-and-white logic, villains were black and good people were white.
If someone's thoughts were humble, they were blue; if they were dyed in lust, they were red.
“This...!”
And Felicie, the queen of all dragons, had a keener sense of color than any other dragon.
The colors she saw when she peered into the Head Mod were...
“...A rainbow?”
They couldn't be defined as any one thing.
Various colors and shapes streamed through Felicie's mind like flashes.
An impossible color, one that should never have existed.
It wasn't even like the colors of the great beings equal to herself that she had sensed before.
“Ah.”
She came to her senses while fidgeting with the fabric she'd brought to the bridge of her nose in both hands.
Then, her face reddening slightly from embarrassment, she dropped the fabric.
But it still lay on her lap, held in Felicie's hands.
“What a fascinating color and scent.”
Joy, sorrow, anger, pleasure, desire, and so on.
Those diverse colors each asserted themselves distinctly while forming a harmonious whole.
Thus, Felicie concluded.
DragonsWillDie: You really are a being who came from another world.
Felicie accepted it as she said this.
It made sense. Otherwise, the Head Mod couldn't be the owner of a gallery even she couldn't understand.
She had no way of knowing where, how, or why the Head Mod had come from, but...
“Now I understand.”
Rather, precisely because of that, despite possessing the power to bring about the apocalyptic scene she'd witnessed,
the Head Mod could find enjoyment in browsing the gallery and posting bait.
DragonsWillDie: There's something about you...
Head Mod*: Yeah?
DragonsWillDie: I can sense warmth from you.
Dragons had transcended the limits of perception.
When Felicie first witnessed that scene, she instinctively regarded the Head Mod as an enemy.
Because even she wouldn't be able to survive that destruction.
But things were different now.
The Head Mod even felt as if the Head Mod had lived in a space cut off from the world.
DragonsWillDie: As though you spent your entire life in a tiny room.
Her curiosity rose higher than her wariness.
Felicie somehow felt as though the psychological distance between herself and the Head Mod had grown much smaller.
*
“How did she know?”
Before I became the Head Mod.
Back when I was an internet wraith wandering countless galleries under the established username SecretOfTheHumanitiesGhost.
I never left my tiny room.
I used to sit in front of my monitor with a blanket over my head and do nothing but browse galleries.
Could she possibly have known that and said it?
Head Mod*: Are you perhaps from Seoul?
So, just in case, I asked.
If she knew that I had come from another world,
I thought there was a chance, however small, that she might even know about Earth.
DragonsWillDie: (Deeply Thinking Dragon emote)
DragonsWillDie: What is Seoul?
“You don't know Seoul?”
But she clearly had no idea.
Head Mod*: Hey, ever had kimchi?
DragonsWillDie: Kimchi? That must be a food from your world?
She seemed to know only the bare fact that I had literally crossed over.
The curiosity that had flared up in me subsided.
“Well, it wasn't as if I missed it all that much.”
I had no nostalgia for my previous life.
Of course, if there had been no gallery here, I would have clung desperately to the hope of returning, but as you can see...
[Welcome to the Otherworld Destruction Gallery!]
[※No. 1 Major Gallery]
- What the fuck, how is it No. 1 when it's the only one?
- If there were even one more gallery like this, that really would be the end of the world lol
- Do magical beasts have a gallery too?
ㄴ The Outside Gallery?
ㄴ LOL, fuck, what a stupid name.
“The galleries are exactly the same here and in my previous life.”
Thanks to the shop, I wasn't particularly inconvenienced either.
Of course, there were magical beasts that wished for the world's destruction...
But stopping them wasn't especially difficult.
[Shop/Category/Nuke]
I just hoped I would never have to buy it.
“So was Felicie the only one affected?”
[A specific target has been affected.]
[The Shop/Nuke category can now be viewed.]
I remembered the warning that had appeared when I first tried to view the Nuke category.
The one saying that a specific target would be affected.
But Felicie was the only one to react so far.
So was Felicie the only “specific target”?
When I closed the shop and returned to the gallery, I soon learned the answer.
[Featured Post: “Be Afraid”]
(Image of a group of magical beasts freezing in the middle of a fight)
(Image of a group fleeing in panic)
Had they finally realized the difference in power?
[Upvotes 1021] [Downvotes 13]
- ?? Where'd they go?
- I've never seen magical beasts retreat before.
- Huh, me neither.
ㄴ 1 point
ㄴ (Image of magical beasts freezing, then fleeing)
ㄴ Fuck, why is this actually real?
“Huh?”
The moment I viewed the Nuke category,
the magical beasts started fleeing in droves.
*
[Title: What kind of phenomenon is this??]
I currently live in the sea.
It's not the backwater you people are talking about,
I'm a bona fide hermit living near the sea, in a place that belongs to no land whatsoever.
It's literally a village whose only gimmick is the gallery shop,
(Image of a red, red-eyed magical beast seen in the dead of night)
A few days ago, magical beasts stormed into our village in force, fuck.
Most of our village is elderly people, too, so after holding them off for days, I thought we were really done for.
But what the hell is going on?
(Image of magical beasts scattering in panic)
(Image of someone throwing themselves into the sea)
(Image of someone smashing their head against a closed rift)
These guys suddenly froze in place for about a minute, then started going berserk like in the pictures.
Thanks to that, we narrowly escaped death at the very last moment... fuck, what is this?
The magical beasts had suddenly started acting strangely.
In other words, the magical beasts that had been trying to kill people with extreme aggression had begun to flee.
Most of them supposedly kept bashing their heads against closed rifts.
Some even ran straight off cliffs or threw themselves into the sea because they couldn't see where they were going.
- Analyzing why magical beasts are fleeing...jpg
- They're fleeing and killing themselves?
- ??? What kind of phenomenon is this?
“Hmm...”
I couldn't tell them the truth.
After all, I couldn't exactly say that they seemed to be acting this way because I had checked out a weapon capable of wiping out a city.
The moment I said that, it was obvious people would fall into confusion like Felicie.
“No, it would be lucky if that were all.”
They might try to kill me or abduct me, like during the Adrian incident.
So I chose not to respond.
Head Mod*: (Dunno emote)
I hadn't expected magical beasts to be affected too, though.
In the end, it was actually a good thing.
Many species were already suffering here and there because of the frequent waves lately.
Others, like the dark elves, were living in hiding.
“This is actually for the best.”
I figured it was a good thing, since the magical beasts were fleeing or destroying themselves.
But whenever magical beasts quieted down, an internal problem always seemed to erupt.
- Wasn't this the Head Mod's doing?
- Honestly, if you suspect the Head Mod, upvote lol
- Ah lol, this time it was way too obvious.
Strange conspiracy theories began poking their heads up.
[Title: Why This Incident Is Highly Suspicious]
(Image from the Great War)
(Images of rifts in various forms)
I've always found it suspicious.
Why didn't the Head Mod appear before the Great War?
Why did the Head Mod appear with the gallery precisely when the world was facing destruction?
Why can't the Head Mod destroy the rifts?
Think about it: the Head Mod appeared and solved things every time an incident broke out,
so why didn't the Head Mod appear during the Great War, and why can't the Head Mod eliminate the fundamental problem—the rifts?
So I thought about it, and the answer is: “He is deliberately leaving them alone.”
Then why?
To increase our dependence on the gallery.
Since the Head Mod stopped it once during the Great War, the Head Mod is doing this so we can't rebel at all, yeah.
What happens if another Great War breaks out while we're dependent on the gallery?
If the Head Mod disappeared then, the races would lose their rallying point and be destroyed easily, yeah.
[Upvotes 1] [Downvotes 12]
- Fuck off, no.
- Seriously, why are posts like this always made by anonymous users?
- Oh, come on. You might as well say the Earth is flat lol.
ㄴ It is a troll post, but the Earth is flat too, yeah.
ㄴ The Earth is flat. What, you think it's round? Jeez.
ㄴ ???
Of course, at first, posts like these faded away after being bombarded with downvotes.
Everyone thought it was just a common trolling shitpost, nothing more, nothing less.
But the key to a troll's success was persistence.
To keep raising the issue, endlessly and repeatedly.
- Don't trust the gallery too much, yeah.
- The gallery ← this bastard is the most suspicious of all.
- Do you still not get it? Are you still blindly simping for the Head Mod just because you think the Head Mod is great?
[Title: You Idiots, Seriously lol]
The gallery's very existence is suspicious,
and despite all the mountains of evidence, you still suck up to the gallery because you think it's great?
Are you going to wait until you get stabbed in the back spectacularly before coming to your senses?
(Image of cola, fried chicken, and a bathtub)
Of course, the shop's items are great.
I don't think I could live normally without them either.
(Artistic depiction of the Head Mod)
Of course, the Head Mod is pretty.
How could anyone not simp for a pretty female half-elf archmage Head Mod?
But now we really need to come to our senses.
It will be too late to regret it once we've been stabbed in the back, for real.
[Upvotes 412] [Downvotes 503]
- Uh, fuck, could that be true...?
- The more I hear it, the more it kind of sounds true.
- Come to think of it, I do wonder where the shop's items all come from.
ㄴ Author) (So you've opened your eyes, priest emote)
ㄴ Author) Bluntly put, they might all be brought in from outside.
The gallery was basically a dopamine machine.
It overflowed with more issues and juicy topics than anyone could keep up with in a day, and its appeal lay in how it encouraged you to indulge your desires, making it hard to escape.
But that was precisely why it had downsides to match.
“Fake news.”
Hearsay, “I heard it somewhere,” and so on.
It was a problem that had occurred constantly in my previous life as well, like an annual event that came around without fail.
Namely, cyber-witch hunts and fake news.
Countless gallery users had been driven off the gallery or left emotionally devastated after becoming targets of this.
Naturally, I could have guessed that something like this would happen to me someday.
“Later than I expected.”
So instead of being surprised or flustered, I was able to react rather indifferently.
In fact, its appearance was late enough to be a little surprising.
But what the trolls didn't know was that I was a crazy gallery addict who had devoted half my life to galleries.
I had been subjected to countless hunts targeting established usernames, and I knew all too well how to deal with them.
[Notice: I Have Appeared]
Author: Head Mod*
Hi.
[Upvotes 7964] [Downvotes 4021]
- Don't give me that ‘hi’ bullshit lol.
- Head Mod, seriously, explain yourself.
- I didn't see you that way, and I'm fucking disappointed.
- Fuck, I knew this was what you'd be like. Sigh.
- I really, really want to believe you... Head Mod, please, say something, anything... ㅠㅠ
I deliberately left it alone for a few days, and quite a lot more gallery users than expected had been swept up in the manipulation.
The proportion of negative comments had risen considerably.
Then I quietly placed my hand on the system.
[Are you sure you want to close ‘Head Mod’s Market’?]
“Time to restore things to normal, right?”
It was time to carry out the first countermeasure against the Head Mod hunt.