In the Forbidden Forest outside Outpost Base No. 6, Qing Chen wrote a densely packed note, carefully tucked it into a bamboo tube, and tied it to the hawk's ankle.
But after thinking it over carefully, he removed the note and replaced it with a much simpler one.
"Go," Qing Chen said. "Take my letter back to the Giant Royal Court on the Black Leaf Plain. Oh, right, make a detour past Outpost Base No. 5. Be careful not to get intercepted."
With a long cry, the hawk beat its wings and shot into the sky, swift as a whistling arrow as it headed back toward the Black Leaf Plain.
Qing Chen watched it depart, hoping his deductions would reach the King of Giants as quickly as possible.
He turned and returned to the Outpost Base, unaware that after the hawk had flown back more than two hundred kilometers, a laser suddenly burst from the higher skies and pierced its head in an instant.
The hawk fell toward the ground as a large unmanned reconnaissance aircraft slowly descended.
The information about the hawk being shot down was transmitted in real time to the Storm Aerial Fortress.
There was more than one reconnaissance drone. The drone swarm sealing off the Forbidden Forest was like a conspiracy hanging over the sky.
Inside the command room, a soldier seated at the edge, managing all the drones, called out, "Confirmed: one hawk has been shot down. A bamboo tube was tied to its ankle. A robot has been dispatched to retrieve it."
The next moment, the drone descended low enough and dropped a metal sphere from the air.
With a thud, the metal sphere smashed through the canopy and landed on the ground. The smooth sphere unfolded, transforming into a palm-sized mechanical spider.
It