This puzzle is part of the Monthly Topic Challenge #1: Restricted Title: xkcd 1xxx
More like Words for Sets of Small, hah!
Intrusion [3]
Aurora [2]
Consortium [2]
Sord [1]
Convocation [1]
Maelstrom [3]
What am I?
Checking your answer (Hint):
The final word is four letters long
You are a ...
... CROW.
The words in the list are ...
... collective nouns of animals:
an intrusion of COCKROACHES;
an aurora of POLAR BEARS;
a consortium of OCTOPUSES;
a sord of MALLARDS;
a convocation of EAGLES;
a maelstrom of SALAMANDERS.
It looks as if the numbers ...
... described positions. But if we take the [n]th letter from each word, we get COCMEL, which doesn't have four letters and isn't really a word.
But there's an important hint:
More like Words for Sets of Small, hah!. — The useful list of animal names also lists the names for young animals of each species:
cockroach ↠ NYMPH [3]
polar bear ↠ CUB [2]
octopus ↠ FRY [2]
mallard ↠ DUCKLING [1]
eagle ↠ EAGLET [1]
salamander ↠ LARVA [3]
The letters at the given positions in the names for the young spell MURDER.
And that's ...
... famously the collective noun for CROWS.
:)
$\endgroup$