The rain has been falling for several days.
In the past few days, the protagonist and all the residents and garrison of "Linshui City" seemed to be back in winter, unable to leave their homes.
As long as there is rain in the sky, the ants cannot go out, otherwise they will be easily drowned by raindrops and stagnant water. This is a disadvantage in size. When the protagonist accidentally leaves the nest when the weather improves, he can also see the corpses of many insects accumulated in the low-lying pools, most of which are very small.
During the occasional good weather, the ants come outside the nest one after another. At this time, it is better to say that they are relaxing than seizing the time to work.
The ants turned a blind eye to the drowned insect carcasses beside the pond next to their nests, because these carcasses were too moist and there was no way to dry them now. If they were taken directly back to the granary, they would soon be covered with mold and contaminate other food. . Therefore, the ants would rather continue to endure the lack of food than temporarily give up these readily available precious meats.
Days like this lasted for several days, with only half a day of sunshine at the longest. But it is much better than the south. In the memory of the protagonist, when he lived in the south in his previous life, everything was wet at this time. The bedding, walls and air seemed to be able to squeeze out a lot of moisture, and colorful mold took the opportunity to grow in the dark corners. It breeds vigorously, so southerners prefer to call it a "mold rain" day.
On the afternoon of the last day, the raindrops became sparse again, and the sun completely broke through the cage of clouds, dominating the earth with unparalleled power.
The ants felt from the changes in temperature and humidity that the menacing rain had stopped. Within a week, even if there were sporadic light rains, it would not become a climate.
At this time, the protagonist should set off to the main nest to attend the cumbersome king meeting, but he decided to postpone it for another day or two.
On the one hand, they are worried that there will be another rain or two. Although the old ants feel that the temperature, humidity and air pressure indicate that there will be no heavy rain in a short time, they are afraid of the worst.
On the other hand, Xiaoqing II's wings had been wetted by the humid air in the past few days and needed to be dried in the sun, which took about half a day, so it would be the evening of the same day.
Therefore, the protagonist simply set the departure time for the early morning of the day after tomorrow. Anyway, he rides Xiaoqing and flies very fast. Even if the kings of other secondary nests set off immediately, they may not arrive at the main nest earlier than him.
——I am the dividing line——
The protagonist delayed his departure, but there were still some unexpected gains.
Early the next morning, after the sun came out, the protagonist climbed up to a branch to lazily bask in the sun. He accidentally glanced north and saw a unique scene.
I saw a burst of black smoke billowing in the air on the north bank of the river, not far from the ground. This layer of black smoke is very thin, if there is no smoke, it is difficult to detect without looking carefully. But the smoke seemed to be alive, gathering and dispersing, lingering and hovering over the ground not far from the river bank.
The distance is too far for the protagonist to see clearly, but he can roughly guess that this is not a climatic phenomenon, but like a mosquito pillar, a phenomenon formed by flying insects.
Mosquito pillars are a phenomenon in which mosquitoes (chironomids, etc.) that like hot and humid weather gather and fly together in suitable weather. They even like to follow people. This phenomenon is called "mosquito pillars" in Japan.
But the protagonist feels that the creatures among them are not like mosquitoes, the concentration is not high, and the number is not that large. If the protagonist hadn't paid careful attention, he might have missed it.
At this time, Xiaoqing II's wings were completely dry. Out of curiosity, the protagonist immediately rode it and flew towards the place where the incident occurred.
The protagonist is not worried about safety issues. After a winter, the protagonist feels that he is much stronger. After experiments, he can now lift stones larger than tennis balls after entering the state of "god descending from heaven", roughly having the strength of a cat! ! !
With his current strength, few insects are his opponents, so the protagonist is not only not worried, but sometimes even wants to find a fierce insect to practice his skills with.
The only thing you have to worry about is that the area is the territory of the pavement ant barbarians. You have to be careful not to accidentally fall to the ground and be surrounded. Then the ants will really bite the elephant to death, and the protagonist has no confidence that he can successfully break through the ant army. . But now that there is Xiao Qing II, it is generally safe to fly in the sky, and the pavement ants cannot fly...
However, reality soon hit me in the face!
The protagonist flew over and took a look. The sky was so densely packed with flying pavement ants!
To be precise, they are the male and female pavement ants, the future king and queen.
They may be said to be densely packed, but in fact there are probably only a few hundred of them. They must be carrying out a wedding flight ceremony, chasing and fighting each other in complex flight trajectories in the sky.
It seems that there is not much difference between their wedding flight ceremony and that of big-headed ants, but there are also differences.
The big-headed ants gather all the candidates for the wedding flight ceremony near the main nest to carry out the ceremony. There are only hundreds or thousands of participants in the country in a year.
Thousands of immature male and female pavement ants participate in the wedding flight ceremony every year. Because there are so many of them, they are not concentrated in the main nest. Instead, participants from several sub-nests gather in a central sub-nest, and then each place organizes its own wedding flight ceremony.
This is why the protagonist can see the marriage flight ceremony of pavement ants not far from the north bank of the river. Below is a secondary nest, which is also the closest potential threat to the "bridgehead".
The reason why so many underage male and female ants of the pavement ant barbarians participate in the wedding flight ceremony every year is not only because of their vast territory and large ant colonies, but also because they suffer heavy losses in the wedding flight ceremony.
As far as the protagonist sees it, the pavement ants fight and chase each other during the wedding flight ceremony, which is exactly the same as the big-headed ants, so casualties are inevitable.
And in the sky, there are a group of hungry predators.
These predators include dragonflies, wasps and giant ladybugs. They gathered here from all directions to enjoy a gluttonous feast that was rare in this situation.
The predators bared their fangs and pounced crazily on the pavement ants that gathered in the air again and again. The clouds of flying male and female pavement ants were constantly being broken up. They reunited and formed the effect of gathering and dispersing that the protagonist saw in the distance before.
Even with the threat of predators, the pavement ants participating in the wedding flight insisted on not leaving this place. Because here, there are a large number of guards on the ground. Although the guards are powerless against predators in the air, as long as the male and female ants that have successfully mated can hide on the ground in time, they are basically safe.
The protagonist is hovering in the air, observing this spectacular wedding flight ceremony of pavement ants.
