On the same day, the construction of the "transfer station" was completed, the troops and supplies were stationed, and they had a good night's rest.
The next day, the army gathered outside the nest and prepared to march. Although they experienced a day of marching and construction yesterday, after recuperating their energy throughout the winter, the current Divine Envoy King's army has eliminated the old and weak, and its combat effectiveness and endurance have been improved to a higher level.
Although the target of this battle is not ants, but locusts. At present, these locusts don't seem to be a threat. They seem to just run away without fighting back. However, yesterday's scene of locusts frantically eating the corpses of similar species left a deep impression on the protagonist. Last night, he held a meeting and asked the commanders to brace themselves to deal with it.
The army arrived at the target grassland in a marching column. When many locusts could be seen on the edge of the grassland, the army began to form formations one by one.
The messengers shuttled back and forth. Under the leadership of the experienced legion commander, the five legions quickly formed a horizontal formation, and then the two wings moved forward to outflank them, showing the shape of crane wings.
In the center of the Crane Wing Formation, the troops are denser and the battle line is thicker. The farther toward the wings, the thinner the battle line becomes.
Because of the huge disparity in numbers, the ants formed a very long and narrow formation, trying to extend the length of the front as much as possible.
When the ants were forming their formation, the locusts that were closer had already noticed the abnormality and fled the area jumping up and down. However, they did not flee far. As long as the ants did not appear in the field of vision or were far away, these locusts would The locust feels safe.
But soon, they will pay the price for this wrong idea.
After the formation was arranged, the protagonist gave an order, and the smell and sound information representing the attack was transmitted. Together with the back-and-forth orders from the messengers, the entire Divine Envoy King's army began to move.
The front lines on both sides are like open arms, driving the locusts to scurry around. The ants are not good at speed, and they need to line up in an orderly battle line. Naturally, they cannot catch up with the jumping locusts.
However, although most of the scattered locusts were able to escape, a small number of them fled in the direction of the middle of the ant army.
By the time these locusts noticed something was wrong, it was already too late.
The ant army in the middle did not maintain a horizontal formation like the two wings. Instead, it quickly dispersed into small teams and began to separately round up the locusts that were surrounded.
This is a tactic commonly used by ants when hunting. The troops on the wings are only responsible for disturbing and driving away the prey, while the main force in the center is the real hunter.
Hunting in human history often used similar tactics. For example, the Mongols and Jurchens used a large number of hounds and falcons to drive away their prey when hunting. After the prey fell into a tight encirclement or was exhausted, the hunters would shoot them.
A small team of ants besieges a locust. As long as any part of the locust's body is firmly bitten by a few ants, it will be doomed.
A well-trained warrior will never let go, and the bitten locust sometimes cannot exert its strength to escape, sometimes it is too heavy to escape, and will soon be killed by a swarm of ants.
Ants are very efficient in hunting. They know how to bite the locust's neck and cut off the nerve center there. Although the locust's body has been cut off from the nerve connection between its head and body, its body can still move under the control of the remaining nerves, but it has lost the ability to escape and is destined to die.
This battle was not to obtain prey. After cutting off the locusts' nerves, the soldiers ignored those locusts that were still "alive" but had become vegetative, and continued to hunt other locusts.
The protagonist is watching the hunt from the top of a bush not far away, surrounded by Nobita, Hua Mulan and a squad of guards.
Although the battle seems to be fierce, and the ants are advancing steadily step by step, leaving locust corpses along the marching route, the protagonist cannot say how satisfied he is.
Although the ants' usual hunting tactics are effective, they obviously cannot catch them all.
As long as the disturbed locusts do not get into the encirclement, they will not be attacked. Even if they fall into an encirclement, some locusts who are larger, jump more dexterously, or simply have better luck can escape.
The protagonist saw a very large locust, which seemed to be about to reach adulthood. With a light leap, its wings that could not yet fly fluttered, it jumped nearly a meter away and escaped from the heavy encirclement.
The hunting efficiency of the ants is also unsatisfactory. When a small team surrounds a medium-sized locust, it often takes five or six minutes to subdue it.
Among them, the performance of the hunting ant scout team is far better than that of the big-headed ant warriors. These hunting ant warriors are born hunters. They do not need a whole team to swarm. A group of three or two is enough to subdue most locusts. Only when facing special When it comes to giant locusts, only five or six of them need to work together.
The thorn-like jaws of the Scythe ant can easily bite through the carapace at the back of the locust's neck, not only cutting off the nerves in the neck, but also directly biting off the locust's head.
However, the number of hunting ants is too small, and their effect on the battle situation is limited.
Nearly an hour later, the protagonist estimated that the number of locusts killed was only a few hundred, not even a thousand.
Even if we kill them day and night and for several hours a day, it will take more than ten days to eliminate these locusts. What's more, as the density of locusts decreases later on, the hunting efficiency will drop sharply, and the physical strength of the army will not be enough to maintain it all the time. High-intensity combat.
This drags on for too long, and the protagonist feels something is wrong, but has no choice. Ants are limited to their own size, speed, strength and organization, and it is difficult to improve their hunting efficiency.
The protagonist immediately sent a messenger to the "Southern City" and requested that all local adult ants be mobilized to join the battle to speed up the efficiency of locust extermination.
As the ant army advanced, it left behind a field of locust corpses, as well as some locusts that were not dead but were like living dead with their nerves cut off.
When the army moves away, the protagonist prepares to change the viewing location.
But at this time, a new scene appeared that made the protagonist feel nervous:
After the ant army left, the locusts that had been dispersed by the killing actually gathered again. This time, they gathered at a greater density and at a faster speed.
Because, behind the ant army, there is something very attractive to them.
The locusts that gathered first had already begun to eat the bodies of their companions killed by the ants. In a highly competitive pasture, any grass blades and grass sprouts need to go through fierce competition before they can be eaten.
There is no vegetation left in the entire pasture except rough rhizomes. Driven by hunger, the locusts apparently underestimated the threat of the ants, and instead took the opportunity to enjoy the fruits of the ants' victory.
