Southern Hills, [South City].
Although this place is still far away from the battlefield for the time being and cannot see much of the chaos before the war, it is still busy. Whether on the ground or in underground nests, ants are in a hurry.
They were busy packing their luggage, preparing to wait for the arrival of the large army migrating overland in two days, supplying them with food, and then follow the large army.
In the nest inside the tree stump, the protagonist ignored the ants scurrying around him. Instead, under the guidance of a large worker ant, he went straight to the underground part of the nest closest to the bottom.
A large worker ant led several soldier ants to guard the intersection of a remote passage, blocking the way with a light ball made of ant silk and fibers.
Seeing the Angel King and the big worker ants, the guards used their tentacles to confirm their identities, and then moved away the ball blocking the road. It seemed that this place was very heavily guarded.
Walking into this secret place isolated from the world, there are many and very bright fluorescent bacteria on both sides of the passage, and there is a fishy smell and stench floating in the air, which makes this place even more unique.
Walking into the large nest room, there were no ants inside, except for dozens of large and small clay pots on the ground.
The protagonist opened the lid of one of the clay pots, and a strong smell immediately wafted out, making him nauseous.
Inside the clay pot, there was half a pot of culture medium composed of rotting meat and feces, with nematode-like things squirming on it, glowing with a disgusting and threatening white sheen.
What is fed here with rotting garbage and excrement are not bugs, but the larvae of parasitic bacteria.
These are the parasitic bacteria that once threatened [Dongyang City], and may even be the culprit behind the mysterious disappearance of all ant colonies in the old [Dongyang City].
After fighting the parasite in the southern hills and finally driving the enemy away, the protagonist captured some parasite strains.
Although these parasitic strains are very dangerous, the protagonist still built a laboratory in [Southern City], which was relatively isolated at that time, to conduct research.
The protagonist is very interested in the ability of parasitic bacteria to control almost all animals and allow different types of creatures to coexist harmoniously and even fight together. If the secret in this regard can be cracked, will the Legion of the God Envoy King be able to tame all animals?
However, in the two years since its establishment, this laboratory has not been able to make many breakthroughs in this area. Even other aspects, such as how parasitic bacteria confuse ants so that they are not aware of their own existence, have not made progress.
The only achievement of this laboratory is the discovery of how to effectively raise parasitic strains. It is actually simple. You only need to maintain a suitable environment and add some organic matter. Whether it is food waste or ant feces, these parasitic strains can absorb nutrients. And grow into adults, and then quietly wait for prey to come.
Because there were no results for a long time, all the big worker ants who were doing research here were later transferred to [Dongyang City]. This place was almost semi-idle, with only four big worker ants and a few soldier ants remaining.
Because adult parasitic bacteria are too dangerous, extremely aggressive and parasitic, the parasitic strains in the laboratory will be killed once they are close to maturity, leaving only small strains.
Anyway, the large worker ants who participated in the experiment found that the killed individuals that were about to mature can be quickly grown into new strains as long as they are twisted into longer segments and placed on the culture medium. The asexual reproduction ability is very strong, so there is no need to worry about it. Mature individuals will render it unable to reproduce.
No matter what, there are demons in this laboratory. If they accidentally leak out or get out of control, it will be a lot of fun.
Therefore, the place is heavily guarded, and the parasitic strains are all locked up in clay pots. It would be more laborious to open the pots with their own strength, and the sound they make can also give warning time to the guards.
There is also a special ball blocking the door, guarded by large worker ants and soldier ants that are not easily confused and disturbed by parasitic bacteria, forming a second line of defense.
Anyway, there has been no incident of leakage of parasitic bacteria in this laboratory so far.
The protagonist inspected them, ordered more than ten clay pots containing nearly mature individuals to be carried to the door, ready for action, and then left.
In the afternoon of the same day, a group of large worker ant fly knights arrived at [Southern City]. They are the only group of flying knights in the Angel King's army that use flies as mounts. Most of the flying knights' mounts have been replaced by bees. .
Fifty soldier ants were already prepared in the city. Each of them held a small clay pot that had been sealed with ant glue, climbed on the back of the fly, and fixed it with an ant silk safety belt with the help of the ground worker ants.
Then the flies took off and headed west.
Their target is the [New Yancheng] area, which is the newly fallen [New Yancheng] and several other sub-nests close to the salt marsh.
After crossing the actual control line of the Angel King's Army, the landscape on the ground immediately appeared different. There are no busy ants coming and going around the nest, and there are no endless streams of ants on the ant trails.
But without the ants picking, hunting, and grazing, the vegetation grew lusher in just a few days. The vampire-like aphids lack the care of the ant herders and have been almost wiped out by ladybugs and others, while a large number of other insects are also extremely happy because the top predator has disappeared.
This scene is just like the uninhabited land in the human world is a paradise for wild animals.
The flying knights and soldier ants who were performing the mission did not pay attention to this small difference on the ground. They flew straight to an old battlefield beside the salt marsh.
This battlefield is littered with corpses, and there are corpses of giant crabs everywhere. It is the place where the Destroyer and the crabs fought two days ago.
Now the body of the Destroyer has been carried away by the Little Destroyer, but the body of the Crab is still there. After two days, the air here is filled with the strong stench of rotten river food.
Many scavenging insects, such as flies and maggots, snails, ground turtles, etc., are feasting on many corpses. Some even got in and out of the cracks in the carapace, giving off a sense of corruption and excitement.
There are even other crabs coming here, opening their carapace, eating the flesh of their dead species, or attacking snails and other insects to feast on them.
The arrival of a swarm of flies did not disturb the feast until the ants came down, scaring away many nearby insects.
The ants ignored the panicked insects, avoided the few living crabs, landed, then placed the clay pot filled with parasitic bacteria on the corpse and opened the lid.
The parasitic hyphae crawl up the rotting carcass, take root, and absorb nutrients and mature quickly within a few hours. Around the parasitic fungus, those animals that saw the ants leave and returned to eat turned a blind eye to the parasitic fungus.
They don't know that a disaster is about to happen!
