In the early morning, the morning light penetrates through the gaps between the layers of leaves, and then shines on the surface of each nest through the dense mist, slowly warming the outside of the nest.
"Plop", a drop of condensed dew fell from the tip of the leaf, and fell into dots of crystal on the hard shell of the ant mound made of concrete.
The Argentine ant male ant slave "A Sheng" was still sleeping greedily. He had just emerged from the pupa and was at the age of lethargy. However, the tentacles next to the wall moved, as if he was keenly aware of the movement of the dewdrops hitting it just now.
However, the ferocious overseer ants have already rushed in, making anxious trills and at the same time whipping the Argentine ant workers who were still huddled in a ball and refusing to get up with their tentacles, urging them to go to work.
These Argentine ants worked continuously for 12 hours on the canal construction site yesterday and were very tired. They ate and did some cleaning only after returning to the nest, and it was already very late when they went to bed. In addition, there was an autumn rain last night and the room was slightly cool, which made the slaves not rest well. They were too tired to get up today.
Although ants usually only need a few naps from time to time to replace sleep, they need a long period of sleep to recover after continuous heavy physical labor.
The big-headed ants and pavement ants who oversee the work do not give them enough sleep time every day - the construction period is tight, and "Floating Leaf II" can't wait for these slaves to work around the clock.
Seeing that the friction sound and the awakening effect of the antennae were not good, these overseer ants began to bite with their jaws. Their mouths were very measured, and they attacked sensitive organs such as the antennae, which would make the slave ants feel very painful and wake up, but If the control is good, it will not cause any real harm - if the slave is hurt for no reason, the big and small steward ants will be angry!
The Argentine ant slaves were stung one by one. A few irritable ants immediately wanted to fight back, but after seeing the identity of the overseer, they retreated in despair...
Most of these overseer ants are equipped with gleaming jaw knives. Although many of them are injured, it does not mean that they are easy to deal with. "A Sheng" knew that these supervisors were retired regular army soldiers and were very powerful.
Last time, three Argentine ants lost their temper and tried to attack a big-headed overseer ant that was missing one of its limbs. However, they were all killed by the opponent in two or three strokes, making the other Argentine ants become very docile in an instant.
Of course, this also includes his own contribution to the comfort - "A Sheng" thought. He had been awakened by the noise. Although he was a little irritable, he still cooperated with the supervisor rationally and gathered the slaves under his command.
Although the Argentine ants gathered together are good laborers, they are prone to spontaneous sporadic resistance. It would be much better if there were male ants to sit down and comfort them.
This is different from most slave ant tribes. Other slave ants are very cautious when there are no male or female ants to command them. They regard themselves as fellow slave ants based on their smell and will not resist.
Argentine ants seem to be born with aggressive resistance genes, and the constant resistance makes slave owners and overseers very troubled. Fortunately, "Floating Leaf II" later discovered that these Argentine ants were very obedient to the male ants, and decided to send some of the male ants that had been won over to the construction site to assist, which allowed the Argentine ant slaves to stabilize.
"A Sheng" is such a lucky male ant. Before he emerges from the pupa, all the male ants will be killed except for a few male ants who stay to match the female ants.
After getting up sleepily, the slave ants, comforted by the scent and tentacles of "A Sheng", lined up obediently and got out of the nest where they had rested for the night. They didn't look unruly at all.
This nest chamber is located on the outermost side of the ant mound. The thin layer of ant concrete wall shell is not very warm, so most ants will move underground in winter.
It is early autumn, and the temperature is not bad. The empty nest chambers, which are the coldest at night, have become the places where slave ants sleep. They can only huddle together and try to keep warm. The room temperature of about 20 degrees at night has already made the ants feel a little uncomfortable. cold.
After most of the slave Argentine ants walked out, "A Sheng" left a few ants to clean up the filth in the house. This was left by the slaves last night. They were not allowed to leave the house. The entrances and exits were guarded by soldiers. It can only be solved in the nest room.
After cleaning, "A Sheng" got out first and saw that the slave ants had received today's meal. Slave ants can eat two meals a day to cope with the high physical exertion, one in the morning and one in the evening.
But the food for both meals was very poor. What they received was often moldy, rotten or dried into powdery junk food swept out from the warehouse. It was all made into a puree or powdery shape, and water was added to form a ball. One for each slave ant.
This kind of food tastes hard to swallow. Fortunately, the slave ants are not picky about the taste of food. They just need to eat enough. As soon as I received the food, I couldn't wait to stuff it into my stomach to satisfy my already hungry appetite.
In their simple and simple minds, they may still expect that the food dumplings given to them should have more meat and less vegetarian food, and they would be very satisfied.
But "A Sheng" knew how uneasy and well-intentioned the slave owners were. Once he was called to the conference room and accidentally touched the cobblestones on the ground. He happened to hear the slave owners discussing: There are so many slave corpses now that the cemetery can't pile them up. Should some of the corpses be made into dumplings for the slaves? eat.
Fortunately, another big-headed male ant was in charge, and he was worried that this would cause a plague, so he vetoed it.
"A Sheng"'s behavior was not discovered. He was called over and assigned some tasks and then retreated. He still felt sick in his heart. This was the second time that he lost favor with these slave owners.
For the first time, a male ant named "Aguang" told him some information, which shocked him and made him not want to continue living like this for the first time.
"A Sheng" went to ask for his own food from the ant responsible for distributing food. As a male ant and the right-hand assistant of the supervisor, his food was much better, not those garbage dumplings.
But the standard of food for slave ants is similar to that of ordinary worker ants. The food is different every day. Most of them are vegetarian food, sometimes some meat food. When there is no meat food, they will get some protein-rich liquid food that has been beaten into a pulp. I don’t know. What it is, it tastes okay.
And he had seen the food of those managerial-level big-headed ants and male pavement ants. They had a lot of meat and seemed to have delicious drinks. He was really drooling.
After breakfast, it’s time to start work.
"A Sheng" looked up at the sky. It was overcast and windy. It was another rough day. He didn't know if dozens of the thousands of slave Argentine ants he had commanded would die today or whether they would die next day. What about a hundred?
