Zhang Lang and the scout captain have walked about ten miles away
"Another one?" Zhang Lang frowned and looked towards a small hill not far away. He saw a strange tree growing on the bare hill!
At first glance, this strange tree looks like an ordinary tree. It is three to five feet tall, with a green crown, and palm-sized leaves swaying in the wind... But in the wilderness full of red earth and yellow sand, where no grass grows, such a tree suddenly appears. A big tree, really weird.
On the way here, I seem to have seen a few big trees like this. I didn't pay attention to them before, but now it seems that they are really weird...
"That's not a tree!" the scout captain explained: "It's also a strange insect!"
"Strange insect?" Zhang Lang was stunned: "How did the insect become like this?"
"We don't know either!" The scout captain shook his head: "We have investigated it before, but when touched, this thing will make a ghostly scream, which is deafening, and it can easily attract insects. From then on, we no longer dare to approach it. …”
"Make a strange noise?" Zhang Lang frowned: "Let's go up and take a look, maybe we can find the insect's weakness!"
Arriving at the foot of the hill, Zhang Lang signaled the scout captain to stay away and wait. He jumped up the hillside and came to the strange tree.
"Sure enough!" Zhang Lang's eyes widened and he looked closer. This was indeed a strange insect that looked like a big tree!
This insect looks like a centipede, several feet long, with numerous tentacles sticking out of its tail that are stuck in the ground, and countless green flat tissues sprouting from the front of its body, which look very similar to leaves and open to the sky. From a distance, they are no different from the crown of a tree. .
Zhang Lang frowned, drew out his long knife, and stabbed it into the insect's body, which was unexpectedly fragile. The insect was injured and suddenly trembled all over. A strange, blood-red, wrinkled organ soon protruded from the crown of the tree. It suddenly trembled violently and let out a piercing scream!
The scream shook Zhang Lang's eardrums. Although it was not enough to cause harm, it also made him frown. As for the scout captain, although he had taken precautions and retreated far away, he was still disturbed by the shouts and covered his ears.
Zhang Lang raised the knife again and stabbed it into the sound-producing organ!
Poof, the noise stopped suddenly, a stream of thick mucus sprayed out, and the red organ suddenly shriveled up, and then the entire tree insect became limp and died.
Phew... The scout captain finally let go of his hands, breathing heavily and looking very painful. If he got close to this, he might be easily shocked to death on the spot!
After confirming that the tree bug was completely dead, the scout leader dared to get closer and climb up the hill: "This thing once shocked my comrades... I don't know what the hell it is!"
Zhang Lang frowned and looked at the insect corpse: "The green leaves make noise...I know what this is!"
"This thing is the herald of insects!"
"Herald?" The scout captain was puzzled. Zhang Lang explained: "We dissected insect corpses before and found that they had organs for receiving sound waves. We speculated that the insect king used sounds that humans could not hear to control the insect swarm. But the insect king left If it is too far away, the sound cannot be transmitted. And this kind of tree insect that makes noise is the herald that links the insect king and the insect swarm!"
"You mean, the instructions of the Insect King are transmitted all the way to the front line through trees?" The scout captain understood.
Zhang Lang nodded. In fact, he felt that the insect king should use other methods to contact these tree insects, and then the tree insects would translate its instructions into sound waves and send them out. But it’s too troublesome to explain to these ancients, it would be nice if they could understand.
"This can also explain why the insects retreat at night!" Zhang Lang pulled off a leaf:
"This tree bug is a semi-plant bug. It should obtain nutrients through photosynthesis, so it will sleep at night. Without the herald, the insect swarm will become chaotic and violent, so it retires and sleeps."
"Photosynthesis?" This is still a new word to the ancients.
Zhang Lang thought for a while: "In other words, when the sun sets, these big trees will go dormant, so the insects will also retreat."
The scout captain's eyes lit up when he heard this: "Then let's find these big trees and chop them down. The insects won't be able to attack them tomorrow."
This proposal is very attractive to Zhang Lang. Indeed, as long as the insects do not attack tomorrow and survive the sixth day, their mission will be completed, and there will be no need to go deep into the insect den as dangerously.
But then he thought about it, this was just his guess, what if it didn't work. And who knows how many tree bugs there are in the bugs. If another batch is deployed tomorrow morning, all the efforts will be wasted.
"This is a way..." Zhang Lang nodded.
"Then let's go clean up the tree bugs now?" the scout captain asked cautiously. Facing Zhang Lang alone, the notorious insect-killing demon king, he was really a little scared...
"No!" Zhang Lang looked to the north: "Let's continue looking for the insect nest!"
"Ah?" The scout captain hesitated, and Zhang Lang glanced at him: "Are you afraid? If you don't dare to leave, can I hold you up?" As he said that, he raised his hand to support the scout captain's horse's belly, exerting slight force. , the horse was lifted up by him, and the horse was so frightened that its hooves stiffened and it did not dare to move...
"I can just walk by myself!" The scout captain knew that he had no choice but to lead the way.
After more than an hour of trekking, we finally saw the edge of the insect swarm almost a hundred miles north of the fortress.
The two climbed to a high ground and looked around. They saw millions of bugs, densely packed on the ground, each curled up and falling into sleep. Among these insect swarms, at regular intervals, there is a huge insect nest that seems to be made of clay and is nearly a hundred meters high. The insect nest is full of holes, which should be the passage for the insects to enter and exit.
"There are so many..." Although he had seen the insect swarm army more than once, now that he came to the insect nest, the scale and momentum still shocked the scout captain.
"So many, where is the Insect King?"
"It should be the biggest one!" Zhang Lang pointed to the huge insect nest in the center of the swarm, which was several times taller than an ordinary insect nest.
"Okay, you can go back!" Zhang Lang glanced at the scout captain.
"Ah?" The scout captain was stunned: "You want to go in by yourself?"
"Then you coming with me?"
Zhang Lang glanced at him, and the scout captain hesitated. He was not afraid of death, but this kind of death was meaningless! And with Zhang Lang's combat effectiveness, it seems that it makes no difference whether he can be taken with him or not, and he is still a bit of a burden.
The scout captain took out a small bag and handed it to Zhang Lang: "The powder inside is applied to the body, making it difficult for insects to detect it!"
These are secretions collected from bugs. After years of fighting, humans have discovered that bugs often rely on smell to identify similar species, so when doing some special tasks, humans often apply these secretions to cover up the smell. But it can only cover up the smell. The bugs are not blind or deaf. If they are seen and heard, they will still end up being besieged.
Zhang Lang glanced at him, then at the war horse he was holding, which was covered in sweat. He took out a military ration pill and gave it to him: "There is no grass along the way. The war horse is exhausted. Give it half a pill." This can replenish your physical strength! Keep the rest and people can eat it!"
"When you go back, tell the marshal to send someone to clean up those tree bug monsters!"
The scout captain took it, nodded, led the war horse down the hillside, and left quietly, leaving Zhang Lang alone to sneak into the insect swarm.
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