The Great Battle, Part One

The new Ant Queen be of three types.

The first type of Ant Queen, the fewest in number, is mainly responsible for accompanying the army on expeditions and acting as the commander of the army. Because they are basically not required to lay eggs, their egg-laying ability has been weakened, while their muscles and body size have been strengthened, slightly improving their mobility and self-defense capabilities.

The second type of Ant Queen is the standard Ant Queen that the Swarm used to have. They have relatively average abilities, can lay eggs, and can also be evacuated from the base or transferred to the army at critical moments. At the same time, they are also the most numerous.

The third type of Ant Queen is the species that has been implanted with newly acquired genes, resulting in a mutated abdominal oviposition organ. They sacrifice their mobility to achieve a larger and faster oviposition. However, as a result, they are placed in the heart of the Swarm's territory.

Rowan would build several breeding bases, each planned to house hundreds of these three types of Ant Queen to breed larvae. They would then produce a large number of a certain type of insect according to Rowan's orders.

For example, in normal times, their main task is to breed various Worker Ant. Once the larvae have matured, they are transported to various parts of their territory. In wartime, these bases become large deployment points.

Several dozen days later, the third type of Ant Queen gradually matured, and the Swarm began to explode in number.

Moreover, over such a long period of time, the Swarm has also mastered the cultivation method of "mushrooms." This new crop can effectively clear away dead branches and leaves in the territory, and it is easy to grow and abundant, so it has been widely promoted.

At the same time, the Swarm did not completely imitate the architectural style of the yellow insects, but instead tried to adopt the building layout with many heat dissipation holes, similar to that of the Big-Headed Ant.

After experiments at several bases and observation of a growth cycle, the "mushrooms" grew well and were not affected in any way, so they were promoted and popularized.

Hundreds of days and nights have passed, Swarm's territory has expanded by over a hundred kilometers, with more than 30,000 bases within it. In the later stages, the distance between the bases became extremely large, and the scene of dozens of bases in a few hundred square meters was no longer present.

Later, Rowan even reorganized the initial few thousand bases, leaving only a few hundred Ant Queen to guard them, while the rest were all transferred to new territories to guard them.

Although thousands of new colonies without Ant Queen have been built, these colonies have not been abandoned. Their underground planting systems are already very sophisticated, so the absence of Ant Queen will not cause any problems.

Although the number of bases was limited by the production capacity of the Mother Nest, the number of insects in each base increased several times over. On average, each base now housed millions of insects of various kinds.

Roughly calculated, the total number of Swarm exceeds 30 billion.

With so many subordinates and a powerful enemy who had been a thorn in his side when he was still relatively weak—the one who had severely injured him— Rowan felt it was time to confront them.

Thinking of this, Rowan was very excited. He was not a vengeful person, and revenge was secondary. The most important thing was that there was finally something to look forward to again.

Unfortunately, it will take at least another two hundred days before the Earth-Yellow Ant return to hunt on the cliff.

Long ago, Rowan sent out scout insects to be stationed on the Cliff. Through observation, they calculated that it would take the Earth-Yellow Ant about four hundred days to complete a hunting trip.

More than a hundred days ago, when the Earth-Yellow Ant scurried to the top of the cliff, Rowan had no intention of taking them seriously because he felt he was not strong enough.

However, he greatly underestimated the Swarm's rate of mass production; as the number of Ant Queen increased, the rate of mass production increased exponentially.

However, just over a hundred days later, Rowan's thoughts changed. At the current rate, when the Earth-Yellow Ant arrive next time, the Swarm might number in the hundreds of billions.

They could definitely go toe-to-toe with the Earth-Yellow Ant.

So, the days that followed passed exceptionally slowly, fueled by Rowan's anticipation, making him feel as if each day was an eternity.

Finally, with only a few dozen days left until the Earth-Yellow Ant return, the Swarm has begun preparing for the upcoming battle.

An army marches on its stomach!

About one kilometer from the Cliff, Rowan built several storage bases, and a large number of Transport Bug shuttled between territories, continuously transporting various resources to this place.

Not far from these storage bases are several hatching sites where large numbers of Soldier Ant Insect Egg are hatching. It is estimated that by the time the war begins, these hatching sites can replenish the Swarm with tens of millions of Soldier Ant of various types every day.

With more than ten days remaining before the calculation deadline, several armies began to return. Subsequently, some bases furthest from the Cliff began to send out troops.

As time went on, the bases began to deploy troops in stages. If viewed from above, one could see black lines of troops converging towards the bottom of the Cliff in the Swarm territory.

If Rowan's prediction is correct, the Swarm army will have assembled three days before the calculation date.

After more than two hundred days of development, the total number of Swarm has reached hundreds of billions ahead of schedule. For this large-scale war, Rowan has mobilized almost all available troops.

While ensuring the normal operation of all the farms and plantations in the territory, a full half of the insects were summoned to the front line.

Each day that these more than 50 billion insects stay consumes a huge amount of resources. Therefore, Rowan's arrangement for them to arrive three days in advance was the limit of the Swarm's capacity.

However, seven days before the calculated date, the Scout Bug on the Cliff had already discovered the vanguard of the Earth-Yellow Ant.

According to the pattern, the main force should arrive in two days at most. However, at this time, most of the Swarm's troops are still on their way, and even in two days, only about half of them can be assembled.

Unexpectedly, the Earth-Yellow Ant arrived early for some unknown reason. Fortunately, they weren't much earlier than expected, as Rowan had anticipated this.

Now we don't need to worry about supplies; as long as the two sides start fighting, there will be plenty of food.

The question now is how to hold off the army of Earth-Yellow Ant for two days.

In less than two days, the army of Earth-Yellow Ant had arrived. Perhaps they had sensed something was amiss, since their vanguard hadn't sent back any messages for quite some time.

The Swarm, with their backs to the Cliff, was already poised for battle. This time, the force was still mainly composed of various Soldier Ant, since the enemy also had Acid-Resistant Armor, and Worker Ant were not very effective.

The aggressive nature of the Earth-Yellow Ant is evident from its hunting and roaming lifestyle.

Upon spotting the Swarm ahead, without hesitation, they immediately activated their Catapult Start and charged forward.

These guys are the source of the Catapult Start gene template, so they're naturally adept at using this tactic. But the Soldier Ant of the Swarm aren't intimidated at all; they also Catapult Start into the air to meet them.

The great battle has officially begun.