"Could these worker ants have left?"
System shook his head. Though he had not continued instilling the thought that he was the ant queen into these ants over the past few days, they still regarded him as the one closest to them. They would never disobey his instructions.
Even if the worker ants went outside the temporary nest to get some air, they should have returned afterward and continued feeding the ant larvae according to System's earlier instructions.
System received no clear answer when he asked Shawa.
If System had not asked, Shawa, busy eating slime jelly, would not even have noticed that the number of worker ants in the temporary nest had decreased.
Although Shawa had acquired a certain degree of intelligence, she had always been insensitive to numbers. Even now, she could not grasp addition and subtraction within ten.
System could only feel helpless about that.
But as System pondered, he suddenly felt something peculiar.
That peculiar sensation came from his ability, [Intuition].
System selected a worker ant and took it out of the nest.
Somewhere in the depths of his mind, System received a feeling: as long as he took a worker ant outside, he would be able to uncover the truth behind the disappearance of those two ants.
The group of ants that had previously been patrolling tirelessly at the cave entrance had already been dispatched by Shawa to work on the overwintering nest not far away.
However, since this place was very close to the blackish-brown ants' nest, it was not long before System encountered an "ant search party" out foraging.
One ant in the group spotted him and gradually approached, seemingly wanting to find out what exactly he was.
Yet before that ant could come closer, the worker ant System had brought with him