Feast

The faint cracking sounds of the earth splintering came one after another, emanating continuously from the depths of the frozen ground at our feet.

The snow and permafrost in the middle layer of the swamp were no longer stable, but were slightly bulging and lifting layer by layer, with fine cracks spreading like a spider web across the field of vision. Countless living things were surging in sync beneath the permafrost, and the dense, disordered, and layered wriggling sensation penetrated into his vision, causing Lu Heng's physical discomfort to climb up his spine to the top of his head.

He didn't have time to wallow in his nausea.

The strange movement behind him was approaching at an extremely fast speed, and the rustling sound of the mud rubbing against each other became clearer and clearer. Lu Heng touched his Storage Space with his fingertip, and several heavy pieces of Black Iron-Level Exotic Beast flesh instantly fell into his palm. Without the slightest hesitation, he exerted force with his arm and threw them backward with great force.

Several chunks of meat traced short arcs and crashed heavily into the cracks in the mud deep within the swamp.

The strong stench of blood immediately broke through the cold air and quickly spread amidst the falling snow.

Most of the underground disturbances that were rapidly converging towards him suddenly veered off course, and the surging trajectories beneath the entire frozen ground turned towards the point where the chunks of flesh had landed. The pace of the pursuit was abruptly cut off, and the momentum of the cracking mud and surging mud instantly dispersed.

It was in that brief moment of space.

Lu Heng pushed off the ground with his feet, lowered his body, and rushed at full speed towards the outer edge of the swamp, stepping on the snow-covered frozen soil.

He was already in the middle layer of the swamp, not far from the edge of the woodland, and dared not slow down at all. The desolate swamp scenery on both sides of his vision rushed past rapidly. After only a dozen seconds of all-out sprint, the sensation under his feet suddenly changed.

The hard, cold, damp swamp soil has been completely replaced by dry, thick humus soil from the woodland.

He stepped out of the swamp's territory.

Lu Heng immediately stopped his momentum, turned around and stood steadily in the snow at the edge of the forest, his eyes fixed on the edge of the swamp behind him.

The scene before my eyes was extremely bizarre.

The surging mud that had been chasing the closest and had reached the edge of the swamp all came to an abrupt halt. All the unusual movements beneath the frozen ground ceased to advance even an inch, as if completely blocked by an invisible boundary. Despite the stench of blood wafting through the air, not a single Swamp Slippery Fish dared to step out of the swamp.

Lu Heng stared at the boundary, his tense nerves slowly relaxing, and he instantly understood the key to the matter.

It's not that territorial rules are restrictive; it's simply not worth it.

At this moment, the middle layer of the swamp was littered with the corpses of fallen birds, and beneath the thin snow, bodies that were not yet completely dead and were still twitching and writhing could be seen everywhere. For the Swamp Slippery Fish lurking in the mud, there was ready-made food everywhere without any risks or pursuit.

He, a lone human evacuating alone, faced unknown risks and was difficult to subdue, making him far less attractive than the readily available prey.

So they decisively abandoned the pursuit and turned to a more secure food source.

The wind and snow fell softly, silently covering the ravaged swamp surface.

Lu Heng's gaze swept across the middle layer of the swamp, and a chill ran through him.

This swamp was not a dead land in the past. Before winter, one could still see aquatic animals, reptiles, and various water birds moving about. Although the life was diverse, it was complete. But now all the native creatures have disappeared, leaving only this insidious parasitic slippery fish to dominate the entire mud layer.

It's hard to imagine how many Swamp Slippery Fish bred beneath this permafrost to completely devour the original ecosystem of an entire swamp.

He looked up at the gray sky.

Amidst the swirling snowflakes, no low-flying birds could be seen in the sky.

All birds below the Black Iron Tier lost control and crashed to the ground, now lying paralyzed on the frozen swamp, their bodies convulsing and twitching, becoming nourishment for the monsters at the bottom of the mud.

Only a few Black Iron Tier birds, with stronger physiques and higher resistance, still hovered above the swamp. Their flight was not very stable, and they would occasionally lose their balance and tilt briefly. Subtle undulations and wriggling could be seen in their abdominal cavities, indicating that Swamp Slippery Fish had also burrowed into their bodies.

However, they managed to suppress the parasitic monsters within their bodies by relying on their own bloodline and physical resistance, and did not fall completely out of control like the lower-level birds and beasts.

Lu Heng quietly observed this distorted ecological scene, thinking that the disaster caused by the overpopulation of slippery fish had finally come to an end.

But in the next instant, a completely different movement occurred in the soil layer of the edge woodland adjacent to the swamp.

There was no loud bulging and cracking sound like in a swamp or frozen ground; only the sound of extremely fine soil churning close to the ground. From the gaps in the tree roots and beneath the humus layer near the edge of the woodland, countless tiny black dots slowly emerged, densely packed, silently spreading into the swamp along the boundary between the woodland and the swamp.

The number of them increased, and soon they converged into a dark, dense tidal zone along the edge.

Lu Heng's eyes narrowed, and he immediately raised his wrist, turned on the faint light of his Wristband, and started scanning and identifying the unfamiliar Insect Swarm.

The pale blue screen refreshed rapidly, and several lines of clear species data slowly appeared.

[Digger Ants]

Grade: Common grade social insects

Habitat: Deep humus soil in woodland at the edge of swamps

Characteristics: Social creatures with large populations, they lie dormant in the forest soil year-round. Their bodies have dense, seamless exoskeletons that protect them from parasitic invasions; their jaws are sharp, and their saliva contains a weakly acidic substance that can break down the protective mucus on the surface of the Swamp Slippery Fish.

Ecological relationships: Swamp Slippery Fish naturally restrain their predators, lying dormant year-round, waiting for the large-scale emergence of slippery fish from the mud to gather and surround them for control.

The moment he finished reading the information, Lu Heng completely understood the underlying rules of this ecosystem.

These Digger Ants weren't attracted by the smell of blood at all.

They lie dormant in the woodland soil outside the swamp for a long time, quietly lying in wait, like a group of extremely patient hunters. They precisely guard the nodes of the ecological cycle, waiting for the moment when the Swamp Slippery Fish break through the soil in large numbers and forage collectively, and then launch a timely attack to encircle and kill them.

Just as countless Swamp Slippery Fish emerged from the mud and began to huddle together to devour bird carcasses, fully exposed on the surface, the long-dormant Digger Ants colony officially launched its attack.

The swarm of Digger Ants, rushing into the swamp along the forest-swamp boundary, moved with incredible speed, instantly covering the frozen ground at the edge with a dark, overwhelming Insect Tide.

For the first time, the Swamp Slippery Fish, which had been wriggling and gnawing on bird carcasses on the snow, showed signs of panic.

The protective mucus on the surface of the slippery fish is quickly neutralized and rendered ineffective upon contact with the Digger Ants's body. Without its slippery protection, the fish's body is exposed and instantly clamped down by countless tiny mandibles. The dense swarm of Digger Ants climbs, gnaws, and encircles the fish, rendering the once rampant population utterly powerless against the Insect Tide.

The faint, gnawing sounds mingled together, blending with the rustling of falling snow, and were exceptionally clear in the vast, frozen marshland.

The battle between the two major groups has fully commenced.

The slippery fish desperately twisted its body, trying to burrow back into the frozen soil to escape the encirclement, but the number of Digger Ants was too large, blocking and entangled them layer by layer, giving them no chance to retreat to the mud layer. On the snow-covered ground in the middle layer of the swamp, there was a chaotic scene of the two creatures fighting each other everywhere. Soil, snow, and fine bodily fluids were mixed together, and the scene was cruel and absurd.

The commotion caused by the tribal war grew larger and larger, and the continuous tremors and the pervasive bloodlust began to spread to the surrounding mountains and forests.

Knowing that this was not a place to stay for long, Lu Heng immediately took a few steps back and leaped onto a thick, snow-covered tree next to him. He steadied himself on the high branches, hiding among the snow-covered shadows, and looked down quietly at the entire battlefield while continuously scanning the surrounding movements.

Before long, from the deeper parts of the forest, unfamiliar creatures followed the signs of fighting and arrived one after another.

The first to appear were several giant Black Iron Tier centipedes, each as thick as a forearm. Their bodies were covered in hard armor that gleamed coldly. Their many legs quickly crawled across the snow-covered ground, completely unaffected by the low temperature and falling snow. They charged straight into the battlefield, wantonly devouring the Digger Ants and damaged slippery fish in the midst of the melee.

Immediately afterwards, several small, Black Iron Tier anteaters emerged from their nest, crouched low, and darted quickly along the edge of the battlefield, pecking at the scattered ants.

In addition, several species of bottom-dwelling carnivorous insects have appeared, all undaunted by the severe cold, roaming freely in the wind and snow, taking the opportunity to divide up the food resources brought about by this ecological battle.

The snow continued to fall relentlessly, and the low temperatures enveloped the entire mountain area, but all the predators gathered here were completely unaffected by the blizzard.

Lu Heng squatted on a high tree branch, silently watching the escalating ecological chaos below.

The proliferation of slippery fish, the checks and balances of ant colonies, and the entry of multiple predators to divide the spoils—the entire process flows so smoothly and orderly that there is not a single abrupt turn.

All links are interconnected, and all living beings perform their respective duties, like a fixed cycle that has been running countless times.

A cold thought slowly surfaced in my mind: all of this was not a random catastrophe at all.

The blizzard's swarming of slippery fish, the ant swarms' encirclement, and the frenzy of prey are likely part of a recurring ecological cycle in this frozen swamp.

Humans are merely bystanders who accidentally stumbled into this natural cycle and managed to escape it by sheer luck.