The evolution of insect swarms from XNUMX million years ago

Chapter 146 Terrestrial Pupa Sac

Of course, if you want to create a grade of this size on land, ordinary land mother nests can no longer meet the needs.

When he first landed on land and fought with the nests of terrestrial arthropods, and created the terrestrial mother nest and saw-toothed saw ants, Lin Yi was imagining moving the pupal sac mother nest structure that produced the fearless soldier ashore. , to produce larger grade individuals.

The demand for mortar spiders made him urgently need a brood structure that can produce huge individuals. For example, at that time, the sea produced pupal sac broods of levels such as fearless soldier worms and second-generation pioneering worms.

However, the very different structures of the ocean and land meant that Lin Yi needed a completely new design to use a similar method on land to pupate into large-scale individuals.

The appearance of the Mortar Spider naturally shows that Lin Yi has solved this problem, and the solution is a little complicated - but it turns out that all this complexity with a simple and crude structure is effective.

The complex double-layer shell structure and composite armor-type sandwich exoskeleton prevent most grade individuals from producing larvae and waiting for them to grow up naturally. Instead, they can only be pupated. This gave Lin Yi some thoughts.

Similar to the metamorphosis development method of later generations of insects, the mother nest already has it, and the pupal sac mother nest is further upgraded on this basis. It is equivalent to a huge egg and can directly synthesize high-level individuals internally.

The essence of the insect larvae that develops completely after metamorphosis is a placenta that can move and eat independently, with an adult tissue structure called an imaginal disc distributed inside.

When insect larvae pupate, they dissolve the fat tissue in the body, supply nutrients to the development of the imaginal disc, and gradually combine into a new adult individual.

The mother's nest also performs a similar operation for the production of grade individuals - however, instead of dissolving nutrients, it directly injects concentrated liquid nutrients to allow the imaginal discs to develop.

The same goes for pupal sac mother nests, except that the individuals that develop in them are much larger than those produced in normal mother nests.

Nowadays, pupal sac mother nests on land actually only need to solve one problem - how to ensure that water is not lost. After all, if it is still like the mother nest of the pupa sac in the water, the liquid nutrients will inevitably flow cleanly.

Therefore, in the end, Lin Yi decided to really solve the problem with a structure similar to the pupal sac of later generations of insects.

In fact, when the mother nest produces a high-grade individual, there will be a layer of structure similar to pupa skin wrapped around the body of the individual. This is true whether it is an underwater mother nest or a land mother nest.

Now, the relevant gene fragments have been further extracted, integrated and strengthened by Lin Yi, becoming a new incidental structure of the mother's nest, the terrestrial pupal sac, and thus was born.

The structure of the terrestrial pupal sac is actually quite simple. It is a sac composed of a highly flexible membranous structure that is specialized from the exoskeleton and the incompletely arthropod body part called the intersegmental membrane. bag.

The structure of this layer of pouch is thick and tough, and has good water-locking properties. Rather than saying that it is a separate structure, it is more like a disposable additional organ of the mother's nest - yes, in order to ensure that water is not lost as much as possible. , this bag is disposable.

There are living cells between the outer skin of the sac, and it is covered with several pieces of exoskeleton. From the appearance point of view, it is similar to the abdomen of those scorpions that were eaten too much in artificial breeding environments in later generations, or, in other words, similar to proto-ants and honeypot ants. The abdomen of ants with the habit of storing honey. The only open end of this sac is connected to a huge hole on the bottom surface of the terrestrial mother nest, and the interior is naturally filled with liquid nutrients and stuffed into a structure similar to an imaginal disc.

This allows individuals to pupate in this large terrestrial pupal pouch as they would in a brood nest in the sea.

When the individual completes the process of pupation, the remaining nutrients in the pupal sac will be withdrawn and recycled by the mother's nest, and the outer skin of the pupal sac will be broken open by workers on the outside, allowing the individual inside to walk out.

Immediately, the pupal sac structure is also recovered by the mother nest, and when it is necessary to pupate again next time, a similar terrestrial pupal sac structure will grow on the opening at the bottom of the mother nest, and the next pupation can be carried out.

Today, a large number of mortar spiders have been produced by Lin Yi in this way, and have been concentrated in one place through various transportation methods by sea and land, becoming the world's first artillery cluster, targeting the soil of the enemy's nest. The mounds roared.

From the collapsed mounds, the flying pieces of meat and the pits everywhere, we can see how terrifying the firepower of this heavy artillery group is.

The army of saw-toothed saw ants that had been watching the show outside for a long time took a step forward and stepped onto the land that had been plowed by the cannon fire of the mortar spiders. Pairs of compound eyes looked at the devastation, and Lin Yi felt a sense of satisfaction in his heart.

At this moment, he had a feeling that the "disease" he suffered from, nicknamed "insufficient fire phobia", had finally been effectively treated.

No matter in terms of lethality, projection or mobility, the Mortar Spider, a brand-new grade that plays the role of artillery, is quite qualified - except that its production and ammunition production require a lot of nutrients. outside.

There is a saying in later generations that when a cannon goes off, there is a thousand taels of gold. In this era, the biological ammunition used by the mortar spider is also produced directly from the mother nest. Due to its relatively complex structure, the cost is not low.

The production cost of an ordinary large-caliber shell for a mortar is about one-third of that of a worker, while the cost of each shot of a "rocket-propelled grenade" is almost as much as that of a worker.

In other words, in this battle, Lin Yi did not know how many bombs he smashed out, but they were still full of grease and the incendiary bombs that theoretically consume the most nutrients were not used.

Moreover, the cost of loading workers and the transportation cost of ammunition also need to be taken into account - later generations also commented on the fire coverage tactic that the frontline was very good and the logistics was scolded, although now, he is in charge of both the frontline and logistics. Just take care of it.

Taken together, although the mortar gun spider and the accompanying superior firepower tactics are very refreshing, such tactics are ultimately a waste.

Therefore, the subsequent tactics still need to focus on "infantry and artillery coordination". The crazy-toothed saw ants and the mortar spiders fight together to complete the battle with the greatest cost performance.

As for the problem of dismantling the mounds, Lin Yi planned to use other solutions - with the emergence of the land pupal sacs, there was also the final structural idea that was previously conceived, positioning it as equivalent to the level of a tank, and the rest was only Editing of gene sequences and final production.

(End of this chapter)