The evolution of insect swarms from XNUMX million years ago

Chapter 275 Assassination Incident
While the Hive Group is making extensive changes to the surfaces and low-Earth orbits of Gondwana and Laurentia, further in-depth exchanges with the Ezki people on Earth are also continuing.

The large tilt-rotor aircraft slowly flattened its rotors and lowered its altitude under the escort of two shadow flies. On the fungus carpet below, a platform composed of a hard exoskeleton has pupated in advance. Two shadow flies landed on the left and right and began to send out light signals for guidance.

The tilt-rotor cabin door opened, and several Ezki individuals walked out, and continued forward under the guidance of Shadowflies and Crazy-toothed Saw Ants, slowly heading towards a terrestrial nest on the ground.

The person who made the request was a scientist on the Ezki research ship, the one who had first communicated with Lin Yi before. This person showed great interest in the existence form of nest colonies - he claimed to study "sociobiology", that is, thinking about civilization derived from the existence form of eusocial insects such as ants and termites in later generations.

What surprised Lin Yi was that the Ezki home planet and all the colonial stars did not have the existence of advanced eusocial insects. It is said that there are some primitive social insects similar to the primitive ferocious ants on the earth, but they have evolved. For quite a long time, there was no further progress.

It seems that in later generations, the existence of eusocial insects was once unable to be explained by early evolutionary theory, and the final conclusion reached was the same as the theory proposed by the other party. But the difference is that the earth in later generations is an explanation for the existence of existing species, and there are no higher eusocial animals on the Ezki home planet, so this becomes a complete guess.

If the true social species on Ezki's home planet were more evolved, this person might become Ezki's version of Edward Wilson. It's a pity that things didn't work out. When the existence of the nest appeared in the opponent's field of vision, the Ezki home planet no longer knew what kind of chaos it was.

But having said that, according to the observation of the parasitic carpet tissue in the inner ghost's body through the host's nerves, most Ezki people still have more or less instinctive resistance to unknown aliens in the nest, and he is almost completely No, the Hive is just treated as another "country".

"It seems that there are no other less evolved forms of eusocial organisms on your home planet. So, have they ever appeared? If so, why did they perish?"

In the terrestrial pupal sac on the mother nest in front, two main battle soldiers are gradually pupating, showing each other how the mother nest produces individuals. It seemed that this also aroused the curiosity of the other party. The sound and light signal was slowly transmitted, and he asked Shadowfly.

"It may exist, but it is too long ago to be tested. However, other clusters similar to ours have indeed appeared many times, but without exception, they are extremely aggressive and aggressive and have been wiped out by us."

But it's too good, even now the ancestors still don't know where to play in the mud, Lin Yi secretly complained. He couldn't answer "Yes, there will be plenty in 200 million years." He could only answer in this ambiguous way.

The second half of the sentence is actually true. Except for the odd case of the Anomalocaris nest group, such as the Orthogonal Stone nest group and the terrestrial arthropod nest group, whichever one is attacked immediately without any room for communication, the one that was discovered was already there. I don’t know what happened to the leader of the Ancient Jaw Nest, which was affected by the original mother nest and turned into a swarm of wild animals, but I guess it won’t be much better.

"Without reason, unable to communicate, the meaning of existence is endless reproduction and expansion, extremely aggressive? Like"

"It's like a virus."

Seeing that the other party was hesitant, as if he was afraid of offending his own existence, Lin Yi helped to fill in the word that he had been unable to say. During the previous parasitism process, Lin Yi had already mastered the Ezki pronunciation of words such as virus. Know that at this time, it naturally comes out from the vocal organ of the shadow fly without any hindrance. "Yes, even with a high degree of evolution, it still performs"

However, before he finished speaking, suddenly, the sound of explosions echoed. That person was not a military powered exoskeleton, but just a protective suit similar to later space suits but thinner and without even a power auxiliary device on the chest. , a huge blood hole opened, and bright red blood gurgled out.

Behind him, the standard electromagnetic gun in the hands of an escorting Ezki armed man was aimed in this direction. Through the mask, his expression could not be seen clearly, but he showed no intention of escaping. Instead, he turned the muzzle and pointed it at the fallen man. The local Ezki sociobiologist is ready to continue to pull the firing device.

There was no time to worry too much - now, the parasitic structure has penetrated into the brain of almost every Ezki man. Under control, the parasitic neural tissue immediately blocked the signals from the brain, and the gun in his hand fell to the ground. His body instantly became limp and he lost consciousness.

"Don't move yet, people can still be saved!"

Two shadowflies immediately surrounded the body of Ezki sociobiologist who was lying in a pool of blood, blocking the sight from both sides. The other personnel had not yet recovered from the sudden change. Only one person raised the electromagnetic gun towards Shadowfly again.

Before it could move, a wild-toothed saw ant kicked off its six limbs and pounced on the side, knocking it down heavily. A pair of crossed claws knocked it to the ground, disarming it. Seeing this, the rest of the staff also raised their hands to show that there was no threat - it seems that the military salute of the Republic of China is almost universal to all creatures with arms in the universe.

But there was no time to think too much. At this time, rescuing people was the most important thing - the opponent chose to attack the chest and abdomen first, and then hit the brain with a follow-up shot. However, the second shot was not fired because of Lin Yi's timely discovery.

Such an injury cannot be saved by the medical level of the Ezki civilization, at least on a scientific research ship. However, the level of research in the biological field of the nest group is such that even if there is only one brain left in the body, Lin Yi can find a way to save it.

The gurgling blood dyed a large area of ​​bacteria carpet red, and some root tissue quickly surged towards the huge wound under Lin Yi's control. Now, the top priority is to stabilize the situation and make next steps.

For a moment, Lin Yi thought of the Ezki brain-computer interface, the combat machine pilots who had become vegetative and were sent to the laboratory for research, the two enemy ships, and the last of the Ezki sociobiologists. In half a sentence, a terrifying guess gradually took shape.

This time, the trouble is big. But Lin Yi had no other choice but to try his best to rescue him first - he had a hunch that this sociobiologist was not only the key to the next cooperation between the two civilizations, but also seemed to know some information that he didn't know yet, so he was forced to The other party is eager to kill and silence him.

(End of this chapter)