Overlord: Rise of the Zerg

With the supply of food, the queen immediately begins reproduction activities.

With the current reproductive efficiency of the mutant ant queen, it only takes four days to produce queen ant eggs identical to itself. Add in the time for the hatched larvae to grow into adults. Within ten days, the number of queen ants will increase. Large increases, hundreds or even thousands are not a problem.

Of course, Zero wouldn't do that.

At present, everything is waiting to be done, and the sudden shortage of food means that Zero can no longer produce the ant species he wants as much as he wants. He must start to make careful calculations on how to consume less food and obtain the maximum benefit.

Everything seems to be back to the beginning. The only difference is that the ants are no longer weak bugs the size of rice grains, but generally strong laborers the size of pebbles.

After producing twenty eggs containing queen ants, Zero immediately stopped this activity and started letting them start producing builders.

Builder eggs hatch much more efficiently than queen eggs, taking only six days to grow from eggs to adults.

After moving out the grain from the two nearby granaries, the builders moved on to another closer granary.

Of course, due to the serious blockage, this progress is not high. If the current builders are solely responsible for completing this project, I am afraid that by the time they dig through, there will be only a pile of rotten residue.

However, as the queen ants continue to produce, more builders will join in as soon as six days later, and then a steady stream of builders will complete the hatching. By then, the excavation progress will be greatly accelerated. In this case, grab There is still hope for some food.

Winter is approaching, and for the ant colonies that have experienced a major disaster, the most important thing at the moment is to store food.

However, the ground has spread all over Zeguo, and there is almost no grass growing. We can only dig out as much as possible from the previous grain reserves. Every bit of grain is precious.

The ant colony that had been accustomed to living a spacious life in the past few years was forced to return to a tight life. The builders worked day and night, constantly moving the earth and rocks in the passage leading to the granary. When they encountered a place that could not be shaken, they just let it go. The existing excavators stepped forward to deal with it, and then the builders cleared it.

This efficiency is actually very high. However, the granary is not close to the cave, and the passages are severely damaged. In many places, the original passages have to be bypassed and the connections are re-opened nearby. This part of the work consumes a lot of time.

Six days later, more and more builders joined in, greatly advancing the progress of the project.

As the number of builders increased, the excavation work of this passage gradually became redundant, and Zero decisively started the project to develop the fourth granary.

Although I don’t know how much food will be left after digging now, but it is better than nothing. Now is not the time to be disgusted. As much as you can have.

With the continuous efforts of the ant colony, the passage to the third granary was reopened ten days later.

The originally spacious cave had completely collapsed, and water-soaked sweet potatoes were buried under the earth and rocks. Some of them showed signs of decay.

If you want to get the food here, you must first clear out the earth and rocks.

Five days later, another granary was also opened. The grain stored in it had begun to rot on a large scale. The collapsing earth and rocks destroyed the protective layer on their surfaces. The subsequent floods brought a large number of microorganisms, which were originally dry. The dark space has long lost its original function and can no longer provide the effect of preserving food.

In line with the principle of not wasting, at the intersection of autumn and winter, Zero sent builders to start digging for the last granary.

I didn't have much hope at first, but this time, this granary gave Zero a surprise.

The last granary is located diagonally above the cave. Because of the stone barrier, the passage leading here twists and turns, sometimes going up, sometimes going down, forming an effective water-proof structure.

Originally, when they were on the grass, the ant colonies would build this kind of waterproof structure underground. Even if rainwater overflowed the caves, these caves would not be flooded in a short period of time. However, given the current situation of the ants and the muddy ground, even if some of the granaries are well preserved, it is impossible to save them.

However, the granaries located on the mountainside are different from those on the ground. After all, no one would have thought that one day this area would be hit by floods. Therefore, in order to facilitate transportation, four of the granaries were basically on the same plane as the cave without any separation. water measures.

In fact, this last granary was not originally the main source of food for the cave. It was actually mainly used to provide food for the ant colony on the mountainside. Unexpectedly, by chance, it was able to be well preserved, even because it was surrounded by rocks. , and basically did not collapse, maintaining the original dry environment.

The discovery of this granary made Ling Da breathe a sigh of relief.

The cold winter has come quietly. Within this period of time, the remaining food in the No. 4 Granary, which was the most corrupt, has been completely consumed, and even the No. 3 Granary has consumed more than half of its stock. It was only the beginning of winter, and this group of evolved ants had a huge appetite. If Granary No. 5 had not been well preserved, Zero doubted whether the remaining food would last until next spring.

Even now, Zero has not completely given up his worries.

Next spring, after this year's devastation, there will not be much food left on the island. Although in several granaries, Zero found some various seeds that were saved by the ant colonies for food because they were too numerous, but even if they were sown in the spring, he still had to maintain the ant colonies before the autumn harvest. To survive.

Therefore, after completing the excavation of Granary No. 5, Zero made almost all the ants stop their activities in order to reduce consumption and save food. Only a small number of builders are active who feed the queen on a daily basis.

"We must find more food!" Zero said to himself.

However, Zero had no idea where to look. He could only wait until spring came before going to the plains under the mountain.

Although the new generation of assassins are not afraid of the cold, now, the ground under the mountain is covered with water-soaked frozen soil, and there is no point in going out.

Zero planned to wait until spring came, hatch a group of explorers, and let them search for possible food in every corner of the island. On the other hand, he wanted the builders to plant the saved seeds as soon as possible to ensure the harvest next fall.

"That's all we can do now..." Zero was helpless.

This disaster was a huge blow to him, and more than ten years of hard work were ruined. He originally thought that the ant colony would no longer have a survival crisis, but now his heart is full of insecurity.

…………

The cold winter passed day by day amid the hibernation of the ant colonies, and the originally icy cold wind blew across the earth, finally bringing with it a touch of warmth. The sun is also beginning to emit its original temperature, and the frozen soil on the ground begins to gradually soften - spring is here.