The evolution of insect swarms from XNUMX million years ago

Chapter 11 The Beginning of the Hao Clan
  Lin Yi did not intend to let go of the last products left by the Poseidon Helmet Shrimp - using the nutrients provided by the hunted Poseidon Helmet Shrimp, Lin Yi cultivated a large number of improved short-winged horseshoe crab template individuals. moment of action.

It is a pity that most of these future giant gods will die in their eggs due to the existence of Lin Yi.

A large number of Poseidon shrimp eggs are clamped by the chelicerae of modified short-winged horseshoe crab individuals, and are directly swallowed or supplied to the mother nest. The efficiency of organized clusters to devour these eggs is unmatched by any ordinary organism.

Time continues to pass. Without the food supply for hunting Poseidon Helmet Shrimp, Lin Yi once again returned to his daily life of eating trilobites.

But this time, he already had more than fifty individual feather-winged horseshoe crabs and nearly a hundred individual short-winged horseshoe crabs in his consciousness. Without the Poseidon Helmet Shrimp group, it would be difficult for this water area to support such a large group.

Lin Yi controlled the individual feather-winged horseshoe crabs to pupate into several new mother nests that integrated the genetic sequence of Ringo in the dense nutrient areas brought by nearby ocean currents, and once again slightly changed the genetic sequences of these mother nests. Let them play a very different role from ordinary brood nests.

Rather than changing the genetic sequence, it is better to say that it activates the original function of the mother's nest - laying eggs.

Yes, in addition to directly producing individuals in a manner similar to the pupation of later generations of insects, the mother nest can also produce eggs of species that have absorbed genetic sequences. In other words, this is the correct way to open the mother nest. Directly producing individuals is the wrong way.

But now, this ability has been changed beyond recognition by Lin Yimo - he transformed a special egg.

This kind of egg does not contain any genetic material inside, but only contains a large amount of concentrated nutrients, which is enough to supply the daily consumption of individuals.

According to Lin Yi's understanding, in some eusocial insects of later generations, such as ants and bees, female worker ants or worker bees sometimes lay eggs that cannot hatch, as larvae and queen ants or bees. food. Allowing these individuals with high nutrient needs to directly absorb easily absorbed nutrients.

This kind of egg is directly called a nutrient egg. Therefore, Lin Yi now also calls the unhatched eggs produced by the mother's nest nutrient eggs.

Its main function is to supply nutrients obtained by filter feeding of the ringworm clusters connected to the mother nest to other individuals for absorption, thereby solving the food problem to a certain extent.

……

Time passed by in a hurry, and months passed in the blink of an eye. Now, the seabed in the surrounding waters has changed drastically.

The thicket of sea ringworms swayed, filtering the plankton in the sea currents with their arms covered with whisker-like structures.

Their caudal peduncles are still rooted in the sand on the seabed, but are connected to a main pipe that spreads like plant roots, all the way to the huge honeycomb-shaped life form in the center of the cluster.

The spacing between the plants in the sea forest's ridge-like structure has been adjusted by Lin Yi to maximize the use of plankton in the sea without wasting or overlapping.

Among the sea forest, individuals modified from the previous short-winged horseshoe crab template were swimming around, using the chelicerae at the front of the body to pull out algae and other sessile echinoderms growing among the clusters, like a farmer tending the fields. Now, these "improved short-winged horseshoe crab template individuals" have an official name - Gonghao.

This is not the name of any existing creature, but the name that Lin Yi came up with after some thinking for the individuals that he now controls, which can be called a nest group.

Chai (chai4), in later generations, generally refers to the larvae of dragonflies and toads. Since the larvae of these two types of insects are aquatic and quite ferocious, they are also used to refer to other ferocious aquatic arthropods.

This includes the plate-footed horseshoe crabs, where the feather-winged horseshoe crabs belong. Because it is far larger and more ferocious than any aquatic arthropod, and has a strange structure, it is known as the "weird dragon" in later generations.

What's more, nowadays, the ancestor of insects still doesn't know which trench is playing in the mud. Naturally, he has no pressure to put this name on the nest of horseshoe crabs he controls. The nest group is called the Hao tribe.

Corresponding to the short-winged horseshoe crab being called Gonghao, the individuals transformed from the original feather-winged horseshoe crab template are collectively called Binghao.

With a pair of ferocious sickle limbs, they still have the task of hunting and protecting the mother nest, and have a clear division of labor with the task of tearing food and taking care of the sea forest clusters.

Ever since he became the hive mind consciousness of this community, Lin Yi felt that his consciousness and the group he controlled were somewhat like the Zerg image in the film and television works of his previous life, and the gene editing ability of the mother nest allowed him to continue to develop in this aspect. develop.

Different from the technological civilization represented by humans, the core of the Zerg civilization lies in the differentiation of levels - the technological civilization prefers to use tools or vehicles to complete complex tasks, while the Zerg civilization directly evolves its body into Tools, with different shapes and forms, each highly specialized, are used to complete complex tasks.

In this kind of civilized ethnic group, individuals of each grade are basically designed for specific tasks. Although they are a little less flexible and it is difficult to coordinate the proportion of each grade, each individual is doing its own job. The ultimate efficiency when working is enough to make up for the disadvantages of this approach.

And Lin Yi is now controlling the evolution of the ethnic group in this direction. Among them, because the combat requirements are not high, the soldier modified from the feather-winged horseshoe crab template has not been significantly improved and differentiated again. It only strengthens the structural strength of the large spines on the sickle limbs to increase the destructive power. However, the craftsmen transformed from the short-winged horseshoe crab template were subdivided by him into two categories.

Among them, the chelicerae of the first type have been improved. One pair of chelicerae has large conical spines for fixation, while the other pair of chelicerae is covered with small teeth, like a saw, suitable for cutting and tearing. The specialized chelicera structure is similar to a knife and fork, which can effectively fix and cut flesh and blood tissue. It serves as the digestive system of the "super-individual" of the worm nest group, processing the obtained prey, and completing the treatment of plate-footed horseshoe crabs for individuals responsible for other tasks. Let's tear apart food parts in a hurry.

The second type of chelicerae is relatively simple, slightly smaller and arc-shaped, and only one pair is retained, which can perform grasping-like movements.

They are mainly responsible for taking care of the ringworm clusters and obtaining nutritious eggs. They will also do the old job of the horseshoe crab, the source of its genetic template - picking up garbage and eating it, so as to obtain as much nutrition as possible for the nest group.

These are the two main species levels of the current nest group and the two subdivision levels of one of them. But as a group of eusocial animals with complete grade differentiation, grades for reproduction are naturally indispensable. In the past, this task was performed by the special individual - the mother nest, which was transformed from the pupa of an ordinary individual. But now, after integrating some brand-new genomes, Lin Yi has a new masterpiece.

(End of this chapter)