The evolution of insect swarms from XNUMX million years ago

Chapter 180: Sitting up in shock while dying of illness

On land, the once prosperous nests of terrestrial arthropods have died out, but no living creatures have been found. Some primitive six-legged insects are gnawing on some strange fragments that resemble the mother's nest tissue.

Their appearance is so inconspicuous, but at this time, no one knows that their descendants will become a legendary group that is an order under the taxonomic unit and can rival a class of other taxa.

The wheels of time continued to roll forward, losing the suppression of terrestrial arthropod nests, and plants began a new round of evolution.

In just half the Devonian period, plants have evolved from vascular plants of less than thirty centimeters to towering ferns of more than ten meters.

The descendants of those six-legged bugs thrived in this lush fern forest. The armor-like structures on the sides of their bodies began to grow, allowing them to unfold the armor on their sides and jump up when necessary. Glide from one fern to another.

Eventually, the descendants of their descendants, later known as delicids, took to the air and flew among the ferns.

They inherited the mantle of the nests of terrestrial arthropods and became the first creatures to fly into the sky again after the ancient web-winged cockroaches and the giant-winged swoopers. They were also the first non-nest creatures to fly into the sky.

All this happened in a very short period of time. By chance, the gene fragments stored in the terrestrial arthropod nests were automatically integrated into the genetic sequences of these insects, allowing them to quickly form into future generations before they had time. The rate at which well-known transitional fossils evolved into entirely new species.

But no one knows that the origin of the wings they sprout out of thin air can be traced back to a Pseudognathus spp. that was accidentally acquired by a terrestrial arthropod nest. The wings of insects did indeed originate from the swimming of Anomalocaris. Moving leaves

But even so, it is difficult for them to feed on living plants, which allows the plants to continue to grow uncontrollably, and together with the photosynthetic structure of the forest in the sea, the oxygen content continues to soar.

During the Late Devonian Frasian period, flying fireballs streaked across the sky again, but this time, what they brought was not rebirth like the Middle Ordovician meteor event, but destruction.

Volcanoes erupt violently over large areas, including those under the sea. Large amounts of toxic gases were released into the air and oceans, dust clouds floated into the atmosphere and gathered, and the familiar, long dead silence came.

But this time, before quantitative changes could accumulate into qualitative changes, the stability of the environment was once again broken.

The most terrible thing is that the impact triggered activities in the earth's crust. The surviving creatures escaped the attacks of alien visitors, but had to face the anger from the earth again.

The two asteroid impacts later known as the Alamo and Siljan occurred one after another. Although the scale was not as large as the most famous meteorite impact in the late Cretaceous, the power was still quite terrifying. Where the meteors fell, all surface features were completely destroyed. destroy. The rapidly spreading shock wave flattened the forest lake, instantly killing all the animals and plants in it.

Another recession event came. Low temperature, suffocation and dehydration caused the death of reef-building organisms in large numbers. The first mass extinction event at the end of the Devonian period, later known as the Kelvossa Event, arrived as scheduled.

This was a disaster for small marine life at the bottom of the food chain. Smaller placoderms were almost completely wiped out. On the contrary, medium and large placoderms miraculously survived and continued to rapidly grow in size.

For a time, the predatory Dunkleosteus, the filter-feeding fish, and the first non-nesting predator after the anomalocaridid ​​swordfish-shaped Heard shrimp, the carolinian helmet fish, and other large placoderms Fish began to prosper, but this was also the last glory.

Looking at the overall situation, one conclusion can be clearly seen - placoderms are following in the footsteps of pterygoid horseshoe crabs. Just like a dragon slayer who eventually becomes a dragon, the cartilaginous fishes and bony fishes that have been dormant in their shadows for a long time are, like the ancestors of the placoderms, struggling to survive, occupying more bottom ecological niches, and waiting for opportunities. The smoke and dust dissipated and the sun returned to the earth, indicating that time has officially entered the Dharma period.

But the temperature still hasn't risen. On land, plants began to grow wildly again, and along with the photosynthetic structures from the nests in the ocean, they consumed the greenhouse gases brought by the volcanic eruptions.

A large amount of carbon dioxide is also extracted again, the oxygen concentration continues to rise, and the appearance of lignin means that even if the plant dies, the carbon element fixed in the body will not return to the environment.

The saprophytic fungi that are supposed to be responsible for decomposition seem to have disappeared. At this time, there are no animals that can decompose wood fibers, and the carbon cycle is out of balance.

This indirectly leads to an imbalance in the nitrogen and phosphorus cycles. Heavy rainfall caused by climate change due to an imbalance in the carbon cycle washes excess nitrogen and phosphorus into the sea, causing extreme eutrophication of seawater.

At this time, the plankton had suffered heavy losses in the Kelvasa incident, and its vitality was severely damaged. Various types of phytoplankton began to reproduce in large numbers without restraint, and soon grew explosively.

A large area of ​​what later generations called red tides formed in various parts of the ocean. Instead, it consumed the oxygen in the ocean and caused fish to drown in the sea.

What's ridiculous is that there is extremely abundant oxygen in the air in this era. However, it is difficult for the gills of marine animals to absorb oxygen in the air, so they can only be suffocated to death in the sea.

The second extinction event at the end of the Devonian period, known as the Hangenberg event in later generations, quietly took away 70% of all living things.

Placoderms were completely wiped out, and lobe-finned fishes and tetrapods almost disappeared. Graptolites, the prototype of photosynthetic structures and floating broods, also did not survive and died silently in the anoxia of the Hangenberg incident.

Of the trilobites, only the aphids lineage survives, and among the horseshoe crabs, only marginal groups such as the giant spider horseshoe crab, the cryptid horseshoe crab, and the Hibbert's horseshoe crab are left, and the large species of Orthops are almost completely extinct.

The most important thing is that for such a long time, it seems that no new nest colonies have appeared on the earth. If we ignore the photosynthetic structures of the nest colonies that are still proliferating and expanding, the early Paleozoic Era, when the demons were dancing around, seems to have really disappeared. This ends.

An era is gradually declining, and a new era is slowly opening. The protagonists belonging to the new era are taking faltering steps to set foot on this land again.

However, there are always some remnants of the former dynasty who are unwilling to be left alone. They will suddenly wake up at an inappropriate time and prepare to restore their former glory again in a new environment.

At the same time as all this was happening, in the deep sea, a strange structure like a city of flesh and blood covered with an exoskeleton, the serial brain structure that had been silent for hundreds of millions of years, finally spread the news for the first time after hundreds of millions of years. A thought:

"Fuck!"

(End of this chapter)