It's almost 10 o'clock, and lunchtime is in a little over an hour.

However, Zhao Zian still planned to go and see how his little ant followers were doing.

I found a pair of nail clippers, held down the mouse's little paws, and trimmed each paw quite a bit. Then I used the rough side of the back of the nail clippers to smooth the paws before letting it play with the phone.

The mouse clenched its paws in despair and glared angrily at Zhao Zian.

However, upon seeing the phone handed to him, his anger vanished instantly, and he began playing with great interest.

"Zi'an, you're so kind."

The perspective shifts back to the ant nest, where most of the food has been brought back.

After asking some questions, and based on the ants' reports, it was found that a few birds had eaten some of the spoils, but it was nothing serious.

They brought the vast majority of them back.

And thanks to the continuous reproduction of several queen ants, the number of worker ants has now reached more than 10,000.

The number of soldier ants was increased to 800.

Many severely injured ants had their proteins directly recycled. It would take too long for them to recover, so it was unnecessary to wait; they could just be eaten and reproduced.

These ants are not the maximum number; there is still a lot of food left to eat.

There's no need to develop too much. We went all out before, which is why we used up all our food. We should develop slowly from now on and make sure we have enough food for daily use.

Currently, the horned beetles no longer pose a threat, but some insects still remain in their stronghold.

To prevent the enemy from making a comeback, and more importantly, to seize the food stored in their lair, attacking their main base is also a crucial task.

Moreover, they have more abundant resources over there.

The potential for development is greater, so that place must be taken over.

More than 10,000 worker ants, plus 800 soldier ants, are more than enough.

After wiping out almost all of their elite troops, only the old, weak, sick, and disabled remained.

Perhaps due to her superior talent, or perhaps due to the blessing of divine power, the old queen ant, despite her severe injuries, recovered to about 70-80% of her health by the end of the night.

Because it was the first queen ant, Zhao Zian named it Xiao Yi.

The native black ant was later named Xiao Er.

The main purpose is to make them easier to distinguish, as the queen ants all look quite similar.

However, one specialized ant, which was severely injured, was unable to continue fighting, as its wounds had not yet healed.

The other specialized ant was less seriously injured and is now able to fight, albeit with some difficulty.

Therefore, to avoid any unforeseen complications, Zhao Zian immediately led the main force towards the Horned Worm's base camp.

The strategies for offense and defense differ.

When the ants marched in a mighty army to attack.

The horned beetles' stronghold is still in chaos; they haven't recovered from the devastating defeat at the front.

After the insects that fled the front lines returned to their base camp, they spread pheromones of failure and panic everywhere.

This caused all the insects to lose their sense of direction and not know what to do.

Those who were gathering food stopped gathering food, and those who were patrolling stopped patrolling; the entire base camp was in complete chaos.

This is exactly the scenario Zhao Zian wanted to see. As the saying goes, strike while the iron is hot.

Just as they were recovering, the remaining insects could still cause considerable casualties.

There were about one or two thousand horned beetles near the base camp.

But they had absolutely no intention of defending themselves.

When the ant army rushed in, they encountered almost no effective defense.

The defensive Horned Bugs outside the Horned Bug base were wiped out in an instant.

The ants suffered no casualties.

The situation is completely one-sided.

However, some casualties only began to occur after the entrance to their nest was found and the horned beetles were entered.

The enemies inside the insect nest appeared more composed and less panicked.

The nest is very large, and enemies constantly emerge from the cave to fight the ants.

Moreover, the cave is relatively narrow, making it difficult for the ants to take advantage of their numbers.

When outside, several ants attack a small insect, and there are basically no casualties.

But inside this narrow cave, it's all about real men going one-on-one.

One or two thousand horned beetles have gradually emerged.

It did indeed cause some casualties to the ants, mainly because specialized ants couldn't operate effectively here.

Only soldier ants can lead the exploration inside.

Despite suffering some casualties, they still managed to eliminate the enemy and remove most of the threats.

The ant army continued to venture deeper and deeper, eventually reaching the very core of the horned beetle's nest.

This should be the location of the queen beetle.

Some exceptionally strong horned beetles guarded around their horned beetle queen.

This should be the queen's personal guard, the kind that belongs to the king's exclusive royal guard.

They were all about the same size as soldier ants, but there weren't many of them.

There is only one passage connecting the outside world to the cave where the Horned Worm Queen resides.

The horned beetle guards stood watch at the entrance to the cave.

The opening wasn't big, so only a small number of ants could get in, and then a few would come in and die, a few would come in and die.

There really wasn't much that could be done about them for the time being.

Upon seeing this, Zhao Zian immediately ordered a halt to the attack and instructed them to dig several more holes from the side.

It just takes a little more time.

There were many ants, and they dug the hole very quickly.

While the enemy was still foolishly guarding the initial entrance, ants were also emerging from other places at the same time.

They were completely dumbfounded.

It was too late to put up a defense; a large number of soldier ants rushed in.

The deepest part of the cave has a larger space, and at this point, the advantage of numbers becomes apparent, with about two or three soldier ants fighting one guard beetle.

This kind of battle was basically a sure win. After losing a few soldier ants, they secured a comfortable victory in the entire battle.

This last queen insect proved to be a challenge for Zhao Zian.

He does seem quite interested in taking on underlings.

It's not that he's particularly kind or has an excessive maternal instinct.

The main reason is that he has a slight collecting habit. When he played Pokémon, he wanted to catch and collect all kinds of Pokémon.

But after thinking about it, I decided against it.

But since things have already gotten this bad, they must hate me to death, so I might as well just finish them off.

As soon as Zhao Zian had an idea, the soldier ants on the scene immediately raised their huge mandibles and killed the queen of the horned beetles.

Take it back and let the queen ant eat it, and see if it can make her ants stronger.

However, this horned beetle race doesn't have any special abilities; at most, they're just stronger.

Ultimately, the dominant insect in this area was successfully overrun by the ant army.