Through this firepower reconnaissance, the protagonist has a better understanding of the fighting style between ants and bees and their respective strengths and weaknesses. But what he wanted to know most about the size of the bee colonies in the hive was still cloudy.

He had previously estimated that there were about 10,000 bees in the hive, but in a tentative attack, at most, hundreds of bees came out to meet them.

This may be due to the fact that many worker bees are still out foraging, or more likely that the bees have never regarded dozens of ants as enemies that need to be dealt with with with all their might.

There are only more than 100 bees, and the protagonist doesn't believe that such a large hive and such a dense frequency of entry and exit will be like this!

However, through firepower reconnaissance, there is still something to gain, at least the protagonist has self-vetoed the unrealistic plan of preparing a large-scale frontal attack.

Bees and ants are of different species and have very different ways of fighting.

In ground combat, bees are clearly at a disadvantage because they are flying insects, and although they are able to move on the ground, their body structure is not suitable for fighting ants.

For example, the mouthparts of bees are chewing and sucking mouthparts, although they also have large jaws, but the bees are much larger than ants, and the size of the large jaws is about the same, and the bite force is weaker in terms of bite force. Moreover, the straw structure in the bee mouthparts will also limit the play of their large jaws.

After consulting the information packets of the scythe ants participating in the battle, the protagonist discovers that the bees' jaws may be better suited for nesting than fighting.

In this way, although a single bee is larger in size and has more strength in its whole body, its main weapon determines that their individual combat effectiveness is at most equal to that of ordinary big-headed ant soldiers, and it is not as good as the hunting sickle ant warriors.

And if you fight in an array, not to mention the low "array ability" of the bees, just because of its large size and wings, it determines that its array density is far lower than that of the ant army.

As a result, any bee on the front actually needs to face the attack of three or four ants with the same combat strength as itself, and being outnumbered is obviously a great disadvantage.

But if the bees use the tactics they do best, then trouble will come to the ant army.

At the end of today's battle, the bees have been taking advantage of their air superiority and trying to attack with stinging needles.

Although due to the fierce ants of the hunting sickle, there were no casualties. However, this is due to the fact that hunter-turned-scythe ants are good at dealing with this situation, and both sides are relatively small in number.

If you change to a dense formation of big-headed ant soldiers, firstly, they are too closely formed to avoid the bees' dive attacks from high altitudes, and secondly, the big-headed ant soldiers have worse eyesight and are difficult to warn in advance.

The protagonist feels that a frontal attack by a large army will inevitably cause heavy losses under the air raid of the bee colony, and the male ants who are originally heavily protected will not be safer than ordinary soldiers before the air attack, and even because of their larger size, they are easier to target.

And even the hunting sickle ant has no way to take the bees that stay in the air and do not land, let alone the big-headed ants. Unless the ants are able to raid directly into the hive and drag the battle into melee combat, it is impossible to destroy the main force of the bee army.

This is the main reason that prompts the protagonist to abandon his original plan.

But he soon had an alternative.

Humans have a long history of collecting wild beehives, and the huge human body is defenseless against the bees' counterattack, but the unprotected ancients obviously did not let the bees fight back, they had their own secret weapons - smoke and fire.

These human gatherers will determine the location of the hive in advance and then come back in the evening.

Because bees are diurnal creatures and do not go out at night, there are no sentinels around the hive, so human gatherers can calmly approach the hive and prepare for it.

They did not come empty-handed, but brought torches and prepared fresh green leaves and other smoke-emitting materials.

After igniting the mixture of fuel and smoke with tinder, a thick black smoke comes out, and it only needs to be directed or blown towards the hive, and soon a swarm of dazed bees is smoked out.

Bees with poor vision at night and stunted are no threat at all, and only a few bees can accurately determine where the enemy is and fight back, but to no avail.

Once most of the bees have escaped, the human gatherers can take the hive and clean it out of the adult bees that have been smoked to death, and return with a load of loot: beeswax, honey, pupae, etc.

This technique is simple, and the raw materials required can be prepared by ants.

In fact, in the battle against parasitic ants in the southern hilly area the year before last, because of the stalemate in the battle, the protagonist also led his troops to use smoke tactics at night, and the effect was remarkable.

On that occasion, the Divine Envoy King's army also used natural knotweed as a smoke pipe, which improved efficiency.

As such, the Legion of the Divine Kings is no stranger to smoky tactics. It's just that in the later battles, the Divine Envoy King Legion was either on the defensive side, or the combat effectiveness was crushed, so there was no need for such trouble, so this tactic was never used again.

Deciding on the next tactic, the protagonist immediately orders his subordinates to start preparing.

The new Seventh Legion of the Mantis Tiger doesn't have experience with the previous smoky tactics, but after the protagonist passes them the packet, they are able to prepare the materials as they were drawn.

Over the course of the day, the ants collected enough fuel (dry branches, leaves, insect droppings, etc.), smoke material (fresh plants), and pipes (stalks of knotted grass cut into sections with stone knives).

That night, the protagonist personally led the team to set off and carry out a smoke operation.

- I'm the dividing line -

The weather was beautiful, and the night was still a rare day with gentle winds, and the moon was shining in the sky, bringing enough light to the ground without light pollution.

The bees don't like to be nocturnal, and they all retreat into the hives that they think are safe, and there is no warning outside.

The ants also don't like to go out at night, but they are still able to faithfully carry out their tasks under the command of the protagonist.

This is the advantage of civilization, which can effectively overcome its own fears and discomforts, and can survive in various environments that it is not used to.

The ancestors of human beings are also diurnal creatures, and many humans suffer from night blindness due to malnutrition, but slowly more and more humans also begin to carry out various activities at night to extend their limited life time. Eventually, there was a modern "nightlife" of all kinds.

This nightlife of the ants is destined to be bloody.

Without the interference of the bees, the ants easily piled up the fuel and smoke on the platform under the hole of the hive tree - the lifting platform for the bees.

The ants moved slightly, and they didn't wake up the bees who were about to die!