From the captive's point of view, the protagonist can clearly see the dense fungus and mycelium on top of this mountain of corpses.

But the captives turned a blind eye, threw the bodies of their dead companions upward, and turned away.

If all these ant corpses were cleaned up from the "Dongyang City", then in just a few months, a large number of ants would have died in this nest, and this mortality rate was too high.

In this way, this silk thread parasite is not a harmless thing, not only will it absorb the nutrients of the host, but it will also cause the parasitic ants to die early due to weakness.

Parasites may even control the ants' minds, making them aggressive while also ignoring the harmful effects of parasites.

In addition, the protagonist also meets the queen of this ant nest from the captive's memories. But, is this strange ant really the queen ant?

The captives came to the queen's nest during a changing of the guard and were responsible for feeding the queen.

The queen of a normal ant is larger than the average worker and soldier ant, about three times as long as a worker ant.

When a normal queen does not lay eggs, her abdomen is only slightly larger than that of the male, and she can move on her own.

When it comes time to lay eggs, the queen's abdomen will double as large as it eats and hormonal changes.

At this time, a normal queen ant can lay more than 300 eggs a day. But at the same time, because of its bloated size, the queen rarely moves. Even if she wanted to move, it would be difficult for the queen ant to do it on her own, and she needed to order the worker ants to assist her.

But what does this queen ant look like in the eyes of the captives at this moment?

Just look at the upper body of this queen ant, its upper body size is similar to that of a normal male ant, judging from the shiny shell, she is quite healthy.

If it weren't for the dozens of dense silk threads on the back of the ant, the protagonist would not have been able to imagine that so many parasites could grow on an ant.

It's not just those silk threads on his back, but the most jaw-dropping thing for the protagonist is the queen's abdomen.

The body shape of the ant is completely invisible in this abdomen, the length of the abdomen is five or six times that of the upper body, fat and bloated, and the protagonist suddenly feels that the one in front of him is not an ant queen, but a termite queen.

However, unlike the white belly of the termite queen, the abdomen of this queen ant is still yellowish-brown, and there are horizontal stripes on the pulled almost transparent carapace, dotted with some soft and hard hairs, which is typical of the abdomen of the big-headed ant.

Different from the smooth hairy abdomen of ordinary ants, this queen ant has no ant hair on her abdomen, but the left and right are bulging round bulges everywhere, and these bulges almost burst the already thin carapace on the epidermis.

In some places, it was indeed broken, and in the gaps where the carapaces met, there were bulges in some places, and a trace of green pus was flowing out of the cracks, staining the shells.

The queen ant's bloated belly is constantly laying eggs that look relatively normal at the top.

This queen lays eggs significantly faster than a normal big-headed queen, laying an egg almost every minute. This speed is even faster than that of the paver ant queen, which is known for its strong fecundity.

If this continues, this nest will have more than 1,400 new members a day, and it is no wonder that it does not care about the companions who died in large numbers due to parasites.

It's hard for the protagonist to imagine how much nutrient does the protagonist need to keep up with the fact that a queen ant who has mutated to this extent lays eggs at this rate, has to supply dozens of silk thread parasites to constantly suck nutrients, and the bulge in her abdomen keeps flowing pus?

Through the captive's point of view, the protagonist sees worker ants lined up, and the assembly line generally continues to dedicate a large amount of nutritious food to the queen.

The queen didn't care about honeydew, insect fat, or even fresh eggs that she had just laid, and she tore them all and swallowed them.

There are only a few gaps, and the queen ant will take the time to put her tentacles on the large worker ant next to her, as if she is communicating.

At this point, the protagonist remembers that the nest is strange and does not see a single male. Although this captive is the lowest worker ant, but for a full month, he has been running around in the nest every day, and even the queen ant has seen it, and it is impossible not to see the male ant who is actually in power!

What if there are no male ants in this nest!? The protagonist's idea that a hidden male ant is behind it doesn't hold water.

The protagonist searches the captive's memories again, but still finds no trace of the existence of male ants.

But the protagonist still finds some useful clues.

Basic actions in the nest, such as searching for food and repairing the nest, can be done by relying on the instinct of worker and soldier ants.

And some complex group work, such as the expansion of the nest, large-scale hunting, etc., generally requires the male ant to take the lead.

There are no males in this peculiar parasitic nest, and similar work is done by some of the larger worker ants.

Looking at these large worker ants, which are large in size and obviously have an IQ close to that of male ants, the protagonist feels very familiar.

Isn't this the big murderer hand ant who hides in their wedding team and then waits for the opportunity to murder? Moreover, the little secretary next to the protagonist is also very similar to this kind of big worker ant in terms of IQ and body type.

These large worker ants perfectly replace the male ants in the parasitic ant nest, and they will even form and lead a team of 50 ants to complete the patrol work.

The worker ants and soldier ants in the nest are also respectful to these large worker ants as if they are facing male ants. This captive was ordered many times by the big worker ants, and then faithfully carried out.

The protagonist reads the instructions given by the big worker ant again. These instructions are also packets, but they are slightly simpler than those given by the males, and often have only a simple mission objective. However, this is enough for worker ants and soldier ants to comply with the enforcement.

Are these big worker ants the rulers of parasitic nests? It was also the work of these big workers who murdered Lao Wang and other male ants before?

With the protagonist's limited knowledge, he can't understand why the worker ants make male ants, and this is not a human society, and there are various competing interests.

But in fact, in the original world, if there was one ant species that controlled the entire nest, it was the worker ant.

Male and female ants are only responsible for reproduction, while soldier ants are actually a variant of worker ants, and there are not even soldier ants in many species of ants.

Worker ants, on the other hand, are responsible for maintaining the normal operation of the entire nest and are engaged in almost all work.

And worker ants will interfere or even dominate the affairs of other ant species.

For example, some ants will have multiple queens build a new nest together, and when the nest has reached a certain size, the worker ants will kill the excess queen.

For example, when it is time for male and female ants to get married, the worker ants will attack the male and female ants who are still in the nest and drive them out.

So, is this mutation pattern of large worker ants dominating the nest atavistic or evolutionary?