When the protagonist hears the news, he sees several small objects attached to the rope on a rope that the ants have fished out of the water.

These things have a blue-black patterned round-pointed hard shell, and a soft body sticking out of the shell, and if you look closely, isn't this exactly the same as the medium-sized snail you saw on the sandbar before? It's much smaller, only the size of the head of a big-headed worker ant.

These miniature screws are clinging to the ropes, completely uncaught in their current consciousness, and still destroying the ropes. Their soft bodies bulged together, and in a few moments a rope fiber was cut at a speed visible to the naked eye.

It turned out that these mini snails were the larvae of those medium-sized snails on the sandbar, and when the walnut fleet anchored on the sandbar, the mini snails drifted away with the current, and some of them attached to the hull.

These mini snails inherited the gluttonous characteristics of the adult body, and were not picky eaters at all, although they could not eat walnut shells, but after discovering that the ropes of the walnut boat were made of plant fibers and protein ant silk and could be eaten, these mini snails fed on them, and grew larger and larger.

After discovering the culprit that caused the rope to break, it was natural to find a way to hunt and kill, and not let them continue to destroy.

Throughout the afternoon, hundreds of sailor ants pulled almost all the ropes out of the water and examined them, and found dozens of mini snails. The miniature snails were not wasted, and the only bit of meat was dug up as food to reward the sailor ants, and the miniature snail shells were the size of the male ants as wine glasses, which were saved by the protagonist.

However, not all of the mini snails were killed, and a small number of mini snails were attached to the underwater hull of the walnut boat, some of which could be seen with the naked eye, but the ants who lacked tools could not destroy these stubborn snails.

In addition, after being inspected by sailor ants, the damage to the rope was more serious than previously estimated, and many of the ropes in the underwater part did not show problems on the surface, and as soon as they were pulled out of the water, it was found that half of them had been broken, and the rope part of the entire fleet needed a thorough inspection and overhaul.

If it is to be thoroughly inspected and overhauled, it is difficult to complete in a drifting state, and the risk is very high, it is better to tow it ashore for overhaul on land, at least with a stable mooring.

Although the protagonist does not want to delay the trip, it is now a full week since the beginning of the deviation from the course, and the protagonist has been worried about the changes over time, and has always wanted to return to the swamp sooner.

But the overhaul is related to the safety of navigation, and the protagonist does not dare to slack off, so he can only order Zhang Manfan, with the help of a weak wind, the fleet leans to the east bank of the Qing River in the evening.

There was a huge grove on the shore here, and in the dim light of the dusk, the grove seemed to be a huge shadow. When he gets closer, the protagonist sees that this forest is mixed with metasequoia, water pine, ash, willow and other trees.

At this time, because of the high water of the river, a large area of trees near the river was lost in the water, and the ground could not be seen. But these water-loving plants still grow very well, and there is no sign of withering due to the long period of soaking in water every year, which is worthy of the word "water" in their names.

The walnut flotilla approached the woods downwind, and then lightly crashed into a water pine on the periphery, without loss.

The ants hurriedly fastened the slowly drifting fleet to the swollen trunk of the lower part of the water pine, and the fleet was successfully moored.

At this time, it was already dark, and it was not suitable for the ants to move outside, so after the ants fixed the fleet, they continued to spend the night on the boat!

- I'm the dividing line -

The next day, as soon as the day dawned, the ants began to busily inspect and overhaul.

All the ropes of the fleet were pulled out of the water and carefully inspected, and the damaged areas were repaired with ant glue and fibers, and the particularly damaged ones had to be dismantled and replaced with new ones.

Because the repairs were carried out on the water, not in a dry environment on the shore, it was very difficult, and the ants did not work very efficiently, and it was estimated that it would take three days for a hundred or so sailor ants to complete the work.

And because of the limited working area, the ants can't increase the speed of the ant hand.

A group of ants continued to clean the miniature snails, using long sticks to pick out the miniature snails that were visible close to the surface of the water and roll them away from the fleet.

In addition to these two groups of ants, quite a few ants climbed the trees and were ordered to search for food.

There were about five days of food left on the ship, and considering that they were going to anchor here for three days, the ants would have to search the woods for food and the necessary supplies to replenish the deficit in the cabin for the rest of the journey.

The river flooded the ground, and ants could only move on trees, but fortunately, the dense vegetation was crisscrossed by branches, and a large number of vines climbed the trees and even connected to form bridges, which together formed a network of suspended roads.

In early summer, the woods are rich in supplies, and there is a lot of food to be found for species such as ants, which are not picky eaters.

There was little food on the pines at anchor, and on a nearby ash tree, the ants found a number of brown helmet wax scales. It is a yellowish-brown bug about half a centimeter in size, with an oval or round appearance with a raised back, like a brown helmet buckled to the ground.

Brown helmet wax scales have more fleshy shells and are not tasty, but their colorless mucus-like feces have a faint sweet taste, similar to the honeydew excreted by aphids, but not as sweet as aphid honeydew.

These slime ants can suck and attract flies to lick them, and the ants have taken the opportunity to catch several fly prey. Some of the slime has been on it for a long time, and mold has grown on it, and these molds are also edible.

When the protagonist learns about it, he thinks the newly discovered bug is useful, so he asks the ants to collect some eggs from the brown helmet wax scale and take them to the cabin for storage.

Another metasequoia is even more food-rich.

Soft and juicy coffee codling moth larvae can be found inside the trunk of metasequoia. The coffee leopard codling moth is a very beautiful moth in black and white color, as cute as a panda. The larvae are two peanut-sized, russet-brown in color, and most notably have a nearly rectangular black-brown spot on the anterior edge of the dorsal plate of their prothorax.

The larvae of metasequoia leaves are feeding on leaves in groups, and the larvae are yellow-green and eye-catching, but the head is reddish-brown, and the rump is black, and the color is very rich and vivid.

There are also a large number of small green leafhopper larvae on the trunk, less than half a centimeter long, and the whole body is green like emerald, looking like an elongated aphid.

These bugs on metasequoia are good prey and give the ants a good harvest.

In addition to food, the ants also found some useful materials, such as the dried skin of some rattans torn off to make suitable fiber materials, just to replenish the fiber and rope stocks in the ship's hold.

This forest is rich in materials, which makes the protagonist feel that he has entered a treasure land, and the mood of delaying the voyage because of the need for maintenance is also cloudy.