"Huh?" Zhang Yuan lowered his head strangely and observed the gray-white ball on the ground.

The shape of this oval ball looks a bit like an insect egg or a chrysalis, but it is the size of an ordinary mineral water bottle.

Zhang Yuan took the branch, carefully poked the ball twice, and asked uncertainly, "What is this......?" Pupae? ”

"I don't know." Song Shaofeng shook his head and replied with a frown: "I've never seen such a big one." ”

"Old Song, old Song, there's a discovery here, come here." On the other side of the lake, Hu Ziming waved at them from afar.

"Received, there is also a discovery here, come over immediately." Song Shaofeng replied on the walkie-talkie, pointed to the half of the sheep corpse, and arranged: "Zhang Yuan, is there any more flipping." ”

"Why is it me again?"

"You're from the Department of Archaeology." Song Shaofeng still remembers this stubble.

Zhang Yuan muttered two sentences dissatisfiedly, but he didn't object again, stepped on the sheep corpse with his foot slightly, and took the branch again, turning the sheep's belly open.

I picked a branch for a long time, but I didn't find any other eggs.

"Alright, let's get it back in the water."

After Song Shaofeng finished speaking, he took out a plastic bag from his pocket, put it on his hand, carefully covered the eggs, turned the plastic bag over, and put the eggs inside.

Seeing that Zhang Yuan had already turned the sheep carcass back into the water with a branch, Song Shaofeng lifted the plastic bag in his hand and said, "Let's go, go to the bearded side and have a look." ”

Although Hu Ziming was on the other side of the lake, the distance was actually only two or three hundred meters, and a few minutes later, Song Shaofeng and the others came to Hu Ziming's side.

"What did you find?" Song Shaofeng didn't talk nonsense, and asked directly.

Hu Ziming pointed to the ground, Qiu Rui had already run back to the car, took a storage box, and was taking pictures on the ground there.

Zhao Xuan leaned over and found that there were two ants on the ground, one was intact and the other was only half left, and there was an open tape measure next to it for reference.

After a slight comparison with the size on the tape measure, Zhao Xuan found that the ant was more than ten centimeters long!

If you include the tentacles and legs, it must be at least twenty centimeters.

The ant is black, with several circles of brown lines on its abdomen, a spike on its tail, and huge mouthparts on its mouth, which looks quite oozing.

"That's right." Song Shaofeng squatted beside Qiu Rui, poured out the pupa in the plastic bag, and motioned for Qiu Rui to take a picture together.

The eggs or pupae next to the ant look about the same size as this ant, and they should be of the same species.

"I just found it in the belly of a sheep." Song Shaofeng stood up, pointed to the chrysalis on the ground, and briefly told Hu Ziming about the situation when he found out just now.

"Parasitism?"

"Probably not." Zhang Yuan replied beside him: "Such a big chrysalis, if it was parasitic, the sheep would have been eaten empty a long time ago, and it would not be so complete." ”

After Qiu Rui finished taking the photo, he took out a folding knife from his bag, pointed at the chrysalis, and asked, "Take it apart and take a look?" ”

Hu Ziming nodded and said, "Be careful, I don't know if I'm alive." ”

If it's a pupae, it's really possible that it's still alive.

Qiu Rui put on gloves, carefully supported the pupae, cut it vertically, and slowly peeled off the outer skin to shake out the contents inside.

A gray-white ant, with six legs tightly hugged on its belly, the proportions of each part of its body are not the same as the black ant next to it.

However, judging from the appearance, it should be the same species.

Qiu Rui lightly touched the back of the knife a few times, and found that the ants in the chrysalis did not move, so he was sure that he was dead.

Raising his head, he said to everyone: "It should be a pupa that's right." ”

Although no one here is a biographic, at least everyone knows that eggs are not the same as pupa.

"Put it away." Hu Zi nodded and pointed to the storage box next to him.

Then the people did not separate again, but continued to explore the remaining half of the lakeshore that had not been explored.

At the rest of the lake, the corpses of three more ants were found.

All of them were found in the water, but a few ants were not very complete. The most complete is the one that was first discovered before.

I don't know if it was because of the fight, or because it was eaten by the creatures of the lake after death.

As for the pupae, they were not found again.

Before they could get back to the tent, they received another call from the bureau.

"It has been determined that the black shadow is indeed not a shadow." Hu Ziming hung up the phone, and while walking, he said to everyone: "In several satellite photos, I have found them." ”

"It is about 100 meters wide and more than 300 meters long. The speed of movement is about four to five kilometers an hour. I guess that's it. Hu Ziming sighed and pointed to the box in Qiu Rui's hand.

"One hundred times three hundred, if it's this ant......" Zhang Yuan calculated in his heart and exclaimed: "Millions to tens of millions!" ”

Zhao Xuan gasped after hearing this.

Just these ants, which are bigger than a palm, are gathered together in the number of millions, and I feel my scalp tingle when I think about it.

"The oasis." Zhao Xuan pointed to the ground and asked Zhang Yuan, "It should be too, right?" ”

"I guess so." Zhang Yuan glared at Zhao Xuan and scolded, "The crow's mouth turned out to be your kid." ”

"What's my business?" Zhao Xuan turned his head and glanced at Zhang Yuan.

"Didn't you say that yesterday?"

"I'll just say it casually." Zhao Xuan spread his hands innocently.

"That's why you're a crow's mouth."

When everyone returned to the tent, Hu Ziming began to arrange for everyone to pack up their things.

According to time calculations, if the ant colony has been moving, they are about 30 to 50 kilometers away from the ant colony, and the bureau is stepping up to track down the whereabouts of the ant colony.

Remote sensing satellites are not something that can be easily adjusted, and the next shooting window is about two hours later.

On the other side, the people in the bureau are looking through the previous satellite photos and stepping up to check the path of the black shadow.

However, on a large scale, it is not so easy to check a thing with a radius of two or three hundred meters.

After packing up their things, everyone stepped up to check the vehicle.

On yesterday's march alone, several cars were stuck in the sand at least three or four times.

But fortunately, they were well prepared, and the speed of the car was not fast, and they were rescued without danger several times.

After inspection, the car was not damaged.

Everyone no longer stayed, it was still yesterday's personnel allocation, and continued to drive towards the northwest in the direction of the black shadow.

Whether the shadow is a speculated colony or not, you must check it with your own eyes.

The speed of the car was still not very fast, and it could only move slowly between the yellow sand, and finally arrived at the location where Zhao Xuan found the black shadow in the photo yesterday after more than two hours.

Along the way, I still couldn't find any clues.

Many of the dunes may change their position every few hours due to their weight and the wind, and all the clues are hidden under the dunes by the yellow sand.

However, there is also good news, remote sensing satellites show that the black shadow is currently about thirty kilometers northwest of them, and they are not chasing the wrong direction.

The next satellite photo will be in four hours.

The three cars continued to drive forward, and after more than 20 kilometers of continuous travel, the speed slowed down even more.

Because they were already approaching the position of the black shadow, they had to take a closer look at the dunes before they went around each time.

If the black shadow in front of you is really an ant colony, it is not a fun thing to plunge into the middle of the ant colony.

In the process of repeatedly going up and down the mountain, they walked out more than 10 kilometers and three cars, and they had already crossed the position of the satellite photo a few hours ago.

Hu Ziming's first off-road vehicle, once again, as is customary, stopped on the top of a sand dune.

After two days of training, Zhao Xuan's desert driving skills have improved, coupled with a powerful off-road vehicle, he easily rushed up the hill and parked side by side at a position more than 20 meters away from Hu Ziming.

After getting out of the car, Zhao Xuan wiped the sweat that didn't exist on his forehead, and then walked towards Hu Ziming.

"How?" Zhao Xuan saw that Hu Ziming put down the binoculars and asked a routine question, but he didn't have any expectations.

Hu Ziming frowned, handed the telescope to Zhao Xuan, and pointed to the distance.

Looks like this is finally a discovery?

Zhao Xuan's spirits perked up, and he took the telescope expectantly and looked ahead.

A sand city.

Between the yellow sand, large areas of broken walls are crumbling.

The wide earth-rammed city wall has now weathered so that only stout earth pillars remain, standing upright.

The eye passes through the middle of the earthen pillars, and you can see a number of smaller earthen walls inside, which are also dilapidated.

Countless small black dots, walking between the mounds of earth, because the distance is too far, I can't see what it is, but guess it, it should be an ant colony.

Zhao Xuan handed the telescope to Song Shaofeng, who came over next, and asked Hu Ziming again: "What should I do?" ”

"It's not easy." Hu Ziming shook his head and said, "An ancient city that has not been discovered before, it is a pity to solve it here." ”

Song Shaofeng held the binoculars and looked into the distance, while saying, "Let's take a look today, I don't know if these ants will dig holes." ”

Hu Ziming and Song Shaofeng talked for a long time, but Zhao Xuan didn't understand what they were going to do, so he had to continue to ask: "You talked about it for a long time, what are you talking about?" ”

"What else could it be a bomb?" Zhang Yuan stepped forward, snatched the telescope in Song Shaofeng's hand, and said to Zhao Xuan: "You can't let the little master kill insects with his bare hands." ”

Song Shaofeng glanced at Zhang Yuan helplessly and said, "Observe it today first, and then talk about it tomorrow." ”

Hu Ziming nodded, agreeing with Song Shaofeng's idea.

"Zhang Yuan, Zhao Xuan, you two watch here first, and the others go to set up tents."

Hu Ziming waved his hand, turned around and got into the car.

You can't park in this location, you have to find a slightly sheltered location, otherwise you won't be able to find the car tomorrow.

They are located about two kilometers from the ancient city, and beyond that, there are no longer too high sand dunes, and they can only be observed here.

A few people drove their cars, climbed down the sand dunes, and stopped and camped not far behind.

Zhao Xuan saw Zhang Yuan holding a telescope and observing from a distance, so he simply sat on the sand and asked, "How can this be fried?" ”

Not far away, Shacheng is about 200 meters wide, and if the length is similar, it is the size of four or five football fields.

Zhang Yuan replied without replying: "Cloud burst bombs, incendiary bombs or something, in the desert, you can explode at will." ”