The Brood Nesty deep underground, a depth difficult for ordinary ants to reach without specialized digging limbs. To address this, Luo Wen constructed a temporary nest above the Brood Nest. This structure served not only as a logistics hub but also as a decoy—the first line of defense for the true nest.


    The distance between Ant Nest No. 1 and the Brood Nest was about fifty meters, roughly the same length as the smuggling tunnel leading to Ant Nest No. 2. With his prior experience, this project posed no challenge for Luo Wen.


    After spending some timepleting the tunnel, the Brood Nest resumed siphoning food from Ant Nest No. 1. With two nests supplying resources, the Brood Nest’s food reserves began increasing visibly. The hatchery became fully stocked, and even the storage chambers Luo Wen had excavated earlier started filling with food.


    From then on, Luo Wen’s daily routine consisted of hauling enough food from both nests to meet the transport team’s capacity for the day. After that, he expanded his scouting range.


    Time passed, and Luo Wen’s body grew significantlyrger, nowparable in size to the “War God” ck Beetle he encountered before. Although hecked the massive mandibles, hisbat strength was enough to handle a Soldier Ant in one-on-onebat.


    His bulk now exceeded that of Soldier Ants, and his rounded physique made their slender frames appear feeble inparison. Apart from their sharper mandibles, Soldier Ants resembled oversized Worker Ants. Without the advantage of size, they were no match for Luo-style insectbat techniques.


    Near Ant Nest No. 1, Luo Wen set a trap and, with arge team of minions, ambushed a Soldier Ant. After some effort, he sessfully killed it, acquiring its gic fragments.


    At this point, the Brood Nest housed over 200 adult ck Ants, with more than a thousand eggs,rvae, and pupaebined. Notably, the second batch of modified ck Ants with Burrower limbs had all pupated, while the first batch of ck Beetlervae remained in therval stage. However, theservae had grown muchrger than most adult ck Ants.


    Considering the source of their gic temte and their eventual adult size, this was understandable.Although Luo Wen obtained the Soldier Ant temte, he decided against hatching any. Their role ovepped with that of the ck Beetles, yet theirbat effectiveness was significantly lower. Furthermore, Soldier Ants neither worked nor reproduced and consumed vast amounts of food. Hatching a few would be pointless.


    When the ck Beetles matured, the Brood Nest would be ready to expand to the surface and im territory.


    Before that, Luo Wen needed to locate new ant nests. As the poption in the Brood Nest grew rapidly, the resources from two nests were bing insufficient.


    A few dayster, Luo Wen discovered a new ant nest 200 meters north of the Brood Nest. He immediately forged identification pheromones and infiltrated it.


    The previously spacious main tunnels now seemed cramped due to Luo Wen’s erged frame. If he continued growing, his espionage missions would likely be impossible unless he widened the passages as he went. Whether his forged identity would remain effective by then was another matter.


    During his earlier visit to Ant Nest No. 2’s hatchery, Luo Wen had witnessed a Soldier Ant kill a Worker Ant. That Worker Ant wasn’t a spy like Luo Wen but a legitimate native of the nest. Luo Wen still didn’t understand why the attack urred.


    This incident taught him that even ants from the same nest could attack each other. Over-reliance on forged identity pheromones could lead tocency and grave mistakes.


    Since then, Luo Wen had been more cautious during his infiltrations. However, as his size increased, the rtive threat posed by the nest’s inhabitants decreased, and his confidence began to swell once more.


    The newly discovered Ant Nest No. 3 was also a ck Ant nest, simr in scale to Ant Nest No. 2, and showed no signs of unusual ant types. Luo Wen indulged in some nectar inside the nest and fed a few mouthfuls to some Yellow Bugs freeloading there before returning home to rally his forces.


    Leading his excavation team, he began digging a tunnel toward the new nest.


    The route to Ant Nest No. 3 passed between Ant Nests No. 1 and No. 2. Using the surface posed risks of encountering scouts from either nest,plicating transportation.


    Thus, Luo Wen decided to dig from the transfer hub above the Brood Nest and excavate an underground tunnel over 200 meters long to connect directly to Ant Nest No. 3.


    Given Luo Wen’s size, digging a tunnel to his dimensions created a spacious andfortable passage for the ants. While he excavated at the front, hundreds of ants transported the disced soil behind him.


    Although this 200-meter tunnel was Luo Wen’srgest project to date, itspletion might surpass the fifty-meter tunnel to Ant Nest No. 2 in speed.


    A few days into the project, the newly hatched Burrower Ants joined the team. Their specialized digging limbs vastly outperformed ordinary appendages, akin to the difference between sweeping beans with a broom and picking them up by hand. The increase in efficiency was obvious.


    Everything progressed smoothly, and the new tunnel was on track for earlypletion. Then, something unexpected happened.


    After a day’s work, Luo Wen returned ahead of the excavation team, leaving them to clean up the tunnel and continue their tasks. The soil removed from the tunnel had formed a mound over half a meter high above the Brood Nest, a testament to their efforts.


    Climbing to the surface, Luo Wen nned to drink some tree sap and bring some back for Big ck. Recently, the ck Beetlervae modeled after Big ck had begun to pupate. Luo Wen wasn’t sure if they’d remain herbivorous upon emerging, but he had started preserving the vegetation around the Brood Nest, consciously avoiding damage to the surrounding nt roots.


    While climbing a nt to find a tender branch to nibble, Luo Wen caught a glimpse of several moving patches of yellowish-brown in his peripheral vision.


    His senses immediately went on high alert. With the Brood Nest’s growth, the surrounding area had be devoid of other life forms, let alone rare yellowish-brown ones.


    Luo Wen moved toward the figures, cautiously closing the distance until they came into clear view.


    To his surprise, they were the same Desert Ants that had nearly ended his life before. Indeed, it seemed enemies often crossed paths again.@@novelbin@@