Daily Evolution from Mastering Tai Chi

Chapter 364 - 278: Mobilizing the Ant Army to Intimidate Hundreds

Wang Ye crouched beside a small mound, watching the countless ants swarming inside.

These ants weren’t the common black variety, but had a striking reddish-brown appearance. Based on his knowledge of insect types from watching short videos, he could identify these ants as the infamous Red Fire Ants.

This species, known as the Red Fire Ant, originally came from South America and was later introduced worldwide, including places like China and the United States. It is a classic invasive species, similar in nature to the golden apple snail and the African giant snail. Red Fire Ants are exceptionally aggressive and omnivorous, posing a serious threat to local agriculture, forestry, and livestock. In addition, they can also invade livestock, damage irrigation systems, and even seize other animals’ food sources.

They have a noticeable aggression towards humans, primarily stinging with their mandibles. A sting results in a burning pain similar to a burn, and blisters may appear afterwards. It’s said that being bitten by a Red Fire Ant feels like being burned by fire, and in the severest cases, it can lead to death. The venom can cause symptoms like muscle spasms, skin hemorrhages, rhabdomyolysis, and acute renal failure when the toxin spreads throughout the human body.

They’re regarded as one of the most terrifying ants in the world.

Thus, the first reaction of many people in the country upon seeing Red Fire Ants is to use lethal chemical substances to eliminate them entirely, preventing them from proliferating locally and causing further harm to flora and fauna.

Wang Ye pondered for a moment, trying to pick up a Red Fire Ant worker with his finger.

This Red Fire Ant was about half a centimeter long, appearing very small. It paused for a moment in confusion before decisively biting Wang Ye’s skin with its mandibles and fiercely thrusting its stinger from its abdomen downward, clearly mistaking Wang Ye for an intruder.

Unfortunately, Wang Ye’s skin defense power was too strong.

The Red Fire Ant bit hard for several seconds but still couldn’t break through Wang Ye’s defense.

Meanwhile, Wang Ye endured the ant’s bites while trying to invade its brain domain.

However, countless attempts proved futile.

If his consciousness were likened to a hammer, then the brain domain of this Red Fire Ant felt like a ball of cotton, resisting every blow he dealt.

"Is it really impossible to use mind control on this kind of insect?" Wang Ye couldn’t help but frown.

In his assumption, even if insects lack cognitive abilities, there should be a secondary consciousness built on instinct, and where there is consciousness, Wang Ye should be able to use mind control. But now it seems this thing is nothing more than a pre-programmed machine, devoid of any biological consciousness.

Wang Ye continued to pick up other Red Fire Ants with his fingers, attempting mind control, but it was to no avail.

Each Red Fire Ant lacked any form of consciousness, making it impossible to use mind control ability on them.

Upon learning this result, Wang Ye’s eyes showed disappointment. Unable to control ants meant losing a potentially formidable force.

It should be noted that numerous studies and data indicate that there are at least two hundred trillion ants on Earth, with a total biomass surpassing that of birds and mammals, accounting for 20% of Earth’s biomass. Specifically, based on an average weight of 50 milligrams, the total weight of ants globally reaches about a billion tons, while there are approximately 8 billion humans on Earth, whose total weight, based on an average weight of 60 kilograms, is only 480 million tons. In other words, the total weight of all ants in the world far exceeds that of all humans.

This quantity and mass, coupled with Wang Ye’s intelligence, could amount to terrifying combat power.

If he could indeed control all the ants on Earth, the destruction of human civilization would be a flick of the wrist for Wang Ye, but now he is told that ants lack consciousness and thus cannot be mind-controlled. This is simply catastrophic news.

Wang Ye gritted his teeth, a trace of reluctance in his eyes.

He crushed the Red Fire Ant he held in his hand, sat cross-legged on the ground, and pondered other ways to control the ants.

In fact, he had also considered indirectly controlling the entire ant colony by controlling the queen ant.

But anyone who understands such truly social animals knows that the actions of the ant colony aren’t controlled by the queen ant. The queen is just a big figure in the ant nest, serving as a reproductive machine. Therefore, ants have no leader, nor do individuals have the ability to coordinate and command actions. The reason ants can make countless complex decisions is entirely due to simple pheromone-based interactions among individuals, collectively forming complex behaviors.

For example, army ants build huge tent-like structures at the base of trees as their camp. Each worker ant, with very poor eyesight, only grabs onto its neighbors, but eventually, they construct a high-rise composed of countless ants. This is the self-organizing behavior of truly social animals. Whether it’s foraging, attacking, or defending their home, it’s actually the worker ants spontaneously completing these tasks in a self-organized state, with the queen not contributing at all.

Even before mastering mind control ability, Wang Ye was already able to guide some ants’ actions by simulating simple pheromones through the use of Primordial Qi. However, the effects of "guidance" and "control" are worlds apart. Guidance only allows the guided creatures to go to a specific place, but it cannot incite them to attack. If they sense danger, they might even break free from Wang Ye’s guidance. In contrast, control allows Wang Ye to make the controlled creatures completely obedient to him, even going so far as to strap them with bombs and send them to their deaths if ordered.