The 10 person team continued to climb the stairs, but unlike before, they have now liberated most of the load and are borne by four mutated soldier ants.
This greatly improves their climbing speed, as the four soldier ants have a strong load-bearing capacity and share all the equipment with them, which does not hinder their travel speed.
The biggest problem is actually Yang Caishan. As a woman, her physical fitness is the worst in the team. When I climbed to the second floor, I was already a bit out of breath.
After thinking for a moment, Tom went to Kent to discuss and suggested redistributing the supplies, leaving one mutated soldier ant to carry Yang Caishan.
The previously large mutant worker ants are not suitable because they are only the size of a country dog, which is half the height of a person.
Nowadays, a mutated soldier ant is close to 10 centimeters, and people with a height of 6 or 7 centimeters have no problem riding it, just like riding a horse.
Kent thought for a moment, nodded in agreement, and then called on the vulture to take a soldier to pack the load for the soldier ants.
Tom walked up to Yang Caishan sitting on the ground and asked, "Are you tired?"
Yang Caishan rubbed her ankle and wiped away sweat, "Of course, this is not any easier than filming."
"I remember the dramas you acted in were all cutthroat, didn't you have to put in too much effort?" Tom smiled. He actually didn't like people who were not dedicated, especially celebrities who couldn't do their job well.
"Sigh... you guys are so naive," Yang Caishan sighed, but still gave up her defense. "Okay, I did slack off. Are you coming over amidst your busy schedule to criticize me like keyboard critics on the internet before?"
Tom smiled again and said, "I really don't like actors like you, but I have no right to interfere. After all, someone pays, and that's someone else's business. I came here to ask you, dare you ride an ant?"
Yang Caishan widened her eyes and watched the vulture empty the back of a soldier ant. She was stunned for a while before trembling and saying, "Riding a horse... I can... but riding that big guy... forget it."
"Are you sure? We have only climbed the second floor now, and there are still five floors left. This is not one plus one plus seven. The higher you climb, the greater the energy consumption, and the later you will be more tired."
"I can rest, anyway you have guns."
"We'd better leave this building before it gets dark. It's too dark here, and mosquitoes and mice are bound to breed. When it gets dark, there may be attacks from all directions, which is very dangerous. Moreover, if there are mice attacking us upstairs and we have to escape, the mice won't stop and wait for you to rest enough before chasing us."
Yang Caishan hesitated for a while before murmuring, "Are you... sure... it doesn't bite?"
Tom knew it was done, "Don't bite people..." He almost couldn't help but say the latter half of the sentence, which was that it eats people, and its ability to mutate is likely to have already eaten people.
Of course, now that she finally dares to approach this dark and cold mutated black ant, it's already quite good, after all, this thing still looks quite eerie. I may not have noticed it before, but as it becomes smaller, it becomes larger and looks different.
After the two of them walked over, Tom began to transform the soldier ant with its empty back so that she could sit firmly on it.
Doing the saddle is a skilled job for Tom, and it took him less than two minutes to complete it. Then he retreated to the side and made a gesture of invitation to Yang Caishan with a smile on his face.
"Is it really... okay?" Yang Caishan asked.
Tom smiled and nodded.
"Help me..." Yang Caishan extended her hand to him.
The vulture, who was still loading ammunition for the soldier ants next to him, looked straight in the eyes. How could this big star be so familiar with him? Look at her charming expression, it's even more touching than what she portrayed on TV.
Tom scratched his head and couldn't help it. Time was tight, so he quickly threw her up and started upstairs. So he had no choice but to walk over, supporting her hand on one side and her slender waist on the other, and then gently pushing her onto the back of the mutant soldier ant.
The trunk of the ant is still very thin, so there is no problem riding it.
In order to be safe, Tom just made a simple saddle with an iron block and tied a pillow on it, at least it doesn't sit so hard.
Ants don't actually have high physiological needs. As long as they satisfy their food, most of the time they are tireless slaves.
Now Tom has directly activated pheromones in his body, with several stacked instructions, it acts like a robot.
"Ah... An... Duan Fei... you can't be too far away from me, I'm afraid."
"Don't be afraid, just sit quietly," Tom encouraged her, and then let the soldier ants crawl up the stairs.
This is the vertical climbing stage, and Tom specially made a handle so that she can hold the ant while climbing vertically, and the backrest itself will firmly support her back. Let her not be hung down.
After all, Tom has ridden a gecko and climbed for a while, and he already has a lot of experience on how to ride more comfortably in this mode of travel.
So Yang Caishan quickly got used to the crawling of ants after going through several stages of discomfort. She even laughed excitedly and said, "I finally understand what it feels like for the protagonist to ride an ant in Ant Man. Duan Fei... when will you get a flying ant to ride for me?"
Tom watched as the soldier ants carried her ahead and couldn't help but shake his head. If possible, he didn't want to face flying insects and upgrade from flat combat to three-dimensional combat. For these little people, the pressure would be great. Fortunately, he had good luck at the moment, at least the mutated crow was temporarily managed by him. After sighing, he continued to jump on the stairs with his backpack and supplies on his back.
With the addition of four soldier ants, the difficulties in material transportation and the slow movement of Yang Caishan were solved, and the climbing speed of the team was improved. So originally, I thought a tall building with 168 floors would take longer than expected.
In short time, the odor emitted by the human body is smaller, and the risk of attracting surrounding organisms is naturally lower. So at 2:30 pm, they arrived on the seventh floor smoothly.
"Wait, pay attention to the road!" Tom, who jumped to the front of the queue and was the first to climb the seventh floor, suddenly raised his hand to warn behind him.
With their previous performance, Kent and others trusted him more as a guide, and Tom's attentive gesture immediately caught their attention.
The seventh floor is the top floor of this office building. To the left of the spacious staircase is a huge transparent glass door, and several bonsai plants are placed on the opposite wall. A few plaques are vaguely hanging on the wall, and Tom estimates that they are written about the factory's rules and regulations.
What caught his attention was something white in front of him: a spider web.
This type of spider web, which used to be as thin as hair, now appears to be as thick as fingers. If you don't pay attention to the milky white translucent silk like web structure, it is still easy to overlook and bump into the web. Tom, who has always been extremely vigilant in wilderness exploration, naturally discovered something wrong at the first time.
Kent and others climbed up one by one, and the vulture looked at the wide spider webs scattered all over the staircase. "Isn't it just a few spider webs? What's there to make a big fuss about? Duan Fei, you're too sensitive."
Tom waved his hand and said, "Have you ever seen the spider webs pulled from bonsai to the stairs? It's only been three months now, and even the most desolate house doesn't have such big three spider webs, right?"
"Yeah," the vulture patted its head before realizing, "it's too big."
Kent is quick witted and has undertaken multiple exploration missions, with a strong sense of crisis. "This is a masterpiece of mutated spiders, everyone be on guard, Duan Fei, control your ants well, and don't let them move around."
Tom nodded and pressed his hand onto the ant he had chosen.
Now, he only needs to construct pheromones in the body of the designated head ant, which will naturally "translate" his instructions into ant pheromones. The other three soldier ants were previously buried in Tom's body to listen to the pheromone commands of the head ant, and can complete the effect of commanding an ant army.
This is also Tom's imitation of the structure of the ant army constructed by referencing the mutated queen ant in the rental building.
Tom finished dealing with the instructions from the ants, and the mooncake carefully cut a small piece of spider silk according to Kent's instructions and handed it to him.
"It has strong resilience and also comes with stickiness. If a person doesn't pay attention and hits their head, they may get stuck." Kent checked it and then said, "Go ahead and get the task items. After they come out, collect some and hand them over to the R&D department for analysis."
When Tom saw another soldier with the code name "Grey Wolf" planning to break open the spider web and make a way, he quickly stopped him. "Wait a moment, maybe the spider web is connected to the spider. Breaking open the spider web is likely to disturb the spiders hidden in the dark."
The grey wolf was about to use a stick to push it away when he heard Tom's words and immediately stopped, turning his head to wait for Kent's instructions.
Kent looked up and saw that the first floor was 4 meters high, which was 96 meters high for them. It was not easy to see all the surrounding space clearly. He looked around and didn't notice any hidden threats, but he still said, "Hmm, Duan Fei is right. Mooncakes, use a flamethrower, and burn the spider webs on the way into the office."
"Yes!" The soldier with a flamethrower walked forward immediately, opened the air valve, lit the fire gun, and then pulled the trigger to spit out the tongue of fire.
Although the spider silk is sticky, it contracts and vaporizes instantly when it encounters an open flame. The mooncake moves forward and burns open the three layers of spider webs blocking the way, and everyone follows it.
The glass door is closed, and the handle is locked with an anti-theft lock. This must be the office door that was locked after work on April 5th.
Kent muttered whether to use explosives to blow open the glass door, but Tom volunteered to give it a try. He borrowed a fourth level red crystal from Zhao Xin, covered his back with a cloth net, and activated it.
The 4th level red crystal magnifies 5 times the arm strength, according to the standards customized for the shelter provided by Zhao Xin. The average maximum strength of ordinary people is 10, with the highest strength being 15. Zhao Xin's is 12, while his is 20.
By magnifying 5 times with level 4 crystals, that is the power of 100.
Before entering the shelter of the Haiwei Mini Industry, Tom's strength was estimated to be only around 10 ordinary people's level. Even if you wear the Zero Armor on Old Street and receive 6 times the strength, it only reaches 60. Now it has doubled, even with a 5-fold enhancement, it has increased significantly.
Tom pushed the glass door with a strengthening force of 100, opening a crack in the door, but it was almost enough to pass through.
"I'll help you!" Zhao Xin volunteered to come forward.
Wearing the armor of Type 2 Jade Rabbit, it has 6 times the strength of its arms. Its basic strength is 12, and when magnified, it is 72. Simultaneously pushing the glass door with Tom, they finally opened a gap that was enough for one person to pass through.
"Vulture, you pass first and remain vigilant!"
"Yes! Captain." The vulture carried an assault rifle and first passed through the transparent glass door.