The Best Time to Escape

Watching the two pairs of large pincers behind Tom, Luo Jun trembled nervously, but he still firmly held the matches in his hand because he knew that now was not the time to retreat, otherwise he and his beloved would become ant dinners.

Beside him were Zhang Meng and Xu Dong, each holding one end of the rubber rope, with a piece of cut mosquito net tied to it, waiting for Tom to charge.

As soon as Tom charged on his gecko, Luo Jun shouted, "Pull!" Zhang Meng and Xu Dong immediately pulled the rubber rope.

The bottom of the net made of mosquito nets had been nailed to the table in the morning. Now, lifting the upper sides immediately trapped the ants charging at the front.

Ants have six legs, and their center of gravity is low when they charge, so it's unrealistic to trip them. However, facing the mosquito net made of chiffon, the ants' large pincers couldn't do much.

As soon as the front ant was trapped in the net, Zhang Meng and Xu Dong let go to avoid being flung away.

The first ant was immediately entangled by the net made of mosquito nets. Despite its large pincers, the more it struggled, the more tangled it became, unable to free itself for a while.

The ant behind stopped when it noticed the situation. As it was about to attack Zhang Meng, Tom controlled Biscuit to turn around and counterattack.

Tom brandished the heavy file and struck twice, interrupting the second ant's attack on Zhang Meng.

Meanwhile, Chen Jianbin, who was guarding the net, was still holding a plastic canister filled with kerosene and was still in a daze. Seeing this, Luo Jun hurriedly shouted, "Chen Jianbin, pour the kerosene quickly, what are you waiting for?"

Chen Jianbin woke up as if from a dream and immediately poured the kerosene onto the struggling ants inside the net.

As soon as it was poured, Luo Jun struck a match on the nitrocellulose and lit it, then ran up and threw it on the ants.

The chiffon mosquito net was not flammable, but kerosene was. As soon as the match touched the ants, a larger flame erupted, causing the ants to struggle uncontrollably.

"Haha! Burn to death, damn it!" Li Qiang cheered loudly as he watched the ignited ants. Luo Jun picked up a large knife and shouted at him, "Don't get too excited, chop off its legs!" Saying that, he ran over, enduring the scorching flames, and chopped off the ant's legs.

As long as the ant's legs were chopped off, no matter how powerful it was, it couldn't move. Wasn't it like meat on a chopping board?

While Luo Jun and Li Qiang were dealing with the first ant, Tom and Biscuit were confronting the second ant together.

The tactics were the same as last time, with Biscuit responsible for frontal containment while Tom wielded a big knife to chop behind the ant, focusing on its two hind legs this time.

After Tom chopped off all four legs of the ant, the one that Tom had knocked to the ground earlier finally crawled up.

Tom turned his head and saw that the ant had been ignited and turned into a roaring fire. Only then did he relax. He mounted Biscuit and, leaving behind the ant with only two legs, charged towards the ant that had just climbed up.

According to the previously agreed plan, Luo Jun and the others were responsible for harvesting the ant with only two legs. However, when they approached the ant with their weapons, none of them dared to get close.

Chen Jianbin, holding a needle, shouted at Luo Jun, "You... hurry up!"

Summoning his courage, Luo Jun took a step forward, but the ant turned towards him, and he could see that its terrifying pincers could cut him in half with just one snap. He was so scared that his legs went weak and he collapsed to the ground.

Seeing him like this, the ant immediately crawled up using its remaining two front legs. Li Qiang, beside Luo Jun, shouted and ran away, leaving only Luo Jun unable to get up and watching the large ant getting closer and closer.

Fortunately, at this moment, Liu Lian ran forward and pulled him up, and then the two quickly retreated. Thus, Luo Jun avoided being cut in half by the ant.

Meanwhile, Tom timely rushed back, waving his big knife to knock the ant away, saving Chen Jianbin's life.

He agilely avoided the ant's large pincers while wielding the big knife and finally chopped off the remaining two legs of the ant. Then, he said, "You guys deal with it!" and hurried back to join Biscuit, who was still confronting another ant.

The ant, with only its body left, lay helplessly on the table, while the six men still didn't dare to approach. When Tom dealt with the other ant, Luo Jun finally gathered the courage to chop at the ant's head, but the knife bounced off. The ant's head was quite hard, and chopping at it had no effect.

Seeing Tom come back, Chen Jianbin was overjoyed. "Quick, Uncle An, kill it too."

Tom waved his hand. "Forget it, let's go. The big worker ants are coming."

At this moment, the worker ants left behind finally crawled onto the table.

After the baptism of the two previous ants, the other six men finally loosened up when facing the worker ants. They vented their anger and cooperated with Tom to take care of five large worker ants and four medium-sized worker ants.

Tom wiped the sweat off and sat on the ground, feeding the exhausted Biscuit some crumbs. Just a few steps away, the ant that had been chopped into a stick by Tom was still alive, angrily moving its large pincers back and forth, as if it could pounce at Tom and chop him into pieces at any moment.

"It's great, we're safe! Haha," Chen Jianbin laughed triumphantly, already wearing a new piece of cloth.

"Pack up, we're leaving!" Tom took a bite of biscuit crumbs and ordered.

"What's up?" Zhang Meng, who was drinking water, was puzzled. "Aren't you going parachuting with Luo Jun and the others?"

"Soldier ants are not worker ants. They don't have time to search for food everywhere. They only have one reason to mobilize: attack. This is definitely sent by the queen ant. If they fail to return, the queen will definitely send more soldier ants. After all, we are delicious food now," Tom explained.

After the battle just now, he secretly tried to communicate with the soldier ants using the emerald he had concealed. The result was that the soldier ants only had strong killing intent towards him, and he could sense the command in their pheromones: to capture bipedal insects, send more after the battle.

The idea of sensing the thoughts of creatures was very strange, and Tom didn't know how to describe it, but he felt that his previous judgment was close to the truth.

With the influx of foreign ants competing for territory with the first-floor ants, it seemed that the first-floor ants had already controlled the third floor and might have even extended their influence to the fourth floor. If the inference of the so-called "send more after the battle" sensed from the soldier ants' heads was correct, then two groups of ants were having another battle.

Once the local ants ended the battle, they would be able to send more soldier ants to capture the survivors of these "bipedal insects."

The ants completed the reconnaissance last night and determined their location. Today, the soldier ants had learned to go around the window to find them. Tom felt that they were no longer simply relying on smell to find prey. As long as they were still in this building, he believed that it was only a matter of time before the soldier ants found them. By then, it wouldn't be just a matter of two or three soldier ants.

However, Tom didn't mention the ability to sense biological thoughts from the beginning. Saying it now would only cause this team, which already had little trust, to fall apart, and it might delay their departure. It was better to leave directly. Those who believed could follow, and those who didn't could stay behind.

Although Tom didn't have more convincing reasons, his combat effectiveness displayed in the recent battle was evident to everyone. Therefore, when Tom said to leave, despite the doubts of others, they still obediently followed.

They packed up quickly, picked up some dry biscuit crumbs, brought needles, large knives, and kerosene cans, and set off. Surprisingly, Zhang Meng brought out a firecracker, which no one had expected.

Since Biscuit wasn't in good shape, Tom didn't want it to carry him anymore. Everyone followed Biscuit cautiously along the edge.

Arriving at the window of the stairwell, Tom saw many ants of all sizes' bodies left at the stairwell entrance, which also confirmed the information Tom received: two groups of ants had just had another battle.

For safety reasons, he and Biscuit first inspected the stairwell, confirmed that there were no live ants, and then waved for everyone to follow.

Although the stairs were a bit high, they had become smaller, and their jumping height had increased. It took a bit of effort, but they could still go up.

As they came over, Tom and Biscuit climbed up first, reaching the top of the building. He patted Biscuit's back to let it rest for a while, then squeezed out of the door crack to take a look, only to see that the left side of the roof was full of ants tearing at each other.

The battle of the two groups of ants was actually taking place on the roof, which shocked Tom.

"Now what?" Tom thought of the people still climbing the stairs and looked at the war of hundreds of ants, suddenly feeling helpless.

Should they go back or quietly slip away now?

"No, now is the best time to escape!" Tom squeezed back into the building and waved to the people who were still climbing, signaling them to speed up.

Once the battle ended, the ant colony would be able to spare hands to deal with them, so it was a good time to leave while they were busy fighting.

Downstairs, everyone had to climb hard for their lives. Li Qiang, being strong and powerful, was at the front, followed by Xu Dong and Chen Jianbin. Zhang Jiaqi, being a woman, found climbing more difficult, but fortunately, her boyfriend Luo Jun never left her side. Surprisingly, the one falling behind was the smallest Zhang Meng, who climbed while glaring resentfully at Luo Jun.