Poisonous Insect Valley 4
Ordinary army ants typically spend just a single night at a temporary campsite.
When the temperature drops after dark they huddle together for warmth and protection; the moment the sun rises and the air warms, they set out again.
These ones, however, seemed different.
Whether they were burning through the prey they had already gathered or the queen was busy laying eggs, I couldn’t say—but they were spending a third day at their temporary camp.
From the way they acted I guessed they normally roamed like mad gathering food, then settled for a few days once they had stockpiled enough, repeating the cycle over and over.
What made me think they hadn’t truly stopped was the simple fact that they weren’t sending out any foraging parties.
That wasn’t bad news for us. It bought precious time for the main force my noona was leading to catch up.
The main force carried bamboo collection cages and supplies; if we were going to put my plan into action—racing ahead of the swarm and scooping up every poisonous creature that bolted—we needed either to join them or at least meet once.
And with noona’s arrival I finally understood why Grandfather and a handful of the Poisonous Creature Squad members were the only ones not wearing those strange expressions at my cheerful little proposal.
“Good heavens…”
Noona stared across the river at the ants, eyes wide with shock.
Her astonishment didn’t end there. When I suggested we run ahead of the column once it started moving and snatch up the poisonous creatures that fled in panic, her eyes nearly popped out of her head.
“R-run… in front of those things?”
“Yes. When their column rolls through, everything hiding in the grass, under rocks, or in crevices bolts out in terror. Those are the ones we want. Creatures that are only looking straight ahead and running for their lives are easy to catch.”
Noona stared at my face for a long moment, expression blank, then muttered as if to herself.
“…After bees, is it ants now? We only just finished running in front of the bees…”
That was why Grandfather and a few of the Poisonous Creature Squad were the only ones who hadn’t looked at me like I was insane.
Thinking back on noona’s words, I realized Commander Gu Pae, the Poison Blood Squad commander, and several of their warriors were already veterans of this exact kind of death race.
They had already run a desperate, life-or-death sprint from the entrance of Yunnan all the way back to the Tang Family during the Golden-Haired Bee King incident.
“But didn’t you get excellent results last time?”
“Th-that’s true, but…”
Honestly, I had felt a little guilty toward noona back then.
Even exhausted she was still beautiful, but watching a pretty noona drenched in sweat, unable to sleep or eat properly for days while racing all the way home—carrying me on top of everything else because I couldn’t use lightness arts—had been rough.
What eased my guilt a little was something Grandfather had said afterward. Well, she got a fortuitous encounter because of me, so it worked out.
The reason noona couldn’t really argue when I mentioned the good results was that, according to Grandfather, eating the Azure-Spotted Centipede’s inner elixir had been one opportunity—but the death race itself had been another.
Even after you swallow a spiritual medicine or an inner elixir, it takes a long time for the energy to fully melt into your body through your cultivation method. While noona was running for her life she burned her internal energy down to the dregs over and over, and in the process she managed to refine most of that foreign power into her own far faster than normal.
So I took her hand firmly and said,
“You don’t need the energy still leaking from the elixir for the little centipedes anymore. This time, sweep up every last bit of what’s left.”
It might have sounded a little smug, but it was the truth. What could I do?
I wasn’t doing this just for myself. It would become her blood, her flesh, her internal energy—right?
Noona’s lips twitched as if she had something she wanted to say. Then Grandfather’s voice came from the side.
“Come to think of it, So-ryong, you should run too. Tomorrow you’ll race alongside Hwa-eun.”
“Me too?”
My lightness arts still weren’t great, so the plan had been for Grandfather to carry me once the ants started moving. Suddenly he wanted me running next to noona.
I blinked in confusion. Grandfather pointed at my chest.
“You ate some too, didn’t you? Spiritual medicine.”
“Gasp!”
Right. I had also eaten the royal jelly the Golden-Haired Bee King had passed to me.
In other words, I needed to refine energy as well.
The corner of noona’s previously twitching mouth curled upward.
The moment Grandfather finished speaking, she clasped my hand tightly and smiled.
“So-ryong, let’s run side by side tomorrow. I’m happy I get to race with you. Hehe.”
The look on her face somehow reminded me of someone who had just eaten a mealworm—pleased and faintly mischievous. Surely that was just my imagination. …Right?
During the night we quietly crossed ahead to the place where we expected the swarm to move and staked out our positions.
We had no idea how much longer they would stay, but it was better to be ready early.
The distance to the colony was a little over sixty zhang—roughly two hundred meters.
Once they started moving we planned to close to within thirty zhang, about a hundred meters, and keep that gap while we ran.
The main force would slowly follow us from the far bank of the river, taking the poisonous insects and snakes we caught as we went.
We had already decided to toss the cages of captured creatures across to the opposite shore.
I tossed and turned with excitement over tomorrow’s harvest, finally dozing off—only to be jolted awake by a bone-chilling sound.
—Shaaaaa!
I opened my eyes to morning light. As the sun climbed and flooded the basin, the bamboo forest began to ripple like waves, as if someone had just turned the key in the ants’ ignition.
We had posted sentries, but we hadn’t needed them. The swarm itself was announcing its departure with that thunderous roar.
“S-So-ryong, wake up.”
“I’m awake, Hwa-eun.”
Noona, who had been curled up beside me, shook me gently. I sat up at once, skipping any washing, and tied a cloth band tightly around my forehead.
The Tang Family warriors who had already run this kind of race once before were doing the same—forehead bands knotted hard. Noona quickly followed suit.
We had talked about it yesterday, but I hadn’t understood why until the veterans explained: sweat running into your eyes stings like hell.
Advice from people who had lived it. I took it. So that’s why marathon runners in my past life wore those headbands. I thought it was just for looks…
Once we were ready, the centipedes came to me, the lizards went to noona, and Yo-hwa—who had confidently claimed the day before that she could keep up—I decided to trust for now.
If she couldn’t manage she could always cross the river.
When everyone was finally set, a crimson tide began to pour out of the lower basin.
—Shaaaaaa!
A wave of ants rolled toward us like a living flood. At the front, as expected, were the giant worker ants—the ones that took the place of soldiers, punching the path open and guarding the flanks so the large and medium workers could stream down the center of the column.
“The very front is the hunting party. They bite anything that touches them, so be careful.”
“U-understood, Young Master So-ryong.”
The vanguard of an army-ant column is a hyper-aggressive hunting party that attacks whatever it sees.
I watched them draw closer, thinking it was time for us to start moving, when a beast’s scream split the air.
—Kyaaaaah!
A deer—or maybe a roe deer—burst out of nowhere between the ants and us. Startled by the swarm, it bolted our way, then startled again at the sight of humans and tried to reverse course.
Ants behind, people in front. It must have decided we were the greater threat. That choice led to a nightmare.
—Kyaa! Kyaaaaah!
One of the giant workers sank its enormous hooked mandibles into the animal’s hind leg. The deer screamed and leaped wildly, trying to shake the ant free, but the worker never let go.
Primitive tribes in Asia and the Amazon use these giant ants like living staples when they get cut—once they bite, they never release.
The thrashing deer finally toppled right in front of the column. The crimson wave simply swallowed it whole.
At that sight every Tang Family warrior surged forward as one. The deer had been ground to nothing in an instant.
“S-So-ryong, let’s go too.”
Noona’s voice came from beside me. I turned and found her already in a standing-start stance, both arms raised, body leaning forward as if her heart had already taken off.
I checked the closing gap between us and the ants, then nodded.
“Let’s go!”
The real poisonous-creature harvest had begun.
Army ants have almost no eyesight, so they wouldn’t chase us by sight, but they still rolled forward at a solid clip—about the speed of a person jogging hard.
Whenever a fight broke out over prey at the front, more ants poured in from behind in an instant.
After roughly half a shichen of running, the tally of creatures we had already watched vanish into the red tide included one bear, three wild boars, and two deer.
I was starting to suspect they were following the riverbank precisely because animals came there to drink.
We left the pitiful silhouettes melting into the crimson wave behind us and kept running, scooping up every poisonous creature that burst out ahead—when Commander Gu Pae, who was watching the opposite side from me, shouted.
“Young Master So-ryong! There’s a huge snake up ahead! That might be a python!”
A giant snake? A python?
I spun around at Gu Pae’s cry. A massive serpent was throwing every ounce of strength into crawling toward us, fleeing the ants.
Glossy scales. Thick, powerful body. The creature slithering our way was a Burmese python!
“Satin Python! We have to catch that one!”
The Burmese python ranks among the five largest snakes in the world. On top of that it is relatively gentle and not particularly difficult to keep.
There was no way we were letting it go. It isn’t venomous, but raising one is pure joy.
Gu Pae made a face of pure disbelief. A grumbling protest burst out of him.
“Young Master, you said the same thing when the whip scorpion appeared earlier. And before that with the toad… If you’re going to do this, why not just catch everything that comes out…?”
He was complaining because we had agreed to be selective and only take the valuable ones—yet I kept calling for every single creature that appeared.
But every one of them was something I was seeing for the first time and each had real value. What was I supposed to do? Managing people is hard. Leading by example it is, then?
I sprinted toward the python. Shouts of alarm rose behind me—because the snake was closer to the ants than I had realized.
“Y-Young Master, it’s dangerous!”
“So-ryong!”
Ignoring the cries of the Tang warriors and noona, I dashed in and heaved the serpent across my shoulders.
“Whoa, this thing is no joke.”
Burmese pythons can grow up to six meters; this one was about three. The moment I draped it over my shoulders the solid weight settled in.
I took one step forward. An ominous sound whispered right behind me.
—Seogeok.
I leaped ahead and glanced back. A giant worker had closed the gap without my noticing. Among the nearest ants, a slightly smaller giant worker—the kind whose mandibles are built for cutting and crushing—had just swung its jaws.
The swarm was far closer than I had thought. Between the sudden proximity and the weight on my shoulders, the moment my foot left the ground I slipped on the grass.
—Chwaak.
“Whoops.”
Noona’s and Commander Gu Pae’s eyes went round as saucers. Both of them immediately launched into lightness arts and raced toward me.
I looked back. The ant tide was pouring in.
“So-ryong!”
“Young Master!”
Their shouts were swallowed by the roar of the swarm. I was just thinking I should have been a little less greedy, that this might be the end—when something yanked me forward.
—Chwaaaa.
My body slid across the grass as if on a sled, hauled straight ahead.
I came to a stop right in front of Yo-hwa. Without my noticing she had already looped a strand of silk around me.
—Kish! Kishit!
Yo-hwa immediately began scolding me with angry little clicks. Noona piled on from the side.
“Good girl, Yo-hwa! Give him a proper scolding! So-ryong! From now on I’m not letting you get that close to the ants again!”
“S-sorry.”
I had nearly become meatballs out of pure greed. After patting my chest in relief I stopped collecting anything myself and simply gave orders to the warriors while quietly trailing after Yo-hwa.
Partly because of the near-disaster, but mostly because the stubborn spider had looped silk around my neck and refused to release it. I’m not a pet, you know…
“Yo-hwa, can you let this go now?”
—Kish!
I tried several times. Her answer was a firm, unyielding click every single time.
In the end I had no choice but to follow quietly behind her until the sun began to set and the ants finally started to halt on the far side of a hill.
The moment Yo-hwa dragged me over the crest, something like a checkpoint came into view below. Warriors came running out and blocked our path, shouting,
“From here on is the territory of the Beast Palace! State your identities, intruders!”
The man who looked like their leader was leading a wolf-like beast on a leash. He glanced back and forth between me—still tethered by Yo-hwa’s silk—and his own wolf, and his face went blank with shock.
“Uh…”
No. It’s not what you’re thinking. It’s really not…