章 3: Insects' Eggs
編集者: Atlas Studios
That toad, which was as big as 15 centimeters, caused System's entire body to tremble. The feeling was similar to his encounter with the small praying mantis the other time.
His [Insect Instinct] once again gave out a strong feeling, and System's pair of legs, which was responsible for jumping, stored great energy. The instinct of his body was urging System to jump and escape from there.
So [Insect Instinct]'s function is the urge of immediately jumping to escape when sensing danger? However, this time this instinct has the opposite effect…
System forcibly suppressed the strength of his [Insect Instinct]. The Derived Skill [Insect Instinct] was simple and effective as it could allow him to avoid most perilous situations, greatly increasing the survival chance of grasshoppers.
However, such instincts were unsuitable before the toad.
If this world's toads shared the same habits and characteristics as those in his previous life, then jumping in front of the toad was akin to fulfilling a death wish.
System could guarantee that if he jumped now, the toad's tongue would catch and roll him into its mouth. System would then turn into a puddle of pus from the toad's stomach acid.
Fortunately, the habits of toads and frogs were etched in System's memory—they liked active prey, while they were uninterested in dead prey.
In his precious life, System seemed to have had frogs as pets. System recalled that sometimes when the bread worms he bought were inactive or dead, he would tie those worms with a string and tease his frogs.
System knew that his best option was to stay still as toads were uninterested in inanimate things.
He forcibly suppressed his [Insect Instinct], which gave him the urge to jump away immediately, and the breathing in his abdomen gradually slowed. Thus, he once again entered the half-hibernation state.
Meanwhile, in the process of waiting for the toad to leave, the ants' search team gradually approached System and the toad's location. Apparently, the ants had not discovered the toad, which was hiding within the pile of dead leaves, and kept on searching for possibly edible food present within the dead leaves and branches.
Swoosh!
The dynamic vision of insects' compound eyes was very powerful, but obviously, the toad's tongue was quicker. System saw the toad shooting out its tongue and pulling it back into its mouth in but a flash. Then, he noticed that an ant around 20cm away from the toad had disappeared.
The toad spat out half a piece of dead leaf from its mouth—it should have accidentally eaten it when it used its tongue to capture the ant.
The collision between the toad's tongue and the dead leaves on the ground instantly alerted the few ants. They became vigilant, hastened their movement speed, and crawled around to search for abnormalities that had made the dead leaves move.
However, shortly after, the few ants fell prey to the toads' tongue. Only one ant escaped as its searching direction was different, and it gradually moved further away.
Even when facing strange unreasonable crises, these ants were not afraid. It was unknown if their intelligence was too low or it was just in their nature.
It should be their innate nature.
System recalled the scene of a documentary in his previous life. Even when facing their natural enemies, anteaters, which were tens of thousands times bigger than them, the ants would fearlessly charge towards the anteaters.
…
At noon, the toad before System started to leave.
In that period, the toad had eaten tens of ants, a few flying insects that looked like bees, and a huge dragonfly, one after the other.
After the toad left, System, who had finally escaped danger, got the chance to feed.
Eating and growth were the survival instincts flowing in the grasshoppers' blood, and it was also something System decided to do after much consideration.
For insects such as grasshoppers, which relied on reproductive abilities to ensure the continuation of their race, the survival rate of when they were in the nymph stage was tens of times lower than after they were an adult. Therefore, he had to grow quickly and become an adult grasshopper as soon as possible to increase his chances of survival.
After stopping the hibernation state of his body, System carefully jumped towards a direction he chose.
A grasshopper's jump was similar to the feeling of riding a roller coaster. However, grasshoppers were not human, so in the process of jumping, System felt that his body was like a machine. There were no abnormalities, and he could calmly observe the surroundings.
When jumping towards the first plant, System discovered that there were two white flowers, which were around five centimeters in diameter, on the tip of the plant. However, the distance was too far, so System could not see its shape clearly.
Suddenly, System thought of a bright idea to collect nectar. If he wanted his body to grow quickly, he would need food rich in nutrients, and obviously, nectar was quite a good choice.
Not only so, but System also wanted to try the taste of nectar as he was even able to eat plant leaves, which humans considered slightly bitter, like they were fruits. Therefore, what would the initially very sweet nectar's taste be when it entered his mouth as he ate it?
System was looking forward to it.
When heading to that flower, System, who advanced cautiously, encountered five small translucent white organisms. These tiny organisms also had six legs like him, so they should be a type of insect.
Their body size was extremely small, only 0.2-0.3cm, about half of System's body.
Those small insects used their unique mouthparts to destroy simultaneously the stem's outside wall and suck the slightly cloudy liquid that flowed out from the holes.
Apparently, they were herbivorous insects that liked peace. System did not hold back and directly used his strong body to knock away one of the tiny insects and swallow the liquid they had collected.
As System had predicted, those tiny insects were not living in a colony, like ants. Thus, once the small insect which System had knocked away, saw System with his muscular body, it quickly escaped.
Meanwhile, the other few did not bother about what System did and continued sucking the plant's liquid. They did not think System would be a threat to them.
After observing the tiny insects' behavior, System consumed the liquid from the stem. The liquid's taste was quite good and similar to the mango juice in his previous life.
However, after continuously snatching the liquid seeping out of the hole created by two tiny insects, the few of them escaped one after the other.
System tried to continue biting in the hole but realized that after those tiny insects had left, nectar was no longer secreted from it. It was most likely those insects' unique ability to allow nectar to flow out of the hole. Maybe their mouthpart had injected some special type of liquid.
After giving up on such a type of liquid, System used his legs' barbs and quickly climbed on top of the flower.
That flower looked much bigger than when he was observing it from below. It was around seven to eight centimeters, and its shape was like that of a chrysanthemum.
The stamens in the center of the flower were concentrated and tough. System tried using his mandibles to clear the stamens but to no avail as they were too hard for him to bite.
The shallow layer of nectar had already been sucked clean by bees. If he could not clear those stamens, then only the proboscis that butterflies had could suck the nectar in the deeper layers.
Without any other choice, System left from those two flowers and tried feeding on some mature leaves.
The mature leaves' taste was similar to the tender leaves, and the effects towards his growth were also similar. However, it was quite difficult for his soft mandibles now to bite through such a leaf, so the efficiency was three times lower.
Therefore, if he only ate such mature leaves, his feeding speed might be unable to keep up with his digestion speed—that would undoubtedly make him hungrier the more he ate. Thus, System could only decide to give up on them. It looked like he could only eat such a type of leaf after his first molting.
Meanwhile, just as System continued jumping around and observing if there were any dangers, he discovered up to 100 pale green eggs, which were crystal clear, behind a piece of leaf. His insect head could not help but reveal a greedy expression.
…
Grasshoppers' diet consisted not only of plants. They would eat meat or even nymphs or eggs of the same kind if their hunger overtook them!
-- 贈り物
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