Chapter 67: Double Yolk
Firstly, the mortality rate had indeed decreased significantly.
This time, only about 10% of the bees perished inside the hive.
Moreover, after a thorough check, Hua Mi discovered two advantageous mutated individuals among them.
Double yolk! Of course, among over eight thousand, having two was still a relatively low probability.
However.
Hua Mi had mentally prepared for no yields, but suddenly getting two brought an unexpected delight!
The first mutated bee’s most striking feature was its size.
It was a whole circle larger than the original Chinese honeybee, measuring over 1.5 centimeters in length. Its entire body looked robust and round, especially the area between the wings and the head, which was significantly broader than that of an ordinary bee. It seemed to be filled with muscular fibers, giving off an impression of great strength.
Correspondingly, its legs and wing parts appeared notably stronger.
Its body fur leaned towards black.
The moment Hua Mi established a connection with it, they immediately felt its vigorous vitality.
Compared to a regular Chinese honeybee, it wasn’t just two or three times stronger, but… close to ten times! This bee's outstanding physical strength and displayed power made Hua Mi immediately think of a name for it—Strongarm Bee.
Strength works wonders! Hua Mi first replicated the template of this new bee species, then tested it with weights, finding that it could carry a maximum of 500 grams! Roughly equivalent to ten chicken eggs—an astonishing number.
Insects like bees inherently operated their muscles much more efficiently than humans.
Their load-bearing capacity might exceed the understanding of most people—
A common small honeybee could lift objects equivalent to 300 times its body weight.
For a human, that would be like pulling a truck.
And the mutated Strongarm Bee had even better load-bearing abilities.
However, when it carried 500 grams, it essentially couldn't fly, reaching its ideal limit.
Of course, for humans, 500 grams wasn’t much.
But don't forget, bees are typically social creatures, relying not on individual strength but on the entire colony.
A Strongarm Bee’s limit being 500 grams—what about a group of them?
Suppose it's a colony of ten thousand bees. The theoretical limit for this Strongarm Bee collective would be 5 tons!
Even though, in practice, due to the inevitable deviations in the force directions exerted by each bee, achieving the theoretical load-bearing limit wouldn’t be that high.
But even after accounting for this reduction, it was still an impressive number.
It wouldn't be an issue transporting most heavy objects.
Even if the actual load-bearing capacity decreased by ten times, that’d still be 500 kilograms, easily lifting a person.
Previously, there had been complaints about the lack of transportation in the forest.
With the Strongarm Bees, could flight become a possibility?
Thinking about this, Hua Mi felt a sense of anticipation.
Apart from its larger size, heightened physical strength, and significant power, the Strongarm Bee had another advantage: its honey sac was large, more than twice the size of a regular Chinese honeybee's.
A larger honey sac meant carrying more nectar at once, increasing the efficiency of gathering nectar.
This new bee species had advantages in both combat and honey gathering.
The only regret was the absence of venom glands and stingers.
Combat capabilities had weakened somewhat.
However, for every door nature closed, it seemed to open an even wider one with this evolution.
Hua Mi selected a normal Chinese honeybee colony and injected the template of the Strongarm Bee into it.
Immediately, this colony began cocooning.
[Strongarm Bee]
Derived from the Chinese honeybee, approximately 1.5 times the size of a regular Chinese honeybee. Its fur is black, showing significantly enhanced vitality. Its body strength, especially the strength of its legs and wings, has greatly increased.
The honey sac is over twice the size of a regular Chinese honeybee's, no venom glands, no stinger, slightly slower than a regular Chinese honeybee...
[Lifespan: 0.9]
[Reproductive Capability: 1.3]
[Productivity: 2]
[Attack: 2.5]
[Defense: 3]
[Vitality: 10]
[Speed: 0.8]
Gathering ability: 1.8.
Combat ability: 6.
This was, up to this point, the only bee species Hua Mi had cultivated without any significant shortcomings.
Both its combat and gathering abilities were good.
Considering lifespan and reproductive capabilities, they mainly affected the number of bees in a colony when it reached dynamic stability and the colony's ability to resist risks in its natural state. Of course, higher values were better.
0.9 to 1.3, based on experience, roughly meant a colony of about 15,000 individuals, which was a relatively robust colony.
"If I must say, the only aspect where the Strongarm Bee still needs improvement is its speed. I could try crossing it with the Swift Bee and see if we can increase the Strongarm Bee's speed without affecting other traits."
Based on previous experiences, the probability of solely enhancing speed without affecting other traits was relatively low.
However, it was worth a try.
As more bee species emerged, Hua Mi planned to categorize these bees.
The regular Chinese honeybee as [Level 1 Bee].
Forest Swift Bee, Agonizing Bee, Ironclad Bee were [Level 2 Bees].
Ironclad Swift Bee, Ring Cutter Bee were [Level 3 Bees].
And the newly evolved Strongarm Bee could be classified as a [Level 4 Bee].
As for the other mutated bee, compared to the straightforward nature of the Strongarm Bee, it was more mysterious.
This bee's body had no significant changes and was equivalent in size to the Chinese honeybee.
Two antennae faintly emitted white light at their tips, very faint, just two small white dots in the dark, barely visible unless observed closely.
Its body fur was shorter, harder, and denser.
Besides these, it was no different from the Chinese honeybee.
Its marvel lay in its ability to feed back its perception of the surrounding environment to Hua Mi!
This perception included smell, vision, and hearing.
Do not underestimate a bee's sensory abilities.
A bee's speed in perceiving and understanding its environment was several times faster than a human’s.
Studies showed that a bee’s sense of smell, through its antennae, was 800 times more discriminating than a human’s and could detect extremely low molecule concentrations.
Its vision relied on a pair of compound eyes and three ocelli positioned in a triangle between the compound eyes. The ocelli mainly assisted the compound eyes in better discerning objects' brightness. It could even see ultraviolet light.
There were also sensors distributed throughout its body, responsible for perceiving the environment's sounds. Simultaneously, the body fur played a role in sensing air vibrations.
In short, bees were highly sensitive creatures to environmental stimuli.
This mutated bee's sensory abilities had been further enhanced, and it could share them with its master.
Hua Mi controlled this mutated bee to fly outside and then established a sensory connection with it.
In that instant of connection, everything seemed blurry.
The scene before their eyes was covered in a purplish hue, two scenes overlapping each other.
There was a sudden intensification of smell and some slow, low sounds that made
Hua Mi feel dizzy and nauseous for a moment.
They hurriedly closed their eyes, taking deep breaths several times, slowly adjusting themselves.
With eyes shut, they could only see what the bee saw.
Expecting to see a grid effect from compound eyes, surprisingly, there wasn’t any. The field of view was complete and coherent.
The perspective was much larger than a human's, reaching over 300 degrees, almost without blind spots.
But compared to humans, it could discern fewer colors, resulting in a bluish-purple monotone in its field of view.
It could only see scenes within approximately ten meters clearly; farther was relatively blurry.
As for the slow, low sounds by their ear, those should be infrasound undetectable to human ears.
Bees could pick up sounds below 20Hz.
Actually, compared to vision and hearing, their olfactory sense was what amazed Hua Mi the most.
In the bee’s sensory state, they could discern extremely subtle scents, accurately pinpointing direction and distance, even more than a dog’s nose.
After testing, as the bee flew farther away, the shared sensory ability didn’t weaken. As long as it remained within the control range, Hua Mi could continuously receive clear signals.
"This bee can be used for tracking and reconnaissance... Let's just call it Reconnaissance Bee."
Why not Tracker Bee?
Because Reconnaissance Bee sounded better.
This bee species was quite special and didn't need an entire colony template.
Only one or a few Reconnaissance Bees were enough.
After all, sharing the senses of too many would cause overlapping confusion.
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