Once upon a time…

There was a scholar. He was traveling around, and found a nice, cheap place to rent for a month. So he settled in, setting out his paper and ink on the table, organizing the kitchen to his liking, and so on. The house only had one room, but that was fine for someone who just wanted to read all day.

On his first night, an army of ants marched in, wearing full green armor. They marched around the perimeter of the room, inspecting everything, and collecting a few stray grains of rice he’d spilled at dinner. Then they left.

The next night, the army that came was bigger. They thoroughly investigated under the scholar’s bed, attacking a few enemies in the guise of beetles. Then they “caught” a few grains of rice, and left.

The third night, the scholar was growing to expect the army. They came and went, and this went on for four more nights. At the end of the week, the army came in leading a golden carriage. On it sat an ant wearing red silk robes, observing everything with an air of ownership. The red-robed ant instructed his army to show him the sights. First they showed him under the bed, where they battled beetles and dust bunnies every night. Then they took him to the kitchen, where the army foraged for delicacies of the human world. Next, the carriage was taken to the top of the table, where they inspected the strangely rolled leaves and the onyx lake.

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The scholar was very amused by all this, and laughed the whole time.

And then the army took their king to the feet of the scholar.

The king looked up at him and said “you may think you’re big and strong as a human, but in my home are things four times as fine as what you have here. If you were an ant, everything you work so hard to get would be available for free! Give up your life as a human scholar, and become my attendant!”

The scholar was mildly annoyed by that. So he whacked them with his slipper, and they all ran outside.

The next morning, he found the anthill in his yard and poured insecticide all over it.

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Moral: Don’t insult scholars? …Heck if I know…