The plan was a simple but effective one, as the war against the termites and ants raged on the Swarm sent frogs down to kidnap enemy combatants using their tongues and then retreat away from the fighting. It was a relatively simple undertaking to hold the infected ants and keep them alive long enough for the Swarm Toxin to do its work. And soon enough the memories of both started to flood in and the Swarm dedicated as much of their mental efforts as possible to analyze the information contained in the memories.

"Ohhhh they are more like us than we could have realized."

What more could be said than that? The Swarm was enthralled as they learned about the massive underground hive structures with millions of insects forming one large superorganism. Similar to the Sovereign Swarm but not quite there yet, as these insects only communicated with pheromones. And not with the perfect mental communion that was intrinsic to the Swarm. Notably, the largest deviation was the queens of each hive. So far the Sovereign Swarm had no center, they simply existed across all of the various Units that it was comprised of.

Having a centerpiece of the Swarm felt somehow wrong, at the same time it might add effectiveness to it. The Swarm considered this before they turned their attention to the larger weakness of their enemies.

"If we infect the queens and the eggs, we will be able to turn the hives. In due time all of the millions of beings in them will be comprised of us. Millions upon millions of lives added to the swarm. With those kinds of numbers, we will able to easily turn the rest of the forest."

The Bee-Collective was by far the most excited over the possibilities that came with having millions of ants and termites to alleviate the Bees from the hard work of being the primary infection squad. As for the others, they were more concerned with the logistics of ending the war effort.

"We must use infiltration to turn them, we should send Termites and Ants into their respective hives and reach their reproducers. If we can infect enough of them then the war will be over."

The Swarm concluded this and first experimented by sending a few zombie ants into the hive through one of the many hidden entrances on the surface. Surprisingly rather than seamlessly blending in with the ants, the infected ants were immediately singled out as intruders and disposed of by the attending workers and soldiers. Outnumbered as they were the experimental ants were quickly slaughtered without even being able to enter the hive.

"Experimental infiltration ended in failure. The General Collectives request and I quote, "make this shit work", end quote."

Fungal-Floral network remarked dryly as that collective turned its attention back to expanding their reach through the earth and roots of the forest. The Swarm was perturbed by this failure, clearly they had missed something, and therefore they went back to studying the memories and sensory input of the remaining ants. It took time but eventually the answer became obvious.

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"Pheromones, that is the key to their strength. Our infected have a different hormone scent than the rest of the colony, so they are treated as intruders because of it."

Now having found the root of the issue the Swarm turned to examine possible solutions. Adjusting the infected to give up the correct scent was an easy issue to fix, the Adaptable trait already provided the Swarm everything they needed for that. But that was just a solution to the most immediate problem.

"If we correct the flaw in our infiltrators, that still leaves the issue of after the infection has been done. The ants and termites might reject the Queens and purge them. After all, that is what they have done every single time we have infected their regular units."

"Greater Collective, what if you altered the network to produce these pheromones? That would render the war moot and we can focus our attention on other matters."

"Selfishness! Do you have no idea about the bigger picture Fungal-Flora? We have to subvert these hives and add them to our forces. That will give you ample protection in the future rather than relying on us to adapt your network every time a new threat arises."

"Hypocrite! You just want to slack of and have your precious bees dedicate themselves to gathering biomass rather than attacking mammals and insects above ground."

The two collectives started arguing even more ferociously and the Swarm decided to merge the two rather than having these dissenting opinions distract them all. It would put a hamper on the efficiency of both, but the newly merged Bee-Network Collective remained silent as the thousands of fragments formed a new collective identity.

"Slime...mucus skunk can create slime. Make slimez smell and coat the littlesies?"

The Large-Zombies Collective chimed in helpfully and for once did not face reproach or scorn from the other collectives. Rather the Swarm considered this suggestion before adapting one of the mucus skunks out of its infection duties and sent it towards the ant battlefront. The lesser monster was known for shooting out torrents of slime at predators, and the slime scent glands was easily adapted to produce the same hormones as the ants.

Secondly, the Swarm mobilized a new force of about 300 cockroaches that had recently been turned and sent them to meet with the infested ants. A plan was finally in the works and the Swarm would soon have what was rightfully theirs.