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Description
500 million years in the future, on a much less habitable Earth with an increasingly hostile chemistry, the reign of vertebrates has ended. During the previous extinction event, C3 photosynthesis itself became temporarily impossible on most of the planet. But volcanism fluctuated, C4 photosynthetic plants pumped new oxygen into the atmosphere, and Earth came back from the brink for just a moment. It was only the penultimate, not the ultimate, chapter in terrestrial life.

In a 2.2 million-year-long 'island' of habitability, the last Oxygenated Age, fast bipedal running insects evolve in a very strange yet familiar direction.

The giant arthropod Entomonax apteris is a megafaunal apex predator, the equivalent to Tyrannosaurus rex or Ursus maritimus. Entomonax uses its bone-crushing mandibles and raptorial arms to seize any terrestrial and even some semiaquatic prey. However, in a world of arthropods, the average lifeform is smaller due to the square cube law -- this beast, one of the largest predators in the world, is 'only' 100 kilograms.

Of uncertain lineage among modern day insects, Entomonax and its relatives have been classified into the clade Therothoracia or "Beast Thorax". Indeed, to allow a theropod-like bodyplan with the minimal number of segments available on the insect body, the thorax has expanded forward to an extent unseen in extant insects except the giraffe beetle.

The front legs, (which unlike the gigantic middle legs, almost escape notice), have become tiny mouthparts used to funnel food into the mouth after prey are crushed between massive jaws, and the prothorax is a sort of combined neck and helmet.

Those praying mantis like arms are actually the middle legs, used for facultative quadrupedalism, to slash and capture prey, and feed on ant and termite colonies as orangutans or anteaters once did.

The back legs have migrated forward as far as possible, and angled down to support the center of mass, standing upright in convergent evolution with archosaurs and synapsids. To reduce the weight of the armored body, much of the animal's internals are actually air chambers, extensions of the trachea, with very visible spiracles along the side of the exterior. The circulatory system has evolved multiple hearts and auxiliary pumps.

During molting, the old exoskeleton is broken along built-in lines of weakness, allowing much larger molts than ancestral insects. The shedded cuticle remains as a fibrous protective layer that can also be shaken off to irritate potential predators.

It isn't without weaknesses. Entomonax's high metabolism means that it must be constantly consuming prey animals. Like almost any insect, Entomonax suffers from its own parasitoid wasp, which enacts Xenomorph-like horrors. In addition, swarms of carnivorous orthopterans can sometimes overwhelm even a fully grown Entomonax in its prime by biting too many holes its exoskeleton and reducing pressure.

Description
500 million years in the future, on a much less habitable Earth with an increasingly hostile chemistry, the reign of vertebrates has ended. During the previous extinction event, C3 photosynthesis itself became temporarily impossible on most of the planet. But volcanism fluctuated, C4 photosynthetic plants pumped new oxygen into the atmosphere, and Earth came back from the brink for just a moment. It was only the penultimate, not the ultimate, chapter in terrestrial life.

In a 2.2 million-year-long 'island' of habitability, the last Oxygenated Age, fast bipedal running insects evolve in a very strange yet familiar direction.

The giant arthropod Entomonax apteris is a megafaunal apex predator, the equivalent to Tyrannosaurus rex or Ursus maritimus. Entomonax uses its bone-crushing mandibles and raptorial arms to seize any terrestrial and even some semiaquatic prey. However, in a world of arthropods, the average lifeform is smaller due to the square cube law -- this beast, one of the largest predators in the world, is 'only' 100 kilograms.

Of uncertain lineage among modern day insects, Entomonax and its relatives have been classified into the clade Therothoracia or "Beast Thorax". Indeed, to allow a theropod-like bodyplan with the minimal number of segments available on the insect body, the thorax has expanded forward to an extent unseen in extant insects except the giraffe beetle.

The front legs, (which unlike the gigantic middle legs, almost escape notice), have become tiny mouthparts used to funnel food into the mouth after prey are crushed between massive jaws, and the prothorax is a sort of combined neck and helmet.

Those praying mantis like arms are actually the middle legs, used for facultative quadrupedalism, to slash and capture prey, and feed on ant and termite colonies as orangutans or anteaters once did.

The back legs have migrated forward as far as possible, and angled down to support the center of mass, standing upright in convergent evolution with archosaurs and synapsids. To reduce the weight of the armored body, much of the animal's internals are actually air chambers, extensions of the trachea, with very visible spiracles along the side of the exterior. The circulatory system has evolved multiple hearts and auxiliary pumps.

During molting, the old exoskeleton is broken along built-in lines of weakness, allowing much larger molts than ancestral insects. The shedded cuticle remains as a fibrous protective layer that can also be shaken off to irritate potential predators.

It isn't without weaknesses. Entomonax's high metabolism means that it must be constantly consuming prey animals. Like almost any insect, Entomonax suffers from its own parasitoid wasp, which enacts Xenomorph-like horrors. In addition, swarms of carnivorous orthopterans can sometimes overwhelm even a fully grown Entomonax in its prime by biting too many holes its exoskeleton and reducing pressure.