Chapter 1743: Foolish

After Bai Ji and another employee returned to Mazhi County in a panic, it wasn't long before rumors began to spread wildly throughout the county that Wang Yan had been beaten to death...

Xiao Yan was so scared her face turned pale, but Dean Zhang comforted her, saying that Wang Yan could take on dozens of people by himself with just one gun, so it was impossible for anything to have happened to him. Otherwise, Bai Ji and the others wouldn't have returned without him; it must have been Wang Yan who told them to come back, and so on.

By the time Xiao Yan was worrying, the county was already in chaos. Shi Long was shouting orders at his subordinates, and Duo Jie and the others, who happened to be in the county, also grabbed their guns. Almost all of the twenty-some vehicles in the county were mobilized, heading toward Wang Yan's location in a grand procession.

Lin Peisheng pulled Bai Ji aside to question him: "Is Wang Yan really alright?"

"He is, Uncle Lin." Bai Ji shook his head repeatedly. "Brother Yan took down all dozen or so killers by himself. When we left, we searched them one by one; it's very safe. It's just that Brother Yan was afraid the two of us couldn't handle it, and he has more of a deterrent presence and is a better shot, so he told us to hurry back and report. Brother Yan doesn't have a single injury; he didn't even break the skin."

Seeing Bai Ji's earnest assurance, Lin Peisheng felt temporarily relieved and turned to ask: "You followed Wang Yan on his trip. I heard he caused quite a stir; did he have any gains?"

"Uncle Lin, the gains were huge. Brother Yan sold off all of our county's output. When the time comes, it will be packaged right here in our county and sent to Tianduo City. Brother Yan has also negotiated with the transport fleet, and it will be shipped out directly. Moreover, they are even willing to settle the payment first; we have absolutely no pressure."

As Bai Ji spoke about these things, he was truly beaming, and for a moment, he even forgot the panic he had felt earlier...

On the other side, Duo Jie, Shi Long, and a large group of people rushed over by car to where Wang Yan was. After seeing the scene, they only felt it was a false alarm, followed by shock after shock.

Wang Yan was still sitting calmly on the roof of the car, smoking a cigarette, with a gun in his hand, guarding the people on the ground. As for those people on the ground, most were twitching with broken bones and tendons; the ground was covered in blood, and there were even quite a few teeth—a truly miserable sight.

The way Duo Jie and the others looked at Wang Yan changed. Was he really this brutal? They all unanimously believed that Wang Yan had gone mad with killing, and having been ambushed this time, he had been provoked and was now administering lynch law on these people.

Of course, administering lynch law wasn't the issue; this wasn't lynch law, but an emergency measure Wang Yan implemented to stop them from secretly escaping or resisting. Even if these people spoke in unison, claiming it was Wang Yan's fault, it would be of no use; their words were hard to believe. Especially since these people had come to ambush Wang Yan.

They were worried about Wang Yan's mental state; now, there was no one in the entire Mazhi County who had killed more people than Wang Yan...

"Wang Yan, are you alright?" Duo Jie walked over and asked with concern.

"Do I look like I'm not alright?"

Wang Yan asked in return, but seeing the answer "you look like you're not" in Duo Jie's eyes, he said, "Don't worry, nothing happened. They are like this not because I've gone mad, but because I couldn't swallow my anger. They are truly bold enough to dare to retaliate.

Duo Jie, I'm about to marry Xiao Yan. To avoid future trouble, I simply took heavy action. Even if it wasn't for me, our mountain patrol team has so many people; if they are intimidated so lawlessly, how can we do our work? Who would dare to manage things? These people aren't good things; if we deal with them harshly, they'll all be begging for food and picking up scraps in the future."

Duo Jie just assumed Wang Yan was expressing his dissatisfaction and didn't say anything more.

Shi Long, who had come along, asked: "What's the situation? Have you asked clearly?"

Wang Yan nodded with a smile: "That group that besieged us in the mountains last year—didn't three of them escape?"

"It was them?" Duo Jie couldn't help but repeat the question.

"And that group of poachers who kidnapped tourists in the spring."

"They still have people behind them?"

Shi Long's expression turned ugly. He had handled those cases, and now that they weren't fully resolved, the other party had contacted desperate criminals again and organized forces to retaliate. This was a lapse in his work.

Wang Yan said: "They all know each other. We've been patrolling the mountains diligently, and we have more manpower and stronger firepower, so they can't find a place to get rich and can only bottle up their energy to come and retaliate against us. When I went out this time, I caused quite a stir, and they heard about it.

It's almost winter again, time to hunt sheep and get rich, but they can't get in. After thinking it over, they thought about killing me, the one sticking his neck out. That way, the mountain patrol team would be scared, and no one would hinder them from getting rich anymore."

Currently, Wang Yan really hadn't offended any heavyweight figures.

Although he had killed nearly twenty people and caught several waves, and it was his idea to arrest people in other jurisdictions and conduct cross-regional investigations and raids, he had even followed the clues to start from the disposal channels and directly investigate smuggling networks, wiping out whole nests at once.

But in the end, he hadn't reached the heads of any truly ruthless people, or if he had, they had long since used their own magical powers to get through it.

Wang Yan had only temporarily cut off their path to wealth, but he cut off everyone's path to wealth equally. Although he was inevitably greeted with curses upon his ancestors, it hadn't reached the point of needing to kill him.

All the problems were within Bolamula; they poached, the mountain patrol team caught people—it was just a game of cat and mouse. If they really wanted to kill, Duo Jie would have been killed long ago; he was the most eyesore of them all.

And in terms of importance, Wang Yan was actually more important than Duo Jie. After all, Duo Jie was only a deputy county magistrate; there were over a hundred thousand cadres of this level in the country. But Wang Yan was a national model, a typical example of someone with ideals, willing to practice them, and willing to go to the country's most difficult areas to struggle hard.

Of course, in terms of actual results, there was actually no difference. Regardless of whether Duo Jie or Wang Yan was killed, what would be brought in was counter-terrorism. That would be a bigger battle than last year's special operation, and if things went wrong, the military might even have to be brought out...

This was a problem that anyone with a brain understood; unless absolutely necessary, they wouldn't do this.

Only these brainless people would think of one thing after another; the "idea king" would just clap his head and have an idea, and others would hear it and think it made sense, so they wouldn't think so much and would just start doing it.

And so, today's ambush of Wang Yan happened.

They only thought about the benefits of killing Wang Yan, but didn't think about the downsides of killing Wang Yan. Obviously, they were feeling the downsides now...

After hearing what Wang Yan said, and looking at the corpses being carried down one by one, and looking at the people on the ground who were seriously injured and didn't even have the strength to wail, Shi Long was somewhat speechless, but mostly he felt lingering fear. If Wang Yan had really died, everyone from top to bottom would have been implicated.

"A bunch of brainless people, idiots who deserve to have their brains eaten by vultures." Shi Long couldn't help but curse, shouting, "Take them back and interrogate them harshly; no one is getting off easy!"

After venting, Shi Long took the cigarette Wang Yan handed him and sighed, "Luckily you brought a gun, otherwise I'm afraid it would have been hard to handle."

Duo Jie glanced at him: "Director Shi, back then you were hesitant and made excuses many times. In the end, it was Secretary Chen who made the final decision for Wang Yan to be able to go out with a gun. If there were no gun, where would it be 'hard to handle'? Wang Yan would have been beaten to death by these criminals!"

Although there was no explicit ban on guns before, there was still control; you couldn't just swagger through the streets with a gun. Wang Yan, considering the potential retaliation, applied for the mountain patrol team to carry guns when going out. After several discussions, it was finally reported to the city, and only then was it barely agreed upon.

And it wasn't everyone on the mountain patrol team; only Wang Yan, Duo Jie, and He Qingyuan, the deputy captain, could legally carry guns within the Tianduo City area.

Shi Long felt very wronged: "That wasn't something I could decide. Even if Secretary Chen made the final decision, wasn't it reported to the superiors for approval?"

"You were strongly opposed from the beginning!" Duo Jie said.

"I..."

Shi Long still wanted to excuse himself, but Duo Jie wouldn't listen, turning instead to ask Wang Yan, "How was it? Was this trip out smooth?"

"Except for here, everything else was very smooth."

"Then how much business did you find?"

"Basically sold out everything in our county."

Wang Yan smiled, his tone relaxed, without any of the suppressed pride or arrogance of having accomplished a major task; it was truly plain.

In the county government conference room, smoke swirled, and the sunlight penetrated through, becoming a beautiful Tyndall effect. The county's bigwigs looked silently at Wang Yan at the end of the table, digesting the astonishing news Wang Yan had just uttered.

Although they had already known this result in advance from the excited Lin Peisheng, hearing more detailed data from Wang Yan's mouth, especially that the other party was even willing to pay first, was simply shock upon shock.

This was an enlarged meeting of the Mazhi County Party Committee, enlarged only to Wang Yan alone. After briefly chatting about Wang Yan's ambush and unifying the opinion that it should be handled seriously later, they then let Wang Yan talk in detail about what had happened over the past month or so.

Secretary Chen still couldn't believe it and asked: "Really pay first?"

"Pay first." Wang Yan nodded affirmatively. "They are just waiting for me to call them. Once they receive my call and know I'm back, they will send people over. Actually, quite a few people are waiting in Tianduo City right now.

After all, we still need to coordinate various goods here, coordinate manpower, and engage in production. In addition, we must ensure our own needs; we can't really sell everything, right? This requires, as I said before, purchasing goods from other counties and putting our Bolamula brand on them.

This time is crucial; it can be considered the first step for us to go out."

Secretary Chen nodded with satisfaction, affirming Wang Yan's work.

Lin Peisheng took over and sighed: "It's a pity that our county doesn't have any major industry; it's still too slow to develop..."

"County Magistrate Lin's requirements are too high. Our county doesn't have the environment for heavy industry. In the plateau climate, machines don't work well. Now, if we engage in some light industry and develop the tertiary industry, driving the agricultural and pastoral development in our county, and providing a bottom line for the people in our county, then the days in the county will naturally get better."

Wang Yan said, "Moreover, our county had a bumper harvest this year. Once we get the money and have results, we can ask the city for more loans. At that time, we will also engage in construction in the county, fix the roads in our county, and if there's money left, tear down the houses on both sides of our county's main road and build small buildings."

"Who are we building buildings to sell to?" Duo Jie laughed, "We are too remote here; the tourists were attracted by the articles you wrote..."

"Sell them to tourists, leaders. Everyone hasn't heard that it's ugly here from tourists, right? They only say it's backward here, the supporting facilities aren't good, and it's hard to adapt to high altitudes, but no one has ever said our scenery isn't good.

I wrote another article this time, specifically telling them to hold off and publish it before next spring. By then, there will be another big wave of tourists coming. With the accumulation of these two years, we will definitely be a choice for tourism here.

In the future, with the development of social economy, people's wallets will get thicker, and there will definitely be more and more people traveling. By then, will those who couldn't come here follow my articles and come for a trip? As long as people come, there will be consumption, and there will be business opportunities.

For food, there are restaurants of various grades and different flavors; for accommodation, there must also be places of different grades. It doesn't matter if we don't have them now, but we must have competition. We ourselves must deal with those who do business dishonestly and ruin the reputation of our Mazhi County...

In addition, I also noticed that the young men in our county take cameras to take pictures for visiting tourists and rent them ethnic costumes; these can all support people. When there are more people, there will be more demand, and there will need to be more shops with different needs.

Our county is not big, there are only five or six thousand people in the county, and I'm afraid it will be difficult to expand in the future. The main place for development is this main road in our county..."

Wang Yan fully demonstrated the importance of development in the county and said, "And our county government, how many years has this building been here? The wall plaster here has fallen off, and it leaks wind on all four sides. We definitely need to build a new place.

However, considering the impact, we should fix the roads first and build other places first. When we have built some, and our government office building is no longer conspicuous, we can find a place to build one.

This place can't be abandoned either. I think it can be completely renovated and used as a museum for our county or something, or used for the hospital. The hospital side is mostly single-story houses, only two stories at the highest, and the area isn't big."

Secretary Chen exchanged glances with Lin Peisheng, and Lin Peisheng asked: "Are you willing to give the money to the county?"

Duo Jie didn't speak, looking at Wang Yan.

"Leader, although the whole county is one chessboard, we can't leave us with no benefits at all and take away every last copper coin, right? The goods were sold, and we also earned the price difference, but our goods don't have competitiveness after all, so how much price difference can we earn? We still have to hire people to package..."

Wang Yan complained a lot, "And we have to continue to operate Bolamula. How rampant are those illegal criminals in the mountains? It's like this even when we manage them; if we don't manage them, wouldn't that be terrible?

Besides, all the things in our county have been sold, the county has already earned a lot, and can borrow more money; we can't still be thinking about the little bit of money in our Economic Development Company."

Secretary Chen nodded: "What you said also makes sense, but you also said that the whole county is one chessboard. Later, we should coordinate when we should coordinate. Your Economic Development Company is developing the economy for the county, so you can't engage in this kind of mountain-topism."

"The Secretary is right. The Economic Development Company completely obeys the instructions of the county and supports the decisions of the county." Wang Yan represented the Economic Development Company.

Duo Jie watched from the side with a smile, having no other thoughts.

He was happy to see Wang Yan manage the company well and drive the development of Mazhi County, and wouldn't feel that he was being sidelined or having his power seized. Anyway, he was mainly in charge of the mountains now, and other than that, he was just fulfilling his duties as deputy county magistrate. As long as he needed money and Wang Yan could provide it, he didn't want to manage anything else.

He used to worry about funds, which really scared him; now he was carefree. His work was comfortable, his family was harmonious, and his life was a little bit perfect.

Watching Wang Yan discuss the subsequent collection of goods, transportation and delivery, and the future development of the county with Secretary Chen and others, Duo Jie smoked and drank tea silently, feeling very comfortable...

?? Daily thanks to the big brothers who tipped, voted for monthly tickets, recommendation tickets, and read silently! ===== CHAPTER 1744 =====