Chapter 1061: Kill the Snake Completely, It Has Nothing to Do with Justice

While Qin Liguo was busy selling his Fritillaria, Li Long was in the mountains, sitting and waiting for the Fritillaria diggers to arrive at the small wooden hut to make their deliveries, just like Jiang Taigong.

It was already mid-May; now, Li Long bringing supplies and Mingming and Haohao here every day had become the norm.

Those exchanging for supplies and those exchanging for money were almost equal in number. At this time, even the two large sacks of supplies carried into the mountains at the very beginning were nearly used up.

Moreover, there were all sorts of unexpected situations in the mountains; attacks by wild beasts, robberies by other herb collectors, and flash floods could all cause the carried supplies to vanish.

And for some herb diggers driven to a dead end, the existence of the small wooden hut was simply like a great savior.

After the shed over the wooden hut was built, Li Long, Mingming, and Haohao were much more comfortable here. In May, the sunlight grew stronger and stronger; after a while of activity under the sun, exposed skin would be sunburned to the point of stinging pain.

Even when Mingming and Haohao played, they would play outside for a while, then rest under the shed. Although they would rather go into Lin Zi to pick mushrooms, most of the time they still lingered around the small wooden hut.

Li Long knew the two children's thoughts, so he tried to arrive a bit earlier every day; after arriving, when no one was around, he would take the two children to play in the forest, pick mushrooms, gather lichen, and dig up some thin Codonopsis. When he came today, passing by Passing Qingshuihe, Meng Hai had given him a chicken, so Li Long planned to stew a chicken soup.

Although the season for digging Codonopsis was still far away, it could still be used.

A rooster over a year old, not that meat-chicken breed, wasn't very heavy. Li Long planned to use the chicken back to stew a soup, and chop the remaining meat directly with dried chili peppers to make a wild mushroom spicy chicken.

During this period, Hearing Hearing Bolati would come over to mooch a meal from time to time, so he planned to mix some dough, leave extra sauce when making the spicy chicken, and then mix it with noodles.

The idea was good, but after picking mushrooms with the two children in the forest for less than half an hour, someone came out of the forest from a distance and walked toward the wooden hut, so Li Long could only bring the children back.

Fortunately, both children were quite sensible and obedient; carrying the mushrooms they had picked, they followed beside Li Long, asking about the variety of each mushroom one by one.

It was already mid-May; morel mushrooms were quite numerous, as were pine mushrooms, and Mingming had even picked a large cluster of enoki mushrooms.

Although Li Long had told the two children the names of various mushrooms, after he finished speaking, the two children separately started giving the mushrooms new names.

"This one is called Pointed-Head, this one is called Black-Head, this one is called Yellow-Flower Vegetable..."

The children's creativity in naming was truly boundless; Li Long found it quite interesting to listen to.

The two children were already used to it; when they reached the wooden hut, they automatically went inside to get an enamel basin, put the mushrooms in, and took them to the spring to wash.

The two children possessed a precociousness beyond their years; it wasn't that poor children grow up early, Li Long felt it might be because of himself.

"Exchanging for what?" Li Long arrived at the wooden hut and habitually asked the herb digger who had come over.

Every day he saw different people; most were silent, directly stating what they wanted to exchange for or money, and left after the exchange.

But nearly half of the people, having stayed alone in the mountains for too long, had a strong desire to share. They would talk endlessly with Li Long, telling him about their experiences in the mountains, their original family situations, and other things, quite like chatterboxes.

Li Long felt like a story recycling station; every day he could hear fresh stories and all sorts of messy gossip.

The reasons these people came into the mountains to dig herbs were bizarre and varied; most, like Mo Linsheng, were looking for a way to survive, a few had been tricked into coming here, and there were extremely rare individuals who directly admitted they had committed crimes back in their hometown.

At first, Li Long was startled, but later he got used to it.

Li Long generally wouldn't interfere with these matters; he just listened. These people said they had committed crimes, but whether it was true or false was hard to determine; he wasn't a policeman, so he couldn't really take anyone away, and if those people had committed major crimes, they wouldn't tell Li Long anyway.

The most common crime was fighting; in these people's mouths, it was always others who provoked them.

Li Long usually, after listening, would ask them specifically whether they wanted to exchange for money or supplies.

Here, buying Fritillaria at a low price itself was normal, so it was also normal for people to talk; just listen.

"Exchange for some food, for ten days. Exchange the rest for money. Is there anything ready to eat?" this person asked directly.

"There are naan, steamed buns, sesame cakes, and egg cakes; what do you want?"

"Bring a bit of everything." This person put more than half a bag of Fritillaria on the counter; it felt quite heavy, and Li Long guessed this Fritillaria should be dried goods.

If it was completely dry, this Fritillaria would weigh about thirty kilograms; Li Long's purchase price here was nearly two thousand yuan.

Li Long fetched the cooked food and piled it on the counter for him to choose. This person took five or six steamed buns, five naan, two bags of one-kilogram sesame cakes, and two bags of egg cakes; that was enough.

Li Long asked him to pour the Fritillaria onto the counter to look; it wasn't completely dry, with very few impurities; he probably knew Li Long liked to buy clean Fritillaria here, so it must have been washed.

"Not very dry, fifty yuan per kilogram." Li Long gave his offer; the other party didn't bargain, just nodded.

More than thirty-two kilograms of Fritillaria, sixteen hundred yuan; Li Long considered the food as a gift to him.

This person packed the money and food into the emptied bag, carried it on his back, and walked quickly toward the forest; when he was near the forest, he tripped over something, fell, then immediately got up, turned his head to look at Li Long, and hurriedly entered the forest, disappearing.

Li Long smiled, feeling that this person was still quite excited; he probably didn't expect to exchange for so much money at once.

With the first person came the second; five people came in the morning. Uncle and nephew from the Wu family came every few days; their Fritillaria wasn't much each time, but it was all washed very clean; generally, a small portion was exchanged for food, and most for money. Each time it was just a few dozen yuan; if someone saw it, they wouldn't feel jealous or have other thoughts.

Li Long guessed this was a strategy of the uncle and nephew pair; after all, the money wasn't much, so it wasn't worth having ulterior motives.

Li Long could only prepare to cook in the gaps between buying Fritillaria. Hearing Hearing Bolati didn't come over in the morning; Li Long guessed he must have been arranged by the Captain to guard Shankou.

Now it was the peak season for Fritillaria; the Forestry Team over there definitely wanted to generate revenue too; Captain Captain Aili received quite a lot of money from Li Long every year; although most of this money was turned over, a small part was distributed to the team members, and a portion would become part of the Forestry Team's slush fund.

So he and the Forestry Team's forest rangers were very active; this was normal.

As long as someone came, Li Long would tell Mingming and Haohao to hurry into the wooden hut; he had been in the mountains for so many years and knew that although most of these herb diggers were ordinary people, there was no excluding the possibility that some belonged to the targets of suppression; he himself was fine, but he didn't dare to joke with the two children.

When lunch was almost ready, Li Long had already placed the stir-fried spicy chicken on the counter; additionally, the chicken soup on the other stove was almost done stewing. He washed the pot and was preparing to boil water for noodles when three more people came from the Lin Zi side.

Two men and one woman.

Li Long's eyesight was very good; he saw that the woman was the same one from the man and woman pair from a while ago; the other two men were relatively unfamiliar, seeming never to have exchanged supplies recently.

The two men walked on the sides, the woman walked in the middle; all three carried bags; Li Long watched their posture as they walked over and narrowed his eyes.

Originally, he had prepared to let Mingming and Haohao come out to eat, but when he saw these three people, Li Long took the spicy chicken on the counter to the low table inside the room, gave each child a pair of chopsticks, told them to eat first and not to mind whatever happened outside, and then latched the door.

As those three people walked over, Li Long covered both pots, then asked:

"Exchanging for things or exchanging for money?"

The two men, one in his thirties and one in his twenties, looked somewhat alike; the one in his thirties had a simple appearance and always wore a smile.

The one in his twenties had slightly sharp eyebrows and eyes; when he heard Li Long speak, he lightly touched the woman.

"Mostly for money, a small part for things." The woman trembled slightly when touched, then spoke.

Her voice was slightly unnatural; after glancing at Li Long, she lowered her eyelids, then continued speaking to Li Long: "The things are mainly food; we want some rice and flour, and the rest for cooked food."

"Put the Fritillaria up, let me check the quality." Li Long replied, "I don't have much cooked food left, but I still have plenty of rice and flour."

Three bags of Fritillaria were placed on the counter; Li Long stepped forward, opened one bag, grabbed a handful of Fritillaria, and pulled it out to look.

The Fritillaria was very dirty.

Looking up at the woman, this shouldn't be the case. This woman should know that Fritillaria washed clean would fetch a higher price; when she came with her fellow townsman man last time, she even washed it specially; she shouldn't have forgotten, right?

The woman lowered her head, avoiding eye contact with Li Long.

The Fritillaria bulbs were about fifty to sixty percent dry; Li Long checked the other two sacks, which were quite dirty and also half-dry, half-wet.

He then said: