Chapter 1070: Ke Ke Ke Ke Ke Youmu Is Also Capable of Great Things

It was already afternoon, but Shicheng's Old Street was still quite crowded; only some vendors had left, and the empty spaces they left behind made the old street feel less congested.

Li Long left the Jeep in the parking lot and strolled into the street; he didn't bother asking Ke Ke Ke Ke Ke Youmu's brother-in-law, thinking he could just wander around and find the place himself.

The scent of the offal soup was strong, so Li Long quickly located the spot, situated between a milk tea shop and Chen Chen Xingbang's meat stall.

To Li Long's slight surprise, Ke Ke Ke Ke Ke Youmu was also there by the offal stall helping out; the one actually working was a Uyghur woman wearing a headscarf, whom Li Long guessed must be Ke Ke Ke Ke Ke Youmu's wife.

"Boss Li?" Seeing Li Long, Ke Ke Ke Ke Ke Youmu was surprised and called out in astonishment, then smiled and said, "Welcome, welcome! Come, come, have a bowl of offal soup?"

"Sure." Li Long smiled, walked over, and sat down.

Since it wasn't mealtime, there weren't many customers; of the two tables in front of the offal soup shop, one was empty, so Li Long took a seat there.

Ke Ke Ke Ke Ke Youmu quickly brought over a steaming bowl of offal soup, placed it before Li Long, and then set a pair of chopsticks across the bowl.

The aroma was delightful; one could smell the natural fragrance of the offal itself, with no organy odor—it was very good.

Li Long picked up a piece of tripe, put it in his mouth, and chewed; it was very tender, not too salty, and quite fragrant.

"Not bad, not bad," Li Long nodded while eating. "Well done. Is this your wife?" he asked Ke Ke Ke Ke Ke Youmu, who had now sat down opposite him.

"Mm, yes." Ke Ke Ke Ke Ke Youmu sounded somewhat proud. "There wasn't much happening at home, and the idea to make offal soup was hers. At first, I just thought I'd let her try it, but I never expected it to become popular so quickly. We started with a street stall, but once it took off, we decided to rent this storefront and open a proper shop."

It was clear that Ke Ke Ke Ke Ke Youmu was quite sharp in business, able to seize commercial opportunities and grasp chances when they arose.

Ke Ke Ke Ke Ke Youmu's wife seemed to understand Han Chinese as well; she glanced over, smiled, and then continued busy with her work.

A few vendors arrived carrying baskets, speaking in the Gansu dialect; each ordered a bowl of offal soup, prompting Ke Ke Ke Ke Ke Youmu to stand up and go help.

Once these people had sat down at the tables to eat, Ke Ke Ke Ke Ke Youmu came back over to talk with Li Long.

"Can you manage five hundred kilograms of meat per day?" Li Long asked while eating.

"To be honest, that's a bit difficult." Ke Ke Ke Ke Ke Youmu didn't hide the truth from Li Long, knowing he preferred honesty. "I've already bought up most of the cattle and sheep nearby. To get more from other places means, first, the distance is far, and second, the cattle and sheep bought elsewhere aren't as easy to select freely as those nearby.

Moreover, in this season, the cattle and sheep haven't fully fattened yet, so the meat quality might not be as good as before."

Li Long had already considered this issue on his way back; forcing Ke Ke Ke Ke Ke Youmu to increase the daily meat volume was, to be honest, somewhat unreasonable.

But the business was there; for these past couple of days, having slightly less meat was fine since Sister Yang and the others could handle the manual processing just right.

However, once the drying machines arrive, a shortage of meat might affect production efficiency.

Yet, if he forcibly pressured Ke Ke Ke Ke Ke Youmu to increase the meat delivery, and some poor-quality meat slipped in as a result, wouldn't that be losing the big picture over a small gain?

So Li Long said:

"Then prioritize guaranteeing the meat quality first. A daily supply of three hundred kilograms or more is fine, but the meat quality must be good; otherwise, I won't accept it on my end."

Actually, Ke Ke Ke Ke Ke Youmu also wanted to deliver more meat, but the supply channels weren't fully smoothed out yet, so he dared not make any guarantees. He wanted this business to last long-term; at least at this moment, he was also considering Li Long's interests.

"Send some of your cooked offal over to my place every day—say, fifty kilograms," Li Long said. "I'll pay you the market price."

"Sure thing." Ke Ke Ke Ke Ke Youmu agreed without any hesitation.

Li Long felt slightly puzzled: "Won't this affect your offal soup business here?"

"No, no." Ke Ke Ke Ke Ke Youmu smiled and said, "Actually, although this offal soup shop is booming, we can't possibly sell all the offal every day; quite a bit remains.

This offal is fresh daily; whatever doesn't sell can only be given away or sold off very cheaply by nightfall; otherwise, it would just go to waste.

Boss Li, what you want is pure meat; here, we sell offal, sheep heads, sheep trotters, and the like very cheaply. If there were other shops around, they'd probably scold me for such low prices.

Even so, we still can't sell it all, so don't even talk about buying—you could just take it for free. After all, you buy meat from me every day, and I've already made quite a lot of money!"

He pointed to his wife and said, "The money earned from this offal soup shop is all kept by her herself. Look at the smile on her face—let me tell you, in our ethnic families, women usually don't manage the money; when they need funds, they ask the men.

Now, the money in her hands is even more than what some Uyghur household heads have, so she's extremely happy to run this shop!"

"I still have to pay," Li Long smiled. "We can't let you work for nothing. Of course, please be diligent when cooking; boil it until it's tender like this, as I need to use it for trading."

"Okay, okay, definitely no problem!" Ke Ke Ke Ke Ke Youmu was also quite happy, at least the surplus offal could now be disposed of. He added with a smile:

"Boss Li, to be honest, ever since you started this business, the prices of beef and mutton in the nearby area have changed. Whenever you demand beef or mutton, the market prices for them rise accordingly."

Li Long thought to himself, "That can't be right, can it? How much beef and mutton have I actually ordered?" He felt Ke Ke Ke Ke Ke Youmu was probably exaggerating, just flattering him.

If he could truly influence the beef and mutton prices in the surrounding region, wouldn't that make him a major tycoon?

After finishing the offal soup, Li Long insisted on paying, then left carrying several dozen kilograms of cooked beef, mutton, and offal. Just as Ke Ke Ke Ke Ke Youmu had said, in the back kitchen of their shop, a huge pot of offal was boiling; in a wok over a meter in diameter, the smell of offal was very strong.

Li Long brought the offal back to the county town, didn't stop, went directly to the Fourth Squad to pick up the children, and also dropped off some of the offal at his eldest brother's home.

Li Li Qing Xia complained:

"Didn't we already get some this morning? Why bring more now? How can we possibly finish all this in such hot weather?"

"Just eat it; this stuff is rich in fat and oil, perfect for filling your stomachs," Li Long joked. "We'll worry about wanting more later."

At least for some time, the family wouldn't lack this.

After bringing Mingming and Haohao back to the county town, Li Long distributed some of the offal to Sun Jia Qiang and Liang Shuang Cheng as well; good things should be shared among everyone.

The remainder had to be stored in the family's storage room; since the evenings were still relatively cool now, it could keep well, but in another while, if offal was needed, one would have to go fetch it early the next morning; otherwise, leaving it overnight would likely cause it to spoil.

Early the next morning, after dropping Mingming and Haohao off at the squad, Li Long rushed to the wooden cabin carrying a large basin of offal and other items; finding everything there as usual, he finally breathed a sigh of relief.

He had genuinely worried that Abulike Mu might go mad with revenge and burn down the wooden cabin, which would have been quite troublesome.

Fortunately, such a situation did not occur.

As soon as the goods were unloaded and the offal placed on the counter, people immediately came to trade for items.

Li Long opened for business.

By lunchtime, the several dozen kilograms of offal were traded away again. This offal, which was practically considered cheap discard at Ke Ke Ke Ke Ke Youmu's place, could here fetch a high price of nearly two kilograms of offal for one kilogram of Fritillaria!

There was no helping it; among those digging medicinal herbs in the mountains, almost no one could hunt and eat meat while digging. In fact, if not for Li Long occasionally exchanging goods here at the small wooden cabin, they would rarely have the chance to eat cooked food at all.

Usually, mushroom soup and wild vegetable soup were the most common meals.

This was one of the reasons why Li Long's ordinary food items could command such high prices in trade.

After all, supplies in the mountains were extremely scarce; after the herders moved to new pastures, these herb diggers could only consume the supplies they had brought with them. Human carrying capacity was limited, so the amount they could bring was small to begin with; those supplies would likely be exhausted within half a month, and even if not fully consumed, they would probably become inedible by then.

For someone like Li Jianguo in his youth to catch a roe deer empty-handed in the mountains was a probability far too low.

Most people, like those who had just come to trade for offal with Li Long, no longer cared about cost-performance ratios; being able to eat a mouthful of meat was happiness enough.

Although he clearly knew that this one kilogram of fritillaria could be exchanged for several dozen yuan outside, enough for a large chunk of meat, he couldn't get out now, nor did he want to. If he traded for a mouthful of meat now and stayed here a few more days, he could dig up even more fritillaria.

What surprised Li Long somewhat was that some people had already begun accepting the hundred-yuan notes.

"Even before I entered the mountains, I heard people say that the hundred-yuan notes were about to be released," the first person to make an exchange said, trusting Li Long. "This money is our country's money, and besides, boss, you couldn't print this anyway; it can't be faked. Carrying hundred-yuan notes is convenient; they're easy to stash."