Chapter 119: Irritable Tao Daqiang

Li Long turned to team leader Xu Chengjun's house and mentioned the matter of renting a horse cart the next day. Xu Chengjun waved his hand:

"No problem." Returning home, he found that Li Jianguo had already put the landing net, cross pick, crowbar, shovel, and urea bag on the sled, just waiting for him to return. Li Juan and Li Qiang were also sitting on the sled, looking at him with a smile.

"Are you all going?" Li Long asked.

"Mm, let's go together," Li Jianguo said, "More people take turns, dig more. In less than ten days, once the snow melts, we can't catch fish."

Here, the four of them walked toward the small sea together, walked less than half the way, Tao Daqiang caught up.

He took the rope of the sled from Li Jianguo's hand and strode forward. Li Juan and Li Qiang were laughing happily sitting on the sled.

The snow on the sunny side of the north bank of the small sea had melted a bit, revealing the black mud underneath. Li Long and the others arrived on the ice, found the ice hole they had originally hit, and found that the accumulated snow covered on it had been cleared by someone, obviously it had been used by someone. The people who used this ice hole didn't bury it with snow after leaving, causing the water below to freeze layer by layer, now the ice surface of the ice hole was higher than other ice surfaces, it was ruined.

"Hit it again." Li Long said, "The ice should not be as thick as before now."

Tao Daqiang took the cross pick from the sled, changed a place, and began to smash.

Li Long also took the shovel and crowbar to a place forty or fifty meters away, first cleared a piece of snow, and then began to smash the ice. Li Juan and Li Qiang sensibly went to find reed reeds, while Li Jianguo prepared to take turns with Tao Daqiang.

Li Long clearly felt that the ice was much thinner, smashed a hole of thirty or forty centimeters on the ice, and hit through the ice surface, the water below surged up.

Don't know if it was because of the increased strength or the thinness of the ice layer, this time both sides spent half an hour to get the ice hole done, the next step was to take turns using the landing net to dig for fish.

As Li Long expected, at first they could only dig some miscellaneous fish, small crucian carp, small dogfish, and half-grown silver carp. Although they could clearly feel the landing net touching big fish, they couldn't dig them up.

By noon, the two ice holes had dug less than ten kilograms of fish in total.

Tao Daqiang was somewhat discouraged, and Li Jianguo couldn't help but curse, "Damn those cowards! They didn't even know to fill in the ice holes they dug. They're selfish to the core!"

"Big Brother, Daqiang, it's fine. Let's go, let's head back. After we eat lunch and rest for a while at home, we'll come back in two hours; the fish should have gathered by then. If we work a bit later today, we should be able to catch more."

As the group returned to the Li household, Tao Daqiang was anxious to get back to cook for his father. Liang Wenyu heard the commotion and came out. Seeing that Tao Daqiang was about to leave, she hurriedly called out to him and went back inside to bring out an enamel basin with a lid, handing it to him:

"Inside here are some freshly steamed buns, and underneath are some stir-fried vegetables. You can just heat them up when you get back; you've been working all morning, so it's a hassle to cook again."

Tao Daqiang's mouth moved, not knowing what to say.

"Hurry back," Li Jianguo said with a smile. "Go back, have dinner with your dad, and get some rest. If your dad is doing alright, you can come back later."

Tao Daqiang nodded heavily, cradling the enamel basin as he strode toward home.

Halfway there, Tao Daqiang saw Gu Ermao walking over, swaying unsteadily. He ignored him; he was in a hurry to get back and heat up the food for his father.

"Daqiang, where are you going? What are you carrying? It smells really good, let me take a look." Gu Ermao had been acting very arrogant in the team lately, relying on his status as a driver's apprentice to brag quite a bit.

Quite a few people actually bought into his act and were rather enthusiastic toward him, which gave Gu Ermao the illusion that his status had truly changed and was different from before.

Of course, Gu Ermao used to boss Tao Daqiang around too. He had always looked down on Tao Daqiang, thinking that despite the guy's large frame, he was incredibly stupid and couldn't even put two sentences together.

"Don't touch it." Tao Daqiang reached his hands upward, lifting the enamel basin high, explaining as he did so:

"This is food I'm taking back for my dad. Don't grab it, don't spill it." Gu Ermao said with a grin:

"What kind of food smells this good? I smell meat, come on, don't be stingy, let me have a taste!"

Although Gu Ermao had become a driver's apprentice, this apprenticeship was voluntary and unpaid. So, it was still very difficult for him to get meat.

He had also heard that Tao Daqiang had earned some money following Li Long; whether or not he could eat meat, he at least ate fish often. Gu Ermao was greedy too, and he wanted to snatch it.

Tao Daqiang was nearly 1.8 meters tall, while Gu Ermao was not even 1.7 meters. He definitely couldn't snatch it by force, so he jumped up, and with one slap, he hit the enamel basin.

Disturbed by this, Tao Daqiang didn't hold the basin steady, and the lid on top fell off, crashing onto the snowy ground, and one bun was also knocked out.

"Daqiang, not bad, eating white buns, huh!" Gu Ermao swallowed his saliva. He didn't go to pick up the bun on the snow, but instead fixed his gaze on the enamel basin, saying with a cheeky grin:

"Give me two, I haven't tasted these in a few days..."

"Get lost!" Seeing the bun on the ground, Tao Daqiang's eyes turned red instantly. He roared at Gu Ermao and then bent down to pick up the bun.

Gu Ermao was stunned by Tao Daqiang's roar, and immediately, a wave of shame surged up.

He had actually been roared at by Tao Daqiang, this half-wit!

He looked left and right, discovering that people in the distance had already seen the commotion and were watching.

!.

Unable to save face, Gu Ermao stepped forward and shoved Tao Daqiang, saying with a mix of arrogance and anger:

"Who are you roaring at? You've got some nerve, haven't you? Huh?"

Although Tao Daqiang had already gripped the enamel basin tightly, Gu Ermao's shove was extremely forceful, and two more buns were shaken out of the basin.

Tao Daqiang was furious!

He straightened up, shielding the enamel basin with both hands, and glared at Gu Ermao with burning rage.

Gu Ermao was startled by Tao Daqiang's glare, and before he could react, Tao Daqiang kicked out directly with a heavy foot!

Gu Ermao only had the gift of gab; he was far from being a fighter. With this one kick, Tao Daqiang sent him rolling across the ground like a gourd!

Tao Daqiang chased after him and kicked Gu Ermao's stomach hard two more times, cursing as he kicked:

"Are you damn deaf? Didn't you hear me tell you to get lost? This is my dad's food! My dad's food! Can't you understand human speech? Get the hell away from here, or I'll kick you to death!"

Gu Ermao screamed in pain. Tao Daqiang's anger slowly subsided. He didn't pay any more attention to Gu Ermao, but instead turned around, picked up the two buns, wiped the snow powder off them, picked up the lid of the enamel basin, covered it, and carefully cradled it as he walked toward home.

Several people saw Tao Daqiang beating Gu Ermao, and they all felt quite conflicted inside.

They hadn't expected that Tao Daqiang, who was usually as soft as dough and wouldn't say anything out of line, could be so fierce today!

Gu Ermao lay on the ground screaming for quite a while, but no one paid him any mind. Finally, he slowly crawled up and walked home, dejected.

While lying on the ground, Gu Ermao had been thinking about how to get revenge. However, what discouraged him was that he was completely helpless against Tao Daqiang!

(End of chapter)