Chapter 457: The Natural Survival Laws in the Mountains

The sound of the tractor attracted the attention of quite a few people around the stall. Chen Xingbang, who was cutting meat, looked up and saw Li Long. He smiled and waved his knife at Li Long. Li Long stepped on the brake to stop, pulled the handbrake, got off the car, came to the stall, and said:

"Brother-in-law, this sheep was just brought back from the mountains. Give me the key, and I'll go unload them in the courtyard."

"Alright, I'll go over after I close the stall." Chen Xingbang untied a bunch of keys from his belt and handed them to Li Long.

"You don't need to worry about it; I'll open the door and unload them myself. You just sell your meat with peace of mind."

"Young man, are these sheep all brought from the mountains?" An old man nearby was asking.

"That's right, just brought from the mountains. This is the last batch; the sheep there will move into the deep mountains tomorrow or the day after." Li Long pointed to the sheep on the car and said, "If you want to eat, buy more these two days, otherwise if you want to eat mountain sheep again, you'll have to wait until autumn."

He said this following Chen Xingbang's original words. Li Qing Xia had relayed Chen Xingbang's meaning, so Li Long understood.

"Come, come, come, young man, weigh me two kilograms of ribs, and another two kilograms of meat. Make sure it's fatty." That old man immediately shouted at Chen Xingbang.

Quite a few people also joined the "rush to buy" ranks.

Although there were still quite a few sheep on the tractor, who knew how many days they could sell? Getting them into their hands now was the real thing.

However, there were also people who didn't buy and were watching. Li Long guessed they should be wanting to wait two days, waiting for Chen Xingbang to sell this batch of new sheep he brought before coming to buy.

After all, everything is best eaten fresh.

Li Long took the key and drove the tractor to the courtyard he had rented for him.

There were still a few sheep in the courtyard, looking lonely. Hearing the sound of the tractor entering the courtyard, the sheep turned their heads to look this way.

Li Long parked the tractor in the courtyard, turned off the engine, opened the rear compartment board, took the sheep down one by one, untied the ropes, and put them into the courtyard.

Those sheep hadn't been active for a long time while tied in the tractor. After entering the courtyard, some could stand up, and some simply lay on the ground to recover. Li Long didn't care either; Yushanjiang and the others had techniques for tying, so they shouldn't be ruined.

After unloading all the sheep and putting the last one into the front courtyard, the first few sheep had already recovered and started eating grass in the courtyard.

Because these sheep were prepared for slaughter, Li Long didn't bring any grass on this trip. What they ate before being slaughtered was none of Li Long's business; let Chen Xingbang think of a way.

After unloading the sheep, Li Long put the compartment board back, gathered the ropes together, and then sat on the flower wall of the courtyard to rest.

In less than a few minutes, Chen Xingbang pushed the flatbed cart back. He smiled at Li Long and said:

"Little Long, you've done me a big favor. If this cart of sheep hadn't come, I wouldn't have had sheep to slaughter in two days."

"I see your business is good; these eighteen sheep won't last many days to slaughter."

"That's fine, I've already looked around nearby these two days. There are people raising pigs, and I plan to buy live pigs to slaughter and sell after the sheep are sold. Although that earns less money, it's convenient."

Since Chen Xingbang already had his own ideas, Li Long didn't say much.

"How much is one sheep? I'll give you the money." Chen Xingbang wasn't exactly rich now, but he still had the capital.

"Fifteen." Li Long said, "Two hundred and seventy yuan." The last time the sheep were considered helping, this time they had to be settled clearly.

Chen Xingbang had a total of three hundred-plus yuan in his pocket now. He counted out two hundred and seventy and handed it to Li Long, then said:

"Let's go, let's go eat. Old man and Daqiang are also there. The fish should be sold out soon. Let's go take a look, and after they're sold, I'll take you guys to eat."

Although there wasn't much money left in his pocket, he still had the confidence to treat them to a meal, and Chen Xingbang had confidence he could sell these eighteen sheep for four hundred yuan.

It wouldn't take half a month!

Earning over a hundred yuan, just think, in his hometown, that wouldn't be such a good income even in a year!

Li Long was also tired, so he parked the tractor in the courtyard, waited for Chen Xingbang to put the flatbed cart frame away and put grass for the sheep, and then the two went to the market together.

Li Qing Xia and Tao Da's stall was set up together this time, relatively close. The fish on the two stalls added together was less than ten kilograms now. Li Long and Chen Xingbang helped shout and help, and in less than twenty minutes, the fish were sold out, and they closed the stall and left.

Although it was still a bit early for lunch, everyone was tired and very happy, so they went to eat.

"Old man, is it okay for you to ride over every day like this?" Li Long thought about whether he should get an electric one if the old man was struggling. There were electric bicycles in the later years, but those were true electric bicycles, which were 28-inch bicycles with a motor added in the middle of the triangular frame, using this motor to drive the front and rear wheels. However, the time they appeared was very short, and he didn't know if the technology wasn't mature or if charging wasn't convenient. Anyway, Li Long seemed to have only seen one or two of them.

If the old man was struggling to ride, should he think about getting an electric one?

"What's wrong with that?" Li Qing Xia had never admitted to being old, patted his leg, and smiled, "How far have I gone? Riding a bicycle, earning ten, twenty, or thirty yuan a day when it's good, where else can you find such a good thing? It's much better than when I was young, pushing a flatbed cart with two legs to sell ginger and garlic. Not to mention having a bicycle, with this income, even without a bicycle, I would get up two or three hours earlier and walk over!"

Everyone had the motivation to live a better life. Before, they just couldn't see hope, but now they could see hope, and they could get real benefits by working hard, so who wouldn't work hard?

Even someone like Tao Da was working hard for a better life, thinking about a better living environment for his future child, let alone Li Qing Xia?

The four arrived at the restaurant. Chen Xingbang wanted to order two hard dishes, but Li Qing Xia stopped him.

"Just order four bowls of noodles. That's solid and filling. There's chicken and mutton at home, so we don't need to be so polite."

Chen Xingbang knew the old man was saving money for him, so he didn't put on airs anymore, ordered four bowls of stir-fried meat noodles, added noodles, and also asked for noodle soup.

After paying the money and food stamps, Chen Xingbang came over, poured tea for the three, and said with some excitement:

"This Shicheng market is truly large. Doing business here is much better than in Maxian. Old man, look at whether we should move over here later."

"I won't," Li Qing Xia's goal was clear, and he shook his head directly. "How good is your eldest brother's village? There's rice and fish, and Little Long often brings various meats. What would I move here for? To slaughter sheep with you? This place is good for business, but life is too stifling."

Chen Xingbang smiled awkwardly. That's true. This is a good place for business, but imagining catching fish and catching loaches like the old man, this place definitely wouldn't work.

"What about you, Little Long? Just stay in the county?" Chen Xingbang asked Li Long.

"Yes, Xiaoxia works in the county, so I won't run too far. You bring my sister over to settle down here later. Anyway, it's not far. It's simple to buy a courtyard when you really want to move over here."

Li Long said it lightly. The waiter serving the food curled her lips. These few looked like old farmers, but their words were quite big. What simple to buy a courtyard? Are courtyards easy to buy? She had been squeezed together with her family after returning from being an educated youth, with five or six children in a family squeezed into three rooms. Although it wasn't as crowded as coastal big cities, it wasn't spacious either.

It was relatively easy to arrange work here, but how could a girl go to do physical labor in factories like the tractor factory, sugar factory, or bone glue factory? With those men with bare arms, how shy it would be!

The money earned from running a restaurant here wasn't much, but it was stable. She was thinking about saving money for a few more years to buy a small courtyard in the suburbs.

This was already a very powerful plan, but in the eyes of these farmers, buying a courtyard was so easy?

Bragging!

Li Long clearly felt the waiter's expression was a bit wrong, but he didn't care too much. After eating and leaving, there was no interaction, so why care so much?

Once the noodles were served, they poured the added noodles into the plate, mixed them, and ate them wolfishly without saying a word.

After eating the noodles and leaving the restaurant, Chen Xingbang asked:

"Little Long, are you going back directly later?"

"No, I'm going to the sugar factory to pull a cart of sugar dregs." Li Long said, "The sugar dregs at home, at the horse corral, and at the large courtyard all need some. After pulling them back and putting them down, I'll go into the mountains."

"Alright, then we'll go back to the courtyard together. I have to slaughter another sheep. Looking at it, I should be able to sell one this afternoon."

"I'll follow you to the sugar factory to load the sugar dregs before leaving." Li Qing Xia said.

"Alright." Li Long said, "After loading, you guys don't ride anymore. Put the bicycles in the tractor bucket, and you guys sit on the tractor and we'll go back together. Don't ride anymore; riding back will take another two hours, which is tiring."

The matter was decided. They took the tractor from Chen Xingbang's courtyard, waved goodbye to him. Li Qing Xia and Tao Da carried the bicycles and put them on the tractor, the two supporting the bicycles in the tractor bucket, and Li Long drove toward the sugar factory.

They didn't wait long at the back door of the sugar factory before they saw Song Ming and his apprentice driving a car pulling a cart of sugar dregs out.

Song Ming saw Li Long sitting on the tractor and stopped immediately.

He poked his head out of the cab and asked with a smile:

"Comrade Little Li, are you getting sugar dregs?"

"Yes," Li Long smiled and said, "The sugar dregs at home are at the bottom, so I thought about coming to pull a cart back."

"Heh, you should have gone directly into the factory just now. But it doesn't matter. Little Zhang, you take Comrade Li to the courtyard, give him a few more gunny sacks, just say Section Chief Hu said so. Comrade Li, you follow Little Zhang to the courtyard and load them directly; that's more convenient. This car of mine can't stay here too long. Shall we talk later?"

"Alright, alright, you go ahead." Li Long waved his hand.

The car drove away, and Song Ming's apprentice Zhang Xueliang smiled and got on the fender of Li Long's tractor, holding the seat, and Li Long started the tractor.

"Brother Li, you're amazing! It hasn't been long, and you've bought a tractor. This thing is powerful, it must be very expensive!"

!.

"It's not considered expensive, a few thousand yuan," Li Long said while driving, "It's much worse than the cars you drive."

Zhang Xueliang smiled, a bit of pride in his eyes, and said:

"Hmm, my master said, in another month I'll be able to drive alone."

"Then you're amazing. Being able to graduate means you can both drive and repair cars," Li Long was truly surprised. At this time, most drivers were both repairing and driving. Even if they went to a driving school to learn driving technology two years later, they would still need to learn car repair together, usually starting from half a year. Unlike the later years when there were more electronic equipment in cars, ordinary drivers didn't need to learn car repair.

The two chatted as they entered the back door of the sugar factory. The tractor drove to the workshop door, Li Long stopped, Zhang Xueliang got off and directed the tractor bucket to get close to the discharge port.

Li Qing Xia and Tao Da put their bicycles down, parked them aside, and after Zhang Xueliang came over with seven or eight gunny sacks, the two also found shovels and started shoveling sugar dregs onto the car after they came out of the discharge port.

The tractor bucket couldn't actually hold too much, mainly loading into the gunny sacks, and then pressing them on top of the sugar dregs in the tractor bucket.

Finally, leave a few more gunny sacks, put the bicycles on top, and sitting on them wouldn't wet their butts.

After finishing here, Song Ming also came back driving the car.

Li Long chatted with Song Ming for a few more words, and knowing Li Long was in the mountains now, Song Ming said:

"When you have time, bring some *Fritillaria* over. We also need some here; my mother has an old cough problem."

"No problem." Li Long could easily handle this small matter, "I can send it over tomorrow or the day after." There were some in the large courtyard, he would take some when he went back later, and let Tao Da send it over tomorrow.

"Really? That's great." Song Ming was overjoyed, "Don't need much, just a small handful is enough."

"Alright." Li Long didn't say much either. The sugar dregs in the tractor bucket here were already leaking water, "We're leaving first, it's not good to leave water here."

"Good, good, good, you guys go, are the gunny sacks enough?"

"Enough, enough." Li Long waved his hand with a smile, cranked the tractor, and quickly left the sugar factory courtyard.

There were cars and people on the road, but they were relatively few. The car drove very fast. When crossing the Mahe Bridge, Li Long saw the river was very fierce; the snowmelt flood should have come down. The source of this river also had glaciers, but it was too deep, and no one had ever been there. After

There were no longer any adults looking for jade by the river, though a few children were digging for something in the sand. Li Long remembered that the county annals recorded that there were placer gold deposits in the Mahe River, and the gold nuggets that Ha Ha Li Mu and the others had given him proved this point. It was just that the gold mines were said to have been panned clean later on, with only sporadic amounts remaining, and he didn't know if he would have the luck to find a gold nugget himself in the future.

After crossing the big bridge, he felt it was still a long way to the county seat. Thinking of later generations, Maxian and Shicheng were connected, with the big bridge in the middle, and both sides of the bridge were already filled with single-story houses, apartment buildings, and factory areas; it seemed the city was right by the river. The development over these next few decades was truly too fast.

The tractor first drove into the big courtyard. Gu Xiaoxia was not there, so Li Long and the others unloaded two sacks of sugar dregs; this was feed for the little deer. Li Long took half a kilogram of fritillaria from the side room, divided it into two parts, and found a cloth bag to pack them in, handing it to Tao Daqiang and telling him to give it to Song Ming when he sold fish tomorrow. The dried fritillaria was very light, so half a kilogram made quite a large bag.

He didn't stop here either, driving directly back to the production team. He dropped off six sacks of sugar dregs at the horse corral, unloaded one sack at Tao Daqiang's home, and hauled the rest to Li Jianguo's courtyard. The sow had already farrowed nine piglets; this professional pig-raising status was truly confirmed.

Li Long had been coming back every few days, and Du Chunfang was always very happy to see her youngest son. But Li Long didn't have time to stay long; he unloaded the sugar dregs, chatted with his parents for a while, then filled up the tank and topped off the oil drum as well. After adding water to the tractor, he drove off.

"Day after day, coming in such a rush and leaving the same way, when will it ever end?" Du Chunfang was very dissatisfied.

"That's to earn money, isn't it?" Li Qing Xia took a broad view. "Otherwise, how would we have so much meat to eat? How would we have a TV to watch?"

These past few days, Du Chunfang would go to Li Long's room every night to watch TV, and after finishing, she would return to the east room here to sleep. Hearing Li Qing Xia say this, her face turned red, and she stopped talking.

"Just wait, wait until winter and we'll be able to slow down. But by then, I suppose the baby will be born, right? Will you still be able to manage his child?" Li Qing Xia joked. "You won't be able to handle it, will you?"

"I'd like to manage, but the daughter-in-law has to be willing to let me," Du Chunfang admitted generously. "The way we look after children is different from city people. The daughter-in-law is a cadre now, would she be willing?"

Getting off track.

Li Long stayed in the big courtyard that day and went into the mountains early the next morning.

Although every day was spent in a rush, to be honest, he was still quite happy, and Gu Xiaoxia was quite happy too. At least this way, it didn't feel completely like living apart. Occasionally being able to see Li Long return was still a pleasant little surprise.

A short separation is better than a new marriage, after all!

There hadn't been any major changes at the wooden cabin. Those who stole things like in the first few days were a tiny minority; after all, in such a large mountain, the average distribution of actual drifters inside was very small.

After Li Long rested at the wooden cabin while driving the tractor, he brought along a shovel, loaded some bags into the tractor's bucket, and then started the tractor and set off.

He intended to go dig some coal to bring back.

There was no way to drive directly up to the coal-producing spot, but Li Long already had an understanding of the nearby terrain and could drive into a gully less than a hundred meters from the coal seam.

After driving there, he planned to dig coal into the bags and then carry them to the tractor. He would get a dozen bags first; a dozen bags of coal would be enough for him to burn for a whole summer.

The chugging sound of the tractor broke the tranquility of the mountains; some people heard it, and birds and beasts heard it too.

Although he could drive faster, Li Long's speed was not fast. Many of the mountain gullies here didn't have real roads, just some parts that were relatively flat, so the tractor could pass, but driving fast carried the risk of overturning.

The speed was very slow, not even ten kilometers per hour, but Li Long wasn't in a hurry; he would get as much as he could today.

When the tractor reached the nearest mountain gully, Li Long stopped and killed the engine. He took the shovel and sacks off the tractor bucket, slung the 56-style semi-automatic rifle over his back, and walked toward the coal mine.

Arriving at the coal mine, Li Long put down the sacks, pushed aside the crushed coal, and prepared to get some lump coal first.

Just at this moment, a loud commotion came from the gully to the east—there were screams, wolf howls, and the sound of grass being trampled. Li Long hurriedly dropped the shovel, took the 56-style off his back, disengaged the safety, pulled the bolt to chamber a round, and leaned against the coal seam, watching that side vigilantly.

A few minutes later, a large roe deer darted out from the gully entrance, followed by a gray wolf. The gray wolf would dart forward every now and then to bite the roe deer's hind legs and back. Subsequently, two more roe deer darted out, one large and one small, with one or two more wolves behind them. Further back, a half-grown roe deer had just darted out when it was pounced on by a wolf. The wolf bit the roe deer's neck in one go; the roe deer struggled desperately, but unfortunately, it died in the end.

Then, that gray wolf discovered Li Long. (End of chapter)