Chapter 506: The Influence Has Expanded: Something Li Long Did Not Expect

Seeing that Li Long did not reject her questions, the girl grew bolder and introduced herself:

"My name is Ye Laya, and I am the broadcaster for the Animal Husbandry Team. I would like to write a news report about you repairing houses and digging wells here; do you think that would be acceptable?"

"Sure. Where are you submitting this report?" Li Long asked while continuing to drive the steel rebar downward.

"To the County Broadcast Station," Ye Laya said. "The county has been speaking about our area quite a lot recently and needs reports on this kind of work."

"Alright, ask whatever you want to ask." Li Long figured it wouldn't delay the work anyway, so he answered casually.

"Are you friends with Ha Li Mu and Brother Brother Yushanjiang? How did you become friends?"

Li Long briefly recounted the process of entering the mountains to haul timber and meeting Ha Li Mu; since the story was rather ordinary, Ye Laya took simple notes before continuing to ask:

"Has anything particularly special or memorable happened between you?"

Li Long thought for a moment and felt that everything was actually quite ordinary. He shook his head; regarding the hunting and the exchange of Sheng Huo Yong Pin for mountain resources, Li Long had no intention of going into detail, so he only chatted about it briefly.

Ye Laya was somewhat puzzled; if it were really that simple, she could not understand why Li Long would go to such great lengths to come here and repair houses and dig wells for the two families.

She turned her gaze toward the old woman nearby.

The old woman looked at the murky water in the well, yet her eyes were full of hope.

If they could access water without leaving home, how much time would be saved each day?

For the old woman living here, fetching water daily was a very troublesome task. Although the small river was not far from the village, the elder was advanced in age after all; each time she carried half a bucket of water, it took quite a while to get home. Fetching water every day consumed a considerable amount of time.

Now, if these two young men could dig a well in the courtyard, water usage would become convenient later on, life would improve significantly, and she would have more time to do other things.

Ye Laya still could not figure it out, but upon seeing the old woman, she suddenly asked her a question.

She asked in their ethnic language, which Li Long did not understand.

Upon hearing Ye Laya's words, the old woman lowered her head to think for a moment, then looked at Li Long again before speaking a string of words.

Li Long only caught what seemed to be the name Nasen appearing among them.

Ye Laya listened with great excitement and immediately began recording in the notebook she had brought.

Li Long could not understand what there was for the girl to be so excited about, but he did not pay it much mind. The steel rebar had already been driven down more than three meters; the resistance felt much lighter under his hands, suggesting he had pierced through the Gobi stone layer. Next, they would use the pipe to test whether they could force the water up. If there was an aquifer beneath the Gobi stone, then this pressure well was nearly complete; now it was time to test the water volume below.

He shook the steel rebar vigorously, trying to make the hole it created larger and wider so the plastic pipe could go down. The end of the plastic pipe that went down still needed to be covered with a Mao Jin and tied tight; otherwise, if a stone got stuck inside, even if they reached an underground river, the water might not necessarily be sucked up.

While Ye Laya asked the old woman many questions and the old woman answered them one by one, Li Long and Tao Da worked together to drive the water pipe downward.

Because the hole created by driving the steel rebar down beforehand had been enlarged, the pipe went down relatively easily; whenever they encountered a spot where it was difficult to proceed, the two of them would embrace the pipe together and ram it downward. The plastic pipe was curved, not as straight as the steel rebar, so the speed of ramming it down was slower, but after spending about ten minutes, they had directly rammed it to a position more than three meters deep, and could not go any further.

Next, Li Long went to the other end of the pipe to attach the well head, wrapping the joint tightly with a Mao Jin to prevent air leaks, while Tao Da fetched a ladle of water and poured it into the pressure well; Li Long immediately began pumping, and Tao Da held the well head steady to prevent it from shaking.

Watching their operations, Ye Laya stopped asking questions and watched nervously. She had used a pressure well when she was in school and knew how it worked; now, witnessing the fabrication process of a pressure well with her own eyes, although she was not exactly shocked, she felt very tense, unsure whether water would actually be pumped out.

Li Long pumped with all his might; he felt that both the suction and resistance below were quite strong. An experienced hand could tell from the sound whether there was water below. Although this was Li Long's first time taking the lead in pumping a pressure well himself, he was considered an old hand in this aspect; at least in terms of recognizing sounds, he could confirm that there was indeed water below, but because of air leaks, greater suction was still needed to draw the water up.

Having a chance was good enough!

Li Long possessed great strength; he pumped the well handle with faster and stronger frequency, and soon, the first gush of water was forced up. Because the pipe was not buried and leaked air, plus the pipe was not yet stable after being rammed down, and the aquifer below had not yet gathered the water quickly enough, this first gush of water contained some silt and sand, making the water very murky.

Although she had anticipated this, seeing that the water volume was not large and was very murky, Ye Laya still felt somewhat disappointed.

Li Long, on the contrary, was quite happy; being able to pump water up indicated that the water volume in the aquifer beneath the Gobi stone was still quite abundant. He immediately increased his effort, and soon, gush after gush of water was pumped up; the water remained turbid, but the volume increased.

"Da Qiang, catch a ladleful; wait a moment and taste it once the water clears," Li Long shouted to Tao Daqiang. Tao Daqiang immediately let go of his hand, took the ladle to catch half a ladle of water, and set it aside.

The water pipes brought for use were relatively long; this was in preparation for two wells. According to Li Long's plan, each well would be dug to a maximum depth of four meters; regardless of whether salt-alkali water or fresh water came out eventually, that would be the limit. He and Tao Daqiang were not professional well-diggers, so four meters was the deepest they could possibly go.

Now, with water emerging at more than three meters, and it being very likely sweet water from a deep well, this was already excellent.

Seeing Li Long stop his movements, Ye Laya immediately asked:

"Comrade Li Long, I heard from Ha Li Mu's mother that you previously left medicine for Ha Li Mu and his family, and that this medicine saved Nasen's life; are you aware of this matter?"

"I am aware," Li Long said. "I heard it from Ha Li Mu."

"Then... why didn't you mention this just now?" Ye Laya asked, somewhat puzzled.

"I don't consider this a major event. Actually, I feel that given Ha Li Mu's character, if there had been no medicine at the time, he might have directly taken Nasen and run down the mountain," Li Long said very plainly.

"But that truly saved Nasen's life," Ye Laya felt that Li Long was describing this far too lightly.

"Actually, I suddenly recall something very important," Li Long said abruptly. "I think you could write about this. At that time, I often went into the mountains; Ha Li Mu and Brother Brother Yushanjiang said it would not do for me to have no house in the mountains. During the period before they moved to the summer pastures in spring, they built a wooden house for me. They treated me as one of their own, which is why they did this. What I am doing now is actually the same as what they thought. Although we are of different ethnic groups, we are brothers, we are one of our own. When one's own brothers encounter difficulties, one ought to help; therefore, us coming here to do this is perfectly normal."

Li Long's tone was very ordinary; he was actually speaking the thoughts of his own heart. In the past, when Ha Li Mu gave him good things from the mountains, and Brother Brother Yushanjiang taught him hunting and led people to build a house for him, they never thought about expecting any reward in return. They treated him as one of their own, which is why they did those things, and now he was acting with the same mindset.

The water clarified; Li Long picked up the ladle and took a sip, feeling the water was cool and truly carrying a hint of sweetness. He did not know whether this was due to the contrast with the salty water tasted earlier or if the water was genuinely better; smiling, he said to Tao Daqiang:

"The water is very good! That's it, we've succeeded!"

Tao Daqiang was also very happy; he took the ladle from Li Long's hand, drank a sip, and a smile appeared on his face.

"Is the water really that good?" Ye Laya asked curiously.

"Very good, extremely good!" Li Long laughed heartily. "We succeeded! Da Qiang, come, let's cut the pipe and prepare to bury the well."

Since water had emerged below, and the volume was considerable with good quality, there was no need to Xu Yao Zai Zhong find another location.

It was not that Li Long was skilled at finding locations; rather, it showed that in this era, groundwater resources were still quite abundant, and digging a good well was easy if one just tried. After all, most people in the Animal Husbandry Team were primarily engaged in herding and never thought of digging wells. They were accustomed to following the water and grass to live; generation after generation, they had used river water, stream water, and spring water, and simply did not know how to dig wells. Moreover, society was only just beginning to develop; things that would later become household names like 'village connectivity' and 'drinking clean water' had not yet become widespread. Not to mention here; even in many Han villages, people were still drinking water from reservoirs and rivers. If Li Long, this time-displaced individual, had not come to the Fourth Small Team, the residential point would still be using those wells shared by four or five households; in another two years, they would start using a cellar well for each family, and in a few more years, they would switch to pressure wells—all of which were matters of the 1990s.

Therefore, groundwater resources were truly abundant now, and it was normal to strike a well casually.

Digging the pit was not easy, but filling it with soil was much easier. They filled the soil in, tamped it down firmly, and built up the frame for the pressure well—Li Long and Tao Daqiang expended Yi Fan Gong nearby, and under Ye Laya's guidance, they found a pile of half-bricks and stones to stack up. Li Long also somewhat regretted not bringing cement; for now, they could only stack it up to make it sturdy. It could still be used for a while; when they came back later, they would mix cement with sand to plaster it, and then it would be solid.

"Tell the old lady not to use it for now. Come back and test it before we leave this afternoon; by tomorrow, clean water should be flowing," Li Long told Ye Laya, asking her to convey this to the old woman.

The old woman nodded repeatedly. In just these two hours, a well had been completed. She had witnessed the well water gushing out with her own eyes; although it was still very turbid now, since Li Long said it would clear up later, it surely would.

Li Long poured out the water in the ladle and slowly pumped out another ladleful to set aside.

"Let the old lady taste it in a little while; this water is very good," Li Long said to Ye Laya.

"Okay, okay." Ye Laya was also full of anticipation; she wanted to taste it too.

"Alright, we are leaving. We also need to dig a well in Brother Brother Yushanjiang's courtyard." Li Long was now full of confidence; since the first well had no issues, he believed the second one would be fine as well.

Upon arriving at Brother Brother Yushanjiang's courtyard, Li Long discovered that the mud had also been mixed there; others were clearing weeds and debris from the roof, while someone else was plastering the walls. The work had been slow yesterday due to unfamiliarity and some chaos during the initial preparations. Now, being familiar with the routine, even with two fewer people, the work proceeded much faster. The pilaf cooking on the temporary stove outside had already been covered to simmer, and its aroma had begun to emerge.

Let's continue digging the well.

Brother Brother Yushanjiang's wife was pouring water for several people to drink; seeing Li Long and the others arrive, she smiled and continued with her tasks.

Dig away; it's smooth sailing.

Near the inner corner of the wall, Li Long and Tao Da cleared away the weeds and began digging the pit. Brother Yushanjiang's wife came over to watch, saying something, but Li Long couldn't quite understand. He gestured and pointed at the water, thinking that Ye Laya would arrive shortly and could translate.

Nevertheless, Li Long had decided: this year, he must learn ordinary conversation, otherwise it was too troublesome.

It shouldn't be too difficult, right?

If only it were as simple as digging this well.

Thinking this in his heart, Li Long acknowledged that digging wells was indeed simple. Having just finished one, his spirits were high: dig the pit, drive in the steel bars, then lower the pipes.

Just as the pipes reached the bottom, before water pumping had even begun, Brother Yushanjiang's wife called out that it was time for everyone to eat.

The pilaf was ready.

!.

In a huge wok of pilaf, the spatula scooped up great chunks of mutton bones with meat attached. The carrots had turned soft and glutinous; the onions visible when stir-frying had now dissolved, almost invisible.

Brother Yushanjiang's wife had also brewed a pot of brick tea, which could cut the greasiness of the pilaf.

The children returned from school: not only Ye'erjiang and Jianaguli, but also Nasen and Sasiken, all of them very happy.

The pilaf smelled wonderful. Although there was less meat than yesterday, the rice was soaked in oil, each grain glistening, tasting rich and flavorful.

Each person ladled a portion into an enamel basin, holding it while sitting or squatting wherever they could find space to eat; they were exhausted, yet very happy.

Ye Laya arrived. Brother Yushanjiang's wife ladled a bowl of pilaf for her as well; Ye Laya blushed and tried to decline, but ultimately could not refuse. Li Long asked her to explain the well matter to Brother Yushanjiang's wife. After Ye Laya finished speaking, she told Li Long that she would send this article to the county, and perhaps even to the prefecture.

Li Long's wildlife breeding had previously appeared in the prefectural newspaper, so he was not concerned; hearing Ye Laya's words, he merely nodded. Being in the newspaper was nothing much; anyway, it wasn't his first time.

During the afternoon work, Ye Laya took several more photographs. She said the camera was a gift from her teacher, and she intended to keep these photos as archival material.

She did not realize, and Li Long would never have imagined, that this casual act would artificially elevate the significance of Li Long's actions over these two days by several degrees—the degree of dimension.

After eating the pilaf, they rested for half an hour, then resumed work.

Because Li Long and Tao Da were digging the well, the others had to shoulder more of the workload. However, since everyone was more skilled today than yesterday, and Brother Yushanjiang's wife was helping, while the two children skipped afternoon classes to join in, progress was not much slower than the day before.

Once the well was completed, just like at Ha Li Mu's house, they built a surround using bricks and stones. Li Long had Ye Laya tell Brother Yushanjiang's wife not to use it heavily for the next two days. In a couple of days, he would return to seal it with cement.

After Ye Laya finished translating, she departed. She had accumulated sufficient material and needed to write it up and submit it to the county as soon as possible.

Ye Laya felt this was an excellent topic; surely it could be published, right?

She had heard the county broadcast station was recruiting; she wanted to write more, hoping ideally to get published in the county station.

After all, there were precedents for this in the county.

Who doesn't want to advance?

Late in the afternoon, as the sun was about to set, the work in Brother Yushanjiang's courtyard was finished. Although not entirely transformed, it had completely changed its appearance.

Even Brother Yushanjiang's wife, looking at her own courtyard, sighed repeatedly in amazement.

It truly was different.

At this moment, Li Long operated the hand pump again; water gushed out quickly. Though slightly turbid, it was far better than at noon.

"Tomorrow there will be clear water," Li Long said with a smile. "Tomorrow we won't need to fetch water from the river. Alright, we're leaving now."

They loaded the tools onto the vehicle; once everyone was aboard, Li Long started the tractor and drove away from Brother Yushanjiang's home, heading toward Ha Li Mu's place.

The old woman was guarding the wellside; seeing Li Long approach, she stood up excitedly.

Li Long dismounted the tractor, went to the hand pump, used water from the ladle as a primer, sealed it, pumped a few times, and water flowed out.

The water was very clear. Li Long filled a ladle and tasted it; it was excellent, excellent, feeling even better than the water quality in his own courtyard.

He poured out the water, filled another ladle for the old woman; she smiled, tasted it, then took a large gulp.

This water is truly wonderful!

Li Long waved to the old woman, then climbed back onto the tractor and drove off toward the county town.

"Tonight we'll go to the canteen for banmian; after eating, we'll head home," Li Long said. "Tell them in advance how many extra portions of noodles we need, so they don't run short."

They were all big eaters; this really had to be arranged in advance, otherwise the noodles wouldn't be ready in time, and the dishes would cool down and lose their flavor.

Hearing Li Long treat them to banmian, everyone was delighted. Although the work these past two days had been tiring, the food was good. Hand-grabbed mutton, pilaf, and now banmian at the canteen—this was far better than working at home.

After all, among those riding in the truck bed, few could often eat at restaurants; even people like Jia Weidong or Hu Lao Er might not dine out once or twice throughout the entire year.

The canteen was quite crowded that evening. They had originally wanted to secure a round table, but since it was occupied, they had to scatter. Li Long went to pay and order, pointing out their group to the waitress.

With so many people, few ordered banmian in the evening, and even fewer ordered the stir-fried meat version; since it was the same dish cooked in one batch, the noodles arrived quickly.

Everyone was eager to get home, so they ate rapidly. By the time they finished, dusk was falling. Li Long switched on the tractor's headlights and drove straight back to the team compound.

There were almost no pedestrians on the road; the wind blew with a whoosh, yet it wasn't cold. Li Long could clearly feel that the wind near the county town was warm, but once they left the town and reached the sparsely populated areas, the wind sweeping over from the ditches on both sides of the road turned cool, quite comfortable.

At this very moment, the county broadcast station had received Ye Laya's article. The editor who received it attached great importance to it; after simple revisions, it was broadcast by the announcer.

Meanwhile, a reporter from a certain station, passing through Ma County on official business and preparing to travel further northwest to Ili for an interview, was listening to the radio in a guesthouse when he heard this report.

After listening, he pondered thoughtfully, discussed it with his colleague, and then changed his itinerary.

Only at this point did Li Long finish dropping everyone off. Seeing that it was not yet late, he drove the tractor with its putter-putter sound back to the county town.

It was already past eleven o'clock. The lights in the courtyard were still on; when Gu Gu Xiaoxia heard the tractor rumbling outside the gate, the heart she had been holding finally settled. (End of chapter)