Chapter 747: So, the sheep pen in the courtyard could be this big!

Li Long was finally at ease.

Ever since Li Long and the others became friends with Ha Ha Li Mu, the winter camp had undergone significant changes.

One of them was the increased importance they placed on guns.

With guns and the bullets Li Long provided, even if a woman was alone in the winter camp, they wouldn't be afraid, even at night.

After all, when it comes to wolves, once they encounter modern weaponry, they are nothing but trash—oh no, they are prey.

Li Long thought that since that was the case, it was necessary for him to leave some more bullets.

Li Long always carried a gun whenever he went into the mountains, and this time was no exception. He also carried a hundred rounds of ammunition, so he left all of them behind, except for the ten rounds already loaded in the gun.

Ha Ha Li Mu had to go and notify Yushanjiang and the others, and he would certainly have to carry a gun too; he couldn't be careless.

Although there were few herdsmen attacked by wolves in the mountains during winter, it wasn't unheard of.

These guys weren't picky eaters!

Ha Ha Li Mu knew this matter couldn't be widely publicized, because there would surely be many people wanting to follow him and Li Long to the county seat to slaughter sheep.

Perhaps many people couldn't imagine it, but if you let the young people here go to the county seat alone to look around, there was a high probability they wouldn't go.

Social anxiety.

But if Ha Ha Li Mu or Li Long took them out, they would absolutely break their heads for a spot.

Li Long was someone they trusted, their friend, their *Duo Sen*.

He was different from those merchants who went to the pastures in the summer to trade for goods.

Over two years of time had allowed Li Long to fully integrate into this small tribe, and in Ha Ha Li Mu's view, Li Long was even equivalent to a member of their tribe in the outside world.

The young men who listened to the radio every day naturally wanted to go outside to see the world, to see what those things mentioned on the radio looked like, and to see how people in the cities outside lived.

In the past, there was no opportunity, but now that they were idle and could leave the mountains, who wouldn't want to go?

Li Long didn't stay in the winter camp for long; he had many things to do, and Ha Ha Li Mu and the others didn't keep him, as he also needed to find Yushanjiang and the others as soon as possible.

After all, Li Long said he would come tomorrow, so the sheep slaughterers needed to arrange their household affairs and come early tomorrow to wait here.

When Ha Ha Li Mu went to find Yushanjiang, his horse was loaded with quite a few things: grain, potatoes, onions, chickens... and so on.

He didn't bring much, just a gesture. His idea was that after Yushanjiang and the others returned from Li Long's place tomorrow, these people would carry the things back themselves.

Yushanjiang was feeding the sheep in the pen and was quite happy to see Ha Ha Li Mu come over. Although the two families didn't live far apart, they couldn't visit each other often.

After dismounting, Ha Ha Li Mu grabbed a wooden fork and helped him scatter grass for the sheep, telling him about Li Long's matter while scattering the grass.

"Sure, no problem." Yushanjiang naturally had no problem with it. "Then later I'll go tell Talihaer, you go find Bieke, and then you go home, and I'll tell Amantai, so five people will be enough."

Ha Ha Li Mu agreed.

He wanted to unload some of the things on the horse's back, but Yushanjiang refused. He wasn't lacking in things here and told Ha Ha Li Mu to bring them to the others.

At first, everything was normal, until Yushanjiang ran into Alema and Tukebai visiting at Amantai's house; then things got a bit different.

"We want to go too, to go out and see... no, to go out and slaughter sheep for Li Long!" Twenty-year-old Alema, upon hearing that Yushanjiang was going to take Amantai to slaughter sheep for Li Long, immediately said, "Take us along too, we are also very skilled at slaughtering sheep!"

Kazakh young men and able-bodied men were mostly skilled at slaughtering sheep; since childhood, they had pulled sheep legs when their elders slaughtered sheep, later they would do it themselves when they were older, and then they would practice until they became skilled hands.

"But the car can't fit everyone." Yushanjiang explained patiently, "Li Long's little car can only seat five people at a time, and I've already called five people. You..."

"We can rotate, he can't just slaughter for one day, right?" Alema immediately said, "You ask Li Long, anyway, it's just slaughtering sheep, no need to be so rushed..."

Alright, this matter was a bit troublesome. Facing such enthusiastic young men, Yushanjiang felt it was possible to rotate.

"Then wait until we see Li Long tomorrow before talking about it. You come over again tomorrow afternoon, and I'll have Amantai tell you then."

When he said this, Amantai wasn't willing; if they could go out for two days, Alema would only be able to go out for one day if he said so.

Wouldn't that be a bit bad?

Yushanjiang had a bit of a headache; he would have to discuss this with Li Long tomorrow.

However, he thought Li Long would probably agree. Alema had an older brother, and he figured if he wanted to come the day after tomorrow, he would definitely bring his brother along, so if that were the case, after slaughtering tomorrow, it was really possible to change to a new batch of people the day after.

After Li Long returned from the mountains, it was already noon when he arrived at the county seat. By this time, Gu Xiaoxia and the others had already eaten, so Li Long went to the state-run canteen to eat, then hurried to the Fourth Team.

"Slaughter tomorrow? Sure." Old Man Luo naturally had no objections; they could feed the sheep, but slaughtering and skinning were naturally a bit inferior. "Then we'll handle the offal and wash the intestines."

"You guys can't wash it all, and you need to boil water and such. I'll call my sister-in-law, Sister-in-law Lu, and the others to come help. They can just take some sheep heads and sheep hooves back."

Old Man Luo agreed with Li Long's words; after all, washing intestines and stomachs was quite time-consuming, and slow work produces fine products; this couldn't be rushed.

"You and Uncle Yang and the others collect the blood and boil the water. We'll set up two stoves in the courtyard this afternoon, and tomorrow we'll boil water and cook meat in the courtyard." Li Long continued, "I'm bringing a few people over, they can't eat our food, so if I'm asking them to slaughter so many sheep, we have to cook at least one sheep for them to eat."

"Fine, fine, fine."

Ethnic minorities basically don't eat animal blood, but this stuff, whether it's sheep blood or pig blood, is good stuff for Han people. In the Fourth Team, pig blood is usually made into pig blood buns, and sheep blood, after solidifying, is sliced and stir-fried, making for a very good dish.

Can't waste it.

After Li Long settled things here, Old Man Luo directed Yang Laoliu and a few others to start building stoves in the courtyard; this job wasn't too difficult. Although it was hard to mix mud in the freezing weather, for these old hands, it really wasn't anything.

There were bricks left over from building the new horse stable in the courtyard, and taking a basket to the saline-alkali land west of the new horse stable, pushing aside the snow, it was easy to dig out a basket of soil. Bringing this soil back to the courtyard and mixing it with warm water to plaster the bricks was no problem.

The stoves built this way didn't have a high load-bearing capacity, but using them temporarily was definitely no problem.

So, in less than an hour, two stoves were built, and Old Man Luo even tested them with the pots from the house, and there was no problem.

"Aren't there pots here? Why buy new ones?" Someone felt it wasn't necessary.

"They are Xiao Long's guests, ethnic people, they have their own customs. Let's not worry about so much, just do our own work well tomorrow."

Li Long drove the jeep to his eldest brother's house and mentioned the matter. "That's definitely no problem, we'll all go help tomorrow." Li Jianguo said, "It's fine for your sister-in-law and the others to go over and handle the offal, and calling two more women should be about enough."

"Then I'll call Tie Tou's mother and Yun Dong's wife." Liang Wenyu thought about it and said, "They will definitely be willing to help, and if they can bring back sheep heads and sheep hooves, then there's even more reason."

Helping neighbors with small tasks basically didn't require saying anything; unless there was something going on, they would come when called. If this was going to take a few days of work, it wouldn't be right not to give people some compensation.

After settling this, Li Long hurriedly drove away again; he still had to go back to buy new pots. He had to pick people up early tomorrow morning, and it would be too late to buy them then.

Returning to the county seat, the department store hadn't closed yet, and Li Long bought two new pots, a stack of enamel basins, a pair of new chopsticks, and other things.

He originally thought about buying the *naan* bread together, but thought that when he picked up Ha Ha Li Mu and the others tomorrow, the *naan* shop would definitely be open, so buying freshly baked *naan* then would be better.

Packing all these things into the jeep, he would just take them away tomorrow.

After returning to the courtyard, Gu Xiaoxia hadn't finished work yet, so Li Long spent time with the two children as usual, and only then did Sister Yang find time to cook.

The two children were very willing to play with Li Long; this was a different feeling from being with Sister Yang. Li Long held one in each hand, sometimes hugging, sometimes lifting, allowing the two children to experience what excitement was.

The next day, after waking up and eating breakfast, Li Long hurried to the mountains. When he arrived at Ha Ha Li Mu's winter camp, he saw several horses tied up by the sheep pen.

!

Hearing the dogs barking, the door of the winter camp opened, and Ha Ha Li Mu, Yushanjiang, and the others filed out. What surprised Li Long was that he felt these people were not dressed in their usual old Zhongshan suits or jackets, but were wearing *chapan* and ethnic-style hats.

Is it that formal?

Li Long felt he had thought about taking them to slaughter sheep a bit too simply.

Perhaps in the eyes of Ha Ha Li Mu and these people, they weren't just going out to help Li Long slaughter sheep, but were also going to a guest's house as guests.

After all, Li Long was their true friend; Li Long often stayed at their houses, but they hadn't been to Li Long's house yet.

How could they not take a look this time?

Seeing these people dressed so formally, looking at him with smiles, Li Long felt he had been a bit negligent.

But since things were already like this, let's proceed according to the plan; anyway, the relationship was good, and he figured they wouldn't mind too much.

When greeting everyone to get in the car, Li Long was surprised to find that Talihaer and Yushanjiang had moved quite a few hides into the trunk together, along with a few deer antlers.

"We also hunted a bit when we were idle in the mountains during this time." Yushanjiang said with a smile, "Sometimes we can encounter prey. Today we are going to your side, and we don't have anything good to bring, so let these things be gifts."

"Fine," Li Long didn't stand on ceremony, "Then I will accept them on behalf of my family."

Li Long drove the jeep, carrying Yushanjiang, Ha Ha Li Mu, Talihaer, Bieke, and Amantai, five people, down the mountain.

Since they brought gifts and were so formal, Li Long first took them to the courtyard—he had originally planned to buy *naan* and go directly to the Fourth Team.

"This is my house." When the jeep arrived at the courtyard gate, Li Long got out, opened the main gate of the courtyard, drove the jeep in, parked it, let these people get out, and introduced to them:

"Later I'll bring the children out for you to see."

Ha Ha Li Mu and the others knew Li Long was married, had seen Gu Xiaoxia, and had sent wedding gifts and gifts for the children, but they hadn't seen the children.

"This is a courtyard that only a wealthy person could live in, right?" Talihaer looked at such a large courtyard and sighed, "Li Long is too generous!"

"He bought someone else's courtyard. It seems it cost a few hundred yuan when it was bought, not very expensive." Ha Ha Li Mu knew Li Long's affairs best and said, "I don't know if it's expensive now, but at the time, it wasn't expensive."

"Hmm, it's just that there's no sheep pen, otherwise, could we buy one too?" Bieke looked around.

Li Long greeted them into the house. Sister Yang had just finished feeding the children supplementary food. At this time, a group of people came in, and she greeted them. Ha Ha Li Mu was a bit confused; this didn't look like the Li Long's sheep camp he had seen before, right?

"This is Sister Yang." Li Long introduced, "My wife went to work, she's not here."

So that's how it was.

Ha Ha Li Mu and the others looked at the children, feeling very curious. Clearly, Hao Hao was also quite curious to see so many people, not afraid at all, looking at them one by one, blinking his big eyes, and laughing from time to time, which made the few big men quite happy.

"Alright, alright, let's go." Yushanjiang knew that the smell on them was different from the house, and it wasn't good for so many people to stay here together, so he said shortly after seeing the children, "There's still serious business to attend to."

After coming out, Li Long and them unloaded the hides and deer antlers together, Yushanjiang and the others got in, Ha Ha Li Mu stayed behind to close the gate, and after going out, Ha Ha Li Mu squeezed into the car, and Li Long drove to the *naan* shop.

"Buying *naan*? How much is one *naan*?" Amantai was quite curious to see the *naan* seller.

"Fifty cents." Li Long said, "There are also milk tea houses; some people don't have time to cook in the morning, so they eat a *naan* and drink a bowl of milk tea in the milk tea house."

In his previous life at this time, Li Long started setting nets to catch fish in the Great Lake in the summer, went to the market to sell them in the morning, and after selling the fish, he would drink milk tea and eat *naan*.

Buying twenty *naan*, Li Long put them in a bag in the trunk and drove away again.

"Let's go slaughter sheep first." Yushanjiang, sitting in the passenger seat, said, "Let's look around the county seat when we come back in the afternoon, no need to look now." He had already seen that Li Long intended to take them around the county seat to let them see.

However, he still remembered that serious business came first.

Li Long didn't take any detours and drove directly to the Fourth Team.

When they arrived at the Old Horse Stable, Old Man Luo and the others were already in position, one of the two stoves already had boiling water, and the other fire was also burning very vigorously, just waiting for the new pots.

Sister-in-law Liang Wenyu and the others were also there, and seeing Li Long bring people over, they all came out ready to work.

"This sheep pen is also very big!" Talihaer exclaimed after getting out of the car, "How many sheep can this raise?"

Both the house and the sheep pen (horse stable) he saw were much more formal than those in the mountains, so he couldn't help but sigh.

"Sheep, cattle, horses, and deer are raised here... it used to be a production team's livestock pen, so it's a bit bigger." Li Long explained, "Come, let me introduce you."

Li Long introduced the people on both sides. Yushanjiang and Ha Ha Li Mu were a bit better, but the other three were a bit constrained.

Li Long knew this, so he didn't say much more and led them directly to the entrance of the new horse stable where the site had been cleared, ready to slaughter sheep here.

Looking at these sheep in the pen, this time Yushanjiang and Ha Ha Li Mu were also surprised.

"These sheep are raised really fat, not bad, very impressive!" The two of them sighed from the bottom of their hearts.

Convinced. (End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 748 =====