Chapter 810

In the bedroom, this time Li Long and Gu Xiaoxia had swapped positions. Gu Xiaoxia was by the bed looking after Mingming and Haohao, while Li Long sat at the desk writing something.

With the approach of the summer solstice, the days were getting longer and longer, and Mingming and Haohao's bedtime was also being delayed. The two children were now showing energy that exceeded that of ordinary infants, and Gu Xiaoxia increasingly realized that Sister Yang must be very tired looking after Mingming and Haohao during the day.

After finally waiting for Mingming and Haohao to fall asleep, Gu Xiaoxia walked to the desk and saw Li Long still writing under the reflection of the desk lamp.

Gu Xiaoxia stood right beside Li Long, watching him write those characters that looked quite vigorous, and didn't speak.

It wasn't the first time she had seen Li Long write—it should be said that Li Long's handwriting shouldn't be this "good-looking" and "seasoned."

Li Long didn't finish middle school—the last two years of school were spent here in Maxian County, just like Gu Xiaoxia. Gu Xiaoxia vaguely remembered that although Li Long's handwriting was neat at the time, it was far from this level now.

When did his handwriting become so "seasoned"?

Her own life was routine, while Li Long's life was full of twists and turns and—legendary experiences.

Gu Xiaoxia actually also wanted to understand those segments of Li Long's experiences that she hadn't participated in. It was just that every time she asked, Li Long would brush it off in a sentence or two.

For the young people in the team, life was mostly unremarkable: birth, school, graduation, labor—mainly farming—then falling in love, marriage, having children...

Compared to the city, love here at this time was mostly free, of course, also relatively conservative, and there were very few who messed around.

It was also a long time later that Li Long and Gu Xiaoxia learned that there were also sixteen or seventeen-year-old boys and girls who messed around.

Damn it, this really had a lot to do with education and the family environment.

"Yellow sheep skin, full skin forty-five to fifty, damaged skin, one bullet hole, thirty, two, twenty-five...

Fritillaria, first-grade dried goods fifty per kilogram, second-grade dried goods forty-five per kilogram, decreasing by grade; fresh goods vary from six yuan to three yuan per kilogram depending on cleanliness...

Licorice, forty to fifty cents per kilogram, be careful of bitter bean roots pretending to be licorice, bitter bean root skin is black..."

"There's no need to write this, right?" Gu Xiaoxia pointed to the paragraph Li Long wrote and said, "Can't my dad know the difference between licorice roots and bitter bean roots?"

"That's true." Li Long crossed out this item and continued writing.

"Your handwriting is actually quite good, quite similar to our unit's old colleagues." Gu Xiaoxia sighed with emotion, "You've practiced for a while, right?"

"Yeah, when I was a worker in Wucheng, I would practice calligraphy when I had nothing to do... You also know that my handwriting was very average when I was in school."

Gu Xiaoxia smiled and didn't speak again.

Li Long wrote down most of the things he could currently think of that would come to the procurement station to be sold, and looking at the time, it was already past twelve.

Rest.

The next day, Li Long got up, fed the little things at home, and went to milk the goats. On this side, Gu Xiaoxia helped Mingming and Haohao with their toilet needs and then fed them.

Sister Yang was cooking in the kitchen. Han Fang wanted to help Gu Xiaoxia, but she refused, telling Han Fang to go to morning reading and study hard.

When Gu Bo Yuan came over, everything in the large courtyard had been arranged, and breakfast was almost ready.

Watching Gu Xiaoxia and Li Long use baby bottles to feed Mingming and Haohao goat milk that had been boiled and then warmed, Gu Bo Yuan nodded and said: "This is good, supplementing nutrition. It's better than our time now; back then, if I wanted to get you some milk or goat milk, Xiaoxia, there was nowhere to get it."

"Then how did you get it?" Li Long asked.

"How else? Stew fish soup, let her drink fish soup." Gu Bo Yuan said, "The fourth team has a lot of fish. That crucian carp has many bones, and I was afraid it would prick her, so I stewed it for a long time to let her drink fish soup to supplement nutrition."

That was also a way.

After eating, Li Long handed the notebook with the information he wrote last night to Gu Bo Yuan. When Gu Bo Yuan was looking at it, Li Long said:

"I wrote down quite a lot of things. There are more than a dozen winter pastures for herdsmen in the mountains, and it will take ten days or half a month to finish everything. During this time, if you see anything you're not sure about, we'll talk about it when I come back at night, but most of it is recorded quite completely here."

"Dad, if you're not sure, just flip through it more." Gu Xiaoxia also reminded him before going to work.

"Do I need to flip through it more? I remember most of it after one look." Gu Bo Yuan patted the notebook in his hand, "It's just some price numbers, what's hard to remember? Did you all underestimate the gold content of our batch of college students back then?"

Li Long laughed dumbly; that's true, his father-in-law Gu Bo Yuan was a genuine college student. Back then, taking the college entrance exam wasn't easier than now; it could even be said to be even harder than now.

Those who could get into college certainly weren't simple. Character or political line issues aside, at least in terms of IQ, they were definitely up to standard.

Li Long then set his heart at ease. He went into the room, took three thousand yuan in cash, put it in a satchel, and handed it to Gu Bo Yuan.

Gu Bo Yuan counted the money seriously, put it into the satchel, buckled the satchel, and rode his bicycle to the procurement station. Li Long, after Sister Yang took over Mingming and Haohao, also drove the jeep away.

There were already people waiting at the entrance of the procurement station. They were a bit surprised to see Gu Bo Yuan come to open the door.

"Make way, make way. I'm responsible for procurement today, everyone make way, let me open the door first." Gu Bo Yuan didn't feel stage fright at all when he saw these people; after all, he had stayed at the agricultural supplies store for so many days and had seen all kinds of people.

"An old comrade has come to replace him today?" someone said, "What about the young Comrade Li from before?"

"He has something to do." Gu Bo Yuan opened the large iron gate, pushed his bicycle into the courtyard, propped it up against the wall and locked it, and then went to open the room door, "Alright, line up, one by one."

These people were also used to it, and one by one, they lined up.

"This fritillaria of yours isn't dry." Gu Bo Yuan frowned when he saw the things the first person brought, "It's quite clean, you washed it, right? You collected this from someone else and rinsed it again? Why didn't you dry it before bringing it to sell?"

"It's because I'm short of money." That person said somewhat unnaturally, "I remember you all collect it even if it's not dried, right?"

"We certainly collect it, but the price won't be high." Gu Bo Yuan picked up a fritillaria, pinched it with his hand, looked at the humidity after pinching it into several petals, and then said: "This fritillaria of yours wasn't dried in the first place, and you rinsed it again; I can only give you ten yuan per kilogram."

"Ten yuan? Isn't that too little?" That person pulled the fritillaria bag back, "That young man didn't do it like this when he collected fritillaria. Why are you suppressing the price so much? You wouldn't be taking a kickback from this, would you?"

As soon as he said this, the people behind also started to clamor; who didn't want their things to be sold at a high price?

"The same." Gu Bo Yuan didn't pay any attention to the noise and clamor of the people behind, "I'm collecting things according to his method. This fritillaria of yours isn't dry itself, and you rinsed it again; it's only worth this price.

If you want to sell it at a high price, that's fine too. First, dry this fritillaria. Once it's dried, I'll give you at least forty per kilogram, how about that?"

That person argued sophistically:

"I'm in urgent need of money, I don't have time to dry it..."

"Then it's only worth this price. I can't buy the water you mixed in at the price of fritillaria, can I?" Gu Bo Yuan didn't care about this person's misery at all, and his words weren't pleasant.

Although it was his first time doing procurement and grading, how could he not see through decades of experience? This person certainly wasn't digging fritillaria; he should be a middleman who collected fritillaria, washed it clean, soaked it in water, dried the surface, and then brought it to sell.

It was just that he hadn't expected Gu Bo Yuan to have also dug fritillaria, and he was clear about this routine.

"Are you selling or not? If not, make way, there are still people behind." Gu Bo Yuan knew that since it was his first day, if he couldn't suppress the first customer, there would be no need to collect anything later.

His face stiffened, and that person immediately softened, saying in a low voice:

"Old brother, add a little more, add a little more and I'll sell it. You also know that fritillaria is hard to dig now, the forest protection team is watching, it's not easy for some to flow out, and my cost for collecting it isn't low..."

"Fresh fritillaria can be collected for three yuan per kilogram in the forest. I'm already giving you ten yuan for this that isn't even half-dried, which isn't low." Gu Bo Yuan insisted on not being moved, "Why don't you go out and think about it again? I heard there's another procurement station on the market side, you can go there and try..."

"No, no, ten yuan is ten yuan." That person said hurriedly, "I'll sell it here."

The person behind said in a low voice: "Who doesn't know that that procurement station is good at suppressing prices and grading things randomly? That place already stinks; whoever wants to go can go, I'm not going."

"That's for sure, we all know clearly that it's said that that procurement station doesn't even have ten people going there a day, and they can't collect many things; it's about to close down."

Gu Bo Yuan didn't care what others were saying. Since this person was willing to sell, he poured the fritillaria into a flat basket, stirred it, saw that there were indeed no impurities inside, and not many broken ones either, so he weighed it and calculated the money for this person.

His movements were unhurried and methodical. Others couldn't tell that Gu Bo Yuan was actually a novice; they only felt that this old brother really had a steady temperament.

"Come, come, eleven kilograms and two hundred grams after removing the skin, I'll calculate one hundred and twelve yuan for you, count it."

That person tucked the empty bag under his arm, took the money Gu Bo Yuan gave him, counted it seriously, and after counting, took the money and prepared to leave.

"Don't go, sign your name." Gu Bo Yuan took out a small notebook and said, "After signing, this business deal is considered concluded."

Although that person was a bit puzzled and didn't know where this new rule came from, his momentum had just been suppressed by Gu Bo Yuan, so he signed when asked.

The first person had been fooled by Gu Bo Yuan, so the second person didn't have the idea of bullying a newcomer anymore, only thinking about selling his things steadily. There were indeed those behind who tried to pass off inferior goods as superior, those who held bitter bean roots pretending to be licorice roots, and those who brought rotten copper coins to sell copper—unexpectedly, all of them were seen through by Gu Bo Yuan.

These people didn't dare to underestimate the newcomer Gu Bo Yuan anymore—it soon spread in their small circle that an old brother had come to the procurement station. Although he was a newcomer, his eye for detail and steadiness were no worse than the original Little Comrade Li.

You must not try to fool him; if you're seen through, that round of mocking words is unbearable!

At lunchtime, Gu Bo Yuan rode his bicycle back to the large courtyard, carrying two full bags of things. There were some things he couldn't carry, so he left them locked in the storeroom first.

"How was it?" At the dinner table, Gu Xiaoxia asked, "Dad, did anyone make things difficult for you today? Was there any time when you calculated the accounts wrong?"

"How could that be?" Gu Bo Yuan said proudly, "Calculating accounts is such a trivial thing, could I get it wrong? Let me tell you, there were at least five people selling things today who wanted to use inferior or fake things to fool me, and I saw through all of them."

"Then Dad, you're really amazing!"

"That's right, Uncle Gu, you're really amazing!" Han Fang also praised him, and Gu Bo Yuan was so proud.

"I think this procurement station is much more interesting than the agricultural supplies store." Gu Bo Yuan said while eating, "Those who come to buy agricultural supplies are mostly honest and dutiful farmers, and they don't bargain when buying things. I tell them which fertilizers are suitable for which land, and they even thank me. Unlike these people who come to sell things, each one of them has eight hundred heart-eyes, just thinking about how to cheat and swindle."

"Then aren't there any people who come to sell things honestly?" Han Fang asked.

"There are." Gu Bo Yuan said with a smile, "Maybe not even half, the rest are mostly middlemen."

"Then you might as well just open the agricultural supplies store in this procurement station," Gu Xiaoxia discovered that her old dad's interest in this procurement station was clearly greater than that in the agricultural supplies store, so she said, "That would kill two birds with one stone."

"That works too." Gu Bo Yuan really had the idea, "I'll ask Li Long when he comes back tonight. If he has no objections, then I'll do it this way."

"Then what about that person?" Ma Xiao Yan asked curiously.

"I gave him a deer leg and let him go."

"Not bad, you are quite particular." Li Xiangqian said with a smile, "Does this count as 'those who see it get a share'?"

"Counts, of course it counts." Li Long brought back a large handful of branches, sat by the stove, cleaned them carefully, and slowly whittled out a pile of wooden skewers.

After whittling the wooden skewers, Li Long began to cut the meat into pieces.

He took out the meat he had just trimmed from the basin, washed the bottom of an empty basin to use as a cutting board, picked the fat and lean meat, cut it into pieces, and skewered them with wooden skewers. At this time, there was no need to marinate; fresh meat, even wild game, as long as you put enough seasoning when grilling, the gamey smell can be suppressed.

Unless it is the particularly gamey kind, then there is no way.

This male red deer looks to be two or three years old, not yet at the age where it is particularly gamey, just right for use.

There are still two deer antlers on the top of the red deer's head, each with three branches, and the fresh weight can be more than two kilograms. This and the deer penis that Li Long specially kept are good things.

The meat boiling on the stove over there had already started to boil. Li Long didn't bother with it. Here, he continued to cut and skewer meat. Ma Xiao Yan consciously came over to help.

She found that Li Long's jeep was like a treasure chest, with various tools and various seasonings in the trunk.

Ma Xiao Yan found an aluminum spoon, rinsed it at the water pipe, and then went to the stove to skim off the foam on the meat soup and pour it away.

The fragrance slowly permeated.

The meat skewers Li Long skewered were relatively large, with two or three hundred grams of meat on one skewer. The charcoal fire under the groove was not very strong, and the grilling time would be relatively long, so he couldn't be in a hurry.

After skewering twenty or thirty skewers, Li Long took these skewers and put them on the groove to start grilling.

He took salt, cumin, and chili powder from the trunk of the jeep and slowly sprinkled them on the meat skewers.

The deputy director who was working with Li Xiangqian over there, and Section Chief Zhou, could no longer hold back when they smelled the fragrance, and turned their heads to look in Li Long's direction from time to time.

"Stop looking, hurry up and work." Li Xiangqian said with a smile, "Don't let them finish over there, and the three of us haven't even built a pool, that would be embarrassing."

The deputy director and Section Chief Zhou then accelerated the speed of their work. Fortunately, this job did not require much technical content. Lay a layer of bricks, apply a layer of cement mortar, build the pool half a meter deep, and that's about it, then apply cement inside and out, and then wait for it to dry. After it dries, just cover the surrounding sandy soil.

Soon they finished this work, washed their hands, and quickly ran to Li Long.

"Xiao Li, let me try?" Section Chief Zhou Yuan volunteered, "I have also grilled meat at home, and I am familiar with this job."

"Alright, Section Chief, then you come." Li Long stepped down and gave up his seat, then took the salt bag, walked to Ma Xiao Yan's side, grabbed a handful of salt, and sprinkled it into the pot.

"Is it too much?" Ma Xiao Yan asked.

"Not much, not much." Li Long shook his head: "Still a little short."

"Then will the soup be salty?" Ma Xiao Yan asked worriedly again.

"No." Li Long didn't expect Ma Xiao Yan to plan on drinking the soup, so he stopped the action of sprinkling another handful of salt.

Alright, she is a guest, respect her.

"There are wild onions on that slope, go and pull some over." Li Long didn't treat Ma Xiao Yan as an outsider at all, ordering her to work.

Although the wild goats weren't large, a goat leg was still four or five kilograms, but this was meat after all.

Free meat, these people wouldn't complain about it getting stuck in their teeth.

Of course, everyone had no objections to Li Long taking the remaining meat—Li Xiangqian had no objections, so others certainly wouldn't have any. Moreover, this meat was brought by Li Long himself; if he didn't share it with everyone, there was nothing anyone could do, not to mention he had already shared a goat leg with everyone, which was decent enough.

Li Long packed the remaining meat into a bag and put it in the trunk, and then ate the deer meat still boiling in the pot with everyone.

Meng Hai and the others acted separately; some washed the pots, some tidied up the tools. Today's work was equivalent to completing the task ahead of schedule.

There were still some bricks, cement, and wood left in front of the winter pasture. Meng Hai and the others moved these materials into the winter pasture, planning to carry them directly to Talihar's place tomorrow.

As for the carrying poles, Li Long planned to just pull a few people over from Little White Poplar Gully tomorrow.

Before leaving, Li Long paid Meng Hai and the others their wages for the day on the spot, ten yuan per person. Li Xiangqian also said that after this trip was finished, Li Long should go to the finance department to report the accounts, and the Supply and Marketing Cooperative would cover these wages.

The jeep was in front and the truck was behind. When they exited the mountains, the sun was still quite high. Li Xiangqian said with emotion here:

"If everyone worked at this speed, maybe it wouldn't take ten days to finish, right?"

"About the same. There are two or three winter pastures behind that are relatively close, so after finishing one side, we can go to the other side to continue working." Li Long explained while driving, "Today was equivalent to testing the speed; starting tomorrow, we won't be able to be this leisurely."

"Then are you going hunting tomorrow?" Ma Xiao Yan asked.