Chapter 9: Breaking Ice Also Requires Skill

As Li Long was approaching Little Little Haizi, he heard someone calling his name.

He turned to look and saw that the person approaching was Tao Daqiang from the village.

Tao Daqiang was the tall fellow in the village, a year younger than Li Long, somewhat simple-minded, and the young people in the village rarely included him in their games. When Li Long had first arrived, his relationship with him was quite good, but after he started hanging around with Gu Gu Ermao, he followed the crowd and drifted away from him.

Yet every time Tao Daqiang saw Li Long, he would still greet him with a beaming smile, looking quite happy, still treating Li Long as a brother.

In the future, after the implementation of the Household Contract Responsibility System, the land in Tao Daqiang's family was managed by his father and given to his older brother to farm; having no land to till himself, he went into the mountains to join those digging for fritillaria bulbs and started a sideline business. At first, he would return once or twice a year, and each time he came back, he would visit Li Long.

Every time he visited Li Long, he would bring some gifts.

But later on, he stopped returning for several years; then Li Long only heard from his family that Tao Daqiang had started a family in the mountains, then had his legs broken by a wild boar's tusks, and after that, there was no more news.

He was an honest child, and Li Long felt that in his previous life, he had truly failed to reciprocate the other's sincerity.

"Daqiang, what are you doing here?"

"I heard you were back and came over this morning to hang out with you, but your family said you'd come to Little Little Haizi to catch fish." Tao Daqiang walked up to Li Long, panting heavily, and took the bag from his hand, saying, "Give me the bag; you're a worker now, you're not as good at this as I am."

Li Long smiled, punched Tao Daqiang lightly on the arm, and said:

"Alright then, when we catch the fish, we'll split them half and half."

"Hehe." Tao Daqiang laughed.

With a companion, the walk to Little Little Haizi felt a bit easier.

"Look, there are rabbit tracks, and quite a few of them too," Tao Daqiang said, pointing at the marks in the tamarisk bushes nearby.

"If we get some thin wire and set up some snares, we might be able to catch one," Li Long said after examining the tracks, which looked quite fresh.

"You know how to set snares?" Tao Daqiang asked, looking at Li Long with some surprise.

"When I was at the factory, a coworker of mine was from over by Passing Qingshuihe; they have many hunters there, and he told me about it." Li Long could now lie without his face even turning red. "We can give it a try when we have time."

There was no pork at home; if they wanted to eat meat, they had to figure out a way themselves.

Fortunately, there were plenty of wild animals outside at this time, and the vast majority of people in the village were of peasant stock. Engaging in such activities now was unlike in the future, where all sorts of instructional videos were available on mobile phones; even if there were others with the same ideas as Li Long, most were just beginning to explore.

Therefore, opportunities were abundant.

Upon arriving at Little Little Haizi, Li Long selected a large, flat expanse of ice near the reeds, and together with Tao Daqiang, they first cleared the snow off the ice.

This work was mainly done by Tao Daqiang, and only after he had cleared the snow did he ask:

"Brother Long, why did you choose this spot?"

"Because the fish in these waters are mainly carp and crucian carp; these fish are timid and fond of vegetation, so when it gets cold in winter, they mainly huddle together near the reeds to keep warm."

"So that's how it is!" Tao Daqiang exclaimed with sudden enlightenment, looking as though he had gained new knowledge.

Li Long smiled, picked up the crowbar, and struck down at the chosen spot.

The ice was frozen very solid; the threaded-steel crowbar only created a small pit less than the size of a fist with each strike, and the vibration made his hands ache painfully.

"Let me do it!" Tao Daqiang took the pickaxe, raised it over his head, and smashed it down fiercely onto that small pit.

When Li Long saw him strike solidly, he noticed a slight loosening of his grip upon impact and nodded inwardly; at least this way, his hands wouldn't get injured by the shock.

The pickaxe was powerful; with this single strike, a chunk of ice the size of a plate was pried out. Li Long used this interval to strike down again with the crowbar.

The two of them took turns, one strike after another, and in less than ten minutes, they had dug out a pit half a meter square and more than twenty centimeters deep.

"Let's test the size." Li Long stopped, put down the crowbar, picked up the landing net to test it, and found the opening still a bit small, so Tao Daqiang took the pickaxe and began to widen the mouth of the pit.

In just this short while, steam was rising from both their heads, and sweat was visible on their faces.

Seeing this, Li Long turned and went over to the reeds, gathered a large armful of discarded fuzzy reed stalks that others had cut and left behind, brought them to the cleared ice surface, and took a lighter from his pocket to start a fire.

Reeds were a valuable commodity in this era. In winter, they could be woven into reed mats or bundled into thatch for roofing houses, and the county paper mill also purchased reed bundles for papermaking.

There were two reed lakes around the village, and quite a few reeds also grew in Little Little Haizi; however, shortly after winter arrived, once the ice had frozen thick enough to support people, the village would organize people to harvest them as a source of sideline income, which counted as part of the year-end settlement.

By now, the tall reeds growing in Little Little Haizi had all been cut, leaving only some fuzzy, inferior reed stalks that were good for nothing and thus discarded.

This was a typical case of relying on the mountain for sustenance, seizing every opportunity to make money at this time. Unlike in the future, where reeds were useful only for their leaves wrapping zongzi during the Dragon Boat Festival and had little other use, failing to harvest reeds in the current year would actually affect the growth of new reeds the following year.

Therefore, before Li Long's rebirth, the reed lakes surrounding the village had already disappeared, and the accumulated old reeds in Little Little Haizi year after year prevented the new reeds from ever regaining their former lush greenery.

With the warmth of the fire, the two of them no longer worried about catching a cold from sweating, but since roasting a fire at this time meant the front was burning hot while the back felt chillingly cold, they didn't rest for long before picking up their tools to continue working.

Boom!

In less than an hour, the ice hole was finished.

Tao Daqiang impatiently dropped the pickaxe, picked up the landing net, bent over, and scooped into the water.

He lifted the net, but apart from half a net of crushed ice, there was nothing.

Seeing the look of disappointment on Tao Daqiang's face, Li Long smiled and said:

"Don't rush; now that a hole has been opened in the ice, you have to wait for the fish to react before you can catch them."

Tao Daqiang said sheepishly:

"Before winter came, eating fish was very convenient, but now that the water has frozen, it's been a long time since we've tasted meat..."

Li Long found this strange. Tao Daqiang's family also raised pigs, so how could they not have meat to eat?

"Has your family's pig turned into a superstitious pig too?" he couldn't help but ask.

"No. The pig my family slaughtered—my father sold half the meat, and most of the rest is at my older brother's house; we don't usually cook it at home. My father said we'll eat it during the New Year..."

Well, every family has its own difficult scriptures to chant.

Seeing Tao Daqiang lower his head, Li Long quickly changed the subject, pointing to a spot a dozen meters away and saying:

"While we have time, let's dig another hole over there."

"Alright, you're the boss."

This time they were practiced, and forty minutes later, another ice hole was completed.

"Daqiang, let's go check if there are any fish in the first one," Li Long said, holding the landing net.

"Okay!" Tao Daqiang followed Li Long toward the previous hole, full of anticipation.

A thin layer of ice had now formed over this ice hole; Li Long first stepped down onto the footholds carved halfway into the hole, then gently broke the thin ice with his fist, and he saw the shadow of a fish flash by in the water.

Feeling slightly excited and expectant, Li Long slowly extended the landing net into the water, then gripped it with both hands, bent over, leaned his body sideways, and stirred vigorously in the water!

Sensing something thrashing inside the net, Li Long immediately pulled it back, leaned his entire body against the ice behind him, and heaved the landing net up with all his strength!

"Fish, there's a fish! A big one! A huge crucian carp!" Tao Da's voice cracked with excitement!

(End of Chapter)