Chapter 1062: 100,000 in savings (10,000 words, +29 monthly votes)

After the meal, Ye Chengyang couldn't help but sidle over. With his hands spread out, he said sneakily, "Dad, you haven't given me a single cent yet. Give me the money first, and I'll go pick flowers for you in a bit."

"Ye Chenghe always picks the flowers before getting paid. Why should I have to pay first here?"

"He's always at home, but you're often out. If you give me the money first, I can still pick flowers and give them to Mom even when you're not home."

"You're worried that me being away will make you earn less."

"Dad, Mom will definitely be very happy when she receives the flowers. Chenghe says that as long as they're female, from 80 years old down to three, everyone likes flowers."

Ye Yaodong recalled for a moment. Wasn't this something he had said himself? When he told Chenghe to chase his little girlfriend, he had also told him to bring flowers.

"When did you become so keen on making money?"

"I want to fill up my piggy bank."

Looking at his ambitious expression, Ye Yaodong felt he should contribute a little.

He felt in his pocket and pulled out two 5-cent coins. "Don't let your brothers see. Pick the flowers in bigger bunches, and bring me two straw ropes to tie them together."

"Okay, okay."

Ye Chengyang excitedly took them, squeezed them in his palm, and then twisted his head to look left and right cautiously. Only when he was sure no one saw did he put one coin in each pocket.

"Is that to prevent them from clinking when you run and jump?"

"Yeah, yeah! Otherwise, I'll make noise when I walk. I have to take them upstairs first." He took off running toward the house.

The other children had long finished eating and were calling out to each other at the door, gathering friends. Even though they didn't have to go to school until 1:30, it was only 12:00, and they were already running toward school. Who knew where they would end up playing to kill time on the way.

Ye Chenghe held a bunch of flowers in his hands and waved happily at everyone. "I'm leaving first. I'll go to school and wait for you guys."

The others all rolled their eyes.

Ye Chengjiang said disdainfully, "You can't eat them or play with them. I don't know why he carries those broken flowers every day."

Ye Chenghai also said, "Don't mind him. He's a fool, following behind people every day."

Ye Xiuxiu was a bit curious. "Shouldn't we call him when we go up the mountain later?"

"I think the flowers are very pretty. I want to pick some later too~" Ye Jingjing was holding a fallen azalea in her hand.

"What are you guys going to do later?" Ye Yaodong watched them whispering curiously.

"We're going to..."

Just as Ye Jingjing was about to speak, Ye Chenghai covered her mouth. "We're not telling you."

"Pfft, you guys going up the mountain at this time—if you're not stealing cherries, you're stealing plums or loquats. You think I don't know?"

Could he not know what grew on the surrounding mountains?

Could he not know when which fruit ripened?

They couldn't possibly be like that fool Ye Chenghe, going up the mountain to pick flowers, right?

Just mentioning plums made his mouth start to water.

"Nothing can be hidden from Third Uncle. Then, Third Uncle, do you want to go with us?"

One by one, their eyes sparkled as they looked at him.

"Not going. You think I'm as foolish as you to go with you and then get chased? If you want to go, go yourselves."

Thinking of this, he felt a bit greedy too. He wanted to eat loquats. Some families in the village had a few loquat trees; he would just take a basket and go buy a few jin later.

Hearing him say he wasn't going, they all felt a bit regretful. They still missed the time two years ago when Ye Yaodong took them up the mountain to steal cherries.

They waited a while, and after everyone arrived, they hurriedly shouldered their schoolbags and ran off.

Ye Yaodong also took a basket to buy loquats.

However, people's loquats were picked on the spot. When he said he wanted some, they took him directly up the mountain to pick them. As luck would have it, he caught a few children who were in the middle of stealing them.

If he hadn't known, he would have thought he had deliberately brought people up the mountain to catch them. In the end, he helplessly paid the money and let them each pick a backpack full, happily heading down the mountain to school.

He also picked half a basket of loquats and half a basket of small pink cherries. He was even gifted a big handful of plums, but they were so green that just looking at them made his mouth sour.

It was just that the two silly children didn't know.

As soon as he carried them home, the two little girls in the house immediately greeted him happily. Then, each grabbed a handful of small cherries and put them in their pockets, and then grabbed plums in one hand and loquats in the other—they wanted everything.

"They haven't been washed yet..."

Before he could finish, the two little girls had already put the plums in their mouths and bitten down. Immediately, their eyes squinted shut from the sourness, and their faces twisted.

Pei Yu swallowed them dryly, and only after finishing did she stick out her tongue. "Pfft, pfft, pfft..."

Ye Xiaoxi couldn't spit them out, nor could she swallow them. They were so sour in her mouth she was about to cry. Turning her head, she saw a few dogs running over to the basket to sniff wildly.

She immediately threw the loquats in her hand back into the basket, used her freed hand to spit out what was in her mouth into her palm, then hooked the dog's neck and forced it into the dog's mouth.

"Eat, eat... can't waste it... hurry up and eat..."

Stuffing a handful wasn't enough; she bit the remaining plum and followed up by stuffing it into its mouth too.

"Eat, eat, be good~ can't waste it~"

Pei Yu followed suit, hugging the nearest dog and stuffing the remaining plum in her hand into the dog's mouth as well.

The poor two dogs also squinted their eyes together, but their mouths were pressed shut by the two little hands and couldn't open, so they could only whimper.

Ye Xiaoxi was still feeling smug about her own cleverness, grinning. Seeing the dog didn't resist, she patted the dog's head. "Hehe, good dog~"

Ye Yaodong was speechless watching. The family dogs were almost bullied to death by her, and now there was an added Pei Yu who followed her lead.

He didn't bother with them anymore. Since their pockets were full, he walked directly into the house.

Once the dogs were no longer restrained, they immediately ran to the vegetable patch on the side, dug through the soil to spit out the plums they had been holding in their mouths, and then buried them with dirt.

And the two little girls were also happily sitting on the doorstep, eating the small cherries with relish.

Lin Xiuqing was also very happy to see him return with a basket of loquats and cherries. "Peel the loquats for me, and I'll boil a pot of loquat preserves."

"What a hassle. Just peel them and eat them; why bother boiling loquat preserves?"

"The seasons are changing, and Xiaoyu and your daughter have been coughing a bit these past two days. I'll boil it for them to eat, and I'll throw in a couple of loquat leaves and some rock sugar to help stop the cough."

"Fine, whatever."

He had grown somewhat accustomed to being ordered around whenever he was idle at home. He would just do whatever he was told; after all, if he didn't, there would always be a pile of reasons to call him, and there would always be things he had to do.

In any case, she just couldn't stand seeing him sitting there idly.

He took a basin filled with clean water to the doorway, peeling and eating as he went, while also stuffing some into the mouths of the two little girls. By the time the half-basket of loquats was peeled, there weren't many left in the basin, and the two girls' bellies were stuffed full. Only then were they willing to go take a nap with him.

It wasn't until the sun was setting that he woke up. He tucked the small quilt back over the two girls, who were kicking their covers off from the heat and sleeping with their bellies exposed in a sprawl.

The two of them were sleeping with their cheeks flushed and pink, their hair still damp and sticking to their foreheads strand by strand. Their chests rose and fell continuously with their breathing, and their mouths were open, moving slightly as they breathed, looking exceptionally cute.

He smiled knowingly before getting out of bed.

In this weather, it was freezing one moment and then quickly became hot the next. Fortunately, they slept with the windows open, so it wasn't stuffy, but children had high internal heat and were prone to sweating.

On the table outside the main hall, a soup bowl of loquat water had already been set out. He touched it and it was still warm, not yet cooled through. He didn't know where Aqing had gone.

He instructed the old lady to keep an eye on the two children and then went out for a stroll himself.

He had only walked a circle when he heard some new gossip.

Xu Laifu's mother, whose son had lost an arm, had gone to Wang Laowu's house to ask for Wang Lizhen's hand in marriage, only to be cursed out by Wang Lizhen.

"She was called a toad wanting to eat swan meat, and people were dying of laughter, saying she thought she was a swan herself..."

"Then Laifu's mother cursed her back, saying she was just a mountain chicken wanting to turn into a swan, and if it weren't for the fact that she could lay eggs, nobody would want her—some old hen who's been through who knows how many hands. The two of them started tearing at each other right at the doorway..."

"That Laifu hasn't been seen walking around for a year or two, and nobody knows what he's like now. I just heard that back then, he offended someone and had an arm broken. It's truly pitiful; he's basically half-crippled."

"He wasn't any good to begin with, spending all day doing petty thievery... Now that he's in such a miserable state, it's no wonder no woman would marry him..."

"That's right. A woman marries to have clothes to wear and food to eat. He can barely feed himself, yet he wants to marry another one? Who's going to support whom?"

"I heard that before, he even wanted to spend a few hundred yuan to buy someone, but the people from the village committee went to his house and scolded him, saying that human trafficking is illegal and he'd go to jail..."

"Well, of course that's not allowed. Those human traffickers are so deranged; they love to kidnap women and children. If their family bought one, that would be a crime, and they'd go to jail."

"So that's why, now that he can't find a maiden in the neighborhood even with a few hundred yuan, he's set his sights on a divorcee. But it looks like even the older women don't want him."

"Of course. They aren't stupid. Living alone, they can at least manage to get a meal. If they were greedy for those few hundred yuan and threw themselves into a fire pit, their later years would be even more miserable."

Ye Yaodong only found it bizarre after hearing it.

That Wang Lizhen—his second aunt had even been thinking about foisting her onto Brother Asheng before.

A slight comparison made it obvious which was better; who would want to marry that cripple Xu Laifu?

Sure enough, at dinner time, he heard his mother say that shortly after the incident, Wang Lizhen had run over to Brother Asheng's house to make a scene, demanding compensation.

Brother Asheng's wife had been pregnant for over three months and the pregnancy was stable; she had even been walking around. She was so angry that she grabbed a broom to hit the woman, then sat directly on the ground, clutching her belly and crying in pain. She grabbed Wang Lizhen's pants, refusing to let her leave, wailing loudly and calling for her parents, demanding compensation in return.

Upon hearing this, Ye's second aunt rushed over and cursed Wang Lizhen, and the two of them started tearing at each other again.

"You all don't know how miserably the two of them fought. It's really rare for your second aunt to stand up for Asheng's wife for once."

"Is she worried that something might happen to the child in her belly?" Ye Yaodong said casually.

Lin Xiuqing also added, "And she's still messing around with those messy talisman waters every day, soaking incense ash in water and all that."

Ye's mother sneered, "Isn't it just because she wants her to give birth to a boy immediately that she's tinkering with all this nonsense? She doesn't think there's anything wrong with her behavior; she just thinks she's being very good to her daughter-in-law and being considerate, and that those things she prepares will let her have a boy in one go. And since someone is now coming to her door wanting to harm her future grandson, she's obviously going to fight for her life."

Ye's father muttered, "If she could just cause a little less trouble, I'd say Amitabha."

"And then?"

"Then they were pulled apart and persuaded to go back by the women."

"Is the sister-in-law okay?"

"She's fine. She was faking it, but she put on a good show and went back to lie down."

"There's really all sorts of things happening. Here we have a Wang Lizhen, and at Old Man Wang's house, there's that rat's ex-wife. These two are cousins, and now they're both stuck on their hands."

Ye's mother said disdainfully, "Still worried about not being wanted? There are plenty of old bachelors who can't find a wife. They don't even need to get naked; just go lie down on the main street, and there will be plenty of people wanting to drag them home."

Ye's father was almost choked again by her bold words. "What kind of talk is that? So many children are still here."

Ye Chenghu giggled, "Just pretend I'm not here."

Lin Xiuqing glared at him. "Adults are talking; what business is it of yours? Hurry up and eat your food."

Every time they ate, the gossip at their dinner table was the most abundant, basically all originating from his mother. Whatever his mother knew meant the whole family knew it by mealtime.

As long as it had nothing to do with their own family, listening to it was exceptionally good for the appetite.

Having helped his father get the old boat ashore earlier, he was starving now, eating with great relish while listening.

And after his mother finished telling the gossip of their own village, she moved on to the neighboring village, talking incessantly.

He hadn't realized his mother could talk so much before, until his father urged her to hurry up and eat instead of just talking, at which point his mother finally reined it in.

His father also changed the subject, talking about his eldest brother bringing the boat back tomorrow, and told him to go to bed early tonight and get up early tomorrow to help out.

At the doorway, his sister-in-law was still using the lamplight to shuck oysters, all of which had been pried off the bottom of the boat.

At mealtime, she had boiled a few with their shells on—there was no diesel smell—and only continued working after the meal.

And his mother, second sister-in-law, and Aqing had all moved stools over to help shuck them after the meal; otherwise, she wouldn't be able to shuck many in one night by herself.

The children were also happily running and jumping around at the doorway after the meal. With the weather getting warmer, everyone was wearing fewer clothes, so they didn't feel burdened when they ran, and they played even more happily.

It was just that the smaller ones kept falling, and one could always hear this one crying or that one crying. Lin Xiuqing was also busy constantly standing up to soothe the children.

One moment this one had scraped their skin, the next that one had scraped their knee. Since it was hot, their pants were thin, so she kept going in and out, applying ointment to this one and then to that one.

Later, she lost her patience and shoved Ye Xiaoxi and Pei Yu to him. He stayed in the room with his legs propped up, watching TV and eating melon seeds, feeling incredibly refreshed.

However, the two children couldn't sit still either. The old lady was afraid they would be too noisy and disturb Ye Yaodong's TV watching, so she took the two of them to the chicken coop to candle the eggs.

The old lady lit a candle, and the room's lights weren't turned on, so there was only the glow of the candle. The two girls both widened their eyes in curiosity, watching quietly the whole time, being incredibly well-behaved.

They watched as the old lady took an egg out from the nest where the hen was squatting, then used the candle's light to shine through it in the darkness, looking at the shadows inside to see if it had successfully hatched.

A nest of eggs was placed inside to hatch, and there were always some that wouldn't hatch. If you discovered them early and picked them out, the eggs could still be eaten.

The two girls were amazed by the old lady's actions. Each leaned against one side, imitating her by constantly tilting their heads to look, their mouths rounded in wonder the entire time.

They watched as the old lady candled every egg, then placed the ones that hadn't successfully hatched by her feet, while the ones that could hatch were put back under the hen's bottom.

Ye Yaodong saw them being so quiet without a sound, so he curiously went to take a look. He only saw three tilted heads, so he didn't bother them anymore. Being honest and quiet was fine; he was just afraid of them being quiet and silent while causing trouble.

When Lin Xiuqing finished her work and returned to the room to sleep, she discovered that, at some point, a bunch of rhododendrons had appeared in the room, and they were even stuck in the broken vase Ye Yaodong had previously picked up from the sea.

They were bright red and looked exceptionally beautiful, adding a different color to the room and making one feel delighted and pleased.

She looked at the one big and two small figures playing on the bed with a smile in her eyes. "When did you take the flowers from the window and put them in the vase?"

He had helped his eldest brother get the boat ashore in the afternoon and wasn't at home. When Ye Chengyang returned from herding sheep and didn't see him, he had just put the flowers on the window.

He had also waited until after the meal, when she wasn't paying attention, to take the flowers back to the room and put them in the vase.

This vase, which had been salvaged from the sea and was slightly damaged, hadn't had flowers in it many times and had been sitting idle. It was just right to put it to use.

"Do they look good?"

"They look good. These rhododendrons are all over the mountains and plains in bright red. Looking at the mountains from home, they look beautiful, a huge patch of red. But the flowering period should be almost over, right?"

"I bought these with money!"

"Huh?" She looked puzzled and surprised. "Aren't these flowers all over the mountains? Why did you have to spend money to buy them? Is your money burning a hole in your pocket? Who did you buy them from? You have to buy a few flowers..."

"I bought them from your son. He's quite capable of earning money at such a young age. He told me it would cost one cent to pick a bunch, and asked me to pay him one dime directly, and he'd pick them for me for 10 days."

"Yangyang? Hasn't this child been picking them for over ten days already? I see him holding a bunch of rhododendrons every day; why did he think of selling them to you?"

It turned out it was their own son who had earned this money. Lin Xiuqing instantly stopped being anxious and started laughing along.

As long as the wealth didn't flow into outsiders' fields, it was fine.

Ye Yaodong told her the reason, and she couldn't help but shake her head after hearing it.

"Chenghe is opening up way too early, isn't he? He even knows how to use flowers to make a little girl happy."

"He'll probably be able to get married when he's 18."

"Hehe, then the eldest brother and sister-in-law will probably be able to hold a grandchild before they're 40..."

After Lin Xiuqing happily tidied the flowers a few times, she went out to make malted milk for the two little ones. After they finished drinking, she held them to let them pee one more time before coaxing them to sleep.

Then, after coaxing the little ones, she was forced to coax the older one, who was even harder to coax.

Ye Yaodong finally fell asleep feeling physically and mentally satisfied.

The next morning, the village was in an uproar again when Ye Yaopeng's boat returned.

Originally, Ye's mother had long since let the news slip that the boat Ye Yaopeng had ordered would be returning in these few days, but unfortunately, there had been constant news updates in the village during this period, and there had just been a scene yesterday, which had stolen all the headlines.

Fortunately, after the boat returned to the pier, the eldest sister-in-law wore new clothes and went around handing out sugar cakes, also promoting their family's boat everywhere, successfully reclaiming the headline of Bai Sha Village and enjoying a moment of great glory.

"Tsk tsk tsk, the boats that have returned these past few days are all from your family. You're really amazing..."

"Yeah, yeah. How many boats does your family have now? If you add up all the boats in the whole village, they wouldn't be as many as your family's, right?"

"No way, no way... Hehe... Everyone, share in the joy..."

"You already had boats, and now another one has returned. How many is that already? If you divide them by the number of people in the family, it should be enough, right?"

"It's true. In these two years, it's been obvious that your family has really taken off..."

"Another boat? How many more boats does your family have that haven't returned yet?"

"No wonder when I went to the shipyard to inquire last year, they said the delivery dates were already scheduled until next year. Could it be that they were all taken by your family..."

"No, no, hehe. We only have this one boat. The one for Ahua will also be able to return next week..."

"Oh my, there really is another one? Can you even manage them? You have so many boats? You've really made a fortune in these few years..."

"You're so good at earning... How come everyone in your family is so good at making money?"

"All the money has been earned by you. Did you invite the God of Wealth home these past few years?"

There were all kinds of envious and jealous remarks, and the eldest sister-in-law's mouth couldn't close from happiness.

The second sister-in-law was also envious looking at her glorious appearance today, but fortunately, it would be her turn in another week. She was also full of joy and had long since prepared her new clothes, just waiting to wear them on that day.

After the boat returned, Ye Yaodong went straight home. It wasn't his boat, so the glory didn't belong to him; he let his eldest brother deal with those villagers.

But just as he got home and had a sip of tea, before his butt was even warm, his father came over to call him to paint the boat. They had scraped the bottom of the boat clean yesterday and left it on the shore to air-dry for a day, so it was ready for a good coat of paint today.

He hurried off to work without a moment's rest.

The two little ones, having nothing to do, also followed him out on their little feet.

Ye Yaodong thought that since they were just painting on the shore, he wouldn't send them back, so he let them follow him out to play on the beach.

As soon as the two saw the sand, they were overjoyed. They didn't need adults to watch them and started playing with a few dogs on their own.

The father and son spent a whole week painting the boat, applying a coat as soon as it air-dried, and they applied several layers in a row.

The rain that had been promised never fell; it was just constantly overcast, and the wind and waves were a bit stronger, but it had no effect on them.

In any case, the Fengshou boat was still being repaired, so the father and son were very leisurely and calm, resting at home. The serious work of maintaining the fishing boat only took two or three hours a day, but it wasn't like they were just waiting there with nothing to do.

After Ye Yaopeng's boat was in hand, it would soon be Ye Yaohua's turn.

They didn't even wait for the Fengshou boat to be repaired and go out to sea; the father and son just rested until Ye Yaohua's boat returned. The pier became lively again, with strings of firecrackers going off, and their family became glorious once more.

His father and mother were also radiant on the surface; the two of them walked with a spring in their step, and no matter where they went, they couldn't keep the corners of their mouths from curling up.

The doorsteps of his eldest and second brothers' houses next door were also almost worn down, and even some people ran to their house, all there politely trying to climb the social ladder, and even relatives who were related by many degrees of separation had to be brought up and talked about.

He couldn't be bothered to deal with them and went straight to sit at the entrance of the workshop to watch the gate.

"Brother Dong, I heard that a lot of naval soldiers have come to our town."

"They say a lighthouse is going to be built on some island outside the town. Is it true or false? I've heard more tractors and trucks on the main road lately."

"It should be true. I heard the village committee mention it a week ago."

Ye Yaodong pulled out a cigarette for each of the twins, then lit his own before leaning over to let them light theirs.

"Really?"

"What's there to be surprised about? It has nothing to do with us."

"Isn't it just curiosity? Which island will it be built on, and what will it look like? The town must be very lively these days, and there should be boats transporting things back and forth on the sea. It should be very peaceful, I guess."

"I guess so."

He didn't care much. It had happened in his previous life, too; he just didn't remember when it was built.

Having a lighthouse was good; it could guide the way at sea, and the light could be seen from several nautical miles away, benefiting the surrounding fishermen and the passing fishing boats.

"Brother Dong, when your boat returned this morning, didn't you see where they were building the lighthouse?"

"No. Who knows which route's island it is? Besides, it hasn't been built yet, so you can't see where it is. You'd have to go looking for islands with a purpose to know, or you'd have to run into the transport fishing boats. We had to rush back by the time, so how could we be wandering around everywhere?"

"Oh, Brother Dong, then your second brother's boat has returned. Does he have to return your boat to you? Then couldn't you sail out and see where the lighthouse is being built?"

"Am I that full? I have to specially sail out to look for it? Whenever the Fengshou boat is repaired, if I happen to pass by when I go out to sea, I'll take a look, or wait until it's built and I'll naturally see it. What's there to be in such a hurry about? If it's not finished, you won't see anything anyway, and it's just a deserted island."

"You're not curious."

"Not curious."

He had seen it in his previous life.

The twin brothers both looked regretful.

"We actually want to see the naval troops. I heard they're super awesome and glorious. That sailor shirt is so handsome..."

"That's true. That sailor shirt is really a dream for many people." He had actually fantasized about it, too, but he didn't have that kind of fate.

"But they're there to support the construction, so they might not necessarily wear it. They might wear the same things we wear when we work."

"Oh."

"Then Brother Dong, when your boat is returned, are you going to rent it out again?"

"Yeah."

"Are you renting it out now? Do you want to sail out and set the nets for a few days?"

Ye Yaodong chuckled, "You really want to go out and take a look? Then you can just sail out and take a look yourselves."

"How would we know how? We can only receive goods. If we sail a bit further out, we won't be able to tell east from west. We'd be able to get out, but not get back."

"No, Brother Dong, what I mean is, can I help my father rent your boat?"

"How old is your father? Is he still planning to go out to sea and work his life away?"

These twins were quite filial, just like Wang Guangliang, always thinking about finding a gatekeeping job for his father.

"My family has too many brothers. I have three older brothers and two older sisters ahead of me, and a younger brother and a younger sister behind me."

"Hiss, so many?"

He counted on his fingers. Including these two brothers, wouldn't the family have 9 children? Eating would be enough to bankrupt this family.

"That's not even the most. Chen Shi's family has 11."

"Ah!! You're so capable of giving birth? Do your parents have nothing to do at night?"

The two brothers also chuckled.

"However, your family has a large population, and my family has many relatives, too. My father's side has fewer, but my mother's siblings also have 8. I have to prioritize my own relatives first, so you two should wait in line."

"Okay, okay. I was just asking casually. If it works, that's best; if not, it doesn't matter. Anyway, let them find things to do themselves. If we two brothers can support ourselves, that's already Amitabha."

"Yeah."

Ye Yaodong, rarely having some free time to chat with them about their families, simply took the opportunity to understand the family background and population of each of them.

Originally, he had just thought that since they were all here to work, there was no need to check their household registration. If he really wanted to know something, he could just ask around; there were no secrets in the nearby villages.

Now that he was bored, asking casually wasn't bad either.

He sat until lunchtime before going home to eat.

But just as he got to the dinner table, his mother said that A-Guang's eldest sister had been rejected again.

"It wasn't the Pei family that rejected them, but they rejected Uncle Pei's family?" Ye Yaodong asked uncertainly.

"Right. I heard that this morning, the other side came to the door and demanded to get the marriage done early, saying that the two children had been talking since before the New Year, and it had been four or five months, so it was about time to get the marriage done."

"Although the in-laws were disgusted, they also thought about letting their daughter get married early to avoid any more gossip. The old woman is just an old woman, and at her age, she won't live many more years."

"However, that daughter of his has quite a temper. She just said not to get married yet and to wait and see. She probably wanted to see the attitude of the whole family again. But that family didn't want to wait, saying their own child wasn't young anymore, and their peers were already fathers. Then they didn't reach an agreement, and later they just said forget it, let everyone marry whoever they want."

Lin Xiuqing sighed. "Then they'll have to look again. It's probably even harder to find someone now, having been rejected twice, even though there were reasons."

"A three-legged toad is hard to find, but are you afraid of not finding a two-legged man? If it really doesn't work out, just call one of the young guys working for us to take his place."

Ye Yaodong felt that this wasn't an issue at all. With such a generous dowry, were they afraid of not finding a man?

Couldn't they just pick anyone from ten miles around? So what if the engagement was broken? Even a widow could easily marry a first-timer, with people lining up to wait for them. Let alone a maiden; marrying into town would be easy, and there was no need to limit themselves to the countryside.

Ye's mother said with a smile, "How can that be? The age difference is several years; the ones you have there are only seventeen or eighteen."

"What's wrong with that? 'A woman one year older, hold a golden chicken; two years older, a jar full of gold; three years older, hold a golden brick; four years older, blessings and longevity arrive; five years older, better than an old mother; six years older, joy never ends; seven years older, laughing happily; eight years older, sure to build a fortune; nine years older, have everything; ten years older, everything is valuable.'"

Besides, seventeen or eighteen-year-old strong young men had plenty of fire; what was wrong with that?

"The logic is the logic, but when the age difference is large, it's usually the man who is older than the woman. It's rare for a woman to be more than three years older than a man. Besides, these few who work for you were all idlers before..."

"So what if they were idlers? Can't idlers turn over a new leaf? Being an idler didn't get in your way. Wasn't I an idler before? Look at me now; do you still think I'm an idler? Many people slap their thighs in regret that they didn't marry me back then."

Lin Xiuqing glanced at him. "Then tell me, how many people regret not marrying you back then?"

"That would be a lot. They could line up from our doorway to the town. If I had been as successful back then as I am now, just based on my face, the county leaders would have been fighting to marry their daughters to me." Ye Yaodong was extremely smug.

"Your mouth is only good at bragging."

Ye Chenghu helped out very enthusiastically, "Dad is good-looking."

Ye Chengyang also nodded along, "Dad is the handsomest, not the cricket kind of handsome."

Ye Yaodong was even more smug, and he pinched Ye Xiaoxi's cheek in passing. "What do you say?"

"Want to marry Dad!"

"Marry Uncle!"

Everyone at the table was amused.

"Nonsense."

The two little girls didn't know what they had said wrong, nor did they know what the adults were laughing at, looking curiously from one to the other.

"Dad already has a wife, it's your mother, he can't marry another wife."

"Then marry, marry!"

"Hahahaha..."

"I don't want to." Ye Chenghu immediately spoke up in opposition.

Ye Yaodong asked with a smile, "Why don't you want to?"

"She eats too much... I don't have money... I don't want to..."

The adults all burst into laughter.

Ye Xiaoxi also hummed and made faces at him, then buried her head and started eating hard.

After the crowd finished laughing, they immediately chose to condemn Ye Yaodong for not having a filter on his mouth and corrupting the children.

Ye Yaodong didn't bicker anymore. The group of young people he had were indeed a bit young, only seventeen or eighteen. If they were to be matched with A-Guang's younger sister, it would be possible, as they were only two or three years apart, which was just right. The eldest sister's age difference was much larger.

If a man was five or six, seven or eight, or even 10 years older than a woman, that was nothing. If it were the other way around, not to mention the current social atmosphere, even in the future, it would still be a subject of gossip.

But in his view, they were still easy to marry off; handsome young men from ten miles around were still there for the picking, so what was there to fear?

Besides, his father had remarried, so the whole family was huge again, and there were more brothers. The children brought over by the stepmother were also brothers, and they could also provide support.

He had even heard Uncle Pei say that he planned to bring one more person after the Fengshou boat was repaired, and take the older stepson out to sea to get some training.

"Rely on the mountains, eat from the mountains; rely on the sea, eat from the sea." If you don't have the ability to do anything else, you can only follow along and go out to sea to make a living.

After training for a year or two, he could just help receive goods at home. You couldn't just go receive goods without knowing anything; if you couldn't even recognize the fish, it was easy to be swindled.

Taking him around to run errands by his side could also broaden his horizons.

Ye's father also said at this time, "The Fengshou boat has been repaired for so long and still isn't finished. I don't know when it will be. Your second brother's boat has already been returned to you; are you going to go out to sea and set longlines for a few days first?"

"What did the shipyard say this morning?"

"They said the parts haven't arrived yet, and they can only be replaced once they do. I don't know when they'll arrive. His boat is big, and the parts for the propeller and everything underneath have to be ordered, unlike other trawlers, which have plenty of stock."

"Alright then. Let's calculate the accounts tonight first."

"Yeah, it's just the 30th today, so let's calculate the accounts. The three of you can each operate your own boats, so you don't have to gather together to calculate for half a day every month."

"Hurry up. After the eldest and second brother's accounts are done, we still have to calculate Brother Asheng's and the eldest cousin's accounts. Their amounts this month are also large, so they'll probably be able to split over 1000; it's a big profit."

"How much money can you earn from the cuttlefish you've dried into cuttlefish jerky this month?" Ye's mother asked curiously.

"I don't know. When A-Guang left, he sent a batch to the city and it was already sold out. I want to send another batch tomorrow, and then settle the accounts by the way. There should be quite a lot. I haven't settled the accounts this month yet. When I returned last time, the Fengshou boat was broken, so I didn't specially go to the city to dock."

He estimated that the cuttlefish jerky sold just this month was probably worth more than 20,000 yuan.

The newly released goods were relatively rare, and even Boss Zhou's side had asked for 3,000 jin at once, plus the 1,000 jin for the troops, which was already the bulk of it.

There were also more than 1,000 jin sold in small amounts in the shop. As for how much money could be earned, that would have to be calculated by Aqing.

After all, when calculating the accounts in the middle of the month, the cuttlefish collected by the two boats of the eldest and second brother alone already amounted to more than 2,000 yuan, and that was only counting the goods from the 3rd to the 12th.

Later, when the weather got better, there was a continuous small amount, but the accounts hadn't been calculated, and it was estimated that there were nearly 3,000 yuan worth of goods.

And the quantity from the eldest cousin and Brother Asheng certainly wouldn't be less than theirs. In total, the cost of collecting cuttlefish for the 4 boats would be 6,000 yuan, and the goods from their own boat hadn't even been counted yet.

But the profit was definitely a huge one; they could earn more than one yuan per jin, and half of the goods were released just this month.

Tomorrow, they would transport another truckload over to put in the warehouse and sell slowly. Most things were fresher and easier to sell when they first came out; later on, the speed of selling would slow down.

Plus the original operating income of the other shops, he estimated that the operation in his father-in-law's hands this month could be around 30,000.

The expenditure on fish goods had long been calculated into the net income of every trip of his Dongsheng boat, and the labor cost of the workshop was very low; the total labor cost for a month was only around 1,000, plus a few hundred more for the tractor's oil.

So the shop's turnover could be said to be pure profit.

As for the cost of receiving goods from Brother Asheng and the eldest cousin, it only needed to be offset by half the rent, which just happened to cancel it out.

After all, half of the money they earned from selling goods had to be handed over to him as rent.

Therefore, the amount collected by the city shop this month could all be accumulated into the savings in his hands.

This was equivalent to him directly receiving around 30,000 yuan this month, plus the 2,000 yuan he brought back from selling goods a few days ago.

And the profit from selling cuttlefish at the end of last month and the beginning of this month could roughly be used to pay this month's wages, canceling each other out.

Therefore, the savings in his hands could now directly increase to 130,000!

130,000!

130,000 now could be said to be a very large number; all the collective assets of the entire village combined probably didn't amount to 130,000.

No, that had to exclude Lin Ji.

That person was the invisible richest man, and he was the richest man on the surface.

The two had to be separated.

Now that he had more and more industries in his hands, the speed of money making money would also be faster, and his assets would also grow rapidly.

The speed at which the rich made money could not be mentioned in the same breath as the speed at which the poor made money.

Ye Yaodong was just lowering his head and thinking casually, and he was surprised by the number he had estimated casually.

And the accounts for the Fengshou boat hadn't been calculated yet; he would probably have to go calculate them tomorrow.

Calculating this, it really was money everywhere.

And it was all money coming in; there were really no expenditures other than wages and oil money.