Chapter 272: Rural Absurd Past Events Chapter 272: Participating in the Mathematics Competition

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Protagonist:

Li Xiulan

Zhu Rou Rong was stunned for a moment, then gave a dry, bitter laugh:

"It's true. The higher-ups won't let us slaughter pigs privately anymore. But don't worry, I'm Zhu Rou Rong — I'll still keep selling pork. I'll restock from the town slaughterhouse and guarantee that every day you come here, you'll still be able to buy the freshest pork!"

Li Xiulan sighed upon hearing this.

The other villagers chimed in noisily:

"The pork from the town slaughterhouse isn't as tasty as the native pigs we raise ourselves!"

"Exactly, exactly!"

"Feed pigs have a rank stench, they don't taste good — especially those fed clenbuterol!"

Zhu Rou Rong gave a bitter laugh:

"There's no choice. That's the regulation. We just have to comply. I can only say that from now on, when I go to the slaughterhouse, I'll try to pick native pigs to bring back. Actually, it only bans private slaughter — it doesn't ban raising pigs. As long as the pigs our villagers raise are taken to the slaughterhouse for butchering, it's fine. So I can still get native pork back, and I won't have to wield the knife myself anymore, which saves me a lot of effort!"

But Li Xiulan frowned and said:

"Taking them to the slaughterhouse costs a hundred yuan a head — the slaughter fee is exorbitant!"

Zhu Rou Rong could only say:

"No choice. It's their slaughterhouse, they charge whatever they say, we have no say in it."

A villager asked at this point:

"What if we secretly slaughter and secretly sell in the village? What would happen?"

Li Xiulan was very concerned about this question too.

So she immediately pricked up her ears, listening intently to Zhu Rou Rong's answer.

Zhu Rou Rong showed another bitter smile:

"That won't do. If you're caught, not only will your pork be confiscated, you'll also be fined!"

Then he added:

"If I slaughter privately and they find out, they might not let me sell pork at all anymore. So, a month from now, I definitely won't slaughter anymore — no matter how much money you give me, I won't do it. I can't risk losing my livelihood to help you with this. After all, I've sold pork for most of my life. If I can't sell pork anymore, who knows what else I could do!"

Seeing Zhu Rou Rong take such a firm stance, some villagers began to say:

"Zhu Rou Rong, hurry up and help me slaughter my pig — I don't want the town slaughterhouse charging me a hundred yuan slaughter fee!"

"Help me too. My family has two big pigs, originally planned to slaughter them at Qingming. Since private slaughter won't be allowed after this, let's do it this month!"

"Ours too. Even though it's only been raised half a year and isn't big yet, I don't want to keep raising it. Taking it to the town slaughterhouse is such a hassle!"

"Mine too, mine too…"

The villagers clamored noisily, and quite a few chose to have Zhu Rou Rong help them dispose of their pigs within this month, not continuing to raise them.

It was obvious they strongly resisted this rule banning private pig slaughter in rural areas.

Li Xiulan walked out of Zhu Rou Rong's shop carrying one jin of lean meat and one jin of streaky pork.

On the way home, she was still hesitating.

Should she slaughter those two pigs early or not?

Slaughter them — they're too small, she couldn't bear to.

Don't slaughter — but she feared there'd be no place to slaughter later, they'd have to be hauled to the town slaughterhouse, a huge hassle, and she'd have to pay the slaughter fee.

Back home, Li Xiulan told Wang Zhanggen about the news she'd inquired at Zhu Rou Rong's.

Wang Zhanggen kept a straight face, his attitude still firm:

"I told you early on — just keep raising them! When the time comes, if Zhu Rou Rong won't slaughter for us, I'll do it myself. It's just slaughtering a pig — how simple a thing is that!"

Li Xiulan, hearing this, finally made up her mind.

She decided to continue raising those two pigs!

Because she truly couldn't bear to slaughter them while they were still this small!

Pigs raised only a few months — slaughtered they might not even yield a hundred jin of meat!

Wang Xiaohua didn't pay much attention to his parents' decision.

He was single-mindedly buried in his studies.

Even though winter vacation hadn't ended, he self-studied over ten hours almost every day.

In the blink of an eye, the start of school arrived.

Wang Xiaohua packed his luggage and took the bus alone to the county town's high school, beginning his second semester of sophomore year.

That day, the homeroom teacher held a meeting, saying there was a National Mathematics Competition in May. If one got good results, one might be admitted early by a prestigious school without the usual requirements. Those who wanted to participate could sign up enthusiastically and then focus on competition problems. However, this required great mathematical aptitude — only those with exceptional aptitude had a chance to do well. Those with average aptitude shouldn't waste their time.

"Students who want to participate in this mathematics competition, raise your hands so I can see. I'll count the numbers."

The homeroom teacher spoke this sentence.

In the classroom, students began raising their hands one after another.

After all, this was a rare opportunity. Even if one couldn't place in the competition, learning the problem-solving approaches for competition questions would be a dimensionality reduction strike against regular college entrance exam math problems.

For example, using high school mathematical thinking to solve difficult middle school math problems would certainly be easier than using middle school thinking to solve middle school problems.

Many competition problem-solving approaches use advanced mathematics knowledge. Using advanced mathematics approaches to solve high school math problems is naturally also a dimensionality reduction strike.

"Wang Xiaohua, you don't want to participate?"

The homeroom teacher counted the numbers, noticed Wang Xiaohua still hadn't raised his hand, and gossiped this question.

Wang Xiaohua was actually still considering it.

Now his math score could stay steady at around one hundred forty points, and raising it further left little room for improvement.

His weak subject was still English.

So he wanted to spend more time learning English.

What if he entered the competition and failed to get good results—wouldn't that time be wasted?

Students who entered this kind of competition definitely included quite a few monster-level experts.

Wang Xiaohua could achieve decent results in this small county town, but compared to those monsters from big cities, he estimated he would only end up being crushed.

This was what Wang Xiaohua worried about.

So he was still hesitating.

"Teacher, let me think it over, okay?"

The Homeroom Teacher said:

"What's there to think about? In the whole grade, you're the one with the best chance of getting a good ranking in the competition. Based on your current mock exam scores, you can't quite reach those two top schools, Tsinghua and Peking University, but if you get a good ranking in the competition, you might get the chance to be admitted early by those two prestigious schools!"

Hearing the Homeroom Teacher say this, Wang Xiaohua was immediately tempted!

The Homeroom Teacher was right—his current grades, though already first in the whole school, were still far from Tsinghua and Peking University!

With normal performance, six hundred fifty-plus points made it absolutely impossible to get into those top schools!

Even Fudan University, Zhejiang University, and University of Science and Technology of China were still a stretch.

Only through this path of competition did he have a chance to rise higher.

So Wang Xiaohua finally said:

"Fine, then I'll participate too."