73 Chapter 73

Ah Shun looked at everything on the stall and wanted to trade it all. The wild pears in his basket had already been emptied by Wang Jie, and now it was filled with the things he had picked out.

"Sister Hua, is this the only quilt? I'd like to get another one for my grandfather," Ah Shun asked, touching the exposed section of fabric on the quilt with obvious delight.

“Those left outside are all samples. If you want me to ask Brother Hua to get them from the car for you,” Tong Shu said.

"Hey! Then I want three of these blankets." After saying that, his eyes fell on the clothes hanging on the rack next to him: "How do I change into these clothes?"

“Your half basket of eggs is worth three items,” Tong Shu thought for a moment and set a price.

Ah Shun picked up a denim jacket and held it up against himself. After getting Tong Shu's permission, he tried it on and put it in his basket. Then he picked out a dark-colored jacket with sturdy fabric for his grandmother and grandfather and carefully placed it in the basket.

"Sister Hua, I'll bring back chickens to exchange these three quilts, but you have to save them for me." Ah Shun exchanged all the pears in his basket for odds and ends of daily necessities. He didn't originally intend to exchange too many things, but he didn't expect Tong Shu to have such abundant supplies. He quickly picked up his basket, thinking he would hurry home and go to the mountain valley to get some wild goods to exchange.

Before Ah Shun left, Ah Hua came over carrying a basket on her back. She hadn't spoken much to Tong Shu and the others, and seemed a little awkward as she approached: "Is...is this where we exchange things?"

Tong Shu nodded to her: "What did you bring? You can exchange any of these things on the stall."

Ahua quietly breathed a sigh of relief and took off the basket on her back in front of Wang Jie: "These are all the mushrooms I picked up on the mountain today. In the past, when people went up the mountain to collect mushrooms, these varieties could be sold for a good price, so I picked a basket full of these varieties."

Tong Shu didn't know much about mushrooms, so she went back to the car and called Qin Jiaqiang over.

"This kind of mushroom is indeed expensive; it can only be found locally. It used to sell for several hundred yuan per kilogram," Qin Jiaqiang said.

Tong Shu had a plan in mind. She poured out the mushrooms, weighed them, and then told Ahua a number so that she could pick out that many supplies from the stall.

Ahua was overjoyed. She hadn't expected these mushrooms to be so valuable. She twirled her fingers and looked around the stall, somewhat hesitant.

Tong Shu didn't rush her, and sat down to wait for her to choose at her own pace. Seeing that Ahua was a little hesitant, Ashun went over to her to show her the supplies he had exchanged, so that she could have a better idea.

"Ah Shun, Ah Hua! What are you two doing here?" A voice came from afar, and Ah Shun jumped up instantly, looking startled.

Even though he hadn't done anything wrong, Ah Shun acted as if he had a guilty conscience. He quickly put his basket back on and, seeing the villagers approaching him, mumbled, "N-nothing... We're doing business with Sister Hua. I... I have to go back now."

"Doing business? What kind of business?" A woman in her fifties walked over. She glanced at Ah Shun first, then her eyes were immediately drawn to Tong Shu's stall: "Oh! Young lady, did you bring all these things from the city?"

Tong Shu had already observed Ah Shun and the villagers going back and forth. She could tell that Ah Shun hadn't listened to her and told the villagers to come over. Tong Shu saw through Ah Shun's little scheme and found it a bit funny. She nodded to the woman who asked the question: "You can bring your mountain products to exchange with me for these things. I'll estimate the price, and you can take goods of equal value."

The woman's eyes widened in surprise; she couldn't believe such a good thing had happened. She immediately turned to scold Ashun, who must have been the first to know about it and had kept it a secret from the villagers. But Ashun had already run off with his basket on his back, and there wasn't a trace of him to be seen.

"Wait a minute, I'll go back and get my wife to come to the ravine with me!" The old woman clutched her clothes anxiously. Meanwhile, Ah Hua was already putting things into her basket one by one. The old woman looked at the clothes, bedding, spices and seasonings that Ah Hua had taken away, her eyes filled with envy.

"No rush, the stall will stay here until sunset, you can come anytime." Tong Shu raised her voice so that the other onlookers could hear her.

"By the way, if you have any Lala Vine seeds, you can bring them over to exchange for things, but only food, not other necessities." The food that Tong Shu and the others displayed was all homemade on the island, and these supplies could be exchanged for faith points.

Seeds of the vine? The villagers were completely baffled. The vines grew all over the mountains and fields, and since it was currently the fruiting season, there were seeds to be had in abundance. They had no idea what these people wanted them for.

However, they have plenty of Lala vines, but their own things are a different story. Although the vehicle is very large, their village has about a hundred people, and if they arrive late, someone else might get there first!

The villagers each made their own plans and hurried home. In no time, everyone in the village who could move carried baskets and went into the mountains. Even the children were driven to the outhouse to collect seeds of the *Lala vine*.

"Blankets! I need three thin blankets!" a villager shouted, holding up a pheasant.

"I can trade these eggs for two cases of instant noodles! Give me two cases of instant noodles!"

"The thermos! The red one, that's the one I liked first! Shuizi, put it down!"

...

When Ashun returned to Tongshu's place, his truck was already surrounded by enthusiastic villagers. He held a chicken in each hand and carried a basket of freshly picked mushrooms on his back. He squeezed his way in, and soon he was covered in sweat.

"Line up! One by one! We have everything, so don't rush!" Tong Shu was also getting a headache from the noisy crowd, so she pulled out a megaphone and stood on a high place to shout at the crowd.

Although the villagers were reluctant, they had no choice but to obediently line up when they saw Qin Jiaqiang and Wang Jianye standing to the side with iron bars. However, one line still split into five or six smaller lines, and some people were secretly competing to cut in line. Tong Shu pretended not to see this and only served the people at the front one by one.

"Hey girl, do you have any baby formula? The kind that you can just mix and drink?" A woman who was so thin she was practically skin and bones asked Tong Shu after weighing the mountain produce.

Tong Shu didn't react for a moment: "How old is the child?"

"Two, two months..."

"That's a baby," Tong Shu said. "You want formula, right? We have some, just wait."

Tong Shu returned to the car for a moment, then took out five or six cans of milk powder from her bag and put them on the stall.

Seeing the baby formula calmed the woman's anxiety considerably. She smiled at Tong Shu and said, "Could I replace all of these things with this formula? I don't have much breast milk; my baby can only be fed rice water after birth..."

Children born in the mountains faced immense difficulties in raising in the past, let alone when natural disasters struck. A group of fugitives even entered their village, making it all the more remarkable that this child has survived. Tong Shu was moved and asked Wang Jie to pack more milk powder. Wang Jie, also feeling sorry for the child, secretly slipped some supplements into the bag.

“…Hey girl, give me a few cans of formula too, I have a baby too…” Before the other woman could finish speaking, she was interrupted. The man next to her pulled her behind him and said, “Change my ass! Get your parents some nice shoes, I want to change my clothes. What do girls need formula for? We have enough grain at home, and she’ll have plenty of rice porridge from now on.”

Tong Shu frowned when she heard this. When the man walked up to her and eagerly repeated his request, Tong Shu calmly lifted her eyelids and said to him, "Your family can only change the formula."

"Why?! These are all good stuff too, why can I only exchange them for baby formula?" The man was short but had a fiery temper. In his agitation, he sprayed saliva forward like a showerhead.

Fortunately, there was a table between them. Tong Shu tilted her head in disgust: "Why? Just because all these things belong to my family. Are you going to exchange them or not? If not, move on to the next one. Brother, give his things back to him."

Wang Jie responded and was about to empty the things back into the basket.

"Change! I'll change!" The man's wife squeezed out from behind: "I got all of these from the mountains. I want to exchange them for milk powder. I'll exchange them for the same as Chunmiao!"

The man was about to shout again when Qin Jiaqiang stepped forward and slammed his stick on the ground in front of him. Faced with a man two heads taller than himself, the man from Yangshan Village immediately lost his momentum and shrank aside like a chick, not daring to utter another sound.

The woman took what she wanted, slung her basket over her shoulder, thanked him repeatedly, and left without looking back. When the man saw his woman leave, he hurriedly followed her, and soon the sound of arguing could be heard from afar.

They worked until sunset, and a crowd still lingered around the truck. Many villagers, after being rotated out, went back into the mountains to find more produce before returning to trade. Often, entire families took turns going into the mountains, bringing back their goods to Tong Shu.

The old village chief also came with his son and daughter-in-law to exchange goods. His family had also had a baby, a boy and a girl, who were cousins. They exchanged a wild roe deer for a lot of things, including more than ten cans of milk powder.

"Don't give it all to your grandson," Tong Songming said, half-jokingly and half-seriously as he handed over the formula.

"How could that be? They're all our own children," the old village chief said with a smile, then, supported by his son, he walked unsteadily toward home.

As night fell and danger was imminent, the villagers quickly dispersed, and Tong Shu's family once again took precautions around the car.

"What a great harvest today!" Wang Jie exclaimed as he and Tong Shu packed up their stall.

"If it weren't for those fugitives, the villagers in these mountains probably wouldn't even know what happened outside until the apocalypse was over," Tong Shu sighed.

“They have no shortage of food and drink in the mountains, but daily necessities are a bit of a hassle. However, they exchanged these things with us this time, and they can use them for several more years,” Tong Songming said.

After piling all the received supplies onto the island, Tong Shu and the others were exhausted. They quickly washed up and then fell into a deep sleep.