Xu Yunfeng's face darkened, and he shouted, "Stop fooling around!"

Xu Yunhai smacked his lips but didn't say anything, looking a little guilty.

When Xu Yunfeng saw him like this, his heart sank. As a brother who had grown up naked since childhood, he knew exactly what kind of shit Xu Yunhai was going to take the moment he bent over!

"Has someone already gone over?"

Faced with Xu Yunfeng's sudden harsh words, Xu Yunhai felt uneasy and whispered, "Da Niu, Lei Zi and Yun Song have gone over."

"When did you go?!"

"I went there very early this morning."

Xu Yunfeng was so angry at his incompetent teammates, "Should we just go to Zahatun and beat people up?"

"Brother, we can't be that reckless! We have to find a legitimate reason to drive them away!"

Xu Yunhai spoke with conviction. Seeing that Xu Yunfeng's expression had improved slightly, he immediately leaned over and whispered, "Brother, Da Niu knows you definitely can't agree, so they're going to test the waters first and see just how tough these guys are!"

"If it's just a paper tiger, then we can just drive it away."

"If they're tough on us, we'll have to think of another way!"

Xu Yunfeng's expression remained unchanged as he continued, "It seems you've thought of other methods as well?"

"Hehe, we've come up with one, but we still need to discuss it with our older brother."

...

Sheepskin Pass is not close to Zaha Village.

It takes three to four hours to walk along the mountain path.

So when Xu Yunsong, Yang Chenglei, and Yang Chengniu arrived in Zahatun, it was already noon.

Because they went door-to-door collecting ginseng, they had a good understanding of the situation of each household in Zahatun.

They went directly to Huang Mao's house in Houtunzi.

The Huang family of five was having lunch when Xu Yunsong and his group suddenly walked in. Huang Mao's wife's face immediately fell.

"Who is this? Showing up during dinner time! No sense of propriety at all!"

Xu Yunsong grinned and plopped down on the kang (a heated brick bed), with Yang Chenglei and Yang Chengniu standing beside him, their arms around each other's shoulders.

"Sister-in-law Huang, who are you talking to with such sarcastic remarks?"

"Hmph, whoever picks up the words is the one being spoken to!"

Huang Mao, who had been eating with his head down, saw his wife and Xu Yunsong getting into a tense standoff as soon as they started talking, and immediately tried to smooth things over, saying, "Damn it, hurry up and go to the vegetable garden and pick some scallion leaves for me!"

He then said to Xu Yunsong, "Brother Xu, Da Niu, Lei Zi, have you eaten?"

Although he had suffered a considerable loss at the hands of this group last year, he did not want to offend these unruly hooligans, so he patiently gave them a few perfunctory replies.

Xu Yunsong craned his neck to look at his family's dining table. There was a bowl of dry soybean paste, a plate of stir-fried eggplant that looked like it hadn't been cooked with much oil, and three or four cornbreads, bright red and made of sorghum flour. Even before eating them, he felt they were too rough on his throat.

Although he was quite hungry after walking all this way, Xu Yunsong really had no appetite.

Da Niu asked, "Brother Huang, why isn't there even a speck of meat?"

Speaking of this, Huang Mao said irritably, "We didn't make any money from ginseng last year, so how were we supposed to eat meat!"

Da Niu looked embarrassed, while Lei Zi snorted coldly, "Aren't you going to tell me you'll make it up to me slowly later?"

Just then, Huang Mao's wife came in with a few washed scallion leaves. She spread her hands at Lei Zi and said gruffly, "Go ahead and do the patching!"

Xu Yunsong took out ten yuan from his pocket and handed it to Huang Mao's wife, saying, "Look how anxious my sister-in-law is. When have we brothers ever gone back on our word?"

After receiving the ten yuan, the Huang couple's expressions brightened, and the atmosphere in the room relaxed a bit.

Xu Yunsong, pretending to be casually chatting, asked, "Brother Huang, shouldn't you be raising the price of your ginseng from Xipo this year?"

Huang Mao's heart tightened again, and he mumbled indistinctly, "Ah, just these past two days, I haven't had time to tidy up yet..."

"This year, besides selling to the pharmaceutical companies, will the rest still be sold to us?"

Huang Mao chuckled and didn't give a direct answer.

Huang Mao's wife laughed and said, "Brother, we won't sell to you this year."

Xu Yunsong pretended to be surprised and asked, "Why?"

Huang Mao's wife covered her mouth, "Oh dear, you don't know? People from Old Cui's family are buying ginseng in cash, and at a much higher price than you are!"

Looking at the dark faces of Xu Niulei and the other two, Huang Mao's wife felt a surge of satisfaction. She pretended to be caring and said, "Oh dear, I guess everyone will have to sell their ginseng to Squad Leader Li's family this year. If you still want to do this business, you'll probably have to raise the purchase price."

Should!

You guys cheated my family out of our money!

Huang Mao stopped his wife, "What nonsense are you talking about! Squad Leader Li is an outsider after all. How can he compare to Brother Xu and the others, who know him inside and out?"

His words were just a polite remark.

Unexpectedly, Xu Yunsong took advantage of the situation and climbed up the ladder.

"Of course! People from your own hometown are the most reliable!"

Xu Yunsong took out another ten yuan and handed it to Huang Mao's wife, "Sister-in-law, take this money and buy us some meat and wine. The three of us brothers and Brother Huang will have a good drink!"

...

Besides waiting for each household to carry ginseng, Li Xiangdong and his companions have also been busy lately, often going into the mountains with Old Cui.

The mountains of the Xingan Mountains are like a treasure trove of nature, containing all sorts of treasures.

Of course, when going into the mountains in summer, you also need to be careful of poisonous insects and ants, especially a small poisonous insect called a grasshopper, which can bite you if it crawls into your clothes.

Fortunately, Li Xiangdong had an upgraded version of the insect repellent that Dr. Gu had reconstituted based on Luo Hong's original insect repellent. After the group applied it, snakes and insects basically stayed away from them.

Old Cui exclaimed in amazement, "This medicine is incredible!"

Li Xiangdong smiled, "My uncle will drive over in a couple of days. I'll go to the city later and make a call to ask him to bring you some more insect repellent!"

Old Cui said gratefully, "That's great!"

When you're always walking in the forest, insect repellent is an absolute lifesaver.

Originally, Li Xiangdong wanted to do what he did last time on the Bashang Grassland: charter a train car to transport wild boars and ginseng.

However, firstly, he ran into a snag when he went to the train station to negotiate the purchase of train cars, and secondly, he needed to buy ginseng in cash, but he didn't have that much money on him, and it was inconvenient to transfer or withdraw money from other places.

So, when he estimated that Luo Yonggang and Bai Yulong should have arrived in Yanjing, he made a phone call to Yanjing and asked them to change their route to the Northeast and bring tens of thousands of yuan in cash with them.

Li Xiangdong estimated that Bai Yulong and Luo Yonggang should arrive in about ten days.

His mind was racing, and his eyes were also scanning the area. Suddenly, he seemed to see a tiny red dot flash by amidst the green of the weeds.

He subconsciously felt that it resembled a ripe raspberry.

But immediately, he rejected the idea in his mind.

wrong!

Raspberries grow on vines, so there can't be only a few seeds!

Moreover, the surface of a raspberry is bumpy and uneven, while the skin of the red fruit that flashed by earlier is smooth.

A large cluster of red berries...

Holy crap!

Li Xiangdong felt a chill run down his spine and his hands and feet went cold. Could it be?!