“She’s my sister. She hasn’t been home for so many years. My mother has cried herself blind, so we came here to find her.”
“I know Chen Hongxia, but I’ve never heard of her having any relatives.”
"Of course there is! I'm her older sister. At that time, the family was planning to have her marry a man surnamed Bai, but she ran away with someone early on and they haven't been back for over 20 years."
The whole family was furious with their youngest daughter back then. They didn't mean to stop her from marrying the man surnamed Bai; they just wanted her to wait two more years. But who would have thought they would elope like that?
“She must be blaming us for not coming back to visit all these years. My eyes are almost blind. If she doesn’t go back, she won’t even get to see us one last time.”
The Chen family did try to find their sister, but there was still war at that time, and after liberation, they never heard from her again.
Moreover, the Chen family members also felt ashamed about this matter and basically never mentioned this younger sister. It was only when their mother was dying that she kept saying she wanted to see her, saying she couldn't die in peace without seeing her.
When everyone heard that the old man had cried so hard he went blind and that all he wanted to do on his deathbed was see his ignorant little daughter, they were all deeply saddened and quickly took her to the Bai family.
“There are several women named Hongxia here, but only one family has a husband surnamed Bai.”
Chen Hongxia used to be quiet and unassuming, but now she's not only entangled with the Zhou family, but has also severed ties with her own family. That's too ruthless.
"That's Chen Hongxia, and the one next to her is her son Jiahe."
Everyone brought the person there, expecting to witness a spectacular family reunion, but to their surprise, Chen Hongxia's eldest sister stood there, squinting as she stared at the scene for a long time.
"Mom, isn't that our aunt?"
"Is Mom so happy she's gone mad? She's already seen Auntie, why isn't she going over to her?"
"That's not my sister."
Even though more than 20 years have passed, no matter how much a person changes, you can still see traces of the past in their appearance.
That person is definitely not Chen Hongxia; none of her family members look like that.
-----
In the small stone house of the fishing village on the outskirts of the island, a few people who hadn't slept all night looked at the stacks of boxes high, a hint of madness flashing in their eyes.
They have been unloading cargo from the ship for two nights in a row, and the cargo has filled the place to the brim.
I can't sleep all night, and I'm too excited to sleep during the day either.
The box next to me contained goods priced at nearly a hundred yuan each. Who would have thought that such a small metal box would be worth so much money?
I heard that if you pull out the long antenna on top, you can hear sounds coming out, and there are people singing opera inside.
These things cost over 100 yuan each and require a ticket. They couldn't even fill their stomachs before, and had only ever heard of these things.
"This thing costs over 1,000 yuan, which is much more expensive than those radios."
The two television sets were encased in large wooden crates. Several people, eager to see the world, had already opened the crates and were carefully examining the exorbitantly priced metal box.
"I heard you can see people inside."
The group was amazed. They all came from the mountains, where they could barely find enough food to eat, let alone have ever seen such novel things.
People are only jealous of things that are slightly better than themselves, things that are far removed from their own lives, things they've never even heard of before, and they can only marvel at them.
That trip alone, those two metal boxes alone are worth over two thousand, plus so many radios. If they sell them all, they'll all be rich.
No one can remain calm when suddenly seeing such a large sum of money, as they rarely have any large sum of money in their hands.
The leader, seeing the greed in his subordinates' eyes, sneered and warned them.
"This thing can sell for a thousand yuan, but it depends on how many people it's distributed to, and how much of it ends up in our hands. Even if we can earn a few dozen yuan on this trip, that's more than you could earn in a year of work."
After giving a few people a warning, the leader looked at Zhou Han, who was sitting silently in the corner. His foot was injured and had been soaking in seawater for two days without any treatment, making him look pale.
This young man looks worldly, unlike these people who can't even walk when they see these things.
"how's it going?"
Zhou Han gritted his teeth and nodded, deciding to treat his wounds after returning home. He had already endured the past few days, and he needed to persevere for the remaining days.
"Alright, let's take the stuff out in batches today."
There are troops and police officers guarding this area. Let's first transport it outside in an oxcart, then load it onto other carts.
They planned to use an oxcart to transport the goods into the mountains first, and then use other means to transport them out once they were far away from the patrolling people.
"Work in pairs and don't mess with these goods. If you don't have the ability to get them out, and the police are watching you, one life won't be worth a few bullets."
The radio box was small and easy to put in the car. Just cover it with straw and it looks just like any other car.
However, the television box was too big, so they came up with a solution: they took out the cloth and newspapers that were wrapped inside, disassembled the large box that was supporting it, and made a new small box that could just fit the television.
"Put these two boxes here with you. Walk along the village road. There will be no one else along the way except the villagers."
They weren't going to stay on the national or provincial highways; several oxcarts were weaving through various country roads. Zhou Han's legs were getting increasingly painful, and he was sitting in the oxcart when his vision started to go black.
"Brother, I'm talking to you."
The man rushing to catch the carriage said several things, but Zhou Han completely ignored him.
"I……"
"Alright, alright, stop talking. Your face is so pale. Once we make some money, you'll have to take good care of yourself."
The driver cracked his whip, dreaming of the future: if everything inside were sold, everyone would surely get a good share.
The bumpy road made Zhou Han's face even paler.
"Damn, how come there are people there too?"
They had just turned a corner when they saw several people wearing hats standing by a tree ahead, staring at the road.
Unfortunately, they had already turned the corner, and it was too late to turn back.
"Comrades, where are you from?"
“We are from a fishing village and we need to go to town to transport things. We have a letter of introduction.”
Zhou Han forced himself to hand over the letter of introduction. One person took the letter, while the others seemed to be constantly looking at the oxcart.
"Comrade, are you sick? You look so pale."
Zhou Han leaned against the two boxes, which were covered with farm tools and straw.
"fine."
The people rushing to catch the train were so frightened by the fact that they kept looking back that their hands were trembling.
"Shouldn't you have taken an empty truck to transport things to town? Why are you loading so many odds and ends?"
Before Zhou Han could even voice his excuse, the driver was startled and instinctively tightened his grip on the reins. The ox, pulled on by him, immediately began to move.
Those people thought they were trying to escape and immediately surrounded them.
"What's going on? Stop the car right now!"
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