Chapter 67 A Great Harvest

Liu Dazhuang was in charge of collecting firewood.

It wasn’t long before the meat was cooked. Naturally, Liu Yinyin ate the wild chicken.

Even though there weren’t any seasonings, the naturally roasted wild chicken, free of additives, had crispy skin and tender meat—it was surprisingly delicious.

She tore off a large chunk of drumstick meat and ate it.

As for the remaining chicken and the roasted bamboo rat meat, Gu Cheng and Liu Dazhuang took care of them.

Liu Dazhuang licked the oil off the corner of his mouth, his face showing a look of satisfaction. “If my skills were as good as Uncle’s, I’d come to the mountains every day to roast meat.”

Liu Yinyin smiled and said, “Then you’ll have to train hard.”

Gu Cheng had been a soldier for many years, and even after retiring, he never skipped his daily runs and workouts. His physical abilities were far beyond that of an average person.

After eating and resting, it was time to head back.

They packed everything up. Liu Yinyin had over a hundred pounds of bamboo shoots, a basket of bamboo fungus, and a few pounds of wild vegetables.

The two sacks of bamboo rats weighed about a hundred pounds as well.

The couple worked together to pack the bamboo shoots into bags. Gu Cheng hoisted the bag onto his back and carried a sack of bamboo rats in one hand.

Liu Yinyin asked, “Why don’t you let me carry some of the bamboo shoots?”

She was only carrying a basket of bamboo fungus and a small bag of wild vegetables—together, it wasn’t more than ten pounds.

Gu Cheng shook his head. “Let’s go.”

To him, a little over a hundred pounds was no burden at all.

Liu Dazhuang was struggling with his own sack of bamboo rats, but he didn’t complain. Gritting his teeth, he managed to push through.

Liu Yinyin felt bad watching him struggle, so along the way, she occasionally took turns carrying the load with him.

Since they had a lot of goods, the group had to take multiple breaks along the way.

During one of their stops, Gu Cheng managed to catch two more wild chickens and found a rabbit burrow with four fully grown rabbits—both male and female.

Liu Yinyin was overjoyed. It was like a pillow being handed to someone just as they were feeling sleepy—she had been worrying about expanding their rabbit farm, and now the problem had solved itself.

By the time they made it down the mountain, it was nearly four o’clock.

There was no need to divide the spoils—Gu Cheng simply told Liu Dazhuang to take the sack of bamboo rats he was carrying home.

As for the bamboo shoots and rabbits, they wouldn’t be splitting those.

Liu Dazhuang had no objections. Most of the bamboo rats had been caught by Gu Cheng, and he hadn’t contributed to catching the other animals at all. Even so, he had still gained quite a lot.

If it weren’t for the couple insisting, he wouldn’t have taken anything. After eating an entire roasted bamboo rat by himself, he was already more than satisfied.

When they got home, Jiang Cuihua was about to ask why they had returned so late. But then she saw the couple carrying large sacks and bags.

“Why do you have so much stuff?” Jiang Cuihua was shocked. “Heavens, you didn’t go deep into the mountains, did you?”

The deep mountains were home to wolves, leopards, and tigers. Although her son-in-law was skilled, he was still just one person—he couldn’t possibly be stronger than wild beasts.

Liu Yinyin casually replied, “No, we just found a bamboo forest and dug up some shoots. We also caught quite a few bamboo rats.”

After putting everything down, she felt sticky and uncomfortable from sweating, so she went to heat some water for a bath.

By the time she finished bathing and came out, Jiang Cuihua had already left.

Gu Cheng handed their son to her and explained, “Mother went home. I gave her two bamboo rats to take back and eat.”

Liu Yinyin nodded. She was eager to get rid of those bamboo rats as soon as possible.

Holding her fragrant little son, Liu Yinyin kissed him and glanced at the sack of bamboo rats before asking, “What should we do with these bamboo rats?”

The bamboo rats were all alive, and technically, they could be raised. However, the family was already raising so many rabbits, along with chickens and pigs.

If they also started raising bamboo rats, it wouldn’t look good if word got out.

Besides, Liu Yinyin had to teach classes and didn’t have the energy to take care of so many animals.

Gu Cheng hadn’t considered keeping the bamboo rats and casually suggested, “How about we do what we did last time and trade them with the villagers for grain?”

Liu Yinyin shook her head. “That probably won’t work. Everyone has already handed in their grain. Who would still have any left to trade?”

Even if some villagers had secretly hidden a bit of grain, they wouldn’t dare to take it out in the open.

So, even if they were to trade, it would have to be done discreetly.

Liu Yinyin thought for a moment and said, “Let’s set them aside for now. Tomorrow, I’ll ask Mother to see if anyone in the village wants to trade for bamboo rats. We’ll exchange things privately.”

It was better to leave this kind of matter to Jiang Cuihua. She was familiar with most of the villagers and wouldn’t approach unreliable people.

Excluding the two bamboo rats given to Jiang Cuihua, there were still sixteen left.

After asking around, Jiang Cuihua informed Liu Yinyin that many people in the village wanted to try bamboo rat meat.

However, since grain was scarce, they were only willing to trade two pounds of grain for one pound of bamboo rat meat. And the grain wasn’t fine grains—it was corn grits or other coarse grains.

After much thought, Liu Yinyin finally agreed to the exchange.

She simply couldn’t stand feeding the bamboo rats every day anymore. Just looking at them gave her the chills.

She traded eight bamboo rats for twelve pounds of corn grits, four pounds of mung beans, five pounds of soybeans, and ten pounds of dried sweet potatoes.

That was all she could get. As for the remaining eight bamboo rats, she sold them to the system.

Surprisingly, selling them to the system was actually more profitable—wild bamboo rats went for 120 yuan per pound. Selling eight of them earned her nearly 3,000 yuan in one go.

As for the leftover bamboo shoots and bamboo fungus, Liu Yinyin didn’t sell them. The ones they couldn’t finish eating would be dried and stored for later.

Ever since she started working as a teacher, Liu Yinyin felt like time was flying by.

In the blink of an eye, it was the end of April, and the village’s spring plowing had come to an end.

As expected, it hadn’t rained even once since the start of the planting season. All the crops in the fields had to rely on villagers carrying water to irrigate them.

“These past few weeks have been exhausting,” Jiang Cuihua muttered. “This awful weather is really worrying. Your father and your brothers have been carrying water to the fields every day. They’ve all lost weight.”

It wasn’t just Liu Yinyin’s family—everyone in the village was the same. Every day, they worked themselves to exhaustion.

Hearing this made Liu Yinyin feel bad. Farmers really had it tough during this time. Their entire livelihood depended on the weather. They worked hard all year just to secure enough food to eat.

And if a natural disaster struck… not only would all their hard work be wasted, but they’d also have to tighten their belts just to get by.

Fortunately, there were still two wild chickens at home that hadn’t been dealt with. Considering how hard everyone had been working lately, Liu Yinyin decided to cook something special.

She boiled some water and slaughtered one of the wild chickens.

The chicken was quite plump, weighing about three pounds even after being plucked.

She cooked a big pot of chicken and mushroom stew.

She set aside half of it for the Liu family, while the other half was kept for their own dinner.

After the spring plowing, Jiang Cuihua didn’t go to work in the fields as frequently. When she wasn’t working, she would come over to help her daughter take care of the baby.

That way, Liu Yinyin wouldn’t have to carry the child with her to class.

She only had two morning classes with a twenty-minute break in between, so she was finished teaching by 9:40 a.m. every day.

That day, after class, Liu Yinyin returned home, gave Jiang Cuihua a few instructions, and then headed to the county to buy some supplies.

To be honest, she was a little curious about the county’s black market.