Struggle Life in the 1970s

"Do you want to expand your business?" Han Zhao continued.

"I want to, but not now. I don't have that much money and energy." Chu Ye answered honestly.

Business is built up step by step. She spent half a year to stabilize the situation. She will definitely expand in the future. However, she is alone now and will not be able to take care of everything if she expands rashly.

"I'm free anyway, so I'll just consider it as an investment in you." Han Zhao smiled nonchalantly.

"I promised old man Li that I would no longer go to gamble on horse racing, but I still have to find something to do." The top of the fishing rod suddenly fell into the water. After waiting for three seconds, Han Zhao decisively retracted the rod. A fat carp jumped into the air like a crescent moon. It struggled hard and was finally firmly clamped by a pair of big hands.

"Tsk, Chu Ye, the fish here are quite stupid." Although Han Zhao said this, his hands kept moving. He gently pulled out the fishhook and threw the fish back into the pond.

Chu Ye rolled his eyes at him and said nothing.

Han Zhao put away his rod, packed up his things and put them in the storage room. When he came out, he looked indifferent and said, "If you plan to expand your business, you should make plans early. I will pay you and you will do the work. You can pay me back after you make a profit. The dividend is still 20%."

Then without waiting for Chu Ye to answer, he walked away quickly, and Chu Ye looked at the water, lost in thought.

I do have the idea of ​​expanding my business, and currently the business at the stall is tending to be stable, but many problems have gradually been exposed - the fish species sold are of a single type, and only old customers come to buy them, so I cannot attract new customers.

At present, the two fish ponds are arranged properly, but they are only enough for this year's sales. When the summer and autumn come, this batch of fish and crabs mature, and I have to buy seedlings again and wait another year before I can harvest. This is too inefficient. If I contract a few more fish ponds, these problems can be solved.

But in this way, she would be somewhat overwhelmed and would have to focus on one thing. In this case, she would have to recruit someone to help her stabilize the other end, and the person she recruited had to be trustworthy.

She thought of Pan'er and Xiaoya.

She did what she said. In the afternoon, she rode her tricycle around the area. When she had her eyes on Han Zhao's fish pond, she found that there were several abandoned fish ponds nearby. However, they were quite old and it would take a lot of effort to clean them up, so she didn't think much about it. Now that she wanted to expand her business, she had to choose more carefully.

Three days later, after she had chosen a new location, she went to visit Han Zhao. He was a local, so it would be much easier if he could intercede for her. The next step was to borrow money to start building a new fish pond.

By the beginning of spring, Chu Ye's new fish pond was ready. The stall was not too busy during this period and she could take care of it by herself. She originally wanted to tell Pan'er and Xiaoya about this immediately, but then she remembered that they were both from other places and had food and accommodation provided when they worked in the factory. After coming to her place, they couldn't be left without a place to live. Even if they didn't come, she would have to hire people if her business grew, so it was her responsibility to consider accommodation for her employees in advance.

So she suppressed the impulse in her heart, borrowed some money from Han Zhao, hired people to build two bungalows behind her small house, and then painted, decorated and arranged furniture. Before she knew it, another two months had passed.

It is now May and summer is approaching. There are more and more customers in front of the stall. Chu Ye gradually feels tired. Besides, there has been some unrest in this area recently.

The specific story started last week - that day she closed her stall and went to the vegetable market to buy vegetables. She accidentally heard the stall owners chatting with each other, and they talked about someone collecting protection fees recently. Chu Ye was attentive and understood what happened.

It turned out that four thugs appeared on this street some time ago. At first, they just squatted at the intersection, holding cigarettes and watching the people coming and going. After observing for two days, perhaps because they found that the people in this area were simple and honest, they began to walk into the vegetable market blatantly and collect protection fees.

At the beginning, no one was willing to give them money for nothing. Besides, they knew that once this kind of thing started, they might have to pay money every month in the future. The people here earn a hard-earned living by selling vegetables every day, which is barely enough to support their family. How could they have extra money to give to others?

But the gangsters were too cunning. They had been waiting for two days and had already figured out which stalls had the most traffic. So when they set up their stalls in the morning, the four of them would appear in front of the stalls with their hands behind their backs. They were all wearing black short-sleeved shirts and black pants. Wherever they stood, they would cover the stalls tightly. In this way, no customers would dare to come over to buy things. Even if someone dared to come over, they would be rolled their eyes by the four of them and said, "Wait until we finish buying before you buy."

But the four of them didn't buy anything at all. The stall owner could only watch anxiously as his vegetables were left out from morning to night, but no one bought them. He didn't make a penny standing there all day. After two days, the stall owner couldn't bear it anymore. He asked them how much money they wanted and then quickly took out the money and sent them away.

The originally united vegetable market was pried open, and no one wanted to experience the feeling of not being able to sell anything for a whole day. It just so happened that they didn't want much, so they all chose to give money to get rid of them, just like getting rid of beggars.

Occasionally, there were some stubborn stall owners who wanted to compete with the four men when they blocked their stalls. However, they did not expect that the four men only used words and not physical force. The four men argued with each other, and the strong stall owner was so angry that he wanted to hit them. However, as soon as he started to fight, one of the gangsters lay on the ground, covering his head and said that he had a headache and wanted to go to the hospital for a check-up.

The stall owner was so angry that he called the police. When they arrived at the police station and asked both parties what happened, the gangster said that he just stood in front of the stall for a while, thinking about buying something, and was pushed by the stall owner.

When the burly stall owner heard these shameless remarks, he was so angry that he started cursing and directly said that these four people were collecting protection money. As a result, after the police interrogated them, he didn't know what the thugs had done. They were only verbally educated and that was all. When they asked further questions, they were only told to return the money voluntarily.

After this incident, everyone paid the money honestly and just prayed that they would not charge more in the future.

After hearing these things, Chu Ye was mentally prepared. In their seafood market, many people also knew about this matter one after another. They originally wanted to unite and face the outside world, but after hearing about the fate of those who stubbornly refused to pay protection fees, they became much more honest.

So on a sunny morning, four thugs in black appeared at the entrance of the seafood market. They first looked around, then walked straight to the first stall and asked for protection money.

The stall owner is an honest middle-aged man. His daily wish is to sell more fish and save more money for his family. He has two children who are still in school. He doesn't want to cause trouble, so he paid the money as soon as possible.

Then the second one, the third one... When it was Chu Ye's turn, she lowered her eyes and handed over the money she had prepared.

"Tsk! How boring! No one resisted." One of the thugs said disdainfully. He thought someone here would also clamor to integrate them into the police station! But they were all so honest.

"No way, my reputation is known, and everyone in this area is afraid of me, hahaha." Another one echoed, his tone was sharp, and his laugh was like a duck quacking. "But we have such beautiful women here?" The one who collected the money seemed to be the leader here. He looked at Chu Ye more while collecting the money, and then his eyes seemed to be glued to him.

"Wow, you are really good-looking, beauty. What's your name and how old are you this year?" asked a gangster.

"Chu Ye, I'm twenty-two." She replied indifferently, hoping to get rid of this group of people as soon as possible.

"Hiss! Brother Peng, this woman is a little old." said the gangster who spoke like a duck.

"It's okay! You're so beautiful, age doesn't matter!" The one who answered was the one who collected the money, the so-called Brother Peng.

Chu Ye lowered his head and said nothing, feeling sick as if he had swallowed a fly. However, the man thought that Chu Ye was shy and kept praising himself.

Seeing that Chu Ye didn't answer, the man didn't get angry. He talked for a while before leaving.

I originally thought that this matter was over, but I didn't expect that the next day, the man called Brother Peng was waiting in front of the stall early, and when Chu Ye arrived, he came over attentively. Although Chu Ye tried to obstruct him in every way, this man still insisted on helping to move things.

After the stall was cleaned up, the man did not leave. He leaned against the stall and stared at Chu Ye in a daze. Half a day passed like this, and no one dared to come here to buy fish.

Chu Ye finally couldn't help but clenched his fists, gritted his teeth and asked the man what he wanted to do, and then got the three words "I want to chase you".

Chu Ye rolled her eyes when she heard that. She laughed out of anger and suddenly an idea came to her and she thought of Han Zhao.

So she told Brother Peng that she would bring the remaining three brothers over tomorrow and she wanted to give them a surprise. Under Brother Peng's intoxicated gaze, she closed her stall and knocked on Han Zhao's door.

After telling the whole story, Han Zhao's brows were furrowed so tightly that they could kill a fly. He then asked in detail about the appearance of the four people.

"I seem to know these four people you mentioned." Han Zhao spoke softly after listening.

"Ah?" Chu Ye was stunned for a moment, then showed disgust on his face, "I'm not saying anything, Han Zhao, but the quality of this friend you know is too low."

"What are you yelling at me for? I'm older than you and you still owe me money. Just call me Brother Han!" Han Zhao smacked his lips and waved his hands nonchalantly. "Besides, they are not worthy of being my friends. Bring the four of them here tomorrow and I'll teach them a lesson."

"Okay." With these words, Chu Ye felt relieved.

The next morning, when Chu Ye came to the stall, he saw three people dressed in black standing there. Brother Peng changed into a white short-sleeved shirt today and even tidied up his hair.

Chu Ye silently shifted his eyes away, and after putting away all the things with the help of several people, he asked the stall owner on the left to help him look after it for a while, and he led the four people to the town.

Ten minutes later, after three knocks on Han Zhao's door, Chu Ye lowered his head and waited patiently.

"Brother Peng, why does this house look familiar to me?" a gangster said uneasily.

Another one also said, "Yes, I feel like I have been here before."

Chu Ye remained silent as the four of them racked their brains to think whether they had been here before.

With a "click", the door was opened, and Han Zhao in a floral shirt came into view. He was taller than everyone in front of him, and he was strong and oppressive.

Chu Ye silently took a step back, and when the four thugs saw the person in front of them clearly, they were scared out of their wits.

"Han...Han...Brother Han!" The four of them couldn't help but step back and hug each other.

"Sorry, Brother Han! We didn't know you lived here. We're leaving now!" They wanted to run, but Han Zhao made a "tsk" sound, and their feet were nailed to the ground like voice-controlled toys, and they dared not move.

"Come in, I have something to tell you." Han Zhao opened the door wide. The four people did not dare to disobey. They were as honest as quails, which made Chu Ye marvel at them.

Before closing the door, she glanced inside and saw the four people huddled in a corner after entering the room. They looked as pitiful as she did when she was a teacher looking at the students in the class who didn't do their homework.

She shook her head and went downstairs, knowing that this matter would be taken care of.

(End of this chapter)