Courtyard House: After disbanding the Elderly Care Gang, I went to the countryside to cultivate immo

The night of New Year's Eve passed quickly, and in the blink of an eye, it was the year 1969 in the lunar calendar.

After the lively atmosphere of visiting relatives and exchanging New Year's greetings in the village subsided, life returned to the tranquility and slow pace of winter.

For Lin Shengli and his three fellow educated youths, there were no close relatives or elders with whom they needed to follow strict etiquette. On the first day of the Lunar New Year, they went together to pay their respects to the brigade leader Hu Guangming and the old hunter Hu Laopao. They also visited a few villagers' homes where they had briefly stayed when they first arrived, chatted with them, and brought some food they had made themselves. That marked the end of the Lunar New Year celebrations.

Lin Shengli lived a particularly leisurely life.

Every day, besides cultivating his skills and reading in his small courtyard, he would visit the educated youth settlement and joke around with Li Kuiyong and the others.

Just after the New Year, the weather was freezing cold, and people were careful to keep warm. As a result, very few people in the village came to him for medical treatment, and even those with headaches or fevers were rare.

This gave him a lot of free time.

He once invited Li Kuiyong to go into the mountains again, partly to stretch his muscles and partly to see if he could gain anything more.

But Jiang Yuanchao and Wei Jun both explicitly refused.

Jiang Yuanchao frankly admitted that he couldn't keep up physically and would only be a burden in the deep mountains, so he would rather stay home and study. Wei Jun said that the meat he had eaten last time was enough to digest for a while, and he was really afraid of trekking in the snow and ice, so he would rather stay at home and study how to make the limited ingredients taste better.

Lin Shengli understood their choice, so he and Li Kuiyong traveled light and went to the back mountain every few days.

They were lucky; on several trips into the mountains, using Lin Shengli's incredible skill in throwing stones, they managed to hunt several pheasants and a few slow-witted rabbits that came out to forage.

They secretly brought all the prey back, cleaned it up, and placed it in Lin Shengli's courtyard. Any prey that couldn't be eaten immediately was cleaned and dried.

Li Kuiyong was thoroughly enjoying this, as if he had found something more fulfilling than working in the fields.

Of course, they also encountered a real big guy—an adult male wild boar rooting around in the oak forest.

That guy had a mane like a spear, fangs sticking out, and a weight that looked to be over 300 pounds, like a moving mountain of muscles.

When it sensed the presence of the two, it let out a threatening growl and assumed a charging stance. Li Kuiyong turned pale with fright, and his palms, gripping the machete, were covered in sweat.

Lin Shengli remained unusually calm. He was highly skilled and daring. Finally, in the instant when he narrowly avoided a fierce charge from the wild boar and his old strength was exhausted and new strength had not yet arisen, Lin Shengli used the thick-backed machete in his hand, carrying all his strength and hidden spiritual power, to precisely slash diagonally into the wild boar's ear bone, killing it with one blow.

Looking at the giant beast still twitching slightly on the ground, Li Kuiyong finally felt relieved. His gaze towards Lin Shengli was no longer just admiration, but rather a hint of awe.

The two men went to great lengths to cut the meat into large pieces on the mountain and, taking advantage of the darkness, secretly transported it back to Lin Shengli's courtyard. The whole process was done quietly, like thieves.

How to deal with this huge windfall has become a problem.

Lin Shengli didn't particularly like this wild boar meat anyway, and he certainly couldn't finish it all himself, so there was no need to share it with the educated youth.

In the end, Li Kuiyong volunteered to secretly take it to the village's "black market" to sell it.

In those days, meat was an absolute hard currency, especially wild game, which didn't require ration coupons.

After careful consideration, Lin Shengli agreed, but repeatedly urged him to be careful.

Li Kuiyong first went to the village to investigate. After he found out about the black market, he used sacks to transport the processed wild boar meat to the village in batches.

As he expected, this high-quality wild boar meat was extremely popular. Although he dared not do it openly, it was quickly snapped up in certain circles and sold for a high price of one yuan per kilogram.

Nearly 300 pounds of clean meat, after deducting some scraps and the portion kept for myself, sold for a huge sum of over 200 yuan.

After Li Kuiyong returned, Lin Shengli divided the money in half. Li Kuiyong did not refuse. He wanted to pay back the money he owed Lin Shengli first, but Lin Shengli refused and told him not to rush and to wait until he had more money.

Touching the thick stack of small and large bills, stained with sweat and creased, Li Kuiyong was so excited that he couldn't sleep for several nights. He took out one hundred yuan of his share of money, packed it together with a few pheasants and rabbits that he had dried earlier, and sent it back to his home in Beijing.

In the letter, he told his family with pride for the first time that he was "doing well" in Northeast China, that he could "get food on his own and even earn some money," and that his family should not worry.

Time slipped by in this semi-secluded, semi-adventurous tranquility until the 23rd day of the first lunar month.

Early that morning, just as dawn was breaking, Lin Shengli was wondering whether to go to the educated youth settlement for breakfast or just make something simple when there was a knock on the gate. Opening the door, he saw the brigade leader, Hu Guangming, his face showing some urgency.

"Shengli, are you up yet? I need to trouble you to run errands for me." Hu Guangming rubbed his hands together, exhaling a large puff of white breath.

Lin Shengli's heart skipped a beat, thinking one of the villagers had suddenly fallen ill, and he quickly asked, "Uncle, what's wrong? Who's feeling unwell?"

"It's not for medical treatment," Hu Guangming waved his hand. "The township sent a notice that another batch of educated youth has been assigned to our commune, and they specifically requested that our village receive six. We need to go to the township to pick them up. Dongliang can't handle it all by himself, so he'll have to be the driver. I thought you were reliable, and since you're also an educated youth and familiar with the situation, I'd help you go pick them up. On the way, you can also tell the newcomers about the situation in our village. What do you think?"

It turned out they were there to pick up new people. Lin Shengli breathed a sigh of relief, but also felt a little emotional—the four of them had actually become "old educated youth" who needed to "pick up" new people in this Heisonggou Village.

He didn't refuse and readily agreed: "Okay, Uncle, I'll get ready right away and go with Brother Dongliang."

Hu Guangming gave a few instructions, such as paying attention to safety, bringing the people back safely, briefly introducing the situation in the village, and calming the new comrades down, before leaving in a hurry. He still had to arrange the food rations and accommodation for the new educated youth.

Lin Shengli went back to his house, tidied up briefly, put on a thick cotton coat, hat and gloves, locked the courtyard gate, and then headed towards the team headquarters' cowshed.

Hu Dongliang had already harnessed the familiar oxcart, with a layer of dry straw laid out on the floor as usual. Seeing Lin Shengli, Hu Dongliang grinned: "Another trip, this job."

Without exchanging many words, Hu Dongliang cracked his whip, and the old ox, with steady steps, pulled the oxcart, creaking and groaning as it drove out of the newly awakened Heisonggou Village, heading towards the commune.

The journey was still bumpy and cold.

Hu Dongliang focused on driving, while Lin Shengli leaned against the cart floor, gazing at the still-frozen fields on both sides of the road and the hazy mountains in the distance, his thoughts drifting.

What kind of people will the six newly arrived educated youth be?

What changes will this bring to this newly formed small group? The small "educated youth settlement" of Heisonggou Village is about to become lively.