Rebirth in 1972: Redemption in Changbai Mountain

Zhou Rui didn't stop them. He bent down and picked up a few hazelnuts that had rolled to his feet, wiped off the pine needles stuck to the shells, and stuffed them into his cloth bag.

Big Yellow darted over, snatched a round walnut in its mouth, and brought it to An'an's feet, its tail swishing so fast it swept the snowflakes into small whirlpools.

Several girls squatted beside the fallen red pine tree, sticking their fingertips into the pile of pine needles and scooping out plump, round pine nuts, their shells still coated with the oil from deep inside the tree hole.

As soon as He Wei's fingertips touched the snow, she suddenly exclaimed softly and pinched out two bright red feathers.

"Sister He Wei, this is so beautiful!" An An's eyes lit up immediately, staring intently at the two feathers.

Little Rice Cake heard the noise and wobbled over, but after taking only two steps, it slipped and landed hard on the soft, loose snow.

She tried to climb up twice, but couldn't get up. With a quick thought, she simply pulled her little hands back and rolled down the gentle slope.

Little Rice Cake didn't make a fuss at all. As soon as she sat down, she grabbed two red feathers from the ground, one in her left hand and one in her right, clearly distinguishing them.

She was still muttering in a childish voice, "Gao Gao's, Yan'er's."

The nuts scattered on the snow were almost all picked up. Zhou Rui reached into the depths of the pine tree hole and poured out another half pile.

As they were busy gathering things up, Zhou Ping crouched down and quietly crept over, nudging Yang Ping with his elbow: "Sister Yang Ping, come with me, I spotted a big hole where a greyhound hid its grain."

He led Yang Ping twenty steps away, and sure enough, there was a dark hole embedded in the trunk of another old pine tree.

Zhou Ping rubbed his frozen red hands, hugged the tree trunk and scrambled up the tree. He was as nimble as a mountain monkey and reached the tree trunk in no time.

He reached into the tree hole and shouted without turning his head, "Sister Yang Ping, open your pocket and catch it!"

Yang Ping pulled on the cloth bag, tilted her head back and opened the bag wide. She had just replied "Okay" when she heard a soft rustling sound, and nuts fell down like rain.

She barely caught any; most of them hit her on the head.

"Ouch, slow down! You're going to kill me!" She covered her forehead and took a half step back, but her foot didn't land on a tree root, and she fell backward, landing hard in the snowdrift.

The group of people who were still picking pine nuts suddenly burst into laughter, their clear laughter echoing through the pine forest, causing the snow that had accumulated on the branches to fall down in a soft rustling sound.

Zhou Ping, who was in the tree, panicked and tried to climb down in a flurry. His foot slipped on a knot and he almost slid down the trunk.

Luckily, he managed to hook his arm around a branch in time, and while dangling in mid-air, he called out, "Sister Yang Ping, are you alright? I didn't mean to."

"Wait for me a moment, I'll come down after I finish taking out the rest."

He Wu walked over carrying two walnuts, looked up and shouted, "You're pretty good, kid. Climbing trees is much more stable than shooting a gun."

"Brother He Wu, how dare you bring that up? You told me you'd cover for me, but in the end, you didn't even manage to get anything, did you?"

Zhou Ping clung to the branches, laughing so hard he swayed. The last half-bundle of nuts in his arms slipped and fell sparsely, landing on He Wu's cotton hat with a soft thud.

He Wu wasn't annoyed. He raised his hand, caught a pine nut, cracked the shell with his front teeth, took out the kernel, and tossed it into his mouth.

"I deliberately missed because I was afraid you'd lose face."

Yang Ping had already gotten up from the snow, patting the snow off her back and laughing until tears streamed down her face. She then held the open cloth bag above her head.

"Alright, you two, stop joking around. Zhou Ping, hurry up and come over here. After we're done, let's go find a few more squirrel nests."

Zhou Ping hurriedly reached into the hole, mainly because there was nowhere to step on the tree, and he was getting tired after digging for a while.

After a while, he emptied the hole clean before sliding down the tree trunk.

"Sister Yang Ping, are you alright?"

Yang Ping patted her hat: "It's nothing, I was just a little dazed from being hit by pine nuts. You were too hasty in taking them out."

Zhou Ping scratched his head sheepishly, his ears turning bright red, and nervously rubbed his hands together as he explained.

"I saw that the tree hole was full of it, and I couldn't resist and I spilled it all on you."

After Zhou Rui finished picking up the last batch of nuts, he tightened the cloth bag drawer and walked over slowly.

He looked down at the pine nuts scattered on the snow, then glanced at Zhou Ping, whose face was full of embarrassment, and chuckled, "Clumsy and clumsy, you're not reliable at all."

He Wei led Xiao Niangao forward, brushed the snow off Yang Ping's back, and joked with a smile, "That's great, no need to pick them up specially, the pine nuts are delivered right to our door."

An'an also came over, squatted down, and picked up the pine nuts that had fallen on the snow one by one with her little hands.

Big Yellow obediently stood by, occasionally nudging the round nut with the tip of its nose, behaving quietly and well-behavedly.

Little Rice Cake was still clutching the two red feathers tightly in her little hands, as if afraid they would be snatched away.

She tilted her head and looked at the pine cones scattered on the ground, then looked down at the feather in her hand, murmuring softly to herself, her gentle and sweet appearance utterly adorable.

Seeing this, Zhou Ping was no longer annoyed. He bent down and squatted down, quickly picking up the pine nuts scattered all over the ground.

The contents deep inside the tree hollow are exceptionally abundant, including not only the common pine nuts and hazelnuts, but also many round and plump hickory nuts.

Everyone did their part, and in no time they had gathered all the scattered nuts.

Several cloth bags bulged and hung heavily in my hands, their weight substantial, conveying the satisfaction of a bountiful harvest.

Yang Ping weighed the cloth bag in her hand, her eyebrows curving into crescents: "I'm really lucky today. All in all, it weighs at least seven or eight pounds."

"How much does this cost per pound at the supply and marketing cooperative?" He Wei picked up a raw pine nut and bit into it, releasing a refreshing, oily aroma.

"We usually only see the supply and marketing cooperatives buying them, but we've never seen them put on the counter. I guess they can't be cheap, otherwise people wouldn't be willing to eat them themselves and would save them all to send to the purchasing point." Zhou Rui shook his head, indicating that he didn't know.

He Wu took two steps forward, his cotton shoes crunching softly on the snow: "I'll pay five cents a pound for the general goods, and eight or nine cents for the top-grade goods that I pick out."

"It costs at least 1.5 yuan per kilogram to sell outside, but this stuff is so popular that it's all being shipped to big cities. Our local supply and marketing cooperative can't even find a trace of it."

"So expensive?" He Wei's eyes lit up immediately.

"Next year, we can take some time to go up the mountain to pick pine nuts and sell them. We can easily earn tens of yuan, which is more than the money we would earn in a year of work points in the team."

"What a pipe dream."

Zhou Rui shook his head with a smile: "When the pine cones ripen, it coincides with the autumn harvest and the rush to get grain. Do you think the brigade leader would abandon the work in the fields and allow you to take leave to go up the mountain to pick pine cones?"

A thought crossed his mind: he could tell Chen Datou about this. That guy always avoided farm work and went up the mountain, so gathering herbs and collecting pine cones would happen to happen at the same time.

Upon hearing this, He Wei's eyes, which had just lit up, instantly dimmed.

"Let's go, let's start a fire and cook. You've been busy all day, you must be starving."

He bent down and scooped the small rice cake from the snow at her feet, gently brushing the snowflakes off her cotton trousers with his fingertips.

He Wei quickly forgot about it. Zhou Rui sprinkled spices on the meat on the grill, and everyone completely forgot about everything else.