Flip the table and divide the family property! Take his wife and daughter into the mountains and eat

Old Yu's trembling question was exceptionally clear in the howling snowy night.

Hundreds of eyes, hundreds of gazes filled with greed, suspicion, and jealousy, were like invisible knives piercing Zhao Shanhe.

Boss Huang's chest heaved violently, a vicious grin on his lips, like a venomous snake lurking in the shadows, staring intently at Zhao Shanhe, waiting to see him fall apart and be abandoned by everyone.

Zhao Shanhe stood quietly in place.

He glanced at the villagers with their complicated expressions, and then at the cautious Old Yu.

Suddenly, Zhao Shanhe smiled.

He stretched out his hand and slowly spat the last bit of sweet potato residue from his mouth onto the snow, then crushed it hard with the sole of his shoe.

Then he took out a pack of Daqianmen cigarettes from the pocket of his military overcoat, pulled one out, and put it in his mouth.

Click.

He struck a match, and the faint light illuminated his frighteningly calm face.

Zhao Shanhe exhaled a thick cloud of smoke, turned his head, and looked at Boss Huang as if he were looking at a dead dog.

"Seventy or eighty thousand?"

Zhao Shanhe pointed at Boss Huang with a cigarette between his fingers, his voice filled with undisguised contempt: "Boss Huang, not only are you blind, but your accounting skills are also terrible. Use your pig brain to do the math yourself. 150,000 yuan in cash, at a premium price of 5.5 yuan per piece, that's more than 14,000 pieces of leather!"

Zhao Shanhe suddenly raised his voice, pointing towards Kaoshantun and laughing loudly: "More than 14,000 large planks! Even if your subordinate Abiao is blind or stupid, it would still pile up like a mountain! Can my three dilapidated thatched houses hold that much stuff?!"

These words were like a bucket of cold water being poured over someone's head.

The villagers, who had been envious and enthusiastic, instantly came to their senses.

"Yes... more than ten thousand hides, that's simply impossible!"

"The Shanhe family's place is so small, and these southern bumpkins are spouting nonsense!"

"He almost fooled me!"

Old Yu finally realized what was happening, his face darkening instantly. He pointed at Boss Huang and cursed, "You son of a bitch! Even on your deathbed, you still dare to incite the villagers to fight each other!"

When Boss Huang saw that these peasants hadn't fallen for his trick, he was so anxious that his eyes almost bulged out.

"Wait! I haven't finished speaking!"

Boss Huang gritted his teeth, frantically trying to salvage the situation like a gambler who'd lost everything: "Even if you can't keep ten thousand at home, even if you didn't make seventy or eighty thousand, you definitely have at least ten or twenty thousand! Those five hundred top-quality leathers that Ergaizi used to fish for bait were supplied by you! You dare to do it but don't dare to admit it, what kind of man are you!"

"I admit it, I did make some money." Zhao Shanhe nodded, flicked his cigarette ash, and spoke calmly.

"Did you hear me! Did you hear me!"

Upon seeing that Zhao Shanhe dared to admit it in public, Boss Huang became enraged and started shouting wildly: "Folks! He admitted it himself! He used you as a shield and pocketed most of the profits! Are you still going to protect this beast?!"

"Shut your stinking mouth."

Zhao Shanhe's eyes suddenly turned cold, and his loud shout, like a thunderclap from a clear sky, directly shut down Boss Huang's clamor.

He showed no panic or attempt to explain himself. Instead, he strode forward and walked to the hundreds of villagers with varying expressions.

"Envious? Think I, Zhao Shanhe, am hogging all the benefits?"

Zhao Shanhe pointed to his chest, his gaze like a knife, scraping across the faces of every villager. His voice boomed through the wind and snow: "I ask you all, who first suggested this business of selling squirrel pelts?! What price did the county supply and marketing cooperative offer you before I started buying the pelts?!"

Hundreds of villagers were stunned by his extremely powerful aura and subconsciously lowered their heads.

Da Niu swallowed a mouthful of bloody saliva and muttered under his breath, "A...a level one hide is only 15 cents..."

"Fifteen cents! You spend all year in the mountains, and you can't even earn that much for a meal of dumplings! Before I buy them, who among you will go and catch these gray squirrels?"

Zhao Shanhe pointed at the group of villagers with exasperation and roared, "If I, Zhao Shanhe, were a selfish, greedy beast who only cared about making money for myself, I could have bought your goods for two or three cents! Just a tiny bit more than the supply and marketing cooperative, would you have sold them to me?! You would still have lined up to sell to me with gratitude!"

Zhao Shanhe suddenly took a step forward, forcing several villagers in the front row to involuntarily retreat.

"But what price did I offer you?! Five cents! Even more for top-quality leather!"

Zhao Shanhe's chest heaved violently as he pointed at the group of men blinded by greed, his words dripping with anguish: "I artificially inflated the price several times over! I gave all the money that could have gone into my own pocket to everyone in the village, young and old! What did I gain? I wanted to lead everyone to eradicate poverty!"

He turned around abruptly, pointed to the dark night sky to the north, and his voice ripped through the wind and snow.

"I'll give you the lion's share of the profits, and shoulder the entire risk of losing my head myself! This stuff is for the Soviets across the border! What if the Russians close their border one day, and Vasily suddenly stops buying? All those thousands upon thousands of hides will rot in my hands! I'll have to go bankrupt to fill this bottomless pit, and who among you can shoulder even a single penny of that debt for me?!"

Yes, the money and goods are exchanged, and all the risks are borne by Shanhe alone!

Zhao Shanhe sneered and pointed at Boss Huang, who was lying on the ground, completely exposing the true nature of this group of southern traders.

"Think about it again! Why are these southern bumpkins suddenly rushing to our village like mad dogs to collect our goods? Is it because our Kaoshantun village has more and better gray squirrels than other places? What were they doing all these past few years?!"

The entire place was deathly silent, with only the howling wind and snow.

"It's because I, Zhao Shanhe, am very strict in my oversight! It's because the goods we supply to the Soviets are all carefully selected, high-quality goods!"

Zhao Shanhe's chest heaved violently, each word striking like a hammer blow to everyone's heart: "Our Kaoshantun has made a name for itself among the Russians, taking away the livelihood those Wenzhou gang used to rely on to fool them. That's why those bloodsuckers are desperate to steal our meat! If I hadn't paved the way, do you think they would have even given our poor mountain village a second glance?!"

Among the crowd, many elderly villagers were already blushing with shame.

"Fellow villagers, put your hands on your conscience and ask yourselves this question!"

Zhao Shanhe's eyes were red, and his voice was hoarse but filled with absolute frankness: "Some of the goods you handed over were clearly missing a piece or had mixed colors; they wouldn't even qualify as third-grade hides at the supply and marketing cooperative! Didn't I still pay you cash at the second-grade price?! Did I shortchange you by a single penny?!"

"I, Zhao Shanhe, have always acted uprightly and honestly! I led our entire village to earn money and build houses, and now you're going to ruin our own lives just because you listened to a few words from an outsider?!"

These words were a wake-up call, each one a tearful lament.

There is no lofty preaching, only the most honest and heartfelt account of hard work and sacrifice.

Old Yu suddenly shuddered, his cloudy old eyes instantly turning bloodshot.

He raised the butcher knife in his hand, turned it around, and slapped his own face hard across the face with a resounding thud!

Snapped!

"Damn his ancestors! I, Old Yu, have lived to be sixty years old, and today I've been blinded by greed, listening to the instigation of a southern bumpkin!"

Old Yu pointed at Boss Huang and roared like a wolf, "Fellow villagers! Shanhe is right! Without Shanhe taking the risks, we wouldn't even have a fart to eat! These beasts just can't stand to see us doing well! Today, if anyone dares to touch a hair on the head of our village's benefactor, I'll chop him up first!"

"Yes! Protect Brother Shanhe!"

"Those damn southern bumpkins, daring to sow discord in our village! Kill them!"

Faced with an absolutely clear-headed calculation, the scales of humanity instantly and completely tipped in favor of Zhao Shanhe.

The eyes of the hundreds of men from Northeast China were even redder than before, a mixture of shame, anger, and murderous intent that erupted after their intelligence had been mocked and their consciences had been eaten by dogs.

They raised their rusty shovels and hunting rifles, and surged towards Boss Huang and his dozen or so men like a black tide.

"You've all gone mad...you bunch of peasants have all gone mad..."

As Boss Huang watched this group of thugs, who had been brainwashed by Zhao Shanhe's "business logic" and reunited as one, his last bit of psychological defense completely collapsed.