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

Snow and wind raged.

Old Batou from Sidaogou trudged through the knee-deep snow, carrying a bulging sack on his back, panting heavily from exhaustion.

The sack contained over two hundred gray squirrel pelts and dozens of yellow squirrel pelts, which he and his two sons had painstakingly collected over half a month by taking turns in the deep mountains and forests.

At this very moment, his eldest and second eldest sons were still setting traps in the waist-deep snow of Sidaogou, unable to even get a sip of hot water. They were counting on him to sell the hides for money to buy some cornmeal and frozen tofu to send up the mountain to save their lives.

Old Ba's face was red from the cold, but his cloudy eyes shone with an extremely excited light.

The Wenzhou boss is open to buying, 5.5 yuan a piece!

If we can sell this half-sack of hides, that'll be over a thousand yuan! Not only will our two sons on the mountain have enough to eat, but the dowry and other expenses for our second son's future wife will also be covered!

Old Ba's mind was full of colorful 100,000 yuan bills. He finally found his way to the entrance of Kaoshantun Village, but then he was stunned.

I didn't see any jeeps collecting hides.

I didn't see the boss, Mr. Huang, who had a southern accent.

Yesterday, the village entrance was bustling with activity and crowded with hunters from other villages. Now, apart from the mud and snow trampled into a pulp and several large pools of frozen black blood, it is completely deserted.

Old Ba's heart skipped a beat.

He quickly grabbed a villager from Kaoshantun who was shoveling snow with a large shovel, his voice cracking: "Brother! Where's that leather-collecting boss from the south? Where did he go to hide from the snow?"

The villager stopped shoveling, looked Old Ba up and down and at the sack on his back, then spat on the ground with utter contempt: "Collecting hides? What a load of rubbish!"

The villager pointed with a shovel at the pools of blood under the old elm tree and sneered, "Those southern bastards came to our village to cause trouble last night with razor blades and homemade guns, and our men wiped them out, skin and bones! This morning, Director Zhang from the county bureau handcuffed them, stuffed them into a jeep, and took them away to be shot!"

"They...they've been arrested?!"

Old Ba felt a sudden "buzz" in his head, as if he had been struck by lightning, and his legs went weak, almost causing him to kneel on the snow.

He clutched the large sack of pelt tightly to his chest, tears welling in his eyes: "Brother, don't scare me! This is my life-saving hide! If they go in, who will I sell it to? Will the five yuan and fifty cents price still be valid?"

The villager looked at him, shook his head, and sighed: "Five yuan and fifty cents? That's probably impossible. That was the price the southerners came up with to compete with Brother Shanhe. You're too late, brother."

The villager picked up a shovel and pointed towards the high-walled compound in the village: "As for how much it costs now, I don't know. Brother Shanhe went to the city early this morning. If you want to sell it, go to the gate of the compound and ask Erga and the others."

Old Ba swallowed hard, then stumbled and ran towards the village with his sack on his back.

When he arrived at the gate of Zhao Shanhe's large courtyard with its high brick walls, he found it already packed with people.

The group of one hundred people were all old hunters and mountain men who had come from the surrounding villages to sell their hides.

Everyone was clutching a burlap sack, stamping their feet in the freezing wind of minus twenty degrees Celsius, whispering among themselves, their faces filled with extreme anxiety.

On the steps at the main entrance of the courtyard.

The dozen or so strong men that Zhao Shanhe had recently recruited, dressed in thick sheepskin coats, stood guard in front of the gate.

Dazhuang and Ergazi stood at the very front.

At their feet, the two warhounds, Azure Dragon and Black Dragon, stared intently at the crowd below. Although they didn't bark, the deep snorting from their throats and their imposing size prevented any of the hundred villagers from outside from daring to push their way up the steps.

"Brother Ga Zi! Brother Da Zhuang!"

At the front of the crowd, an old hunter from another village, wearing a tattered fur coat, shouted at the top of his lungs: "Now that the boss from the south has been arrested, are you still going to take back the pelts we have? In this freezing weather, give us a straight answer!"

As soon as he shouted, the hundred people behind him all looked eagerly at the steps.

Erga was sweating profusely with anxiety. He turned to Liu Sanye, who was in charge of appraising the hides, and asked in a low voice, "Sanye, Brother Shanhe left in such a hurry that he didn't have time to explain things. Should we accept these tens of thousands of hides or not?"

Old Master Liu took a couple of puffs of his pipe, his old face scrunched up: "Without Shanhe's permission, who dares to set a high price? If we buy the wrong thing, we couldn't afford to pay for it even if we sold you both!"

Ergai gritted his teeth, took a step forward, and shouted at the crowd, "Everyone, quiet down! Stop making a fuss!"

"Brother Shanhe went into town on errands this morning! He left in a hurry and didn't finalize anything!"

Erga shouted at the top of his lungs, "Everyone, go home for today! We're not accepting any goods from the yard today! We'll decide what to do when Brother Shanhe gets back!"

This sentence was like a spark falling into a pot of boiling oil, and the hundred people below immediately erupted in anger.

"You're not accepting them anymore?! Why shouldn't you accept them?!"

"I braved the blizzard and walked over thirty miles of mountain road! My toes are almost frozen off! And you just tell us to turn back with a few words?!"

"Exactly! Zhao Shanhe got the southern boss arrested, and all the business is now his! Why is he leaving us stranded in the snow like this?!"

"We have to take it today! If you don't, we're not leaving! We'll block this dilapidated yard!"

Curses and complaints surged in like a tsunami. The hundred men, their eyes bloodshot, pushed forward, forcing the Azure Dragon and the Black Dragon to bark wildly. Da Zhuang quickly grabbed the door bar to protect Er Ga Zi.

Erga was so frightened by the scene that his face turned pale. How could a country boy like him withstand the wrath of a hundred hunters?

He turned and glanced at Liu Sanye, who was also sweating profusely.

"Third Master, this has angered everyone! If we really drive them away, there will be trouble!" Erga Zi was so anxious that he stomped his feet.

Old Master Liu slammed his pipe down hard, gritted his teeth, and made the decision: "We have to buy this stuff! If we don't, they'll have worn this doorstep flat today! But we absolutely can't pay a high price! We can only guarantee a minimum price according to the old rules before the price increase!"

With Liu Sanye's words in mind, Ergaizi took a deep breath and walked to the front of the steps again.

"Alright! Stop arguing!"

Ergaizi shouted in his hoarse voice, "We can buy it if you want! But no one dares to set a high price for you! Do you really think five yuan and fifty cents is a pie falling from the sky? That's impossible!"

Looking at the hopeful eyes below, Ergazi struggled to state his bottom line.

"Standard price! Gray squirrel pelts, 50 cents each!"

Ergai pressed his hand down: "Even this fifty cents is much better than sending it to the supply and marketing cooperative! Those who want it, line up now to be weighed! Those who don't, you'll have to take it back!"

Dead silence.

The entire venue fell into a deathly silence.

The dream of getting rich overnight with 5.5 yuan was crushed by the harsh reality of being reduced to 50 cents.

After a brief moment of deathly silence, the crowd erupted like a pot of boiling oil.

"Bullshit!"

An old hunter, his face weathered by the elements, immediately reddened in the eyes. He ripped open his tattered cotton-padded coat, pointed at Ergaizi, and began to curse: "I braved the blizzard, wading through waist-deep snow for a whole day and night on mountain paths! I suffered so much in this freezing weather, and you just give me five cents? You think you can fool this idiot?!"

"I can't live like this anymore! I can't take it anymore!"

A one-eyed, disabled hunter pounded the ground with his stick, sobbing uncontrollably: "I borrowed two yuan from the brigade to buy gunpowder for these few dozen weasels! Each weasel cost fifty cents, and I can't even pay back the money for the gunpowder. I can't even afford a red ribbon for my daughter to wear for the New Year! Zhao Shanhe is cutting off our lineage!"

Angry shouts and heart-wrenching cries rose and fell, interspersed with extremely foul language, causing the snow on the trees to fall in a flurry.

Old Ba Tou squeezed to the front, ripped off his tattered dog-skin hat, revealing his bald head, which was red from the cold.

"Brother Ga Zi... how come you only have 50 cents left...?"

Old Ba's voice trembled as he stretched out his frostbitten, old hands, tears and snot streaming down his face, as if he'd lost his soul: "Please, have mercy, can you give me four yuan? Three yuan... three yuan will do! My two sons are still lying in the snowdrifts of Sidaogou, setting traps! They haven't even had a hot meal, they're just waiting for me to use the money from selling hides to buy some cornmeal to bring up the mountain to save their lives! If you give me fifty cents, you're going to starve the three of us to death!"

Faced with this overwhelming pleas and curses, Ergazi's thin body swayed, and his face turned pale.

He was genuinely afraid.

More than a hundred desperate mountain men could drown him with just a spit from each of them.

But if he backs down now, the threshold of the Zhao family compound will be trampled to pieces by these people today, and the plate that Brother Shanhe worked so hard to win will be shattered on the ground!

"What's there to be afraid of! I've seen the world with Brother Shanhe!"

Erga gritted his teeth and suddenly grabbed the thick brass scale bar from the table next to him.

boom!

Erga slammed the steelyard onto the offering table. Although his legs were still trembling slightly, the veins on his neck bulged, and he roared like a wolf cub guarding its food: "Shut the hell up, all of you!"

That shout actually silenced the commotion of a hundred people for a second.

"Don't come crying to me like that!"

Ergaizi raised the scale, pointed at the crowd below whose eyes were red with rage, and cursed viciously: "You think 50 cents isn't enough? Go sell it at the county supply and marketing cooperative! See if they'll give you three or five cents! Those who want to sell, line up now to be weighed! Those who don't want to sell, grab your leather and get the hell out of here!"

"Fuck you!!"

Whoosh!

A block of ice, frozen as hard as a rock, suddenly flew out from behind the dark mass of people.

A muffled thud.

This mud-covered ice clod slammed into Erga's forehead with extreme force, instantly shattering into dust.

"what!"

Erga let out an extremely shrill scream, and slammed the brass scale in his hand onto the offering table with a clang.

He instinctively covered his head, and scalding red blood instantly gushed out from between his fingers, dripping onto the pristine white snow, a glaring sight.

Upon seeing Ergazi bleed, Dazhuang and the dozen or so Zhao family guards behind him instantly ignited a firestorm of anger.

"Fuck you! You dare to use dirty tricks!"

Da Zhuang's eyes were bloodshot. He kicked over the offering table in front of him and held the extremely thick white waxwood stick horizontally in front of his chest.

The dozen or so guards instantly turned red-eyed, drew their weapons, and pushed Ergazi forward a large step.

But once these desperate mountain men saw blood, the extremely violent and evil fire in their hearts completely burned away their reason.

"Anyway, it's the Zhao family who owes us!"

Taking advantage of the momentum from the sight of blood, the bearded man took a big step forward and slammed the sack full of leather he was holding onto the steps.

A muffled thud.

The bearded man stepped onto the first step, drew a gleaming half-foot-long boning knife from his back, and pointed the tip at Erga, who was still clutching his bleeding head. He roared with a ferocious expression, "This heartless place won't let us survive! We'll weigh it ourselves! We'll take the money ourselves!"

"Yes! Weigh it yourself!"

"Let's get our hard-earned money back!"

With a loud bang.

The crowd, pushed to their breaking point, completely went berserk.

More than a hundred people surged up the steps like a herd of mad buffalo, brandishing their gleaming machetes, tridents, and shovels. With a frenzy that seemed to burst a dam, they charged straight up the steps.

"Woof—roar!!"

The moment the first group of people stepped onto the steps, the blue wolf swarm "Azure Dragon," which had been staring intently at the crowd, went completely berserk.

Its massive body snapped as the chains rattled, and it opened its blood-red maw, transforming into a blur of blue light as it lunged directly at the bearded man at the front.

Click!

A tearing sound that was extremely painful to the teeth.

With remarkable precision, Qinglong bit down on the thick, tattered cotton trousers of the bearded man at the base of his thigh.

Even through thick layers of rotten cotton, the terrifying biting force still pierced through the skin and flesh instantly.

"ah!!!"

The bearded man let out a bloodcurdling scream, as if a pig had been slaughtered, and scalding blood instantly stained the white snow between his legs.

"Don't fucking move!"

Da Zhuang's eyes were bloodshot. He threw down the white waxwood stick in his hand and pulled out a black-barreled old foreign cannon from under his heavy sheepskin coat.

Whoosh!

Da Zhuang snapped the hammer of the shotgun all the way down with one hand, and the dark barrel pressed directly against the forehead of the second man who charged at him, causing the veins on his neck to bulge.

"Fuck you! Anyone who dares to take another step up these steps, I'll shoot them dead today!"

As soon as Dazhuang drew his gun, the dozen or so Zhao family guards behind him also drew their switchblades and double-barreled shotguns from their waists, each with red eyes, standing firmly at the front.