Carrying a Jurassic on me
Chapter 341 - 61 Hiring You to Raise Cows Weeping Willow_1

Chapter 341: Chapter 61 Hiring You to Raise Cows Weeping Willow_1

Upon hearing Yan Fei casually threatening to silence him, Heizi, surprisingly, wasn’t scared at all.

He nodded immediately, notwithstanding that he was seated behind Yan Fei and therefore invisible to Yan Fei: "Don’t worry, Brother Fei! I’ve known about this stuff for a while now. But I’ve never told anyone, it’s been killing me having to hold it in. Just talking to you about it now makes me feel better. I promise it’ll die with me, I won’t tell a second person. You can count on me, I won’t even tell my wife."

"Quit talking about me! Let’s talk about you! At dinner, I heard you’ve been delivering eggs to the mute’s house. If you’re no longer using him for work, why are you still trying to curry favor?" Having gotten Heizi’s assurance, Yan Fei turned the conversation around on him.

"Listen to you! Am I really trying to curry favor? Isn’t it just caring for those working on the site with me? Is that wrong? Even if it’s not about a coworker, can’t I care about a disabled family? Plus, even though I’m not making him work, if he insists on helping me out, I can’t fight him off, can I?" Heizi instantly came up with a stream of excuses.

"I don’t believe you." Yan Fei didn’t buy his sophistry at all. "The more you talk, the more certain I am that there’s a problem. You don’t have to say anything, we’ll find out sooner or later. I don’t believe you don’t have an ulterior motive!"

"Humph! If you don’t believe me, then forget it!" Heizi retorted stubbornly. "Anyway, I was just delivering a few eggs; is there anything wrong with trying to win people over for you?"

"Alright, alright!" Yan Fei laughed it off, not believing Heizi’s words at all. "By the way, has Fang Xiaoqing been helping sell medicinal wine during the break?"

"Yeah! So what?"

"When you get back, tell Aunt Yu Mei. If necessary, let her buy an old bicycle or something. From now on, we can let that little girl ride to school. She can come to the farm for lunch, and she can even help us sell medicinal wine during her lunch break. It will spare Aunt Yu Mei from having to watch the shop while making meals!"

"Sure! That’s simple. The school meals are worse than our pig feed! They’d certainly be happy." He barely finished speaking and suddenly exclaimed, "Can’t you ride more steadily? I’m still holding onto the jar!"

Yan Fei too was exasperated: "The road is just this crappy, what can I do about it?"

The two of them continued to converse as they started to veer onto a small road.

This path was barely wide enough for a hand tractor to pass, with two wheel ruts forming two trenches, both half a foot deep. In the middle of that narrow path were numerous deep pits made by cow hooves — it was clear that this road was designed to challenge anyone’s driving skills.

Seeing the state of the path, Heizi immediately went quiet, fearful that the slightest distraction could cause Yan Fei to drive the bike into one of the trenches.

The old lady, who had exchanged her silver coins for wine, lived in a large village at the end of this road.

In reality, this large village was split into two, one named Heap Hillock and the other called Huangtuwa. Previously, one was located up on the hill and the other down in the hollow. It was only gradually that the two grew together.

When Yan Fei first encountered cattle thieves last year, he was hunting hares in this area and bumped into them on the way home.

This place was quite well-known in the vicinity, but sadly, not for a very good reason. It was notorious for its poverty. Nicknamed Nine Hills and Eighteen Hollows, it seemed to have nothing but bandits.

Of course, banditry as a profession has now virtually disappeared, so all that was left in this place was poverty — nothing else.

Once inside the village, it was filled with the usual rundown tile-roofed houses as well as crumbling mud huts. On their journey here, Yan Fei and Heizi had passed by other villages where they saw many refined two-story buildings. But in this large village? Forget about two-story buildings; even new tile-roofed houses were scarce.

While elsewhere, crops were only being harvested sporadically, this place was more proactive, with donkey carts and cattle carts already being loaded, and most people were working alongside their families, pulling carts to bring in the harvest.

It’s not that this place was experiencing an early harvest, but rather due to the topography of the land. The areas on the hilltop lacked water, so the crops, such as corn, were ready to be harvested earlier than other places.

Of course, the corn cobs there were smaller, and the state of other crops could be easily inferred.

Yan Fei had observed this area’s terrain while flying overhead earlier — the entire land appeared to be a series of waves. It looked as though God had randomly sculpted this piece of land, creating a landscape of high and low undulations.

There were rivers in the vicinity, but they were of no use. With the hills and hollows here, going up and down for several miles, and the slopes being particularly steep, even tractors pulling loads were unable to fill up their carts. Despite this, climbing uphill was so strenuous that the tractors let out black smoke. Not to mention transporting water by manpower!

Even the carefree Heizi was dumbfounded when he entered the village: how could a place be so impoverished?

But the two of them didn’t focus on that. After asking around for the old lady they were looking for and finding out where she lived, they went straight to her home.

Twisting and turning along the village’s mud paths, many bare-bottomed children chased after their motorbike. Some of them were obviously of kindergarten age, yet here they could hardly secure a pair of pants, let alone carry a schoolbag.

It was barely twenty miles from the town to here, yet it felt as though they had entered a different world.

Finally arriving at the old lady’s house, it seemed that her living conditions had been pretty decent in the past. There were several rooms made of blue-green bricks with tiled roofs, and the yard was kept quite clean.

Unmistakably, the labor of the household in recent years had transformed into patients, leaving the daily living in shambles -- the unpatched hole in the roof of the small tiles house, punched through by a jujube tree, served as evidence.

The corn from the courtyard was hauled back home, surprisingly, the household was not made up of two as they previously heard, there was an added youth of about fifteen or sixteen at home.

All three of them were present, the old lady was busy peeling the corn, the young lad swung his arms, weaving the corn cobs into strings getting them ready for drying; a middle-aged man with a slightly skewed mouth, drooling and watching the duo off in the corner with a pleasant smile.

After hearing Yan Fei and his companion’s intent of visit and seeing the jar of wine that they brought, the old lady hurriedly brought some water, even instructing the young man working to boil some eggs for poached eggs.

This was the best manner of hospitality one could muster in rural areas for distinguished guests.

Yan Fei made no mention of the fact that silver coins had been sold, only stating that they came over to see if the medicinal wine worked well.

The old lady kept expressing her gratitude, introducing, "We originally planned to purchase more wine after the Autumn Harvest, but you delivered it. In fact, ever since our Xiao Bao came back, we don’t need to ask for help with our work. Our days will only get better. It’s just that poor Xiao Bao is having a hard time. He is such a good child. It might be difficult for him to find a wife following us around like this..."

Quite a fine lad indeed, the cheerful young man glazed with constant smiles that weren’t supposed to exist in their imagination, was the old lady’s grandson. Following his mother’s remarriage years ago, he had grown into a strong young man whilst enjoying the finer living conditions of that household.

His living standards at his mother’s new home were good, he had half brothers on his side and beneath him, he now had a younger half brother as well. Contrarily, with no one capable of working on his father and grandmother’s side, life was unjust. Hence, he returned back home.

No, it’s not some tragic story about family abuse. The family members on that side of the family were pretty decent. It’s said that the elder half brother even brought over some stuff to check on him after his return.

Yan Fei and Heizi are who they are, both willing to sit and listen to the ramblings of the old woman weren’t present. As soon as the quick-handed lad served the poached eggs, the two gobbled up their meal, left the wine behind and prepared to leave.

Before leaving, Yan Fei left 700 yuan saying, "Use this money to buy a calf. By next year it’ll be old enough to help with work."

There was no need for more words, this was the only solution rural folks had to improve their standard of living. Raise a calf for a year or two, sell it and then buy another calf to raise again, it could even help with some work in the meantime. As long as nothing problematic arose, he could plan on saving money to get married in the coming years. Relying on their little piece of farm land alone would never have afforded the young lad to even think about a wife.

How could these three ever dare to accept such an offer! They didn’t dare to accept the money, so Yan Fei straightforwardly told the lad, "Let’s think of it as I’m buying the calf, and you’re being paid to raise it. If the calf ends up dying, it’s on me. If it survives, you can sell it to me. If you are unsure how to buy a calf, come find me after the harvest season and I’ll accompany you to buy one. You’re not even daring enough to do that, are you?"

A fifteen or sixteen year old lad, no matter how naïve, would have some sort of spirit. Faced with two peers of his own age, who could bear such provocation. He promptly accepted the money.

As soon as they were out of the courtyard, Heizi extended his thumb in appraisal, praising Brother Fei’s new trick to convince people to accept money.

This was only possible due to Yan Fei’s experience with Little Dark-skinned Girl’s affairs, which gave him the courage to say such things. Last time, he gave 500 yuan as a partnership for doing business, this time it turned into buying a calf and paying for raising it.

Not far off, Heizi snapped back to reality and shared his concern with Yan Fei, "Aren’t you afraid that when they find out about Silver Coin selling money, they might have ... uh ... bad thoughts about us?"

Yan Fei chuckled, "The instant the old lady exchanged items for that wine, it became my belonging. Why would how much I sold it for be any of their concern? I came here to ease my conscience, as long we are guilt-free, all’s good. If they are really upto some crooked ideas, would I be any less given their entire village?!"

Heizi nodded with deep conviction, "Well, that’s true!"

Yan Fei boasted a little more, "Not scared of the brawny, even less scared of the brainy. Don’t forget, my wife is a student at the Provincial University Law School!"

Heizi twitched at the corner of his mouth hearing those words, you bring it up every day, I cannot even forget it even if I wanted!

Anyhow, Yan Fei wouldn’t see his expression, so he flaunted right toward the back of his head, "Do you see any room left for anyone else to live?"

"I’m right though! Righteousness goes around the world, who are we to argue?" Yan Fei responded with undeniable confidence.

For Heizi, who was capable of fabricating a faulty logic for anything, he was speechless in response to Yan Fei’s answer.

After some time, he shot back, "Fine, leave if you want to! Why do you keep turning your head around? I’m sitting behind you!"

Yan Fei turned around to take a look over there and said, "Don’t you think those willow trees look better than others around here?"

Heizi turned around for a look, "This is what they call a weeping willow, right? It’s quite rare around here. It does look good. But what’s the point? You can’t dig it up and take it home!"

This time, it was Yan Fei’s turn to look down on him, "Why would I want to dig them up? It’s something that can be planted just by cutting a few branches. Do I really need to uproot them?"