Chapter 28: Wiping Out the Pests

  He rushed into the room, turned on the light and saw that the door lock had been pried open. The room was in a mess, with books, documents, and bedding scattered all over the place. Everything except for a worn-out quilt had been stolen, including food and clothes.

  His two legs went soft, and he sat down on the bed with a thud. The pancakes his mother had baked, the salted yellow beans Aunt Yuemeng had stir-fried, the high-waisted military boots Second Brother had sent, the bag of wheat ears and the bag of dried yams that had been brought from home - all stolen. He sat there in a daze for over an hour before suddenly bursting out laughing.

  Forget it, maybe it was those "official second generation" seeking revenge, or perhaps a thief who was more unfortunate than himself. He remembered the back of the kitchen stove, where someone seemed to have slept, and wondered if one of the vagrants who had lived in the kitchen had stolen from him. Either way, it was an end to it all.

  What to do? Ask for help from home? He quickly denied himself. The family was extremely poor, everything had been taken away by the birth control team, even the house was a temporary low thatched hut, and it was about to get cold, his parents were struggling at home.

  Xiao Ye, Yu Yueyue and Wang Feng's three families were originally very poor, they had all helped each other with everything they had. How could he still go back to his family for help? How could he bear to take food from their three families again? As for Zhang Laoshi, he couldn't go there either, it was too troublesome. And as for Zhuang Ba, he didn't even want to go, he didn't want him to see that he had fallen to the point of asking others for help.

  He was determined to take everything on himself and find a way to survive on his own!

  He still had 1.5 yuan on him, which was all he had to his name. The next day, he first went to the small grocery store and spent 29 cents buying two catties of coarse salt, then spent 15 cents buying a pack of sewing needles, and spent five cents buying two candles. He untied a thin nylon rope from the mouth of a sack piled up at the school cafeteria door. Then, as usual, he went to school. He carefully observed Peng Yuhui and others, and was sure it wasn't them who did it.

  For a whole week, he didn't eat a single wheat bun. Every day in his lunchbox was steamed fresh green radish blocks, and the school cafeteria's daily noon five-cent large spoonful of white vegetable tofu, which he never bought. His staple food every noon and evening was steamed green radish, even raw big radish, and every day's dish was salted mixed big white cabbage heart.

  Outside the forest school, under the vegetable field, countless big cabbages and radishes were buried. He wasn't worried about starving at all. It's just that this stuff was really not filling, even the urine and feces he excreted every day had a foul smell of rotten radish.

  On Thursday afternoon, there were two classes of English taught by Teacher Zhang. Yu Songyuan was late for one class. During the break between classes, Teacher Zhang walked up to him. Originally dissatisfied with his absence from English class, she saw that he looked unwell and touched his forehead, "Songyuan, are you sick? Your face looks terrible."

  "Teacher, I'm fine, just had a bad stomach yesterday." He weakly told a lie. In fact, at lunchtime, the radish flavor in the thermos made him feel nauseous and hard to swallow. Suddenly feeling uncomfortable in his stomach, he went to the toilet next to the dormitory and squatted for a while. When he got up, everything went black, and he didn't know anything else.

  When he woke up, he found himself lying on the bathroom floor, and he realized that he had fainted from hunger.

  On Friday evening after self-study, after all his classmates had left the classroom one by one, Yu Songyuan, who was feeling weak and limp all over, finally stood up. Suddenly, golden stars danced before his eyes, and he fell head-first onto his desk again.

  "Yu Songyuan, Yu Songyuan..." A very distant voice, as if someone was calling him, pushing his head. He lifted his head and saw two figures swaying in front of him.

  Yu Songyuan struggled to open his eyes, and it turned out to be Xiao Pangniu Tian Tian and deskmate Li Yun, looking at him with concern. "What are you back for again?" he asked weakly.

  Tian Tian touched his forehead, "We're on duty today, I forgot to lock the door and turn off the lights, so I came back. What's wrong with you? You don't have a fever, but your face is a bit dark, looking really bad?"

  "It's okay, I might be a bit hypoglycemic, got up too quickly."

  Li Yun said with concern, "Your face looks terrible, it's quite frightening. Do you want me to take you to the school infirmary for a check-up?"

  Yu Songyuan said, "No need. If the school infirmary is still open, there will be people coming. I'll just take a rest for a while and I'll be fine. You all go back and rest first, I'll take care of the doors and windows."

  Tian Tian said, "Well, that's tough for you. But Yu Songyuan, with your current level, taking a key university exam is no problem at all, there's absolutely no need to work so hard. Your body is the capital of revolution, don't overexert yourself."

  After the two girls left, Yu Songyuan closed his eyes and calmed down for a while before feeling a bit more energized. He turned off the lights, locked the classroom door, and slowly walked back to the dormitory. Usually, he didn't feel it, but now, he felt that this one thousand five or six hundred meters of road was so far away. His legs were like they had two big bags of grain tied to them, very heavy, every step feeling like a struggle.

  What's going on, just a few days of not being able to swallow water vapor and radish, it became like this. Master had boasted in front of Father Yu Xinhe and Young Master Yu Xinmin that he was naturally talented, saying "In terms of physical strength, endurance, and explosive power, Yu Songyuan is one in a million!"

  In the later stages of qinggong training, Chen would often schedule sessions in the middle of the night. He would have Yu Song carry dozens of kilograms of heavy objects from Nan Yi Qu to Bei Er Dao Qu, a distance of over 6-7 kilometers, and require him to complete it within a set time. During this time, he was not allowed to turn around, and when encountering obstacles such as ditches, buildings, etc., he had to climb over, jump over or wade through them. By the end of his qinggong training, Yu Song could carry over 100 kilograms of bricks on his back and easily complete long-distance sprinting exercises.

  He was always confident in his physical strength, but this time he got hungry for just a few days and it ended like this, which made him very puzzled.

  On Saturday evening after self-study, he lit a candle, heated the sewing needle red and bent it into a fish hook, unfolded the thin nylon rope to make several finer nylon threads. Then, he threaded the fish hook with the nylon thread and used that rusty broken stone knife (northern dialect for kitchen knife) to cut down several flexible and over two-meter-tall willow branches in the backyard to make a fishing rod.

  At night, the pangs of hunger were unbearable. He had no choice but to get up and gnaw on a big green radish again. Although he felt nauseous and found it hard to swallow, he still forced himself to gulp down mouthful after mouthful.

  On Sunday morning, he went on an empty stomach, dug up earthworms with a broken iron shovel, wrapped them in newspaper, and walked to the riverbank in the dense forest. Then he followed the riverbed into the depths of the dense forest, stopping only when he reached a relatively open area where the riverbed was also wider. He first dug a small enclosed pond on the edge of the ditch, filled it with water, closed it off from the riverbed, and covered it with branches before threading the earthworms onto his hook to start fishing.

  The skills of catching fish and crabs learned in childhood are now playing a crucial role in making a way out for myself.

  After moving into the "ghost house", he had carefully observed on weekends that this ditch was connected to the Tangxiang River, a tributary of the Irrigation River, with a large belly and a small mouth, and the confluence was less than two meters, forming a relatively closed large fish pond. Moreover, the water flow is gentle, the water quality is fresh, the aquatic plants are lush, and various plankton are abundant. The reeds along the ditch are dense, and there are no human settlements within several kilometers, with few people disturbing them. It is absolutely a paradise for knife fish and red fish (note: people in northern Jiangsu call crucian carp "knife fish" and common carp "red fish").

  As expected, the four hooks were put down for only a dozen or so minutes when one of the floats shook violently. With a strong pull, a splash was heard and a knife fish was pulled out of the water. The fish was taken off and put into the pond, and the hook was rebaited with an earthworm and put back in the water. For the entire morning, a total of ** large red fish, 17 or 18 large knife fish, and 11 or 12 large carp were caught.

  These mullets are all bigger than a palm, the larger ones exceed half a catty, and the smaller ones also have three or four taels. The red fish and perch are all big blocks, the larger ones weigh at least two or three catties, and the smaller ones also weigh over one catty.

  Yu Songyuan estimated that these fish weighed around ten or more catties. He took out a red fish, a perch and a knife fish, cleaned them up, lit a fire, threaded them onto wooden skewers and roasted them. After they were cooked, he scraped off the charred skin, sprinkled some crushed salt on the fish, and then enjoyed his meal.

  Among the three fish, especially the sea bass is more tender and delicious. This was his first decent lunch in a week. During the process of roasting the fish and having lunch, they caught another five or six large cutlassfish and sea bass. After finishing their meal, lying by the bonfire, rubbing his belly, he felt so comfortable that he really wanted to take a nap.

  But after only a short rest, he jumped up and first pulled out a few handfuls of water grass from the water to pad the bottom of the bag. He then scooped up these lively fish from the pond and put them into the food sack, covering them with more water grass. Only then did he pick up the fish and hurry downstream along the river embankment.

  When I walked to the county town, I turned to the county town and went to the market to see the price of fish. The knife fish was 42 yuan per kilogram, and the red fish was 37 yuan per kilogram. A small vendor asked enthusiastically: "Want to buy some fish?"

  Yu Songyuan smiled and asked, "Do you have mandarin fish?" The fish vendor looked at him and didn't seem like someone who was buying fish, so he replied indifferently, "In this freezing cold season, where would we get mandarin fish?"

  He had counted his money, quickly left the market and came to the side of Guanhe Restaurant. Opposite here is the long-distance bus station, with a large flow of people and all kinds of vehicles coming and going non-stop. He spread out the newspaper on the ground, took out some water grass and put it on the newspaper, then poured out a few fish, the fish jumping and twisting continuously, and finally managed to arrange them roughly.

  Just arranged, lively big fish, attracted many people to ask the price, "Live fish, too fresh, how much is the knife fish per catty?"

  Yu Songyuan said: "A knife fish costs five cents, a red fish four cents and five cents for a bass."

  An aunt came over to ask the price, but thought it was expensive. However, she couldn't bear to part with the live fish. In which era can you not find live fish for sale in the market? Freshly caught live fish are extremely rare and can only be bought at the fishing spot. The aunt finally gritted her teeth and bought four live knife fish, saying that her daughter's child had just turned one month old and would take it back to nourish her milk.

  At this time, more and more people surrounded him to ask the price. Some were indignant and questioned Yu Songyuan, "Young man, you're killing people! Why is it so much more expensive than the market? You are disrupting the market order."

  Yu Songyuan said, "This is all freshly caught, just out of the water, not even stained with muddy water, that's why it's expensive." Some people were still arguing, Yu Songyuan was a bit annoyed, "If you think it's too expensive, you can go to the market and buy dead fish, no one will stop you. Dead fish is indeed cheaper, but can it be compared to live fish? Besides, during this season, can you see mandarin fish in the market, or are they even alive?"

  Just then, a middle-aged man in bright clothes squeezed in, picked up a sea bass with both hands, and ordered urgently: "Quickly, quickly put the fish away, quickly follow me, I want them all."

  "Why? Buying fish is a matter of one hand giving money and the other hand giving fish, no buying no talking." Yu Songyuan felt a bit wary, the man's clever face made him lack trust.

  The middle-aged man took out his work permit and waved it in front of Yu Songyuan, then said: "You're really a stubborn fool. I'm the manager of this big restaurant, I want all these fish, hurry up!"

  Yu Songyuan insisted: "Discuss the price first."

  "Are you gonna shut up or what? The fish are all gonna be dead and worthless in a minute. If you're gonna sell, then hurry up! A big restaurant like ours can't be cheated by you!"

  Yu Songyuan gritted his teeth and picked up the fish, preparing to follow him into the restaurant.