Crossing the farm gate, the whole family reunites in the disaster year

Lin got off the car halfway.

It was clearly my first time here, but I remembered that I had been here countless times. The dirt slopes and forks along the way were all very familiar, and it was a wonderful feeling.

The poultry house is outside Shilipu Village. Because raising chickens has a strong smell, there are no houses within miles around.

When Lin arrived, the wooden door of the poultry shed was closed and there was no sound in the huge yard.

This is not a good situation.

But since I'm here, I might as well see what's going on.

"anyone there?"

Lin shouted, her voice echoing in the birdhouse.

The poultry house covers an area of more than two acres, with a circular thatched shed in the middle. There are no walls around the shed, only a circle of wooden fences for the chickens and ducks to sleep at night.

After a while, the courtyard door opened from the inside, and a haggard old man poked his head out. He glanced at Lin outside the door and then lowered his eyelids.

"The poultry house is closed. Customers can go order from somewhere else."

After saying that, he turned around and closed the door. He had stayed up all night last night and really didn't have the energy to deal with the guests.

Lin clearly saw that the old man was covered in fresh chicken manure, so she explained her purpose: "I want to buy some chickens and ducks to raise. Since the poultry house is closing, can you sell me the remaining chickens and ducks?"

The old man paused and shook his head wearily.

"If you had come a few days earlier, I could have sold it to you. But now I can't sell it to you."

"Why?"

The old man sighed and opened the gate: "You'll know when you come in and take a look."

Lin was full of doubts and followed the old man into the chicken coop.

When he saw the scene in the round shed, he took a deep breath.

All the chickens in the round shed were crowded together, their heads tucked under their wings, curled up into a ball. Some of the seriously injured ones had fallen to the ground and were unable to get up. The shed was filled with a faint sour smell.

"This..." Lin originally thought it was due to lack of water and food, but unexpectedly it was an infectious disease.

In my previous life, I had only seen outbreaks of chicken plague on the news, but I didn’t expect to see it with my own eyes today.

The old man skillfully picked out a hen that had just died, with a numb expression on his face, as if he was used to it.

"It's not that I won't sell it to you. This sick chicken won't survive more than a few days. If you take it back to the village, all the chickens in your village will get sick. Selling it to you would be cheating people. I can't do such a wicked thing."

Lin knew the harm of chicken plague. Not only was it highly contagious, but the dead chickens could not be eaten and had to be buried deep in a pit.

“Are the ducks sick too?”

The old man's brow relaxed. "The ducks haven't been infected yet, but you never know. This disease is very dangerous. They may all be sick overnight even though they look healthy."

What the old man called "weird" can be translated into professional terms as the incubation period. Unless professional biochemical tests are performed, it is difficult to determine whether the person is infected with the disease by the naked eye during the incubation period.

In this case, we can’t buy ducks either.

Lin opened her mouth, not knowing what to say. She originally wanted to buy chickens and mix them with the chickens and ducks from Zhaozhao Mall.

Now the chickens are all sick, so there is no chance to cheat secretly.

"Then I'll ask someone else."

I just don't know where there are any poultry houses nearby.

Lin was about to leave when the old man called her.

"I don't know what you're going to do with all these chickens and ducks, but based on my decades of experience raising chickens and ducks, I think it's best to wait until next year."

"Is it that serious?"

The old man said with a serious expression, "This disease happened more than ten years ago. I don't know about it in the distant past, but all the poultry houses in several nearby counties were infected. We privately call it 'wind-induced collapse'. Wherever the wind blows, the chickens and ducks will fall ill."

"During those two years, healthy chickens and ducks were as expensive as gold. An egg cost dozens of coins, not to mention live chickens and ducks."

Thinking of the tragic situation of that year, the old man sighed repeatedly.

After Lin left the birdhouse, she kept thinking about the old man's words. She felt like a huge rock was pressing on her heart, and her breathing became heavy.

Droughts, locust plagues, and poultry diseases have hit one after another, as if by agreement, leaving no chance for farmers to breathe.

We thought we had found a way to deal with the locust plague, but the reality was another round of crisis.

It's really hard to live a stable life.

Lin went to the county town in silence.

the other side.

Silang carried a bamboo basket and walked around the noisy crowd. He found an open space with his sharp eyes and quickly put down the bamboo basket to take the position.

Cui Chengliang followed behind, pursed his lips and said nothing.

He didn't even know when Lin got off the car. They had agreed to go into the city to sell pottery, but how come he disappeared halfway?

Silang skillfully placed the ceramic basins and bowls on the ground. Just after he put two rows, four or five people gathered in front of the stall.

"I finally waited until you opened your stall. Last time I bought some, the neighbors all asked me where I bought such cheap bowls. I told them I was at the city gate. But you didn't open your stall for two days in a row, so they thought I was taking advantage and eating all of it myself."

"Don't blame the guy. I asked him last time and he told me to come back in three days." The woman next to him was proud of her own wisdom.

Shi Lang wiped his sweat and said haltingly, "It's still the original price. Everyone, take your time to choose."

Without Third Aunt, I feel like I don’t have the confidence to speak. There are so many people around, so there’s no need to shout, right?

All those present were old customers, and they were selecting their items skillfully.

Silang stared at the hands in front of the stall to prevent anyone from stealing them in the chaos. Cui Chengliang took bowls and basins out of the bamboo basket.

An aunt asked while choosing: "Or buy two get one free?"

"Yes, bowls are three cents each, buy two get one free, large basins are nine cents each, small basins are six cents each, buy one get one free."

After confirming that the price was correct, the customers at the stall continued to choose with peace of mind.

Cui Chengliang scratched his ears and pulled Shilang aside.

"Did you order the buy two get one free deal?"

He hadn't heard this word for three years, and when he first heard it, he felt a little dazed.

Silang stared at the stall and listened attentively to answer his uncle's questions.

"It wasn't me, it was Third Aunt who decided it. She said..." Silang racked his brains to recall Third Aunt's exact words, "...she said that the low price and the purchase-one-get-one-free offer would give customers the feeling of getting a bargain."

The original words seemed to be this.

Cui Chengliang opened his mouth, as if a bucket of water had been poured over his head, and he was stunned for a moment.

This familiar sales routine was like a bullet fired a thousand years later, traveling through time and space and accurately hitting him in ancient times.

Cui Chengliang swallowed his saliva and asked anxiously, "What else did your Third Aunt say?"

If Lin was born with such a sharp business mind, she would not have married Cui Chengliang, a farmer, in the first place.

Or is it that Lin, like him, is a person who traveled through time?

Unfortunately, he had no memories of his previous life, so he didn't know Lin's original personality and had no way to compare it.

This feeling is very magical, even more exciting than meeting a fellow countryman in a foreign country. Cui Chengliang feels like the blood is rushing through his body.

"Brother, help me wrap these two basins."

A woman picked out two basins and handed over nine coins.

"okay."

Silang was busy collecting money and packing things, and had no energy to pay attention to his uncle's strange behavior.