Li Hui blankly watched Zhang Wei walk out, until his backlit figure completely melted into the halo of light and disappeared.
The next second, Li Hui’s expression turned dead serious. She nodded heavily a few times, as if she had secretly made some major decision.
Zhang Wei stepped outside and, in the blink of an eye, slipped into a storage room.
This was the warehouse where the production brigade stored important production materials, the most crucial of which was grain.
There were two locks on the storage room: the warehouse keeper held one, and the accountant held the other.
Whenever materials needed to be allocated, both the warehouse keeper and the accountant had to be present at the same time.
However, Zhang Wei found it troublesome, so he had wheedled an accountant’s key out of his uncle.
More than half of the storage room space was walled off by a square wooden house.
This wooden house stood about half a meter off the ground, its base laid with dark cyan old bricks—it was none of other than one of the Red Star Production Brigade’s granaries.
“Haha! I’m rich, I’m actually rich. If I sell this grain to the system mall, getting rich is a piece of cake.”
With an excited heart and trembling hands, Zhang Wei began stripping off the wooden boards of the granary’s partition door one by one from top to bottom.
He didn’t stop until he had cleared down to thigh-height.
The grain stored in the granary wasn’t polished white rice, but golden, unhusked paddy rice.
Because the autumn harvest was just around the corner, the granary only kept a shallow layer of paddy rice left over for emergencies—about three thousand five hundred catties worth.
“Recycle, recycle, hehe!”
As Zhang Wei chuckled craftily, the over thirty-five hundred catties of paddy rice vanished into thin air.
The buyback price for a catty of organic paddy rice was three yuan.
Three thousand five hundred and twenty-six catties exchanged for ten thousand five hundred and seventy-eight mall coins.
For a brief moment, Zhang Wei didn’t even want to buy the mall’s rice back to cover the books.
He only thought about it, though—after all, he couldn’t just throw his uncle under the bus.
With his uncle acting as his backing, he, Zhang Wei, could comfortably slack off as a parasite in the Red Star Production Team and eat for free until the day he died.
The genetically modified paddy rice in the system mall had plump, full grains and cost only one yuan and fifty cents per catty.
With a wave of Zhang Wei’s hand, three thousand five hundred and twenty catties of genetically modified rice were laid out inside the granary.
In a way, he was doing a great public service; back in the 1970s, the members of the Red Star Production Team were already getting to enjoy high-tech artificial wonders.
With the system mall’s balance showing an extra five thousand-plus yuan, Zhang Wei felt like he was floating on air, walking with a spring in his step.
Suddenly, a roar echoed from outside.
“Wei-zi, get over here! Every single day, you walk around looking like you’ve got no spine. Let me ask you, what was going on last night? The militia company commander told me that Old Li and his wife got beaten up, and their faces swelled up like pig heads!”
The speaker was a middle-aged man in his forties. Unlike the sallow and emaciated villagers, the middle-aged man had a very robust build, spoke with a resonant voice, and exuded plenty of vigor.
This middle-aged man was none of other than Zhang Victory, the brigade leader of the Red Star Production Brigade and Zhang Wei’s uncle.
“Hehe! Uncle, you guessed it—I’m the one who beat them.”
Zhang Wei grinned with a thick-skinned, shameless look.
The middle-aged man looked around, and upon seeing no one else, lowered his voice and cursed:
“You little punk, do you have any decency left at all? Those are your father-in-law and mother-in-law! Get inside and talk!”
Inside the house, Zhang Victory pointed his finger at Zhang Wei’s face, jabbing the empty air several times before letting his hand drop powerlessly.
“Sigh!”
A sigh so heavy it felt impossible to untangle.
The old Zhang family only had this single twig of a descendant, yet he turned out to be such a piece of mud that wouldn’t stick to a wall.
“Ah-Wei, can you stop stirring up trouble for once? I can protect you for a moment, but can I protect you for a lifetime? Wasn’t it you yourself who said you wanted this wife? You wanted someone pretty, obedient, and best of all, a mute so she wouldn’t annoy you…”
“Uncle, I was just making a joke. How could you actually find me a mute? Uncle, hurry up and annul this marriage for me. I haven’t touched her; she’s still pure…”
“Annul it? Do you think marrying a wife is playing house? Once she steps foot through your door, she’s your person. Don’t think I don’t know what you’re scheming, my good nephew—that educated youth Liu doesn’t even look at you like a human being!”
“Uncle, it has nothing to do with Educated Youth Liu. But me, a fine and upstanding man, marrying a mute? If word gets out, won’t people make a laughingstock of me? Uncle, when people mock me, they’re mocking you.”
“Crap, what’s wrong with a mute? That Li Hui seems just fine to me. The matchmaker also said that woman has a sturdy frame, guaranteed to give you a son. You brat, as long as you let me hold a great-grandson, everything else is negotiable.”
“Really? Then what if I want to keep a couple of widows on the side?”
“Hah! Look at you, you loafer. It’s not that I look down on you, but if you actually have the ability, I’ll pay for the money to keep those widows. Once they pop out babies, I’ll help you raise them too! Go on, hurry up and keep some widows, I’m begging you. I swear I’ll chant Amitabha and kneel before the Buddha for a whole month.”
Zhang Victory wasn’t just speaking out of anger. Compared to ending up as the family branch that dies out without descendants, his sole obsession now was getting Zhang Wei to spread branches and scatter leaves for the Zhang family.
Outside the house came a sharp bang!
Uncle and nephew looked at each other and went outside to investigate.
Aside from an extra puddle of water on the ground, there was no one in sight.
Just around the corner of the wall, Li Hui sat limply in a squatting position, two trails of clear tears hanging from her lifeless eyes.
On the ground beside her lay a wide-mouthed thermos bottle with its cap off.
The conversation between Zhang Wei and his uncle had completely shattered the hope Li Hui had just ignited for her life.
“Yeah, I’m just a mute. What qualifications do I have to daydream?”
Not seeing anyone, Zhang Wei cursed and kicked a pebble away.
Suddenly, Zhang Wei’s eyes lit up as he saw a young man outside the courtyard waving at him.
“Uncle, you’re right. I’ve thought it through: of the three unfilial acts, having no descendants is the worst. Tonight, when I go back, I’ll deflower the mute girl, I promise you’ll be holding a big fat grandson in no time. Uncle, let’s make a deal. I’m a bit tight on cash lately, spot me ten yuan to spend.”
Looking at Zhang Wei’s shameless demeanor, Zhang Victory felt as disgusted as if he had swallowed a mouthful of shit.
“You debt collector, you want money to gamble again? Believe it or not, I’ll have the militia drag you to the shooting range!”
“Uncle, even if you make an ox plow the fields, you still have to feed it some grass, right? You’re asking me, Zhang Wei, to go plow the mute’s field, shouldn’t you show a little sincerity? I’m not asking for much—ten yuan in exchange for a great-grandson, what a great deal!”
“Dammit, if it weren’t for the sake of your parents, I—I’d slap you to death right now! Five yuan, take it or leave it.”
“Take it, of course I’ll take it! Uncle, you really are something, so stingy. Isn’t what’s yours mine anyway? Why are you playing hardball with me?”
So angry that his soul was about to leave his body, Zhang Victory pulled off one of his shoes and moved to discipline Zhang Wei.
Seeing that his uncle had genuinely lost his temper, Zhang Wei took to his heels and sprinted off.
“Uncle, don’t bother seeing me out, no need to walk me off! Oh, and don’t bother saving any food for me at the canteen for lunch. Also, that mute is in the utility room picking soybean seeds. Help me lean on her a bit and teach her some manners. Marrying me, Zhang Wei, is the blessing of a lifetime…”