novelslam Chapter 1859 Taking Down the Nest in the Mountains
Chapter 1859 Taking Down the Nest in the Mountains
Chapter 1859 Taking Down the Nest in the Mountains
At Ma Yang's shout, the three dogs tied to the tree by Li Baoyu and the others immediately barked. Zhao Jun and the others were all startled and hurriedly walked towards him.
Just then, a little squirrel darted down from the tree next to Ma Yang and disappeared swiftly and nimbly from everyone's sight.
Ma Yang covered his groin with one hand and pointed in the direction the squirrel had gone, shouting, "Brother-in-law, hit it!"
Everyone thought Ma Yang had found a giant club, but it turned out to be this piece of junk. Zhao Jun glared at the back of Ma Yang's head and muttered irritably, "I fucking want to hit you!"
Even with Zhao Youcai's marksmanship, it would be difficult to shoot squirrels in the forest during this season, so when everyone saw that it was just a small squirrel, they didn't pay any attention to it.
Zhao Jun sighed softly, and was about to call on Li Baoyu to be the fourth striker, when he heard Ma Yang, who was fastening his trousers, say, "Why is the dew on this reed so shiny?"
"Huh?" Zhao Jun suddenly turned to look at Ma Yang and shouted, "Xiao Yang, what did you say?"
"Brother-in-law, I didn't say anything." Ma Yang thought Zhao Jun was angry with him, and immediately said aggrievedly, "Why do you always yell at me like that?"
Zhao Jun ignored Ma Yang's complaints. He quickly walked to Ma Yang's side and looked at the ground around Ma Yang.
Not far from Ma Yang's right foot, there is a plant called Artemisia selengensis, also known as split-leaf artemisia or striped artemisia, which is a very common grass in mixed coniferous and broad-leaved forests.
In this season, it gets light around four in the morning in the Yong'an forest area, and the dew in the mountains and forests doesn't disappear until after eight o'clock.
Therefore, Zhao Jun went up the mountain at around nine o'clock to avoid the dew.
After the dew recedes, very faint watermarks remain on the surface of some grass blades, and tiny white salt crystals condense on some blades.
At this moment, there were very faint dew marks left on the wormwood, and for some reason, when the breeze blew and the grass blades moved, the dew marks on them shimmered with a silvery-white light, just like moonlight!
Zhao Jun stared wide-eyed, and Zhang Yuanmin and Li Baoyu, who had followed, also noticed the wormwood and discovered the same unusual thing.
“The shimmering light on the grass and trees is like moonlight.” Zhang Yuanmin murmured, his eyes widening as he exclaimed, “So that’s how it is!”
"Big Brother!" At this moment, Li Ruhai's voice called out to Zhao Jun came from the side.
Zhao Jun looked up and saw Li Ruhai pointing to a spot one step east of the Artemisia argyi, where there was a single-flowered iris with small blue-purple flowers.
On the blades of the single-flowered iris, there were also dewdrops reflecting the moonlight.
"What's wrong?" Ma Yang, who had fastened his pants, came over to look at the wormwood, then at the single-flowered iris, and asked, "What's wrong with this?"
Zhao Jun now dares to tell Li Ruhai the secrets of the ginseng gang, but he doesn't dare to tell Ma Yang.
So Zhao Jun didn't say much to Ma Yang, but just told everyone to continue practicing with the sticks, saying, "This is the only area, let's search close to the ground."
After saying that, Zhao Jun divided the ten men into two groups. He led Zhang Yuanmin, Li Baoyu, Xie Chen, and Zhao Jinhui in the front, while Wang Qiang led Xing San, Zhao Youcai, Li Ruhai, and Ma Yang in the back.
Zhao Jun led his men to go first, and then Zhang Yuanmin led his team to check and confirm again following in the footsteps of Zhao Jun and his group.
This is because it's not easy to release seedlings at this time of year; the seedlings may not have even emerged yet, they're just small buds, hard to spot with the naked eye.
After arranging the sticks, everyone followed Zhao Youcai's advice, raised their sticks high, and shouted loudly, "Mountain God, Old Foreman... Let's open the mountain..."
Among them, Li Ruhai and Ma Yang had the loudest voices, and Zhao Jun was afraid that the two boys, who were going through puberty, would damage their voices by shouting.
They shouted, and Black Tiger, Erhei, and Green Tiger followed suit.
As soon as the shouts subsided, Zhao Jun dropped the stick he was holding and yelled, "Let's go up the mountain and get the sticks!"
The other nine people responded loudly: "Get the clubs..."
Zhao Jun swung his baton southward, and Zhang Yuanmin, standing to the south, raised his baton in response. Li Baoyu, Xie Chen, and Zhao Jinhui stood between Zhao Jun and Zhang Yuanmin.
The five of them were no more than three meters apart, and then Zhao Jun and Zhang Yuanmin slowed their pace and controlled the rhythm, leading the three of them to begin trekking down the mountain.
So pulled the stick around the grass, rolling up the surrounding grass blades so that people could see what was underneath.
The two groups of people went up the slope one after the other, and Zhao Jun and Zhang Yuanmin then led the group down the slope.
Just then, Ma Yang suddenly cried out "Ouch!" and then Zhao Jun and his five men saw Wang Qiang, Zhao Youcai, Xing San, and Li Ruhai all moving closer to Ma Yang.
Immediately afterwards, Wang Qiang stood up and waved in their direction.
Zhao Jun raised his hand to signal Zhang Yuanmin and the others to wait where they were, then picked up his rope and stick and strode towards Ma Yang.
Watching Zhao Jun's departing figure, Li Baoyu muttered softly, "What's wrong? Could he have fallen for a fool?"
"No." Xie Chen fiddled with the dagger in his hand, saying casually, "Even the five of us, with our experience, haven't been fooled. How could they be?"
As soon as Jie Chen finished speaking, Zhao Jun paused, then suddenly stood up and shouted, "Club! Club!"
Zhang Yuanmin jumped in surprise and shouted in response, "What grade of leaf?"
"Six-leaf variety!" Zhao Jun shouted again, and Li Ruhai asked first, "How many seedlings are there?"
"They're everywhere!" Zhao Jun shouted, waving to Zhang Yuanmin and the other three.
When Zhang Yuanmin and the others arrived, Wang Qiang, Xing San, Zhao Youcai, Li Ruhai, and Ma Yang had already formed a circle, surrounding Zhao Jun and a piece of land in the middle.
"Brother, let me see this!" said Li Baoyu, who had just arrived, meaning he wanted to see the club.
At this moment, Zhao Jun was wearing gloves and pulling a clump of lily of the valley out of the soil.
The lily of the valley is poisonous in its entirety. When Zhao Jun was a child, forest rangers would come to his house to tell the children not to pick this plant.
Zhao Jun tossed the four lily of the valley plants between Zhao Youcai and Xing San, then pointed to the small, protruding buds on the ground.
As Zhao Jun pointed his finger, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven appeared—a total of seven elephant trunk buds, with one more bud already half-unfurled.
“Eight…Eight seedlings!” Zhang Yuanmin’s eyes lit up, but as soon as he finished speaking, Zhao Youcai questioned, “What’s wrong with your eyes? Didn’t you see them before?”
Zhang Yuanmin, Li Baoyu, and Xie Chen looked at each other, their faces showing genuine embarrassment.
The three of them had all worked with Zhao Jun in rafting and digging, while Wang Qiang, Zhao Youcai, and the other four had only ever done haphazard digging for clubs, with Zhao Youcai having absolutely no experience.
Unexpectedly, it was Ma Yang, who had dropped out of school and gone up the mountain, who finally discovered the problem. This was quite a slap in the face for Zhang Yuanmin and the other two.
"Hey, second brother." At this moment, Xing San stopped Zhao Youcai and said, "Going up the mountain has nothing to do with eyesight or anything like that. It depends on whether you have good fortune."
As he spoke, Xing San pointed at Ma Yang and said, "We have to say that Ma Yang is lucky."
"Right, Third Uncle?" Hearing Xing San praise him, Ma Yang grinned and said, "I told you I'd be useful, hahaha..."
Ma Yang smiled smugly, and while he was gloating, he didn't forget to glance at Li Ruhai.
Li Ruhai didn't argue with him, but asked Zhao Jun, "Brother, shall we carry it?"
“Lift…” Now that we’ve found the ginseng, how can we not lift it? But when it came to lifting, Zhao Jun hesitated.
Zhao Jun knew that none of the nine men he brought had any experience in mountain climbing. But now that he was in trouble, he had no choice but to discuss it with them.
“Come on, let’s take a look.” Zhao Jun said, pointing to four elephant trunk-shaped seedlings. The distribution of these four seedlings was like the four points of a square, and they were all very close to each other, only three to five centimeters apart.
“Let’s leave those four inside for now,” Zhao Jun said. “Let’s start lifting from the outside.”
After saying that, Zhao Jun pointed to the four Miao people scattered outside and said, "I'll carry one, my elder brother and Jin Hui will carry one, my uncle and Bao Yu will carry one, and then Ru Hai and Xiao Chen will carry one."
Knowing they lacked experience, the Zhao family members practiced at home. Of course, they couldn't practice with wild ginseng, so they practiced with grass from their garden, each using a deer antler spoon to pry open the grass roots until they were quite adept at it.
But among the seven, Zhao Jun is next in rank, followed by Zhang Yuanmin, then Wang Qiang and Li Ruhai. Li Baoyu, Xie Chen, and Zhao Jinhui are all burly and heavy-handed, with a rougher build.
Therefore, Zhao Jun assigned them to be assistants, helping Zhang Yuanmin, Wang Qiang, and Li Ruhai with some simple tasks.
At Zhao Jun's command, Wang Qiang and the others swung their waist pouches around and brought them to their front.
This scene made Ma Yang's eyes light up; he felt it was incredibly cool.
Immediately afterwards, Zhao Jun and his seven men each took out a red cloth bag from their pockets, spread the bag out in their hands, and took out a deer antler key and a small pair of scissors from it.
"Brother-in-law." At this moment, Ma Yang moved closer to Zhao Jun and said, "I'll help you out."
"No need, Xiao Yang." Ma Yang had just made a contribution, and Zhao Jun said to him in a friendly manner, "You can go over there and rest for a while."
If this were the Lingnan ginseng gang, even the open-minded Ma Yang would be treated like royalty, with someone specifically there to fan him and massage his legs.
There's no such rule in Lingxi, and Zhao Jun wouldn't send Zhao Youcai and Xing San to serve Ma Yang.
But Ma Yang couldn't rest at this time. He stood behind Zhao Jun, watching Zhao Jun work.
Zhao Jun knelt down and used a deer antler spoon to pry open the soft humus, revealing the buds and rhizomes under the elephant trunk bud.
Zhao Jun used the deer antler spoon to dig the soil, and horse tooth reeds and piled flower reeds appeared in front of him.
"Holy crap!" Just looking at that head of the reed made Zhao Jun curse.
But he wasn't angry; he was excited.
The ginseng has a slender, long stem with a bend, and the stem bowl is tightly packed. Zhao Jun roughly estimated that this ginseng is no less than sixty years old.
"Head." Suddenly, Zhang Yuanmin called to Zhao Jun, "Come and take a look at this reed head."
When Zhang Yuanmin was carrying ginseng, he called Zhao Jun, and he didn't call him "brother" but "boss," which indicates that something was amiss.
Upon hearing the sound, Ma Yang tried to go towards Zhang Yuanmin, but Zhao Jun, who had gotten up, pushed him aside.
Zhao Jun walked over and took a look, and his eyes widened in surprise.
At this time, the ginseng root head had already been unearthed, but this ginseng root head was coiled around the body like a snake.
Zhao Jun squatted down, frowned, squinted, and silently counted, feeling a chill run down his spine.
This ginseng has a long stem and many stem buds. Zhao Jun roughly estimated that this ginseng is over eighty years old.
This ginseng has just sprouted its trunk buds and its stem has not yet stood upright, but once its stems and leaves unfold, it will be a top-grade ginseng.
"Brother!" Li Baoyu called out to Zhao Jun again. Zhao Jun looked at him and Wang Qiang, and then heard Wang Qiang say, "Nephew, come and take a look."
Zhao Jun stood up, moved to Wang Qiang and Li Baoyu's side, and after just one glance, he patted Li Baoyu and Wang Qiang on the shoulders.
Zhao Jun didn't speak. Wang Qiang and Li Baoyu didn't know what he meant, but they subconsciously got up.
We can't see what kind of ginseng Wang Qiang and Li Baoyu are carrying, but Zhao Jun can see two root heads.
One rhizome is connected to an elephant trunk bud, while the other rhizome has buds but has not yet sprouted, seemingly in a dormant state.
Zhao Jun knelt before the ginseng, looking down to examine it carefully. He could not see any injuries on the ginseng rhizome that had not yet sprouted. It could be that the injury had just healed, or there could be some other reason.
The reason doesn't matter, because the ginseng root head is fine, so we can continue lifting it. The key is that both root heads are quite long, and there are quite a few root stalks piled on them, meaning they must be over sixty years old.
Zhao Jun got up and went to Li Ruhai and Xie Chen.
When Zhao Jun got closer, he saw that the ginseng seedling that Li Ruhai and Xie Chen were carrying was quite decent. Judging from the appearance of the ginseng root, it was about forty years old and should be a seedling from the Dengtai variety.
"Come on, everyone, let's stop carrying them for now." Zhao Jun stopped the Zhao family gang from carrying the ginseng and said, "Ruhai, go and gather some locust branches. After that, put the locust branches together with these ginseng roots, and then bury them back in the soil. When you bury them, make sure the locust branches are sticking out a bit, so you can mark them."
"What's that for?" Zhao Youcai asked before Li Ruhai could answer.
"We can't carry these eight or nine bunches of clubs out today," Zhao Jun said. Zhao Youcai pressed, "If you can't carry them out, then carry as many as you can, right? What are you going to do? Go back today and come back early tomorrow?"
Zhao Youcai's question implied that he had arrived early enough today, and wouldn't be able to get up much earlier tomorrow.
“No way.” Zhao Jun shook his head and said, “Baoyu, you and Xiaochen, you two go down in the jeep, then take the Liberation truck back and bring our stuff. We need to stay here for the next couple of days.”
Zhao Jun said "take the nest," meaning he wanted to stay here.
Hearing this, Zhao Youcai frowned and asked, "No? Is it really necessary to stay here?"
“It’s fine.” Zhao Jun nodded without hesitation and said, “Of these four or five ginseng seedlings, apart from Ru Hai and Xiao Chen’s, which are Deng Tai Zi, the rest are all fourth-grade and fifth-grade leaves.”
At this point, Zhao Jun pointed to the four small elephant trunk buds in the middle of the four pits and said, "There must be a sixth-grade leaf in the middle!"
"A sixth-grade leaf!" Upon hearing Zhao Jun's words, everyone's eyes lit up.
The sixth grade of ginseng is a hundred-year-old ginseng. Although its roots are clear and without tangled hairs or fuzz, the roots are certainly not short.
It takes a lot of effort to lift such a ginseng. Just like the king of ginseng in the Jilin Hall of the Great Hall of the People, it took four people three whole days to lift it out.
This is why Zhao Jun chose to live in the mountains.
In this situation, they couldn't even find shelter in the shacks on the bluestone cliffs; they had to stay here.
It's better to be safe than sorry. If something goes wrong and you lose the prize you've already got your hands on, that's incredibly frustrating.
"Brother!" Li Baoyu stood up, clasped his hands in a fist salute to Zhao Jun, and said, "Just tell me, what do you need?"
"Chainsaw, tarpaulin, get a few burlap sacks." Zhao Jun thought and recited, while Li Ruhai, who was next to him, brought up paper and pen and took notes for Li Baoyu.
"Hot water bottles, kettles, pots, rice, noodles, pickled vegetables, and some bald-head pancakes," Zhao Jun continued. "I have some old bedding and stuff in my storage room, don't worry about whether it's clean or dirty, just take it."
After Zhao Jun finished speaking, Li Ruhai finished writing. He tore a piece of paper from his notebook and handed it to Li Baoyu. Then he quickly walked to Zhao Jun's side and whispered something to him.
After listening, Zhao Jun looked up at Ma Yang and said, "Xiao Yang, you go back with the car."
Ma Yang: "..."