After observing the small amount of bear gall powder on the plate for a long while, Li Yongrui dipped his index finger into the powder and licked it.
After savoring it for a moment, Li Yongrui finally spoke
"This bear gall is entirely golden yellow, first-grade quality, 25 yuan per gram."
Upon hearing the price of 25 yuan, the corners of Feng Chengmin's eyes quirked upward; he was clearly very pleased. One had to realize that this price was a full 11 yuan higher than that of the supply and marketing cooperative.
Although Feng Chengmin was delighted, he still pretended to be nonchalant as he said
"Alright, my nephew trusts you, so I'll trust you too. Go ahead and weigh it."
Li Yongrui nodded, then pulled a stack of masks from his backpack and spoke to the group with a serious expression
"Gall powder is very light. When I cut open the gall bladder, there cannot be a single breath of wind blowing over it. You either need to stand far away, or you must put on these masks. Furthermore, when I cut the bladder open, none of you can make any sudden or large movements. Is that all clear?"
Although Li Yongrui's words seemed a bit cold, they were entirely reasonable. After all, bear gall powder was so precious that if even a tiny bit were accidentally spilled or blown away by the wind, it would be a massive loss.
The main point was that once this stuff was blown away by the wind, it was truly impossible to recover!
However, as soon as Li Yongrui finished speaking, Wang An, Mu Xueli, and Wang Li very shrewdly pulled several masks out of their pockets. Wang Li even handed one to Feng Chengmin.
Wang An said with a beaming smile
"We have masks; your old man had us prepare them long ago."
The reason Wang An had prepared masks was indeed because Li Ziqian had mentioned it to the three of them while they were chatting at the Li Family Pharmacy.
Even the small scale had been bought at Li Ziqian's instruction. In Li Ziqian's words, if one possessed items like bear gall and ox gallstone, one absolutely had to have a precision weighing instrument.
Only then could one ensure that no one tampered with the scales. After all, whether it was ox gallstone or bear gall, they were priced by the gram; even if one were cheated out of a few grams, it would be a significant amount of money.
Therefore, Wang An and the others had decisively bought many masks and four small scales.
Of these four scales, Wang An's three families each had one, leaving one to be used for calibration or as a spare.
Seeing Wang An's actions, Li Yongrui burst out laughing and said
"True, it is safer to wear one's own mask. If someone were to spray knockout drugs on the masks, it would be a huge problem."
Wang An replied with a smile
"That's not the case; I trust you very much, Brother Li."
Despite his words, Wang An still obediently put on his mask.
After the brief interlude, Li Yongrui first placed the entire bear gall on the scale to weigh it, and Wang An used his own scale to weigh it again.
This dried black bear golden gall was not particularly small, but it certainly wasn't large. Weighed with the bladder skin, it was 93.63 grams, rounded to 93.6 grams.
If the supply and marketing cooperative or a medicinal materials collection station were buying it, they would pay for it including the bladder skin.
However, the purchase price at the cooperative or collection station was only 14 yuan per gram, meaning 93.6 grams of golden gall would be 1,310 yuan and 40 cents.
Once Wang An finished weighing, Li Yongrui took a pair of scissors and cut the entire bear gall in half, carefully pouring the bear gall powder inside into a small stainless steel plate.
After pouring out the powder, Li Yongrui used a small brush to carefully scrub the empty gall shell, striving to ensure not a single speck of residual powder remained.
Next, Li Yongrui placed the entire stainless steel plate on one pan of the scale, added weights to the other pan, and adjusted the sliding weight to re-weigh it.
It must be said that the equipment Li Yongrui used was very professional; even the stainless steel plates used to hold the powder had a standard weight, making the weighing process very convenient.
The final weight was determined: the pure gall powder of this bear gall weighed 88.57 grams, rounded to 88.6 grams. At 25 yuan per gram, that came to 2,215 yuan.
In other words, the thin bladder skin didn't weigh much—only about 5 grams—but it had to be admitted that 5 grams being worth 125 yuan was still a decent amount of money. It was perfectly reasonable that Li Yongrui and his group didn't want the skin.
But compared to the price of this bear gall at the supply and marketing cooperative or collection station—which was 1,310.4 yuan—the price difference for this single gall was a full 900-plus yuan!
Thus, although the process of collecting bear gall was troublesome for Li Yongrui and his team, Wang An and the others loved this kind of trouble.
After the weight was measured, both parties recorded it in their notebooks, and Li Yongrui carefully poured all the bear gall powder from the stainless steel plate into a glass bottle.
Following the same method, Li Yongrui then tested and weighed the remaining five bear galls belonging to Feng Chengmin one by one.
The powder of the second black bear golden gall was brownish-yellow, 20 yuan per gram, but it had a high weight; after removing the skin, it was 132.5 grams, priced at 2,650 yuan, which was 700-plus yuan more than the cooperative.
The third was a black bear iron gall; the powder was dark green, 12 yuan per gram, with a net weight of 96.2 grams, priced at 1,154.4 yuan, about 300 yuan more than the cooperative.
The fourth was a black bear grass gall, very small—likely from a young black bear—at 9 yuan per gram, with a net powder weight of 45.3 grams, priced at 407.7 yuan, 100-plus yuan more than the cooperative.
The fifth was a brown bear iron gall, dark brown, 12 yuan per gram, with a net powder weight of 204.4 grams, priced at 2,452.8 yuan, 1,400-plus yuan more than the cooperative.
The sixth was a brown bear grass gall, 6 yuan per gram, with a net powder weight of 223.8 grams, priced at 1,342.8 yuan, 400-plus yuan more than the cooperative.
When the final tally was made, Feng Chengmin's six bear galls sold for a total of 10,222.7 yuan. In total, he made about 4,300 yuan more than if he had sold them to the supply and marketing cooperative!
Selling bear gall every year, and more than once a year at that, Feng Chengmin could naturally estimate roughly how much these six galls would have fetched at the cooperative.
Therefore, after the final total was calculated, Feng Chengmin, who had been calm throughout, suddenly looked agitated.
The main point was that something clearly worth less than 6,000 yuan had now sold for over 10,000; no matter who it was, it would be difficult to remain unfazed.
Having finished the calculations, Li Yongrui didn't waste any words. He turned and took the briefcase from the person beside him, unlocked the small latch, and opened the lid.
Just as Wang An expected, the small briefcase held by Li Yongrui's bodyguard was filled with stack upon stack of "Big Unity" ten-yuan notes. At a glance, there were at least 50,000 yuan.
Most importantly, this money consisted of new notes with sequential serial numbers, and each kraft paper band around the stacks bore the official stamp of the bank.
In other words, the probability of there being counterfeit money in here was extremely, extremely low.