At this point, Wang Li stopped talking. Wang An was still pondering as he listened, and subconsciously glanced at Wang Li. He saw that on Wang Li's face, which was still bruised dark blue from being slapped, a look of resentment was beginning to rise again.
Wang An suddenly reacted and hurriedly said, "Old Fifth, hurry up and learn from Brother Mu how to extract black bear gallbladders. This is technical work; once you learn it, it's knowledge in your pocket."
Sure enough, before the resentment could even fully surface, the moment Wang Li heard about extracting gallbladders, it vanished instantly. He ran over to Mu Xueli, filled with excitement.
Looking at Wang Li's retreating back, Wang An thought to himself: *Luckily, Old Fifth is quite easy to fool!*
He glanced at his own right hand. *Sigh! Every single day!*
While Wang An was still wondering where three black bears had popped up from, he heard Mu Xueli shout happily, "Brother-in-law, this one is an iron gallbladder!"
Wang An was also very pleased upon hearing this. Although an iron gallbladder wasn't as valuable as a gold one, it was still worth at least 300-plus yuan. He quickly pulled out some fine hemp rope and a cloth bag, ran over, carefully tied the top of the iron gallbladder, and placed it in the bag.
Watching his fourth brother carefully pack the iron gallbladder into the cloth bag, Wang Li could no longer restrain himself and asked, "Fourth Brother, how much is an iron gallbladder like this worth?"
Wang An glanced at Wang Li. Perhaps Old Fifth had never paid attention to the purchase prices when he went to the county supply and marketing cooperative, so Wang An casually smiled and said, "This one is about three or four hundred; you can get over a hundred yuan from it."
Upon hearing this, the corners of Wang Li's mouth stretched almost to his ears, and he muttered to himself, "Over a hundred yuan... oh my god! I've never even seen what a hundred yuan looks like!"
At this time, Mu Xueli said with a smile, "Working with your fourth brother, what's a hundred yuan? A thousand yuan is small change!"
Hearing this, Wang Li seemed to realize something. He looked at the remaining two black bears whose gallbladders hadn't been taken yet and the large pile of blue sheep pelts, and subconsciously nodded!
Earlier, while chatting with Mu Xueli, Wang Li had heard her mention the approximate price of blue sheep pelts. This huge pile could genuinely be worth a lot of money!
Next, the second black bear yielded another iron gallbladder. The three of them were happy, but they had calmed down significantly.
However, the third black bear also yielded an iron gallbladder. Mu Xueli and Wang An couldn't help but look at each other in bewilderment. Only Wang Li, oblivious to the oddity, said excitedly, "Doesn't that make it over a thousand yuan then?"
Wang An and Mu Xueli ignored Wang Li, staring silently at the iron gallbladder before them. Both were extremely puzzled; this situation was truly bizarre.
If the third bear's gallbladder had been gold or grass, they would have felt it was normal. Based on a one-third probability, either of those would have been fine!
But three black bears producing three iron gallbladders—what were the odds of that?
"Brother-in-law, you said these three black bears are basically the same size. Could they be from the same litter?" Mu Xueli asked curiously.
Wang Li looked at the three bears. Come to think of it, they really did look like they were from the same litter; they were all around two hundred and twenty to thirty pounds, not particularly large, the kind that had left the den a year or two ago. Moreover, none of them had testicles. These three black bears really might have been three biological sisters!
Seeing this, Wang An nodded. "Yeah, it's likely that's the case!"
Then Wang An asked, "Then tell me, why did that mother and her two cubs we hunted last time produce three different types of gallbladders?"
Mu Xueli was stunned for a moment, blinked hard a few times, and then said something that sounded perfectly logical: "Maybe those two little black bears took after their father!"
After Mu Xueli spoke, Wang An was momentarily dazed. *Could it be that biological brothers have different gallbladders, but biological sisters have the same?*
After thinking for a while, Wang An suddenly realized: *Why the hell am I obsessing over this? Whatever the fuck it is!*
With that thought, Wang An looked up and found that Mu Xueli had produced a cloth bag from somewhere and was packing the bear gallbladders into it, while Wang Li was still standing there grinning like an idiot.
"I told you to learn how to extract gallbladders, what are you doing? Have you learned it yet?" Wang An bellowed at Wang Li.
Wang An's shout immediately stopped Wang Li's silly grinning. Without answering, he obediently stepped forward to help Mu Xueli pack the gallbladders.
Wang An gathered the seven wolves together. Four of the wolves had intact pelts. The last three that Wang An had killed didn't have major injuries to their pelts, only small holes the size of fingernails from the dogs' bites!
They couldn't be sold as prime pelts anymore; they could only be used to make mattresses!
Nowadays, even in Shen Wei's house, the cotton mattresses were topped with pelt mattresses after they had been dried on the *kang*. These pelt mattresses were truly warm, but they attracted lice terribly. Every few days, they had to be thrown outside to freeze for a while; otherwise, with the fur protecting them, the lice wouldn't freeze to death in just a day or two!
Wang Li handed the last collected iron gallbladder to Wang An for safekeeping, and then Wang An said, "Old Fifth, you skin these three wolf pelts to get some practice. I'm going to fetch the sled."
After speaking, Wang An turned and left. A few minutes later, he returned to the blue sheep pile, tied up the big horse, fed it fodder, and joined Wang Li and Mu Xueli in skinning and butchering the wolves and black bears.
By the time they finished everything, Wang An checked his watch and saw it was already one in the afternoon. The three of them set about starting a fire to cook.
Wang An and Mu Xueli were already well-versed in this routine; it was second nature to them. However, while Wang An was stewing the blue sheep meat, Mu Xueli and Wang Li had a disagreement over the grilled meat.
Mu Xueli wanted to grill the blue sheep meat, saying only mutton tasted good grilled! But Wang Li insisted on grilling the black bear meat, saying bear meat had more fat and was therefore more fragrant!
Wang An looked at them and almost gave them each a kick, shouting impatiently, "Are you two sick? Why are you bickering over such a trivial thing? Grill whatever you want!"
Actually, Wang An also preferred mutton. Bear meat was too fatty; it was only suitable for rendering oil or stewing with pickled cabbage. Nowadays, whether at Wang An's house or Mu Xueli's, fatty meat was rarely seen on the dinner table. Mainly, neither the adults nor the children wanted to eat it!
Especially at Wang An's house, whenever fatty meat was left on the plate, Liu Guilan would make Wang Dazhu eat it. Wang Dazhu didn't dare resist and could only symbolically eat a couple of slices!
Whatever was left was basically mixed into the cornmeal or boiled with potatoes to feed the dogs!
Dogs are animals that cannot be fed meat alone, because humans have bred them into omnivores!
Once the grilled meat was done, Wang An and Mu Xueli ate their mixed-grain steamed buns with the grilled mutton, while Wang Li ate the grilled bear meat by himself. He didn't touch a single bite of the buns; he ate until his mouth was dripping with oil, finding it incredibly savory.
Wang An and Mu Xueli didn't mind. When they first started hunting in the mountains, they also liked fatty meat, but after eating too much of it, they lost interest and found that the steamed buns were what they loved most!
That's just how people are; they are constantly changing!
After a while, the mutton stew was ready. Wang An and Mu Xueli began drinking the soup, while Wang Li was still stuffing grilled bear meat into his mouth!
At Wang Li's age, this appetite was perfectly normal. The saying "a half-grown boy eats a grown man out of house and home" was absolutely accurate!
(End of Chapter)