Wang An didn't want to collect leather, not because leather wasn't profitable, but because the stuff itself wasn't worth much. Not only did it take up space, but the profit margin was too low.
To put it bluntly, Wang An simply looked down on that small amount of money.
On March 7th, Feng Chengmin hurried over with a sled to deliver the goods he had collected, costing Wang An another 60,000 yuan.
In just two short days, a total of 210,000 yuan had been invested.
Of course, this was because everyone had been stockpiling their goods for too long; in the future, on the 6th of every month, he certainly wouldn't be able to collect this much.
However, because Wang An had lowered the purchase price, the goods worth over 150,000 yuan collected by the three of them could be sold for approximately 310,000 yuan.
In other words, Wang An, Wang Li, and Mu Xueli could make a pure profit of about 160,000 yuan or more in a single day.
It was just that the profit from Feng Chengmin's portion of the goods wasn't very high; the three of them could only earn about 10,000 yuan in total from that.
Although 10,000 yuan at this time was a considerably massive sum—roughly equivalent to 2 million yuan in later generations—when one thought about the immense risk of death the three of them faced on their journey to Anguo, earning this much money wasn't actually that significant.
When Wang An told Feng Chengmin that they would start collecting precious furs starting March 16th, Feng Chengmin was instantly delighted, saying with a face full of joy
"Collecting furs is great! Collecting furs is absolutely great! People have always wanted me to collect furs, but I never dared to. Hahaha... very good, very good. So, what price are we buying at?"
It wasn't surprising that Feng Chengmin was happy. One had to realize that for hunters entering the mountains, the most abundant harvest was actually furs.
After all, in a place like the Lesser Khingan Mountains, the variety of animals that produced fur was extremely diverse.
Squirrels, sables, minks, otters, musk rats, weasels, foxes, raccoon dogs, badgers, blue sheep, wolves, dholes, lynxes, bears, leopard cats, Amur leopards... and so on. The furs of these animals were all very high quality.
As for the extremely valuable items like bear gall, deer velvet, bezoars, musk, and ginseng, how many of those could there actually be?
Hearing this, Wang An took out the price list he had seized from the supply and marketing cooperative and said
"For things like squirrel skins, musk rat skins, and weasel skins, we just need to be one yuan higher than the cooperative.
Then for fox, wolf, raccoon dog, and bear skins—the ones worth dozens of yuan but under a hundred—we'll offer 5 yuan more than the cooperative."
The "water rat" Wang An mentioned was the musk rat, also known as the *qinggen diao*.
Besides the musk rat, there were also minks and otters in the area, and otters were locally called "water dogs."
The musk rat, mink, and otter were three completely different animals. Although they all liked living in water, there wasn't even a shred of relation between the three of them.
The musk rat was very small, and the price of its fur wasn't much different from a squirrel's, both around four or five yuan.
But mink and otter furs were completely different. Minks were similar in size to sables, and their fur price was similar to sable skins—they were quite valuable.
As for otters, they were even more extraordinary; the price of a single otter skin was nearly the same as that of a lynx skin.
However, the number of these two in the local area was very small, their rarity comparable to that of leopard cats at the time. Furthermore, because they lived in water, let alone hunting them, even spotting them was quite a struggle.
In any case, since his rebirth, Wang An had seen plenty of musk rats, but he hadn't seen a single mink or otter.
He had heard that these three were more common over in the Greater Khingan Mountains, but Wang An had never been there.
Pausing for a moment, Wang An hesitated for a long while before adding
"Then for sable, mink, water dog, leopard cat, lynx, and wolverine skins, let's go 30 yuan higher per piece. I reckon this price will definitely be enough.
For leopard skins, let's just go 500 higher. Anyway, I don't think we'll necessarily be able to collect any leopard skins."
There were countless hunters throughout the Lesser Khingan Mountains, but the number of people who had actually killed a leopard was very few, and leopard skins available for trade were even rarer.
Once Wang An finished speaking, Feng Chengmin immediately looked as if he were rubbing his palms in anticipation, clearly impatient to start collecting furs.
It couldn't be helped; the volume of furs was simply too vast. Even if the profit wasn't as high as items like bear gall or bezoars, it was absolutely not to be underestimated.
Following this, after Wang An discussed the purchase prices for the furs with Feng Chengmin, Wang Li, and Mu Xueli, it became noon. The three of them had another drink at Wang An's house before dispersing, planning to notify the nearby hunters tomorrow.
The next day, with nothing to do, Wang An decided to go check out the "dead man's pit" where Song Ping had hidden his treasure.
As the saying goes, "Whether there are dates or not, try shaking the branch first." What if he found it smoothly?
Thus, Wang An called over Huang Zhong. The two of them each carried a gun, and on the sled, they placed tools such as a pickaxe, a boarding axe, an iron shovel, a sledgehammer, and a chisel. Wang An also brought a gas mask in his bag. The two of them drove the sled straight toward Taiping Village.
This time, Wang An did not bring Mu Xueli and Wang Li.
Mainly, according to Song Shuanzhu, the dead man's pit wasn't large—at most less than half a *mu*, roughly 300 square meters. There was absolutely no need to bring the other two.
Moreover, whether there was treasure and whether it could be found was entirely unknown. To be honest, even Wang An himself didn't hold much hope.
On the way, Huang Zhong asked Wang An in a bit of a daze
"Big brother, what are we going to do?"
Indeed, although Wang An had called him out, he hadn't said what they were doing.
Wang An didn't hide it and smiled
"Remember that night we went to find Song Shuanzhu? He told me that Song Ping hid some treasure in a certain place. Today, we're going to find the treasure Song Ping left behind."
The moment he heard "treasure," Huang Zhong's eyes turned green with greed.
When it came to searching for treasure, there was perhaps no one who wouldn't be interested.
Huang Zhong said with a glowing face
"Searching for treasure? Big brother, do you know what kind of treasure it is?"
Wang An shook his head and said
"I don't know. Song Shuanzhu said he didn't know what Song Ping hid, but it's definitely something valuable."
After a pause, Wang An added
"I just don't know if we can find it. Song Shuanzhu said he went twice and didn't find anything, so we shouldn't get our hopes up. Anyway, it's better if we find it; if not, we'll just treat it as a stroll."
Huang Zhong nodded, but his face remained full of excitement as he said
"Mm-hmm, I reckon we'll definitely find it if we go, hehehe..."
Everyone is the same; they always feel that they are the sole lucky one.