War Photographer's Notebook

Chapter 1734 Bonus Drone Mural

On the morning of January 1th, Sui Sui finally finished all the work before the New Year and made the wise decision to return home immediately to prepare for the New Year.

“To thank you for your hard work in the past year”

In the temporarily closed library, Sui Sui took the microphone and started the first annual meeting of the company. "So before the holiday, I decided to give everyone a bonus!"

Before she finished her words, Wei Ran, who was standing inside the bar, immediately lifted the red cloth covering the bar, revealing a long row of bulging red envelopes.

"First, Uncle Ivan and Mrs. Samantha"

As Sui Sui spoke, she had already picked up two red envelopes and personally gave them to Apoli and Mrs. Samantha, who were sitting on both sides of the nearest table.

"After we leave, I'll leave the house in your care."

Sui Sui handed over the red envelope, and then asked again, "Are you really not going to go to China with us?"

“I’m not going.”

Apoli took the red envelope and put it in his pocket. While Lucinda was translating for Mrs. Samantha, he said, "I'm old. I'm no longer at the age where I like to go out and see things. I wish you a happy Chinese New Year and a good time in China. Also, thank you for the red envelope."

“Thank you Uncle Ivan for your blessing.”

Sui Sui responded with a smile, and then accepted the thanks and blessings from Samantha translated by Lu Xinda.

"Katyusha! Natasha! It's your turn!" She greeted them enthusiastically.

Before she finished her words, a dozen or so pink-dressed little girls came over and took the red envelopes from Wei Ran or Sui Sui in an especially sweet manner.

These pink little girls, who are ostensibly the backbone of Baba Yaga, will also not go to China. In addition to guarding the library and the villa next door, they are also responsible for keeping an eye on the construction site at the winery.

Of course, during this period, the girls have agreed to take turns taking vacations and visiting Inta.

After these noisy girls sat down again with their respective red envelopes, Sui Sui also started to give red envelopes to the Hela girls under her. These girls were going to go to China with them.

Compared to Wei Ran who has a "bad memory", Sui Sui can call out the name of every Hela girl and even every pink little girl. While handing out red envelopes, she will even chat with these girls.

After two more stacks of red envelopes were given out, the next people to be called up were Lola, Lucinda and Liubov, three girls of about the same age. They would also go to China.

Finally, a big red envelope was given to sisters Marta and Kajianka respectively, and the annual meeting, which had just started for less than half an hour, had reached its final stage.

"Next up is holiday arrangements!"

Sui Sui cleared her throat. "Our vacation ends on the last day of February. We'll leave at noon today. Are you planning to take advantage of the vacation to move around freely?"

Naturally, no one responded to this question, even though the Hela girls knew that if they went to China, they would have good food and drink, and at most they would just be busy with work for a few days before the New Year.

What's more, for them, even if they are free to move around, there is really nowhere to go.

"Since there isn't any, everyone go pack your bags now, we'll leave after lunch!"

Following Sui Sui's order, the girls in the library immediately scattered like birds and beasts and disappeared.

"Where should we place so many girls after we take them back?" Wei Ran asked with a bitter face. He really wanted to live a quiet life for a few days.

"Don't worry, our colleagues in China will be responsible for the reception."

Sui Sui pulled Wei Ran to the next door and said, "Except for the two days during the Chinese New Year when they go to grandma's house, the rest of the time they can go wherever they want to play."

"Forget it, just pretend I didn't ask"

Wei Ran shook his head tiredly. Those girls were not stupid. They knew exactly where the delicious food and red envelopes were.

How could that be? Of course it was their grandmother’s house.

"I plan to bring back the phoenix crown I brought back from Spain last time."

Sui Sui held Wei Ran's arm and said expectantly, "Didn't you ask Brother Xia to help find an expert to take a look? When will they be available?"

"As soon as we go back, they might have time to go back." Wei Ran felt his head getting bigger.

Speaking of which, ever since he had a phone call with Xia Shushi a few days ago, the other party seemed to be possessed in the past few days, calling him every now and then to ask whether the Downey brothers' films had arrived, and by the way, he would also ask whether he was going to bring back the phoenix crown.

"Who will come forward then?" Sui Sui asked meaningfully.

"What are your plans?" Wei Ran threw the question back.

"How about I come forward?" Sui Sui said with a smile, "I, a Russian, will come forward."

"Okay"

Wei Ran nodded happily, obviously understanding the other party's hint.

When the two of them happily returned to the next door, the girls who had packed their luggage a day in advance had already gone into the kitchen and started busy preparing lunch.

Seeing this, Wei Ran and Sui Sui went back to their room, took out their suitcases, and began to prepare the things they planned to bring back home.

In addition to daily necessities, what Wei Ran planned to bring back were naturally the relics of the Spanish International Brigade.

Although the letter had been taken back by Xia Shushi, the flag, seal and other items were still in his hands.

I don't know how the letter is being cleaned up now.

Wei Ran muttered to himself, and in his heart he couldn't help but expect Xia Shushi to give him an answer after he returned.

After lunch that day, everyone arrived at the airport in an armored commercial vehicle driven by the little girls in a grand manner, and left Kazan on an An-74TK-300 passenger plane piloted by Apoli himself.

After a long flight and a refueling stop in Tomsk, it was already evening when the private plane landed at Jinmen Airport.

Fortunately, when this group of beautiful girls who attracted a lot of attention, and Wei Ran who was at the end, walked out of the airport, Wei Ran's parents were already waiting not far away.

"What kind of a life is this bastard living?"

Comrade Lao Wei couldn't help feeling dizzy when he saw his son parading through the streets like a rooster with a group of hens.

"What are you talking about?"

Wei Ran's mother glared at the former, then said with a slightly awkward smile, "Go back and buy a few more bags of flour and rice. I think we didn't buy enough pork, beef, mutton, etc. I think we need to buy a dough mixer and a few commercial rice cookers."

Without waiting for Comrade Lao Wei to accept the job in the kitchen, Sui Sui had already run over and hugged Wei Ran's mother, shouting "godfather and godmother".

Before Wei Ran and his father could even have a warm hug, the girls, led by Kajianka and others, swarmed over them, shouting auspicious words they had learned from Lu Xinda, such as "Happy New Year, Uncle and Auntie," and handing over various gifts they had prepared for the two.

There is no doubt that Comrade Lao Wei, whose face was almost split in two by laughter, forgot that he seemed to have a son. He hurriedly accepted various gifts such as ties, belts, mink coats, and enthusiastically greeted these young, beautiful and polite girls and walked to the parking lot.

Wei Ran, still preparing to hug, looked at the tourists around him, patted the back of his head awkwardly, and chased after them with a little difficulty, pushing his and Sui Sui's four large suitcases.

"Is this the whore boss?"

Among the crowd of passengers at the airport, a man who looked to be in his early thirties asked with great joy.

"Yes, it can only be that whore-monger."

His colleague next to him joked, "He has a lot more beautiful women in the background than the last time we saw him in the news."

"Next year I will apply to the company to develop new business in Russia."

The man who first recognized Wei Ran said expectantly, "Maybe when I come back next year I'll be able to bring such a large group of girls with me."

"Let's not talk about whether my sister-in-law can chop you into eight pieces."

His colleague next to him gloated and reminded him, "Our crappy company only makes health products for the elderly. Even if this thing can be sold in Russia, are you sure you will have a chance to meet young Russian girls?"

"What are you planning to eat later?" The man, who had been excited at first, immediately lost his expectations and changed the subject while walking with his suitcase.

At the same time, Wei Ran also narrowly got into the bus driven by his father before the door closed, so he was not left behind at the airport.

"Where are you going today?"

After the car drove out of the airport, Comrade Lao Wei, who was sitting in the driver's seat, first glanced at the girls who were chatting enthusiastically in the rearview mirror, and then asked his son who was sitting next to him as a tour guide.

"Do grandma and grandpa know we're back?" Wei Ran asked.

“I didn’t tell them.”

Comrade Lao Wei joked, "But judging from the noise at the airport entrance just now, they will probably know about it soon."

“We may not be able to go back today”

Wei Ran thought for a moment and said, "Sui Sui brought back an antique, it might be a national treasure, we plan to look for it tomorrow."

"Bringing back another antique?"

"again?"

"Didn't you bring back a piano a few years ago?"

Lao Wei asked with great interest, "What rare thing is this time?"

"Phoenix crown, it's a phoenix crown!" Sui Sui, who was sitting in the first row behind Wei Ran, said as if to take credit, "It's so beautiful!"

"So where are you going today?" Comrade Lao Wei asked, "To grandma's house or to your little Western-style building?"

"Where are we going?" Sui Sui leaned over to ask Wei Ran, who was sitting in front of her, "Can that small western-style building accommodate so many people?"

"Available for accommodation"

Wei Ran thought for a moment and said, "Let's take the high-speed train back tomorrow. It will take at least two or three hours."

"In that case, I'll take you to find a place to eat first." Wei Ran's mother made a straightforward decision, "After dinner, you can go back by yourselves."

The rest of the people naturally had no objection, and Comrade Lao Wei didn't even need a navigation system, and drove the bus to take everyone to the dining venue that had been booked in advance. This meal was naturally very lively, and during the meal, Sui Sui also curiously asked about their "arms business."

“Don’t mention it.”

Old Wei was helpless when he talked about this. "You don't know how much your mother has cut costs. Even Grandet and Plyushkin would have to go there to learn from her."

"What nonsense are you talking about?"

Wei Ran's mother glared at Comrade Old Wei, but then she said with a smile, "It's a bit too economical."

"No, why don't you tell me what my aunt did?" Wei Ran couldn't help but ask curiously.

"It was the drone that allowed her to reduce costs."

Comrade Lao Wei gave a thumbs up and said, "You don't know that the drones assembled there are now smaller in size, with frames made of plywood, and high-performance batteries and high-definition cameras are modular options.

Even the remote controller is not one for each machine. A box of 100 machines comes with one remote control and one pair of glasses. The cost of one machine before is now enough to make two machines.”

"Does it work?" Wei Ran couldn't help but ask.

“It can’t be used”

Comrade Lao Wei said proudly, "The idea of ​​making the high-performance battery and high-definition camera into optional modules was suggested by Xiao Ma's friend.

Ahem! If you want to have a fast-flying competition, you can use a cheap camera. If you want to have a clear-viewing competition, you can always switch to a high-definition 4K camera with night vision and a long-lasting battery.

I heard before

Ahem, the former Soviet Union, yes, the feedback from friends in the former Soviet Union is very good."

"Your father, Wang Beizhan and I simply bought an electronics factory in the south to produce the parts they use, and then shipped them to them by train."

Seeing that Old Wei was leaking more and more secrets, Wei Ran's mother simply took over the topic, "After all this, the cost of the cheapest model has been reduced to almost the same as a toy drone."

"What about the profit? Has the profit increased or decreased?" Sui Sui asked with concern.

"It has to get bigger," Wei Ran's mother said something into Su Su's ear.

"So many?!" Sui Sui exclaimed.

"Where is this?"

Wei Ran's mother said confidently, "We should be able to recover all our capital by the end of the year, and next year's profit is expected to double. If we are not afraid of overexerting ourselves now, and if we give us a little time to fully utilize our production capacity, it won't be difficult for every Russian farmer to own a machine."

Hearing the bold words coming out of their mother's mouth, Wei Ran and Sui Sui couldn't help but look at each other. They both saw surprise in each other's eyes.

The girls who came along enjoyed the meal very much, and Comrade Lao Wei and his wife also enjoyed showing off their brilliant achievements over the past few months.

In contrast, neither Wei Ran nor Sui Sui mentioned their respective achievements.

"Come on, let's have a drink."

Wei Ran said, and stood up to pour a glass of wine for his parents, and said jokingly, "The two old comrades should keep up the hard work to make money. I wish your father will become a dragon and your mother will become a phoenix. I will just wait patiently for the support of my parents."

"You just talk nonsense every day"

Comrade Lao Wei said this, but he still raised his glass and clinked glasses happily with the younger ones at the table, and drank it all in one gulp amid the "Ula" shouts of the girls at the other two tables.

After a sumptuous dinner, when they were about to go out again, Aunt Fu from the travel agency had brought a few people with her to deliver two Iveco buses that also belonged to the travel agency. She also arranged for a driver to drive the bus away. After giving some enthusiastic instructions to Wei Ran and Sui Sui, she personally drove away Wei Ran's parents.

"Let's go back too," Wei Ran said with a burp.

"I seem to have forgotten to show them my phoenix crown just now," said Su Su incoherently after drinking two glasses of white wine and successfully getting herself drunk.

“There are plenty of opportunities”

As Wei Ran was speaking, he and Marta helped Sui Sui get into an Iveco.

Following closely, the rest of the girls also divided into two teams and got into two cars, while the Kajianka sisters, who had never drunk alcohol during the entire journey, took over the driving job.

"Have all those drones been delivered to your friends on the front lines?"

When the car started, Wei Ran hugged the sleeping Sui Sui and whispered to Marta who was sitting on the other side of Sui Sui.

"My friends on the front lines have countless drones at their disposal"

Marta corrected, "Now each of them will have a large box of drones in their car, and they carry the remote control, glasses and spare batteries with them, just like a gun. "

"Is it useful?" Wei Ran asked after a pause.

“My friend hasn’t been injured for a long time.”

Marta said gratefully, "Those drones have been a great help. Not only can they fight, but they can also clear mines, deliver medicine and supplies, and conduct patrols. There have been no casualties in the villages you visited for a long time."

At this point, Marta, who had just taken the initiative to toast Wei Ran's parents several times, turned her head and looked at Wei Ran, and said very seriously, "I want to thank you for taking me away from the battlefield, and I also want to thank Aurora for persuading me and taking me in.

She helped me calculate how many people I could save in a whole year, and now she has done everything she promised, no more, no less."

"It's really interesting."

Wei Ran mumbled in his native language, then continued in Russian, "I heard that your friends commissioned you to post those videos and activated the bounty hunter mode?"

“Yes, and the profit is good.”

Marta said happily, "The drones they used were all obtained by exchanging those bounty videos, and the people who took the orders to complete the bounty missions were all combat engineers who had received training from your friends. They saved many people on the battlefield."

"That's good." Wei Ran breathed a sigh of relief.

"Do you remember the village you visited?" Marta asked.

"Remember"

Wei Ran nodded. It was there that he met Marta by chance and brought her back.

"The village rebuilt a wall before the New Year"

Marta said, taking out her phone and pulling out a photo and handing it to Wei Ran, "They repainted the scene from the photo of the red flag of the Capitol that you found on that wall, and also painted Volovic. Do you remember Volovic?"

"The guy who first painted the photo I found on the wall to encourage everyone?" Wei Ran asked without turning his head, his attention all focused on the screen of the mobile phone handed to him by Marta.

This is a photo of the village. Outside the village, a lonely wall was built, and painted on the wall was the scene from the photo of the red flag of the Capitol that I found.

In the lower left corner of the mural, there is a figure holding a paint bucket in one hand and a long-handled brush in the other. There is red paint remaining on the edge of the paint bucket in his hand, and the long-handled brush is also covered with red paint, extending all the way to the red flag.

"it's him"

Marta took the phone from Wei Ran and said, "He spent a week to finish the painting on the wall of his house, but he died the second week after the painting was finished."

"I remember him," Wei Ran sighed.

“Now He’s Alive Again”

Marta shook the screen of her mobile phone. "Look, this painting was taken before the New Year. It is still there. Not a single bullet or shrapnel has hit it."

“Tell your friends to take a good photo of the mural sometime.”

Sui Sui, who was drunk and leaning in Wei Ran's arms, didn't even open her eyes. She hugged Wei Ran's neck and said in a daze, "Maybe we can make a movie after the New Year, based on that mural and the young man named Volovic."

"I thought you were asleep," Marta smiled, "I'll ask my friend to take a good picture."

“I was asleep.”

Sui Sui yawned loudly as she spoke, then looked up at Wei Ran who was still holding her. With a bright smile in her drunken eyes, she asked in her native language, "Are we also considered heroes? At least for that small village."

"Of course, my queen."

Wei Ran smiled and replied seriously, "To many people, you are already a hero."

"And you, too. You are all heroes too."

Sui Sui sat up straight, hooked her hands on Wei Ran and Marta's shoulders, and said with a smile.

"I'm just lucky to survive again and again," Wei Ran sighed secretly.

"I just luckily left the battlefield alive," Marta sighed in Russian.

In a sense, the two people sitting next to Sui Sui are just survivors of the war. There is no victory or defeat, just survivors.

"Lu Xun said so!"

Sui Sui patted Marta's shoulder vigorously and said, "If you can't kill me, I will become stronger. Now that I'm alive, I'll become even stronger!"

"Did Lu Xun say this?" Wei Ran asked with a smile, and at the same time glanced at Marta who seemed to have complete faith in Mr. Lu Xun.

"From now on he said"

Sui Sui covered her mouth with her hand before she could finish her words, and looked at the car door in panic.

"Stop it quickly."

"vomit--"

A queen who couldn't hold her liquor was handsome for less than three seconds, but ended up vomiting in the carriage in an extremely embarrassing manner.

"Is she really half Slavic?"

All the girls in the carriage, even Wei Ran, couldn't help but have the same question in their minds.