My Gold Rush Career Begins in 1984

Chapter 113 Ready to use right away
Wu Yang, familiar with the route, dragged the corpse down to the riverbank, tumbled into the water, watched it drift away, washed his hands in the river, and then returned.

The two Wu-Yue people were stunned by the skillful movements.

Seeing Wu Yang approach, the two felt a little scared and moved to the side, keeping a little distance.

Wu Yang noticed their subtle movements and couldn't help but roll his eyes: "Brother Zhou, what do we do with these two? Kill them? This whole mess was their doing; they're trying to get us killed!"

Upon hearing this, the two became even more terrified.

Zhou Jingming looked at the two of them and said, "Forget it... You can go now. Whether you stay in Gold Rush Valley or go back to your hometown, you'd better watch your mouths from now on."

You all probably know why Old Tang and that guy surnamed Ma died. They were the ones who started causing me trouble. If I didn't deal with them, I might suffer the consequences later.

"You've been here for a while now, so you should know that this is what Gold Rush Valley is like."

The two men from Wu and Yue nodded repeatedly.

It wasn't that Zhou Jingming wasn't ruthless enough; he just didn't want to kill indiscriminately.

Having worked in the gold mining industry for many years, Zhou Jingming knows that the lower down the gold miners are, the harder it is for them.

They came to this desolate wilderness from afar with dreams of getting rich, only to find that their dreams were as fragile as a bubble that would burst at the slightest touch. In this cruel environment, they could only live like willows swaying in the wind, drifting aimlessly. Many times, it wasn't that they really wanted to do it, but that they had no choice.

These two people posed no threat to Zhou Jingming.

Even if they don't say anything, the news will still get out, and people will still come knocking on their door. The fact that the small peninsula has rich mineral resources has long been out of the question.

The crux of the problem lies in people's desire for gold, in their inner greed.

On the other hand, none of the gold prospectors who came to the Gold Rush Valley were not greedy.

Zhou Jingming himself was no exception.

The two Wu-Yue people dared not linger any longer and were severely beaten, suffering numerous hidden injuries. They were unable to walk properly and stumbled away.

Zhou Jingming and Wu Yang watched them walk away, then turned back.

Seeing the two return, Peng Yuanchao, who was sitting at the tent entrance with his gun in his arms, breathed a sigh of relief. He put the hunting rifle on the table and busied himself adding firewood to the fire.

Zhou Jingming and Wu Yang crawled into the tent, took off their wet clothes, dried their hair with towels, changed into dry clothes, and dragged a wooden stump to the fire to sit and warm themselves.

Wu Yang took out the gold chain and gold ring from his pocket, weighed them in his hand, and immediately attracted Peng Yuanchao's attention.

Needless to say, Peng Yuanchao knew where the stuff came from.

He reached out and took the item, weighed it in his hand, and asked Wu Yang, "How many grams do you think it weighs?"

Wu Yang thought for a moment: "It feels quite heavy, it should weigh about forty grams!"

"I bet it can't be more than thirty grams!"

As Peng Yuanchao spoke, he got up, turned over the small balance scale in his bag, put the item on it, weighed it, and announced the number: "Twenty-eight grams!"

Wu Yang couldn't help but curse, "Damn, that's all!"

Zhou Jingming looked at him with a smile: "In the Gold Rush Valley, if there is gold, everyone will hide it very carefully. Someone like him, with gold chains and gold rings, is already considered to be quite unconventional. How much could he dare to wear? If he wears too much, isn't he afraid of being robbed?"

Wu Yang nodded slightly and looked at Peng Yuanchao: "Now that the scales are out, let's divide it according to the established rules! Even a small mosquito is still meat!"

Peng Yuanchao weighed the gold ring and the gold chain separately. The gold ring weighed eight grams and the gold chain weighed twenty grams. He went to get an axe, cut the gold chain in half, took out a portion, weighed it together with the gold ring, and made a total of fourteen grams. He then handed it to Zhou Jingming.

The remaining gold chains were divided into two portions, one large and one small. They were weighed separately; one portion weighed exactly eight grams, and the other six grams. Just as he was about to add some more for Wu Yang, Wu Yang casually took the eight grams of gold and put it into his small glass bottle, saying, "Why divide it so finely? That's enough!"

Peng Yuanchao smiled and didn't say anything more. He took the remaining gold chain and returned the scales and axe to their place.

When he returned to the fire and sat down, Zhou Jingming asked, "Brother Peng, what's going on today? Everyone's been dawdling in their tents to get their guns, and they haven't come out for ages."

To be honest, when Zhou Jingming went outside the tent alone with his hunting rifle and saw Ma Jihua and his large group of people coming over, but no one came out beside him, he felt a lot of pressure.

You have to understand that in that situation, if the other party attacked him deadly from the start, he would definitely be finished.

The remaining nine guns were the greatest source of confidence in calmly dealing with the overwhelming numbers of the enemy.

However, apart from Wu Yang who came out in time, the rest of the people were like hens laying eggs, taking forever to squeeze one out.

Peng Yuanchao seemed unaware of the seriousness of the problem: "The gun is out of bullets, they're busy loading it!"

Zhou Jingming frowned immediately: "The guns are out of bullets... Brother Peng, when we brought these guns back, we told you to put them away. Don't you know that in the Gold Rush Valley, guns can't be used as soon as you pick them up? Didn't you see that when Wu Yang and I slept at night, we kept the guns in places where we could easily reach them?"
"If someone were to break in, pick up a gun, and it wouldn't fire, what's the difference between it and a fire poker?"

Seeing that Zhou Jingming's expression was not right, Peng Yuanchao quickly explained, "Now that there are more people in the team, it's a bit chaotic. I was afraid they might mess things up and accidentally discharge the gun and hurt someone, so I took all the bullets out of the gun, thinking I'd reload it when I needed to use it."

The guns were collected and stored in a unified manner, which was Zhou Jingming's own idea.

This thing is, after all, a weapon of mass destruction. If it falls into the hands of those people below, who are all hot-tempered, they are likely to clash over trivial matters. If they know how to control themselves, it's fine, but if they get angry and start shooting, it could be fatal.

Furthermore, it's hard to say what this person is thinking. Zhou Jingming couldn't guarantee that the people in the team didn't have any ulterior motives. What if one day they took the guns that had been distributed to them, turned around, and pointed the guns at him?
The heart of defense is indispensable!

Regardless, entrusting the guns to them for safekeeping would have too many drawbacks.

So he ordered Peng Yuanchao to collect the guns and put them away in a safe place. However, he didn't expect Peng Yuanchao to remove the bullets from the guns, which would cause delays in loading the guns due to the presence of molecular bullets during that critical situation…

Zhou Jingming's forehead veins throbbed, but after thinking for a moment, he suppressed his anger: "Brother Peng, I know you're doing this for safety reasons, but next time, don't do it like this. A gun should be ready to use as soon as you pick it up."

Otherwise, like today, if such a large group of people rushed over, and we just opened fire... do you think it would be risky?

Peng Yuanchao now understood the problem, and after thinking about it carefully, he felt a chill of fear: "Brother, I promise it won't happen again!"

"Ok!"

Zhou Jingming nodded slightly, and the matter was thus put to rest.

The next day, another group of people went upstream through the woods behind the small peninsula, which made everyone on guard for a while.

However, those people were just passing by, keeping a distance of several dozen meters from Zhou Jingming's camp, and nothing happened.

The rain continued to fall for three more days before gradually clearing up.

The river has risen considerably, and in many places on the hillside, water from the earth's veins has even seeped out. It is estimated that the river level will not drop quickly in the short term.

The water on the small peninsula remained stagnant, making it inconvenient to collect water. After the rain stopped, the group focused on digging drainage ditches.

Taking advantage of the high water flow, the excavated mud and sand were dumped directly into the river to be carried away by the water, saving a lot of trouble in transportation and greatly accelerating the progress of the drainage ditch excavation.

Three days later, the water in the sandpit was drained, and a new small well with clean water was dug. The previous one had long been destroyed by the flood.

After that, the digging, transporting, and washing of materials were finally able to proceed normally.

For the next two weeks, the small peninsula remained calm, and nothing seemed to happen in the Chagou River Valley.

In fact, due to the cold weather, people can only go into the mountains to pan for gold for about half a year each year. In the blink of an eye, it's already mid-July.

By this time, most of the prospectors who came to pan for gold had arrived and joined the Gold Rush Valley. Mining sites that were supposed to exist had already been established, and those that were supposed to be merged had already been merged. The Gold Rush Valley had reached its most stable period.

Everyone was busy searching for items, unlike at the beginning when everyone was fighting and it was a chaotic mess.

During this period, the small peninsula produced a good amount of gold. Most of the time, Zhou Jingming was able to get nine grams of gold every day. On the days when he reached the bottom, the harvest was even richer, with twelve grams a day, and even fifteen grams on one day, because he found several small gold beans in the small gold mine at the bottom of the pit.

Of course, there are also times when it's less frequent.

As the sand pit is dug deeper and deeper, the shovels and windlasses are re-erected, and some surface mud and sand need to be removed. With these miscellaneous tasks causing delays, the amount of gold extracted from the mine will naturally be less, and the share will be smaller.

That night, the weather turned gloomy again, and it started to drizzle.

After days of hard work, everyone was feeling the strain. The next morning, seeing that the weather was changing, Peng Yuanchao decided to let everyone rest for a day. He also brought out the half piece of beaver meat that he had been saving and was reluctant to eat, preparing to have a good meal.

Zhou Jingming and Wu Yang continued their morning and evening training sessions. After returning home, they had nothing to do, and since they didn't need to help with cooking, they simply went to bed and took advantage of the rare cool weather to have a comfortable nap. They were only woken up by Peng Yuanchao when the food was ready.

After the meal, the light rain stopped and the sun gradually came out. Zhou Jingming went to the riverbank and set a fish trap. Bored, he called Wu Yang and led Jin Wang to wander in the mountains, hoping to see if they could find any wild animals to bring back to feed the dogs.

However, after wandering around the mountain for more than two hours, they saw two rabbits, but they ran away very fast, giving Zhou Jingming and Wu Yang no chance to fire their guns.

Jinwang did chase after it, but after quite a while, it returned empty-handed and still couldn't catch up.

The two continued to wander in the mountains, searching for traces of wild animals.

"Choo Choo Choo……"

"Choo Choo Choo……"

A strange sound came from afar, sharp and short.

Upon hearing the sound, Wu Yang's expression changed. He took the gun off his shoulder and warily scanned his surroundings: "What is that?"

Zhou Jingming had heard this sound more than once and immediately recognized it: "Don't be so nervous, it's the sound of a marmot!"

Wu Yang was taken aback: "What does a marmot look like?"

Zhou Jingming smiled and said, "You'll see when you see small animals that can grow to ten or so pounds!"

The two then followed the sound.

Not long after, on a sunny grassy slope, Zhou Jingming saw piles of soil that had been dug up. He pointed and said, "Those mounds are what marmots dug out of their burrows... There's one over there!"

Following the direction Zhou Jingming pointed, Wu Yang saw a small, brown-yellow animal standing on the grassy slope, turning its little head and looking around.

Jin Wang was also looking up, occasionally glancing at Zhou Jingming, and whimpering softly.

Seeing its impatient look, Zhou Jingming gave it a command: "Hee hee..."

Once he received permission, Jin Wang immediately charged towards the hillside where the bird was located.

The alert marmot saw the commotion, ducked down, and scurried into its burrow.

(End of this chapter)