Returning to the small mountain village of '86, intelligence updated daily.

"Brother Zhou, how have you been lately?"

"Hey—isn't this Zhou Lao Er? What's up? Not lazy anymore? Look at you, you don't look like our Brother Zhou at all. You're probably not even his biological son."

Wearing leather shoes, Li Dehua was very arrogant, openly mocking Zhou Shijie.

He was usually arrogant and domineering in the village, and it was rumored that he had connections with higher-ups, which was why he dared to be so flamboyant.

Zhou Shijie naturally saw the person who had bullied him since childhood. He instinctively looked away, but unexpectedly, he was met with even more vicious words in return.

"Second brother, what's wrong? Are you too scared to look at me? Second brother is just second brother, spineless, hahahaha—"

Upon hearing this, Zhou Shijie gradually clenched his fists.

Just then, Zhou Shiwei took a step back, patted Zhou Shijie on the shoulder, and whispered:

"Don't be impatient, let's see what he's up to."

After finishing speaking, Zhou Shiwei stepped forward and said in a calm tone:

"Li Dehua, my family paid off the money we owed you a few days ago. What do you want to do today? Just say it."

Li Dehua, a wealthy man with ten thousand yuan, clearly harbored a slight fear of Zhou Shiwei, as he had previously caused Zhou Shiwei to miss an opportunity.

Otherwise, the Zhou family, not the Li family, would be the wealthy ones now.

After the incident was exposed, Zhou Shiwei, who was still quite young at the time, rushed into his house with a knife. If the villagers hadn't arrived quickly...

Therefore, Li Dehua was not afraid of anyone in the village except Zhou Shiwei, who appeared to be down-to-earth and hardworking but secretly harbored a ruthless streak.

"Brother Zhou, you're being too polite."

"We're all relatives from the same village, we see each other all the time. I heard you hunted a wild boar today, that's impressive! I'm here to support your business, brother."

Li Dehua put away the disdainful expression on his face and spoke to Zhou Shiwei in a calm and gentle tone.

Ignoring the other party's flattery, Zhou Shiwei said calmly:

"Some things from the past are best left in the past, but you still want to bully my second brother today?"

Upon hearing this, Li Dehua feigned an apology to Zhou Shijie, who was two steps behind him:

"Hey, second brother, I was just kidding. Let's not talk about that. Brother Zhou, do you have any pork kidneys here? Can you get me a couple?"

Li Dehua dared not touch the tiger's whiskers again and turned to serious business. Just as Zhou Shiwei was about to respond, Zhou Rui spoke up with a smile.

"Uncle, you've come at a bad time. These pork kidneys have already been reserved."

Zhou Shiwei felt a clear sense of doubt, but he remained calm and decisively chose to believe Zhou Rui.

Zhou Rui was not about to sell the pork kidneys to Li Dehua so easily; he was determined to squeeze some money out of him.

He certainly knew why Li Dehua, a wealthy man with ten thousand yuan, was so insistent on buying pork kidneys to eat, because at that time, it was rumored in rural areas that eating pork kidneys had the effect of enhancing male virility.

As far as he knew, Li Dehua was a man with severe kidney deficiency, to put it bluntly.

This morning, Zhou Rui saw the latest intelligence very early in the morning.

[Intelligence 1: Li Dehua, a wealthy man with tens of thousands of yuan, leads an immoral private life and suffers from severe kidney deficiency, spending his days seeking remedies to nourish his kidneys.]

[Intelligence 2: Li Dehua, a wealthy man with ten thousand yuan, is eager to eat kidneys.]

The two pieces of information are: one was already known yesterday, and the other is new.

In fact, Zhou Rui had a similar guess yesterday, but he was not sure. Today's information just confirmed his guess.

This gave him the confidence to extort money from Li Dehua.

As expected, Li Dehua looked anxious after hearing that the pork kidneys had already been pre-ordered.

"What?! Who wants it?! I'll pay double!"

Zhou Rui saw this and thought to himself that things were settled, but on his face he looked reluctant to part with it.

"Uncle, I'm afraid this isn't a good idea. They paid 10 yuan for a whole set of pig offal."

Zhou Rui deliberately exaggerated the price, saying that in those days, a pair of pig kidneys, along with pig liver, pig heart, pig stomach, large and small intestines, and pig lungs, would generally cost around 6 yuan.

Even if it's a wild boar, the price won't rise by more than 2 yuan, which is a maximum of 8 yuan.

Upon hearing this, Li Dehua thought for a moment and then said:

"I only want the pork kidneys."

Zhou Rui shook his head.

"If I don't have pork kidneys, that household won't want it, and then my other offal won't sell well."

Li Dehua pondered for a while, then gritted his teeth.

"I'll pay 15! But you have to give me two pounds of pork ribs as a gift."

Clearly, Li Dehua didn't want to suffer too much of a loss; the double he mentioned earlier referred to the price of a pair of pork kidneys.

But now they were in a difficult situation, so they quoted a price of 15 yuan, adding half the price, and also made some demands.

Zhou Rui sighed and said:

"Sigh—they've already paid a deposit, and they're my relatives."

"He knows that my mom makes thick and durable insoles, so he ordered several pairs. If I offend him like this, my insoles won't sell well."

Zhou Rui's meaning was clear: he wanted the other party to buy the remaining insoles as well.

Li Dehua wasn't stupid; he naturally understood Zhou Rui's implied meaning. His expression gradually froze, and he slowly said:

"Little one, that's not how you do business!"

At this moment, Zhou Shiwei, standing behind Zhou Rui, also spoke in a cold tone:

"Others may be afraid of you, Li Dehua, but I'm not. Business is about voluntariness. If we don't want to sell, do you expect us to rob us?"

At this moment, Zhou Rui, acting as a peacemaker, quickly spoke up:

"Uncle, well, if we've offended them, so be it. I'll go with my father to apologize another day, and that'll be it."

"If you buy the remaining 6 pairs of insoles, I'll give you 3 jin of pork ribs and some pig's blood as a gift, how about that?"

At this point, there was still some pork left in the tricycle, but not many bones, totaling about three pounds.

Li Dehua is the kind of person who cares a lot about his image. When he heard that Zhou Rui wanted to give him something, he felt that the other party was afraid.

This made them feel proud, and at the same time, they didn't feel like they had lost out.

In this era, even those with tens of thousands of yuan won't blindly spend more money to buy things; they are more careful with their money.

He hesitated and said:

"Okay, how much is it in total?"

"It's 27 yuan in total. You can have the remaining three jin of pork ribs. Also, get some pig's blood to make pig's blood soup for your aunt."

Zhou Rui looked helpless.

Li Dehua seemed to have gained a great deal of face, and his expression improved because Zhou Rui had risked offending others to do business with him.

Moreover, Zhou Rui's act of giving him the bone was, in his view, a sign that he wasn't being taken advantage of; otherwise, others would have called him a sucker.

"Zhou Rui, you're a shrewd businessman, kid. Tell that guy I, Li Dehua, bought his stuff. Let him come find me if he has any complaints!"

He pulled out two "big unity" bills from his bag.

He then took out a five-yuan banknote printed with a steelworker and two one-yuan banknotes printed with female tractor drivers, and handed them to Zhou Rui with great generosity.

Zhou Rui shook his head, sighed, and accepted the money, muttering to himself:

"Sigh—I don't know how to tell them."

Zhou Shiwei also stopped threatening, glanced at Zhou Rui, and secretly gave him a thumbs up.

With just a few words, he got this bastard to buy things at a high price, and ended up selling almost an extra "Big Unity" bill!

In the end, he even thanked us.

The pig's blood that Zhou Rui gave away was worthless, but it was a gesture of goodwill that would make the recipient feel comfortable.

Especially for someone like Li Dehua.

Seeing Li Dehua, the wealthy man with ten thousand yuan, walk away happily, he turned around and grinned at his father.