novelbin Chapter 455 Acquisition Ends
Chapter 455 Acquisition Ends
Every time Lan Yue puts a mushroom into the waste bag, the corner of her mouth twitches, as if someone has taken something from her pocket.
"Why don't you take this one? I recognize it, it's edible, I've eaten it before."
She picked up a grayish-brown mushroom from the pile of miscellaneous fungi, held it up to Blue Moon, and spoke with a hint of displeasure.
Lan Yue took the mushroom and turned it over to show her the back of the cap:
"This is called yellow-spotted mushroom. It is edible, but it tastes bitter. Whether you put it in soup or stir-fry, the whole pot will taste bitter."
We're taking these back to sell as dried goods. Nobody wants the bitter ones. Sister, I'm picking them out for you. I'm not trying to cheat you, but to save you from having any trouble eating them later.
The middle-aged woman held the mushroom under her nose and smelled it; it did indeed have a faint bitter smell.
She hadn't noticed it before, but now that Lan Yue had mentioned it, she could smell it. She threw the mushroom back into the pile of miscellaneous mushrooms and stopped asking.
After selecting them, the pine mushrooms and green-headed mushrooms weighed about six pounds in total, while the purple lilac mushrooms and maitake mushrooms only had a small handful, less than two pounds.
Xu Xiaoyan began to speak:
"Six catties and two taels of pine mushrooms, eight taels of green-headed mushrooms, one catty and one tael of purple lilac mushrooms, and six taels of maitake mushrooms. All together, it weighs eight catties and seven taels, which is eight taels short of nine and a half."
Xu Xiaoyan pointed to about two pounds of mixed mushrooms next to her and said, "These can be used to offset the shortfall in weight. Do you agree?"
The middle-aged woman nodded without objection, took the cookies, and turned to leave.
The people at the back of the line witnessed the whole thing, and their expressions changed from indifference to joy.
When it was their turn, no one questioned why only these kinds of mushrooms were accepted. They cooperated by pouring out the mushrooms for Lan Yue and Xu Xiaoyan to choose from.
On that day, nearly twenty people came and went around the stall.
Some had come yesterday, some came based on recommendations, and some were just passing by when they saw the sign and the line of people and decided to come and see what was going on.
Xu Xiaoyan and Lan Yue were busy from morning until afternoon. When they packed up in the evening, Lan Yue weighed the pile of mushrooms they had collected.
We harvested nearly 80 jin of matsutake mushrooms, 35 or 36 jin of green-headed mushrooms, and less lilac and maitake mushrooms, totaling less than 30 jin.
The mushroom purchase lasted for two days.
On the evening of the third day, Xu Xiaoyan called out from the door, "Lan Yue, change the words on the sign to 'Acquisition Suspended'."
Blue Moon peeked out of the wooden house, holding a bag of dried mushrooms that hadn't been tied up yet, and paused for a moment.
She glanced at the pile of fresh mushrooms waiting to be dried, then at the stacks of already packed dried goods bags in the corner, and realized there were indeed quite a lot.
"Okay," Lan Yue put down the bag of dried mushrooms in her hand, patted the crumbs off her hands, and walked to the sign.
He took the cardboard off the wooden stake, turned it over, and wrote four large characters in charcoal: "Suspension of Acquisition".
The two had just sat down in the cabin and hadn't even had a sip of water when they heard a cacophony of footsteps and voices outside.
"Huh? Why has it been changed to a suspension of acquisitions?"
"What do you mean? You're not accepting it anymore? You were accepting it just fine yesterday!"
"Boss! Boss, come out here! What's going on?"
Lan Yue frowned, stood up, walked to the door, lifted the waterproof curtain, and looked outside.
There were more than a dozen people standing outside the door. Some were familiar faces who had been coming here often in the past few days, while others were new faces. They were all carrying, carrying, or shouldering containers full of mushrooms.
More people continued to come up from the mountain road. When they saw the four characters on the sign, they quickened their pace and shouted, "Wait, let me go and take a look."
Lan Yue turned around and glanced at Xu Xiaoyan.
Xu Xiaoyan had already stood up from the stool, her expression unchanged.
She walked to the doorway, facing the dozen or so faces, some familiar and some unfamiliar, and spoke in a soft but clear voice:
"We've collected too many mushrooms these past few days and need time to process them, so we're not accepting any more for now. Please go home."
Before he finished speaking, the crowd erupted in an uproar.
"We'll handle it, but we delivered it, so you just accepted it. There's no reason to turn away business!"
"That's right, my husband spent the whole day running around in the mountains, hoping to exchange these mushrooms for biscuits! What are we going to do if you don't buy them?"
"Boss, please be lenient. These mushrooms were picked according to your standards—pine mushrooms, green-headed mushrooms, not a single mixed variety. Look at them, they're of excellent quality!"
A young woman squeezed to the front and held up her basket in front of Xu Xiaoyan.
Inside, it was indeed full of pine mushrooms, all with intact shapes, tightly closed caps, and pure white color—truly high-quality stuff.
Xu Xiaoyan glanced down at the basket of mushrooms; they were indeed quite good.
But she didn't budge; her tone remained steady, carrying an undeniable certainty.
"The items are good, but we really can't accept them right now. If we accept them, we can't process them all, and it would be a waste if they spoiled."
Some people in the crowd fell silent for a moment, but most remained unconvinced.
"Can't you accept it today and deal with it tomorrow?"
"Yes! Just take it first, you can deal with it later, there's no rush!"
"Boss, stop making excuses. Are you trying to lower the price because you think it's too low?"
This statement was like a match thrown into an oil drum; the crowd immediately erupted in buzzing discussions.
"Price reduction? It's already 9.5 jin (4.25 kg), any further reduction and I'd rather go to the trading point!"
"The price has also dropped at the trading point. I went to ask this morning and it's now eleven pounds for one compressed biscuit."
Moreover, the quality requirements are stricter now; anything even slightly old is rejected. Many people carry their bags there and come back empty-handed!
"That's why we came here! At least you guys help us choose, and we can take back what we don't want. But the trading point just throws things away without even an explanation!"
Standing next to Xu Xiaoyan, Lan Yue watched the group of people getting more and more excited as they talked, and a nameless anger rose up in her heart.
She opened her mouth as if to say something, but Xu Xiaoyan gently touched the back of her hand from behind, meaning, "Don't rush."
"Listen to me, everyone," Xu Xiaoyan's voice rose slightly from before:
"We're not buying mushrooms for charity; we're doing business. Business is about mutual consent. I'll buy if I want to, and I won't if I don't. It's not about who owes whom."
There was a moment of silence in the crowd. Some people started counting on their fingers, while others whispered to each other.
A middle-aged man pushed his way to the front, his voice loud and aggressive: "You just say you won't accept them anymore, without giving us any time to adjust. Do you know how difficult it is for us to make this trip up the mountain?"
Lan Yue finally couldn't hold back any longer. "Brother, what you're saying is hilarious. Whether we accept it or not is our freedom. When did it become your place to interfere?"
The middle-aged man's face turned bright red. Several people next to him tugged at his sleeves and whispered a few words of advice.
He snorted, slammed his basket on the ground, turned and walked away. After a few steps, he turned back and glared at them, muttering something under his breath.