So angry his face was twisted out of shape

"That's right! What does our slaughtering a cow have to do with you? You can't just lose a cow, and then whichever village happens to slaughter one must be yours! By that logic, why don't you claim that the beef sold in the city belongs to your village too?"

"Exactly! Have you people no shame? Why don't you go to the city and rob them of their beef?"

Upon hearing this, the commune cadre immediately frowned. "Stop talking nonsense! State the facts directly and leave out all this messy chatter." If outsiders were to hear this, wouldn't it sound like rural peasant brothers were making reckless and groundless accusations against urban residents?

Those urban residents held city household registrations, ate commercially supplied grain, and bought meat that was subject to state unified purchase and distribution. There was no such thing as them consuming beef belonging to rural peasants—especially since, at this moment, the people of Niuluo Village had genuinely lost a cow.

This was nothing short of stirring up class conflict!

Cadre Zhao, an older official from the commune, spoke up. "You claim you just had a veterinarian examine the cow a couple of days ago. Why slaughter it so soon after?"

"Right, and another thing: why didn't you report and register the slaughter with the commune?"

"You slaughtered a cow all stealthily, and now you expect anyone to believe it was yours?"

"This..." Confronted with Zhou Dahu's sudden speechlessness, Chen Daliang pressed his advantage, while Li Youcai and the others chimed in one after another, asking questions that left the people of Xinxin Village dumbfounded.

"We searched for four days! Our whole village couldn't eat or sleep properly, searching up in the mountains and almost falling into the jaws of wolves..."

"Are you even human? If you wanted to eat beef, you should have slaughtered your own village's cow. Why on earth prey on our village's ox?"

"Our ox was meant to be kept for farming the land! I'm going to fight you to the death..." Chen Youfu shouted as he lunged toward Zhou Dahu, only to be quickly intercepted by Cadre Zhao and another official who had the quick reflexes to grab him by the waist and hold him back.

Cadre Zhao intervened, "Hold on! Our leadership is present, so don't go shouting about fighting and killing. Let's look into the facts first. Rest assured, once everything is confirmed, we won't let you be wronged."

"That's right. If you hit someone now, even if you were in the right, you'll instantly be in the wrong. With just the few of you, do you really think you'd make it out of their village?"

Restrained and seeing that his own village head was also looking at the commune cadres with a gaze full of trust, Chen Youfu could only reluctantly allow himself to be pacified.

"Then please, leaders, make the decisions for us."

"Yes, the leaders must seek justice for us."

"Don't worry, don't worry. The truth will come to light."

Upon hearing this, the people of Xinxin Village immediately grew anxious. What kind of justice? What were they talking about? Why did this sound so wrong?

"All right, no one needs to get worked up. We'll investigate first. We'll know what really happened shortly. As for this beef, nobody touches it for now."

The commune cadres first examined the ox head and the peeled-off hide. True to what the old veterinarian had said, there were clear marks of a fight between cattle. Looking further at the other three oxen belonging to Xinxin Village, they also bore injuries—the obvious result of brawling.

What more was there to say? This ox definitely did not belong to Xinxin Village.

Only an alien ox would be ostracized. Xinxin Village's own oxen must have wanted to drive the intruder away, which was why they had jointly headbutted and kicked the slaughtered ox.

As for why the people of Xinxin Village had gone to the trouble of calling the old veterinarian to examine the animal, they had probably intended to keep the ox for their own village's use at first. But when it became clear that the beast wouldn't make it, they hardened their hearts and slaughtered it for meat.

When the commune cadres announced their investigative findings, the people of Niuluo Village felt even more grief-stricken. Chen Daliang and his group glared at the people of Xinxin Village with bloodshot eyes; if not for the presence of Cadre Zhao and the others, they would surely have started throwing punches.

Meanwhile, the people of Xinxin Village were dumbfounded.

What? This was supposed to be Niuluo Village's ox?

Some villagers even cursed in exasperation, "What kind of incompetent leaders are you? Do you even know what you're talking about? This is our village's ox!"

"Exactly! We just led it out of our own village's cattle shed. How on earth did it suddenly become Niuluo Village's ox?"

Hearing someone cursing in defiance, the commune cadre's expression darkened. He spoke in a severe tone, "Still not convinced? Fine, let me ask you this." Stealing a cow and then cursing people out? They were simply beyond reason!

"Since you insist the ox belongs to you, tell me: these four cattle have always been kept together, so why did they suddenly start fighting?"

"I—how would we know? We have no idea what goes through a cow's mind."

Cadre Zhao also spoke up, "Even assuming the ox was from your village, it fell ill and was examined by a veterinarian. Why slaughter it so suddenly just a couple of days later?"

Someone answered at the top of their lungs without even thinking, "It wasn't sudden! Our village discussed it last night and decided to slaughter the ox today."

Hearing this, the commune cadre let out a cold, mocking laugh. "Very well, I understand now. Having the old veterinarian come by was just for show, wasn't it? Since it wasn't your own ox to begin with, of course you felt no heartache slaughtering it!"

"No, I..."

Zhou Dahu hurriedly glared at the unhelpful villagers, then hastened to explain to the commune cadres, "No, Leader, it's not like that! He's just talking nonsense. But this ox really does belong to us in Xinxin Village. Everyone in the surrounding area knows our village has four cattle."

Chen Daliang immediately shouted from the side, "Who knows whether you lot killed your own ox, stole ours, and then slaughtered ours instead?"

"Shut your mouth! I'm talking to the leaders—what business is it of yours?" If the commune people hadn't been there, Zhou Dahu would have long since called for people to throw these fellows out. The bad blood from last time hadn't even blown over among the people of Xinxin Village yet.

Unrelenting, Chen Daliang thrust out his neck defiantly. "How is it none of my business? Your village slaughtered our ox, and that's a fact! If you don't give us an explanation today, we won't let the matter rest. Just wait and see who's afraid of whom!"

Zhou Dahu wanted to hurl insults back, but catching sight of Chen Youfu—who was tugging at a half-white shoulder strap and glaring at him with a murderous expression—he thought of that massive white tiger back in Niuluo Village. He couldn't help curling his lip, pretending he was above bickering with Chen Daliang, while the commune cadres continued their questioning.

"Leader, don't listen to these Niuluo Village people trying to turn things around. Listen to me..."

"Enough. Don't explain to me for a moment. Let me ask you this again: cattle are collective property, and the commune has all of them registered. Why didn't you report and register the slaughter in advance?"

Zhou Dahu froze for a moment before hurriedly replying, "We wanted to go register and report it! We just... well, we didn't have time yet!"

"Didn't have time? You discussed slaughtering the cow last night, and you're telling me you didn't have time?" The commune cadre felt as though he were being treated like an idiot, his face twisting with anger.

"Leader, listen to me, we really didn't have time. We were planning to go in the afternoon..."

The commune cadre raised a hand, cutting off the rest of Zhou Dahu's words. "Enough, say no more. The way you're acting makes it impossible for me to believe you. Even if you didn't have time last night, sending two people over to report and register at the commune early this morning surely wouldn't have been that hard, would it?"

Wasn't it obvious what had happened here?

It wasn't as though villagers hadn't secretly slaughtered collective livestock to eat over the past couple of years. It came as no surprise that Xinxin Village would pull a stunt like this.