Chapter 149: How Infuriating

"What is this? Are you planning to wait until the beef is all cooked and eaten this afternoon before registering and reporting, presenting us with a fait accompli?"

Officer Zhao's eyes rolled as he chimed in with an interrogation: "Could it be that you had no intention of reporting this ox at all, and once you've eaten it, you'd set your sights on the next one, only to claim later that the ox wandered off and got lost?"

Upon hearing this, the commune cadres immediately fixed a hard gaze on Zhou Dahu. Such a scenario was entirely plausible.

While Officer Zhao was speaking, Chen Daliu's expression remained unchanged. Sensing that two villagers from his own village were wearing guilty looks, he feigned a sudden bout of weakness, staggered a few steps, and viciously pinched the waists of those two villagers whose facial expressions had betrayed them.

Stung by the pain, the two men quickly snapped back to their senses and immediately resumed looking indignant. Chen Daliu shook his head inwardly; they had been so full of bravado on the way here, yet they had almost given the game away. Truly, they lacked seasoning!

Had Bai Xi been here to witness this, she would have praised Chen Daliu. For these men to pull off such a performance under the circumstances was already quite commendable.

"No, that's not it, absolutely not. We had no such thought, we really didn't," Zhou Dahu stammered, waving his hands frantically as anxiety gripped him. So they slaughtered a sick ox—among the neighboring villages, slaughtering sick pigs and oxen wasn't something only Lower New Village had ever done.

"If that's not it, then explain this to me. Answer these few questions." Officer Zhao was no fool; it was blatantly obvious that the people of Lower New Village were in the wrong. No matter who came to investigate, Lower New Village's culpability could not be concealed.

They themselves were impartial arbiters representing the commune. Now that the truth had come to light, the people of Lower New Village were still refusing to repent, making excuses and even hurling insults—they were simply unreasonable and unruly ruffians.

Zhou Dahu was left speechless. Slaughters of oxen were rare events, and the villagers naturally wanted to gather around for the excitement; he simply hadn't thought this through in the heat of the moment. Besides, going to report it in the afternoon was still technically within the rules—who could have foreseen that Ox Lu Village would come looking for a lost ox?

"If you feel that my investigation is wrong and that we've wronged your village, that's fine too. We can simply invite comrades from the Public Security Bureau to come and look into it," the commune cadre said, sweeping a severe, scrutinizing gaze over the crowd from Lower New Village.

"This, this..." The villagers of Lower New Village looked at one another, and for a long moment, no one dared to speak.

Zhou Dahu opened his mouth as well, but when he looked at the slaughtered ox, then at the grief-stricken and indignant expressions of Chen Daliu and his party, and finally at the furrowed brows and angry glares of the commune officials, he suddenly found himself at a loss for words.

Originally, the people of Lower New Village had intended to go to the commune to report the matter in the afternoon, since slaughtering a sick ox required reporting it to the commune anyway. But now, with the people of Ox Lu Village leading the officials here and kicking up such a fuss, even if Lower New Village claimed it was their own ox, it wouldn't wash.

With the commune officers and cadres present, Lower New Village's ox had to be Ox Lu Village's ox, whether it actually was or not.

Even if the people of Lower New Village felt aggrieved, there was nothing they could do; their various actions simply could not withstand scrutiny.

Had it not been for the impending heavy penalties forcing the people of Lower New Village to back down, admit their mistake, and reluctantly salvage one-third of the beef, they would have been in even worse shape.

Watching the people of Ox Lu Village haul away their ox cart, and then looking back at the resentful and unconvinced glares of his own villagers, Zhou Dahu felt his chest heave with bottled-up rage.

Yet what could he do? Pushing the matter further would only result in the public security officers being called in to investigate, and word like that spreading would hardly sound good. Moreover, everyone harbored a deep-seated dread of public security personnel; should they dig up anything else, it would be Lower New Village that suffered the catastrophe.

And so, they had no choice but to construct a story: they claimed an ox belonging to Lower New Village had wandered off, and upon seeing a stray animal appear at the boundary of their village, they simply assumed it was their own missing beast. Later, discovering it did not get along with their other three oxen, they realized for certain it wasn't from their village.

As it happened, the ox fell ill, and though they called an old veterinarian to examine it, the condition only worsened. Fearing it would infect their other three oxen, they had no alternative but to slaughter it posthaste.

Hearing Zhou Dahu and the others spin this narrative, the commune officials found it plausible enough.

While it was impossible for a village not to recognize its own livestock, country folk were naturally prone to petty opportunism and always fancied they could get away with things unnoticed—a common enough sight in the countryside.

With one ox lost and another appearing out of nowhere, they had naturally been tempted to play along with the mistake and let sleeping dogs lie. Who could have guessed that the newcomer would clash with the resident livestock, fall ill from homesickness and the change of climate, and take a turn for the worse? Naturally, cutting their losses by slaughtering the beast for meat seemed the most pragmatic choice.

Looked at this way, it became quite easy to understand why Lower New Village hadn't registered and reported the slaughter in advance: they were afraid people from other villages would come to watch the excitement and immediately recognize the animal as belonging to Ox Lu Village.

To register and report only after the slaughter—if the people of Ox Lu Village hadn't come looking for it, nobody would have been any the wiser that the beast didn't belong to Lower New Village.

Although the people of Lower New Village had to compensate Ox Lu Village two hundred yuan, they were at least allowed to keep a portion of the meat. This was the result Zhou Dahu had fought tooth and nail to secure for them.

After all, the people of Lower New Village had fed and tended to the ox for a few days, and hiring the old veterinarian had cost money. Furthermore, had the people of Lower New Village not corralled the stray animal in the first place, goodness knows what might have happened to Ox Lu Village's ox.

To put it bluntly, the people of Lower New Village had broken a sweat and done the heavy labor of slaughtering the beast.

Chen Daliu also knew he shouldn't push people too far, so he reluctantly agreed to this compromise, "purely out of respect for the commune cadres and officers."

The two hundred yuan was pooled together on the spot by the villagers of Lower New Village as compensation for the wrongful slaughter of Ox Lu Village's ox. Originally, Chen Daliu and his group had demanded that Lower New Village compensate them with an actual ox—a live one.

However, the people of Lower New Village had dug in their heels, growing so frantic they were ready to swing hoes and flash knives.

"This is sheer bullying! Why should we hand over our own village's ox to the people of Ox Lu Village? In your dreams!"

Chen Daliu and his men had put on a do-or-die attitude as well: "A fight? Let's fight! Just wait, we'll go back to the village and call everyone out."

"Enough! What is all this talk of fighting? If you're so fierce, we'll send you to the front lines to fight the enemy, how about that?" The commune officials had come to solve a problem; they had no desire to see a full-scale brawl break out between two villages.

"Will this ever end? You're all neighboring villages, bumping into each other day in and day out. Do you really have to kill a few people to be satisfied?"

Officer Zhao glared at Zhou Dahu and the others. "You're the ones in the wrong, yet you're still acting this arrogant? Why don't you put those hoes down—what, do you really want to spend time in a jail cell?"

With a mix of threats and persuasion lasting over half an hour—nearly reaching the point of actually summoning the public security bureau—the two sides were finally and reluctantly talked down.

Under the guidance of the commune officials, Chen Daliu and his people had no choice but to collect the money and load the portioned beef onto the ox cart. Amidst the sounds of villagers hugging ox legs and weeping bitterly, they departed Lower New Village alongside the commune personnel.

The people of Lower New Village were gnashing their teeth with hatred. They had to swallow their own broken teeth, swallowing bitterness like a mute drinking herbal tea—there was simply no way to voice their grievances.

No matter how they turned the matter over in their minds, it left a sour taste. The more they thought about it, the angrier and more wretched they felt.

Within the crowd, someone brandished an axe and shouted at the top of their lungs: "We can't just let it rest like this! Once the commune people are gone, let's grab our gear and march over there to drag our beef back!"