Work started an hour ago, and Lin Shu still had no idea whether Gu Jun and the others had made it back.
After all, everyone worked different plots, and she had no way of knowing which fields still hadn’t been transplanted.
She had no other choice—she’d have to find Team Leader Gu first.
Team Leader Gu was in the fields with everyone else, trouser legs rolled up, straw hat on, transplanting rice seedlings.
Lin Shu walked from the field path to the center of the paddy and told Team Leader Gu that she still hadn’t seen Gu Jun and the others by the time work started.
Hearing her words, Team Leader Gu straightened up and looked at her.
“You’re saying Gu Jun still hasn’t come back?”
Lin Shu said, “I don’t know either, but I hadn’t seen him by the time work started. On my way here I asked around, and no one’s seen Gu Jun or Sent-down Youth Qi.”
Hearing this, Team Leader Gu set down the seedlings in his hand and waded out of the mud onto the field ridge.
“Don’t panic yet. Go wait on the main road, I’ll go ask around.”
Team Leader Gu went to ask people in the other fields that hadn’t finished transplanting.
Fortunately there were only two more days of work left, so there weren’t many fields left to do.
Lin Shu carefully made her way back to the main road and stood there watching Team Leader Gu go ask the others.
About ten minutes later, Team Leader Gu came back, clearly having found nothing.
He said, “I’ll go check over by Ox Horn Cove, there are still a few plots there that haven’t been transplanted—they might be working there.”
“You should go back to work first—” He thought about it, then said, “Never mind, go home and wait. Once I have news, I’ll send someone to tell you.”
Lin Shu answered, “All right, I’ll go back and wait. Whether there’s news or not, please have someone come tell me. Thank you, Team Leader.”
Team Leader Gu waved a hand. “Go on home.”
Lin Shu could only walk home, heart heavy with worry.
She wasn’t worried about anything else—she was only afraid the plot was snapping back onto its original track.
Lin Shu waited nearly an hour at home, and still no news came.
From that field to Ox Horn Cove was at most a twenty-minute walk, so there should be news soon…
“Sister-in-law! Sister-in-law!”
The moment Lin Shu heard the voice, she rushed to open the courtyard gate.
It was a boy of about eleven or twelve. Lin Shu had seen him once or twice around the production brigade, but couldn’t recall his name.
She asked hurriedly, “Is there news about Gu Jun?” — Black Lotus novel Novel Chapters · Black Lotus Novel
The boy shook his head. “Team Leader Gu said they might’ve gotten held up in the city. If they’re still not back by midday when work lets out, he’s going into the city to look for them.”
Hearing this, Lin Shu’s heart sank.
Just what she’d been afraid of.
She guessed there was an eight or nine in ten chance they really had been caught.
She just wasn’t sure what had gone wrong.
Had Qi Jie been swindled?
Was the purchase order fake, and that’s why they’d been arrested?
Or was it just bad luck that had nothing to do with them at all?
The more Lin Shu thought about it, the more her head throbbed. She wanted to go into the city to ask around, but there was simply no way for her to get there.
The tractor didn’t go into the city often, and the whole production brigade only had two bicycles.
One belonged to Qi Jie, and the other belonged to the brigade collectively.
Both of those bicycles had already been ridden into the city.
Team Leader Gu wasn’t planning to go until the afternoon, and even then he’d have to walk twenty-some minutes to the brigade headquarters to borrow one.
She couldn’t go, so all she could do was sit at home and fret.
By rights, Qi Jie had male lead plot armor—even if Gu Jun got caught, Qi Jie ought to be able to get out of it unscathed.
Lin Shu asked the boy, “Then has Qi Jie—Sent-down Youth Qi—come back?”
The boy shook his head. “I haven’t seen Sent-down Youth Qi either. I heard Team Leader Gu mention it to my dad—neither of them has any word yet.”
The boy left after saying this.
Lin Shu’s face turned grim.
Even if they’d been arrested, as long as the purchase order checked out, they should be let go after being held a day or two.
But what if the purchase order was fake?
Then this really would be over, and Gu Jun would be forced onto the original novel’s plotline after all.
Three years of reform-through-labor at a farm, working without rest day or night, and by the time he came back, half his hair would have turned white.
What Lin Shu feared even more was that if Gu Jun couldn’t escape being sent to labor reform, then what had happened to Wang Xue in the story would happen to her too, here and now.
—A difficult birth. Two lives lost at once.
The moment the thought crossed her mind, Lin Shu’s scalp went numb and gooseflesh rose all over her body.
She wanted to go back to an age of advanced technology, with phones, air conditioning, good food—but she had no idea at all whether dying here would actually send her back.
What if she didn’t go back, and instead just died here for good, soul and all?
Lin Shu didn’t dare gamble on it, not even a little.
As long as she could stay alive, she’d find any way to keep living.
Only if Gu Jun made it through this safely could she be certain the plot could actually be changed.
Only then could she truly set her heart at ease.
Before work let out at midday, Lin Shu waited on the road Team Leader Gu would have to take into the city.
Just as Team Leader Gu was setting off on foot to the brigade headquarters to borrow a bicycle, he spotted Gu Jun’s wife and sighed.
“Gu Jun’s wife, you don’t need to worry too much. That purchase order Qi Jie showed me last time—the stamp on it can’t be faked, so there’s really nothing to worry about.”
Lin Shu said, “Just in case, Team Leader, when you get to the city, could you swing by the security patrol station? I’m not worried about anything else, I’m only afraid they got arrested by mistake.”
Though Lin Shu wasn’t from this era, she’d read her share of period dramas that took the setting seriously.
In the sixties and seventies, crackdowns on speculation and profiteering were harsh—didn’t matter if you were legitimate or not, they’d arrest you first and only investigate whether it was proper business afterward.
Sometimes they didn’t even bother investigating, which led to no end of wrongful cases.
Team Leader Gu turned this over in his mind—Gu Jun’s wife had a point, it really was possible they’d been arrested by mistake. · B L A C K L O T U S Novel Chapter · Black Lotus
After all, hauling that much fish into the city first thing in the morning was bound to draw attention.
If they really had been wrongfully arrested, then he needed to hurry to the security station without delay.
Once someone was taken to the security station, they usually weren’t questioned right away—they’d be locked in a holding room first.
And if there were a lot of people, it could take a day or two before they even got around to questioning everyone.
“All right, I’ll go to the security station first thing when I get to the city. If they really were arrested by mistake, I’ll head to the Textile Factory after.”
“You’re carrying a big belly. Go home and stay put, don’t be running around.”
With that instruction, Team Leader Gu set off.
There was nothing else Lin Shu could do but go home and keep waiting for news.
The first thing Team Leader Gu did once he reached the city was go straight to the security station.
He asked around among the local residents and learned that early that morning, before dawn had even broken, the Red Armband patrol had raided the black market and hauled a good number of people off to the holding room.
Hearing this, Team Leader Gu thought grimly—surely those two young men hadn’t really been that unlucky?
Uneasy, he found his way to the security station and stepped into an office to ask, “Comrade, I wanted to ask—the speculators you all arrested this morning, were they all caught at the black market?”
The bespectacled Red Armband officer looked up from his desk, adjusted his glasses, and narrowed his eyes slightly. “Why, you know someone who’s done something wrong?”
Team Leader Gu shook his head at once. “No, nothing like that. It’s just that my production brigade has two young men who went out this morning to deliver some loaches and catfish to a factory. That’s not illegal speculation—they had a proper purchase order, they weren’t even taking money, just trading for goods. But they still haven’t come back, so I wanted to ask if there’s any chance they were caught by mistake.”
The man’s face darkened. “If there’s been a mistake, we’ll certainly get to the bottom of it. But it’s not a mistake just because you say it is!”
Team Leader Gu said hastily, “That’s not what I meant at all. It’s just that no one can find them, their families are worried sick, so I came to ask whether their names are on the list of people you arrested.”
The Red Armband officer asked coldly, “What are their names?”
Team Leader Gu said, “Qi Jie. Gu Jun.”
The officer called out, “Xiao Chen!” A moment later a young man hurried in and asked, “Squad Leader, what is it?”
The squad leader asked, “Among the people we brought in this morning, was there a Qi Jie and a Gu Jun? Said they were delivering catfish and loaches to a factory.”
Xiao Chen thought it over carefully. “There really were two like that. They kept insisting they were legitimate, not speculating. But then again, who we bring in ever admits to speculating?”
Team Leader Gu said, “They have a proper purchase order on them.” “We didn’t find one.”
Xiao Chen said, “When we caught them, there wasn’t much left in their buckets—looked like they’d nearly sold out and were about to head back. No purchase order, we never saw one.”
Hearing this, Team Leader Gu knew things had taken a bad turn.
If the delivery was already done, then the purchase order would have been handed back to the factory already.
The squad leader’s face turned colder still. “Go home and wait for news. We’ll get to the bottom of this.”
“We won’t let a single parasite on society slip through, and we won’t wrong a single innocent person either.”
Watching the man’s attitude, Team Leader Gu got the sense he’d already decided they were guilty of speculation. He didn’t look like someone who’d actually investigate properly.
More likely than not, they wouldn’t even bother looking into it—they’d just hand down a sentence outright.
Team Leader Gu knew all too well how this crowd loved to wield a feather duster like an imperial edict, so he didn’t waste any more time at the security station.
He made his way to the Textile Factory. He remembered the surname of the director who’d approved the purchase order—Zheng.
He found a guard outside the factory building and said, “I’m the team leader of Red Star Production Brigade. I’m here to see Director Zheng, who oversees the cafeteria.”
The guard said, “The cafeteria’s busy right now, he won’t be free until three in the afternoon.”
Team Leader Gu glanced at the sky—it was a little past one.
“I can wait.”
Team Leader Gu squatted down by the curb outside the factory to wait.
It wasn’t until half past three that the man finally showed up. · black lotus Novel Translation Site — Black Lotus
When Director Zheng heard it was the team leader from Red Star Production Brigade, he thought it over and realized—that was the brigade that had delivered the fish that morning.
When they met, Director Zheng asked, “What’s going on?”
Team Leader Gu told him about the two young men being arrested.
Director Zheng frowned at the news. “Didn’t they say the delivery was for our factory?”
Team Leader Gu sighed. “They did, but the officers didn’t believe them, and there was nothing to prove it, so they locked them up.”
Director Zheng thought for a moment. “I haven’t heard anything about anyone from the security station coming by to ask questions today.”
Team Leader Gu said, “From the sound of it, they’re probably not taking this seriously at all—there’s a real chance they’ll just be shipped off to labor reform. That’s why I came here, hoping Director Zheng could help.”
Director Zheng, for his part, had no desire to deal with that pack of troublemakers at the security station either. He weighed it for a moment, then said, “Come with me first to talk to Director Qi about it.”
Director Qi—likely a relative of Sent-down Youth Qi’s family.
When they found Director Qi and told him what had happened, he didn’t hesitate at all. He dug out the purchase order, stood up, and said at once, “Let’s go find them.”
Team Leader Gu asked, “To the security station?”
Director Qi said, “That security station is nothing but a pack of bandits. Doesn’t matter if there was speculation or not, they’ll squeeze some blood out of you regardless—they’d rip a leg off a fly if they saw one. By the time those two get released, I’d bet there won’t be a single thing left on them.”
“Everyone’s worked hard for days on end—not so we could line those people’s pockets.”
“No point arguing with them. We’re going straight to the Revolutionary Committee, let the higher-ups put the pressure on.”
As long as the Revolutionary Committee stepped in, not only would the two be released, the officers wouldn’t dare pocket anything either.
Hearing this, Team Leader Gu realized he’d finally come to the right person.
They headed straight for the Revolutionary Committee and managed to find the official in charge before the office closed at five.
The Textile Factory was the largest factory in Guang’an City, and the director had connections at the Revolutionary Committee, so they found the official without much trouble.
The whole matter was backed by proper paperwork—there was nothing to argue about.
The official immediately picked up the phone and called the security station, hanging up again after only a few words.
Setting down the phone, he said, “They’ll release them right away. Whatever was taken off them will be returned too.”
Team Leader Gu let out a breath of relief and said hurriedly, “Thank you, thank you so much.”
The official waved a hand. “This is only what we ought to do.”
“Besides, if the security station arrested the wrong people, that’s their failing. We’re the ones who owe an apology.”
