Scaling Up

After wrapping up a brief meeting, Jiang Miao and his brother-in-law headed to the Yan Cun Village farm again.

In the car.

Jiang Miao asked, "Brother-in-law, have Sis come help out at the company cafeteria! I'll pay for a place for you two in Ma Gong Town."

"Wouldn't that be inappropriate?"

"Then treat it as a loan from me. If you stay in the village, there'll definitely be a lot of people coming to you for favors later on," Jiang Miao reminded him.

His brother-in-law immediately understood. News of the company's booming business had not spread yet, but it certainly could not be kept under wraps for long.

In fact, that was why Jiang Miao did not hire locals or experienced workers for purchasing and finance. Even Li Xinhua, who managed the Canned Food Factory, was not from Hai Lu Feng, but one of the Chaozhou People.

He was guarding against the deeply entrenched local network of connections, preventing them from colluding with local bullies.

Outsiders and newcomers might lack experience, but at least they would not take kickbacks or have a local Hai Lu Feng network of connections.

Before Jiang Miao's company opened, he had arranged for his parents to temporarily move into the company headquarters, precisely because he was worried about the village's tangled web of relationships.

When the time came, all sorts of distant relatives would come recommending people. His parents would find it hard to refuse them all, and those relatives would not be easy to manage once employed.

Up to now, aside from his reliable brother-in-law and parents, he had not informed a single other relative, nor did he intend to bring them into the company.

His reminder to his brother-in-law today was simply a precaution against future trouble.

"I'll discuss it with your sister tonight."

When they arrived at the farm.

The group entered the indoor breeding area.

The third batch of ten thousand eels had already been placed in the breeding pools, waiting to undergo sex reversal and mature. They were expected to spawn in about a month and a half.

There were currently fifty-seven thousand eels left in the Open-air Fish Pond. Aside from the seven thousand males kept for breeding, the remaining fifty thousand, at a rate of ten thousand every two months, could probably last around ten months.

Producing 15.2 million Glass Eels every two months sounded like an enormous scale, but in reality, at 0.1 grams per Glass Eel, that was only 1,520 kilograms.

The annual wild Glass Eel catch had been declining year by year. This year, the catch of wild Eel Fry was less than thirty-five tons.

And there was a problem with that thirty-five-ton figure.

For example, Glass Eels caught in the Mariana Trench waters generally weighed about 0.1 grams each, while leptocephali caught near the Pearl River Estuary and the Yangtze River Estuary generally weighed around 0.5 grams each.

According to the information Jiang Miao had gathered, East Asia had once caught more than a hundred tons of Eel Fry annually at its peak.

This meant Hai Lu Feng Company's current capacity was still insufficient to meet market demand. It would need to expand tenfold just to barely satisfy East Asia's demand for Eel Fry.

And beyond East Asia, Western Europe was also one of the world's largest consumers of Eel Fry, consuming several hundred tons a year with ease.

However, Western Europe cooked Eel Fry directly rather than raising them.

Therefore, Jiang Miao's next priority was to seize the biggest slice of the East Asian market.

Although he knew very well that once Hai Lu Feng Company's Eel Fry entered the market in large quantities, it would inevitably force prices down.

But Hai Lu Feng Company had no other choice. If Eel Fry prices remained high, other fry cultivation companies would inevitably enter the competition.

They had to first seize the early market with the highest profits, then gradually drive down prices until other companies had no profit to make, thereby preventing them from entering the market.

"Brother-in-law, expand the next batch by another twenty thousand females. At the same time, increase our purchases of mature eels. We need to drain every last drop of the first pot of soup."

His brother-in-law nodded. "That's right. We can't afford to be slow now. We have to end this quickly. I'll contact the nearby farms right away and see whether there are any suitable ones."

Jiang Miao thought for a moment. "Around 1,500 per mu is acceptable."

"Alright. I'll do my best."

His brother-in-law hurried off to find the owners of the surrounding fish ponds.

Meanwhile, Jiang Miao contacted his cousin Jiang Yao and Old Huang from the factory equipment company, asking them to make time to come to the farm so they could discuss the construction project for another indoor breeding facility.

Neither of them dragged their feet, and they drove over that very afternoon.

However, Jiang Miao was startled when he saw his cousin. Jiang Yao's eye sockets were sunken, the bags under his eyes were dark, and his eyes were bloodshot.

"Yao, what happened to you?"

"Ah, don't mention it. I stayed up late and ate too many late-night snacks these past few days. My gout flared up."

Old Huang beside him also looked deeply moved by the hardships of life. "Once you hit middle age, all kinds of ailments come knocking."

Jiang Miao suddenly frowned slightly.

Status: Hyperuricemia, acute gout, 37 gouty tophi in the feet, hyperlipidemia, moderate fatty liver, gallbladder polyps, cystitis...

Contains externally introduced artificial drug components: glucocorticoid "Dexamethasone" (blood drug concentration...), "Dexamethasone Acetate" (blood drug concentration...)...(expandable)

What's going on? He's actually taking glucocorticoids? And two kinds at that? Jiang Miao was shocked and quickly asked, "Yao, have you taken any medicine?"

"I have. My wife got it from an old doctor in Gongping Town. His medicine is made from some kind of tree root. They say it's a family Secret Recipe, harmless to the body, and pretty effective. Whenever my gout acts up, I take it, and it works right away."

Jiang Miao was instantly speechless, but it was not appropriate to say so directly. Instead, he asked, "Yao, do you have that medicine on you?"

"Yes. I took one packet this morning, and I still have five left." As Jiang Yao spoke, he pulled a sealed bag from his pocket, containing five small packets of medicine.

"I'm not at ease about this. Don't take it for now. Give me two packets, and I'll ask a friend to have them tested." Jiang Miao took two packets of powdered medicine from the sealed bag.

"Is there really a problem?" Jiang Yao grew nervous as well.

Jiang Miao explained his suspicion. "With purely herbal medicine, aside from prohibited substances like opium, it's hard for anything else to work immediately. I suspect it contains steroid medication or nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs."

Upon hearing this, cold sweat broke out on Jiang Yao's back. "Then let's get it tested. Whether there's a problem or not, I just want peace of mind."

"Don't worry. The results will be out in two or three days." He turned to Li Wenna. "Wen Na, send these two packets of powder by SF Express later. I'll send you the address and recipient information on WeChat."

"Okay, Boss." Li Wenna accepted the medicine packets and placed them in the side pocket of her briefcase.

Jiang Miao reminded his cousin once more, "Yao, if you're sick, go to the hospital. Don't blindly trust those back-alley remedies. Once we're done talking, go get checked out."

"I'll go right away." Jiang Yao was also feeling lingering fear.

Half an hour later, Jiang Miao had finalized the next project with the two men: building another twenty mu of indoor breeding facilities.

The price followed the same standard as last time: ten million for the basic construction, 7.2 million for supporting equipment, for a total of 17.2 million.

After the contract was settled, his cousin hurried off to see a doctor, while Old Huang took his leave as well.

Jiang Miao sent the address, contact number, and other details to Li Wenna, telling her to send the package out as soon as possible.

Then he picked up WeChat and sent a message to a blogger he knew. The man was a blogger Jiang Miao had met on Bilibili, specializing in clinical drug research with a focus on gout medications. He also accepted paid drug-testing commissions online.

Before long, an assistant from the doctor's studio replied. Jiang Miao explained the situation and transferred the testing fee.

Although he could see the precise ingredients of the powder at a glance, he had no way to say that directly. He needed a specific test report to settle the matter conclusively.

The incident also reminded him that he needed to pay closer attention to the medications taken by the elderly in his family, especially those so-called fast-acting folk miracle medicines. He had to stay extremely vigilant.