197: You little rascal tricked me!

A busy night passed quickly.

With the combined efforts of the Cockroach army and the Termite army, the excavation progress was once again significantly boosted.

Furthermore, Ye Tian discovered that these two species had started coordinating with each other while working.

Termites were experts at digging holes and excavating soil.

Cockroaches were mainly responsible for transporting the fine soil.

Combined, they were twice as fast as when the ants worked alone last time.

Fortunately, now that the depth had increased, the slope area in the direction of the landfill was wide enough.

Otherwise, Ye Tian would have been really worried about the workers discovering something unusual when they started their shift.

Directing the Cockroaches and ants to return to the factory.

Ye Tian arrived at the vegetable garden.

As soon as he approached, the corners of his mouth couldn't help but curl upward.

After a night, the termite mushrooms that previously required digging through the surface soil to be seen had now broken through the ground, their grey-brown caps like flower buds waiting to bloom.

The stems were white and slender.

It made one feel the urge to harvest them at first sight.

Without much hesitation, Ye Tian brought a carrying basket. He didn't want to miss the best time for harvesting.

Before long, all the termite mushrooms were harvested.

This time, because it was an experiment, the amount of small white ball bacteria brought over was not much.

Therefore, only about 20 jin of termite mushrooms were harvested in the end.

Just after finishing, the old man had also woken up and come to the vegetable garden.

Looking at the termite mushrooms in the basket, he nodded with a smile.

"Not bad, not bad. It looks like they developed very well; they didn't become deformed because of the move. I just wonder how they taste."

"That's simple enough, just taste them."

With a chuckle, Ye Tian carried the basket to the kitchen.

Before long, waves of fragrance drifted over.

It enticed the old man, who usually didn't like entering the kitchen, to poke his head in to take a look.

In the oil pan, the cleaned termite mushrooms had all been poured in, simmering over low heat.

Besides oil, Ye Tian only added salt.

But that couldn't stop the natural fragrance of the termite mushrooms from invading his nostrils.

"Little Ye, this is extravagant. Using such fresh termite mushrooms to make oil."

The old man joked with a smile.

"It's just because we don't have much free time. Sometimes when we wake up in the morning and have porridge, using this as a side dish is simply superb."

"I can't tell, you kid really know how to enjoy life."

The old man seemed to have his appetite whetted as well, and couldn't help but swallow his saliva.

Ye Tian smiled slightly and kept his focus on the pot.

Patiently, he simmered away all the moisture from the termite mushrooms, and the termite mushrooms, which had been torn into strips, were all concentrated into fine threads.

But the aroma became even more intense.

Just then, the porridge in the rice cooker was also ready.

Ye Tian smashed two cucumbers and a clove of garlic, then drizzled a spoonful of termite mushroom oil over them.

Amidst the sizzling sound, a side dish for the porridge was finished.

The two of them each held a large bowl and ate the side dish.

They ate with great delight.

"Good, good, good. I didn't expect these simmered termite mushroom threads to be so satisfying with porridge. We can eat this every morning from now on."

The old man surprisingly drank two large bowls of porridge for breakfast, and his expression was very satisfied.

Ye Tian also nodded with a smile; life should be lived like this.

While busy, discover more delicacies to reward yourself. It can also strengthen your body in the process.

After cleaning up the kitchen, Ye Tian took the old man to the Pharmaceutical Factory.

Factory Director Wu reported the progress immediately.

"General Manager Ye, the packaging companies have finished adjusting all the custom packaging we ordered, and production can begin. Should we let them start now?"

"Start. Let's do 100,000 sets of each first to see the results. If there are any issues, we can improve them in time."

"Understood. The outsourced factories this time are all ones we've worked with before. For 100,000 sets, it shouldn't take more than two days. I'm just not sure if the raw materials will be enough by then."

"Except for Kangfuxin, you don't need to worry about the other raw materials."

"Then Kangfuxin has to wait for the old man's side to step up?"

"Yes, for things that are ingested, we cannot let anyone find a single fault. It's better to be safe."

"General Manager Ye, speaking of which, I've received some news these past two days. It seems the American Cockroach breeding base at Company has reached cooperation agreements with several pharmaceutical and cosmetic companies, becoming their raw material supplier. It looks like their breeding scale is quite large. Will it have any impact on our products?"

"What kind of impact?"

"If their breeding scale is large, their costs might be very low. If their prices for similar products are lower than ours…"

"You're overthinking it. In the end, any product relies on quality, not quantity, especially when it comes to beauty and pharmaceutical products. What good is a large quantity?"

"General Manager Ye, I understand that principle, but you might not know some of the inside information in this industry. Nowadays, many pharmacies and hospitals pursue profit, not effectiveness. Often, for drugs with the same therapeutic effect, whether they sell well depends on how low the costs can be pushed.

Let me give you an example. Generally speaking, for the same type of prescription medication, there are regulations from above, so there won't be a big difference in retail prices. In this case, if you are a pharmacy, and the selling price cannot fluctuate at will, whose medicine would you choose to sell? Naturally, the one with the lower price. So at this time, even a cent or a fraction of a cent will have a huge impact on sales volume.

Why did our Golden Throat cough syrup decline so quickly back then? Besides problems with the product itself, the biggest reason was the appearance of many similar cough medicines. Their costs were much lower, so much so that many pharmacies, after comparing, simply didn't sell our medicine. Otherwise, with our reputation, we would never have fallen into this situation so suddenly."

Ye Tian frowned slightly.

"You mean what we need to worry about is not whether it sells well, but whether it can be sold at all?"

"Yes, no matter how good the product is, it must have channels to be sold, otherwise it's all in vain."

"I see. Then your concern is indeed not without reason. In that case, let's contact those sales platforms in advance and see what the situation is."

"Understood, General Manager Ye. I will give the order right away."

After they finished talking, Ye Tian saw that it was getting late.

He drove to school.

After finishing the morning classes, he went straight back to the Breeding Farm.

He arranged for vehicles to start delivering the Essence to the Pharmaceutical Factory.

In his spare time, Ye Tian started researching the cultivation of termite mushrooms.

Now, half of the vegetable garden underground was dotted with many satellite nests.

However, the small white ball bacteria did not appear naturally as they did in the main nest.

Therefore, during the day, after communicating with the Gold-level Ant Queen, Ye Tian had them command a large number of ants to start transporting various substances for cultivating fungi, such as fallen leaves, wood, and so on, into those nests.

Considering that natural cultivation was too slow, Ye Tian also had the Termites bring over quite a bit of ready-made fungus spawn from the main nest to accelerate cultivation.

After much effort, sure enough, on the second day, tiny specks of white fungus spawn began to appear in the termite mushroom field.

Ye Tian tentatively watered them.

By the third day, sporadic termite mushrooms finally began to poke their heads out of the ground.

It worked!

Looking at those newly developed termite mushrooms, Ye Tian took a deep breath. He had finally developed another stable income-generating project.

He took out his phone, just about to share the good news with Li Ming.

But Factory Director Wu's call came in first.

"General Manager Ye, our technician has been invited over by them."

"Have they figured out the results?"

"It should be, I just don't know if the technician will be in any danger."

"What danger could there be? What we sold them isn't fake. Just wait patiently."

"That's true. Then I'll wait and see."

"Hmm!"

The two ended the call.

The technician from the technical department had already headed to Zhang Guangsheng's laboratory.

Inside the laboratory.

Zhang Guangsheng looked at the test report and samples in front of him, his expression uncertain.

"Are you sure you followed the formula I gave you?"

"Can't you taste it yourself, Director Zhang?"

Facing Zhang Guangsheng's questioning, the researcher still replied testily.

"I can taste it, the flavor is fine, there's almost no difference from the sample I gave you, but the texture and color—why are they so different?"

"I don't know about that. The formula you gave is like this, and I absolutely recreated it one-to-one. As for why it's different, I think you should ask the person who gave you the formula."

"Boss, the person has been brought over."

As the researcher finished speaking, the assistant approached and said.

"Bring him over."

Zhang Guangsheng's face darkened, and he said.

Before long, the employee from the Pharmaceutical Factory's technical department was brought before Zhang Guangsheng.

As soon as they met, he saw Zhang Guangsheng's hostile expression.

"Mr. Zhao, business cooperation is based on integrity. You took my deposit; this isn't how you do things, right?"

Zhang Guangsheng questioned him right away.

Technician Zhao was stunned: "Director Zhang, what do you mean by that?"

"Still playing dumb? We agreed that I give you money, and you give me the formula. But what is it that you've given me now?"

"Isn't it the formula?"

"It's a load of crap, not a formula. The medicine we concocted according to your formula is not the same thing as the samples from your factory."

"Impossible. Before giving you that formula, I tested it countless times myself; there is absolutely no problem. If you don't believe me, I can concoct it for you right in front of your face according to the formula. If it's different, I'll let you deal with me as you see fit."

Zhang Guangsheng frowned, looking at Technician Zhao with suspicion, but he found no trace of acting in the man's indignant expression.

After hesitating for a moment, he nodded.

"Fine, then do it and let me see."

Technician Zhao snorted coldly and came to the lab bench.

Looking at the people around, he smiled disdainfully: "What kind of people have you hired? They can't even execute such a simple formula; it's a waste of my time."

Saying this, Technician Zhao began to operate meticulously using the materials in front of him.

"Watch closely: peppermint Essence, 3 grams; fructose syrup, 5 grams; concentrated lemon juice, 1 gram..."

Technician Zhao weighed, stirred, and mixed each ingredient in front of everyone.

Ten minutes later.

A cup of pale green liquid, almost identical to the sample, appeared before everyone.

"Taste it, is it that flavor?"

Technician Zhao handed the cup to Zhang Guangsheng with a confident expression.

The latter looked at the contents of the cup, and a glimmer of light appeared in his eyes.

He didn't drink it directly but poured a bottle of the purchased sample into another cup to compare and observe.

Both the color and the aroma were almost identical.

Taking a deep breath, he took a small sip of the concocted medicine into his mouth.

Then he nodded happily.

"Yes, that's the flavor."

"So? I concocted it in front of all of you. You all saw it; there was no possibility of me faking anything. What is wrong with my formula?"

"This..."

Zhang Guangsheng was at a loss for words, completely unable to refute, and subconsciously looked at his own technicians.

"Shouldn't you give me an explanation? Why can he make it according to the formula, but you can't? Who was it just now that kept insisting it was a problem with my formula?"

"Director Zhang, are you blind? Is what he made the same thing as what you want? What you just drank is just a bottle of beverage made from plain water; who can't do that? Isn't the sample we gave you this flavor?"

"Then why are the color and texture different?"

Facing the words of his own technicians who gave him absolutely no face, Zhang Guangsheng said angrily.

"Why are they different? Do you not know what american cockroach extract tastes like? Can it be the same with it added and without it?"

"american cockroach extract?"

Zhang Guangsheng's expression changed, and he quickly picked up a few bottles of medicine to compare.

"That's right, you didn't add american cockroach extract just now."

"Why add that stuff? Didn't you ask for a flavor formula? I've already given it to you completely. You yourself said the flavor was fine."

"But the medicine made with this formula of yours is not the same as what I wanted."

"Then what does that have to do with me? You wanted a flavor formula, and I gave you a flavor formula. What's the problem with that?"

"Damn it, I can't even explain this clearly. My point is, after adding the american cockroach extract to this formula you gave, the texture is different."

"That's none of my business. I've already given you the flavor you asked for. Do you want to take out the contract and look at it? It's clearly stipulated on it that what you purchased from me is the flavor formula for the Pharmaceutical Factory's kangfuxin liquid. Just tell me, is the flavor correct or not?"

As he finished speaking, Zhang Guangsheng's expression changed drastically. He turned his head to look at his assistant.

The latter quickly brought the contract.

After looking closely, Zhang Guangsheng's face turned pitch black.

He glared fiercely at Technician Zhao.

"You brat, are you trying to scam me?"

"Scam you? Director Zhang, you can eat whatever you want, but you can't say whatever you want. How did I scam you? From beginning to end, you kept telling me that you possess the largest American Cockroach breeding base, and as long as I could help you get the flavor formula, that would be enough, and I didn't need to worry about anything else.

Now that you can't even handle the thing you're best at, you want to pin it on me, right? I'm a technical researcher at a Pharmaceutical Factory; do I also have to teach you how to breed and extract? Isn't that a joke?"

"But the problem is, the things we produce using this formula of yours are not the same as the samples."

"I'll say it one more time: that is your problem. I've already done what I was supposed to do. If you want to use this excuse to cause trouble and not pay the final balance, fine, I'll take the loss. At worst, I'll just forgo the remaining 25 million."