Chapter 204: Chapter 180 Group Fishing and Hunting Chapter 204: Chapter 180 Group Fishing and Hunting The next day, Zhang Wei came back, clutching his waist.

When Chu Mingcheng saw him like this, he slapped him on the waist, and immediately Zhang Wei knelt on the ground.

“Damn, I’m already holding my waist and you still slap it? Don’t you know my legs are also weak?”

“Tsk tsk tsk, just spending without any input won’t do. Wait a bit, I’ll take you to do some fishing, swimming and diving are great exercises for the body.”

“If you manage to catch something like a sea eel, it can even nourish you a bit.”

Chu Mingcheng shook his head at his appearance; although he could enhance his body by converting life force, the physical quality would still slowly deteriorate without regular exercise, hence he had maintained daily exercise before.

But ever since they got the boat, the number of times he went out for a morning run had decreased a lot, mainly because fishing itself was a comprehensive exercise and there was no need to do anything else.

Many gym equipment and exercises can harm the knees, as well as other joints and the waist, but swimming doesn’t, and it is a very good form of exercise.

But upon hearing that he had to go fishing today, Zhang Wei didn’t kneel any longer; he immediately lay down on the ground: “Please no, I need to lie down in bed and recuperate today. This college life is really something!”

“I’m sick of the familiar, and switching to something fresh almost made me lose control.”

“Alright, I know you’ve had quite the conquests. I suggest you still come out to sea with us today, and we’ll slip away to stay somewhere else when we come back in the evening, Ah Cheng’s girlfriend just bought two cases of baijiu this morning.”

Chen Yang came out of the bathroom and helped the prone Zhang Wei up, trying to persuade him.

“Hiss~~”
Zhang Wei held his waist; whether it was the pain or the shock of the two cases of baijiu, he nodded repeatedly: “Let’s go, to fishing we go. Today I’ll show you all what a real man is.”

“Let’s go!” Chu Mingcheng chuckled, shook his head, and led the way out of the room after packing up.

He first went to Jiang Luoluo’s place and greeted her, “Luoluo, today I’m taking Ah Yang and the others to go fishing. They’ve just learned and are still newbies. I need to get them used to the sport so that they won’t have accidents when I’m not around.”

“Go ahead!” Jiang Luoluo was sitting on the couch reviewing her recent choreography. She nodded when she heard Chu Mingcheng was heading out to sea, “If you won’t be back for dinner tonight, remember to call me on the satellite phone.”

“Sure!” Chu Mingcheng stepped forward and embraced her, “Your boyfriend is going out to work and earn money, don’t you want to show some affection?”

“Mua~” Jiang Luoluo pecked him lightly on the face with her pouty lips and then mockingly put on a cute face with a Treasure Island accent, “Darling, you have to work hard today, okay!”

Chu Mingcheng shivered all over and immediately started rubbing away the goosebumps on his body, grinning: “Where did you learn that from? Switch it out already, it’s numbingly irritating, even more than the hotpot from Yu Zhou!”

“Hahaha… I knew it! Jiayi even told me that men like this sort of thing!” Jiang Luoluo suddenly burst into laughter upon seeing his reaction.

“Who would like that sort of thing; can you not do that, please!”

“Ew~ so sissy!”

Chu Mingcheng watched amusedly as Jiang Luoluo curled her toes in mock frustration: “Can’t handle it, can you?”

“You’re doing an idol drama tone, of course, I can’t handle it.”

“Haha, alright, no more messing around. Ah Yang and the others are waiting for me. I’d better head out now.”

“Wait a minute!” Jiang Luoluo stopped Chu Mingcheng as he got up, and then got up herself to hug him, tipping her toes up to give him a popo, “Ah Cheng, didn’t you say before that you wanted me to help keep an eye out, to introduce someone to Ah Yang?”

“I don’t know many people here, and the only suitable ones are Wanying and Jiayi. But Ah Yang seems to have a decent family background, and Jiayi’s family isn’t bad either. How about I invite her over so they can meet?”

Chu Mingcheng had met both women. Though not very familiar with them, he thought they were decent.

But there was some hesitation in his mind about Zhou Jiayi.

Mainly because some women from Treasure Island had been extremely dramatic recently, executing a variety of eye-popping tactics.

That had led him to wonder if everyone from there was like that. Besides the sweet girl image he had of women from that area, he now also associated them with being dramatic, selfish, and calculating.

In comparison, Chen Wan Ying might be a bit less attractive than Zhou Jiayi, but at least she had opened a decent styling studio through her own efforts, earning a good income annually, and was a rather capable woman.

“Maybe let’s not consider Zhou Jiayi? To be frank, I’m somewhat worried that if problems arise later on, Chen Yang, with his kind of personality, might be taken advantage of. Even if Zhou Jiayi herself has a good personality, what about her family?”

“Will they be stingy, selfish and calculating?”

“…” Jiang Luoluo rolled her eyes, speechless, but understood what made her boyfriend somewhat biased, “I’ve met her family; they do speak and act like they’re in an idol drama, but they’re genuinely nice people.”

“Don’t think that everyone is like that because of one family’s behavior. Whether a person is good or bad is largely related to their own character and family environment. Jiayi’s family isn’t the calculating type.”

“And it’s just arranging for them to meet, whether they click or not is up to them.”

“I’d introduce Jiayi; mainly because she’s simpler than Wanying. Not that Wanying isn’t good, it’s just that having worked out there for so many years, she’s inevitably more calculating, and Chen Yang might not be able to handle her with his personality.”

“Alright then, you arrange it,” Chu Mingcheng nodded in agreement.

What Jiang Luoluo said made sense, and he had no reason to object; it was just a casual meetup, not an official match-making.

Chu Mingcheng went down to the garage. Chen Yang and Zhang Wei were already waiting in the car. The group bought two large foam boxes of crushed ice.

Clearly, they were confident about a big catch for the day.

But in reality, Chu Mingcheng didn’t expect the two of them to hunt down much fish.

Fishing is generally divided into three types. One is reef fishing, which is Chu Mingcheng’s current main method. He mostly fishes in areas near coral reefs and small islands.

This type of fishing is the easiest and more suitable for beginners, but the downside is that the resource quality is all left to chance.

The second type is structural fishing, which involves looking for oil rigs and fishing underneath them.

Many cylindrical structures under the oilrig are favorite habitats for fish.

However, the requirements for diving ability are also high; at minimum, a three-star free diving level is necessary, along with a sufficient awareness of risk prevention.

So far, Chu Mingcheng has only once hunted a few sea bream under a signal tower, but such sites with just a single column attract too few fish.

He hasn’t yet found a suitable structured fishing location, unless he has access to a larger boat that could go farther out.

As for Blue Water Fishing, it goes without saying that it’s basically about hunting big fish in the Far Sea.

Taking into account that he has now unlocked the use of a trailing line, Chu Mingcheng went out and bought a short one with fifty hooks.

Without a winch on board, pulling in this smaller type by hand should be relatively easy.

He also bought fifty live shrimps as bait, anticipating a good chance of making catches.

Having not gone out to sea for several days, Chu Mingcheng chose to return to the coral reef where he previously hunted Emperor Fish, to ensure today’s haul.

Of all his fishing spots, this one had the richest resources.

Chu Mingcheng planned to set the trailing line first, so he steered the boat to a deep-water area not far from the coral reef.

He let Zhang Wei navigate the boat slowly along the waterway; this simple task of boat handling shouldn’t be a problem for him.

Meanwhile, Chu Mingcheng and Chen Yang were busy baiting the hooks with live shrimp and gradually lowering the trailing line into the water.

After finishing with the trailing line, they returned to the coral reef to set down the shrimp traps and crab pots.

Both the trailing line and the pots had buoys, and with them nearby, there was no worry of losing sight of them.

Then, they anchored the boat and got changed into diving suits, ready to dive in.

As for Zhang Wei, he went off to catch up on sleep in the bedroom.

In his current state of subpar mental alertness and significant physical exhaustion, Chu Mingcheng wouldn’t risk letting him dive–it was far too dangerous.

“Ss–It’s a bit cold out here!” Chen Yang exclaimed, shrinking his neck as he stepped out of the cabin and the sea breeze hit him.

Today, the highest temperature in Xia City was just eighteen degrees, and it would be even colder over the sea.

It was only natural for him to be more susceptible to the cold, given that he’d been staying up late and only getting out of bed at noon, spending afternoons sitting in a chair.

“Today is actually quite good, it’s also the last weather of the year suitable for fishing. It’s going to cool down in a couple of days, and then the daytime temperature here will only be in the tens, which means we can only do line fishing.”

Chu Mingcheng started warming up his body on the deck, making himself feel warmer.

One hidden benefit of his enhanced physical condition was that he wasn’t very susceptible to cold anymore, probably able to winter-swim in snowy conditions, just like someone from a nation accustomed to battle.

“To be honest, when I was learning fishing in Qiongzhou, I didn’t even realize it was already winter,” Chen Yang said with a wry smile while warming up his body too, because stiff muscles could easily lead to cramps while diving.

Once he got his body moving, Chu Mingcheng threw his Carbon Fish Spear into the water, then jumped in after it.

Picking up his own spear, he turned around to catch Chen Yang’s spear as he watched him dive in.

Chu Mingcheng was fully equipped for today’s outing, even wearing a camera on his head.

Already in mid-December, he estimated he would go home after New Year’s, when a very pricy fish species would be waiting for him to catch. Hence, there might not be many more days for spearfishing this year.

Once Chen Yang was in the water too, Chu Mingcheng handed back his spear, then the two split up and started moving independently about ten meters apart from each other.

But Chu Mingcheng positioned himself slightly behind to easily monitor Chen Yang’s movements and quickly assist him if any accidents occurred.

After a while, seeing Chen Yang successfully spear a Black Sea Bream, Chu Mingcheng felt at ease.

Today, he wasn’t picky about the fish. Generally speaking, as long as they were big, they were his targets.

There were plenty of Black Sea Bream today, each weighing at least two or three pounds. Chu Mingcheng was lining up a shot with his spear when he noticed several Stone Clamfish swimming nearby.

The Stone Clamfish, also known as Star-pointed Dace or White Star Diao, and colloquially as Yellow Winged Fish, is a kind of dreamy fish species with an incredibly inflated price.

This fish is so scarce in the market that it commands a high price for its flesh. Even smaller ones caught in nets, cost over five hundred each.

But sea fishing typically happens in deep waters, where any catch is likely to be over two pounds, pushing the price up to fifteen hundred.

The ones Chu Mingcheng saw weren’t small by any means, about the same size as the Black Sea Bream he had noticed, which meant they were also over two pounds at least.

Seeing the fish lingering above the coral reef, he moved closer with his spear ready.

When he was about five meters away, he chose an easily hittable target on the left, watched its movement, and immediately pressed the trigger.

Immediately, the arrow pierced through the fish’s body, startling its companions into scurrying away in fright.

Chu Mingcheng swam to the surface, starting to reel in the line.

By this time, Chen Yang had retrieved his fish and re-armed his spear, then swam down to join Chu Mingcheng, “What did you get?”

“Got a Golden Stone Clam, the kind that’s worth at least a thousand each.”

“Damn, why didn’t you call me over just now?”

PS: Another update coming later.