Chapter 205: Chapter 181: Head as Big as a Basketball Chapter 205: Chapter 181: Head as Big as a Basketball “Golden Stone Clam, oh, this fish is really rare.”

Of course, Chen Yang wasn’t blaming Chu Mingcheng just now. He was simply envious and annoyed that he missed the Golden Stone Clam.

After learning fishing and hunting, he would definitely think about hunting some precious fish.

“Don’t panic, the fish hasn’t gone far.” Chu Mingcheng secured the fish to a live fish clip, reloaded the fish harpoon, and then took him to look for the Golden Stone Clam.

He had noticed the direction in which the fish had escaped, and they usually wouldn’t go too far.

Indeed, after swimming just over twenty meters, they spotted the trace of the Golden Stone Clam again.

There were still four swimming ahead; Chu Mingcheng stayed back a body length, allowing Chen Yang to go ahead and hunt.

One school of fish for two hunters clearly didn’t permit simultaneous hunting. Each fish moved differently, so they couldn’t both press the trigger at the same time and each hit a fish.

There would definitely be an order, and the one behind would naturally miss.

This was also the reason Chu Mingcheng hadn’t called Chen Yang over earlier. Coming over wouldn’t have helped; he could only watch him hunt.

Normally, fishing and hunting involved finding one’s own fishing spots, and how much one caught depended purely on personal skill.

However, because the Golden Stone Clam was so rare, Chu Mingcheng brought him to catch one.

With a bang, Chen Yang pressed the trigger.

The fish arrow accurately hit the Golden Stone Clam. This hit rate was somewhat higher than his previous ones; could this be the advantage of liking to play “chicken games”?

“Haha, over a thousand per pound. I rarely eat such expensive fish. We’ll eat it for lunch,” Chen Yang said excitedly as he retrieved the fish.

Today, having caught only two fish, he found himself falling in love with the sport.

Chu Mingcheng was surprised, “Eat it yourself? You’re not selling it?”

Chen Yang shook his head, “I’m not like you. I fish and hunt and buy boats purely to eat rare yet fresh seafood. Eating is the main purpose, having a healthy hobby is secondary. Whether I sell the fish depends on the situation.”

“That makes sense, looks like I’ll be enjoying some good meals in the future, too. I can’t bring myself to eat expensive fish, so I’ll just freeload at your place.” Thinking about his family background, Chu Mingcheng felt that was certainly the case.

“No problem, it’s just eating!” Chen Yang agreed immediately, always generous when it came to food.

Afterward, the two split up, each searching for their own prey.

Chen Yang was now hunting in the shallow waters, equipped with safety ropes and floats, so safety shouldn’t be a problem.

Chu Mingcheng, however, had to chase the few remaining Golden Stone Clams. As a fish that was as pricey as the Rat Spot, he couldn’t just let them go.

Still, before leaving, he specifically reminded Chen Yang to set a timer for himself.

Whether or not he could hunt their target, he had to return to the surface to breathe after a minute and a half.

His current static breath-holding had just passed two minutes; he needed continuous practice in free diving to improve his physical condition, then his time would extend again.

The most taboo thing in free diving fishing is greed. Encountering big or expensive fish might lead one to keep waiting for a better opportunity, and that situation can easily lead to drowning.

But in reality, there are so many fish in the sea; if it doesn’t work out this time, there will be other times. There is really no need to risk one’s life for a fish.

After splitting up from Chen Yang, Chu Mingcheng arrived in the deep-water area and found a Golden Stone Clam hiding next to the coral reef.

There was only one, apparently separated from its companions.

Chu Mingcheng couldn’t bear to see it alone, so he shot an arrow to reunite it with its earlier companions.

Two Golden Stone Clams, today’s fuel cost was covered, and the rest was profit.

Having dived for less than two minutes, Chu Mingcheng, not wanting to waste time, pulled the fish back directly.

However, the struggling of the Golden Stone Clam seemed to have caught the attention of another creature. A fish suddenly appeared in his sight, heading slowly towards the Golden Stone Clam and bit its tail.

It ended up being pulled back together with it, revealing itself to be a Cat Shark.

It only realized the danger after being pulled closer and immediately let go of its mouth to escape.

But its speed was not flattering, and thinking of escaping now seemed a bit late; Chu Mingcheng easily grabbed its tail.

Although called a shark, the Cat Shark doesn’t resemble the sharks people usually imagine.

It’s also small in size, barely seventy centimeters at its longest, and a normal Cat Shark weighs only about two to three pounds. Despite being quite long, it’s indeed light.

Luckily, the price is good, around one hundred per piece.

The price clearly suggests the Cat Shark’s meat is decent; otherwise, it wouldn’t sell for so much.

Having caught a live one, Chu Mingcheng first swam back to the boat to ice up the Golden Stone Clams and tossed the Cat Shark into the live well.

Just as he was about to dive again, Chen Yang’s shout suddenly rang out.

“Ah Cheng, come help me finish it off. I don’t know what I hit, it’s hiding in a rock cave and I can’t pull it out.”

“Coming right away!”

Chu Mingcheng immediately became interested. It must be something big; otherwise, it wouldn’t be impossible to pull out.

He dove into the water, quickly swimming towards Chen Yang.

Then he followed him to the front of a huge boulder. Below the boulder was a deep cave; he approached the cave entrance and looked down, unable to see clearly what was inside.

At that moment, Chen Yang signaled to him, asking him to aim while he began pulling the fishing line, trying to pull something out from inside.

After a little while, Chu Mingcheng saw a vague shadow being pulled out from the cave; he immediately pressed the trigger, and the fish arrow hit the target successfully.

So, he and Chen Yang began to pull together.

Unexpectedly, the creature inside was unexpectedly tenacious, and even with their combined efforts, they couldn’t pull it out for a while as it resisted fiercely.

Seeing Chen Yang was about to run out of breath, Chu Mingcheng gestured for him to go up for air, then took over the fishing line from his hand and held it along with his own.

He pressed one hand against a huge rock and continued to exert force with the other.

Exerting force suddenly could easily damage the creature inside.

Continuous exertion could temporarily avoid this situation, but if it went on for too long, it might still cause damage.

However, they had no choice as a single fishing arrow cost several hundred yuan, and two together were over a thousand yuan. Cutting the fishing line and leaving would be too extravagant.

When Chu Mingcheng got serious, the creature inside could no longer match his strength. Wounded, it was slowly pulled out bit by bit.

At this point, Chen Yang swam back to help pull the fishing line.

But the creature inside truly was strong. When his oxygen was depleted, he still couldn’t see it and had to go up for air again.

Of course, watching Chu Mingcheng’s breath-holding ability in action, he was astounded. He had not known that the other could hold his breath for so long.

It wasn’t until the third dive, with his help, that the creature inside was finally pulled out.

Only then did they realize that hiding inside was an enormous octopus.

The octopus’s head alone was as big as a basketball, and its tentacles could certainly reach a diameter of one meter if spread out.

Both fishing arrows had pierced its body, but because of the barbed pieces, no matter how they pulled, they couldn’t yank out the arrows.

Afterward, they swam to the surface with the octopus in tow.

As soon as Chen Yang surfaced, he immediately asked, “Ah Cheng, tell me the truth, how many minutes can you hold your breath dynamically?”

“My dynamic breath-holding is so-so, about five minutes. I haven’t tested my limit, but it should be over six minutes.”

“Damn, so-so? That’s insane!”

“Hey, hey, hey, why are you cursing at me?”

“That’s not cursing you, that’s praising you. Look, I had to breathe three times just now, but you didn’t take a single breath.”

Chen Yang grew even more envious of his childhood friend’s various physical talents. Compared to him, he felt inept!

“I really envy your breath-holding ability. I have to swim back to the surface for air after catching one fish, but you can catch several. Ah, it’s truly frustrating to compare with others!”

Chu Mingcheng didn’t like that last comment: “What kind of thing is that to say? With your skills in life, how many people could envy you but never achieve what you have?”

Chen Yang was taken aback, then chuckled, “You’re right.”

Because of his family background, he indeed had a head start of decades over others, and envying others seemed truly pointless.

Then, Chen Yang took the octopus back to the boat.

After all the yanking and diving repeatedly, he was quite tired, so he decided to rest in the morning and start preparing ingredients for lunch.

Considering they were planning to go fishing in the afternoon, he just rinsed off simply, dried himself with a towel, and made do for the time being.

Outside, the octopus temporarily stored in the fish box was still moving. Such creatures indeed have strong vitality.

Chen Yang actually felt quite tempted looking at it; such a large octopus was perfect for braising.

Unfortunately, there was no suitable pot on the boat, so he had to settle for covering it with ice until they could cook it at home in the evening.

So, he took out his golden stone clam and the black sea bream he caught earlier to prepare, waiting for Chu Mingcheng to come back and cook lunch.

In the realm of cooking, both he and Zhang Wei were quite ordinary.

After Chen Yang returned to the boat, Chu Mingcheng immediately felt unencumbered.

He swam directly to the deep-water area of the coral reef, diving to the bottom to look for suitable prey.

To his left, a grouper about sixty centimeters long caught his attention.

Such a big grouper definitely weighed over twenty kilograms.

He swam closer to inspect but was somewhat disappointed to find it was a cheap pearl dragon ginseng.

Pearl dragon ginseng is a hybrid cultivated from a male dragon gizzard grouper and a female tiger spot, and those encountered in the sea all escaped from cultivation boxes, technically making them wild!

But this grouper was very cheap, and the bigger it was, the cheaper it got.

This twenty-plus-kilogram grouper was priced only at 45 yuan per kilogram, but it was still worth roughly one thousand yuan, so Chu Mingcheng naturally took it.

He approached slowly until he was about three meters away from the fish, which only then became alert and slowly began to move away from him.

But this movement revealed a vulnerability.

In an instant, a fishing arrow pierced its chest and abdomen, and blood immediately flowed out.

Although the pearl dragon ginseng had escaped from a cultivation box, its size gave it no small amount of struggling power and force. Chu Mingcheng couldn’t subdue it immediately.

So he decided to keep pulling the fishing line towards the surface, bringing the fish to the middle, open waters.

This allowed him to breathe normally, and the fish would wear itself out more quickly than if it found a place to hide, which would make the struggle much harder.

After a while, the gravely injured pearl dragon ginseng couldn’t hold out much longer and finally lay still.

Chu Mingcheng retrieved the fish and checked the time; it was only 10:10 AM. He could still fish for another half-hour, so he decided to keep the fish with him for now.