Chapter 323: Chapter 216: Maxed Out, Returning Early

For their late-night snack, Yi Chen naturally made noodles again—they were quick. But this time, besides some seafood, she also added pork belly and ribs.

She also specially fired up a portable grill and made everyone a few skewers of fatty roasted lamb.

You have to admit, there was a reason ordinary people loved fatty pork decades ago. Having some grease in your stomach helps you stave off hunger better; seafood just doesn’t quite cut it in that regard.

Full and satisfied, the group returned to the deck and took out the sardines to create a new chum line.

The previous chum line had dissipated while they were eating their late-night snack and had stopped tossing bait, so they needed to start over.

Besides, the time spent tossing chum was a good chance to digest. The other three were fine, as they were all using electric reels, but Gu Nan was doing it manually to maximize his catch.

After tossing about fifty pounds of sardines overboard, only four boxes of bait were left on the boat.

The two pairs had two boxes each, which would be enough to last them until dawn if used sparingly.

Gu Nan and Yi Chen each baited their hooks with a live squid and cast them into the water, waiting for the tuna to bite.

As soon as the chum line formed, a large school of tuna swam over to feast on the free late-night snack.

Seeing the injured squid, they immediately swam over to fight for it.

Gu Nan immediately felt the activity. Sure enough, the next moment, his fishing rod was yanked hard.

Just like before, he forcefully lifted the rod, trying to stop the fish with a single powerful tug.

But when he heaved, holy crap, he couldn’t budge it at all.

The force coming through the line was immense, far more than he could handle.

Gu Nan could brute-force a fifty-pound fish, but sixty pounds was a struggle.

For a hundred-pounder, he had no choice but to properly fight it and wait for the fish to tire out.

The fish’s sheer power caught him off guard, but he reacted instantly, bracing himself against the side of the boat for leverage. He locked the drag and simply let the fish run for a bit.

"Ah Nan, is it a big one?"

Yi Chen had a fish on the line too. After pressing the button to start reeling it in, she didn’t pay it much more mind, but seeing Gu Nan using a different technique than before, she asked out of curiosity.

"Not ridiculously huge, but it’s probably one of those hundred-pounders Brother Guo was talking about," Gu Nan replied, mentally calculating the line and distance.

"Well now, looks like you hit the jackpot again, kid?" Guo Xiao immediately teased when he heard that.

Earlier, he had seen the fish finder: there was a dense swarm of forty- to fifty-pounders, but only a few that were over a hundred pounds. Hooking one of those really was like winning the lottery.

"Haha, you guys know me. I’ve always had good luck when it comes to fishing," Gu Nan said, laughing it off. ’I didn’t even use the Fish Selection Card from the gold treasure chest, so hooking this one really was just luck.’

The others chuckled. They couldn’t really argue with that; none of the other three on board had luck as good as his.

As fish started hitting all their lines, everyone began to focus on the task at hand.

The fish on Gu Nan’s line had already run more than three hundred meters out. He figured it was time to put a stop to it, so he took two steps back, planted the butt of the rod in his fighting belt, and heaved upward.

If this had been a tuna of around fifty pounds, that would have been enough to stop its charge. But this one didn’t stop; it only slowed down slightly.

Seeing that it was having an effect, Gu Nan pumped the rod hard again and again, trying to gain a few turns on the reel with each lift.

This style of fishing was incredibly draining. After just a short while, his breathing grew ragged, and he had to open his mouth to gasp for air.

Gu Nan’s persistence paid off. The fish was still over three hundred meters out, but it wasn’t running any farther. At the same time, its stamina was being drained, and its pulls were noticeably weaker.

The big tuna in the water was getting anxious. Unable to swim freely, it instinctively felt uneasy and was also growing increasingly deprived of oxygen.

It could no longer make a long run, so all it could do was swim in circles, trying to gather strength for another struggle.

But Gu Nan wasn’t about to let it get its way. Every move the fish made, every ounce of force in its struggles, was transmitted clearly through the line to his hands.

So, every time the big tuna started to dart away, Gu Nan would seize the opportunity to pump the rod hard, yanking it upward.

This force would immediately break its attempt to build momentum. At the same time, it would pull on the hook, and the pain would instinctively make the fish follow the pull of the line, swimming diagonally upward.

And so, without even realizing it, the big tuna that had been in the mid-layer of the water surfaced.

When it broke the surface, the boat’s lights hit it, sending the tuna into an even greater frenzy.

But it was helpless. Tuna are propelled from the tail; control the head, and you control the direction of its struggle.

This is true for most fish. The moment they bite the hook, their fate is in the hands of the angler.

The only thing to watch out for is the fish taking this chance to thrash wildly at the surface, trying to shake the hook free, break it, or chafe through the line.

"Don’t think you’re so tough just ’cause you’re big! Yoink!"

Gu Nan knew this was the critical moment. The next little while would be when the fish struggled the hardest. If he could get through it, he’d be able to land the fish soon.

If he couldn’t manage it, this fish could end up wasting a lot more of his time.

The fish was too far away for Gu Nan to see, but luckily there were no other fishing boats within a kilometer of him, so he didn’t have to worry about the line getting tangled and cut.

Every time the tuna struggled, he would pump the rod to break its rhythm. Sometimes, when it got tired, Gu Nan would even jab the rod to provoke it, getting the ’puppy’ to start moving again.

After all the back-and-forth, the tuna was completely worn out, with no fight left in it.

On top of that, the constant tension from the rod, line, and hook was continuously sapping its strength, making it even more miserable.

It was like comparing two runners in a thousand-meter race: other fish were running unburdened, while this one was carrying a fifty-pound weight. It was already exhausted before even reaching the five-hundred-meter mark.

When the tuna went several minutes without any violent struggles, its fate was sealed.

Gu Nan seized the opportunity to reel in the line quickly, finally pulling the fish to the side of the boat at almost the same time as Yi Chen.

That’s right. The electric reel was slow, and even though Yi Chen’s tuna was clearly a lot smaller, she finished at about the same time he did.

It only took Gu Nan a little over thirty minutes to land this fish, which was incredibly fast.

If the fishing fans in a livestream were to see this, they’d most likely be waving their hands in denial, ’Impossible! Absolutely impossible!’

Yi Chen glanced curiously at the fish Gu Nan had caught. At first, she thought it was a different type of tuna, but when she saw its long pectoral fins and realized it looked the same as hers, she lost interest.

In truth, the school of albacore tuna they’d found today was already full of exceptionally large ones. The albacore normally seen on the market are usually only ten to twenty pounds, quite small.

Even fifty-pounders were uncommon, as fishermen would sell the larger fish to the tuna market. They would be bought up there and then processed into canned tuna.

The market would set the price based on fat content and quality. This was a way to sell the fish quickly and get paid, and with a bit of luck, you might even earn a little extra.

The market price for albacore tuna isn’t particularly high, about the same as yellowfin tuna, around fifty to sixty yuan per pound.

This was also why the customers in their group chat were so happy to hear it was albacore tuna.

There were two reasons for this. First, it was affordable. If it had been bluefin tuna, they probably would have just bought other fish or had to pool their money together to buy one.

Second, albacore tuna can have a fat content of up to 7%, which is 5% higher than yellowfin. For a similar price, the flavor was much better. Anyone would be happy with that deal.

Gu Nan was busy landing the two tuna. Yi Chen unhooked her fish and re-baited her line to keep fishing, then got ready to bleed the catch.

He, however, made sure to spike the fish’s brain first before handing it over to his girlfriend, so it wouldn’t thrash around and hurt her.

An unknown amount of time passed. The sky began to pale, and the lights on the boat and the nearby oil rig were all switched off.

By now, the baited hooks in the water were all still. The school of fish, which had been in a frenzy all night, had clearly moved on.

The four people on the fishing boat had a massive haul. The refrigerated hold was so small that the tuna almost didn’t fit. Fortunately, Gu Nan moved out all the fish he had put in earlier, clearing up space. Only by stacking the tuna could they just barely fit them all in.

Including the ones caught by Guo Xiao and Wang Junhe, he estimated they had over thirty fish in total.

He and Yi Chen alone had caught around twenty-five. It was a shame the bite wasn’t as good in the second half of the night; otherwise, the two of them could have easily passed thirty.

Gu Nan had also slowed down later on, mainly due to exhaustion. His pace was barely keeping up with the efficiency of the electric reels.

But no matter what, the quantity was definitely enough to sell. He was going to make a good profit this time.

"Whew... The life of a pro fisherman really isn’t for me. It’s too damn tiring! If I had to fish like this every day, I’d definitely find a new hobby."

For Gu Nan’s sake, Guo Xiao had stayed up fishing with his electric reel all night, and now that he had put his rod away, he was exhausted.

If it were up to him, he would have gone to bed long ago. He found this tedious style of fishing incredibly boring. Thankfully, it was just for one night.

Wang Junhe just smiled without saying anything, but he looked just as exhausted.

"Brother Wang, Brother Guo, I won’t say much, but I’ll remember what you did for me tonight. I got some news, and I’ll have a surprise for you in a few days."

Gu Nan felt he had to show his appreciation for their help with the fishing trip, even though he was buying the fish they caught at his own procurement cost.

But it wasn’t like either of them was short on money. Therefore, he had to give them something else as a proper token of his gratitude.

"A surprise?" Wang Junhe and Guo Xiao exchanged a look, their curiosity piqued. "What kind of surprise?"

"It wouldn’t be a surprise if I told you now, would it? Just wait. I guarantee you’ll be satisfied."

’What else could it be? A Legendary Antarctica Dogtooth Fish for each of them, of course.’

A Legendary-grade Dogtooth Fish weighed over two hundred pounds. Even with the head and guts removed, a single one was worth around forty thousand yuan. Gu Nan was confident they would be more than satisfied with this surprise.

In fact, he had to prepare three of them. The third one was for the shipyard.

Guo Xiao nodded in satisfaction, a flicker of anticipation for this so-called surprise building within him.

"Alright, we’ll be waiting for your surprise. Let’s pack up, have some breakfast, and get some sleep. We’ll head back when we wake up."

Once everything was tidied up, Yi Chen had breakfast ready. After eating, they all went to shower and sleep.

Gu Nan, however, didn’t join them. If they waited until they woke up to leave, they wouldn’t get home until the middle of the night. So, he forced himself to stay awake and start the boat, planning to sleep after the others woke up.

The boat full of fish needed to be weighed back on shore, so it was essential to head back early.

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