Chapter 369: Chapter 241: Snatching Food from a Shark’s Mouth (Part 2)

When fishing for tuna, you can only catch so many even if you find a whole school. Learning about this route was much more reliable than Gu Nan just trying his luck out at sea.

He offered a 50% discount on their fish purchase as a thank you, then immediately started the fishing boat and headed over.

A little over twenty nautical miles was just over an hour’s trip. The sooner they got there, the sooner they’d find the tuna.

Now, everyone on board was filled with anticipation. Their target this time was bluefin tuna. They hadn’t seen a hint of one for days, and everyone would be disappointed if they went back empty-handed.

The weather was pretty good today. Gu Nan went up to the flybridge to pilot the boat and enjoy the breeze, since there was a helm station up there as well.

An Jun and the others decided to follow him up to chat. The three women even went to the trouble of cutting up two platters of fruit and juicing a few glasses. They were living the good life.

If you’re going to get a fishing boat, you might as well enjoy the day-to-day comforts. It adds a bit of color to the otherwise arduous life of a fisherman.

About half an hour later, Gu Nan’s eyes narrowed, and he picked up his binoculars.

Through the binoculars, he was surprised to see a seal on the surface of the water. ’A seal? All the way out here?’

Gu Nan blinked. He thought it was a sea lion at first, so he took a closer look.

Sea lions and seals look quite different. After observing it again, he confirmed that it was, in fact, a seal.

’Seals usually live in cold waters. What’s one doing all the way out here?’

Gu Nan immediately used his appraisal ability on it and learned that it was an adult spotted seal.

It was the only species of seal that bred in the country, primarily found in the Bohai Sea and the northern Yellow Sea.

However, they did occasionally appear in the southeastern seas, though sightings were extremely rare.

Thus, for fishermen in the southeastern seas, while sea lions were a common sight, seals were exceptionally rare.

Gu Nan had no particular interest in the seal. He knew without a doubt that it was a nationally protected species. He couldn’t be bothered to check its protection level; all that mattered was that it was off-limits.

What he failed to notice, however, was that the seal was in a panic, desperately trying to escape something.

Not far from the seal, a triangular fin was cutting through the water, speeding straight for it.

The waves on the open sea were quite high, which was why Gu Nan had initially overlooked the inconspicuous fin.

Just as Gu Nan was lowering his binoculars, a massive, bloody maw erupted from the surface. The seal, which had just dodged a fatal strike, was sent flying.

"Holy shit—"

Gu Nan slammed the binoculars he’d just lowered back to his eyes. ’A shark hunting a seal?’

’Just like a scene from a nature documentary!’

"What is it?" Yi Chen asked.

"A shark is hunting a seal." Gu Nan quickly changed course, heading toward the seal.

In fact, the seal was also swimming toward their fishing boat. It had seen plenty of these huge things before and knew that if it could just reach one, it would be safe.

But the distance between them wasn’t short. Whether it could escape the shark’s pursuit would come down to pure luck.

"Hey, the seal’s coming our way!"

"You can do it, little seal!"

The women were a nervous wreck, clenching their fists and cheering the seal on.

The men, on the other hand, watched with great interest. They didn’t care whether the seal lived or died, but they weren’t about to miss such a rare spectacle.

They spent their days fishing and killing fish; they didn’t have it in them to be bleeding hearts. The law of the jungle was cruel, and it was up to the seal to save itself.

The distance was only about a thousand meters, and they were closing in on each other rapidly.

The shark attacked twice more, and amidst the women’s screams, the seal got lucky and managed to evade both attacks.

With only a few dozen meters to go, Gu Nan cut the engine, letting the boat drift forward on its own momentum as he ran down to the main deck.

An Jun and the others followed, thinking they might get to pet the seal in a moment, or maybe even feed it some fish.

But when they got to the deck, Gu Nan froze, staring at the blood-red water churning beside the boat.

Yi Chen hadn’t expected the seal to fail at the very last second. Her bright eyes grew moist; she had been cheering for the seal the whole time and was now overcome with emotion.

"Tsk, tsk. It was fated, I guess. Just one step short. What a shame," An Jun said, shaking his head.

"Yeah, I was hoping to pet its head and see how it felt compared to a dog’s," Ye Jing added with a hint of regret.

He ran a pet shop, so he didn’t really like seeing cute mammals like this get brutally killed.

Just then, Gu Nan’s sharp eyes spotted the seal’s mangled torso floating to the surface. An idea struck him. He quickly grabbed a gaff that was lying by the gunwale and hooked the headless body, trying to haul it aboard.

Adult spotted seals can grow up to two meters long and weigh over two hundred pounds.

This particular seal wasn’t that long, but even without its head and neck, the body was still a little over a meter long and by no means light.

Gu Nan couldn’t lift it on his own and quickly called to An Jun and Ye Jing for help.

The shark must have still been busy with the rest of the seal, because it didn’t immediately surface to challenge them.

Seizing the opportunity, Gu Nan and the others worked together to quickly haul the mangled carcass onto the boat.

BANG—

"HOLY SHIT—"

"FUCK—"

Just as they lifted the seal’s carcass into the air, a huge shark—its teeth stained with blood, its eyes pitch-black—erupted from the water and slammed into the side of the boat.

It was a massive tiger shark, looking to be at least four or five meters long.

If a great white’s gaping maw was intimidating, this tiger shark’s appearance was downright horrifying.

Its face was more ferocious, covered in scars, but the most unsettling part was its eyes. They had no whites at all, just pure black, like something out of a Korean horror film.

Its sudden appearance made An Jun and Ye Jing jump, and even Gu Nan felt a jolt.

’Okay, I was just shocked by how ugly it was.’

’People aren’t afraid of ghosts; they’re just repulsed by how ugly they are.’

The tiger shark was furious. After that long chase, it had finally gotten a taste of meat, only for its huge prize to vanish in the blink of an eye!

It was so enraged that it tried to take a bite out of the big metal clunker, but the hull was too hard and too big; it couldn’t get a purchase even with its jaws stretched to their limit.

’If its eyes weren’t naturally pitch-black,’ Gu Nan mused, ’they’d probably be red with rage right now from having its meal stolen.’

What should have been a full meal ended up being just a taste.

"Ah Nan, why did you bring that seal carcass on board?" The seal’s body lay limp on the deck, blood pooling around it.

Yi Chen and the other women immediately backed away, watching the scene with disgust.

Spotted seals were actually quite cute, even as adults. But now, headless and mangled, the bloody mess was just nauseating.

It was a mammal, after all, which felt different from gutting a fish.

Gu Nan chuckled mischievously. "This is a protected species. If the shark hadn’t gotten to it first, when would we ever get a chance to taste one?"

"I’ve heard seal meat is very lean, super high in protein, and tastes delicious—kind of like venison. It might have a slight iodine flavor, but as long as you prepare it right, it’s supposed to be incredible."

"This is a rare opportunity. We can’t let it go to waste."

The others were stunned. They never would have guessed this was what Gu Nan had in mind.

"Holy cow, you’re really something else. Gutsy enough to eat a protected species!" An Jun exclaimed. The thought of eating a seal had never even crossed his mind.

Ye Jing clicked his tongue, his interest in the seal meat suddenly piqued.

’There are no other boats around. If we eat it, we eat it. Who’s gonna know what we did?’

Besides, they hadn’t killed the seal themselves; they’d snatched it from a shark’s jaws. They could eat it with a clear conscience.

"You guys can eat it. We’re not having any!" Xu Zhina said, shaking her head repeatedly. Just looking at the hunk of meat made her lose her appetite.

Gu Nan just smiled and said nothing.

Instead, he grabbed a filleting knife and began to butcher the mangled seal carcass. Best to do it while it was fresh.

"Ah Nan, should we keep the hide?" Ye Jing asked, coming over to help.

Before Gu Nan could answer, An Jun cut in irritably, "Keep it? Hell no! Throw away everything identifiable. Give it back to that tiger shark. We’ll just keep the meat. Even if we can’t finish it all, we can take the rest back. No one will be able to tell what it is just by looking at it."

Gu Nan nodded. "He’s right. We’ll just keep some of the meat. The hide, especially, has to go. We can’t leave any evidence behind."

Plenty of fishermen at sea did this sort of thing.

Just tasting one that you found by chance, without killing it yourself, was already considered restrained. There were far worse people who would kill a protected species outright and then just dump the body.

Out on the open sea, nobody knows what you’re doing. It all came down to a person’s own moral compass.

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