Chapter 1103: Unexpected Discovery

The long silver-white "ribbon" made both of them widen their eyes in astonishment.

And because of that long strip of silver-white light in the middle, the sea urchins growing densely on the steep cliff walls on both sides of the trench were reflected with extraordinary clarity, just like natural lighting.

Their eyes seemed insufficient, darting back and forth between the sea urchins and the light, yet they simply couldn't communicate underwater, the shock in their eyes couldn't be expressed, and they had no proper tools in hand, so they could only hold it in.

Ye Yaodong was the first to react. He gestured to Ah Guang, took out the large net bag he had brought when going into the water, as well as the iron claw tied to his waist, signaling him to start working first.

Originally, the purpose of their dive this time was the sea urchins growing on the cliff walls on both sides of the trench. The silver-white ribbon in the middle was an unexpected discovery. They could chat about it after going up; time was limited, so they had to finish the work at hand first before going up.

Ah Guang also immediately composed himself, following his example by taking out the tools tied to his waist, then also kicking his fins like him, descending into the trench, using the iron claw to hook the sea urchins on the cliff wall into the net bag.

After all, it was his first time doing this job, so Ah Guang wasn't that deft. After a few attempts, he had to turn his head to check on Ye Yaodong's movements beside him. Seeing his swift speed, he also sped up and stopped dawdling.

After putting all his focus on the densely packed sea urchins on the cliff wall, he also forgot his fear, forgot that he was now in the middle of the trench, with silver-white light below instead of a pitch-black hole.

And because of the illumination from the light below, their line of sight was no longer obstructed, and their efficiency improved.

After the two net bags in Ye Yaodong's hands were full, he tossed them to the seabed first, swam to Ah Guang's side, and seeing that his second net bag had only just started to fill, he waited a moment.

He also took the opportunity to observe the silver-white glowing "ribbon" below.

These "ribbons" were ribbonfish. The dense, silver-white, long ribbonfish deep in the trench swayed and moved, filling the bottomless trench, no longer giving one the creepy-crawly feeling or the illusion of being sucked down.

They were all constantly swaying, densely packed at the bottom of the wide trench.

When he first laid eyes on it, he was shocked. Although he knew many strange creatures grew in trenches, and the deeper the trench, the more peculiar the creatures.

But he never expected there to be ribbonfish right inside the trench.

Ribbonfish generally live in waters 60 to 200 meters deep. They can be found in continental shelf waters, where food is abundant and suitable for them to hunt.

For example, China's East Sea ribbonfish float in the middle layer of the sea during the day (about sixty meters), and descend to the seabed at night (one hundred meters deep). At the winter solstice, the water temperature drops, and the ribbonfish swim to deeper waters to avoid the cold.

Additionally, there are other varieties of deep-sea ribbonfish that live year-round in trenches 1,000 meters deep.

At the depth visible to his naked eye, these ribbonfish were now only at a position of several dozen meters deep, not belonging to a special variety of deep-sea ribbonfish, looking like ordinary white ribbonfish.

Just as he was wondering—if there were this many ribbonfish down there, blocking out the sky, what about the jellyfish?

The jellyfish also emerged from the bottom of the trench…

Clearly there were jellyfish on the surface just now, indicating jellyfish were still emerging. So what's the deal with the ribbonfish down there? Could it be that this year there won't be jellyfish, but ribbonfish instead?

Just as he was puzzling, he saw a small area of the ribbonfish school below stirring violently, and then a large black hole was exposed around it.

The ribbonfish originally in that spot all dodged to the side, and a transparent, loose, large jellyfish emerged from the black hole, slowly rising up.

"Holy shit…"

He cursed in his heart—could it be that the ribbonfish had usurped the nest?

Once the jellyfish spawning season arrived and large numbers of jellyfish surfaced, these ribbonfish would have to migrate and avoid them, right?

Fish generally have an antagonistic relationship with jellyfish. Once a fish touches a jellyfish's tentacles, these stinging cells will shoot out their internal stinging threads into the fish or shrimp's body, and the stinging threads contain various types of venom used to paralyze the fish or shrimp.

This way, no matter how agile the fish or shrimp, it's hard to escape the jellyfish's "clutches," so fish and jellyfish are in an antagonistic relationship.

Ye Yaodong's gaze stayed on the jellyfish that had just floated up from the ribbonfish school. He wondered if, as the jellyfish increased day by day, these ribbonfish schools would all disappear and move elsewhere.

Then he'd have to hurry up?

After Ah Guang's net bag was also full, he stopped, turned around to look for Ye Yaodong, only to find that he was actually not far behind him.

At the same time, the ribbonfish school around them below became restless again, and two more black holes appeared. In a short while, two more jellyfish rose up from beneath the black holes.

"Huh?"

Ah Guang was extremely astonished.

Earlier, when both of them were fully focused on using the iron claw to hook sea urchins, several jellyfish had intermittently surfaced in the same manner from the bottom of the trench beside them.

They just hadn't noticed. Only after finishing the work did they realize it.

Ye Yaodong also looked at the jellyfish surfacing in the same way, and roughly understood.

He patted Ah Guang, signaling they could go up.

Only then did the two of them simultaneously kick their fins, holding the ropes of the net bags filled with sea urchins in their hands, and swim upward.

Just as they surfaced, Ah Guang couldn't wait to take off his face mask and breathing tube.

"Holy shit, there's not just sea urchins down there, but also ribbonfish. Damn, it almost blinded my dog eyes. I wanted to talk ages ago, I'm dying holding it in."

"Get on the boat first."

"The quantity is really huge, you can't see the end at a glance, densely packed."

"Are you talking about the sea urchins or the ribbonfish?"

Ah Guang hurriedly followed, swimming and saying: "Both. The sea urchins are also densely packed, and so are the ribbonfish. Just don't know how long or how deep that trench is. Anyway, the light down there wasn't good, and looking at it, it was all there."

"F*ck, so this is what the seabed is like, everything's down there…"

"Just now a fish swam right past me. I was holding the iron claw and poked that fish, scared it into blowing several bubbles, its tail flicking as it fled."

"If only I'd listened to them last year and come along to join the fun…"

"Dongzi, what about those ribbonfish? The quantity is huge, but we can't drop a net there…"

Ah Guang followed behind him toward the boat, chattering nonstop. The scene at the bottom of the sea had truly shocked him. If he could have spoken, he wouldn't have held it in until now.

Ye Yaodong climbed up first, then said: "We have to use fishing lines. Nets won't work. We need longlines. When we go back this afternoon, we need to hurry to buy nylon rope and hooks, ask the locals to make them overnight, finish them tonight, so we don't delay tomorrow's fishing."

After saying that, he slapped his thigh again, "Who knew this thing would come in handy, otherwise I would've brought it myself."

"Who would've thought? Longlines take up so much space, you'd have to be full to bring them out. Then let's head back early this afternoon, buy the rope early to make fishing lines."

"What are you talking about?"

Ye Fu gathered around the two of them, just listening to them chatter, not understanding a single word, only catching that they regretted not bringing longlines.

"What longlines? Where did the ribbonfish come from? Can there be ribbonfish here? Shouldn't you have to go to farther, deeper waters?"

Before Ye Yaodong could speak, Ah Guang excitedly chattered about what they had seen and heard at the bottom of the sea, gesturing as he spoke, animated and lively.

Even the boatmen nearby listening were extremely surprised.

"Ah, there are ribbonfish at the bottom of that trench? We didn't see them last year."

"Really that many? And they're glowing."

"Hairtail naturally glow at night, and they glow when they break the surface too."

"Is it because there are too many hairtail blocking the way, so the jellyfish couldn't come up, and that's why the surface is so sparse today?"

"Just now, for the longest while, we only saw a few pop up…"

"No, it's simply that the peak fishing season hasn't arrived yet—we still have to wait a few more days. But we can use these few days of waiting to catch a wave of hairtail. Once the jellyfish show up, the hairtail schools should disappear and migrate away."

Ye Yaodong listened to them chatting and chimed in. His hands weren't idle either—the two net bags of sea urchins he'd just harvested were still down below, not yet hauled up, so he casually called the two over to help gather them together.

Ye Fu clucked his tongue in wonder. "This sea trench is just too amazing, isn't it? A whole patch of jellyfish popping up would be one thing, but the rock walls on both sides are also covered in dense sea urchins. The jellyfish haven't even reached their peak fishing season yet, and there's already a hairtail school inside—too amazing."

"Nature is just that miraculous. Stop overthinking it. Which of you is going down? Experienced divers pair with new ones—hurry up and get your gear on. I'm about to haul mine up."

The two bundles of sea urchins together came to about seventy or eighty jin, and the two bundles on Agu's side were about the same amount.

Every single one was black and shiny, with sharp spines on top just like a hedgehog. Probably because no one had ever gone down into the water, these sea urchins had never been harvested, so besides being densely packed underneath, each one was big and fat—every one of them was about three or four liang.

They took the lead in carrying the net bags to the edge of the basket, then dumped them all into the basket to free up the net bags so the second wave of divers could go down again.

When someone was picking up sea urchins that had fallen on the deck, they accidentally got pricked by one of the spines and even bled, but they didn't panic—just stepped aside and peed on their own hand.

Because some sea urchins' spines still carry neurotoxins, it's not a big deal if it's mild, but it's best to rinse it with urine—then it'll clear up right away.

While they were getting into the water, Ye Yaodong also gave some instructions: "New divers, take it slow your first time down. Those of you who went into the water last year, keep a closer eye on them and guide them down gradually. After one or two times of experience, it'll be fine after that."

"Got it."

"Warm up first. If you feel physically uncomfortable or psychologically uncomfortable, come up immediately—don't push it."

"Okay."

While they were stretching, he added a few more words, mainly for the new divers to hear. Better to say it all at once now so he wouldn't have to repeat it later.

After the second wave had gone into the water, he asked the others, "Were there many jellyfish popping up just now?"

"…, scattered. Our boat didn't dare move. The Harvest happened to scoop up two; the rest were picked up by the small boats."

"Ah… there's another one popping up over there…"

"When we came over earlier, there were only a few dozen on the surface. Looks like the rate of them popping up will get faster and faster from here on."

Ye Fu said, "Once we dock this afternoon, I'll go buy materials right away. Good thing it's a small seaside town—these materials are easy to get."

"I wonder how much of this opportunity we can seize. Is this the first time hairtail have appeared here, or have they always been like this every year—only after the fishing season arrives and this place is occupied by jellyfish do they migrate away, returning the following year?"

"Who cares. As long as we can catch them, that's what matters. Tomorrow we'll make the longline. We'll just pull the line down into the water ourselves, then aim the hooks at the sea trench and drop them—much more accurate."

"Exactly. Dropping them right into the school of fish means a higher catch rate. These hairtail are easy to catch too—I heard they're very greedy feeders. Let's prepare more bait tomorrow."

"Perfect. Just now, one after another they all went out to drag the nets, and there's plenty of bycatch. Tonight we can just take whatever they don't want and use it as bait."

They waited on the boat, discussing strategy on the side, figuring out how to maximize the hairtail catch from the sea trench over the next two or three days.

Luckily, they had plenty of boats between them. Tomorrow they could move the boats around to extend the longline's fishing range.

That sea trench's fissure was so long—they could drive the boat into the water, pinpoint the location, then drop the longline into the sea trench.

The second wave of divers came up after quite a while. Everyone gathered at the ship's rail, and the two underwater also broke into smiles.

After hauling the men up, these two also chattered nonstop about what they'd seen underwater. It wasn't much different from what Ye Yaodong and Agu had said earlier, just described more dramatically, making the others who hadn't gone down yet all the more eager to get down there soon.

And the sea urchins they hauled up—each person also had seventy or eighty jin, no less than what Ye Yaodong and his group had brought up. Poured into the basket, it was another two full baskets.

Ye Yaodong deliberately kept ten people on the boat, in pairs. One haul came to a hundred and fifty jin. If everyone took a turn, that was about seven or eight hundred jin, taking roughly two hours—longer than the time it took to drag a single net.

But the yield from dragging one net wasn't this big.

It might also be because now two people go down together, with company, so they can overcome each other's fear. Once they're used to it, efficiency can be greatly improved. That sea trench was also packed full of hairtail, so you couldn't see the dark, deep hole, which meant every trip's haul was higher than last year.

He clearly remembered that last year when they went into the water, everyone's haul was only around thirty or forty jin. Two rounds only yielded 500 jin, and only when he went down himself did the haul get a bit higher. Now one round alone could get seven or eight hundred jin.

One person going down to the seabed and then into the dark, deep sea trench really puts pressure on the mind. Luckily this year he was smart and got another one.

If those sea urchins are still last year's price—about 2 mao per jin—then 1,000 jin is 200 yuan.

It's only 9 o'clock now. If they don't go back for lunch, they can do three or four more waves. Ten people taking turns, with plenty of rest time.

If they work until four or five in the afternoon before heading back, they can get nearly 4,000 jin in total—about 800 yuan in a single day!

Workers' wages are 4 yuan 5 a day, 28 workers. Not counting his father for now—his father would definitely get extra. So even if they didn't work, the workers' wages alone would be 126 yuan a day.

The ten divers each get an extra two yuan subsidy—another 20 yuan on top—so labor costs come to 146 yuan.

That's a net profit of around 650 yuan. We're rich.

Jellyfish or no jellyfish, the sea urchins alone are enough to make him money.

Still, he couldn't really let people work at sea without eating or drinking.

After mentally calculating how much they could get today, Ye Yaodong turned to his father and said: "Anyway there aren't many jellyfish on the surface. Those small boats are just wasting time rowing around out there—who knows if they've even found a few jellyfish by now. They don't even have hand-thrown nets or anything. Why don't you go gather those boats back and take the men home first?"

"Take them back? Not let them keep looking on the surface?"

"Right, efficiency's too low. Wasting manpower isn't worth it. If you head back early, you can also go buy the nylon line for the longline first. If it's hard to find locally-made ones, you can just have these boatmen sit at home and work—ten or twenty people can easily make one or two fishing lines in half a day."

"That's true, the longline does need to be prepared in advance. Then I'll go gather those small boats back now, and we head back together?"

"No, we're not going back. The haul from this trip is pretty big. Our boat is just going to stay here. We're not leaving today—we'll just stay here and dive for sea urchins. Bring us a meal at noon."

"That works too. When the small boats are called back later, should I just leave them here with you, and you tow them back together in the evening?"

"Mm."

Agu listened and started thinking it over too.

"The Harvest staying here is pointless. I'll just help you tow those small boats back, and on the way I'll also go prepare the longline materials. My dad's already gone out dragging nets, so I can't ask him to help."

"That works too. Then take your boat and the men on it back to prepare. Your boat's crew just sitting around here is a waste anyway—they won't catch many jellyfish. I've got enough divers here; I already kept ten people."

He and Agu weren't counted in the headcount. Agu had also just come over on a whim to join the fun.

"Alright."

The two families had brought the most people. A whole day without opening for business meant expenses of dozens to a hundred yuan—they had to open up new sources and economize as much as possible. Luckily, besides sea urchins, there was now also a hairtail school down below to subsidize things.

The other fishing boats going out to drag nets today could still earn a little to subsidize things.

Ye Fu took Dongsheng 002 out for a spin and towed back a bunch of small boats and people.

After all, they had only just gone out not long ago, so nobody had much of a haul — some had caught a few fish, some had scooped up one or two jellyfish.

Although what one boat gathered wasn't much, when the catch from all 10 boats was pooled together, it looked quite decent. Ye Fu moved everything onto the boat as well — they could add to the meals back home and also sell it for a few yuan.

After returning, he didn't put all the small boats behind the Harvest; he kept three at the rear himself.

Because there were also small boats brought out by other households — only three or four — those original trawler boats had originally planned to swing by and tow the small boats back on the return trip.

But now, seeing the big boats heading back, those small boats all begged Aguang to tow them back as well — they had no cargo anyway, so drifting there was pointless.

Aguang was helpless too — they were all from the same village, neighbors helping neighbors, and it was hard to refuse such a small favor within his ability; it was only three or four extra boats.

Then the two boats, towing a heap of small boats, headed back first.

Ye Yaodong's household had also left people on duty — after all, with a pile of supplies sitting there, someone had to keep watch. The ones on day duty were the ones who had slept on the boat at night, so as a reward they got to rest at home during the day.

That worked out to each person being on duty two days a month and resting two days during the day.

He only went down with Aguang on the first trip; after that he didn't go into the water again, just stayed on the surface watching the others take turns diving to work for him. He also mentioned that those who dived solo got extra pay.

Everyone was thrilled — although they'd had this last year, and surely this year too, hearing about the extra pay made them even happier.

Originally they already had 4.5 yuan a day; add another two and it's 6.5. If they worked a full thirty days a month, that would be 200 yuan — higher than any other job's wages.

After everyone did the math themselves, they worked even harder.

And after one rotation cycle, when they went down again, everyone's efficiency was even higher — sometimes one person could bring up over 100 jin, and the returns could exceed his estimate.

Ye Yaodong was just like a landlord or rich man — after changing into clean clothes, he sat there with his feet up, enjoying the breeze, watching everyone take turns diving to earn money for him. He was only short of a handful of sunflower seeds in his hand — of course, he couldn't be that excessive.

Now their boat was the only one drifting alone in the sea trench. While everyone was gathering sea urchins, jellyfish kept drifting up one after another — dozens of them, big and small. Because their fishing boat had stayed put without moving, nobody went to scoop up those jellyfish.

It wasn't until Ye Fu finished his errands and steered the boat out to deliver the meal that he hurriedly cast a net and scooped up all the jellyfish that had drifted to the surface nearby over the past few hours.

Then he came over, called the people on the boat who had finished eating to come help with the butchering, and climbed over himself to check on their haul from the better part of the day.

"So much!"

Ye Fu was astonished, looking at the deck piled full with basket after basket of sea urchins — over twenty baskets by his count. He stretched out his index finger and counted them basket by basket.

"It's only been half a day — how is there so much?"

"Two people diving together are way more efficient — one person's haul is almost catching up to what two people got last year."

"Is there 2,000 jin here?"

"About that, maybe a little more."

Ye Yaodong checked his watch — it was just past 12, not yet 1. It was pretty much what he'd expected; getting around 4,000 jin today should be doable.

They had to take advantage of the jellyfish-free window to dive and haul as much as possible — no outsiders around, and they had favorable weather, terrain, and teamwork.

"Then won't we catch four or five thousand jin of sea urchins today?" Ye Fu's face broke into a delighted grin. "We're rich!"

"Probably. Did you happen to ask about the prices when you went ashore?"

"I did. They said ones over three liang go for two mao, under three liang only one and a half mao, and one liang ones only eight fen."

"That's quite a difference."

"Seafood is all about size — of course the small ones have less meat. I also asked about hairtail — that one's valuable. As long as the flesh is thick and the size is bigger, the purchase price is over three mao."

Ye Yaodong beamed. "That's great — we can make more money when the time comes. Did you buy back the lines for the longline fishing?"

"Bought them. I had the boatmen make them directly, saves having to hire people. Their daily wages are already not low, and it's not right to have ten or twenty of them sitting around idle with nothing to do. There's nothing much to do once we're back anyway, so I just told them to make them."

"Mm."