Chapter 166: Humphead Wrasse

After a simple lunch, Ye Yaodong took the newly made ground cages and a few buckets for the cargo and headed to the pier.

It had been two days since he had netted, and it had been calm lately, so nobody dared to steal the nets. There would probably be quite a bit of cargo this time.

When he arrived at the pier, Hearing Xiao Xiao and Azheng were already on their boat. He saw the two bamboo baskets on their small boat at a glance.

In the bamboo baskets were countless coils of fishing line, with nearly a hundred hooks hooked onto the edge of the grass basket, dense and packed. He didn't know how much effort it must have taken.

"How many hours does it take to organize these hooks and lines?" Ye Yaodong had been a bit tempted when he saw how complicated it was, but he gave up on the idea immediately. Ground cage nets were still less trouble.

"Two hours, I guess. It's not too bad."

Two hours was "not too bad"? Forget it.

"What a hassle."

Hearing Xiao Xiao felt the same way. "Indeed. Next time before going out to sea, we can ask the women or elderly nearby to do it; it'll be less trouble."

"Let's go, let's set off. I have to check the ground cages first. You guys wait for me when you set the longlines later!"

"Alright, we also have to check the ground cages and set the few ground cages on the boat while we're at it. Once you're done, we'll set the longlines."

The two boats sailed away from the shore one after the other, each rowing to their own ground cage spots.

Ye Yaodong checked the several rows of ground cage nets one after another. At first, he had been full of passion, but now that he did the same thing every few days, he no longer had that "opening a blind box" feeling when checking the cargo, unless a rare item suddenly appeared. But rare items weren't there every day.

Today was the same.

But the harvest was quite good. There were plenty of fish, shrimp, and crabs, with the most being croakers and swimming crabs. The valuable ones were still the mud crabs; autumn crabs were plump and delicious.

He put all the cargo into two large buckets without sorting them. After resetting all the ground cages, he rowed toward the sea area where Hearing Xiao Xiao and Azheng had set their ground cages.

They had already finished checking their cargo and had cast a few more nets, but the harvest wasn't great.

As soon as he got close, he heard them muttering that hand-casting nets were too much trouble, saying that if longline fishing was good, they would all do longline fishing in the future.

"Hey, is the harvest not good?"

Azheng curled his lips. "There are only two or three rows of ground cage nets in total, what could be good or bad? We've only cast the hand-casting net a few times, it's just so-so. We were just waiting for you to come over so we could set the lines."

"Then let's set the lines. Do you need help?"

He saw that the hooks in the original bamboo baskets were already covered with small shrimp as bait. It seemed they were just waiting to set the lines and didn't need his help with anything.

"No need. We're using the small shrimp we just netted as bait, and they're already hooked. The two of us are enough—one to set, one to steer the boat."

After Azheng finished speaking, he signaled Hearing Xiao Xiao to steer the boat forward for a distance. Then, while steering, he threw the head anchor into the water, simultaneously throwing out the buoy, connecting the main line, and then taking the hooks off the edge of the basket one by one to cast the fishing gear into the water.

After setting the first basket of main line, he connected the tail end of that basket's main line to the head end of the second basket's main line, as well as the buoy rope and sinker rope, and threw them into the water. Then he cast the second basket of main line, and finally threw out the tail anchor and buoy.

Because they were just testing the waters today, there were only two baskets of main line, about 200 hooks or so.

After Azheng finished setting all the hooks, Ye Yaodong asked, "Just like that? And then we just wait to pull them up?"

"How could that be? My father-in-law said we also need to move the fishing line to make the bait swim, luring the big fish in the sea to eat the bait."

"We don't have to keep swinging it, do we? Won't it move when the water flows?"

"Who knows? Maybe the range of movement isn't big enough. Let's try it first."

Seeing that it wouldn't be pulled up that quickly, Ye Yaodong simply took out the fishing rod from his boat, took out a fish, picked off some meat to use as bait, and cast the hook.

Anyway, since he was idle, it wouldn't be bad to fish a few times to satisfy his craving.

He didn't know if it was because so many rows of hooks had been set nearby, but the fish seemed to have been attracted by the bait over there. His hook had been in the sea for a long time, but there was no movement at all.

He simply pulled up the hook, thinking of changing direction to cast again, but found that the bait was gone.

Damn, no wonder there was no movement for so long!

Better use shrimp. He took out a small shrimp and continued to bait the hook.

This time, the bait was taken quickly. In less than two minutes, a 6-jin big eel bit the hook.

"Damn, Dongzi, you actually caught a fish? And it's a sea eel."

"I was just thinking that since I was idle anyway, and your longlines haven't been pulled up yet." Ye Yaodong happily unhooked the big eel from the hook.

The two of them were itching to try it. Azheng stopped shaking the fishing line, and both of them took out their hooks, ready to try fishing for a while.

"Aren't you going to shake it to make the fish swim anymore?"

"The seawater is flowing, the bait will move anyway. Forget it, let's fish for a while first, and pull the lines in two hours."

"Hey~ here comes another one." As he spoke, Ye Yaodong pulled the fishing rod again. It was a 2-jin sea bass.

"You're catching fish pretty fast, aren't you?"

"It's alright. It shows that there are still quite a lot of fish in our sea area."

"Could it be that there are fewer people fishing now?"

They were chatting easily when Hearing Xiao Xiao suddenly said, "I heard recently that many fishermen in the south are participating in smuggling and not fishing anymore."

Azheng asked in surprise, "Ah? Who did you hear that from?"

"Didn't my third brother go out with a big boat a while ago? When passing through the town of Shishi Port, he saw a large number of smuggling boats and all kinds of goods. I heard the whole town was involved."

Ye Yaodong wasn't surprised at all. After the reform and opening up, people were full of expectations and hopes for the future, so in terms of living expenses, everyone no longer considered just food and clothing as before, but also began to pursue variety and trends.

However, the awkward thing was that all kinds of daily necessities were particularly scarce at the time, such as black-and-white televisions, video recorders, watches, motorcycles, etc. Many of them couldn't be bought even with money, which made many lawbreakers see "business opportunities."

As the vanguard of reform and opening up, the coastal areas had increasingly busy economic and trade routes, and many people had long seen the huge profits of smuggling.

Smuggling was too normal. Didn't Lin Jishang in their village participate in the smuggling line? It was just that they didn't know what they were smuggling.

A while ago, he had even seen them sneaking toward the pier at night. They must have been moving smuggled goods back at night.

The crackdown on smuggling had been strengthened in the past two years, but driven by interests, how could the masses give up so easily?

In his previous life, he had heard that in the years after the reform and opening up, many places had seen serious phenomena of farmers abandoning farming, workers abandoning work, fishermen abandoning fishing, and teachers abandoning teaching to participate in smuggling and trafficking.

After all, how could a dead wage compare to the huge profits of smuggling?

"Tsk tsk tsk~ these people are going to make a fortune. It's just that we don't have the connections. The villagers in our village are all honest, and the fishing boats are all fishing properly. Otherwise, we'd have to get a piece of the action and make a fortune."

Azheng was incredibly envious. He also knew that smuggling was rampant after the reform and opening up. Cars often came to their village to sell cassettes, nylon folding umbrellas, nylon mosquito nets, polyester knitted fabrics, and other common daily necessities, all cheaper than the supply and marketing cooperatives.

Ye Yaodong shook his head and said, "Don't even think about it. There's a strict crackdown going on right now. If you get caught, you might end up sitting in jail until you rot."

"I heard from my third brother that the whole county over there is involved in smuggling. There are so many people..."

"Don't hold onto any wishful thinking."

He just wanted his wife, children, and a warm bed, to be a decent person and earn some decent money. Although he was a bit less ambitious, he didn't have to take risks.

He remembered that early next year, the "first corruption case of reform and opening up" would be publicly tried and sentenced, and the official involved would be directly sentenced to death.

Azheng said, unwilling to give up, "Don't we Chinese have a saying that the law doesn't punish the masses?"

"So, are you going to Shishi?"

"Ah, this..."

He didn't have the courage to go alone. To be honest, he was just an ordinary fisherman. Things hadn't happened around him, so asking him to take the initiative to go to an unfamiliar place and get involved in unknown events still made him a bit timid.

"The crackdown is very tight in the coastal areas now. You have no connections, no money, and even less courage. Just honestly work the sea. Your longlines can be pulled up."

"Alright."

One sentence stifled all his thoughts.

Hearing Xiao Xiao's wild imagination was also dampened by him.

During the time they were chatting, Ye Yaodong had only caught 6 fish intermittently. In fact, his mind had also been affected.

He kept thinking about the social phenomena of this era. He thought that smuggling had nothing to do with him, but he didn't expect his friends to have ideas about it.

It was hard to handle. Anyway, everyone had their own aspirations; they could listen or not.

Seeing Azheng start to pull the fishing line, Ye Yaodong also put away his fishing rod and stopped fishing. It was almost sunset now. Once he finished collecting the longlines, it would be time for them to go home for dinner.

"Hey~ not bad. The first one is a white croaker, it's 2 jin."

He unhooked the fish and threw it into the bucket, then continued to pull.

"What kind of fish is this?"

Azheng said as he reached out to grab it, but was sternly stopped by Ye Yaodong. "Wait a minute, don't touch it!"

"Ah?" Azheng was startled and almost let go of the line. "What are you doing?"

"This is a sand cat fish. On the poisonous fish ranking, first is the stingray, second is the tiger fish, and third is the sand cat. The sand cat ranks third. The one on its dorsal fin and the two on its pectoral fins all carry neurotoxins. If you're accidentally stung, the pain is like a nail being driven into your hand. It will hurt for a day and a night, and it will also cause twitching, spasms, and paralysis. Don't touch it directly."

"Ah? So that's it. Damn, I actually caught this. Forget it, let you go."

He took the scissors and made a gesture to cut the fishing line to set it free, but heard Ye Yaodong say again, "You don't have to set it free. Just cut off its fins. The meat of this fish is delicate, fragrant, and sweet, with few bones and plenty of meat. It can also cool you down, relieve summer heat, and nourish the body."

"Forget it. You said its fins are poisonous. Better not take the risk."

He directly cut the line with a snap, but he didn't expect that the third one to come up was still this fish, and the fourth, and the fifth.

"Damn it, did I poke a rat's nest? Caught 5 in a row?"

"It's 4!" Ye Yaodong corrected.

Hearing Xiao Xiao said like a crow's mouth, "Maybe the next one will be too?"

"Don't, please? He's already cursing, and you still hope the next one is? Actually, this fish is quite delicious if you cut off the fins."

"Don't want it, it's too ugly."

Azheng continued to pull, but didn't expect it to be empty. The bait had been eaten, and he was depressed again. He didn't expect the next one to actually hook a Humphead Wrasse.

"Damn, damn, it's a Humphead Wrasse!"

"Humphead?"

"Humphead Wrasse?!"

All three of them widened their eyes in surprise!