Chapter 575: Swordfish Crisis

Wu An planned to have Fan Dali help find people.

Many people came for the interview, so there would be room to select later.

This is his base.

He would definitely enforce strict screening, absolutely not allowing unreliable people aboard, and try to prevent the situation where "one bad apple spoils the whole pot."

He had dinner.

Fried spiny pomfret, steamed hermit crab, stir-fried chili flower crab, braised large-eye chicken, vinegar-sautéed potato shreds, stir-fried greens, purple seaweed egg soup, six dishes and one soup, quite a feast.

The only thing that slightly dissatisfied Wu An was that everything was seafood.

This trip was prepared somewhat hastily; not much meat and fish were prepared, and they had already been eaten yesterday.

First, serve a separate portion for Lao Fu Tou and send it over.

After eating and drinking fully, the trawl had already been dragging for two hours in the sea; Lao Fu Tou came to ask whether to haul it up, and Wu An thought for a moment and said, "Drag it for another hour."

"After this drag, we'll rest."

"We can lower the net early tomorrow morning."

Lao Fu Tou nodded, with no objection.

At exactly 8 p. m., after dragging for three and a half hours, the net was hauled up to the whistle of Fu Yongning; the crane operated, and the net bag was lifted.

"It's pretty full."

"Then the catch from this net should be good."

"Great, we can make up for the loss from the previous net."

Fu Yongning went to pull the rope to untie the net.

At first he was still laughing, but when the net bag opened and the catch poured down together with a lot of trash, he could no longer laugh.

Wu An was not surprised and said, "The catch is not small either, roughly a thousand or so catties."

"That's not bad."

"Everyone first sort out the trash and throw it to one side, then finally sort out the catch."

Everyone responded in unison.

The trash was varied, all kinds of junk: torn nets, plastic bags, bottles, and even a flip-flop—no idea which unlucky thing fell into the sea.

Wu An also took a special look; not only domestic, some bags clearly bore Southeast Asian script.

First pile them in the deck corner, then finally gather them into snake skin bags for storage.

Suddenly, A Qing shouted excitedly, "Brother, brother, come quick, I found a swordfish over here!"

Wu An hurried over.

It really was a swordfish, considerably larger than the previous one, weighing two or three hundred catties, already dead, previously covered by trash; A Qing only saw it while cleaning up the trash.

Everyone was very happy.

Such a swordfish is worth several ten thousand; calculating this way, although the net contained a lot of trash, the haul is still not small.

Fu Yongning said cheerfully, "This one probably was rather greedy, chasing after the spiny pomfret school, ended up isolated, and got caught in the net."

Wu An smiled and nodded.

Without cheating, relying purely on luck, this net's haul is also quite good.

It's like a student who always cheated, suddenly relying on genuine ability to score well.

This feeling is not bad.

Mei Wu paid more attention to the trawl's condition and said, "This one is also torn."

Fu Yongning looked and said, "No problem, this is easy to repair."

Although there are spare trawls, replacing one is too troublesome; mending fishing nets is also considered an essential skill for fishermen.

Compared to everyone's cheerful mood, Wu An couldn't help but feel a bit worried.

Being able to catch a swordfish in this net shows good luck, but it also indicates that the swordfish school hasn't moved far away, and may even be drifting near the fishing boat.

This is somewhat troubling.

For now, without luck boost, it doesn't matter.

But if he were to apply luck boost at dawn, attracting fish schools and thereby drawing the swordfish school, that could become troublesome.

Mei Wu had prepared several trawls, but they couldn't withstand being damaged like this.

Mainly, destroying one trawl loses dozens or even hundreds of luck points, which amounts to tens of thousands of dollars thrown into the sea.

Just thinking about it makes him ache.

He can only hope the swordfish school goes elsewhere to feed; given the swordfish's speed, once they leave, they'll actually swim far away quickly.

Otherwise, he could simply not apply luck boost to the trawl, but directly apply luck boost to fish for swordfish.

But that would be too dangerous.

If the luck boost runs out and the swordfish retaliates, it could very well cause casualties.

Wu An doesn't really want to take that risk.

Actually, there is another method.

That is, have Hu Zi bring the orca pod over.

As long as the orca pod comes, the swordfish school should not easily approach.

"Why hasn't Hu Zi arrived yet?"

Wu An, while picking up trash, absentmindedly let his thoughts wander.

……

At this moment, Hu Zi is being surrounded by the orca pod and then beaten by the lead whale.

After receiving a message from the dolphin, Hu Zi quietly left the orca pod.

Considering Hu Zi often strayed from the group, the orca pod was already alert, constantly watching his movements, and quickly discovered that this careless creature had run off.

The lead whale took the lead and chased.

Hu Zi was still small, swimming and playing, and when hungry he'd snag a bite from a fish school; soon the orca pod caught up with him.

Then.

Then the lead whale gave him a sound beating.

The beating left Hu Zi with no spirit to resist; he could only follow the orca pod to forage.

No wonder.

Night fell.

Time to sleep.

Only then did Hu Zi sneak away from the pod again, set his course, and head back toward the road to find his good friend.

What are parents and ancestors?

Getting beaten is just getting beaten.

That still couldn't stop him from going out to play.

……

On the trawler.

In less than an hour the catch was already processed; now everyone was sorting the trash, roughly categorizing it, rinsing off some mud with seawater, and finally stuffing it into snake skin bags.

All done.

Lao Fu Tou also dropped the anchor.

Before nine o'clock at night, the fishing boat ceased operations.

Even though this was only his second time going out to sea, Fu Yongning still wasn't used to it—who has such comfortable fishing trips? On Chen Lao Da's boat they work nonstop; each sortie leaves them several pounds lighter and utterly exhausted.

But now, three meals a day are basically on time, and sleep is pretty much like at home.

Saying this is like a vacation wouldn't be an exaggeration.

Lao Fu Tou puffed on his cigarette and nodded with a grin.

There's nothing much to say about it.

Fu Yongning is also a seasoned shipworker; if he's not used to it, he'll just get used to it gradually.

Going from extravagance to frugality is hard.

Going from frugality to extravagance is easy.

Living comfortably is easy to get used to.

Time for a late-night snack.

They ate the spiny pomfret that Fu Yongning had prepared earlier; they set up a grill on the deck, gathered around, poured drinks, and Fu Yongning handed out the freshly grilled fish.

Eating and drinking.

Besides the spiny pomfret, there were other seafood like squid and octopus.

If they had a griddle, Wu An would have shown them the charm of teppanyaki squid—he really knows how, having done it at his stall before.

Lao Fu Tou would occasionally go around the fishing boat to check things, returning with a grim expression.

Wu An asked, "Lao Fu, everything okay?"

Lao Fu Tou said, "Nothing much."

"The lights attracted the fish school; I think I saw a swordfish."

Wu An blinked, looked up, and said, "Really?"

Fu Yongning nodded.

He took Wu An to look, adjusted the light, aimed into the distance, and indeed saw a large dark mass on the sea surface.

It flashed past.

It was very fast.

Wu An nodded and returned with Lao Fu Tou.

"Really a swordfish?" A Qing cursed, "Damn, why hasn't the swordfish left?"

"Has it latched onto us?"

"Could it be that I guessed right and it's come for revenge?"

Having said that.

He then spat a few times, slapped his own mouth, and chided himself not to be a jinx.

Wu An also felt a sinking feeling inside, but on the surface he smiled and said, "You're overthinking it."

"All right."

"They've grilled all the food we need in one go; let's head to the lounge to keep eating and drinking."

"Even if the swordfish wanted to cause trouble, it could only stare helplessly."

"Come, let's drink a cup and wish us smooth sailing tomorrow."