I Can Fish Up Everything!

Chapter 73: Chapter 73: We Anglers Aren’t Fishing, We’re Feeding the Sea

”Where are we going to fish?” The boat was already far from the coast, and Gu Nan, having more or less figured out how the recreational boat operated, finally asked.

”A small, isolated island. There’s a beach there. My wife and daughter will go there first to forage along the shore while the three of us fish from the boat. Then, at noon, we’ll have a big seafood feast.” Wang Junhe had clearly planned it all out and laid out the schedule directly.

’Sounds pretty good. It’ll be a nice way to relax.’

Gu Nan sat down on the sofa and chatted idly with the other two, but he was actually dividing his attention, focusing part of it on the game.

’I made sure to save one guaranteed-catch chance yesterday. Time to see if they can be accumulated.’

However, when Gu Nan saw he only had nineteen guaranteed-catch chances, his hopes were instantly dashed.

Fortunately, when the game refreshed at six in the morning, it had left two system messages that clarified the situation for him.

[One daily guaranteed-catch chance remains. Host, please use it as soon as possible.]

[Daily guaranteed-catch chances have been reset. Note: The accumulation feature will only be unlocked after the Host has fully explored the Fengqi Coast map.]

Previously, Gu Nan had used up all his chances every day, so he’d never gotten this extra notification.

To his surprise, this deliberate act of saving a chance had revealed new information to him ahead of schedule.

’It’d be great if they could be accumulated. That way I wouldn’t have to go fishing every single day.’

’It’s like a daily chore. After a while, it just gets exhausting.’

’The only problem now is that I’m catching elite fish too slowly. I can’t complete the elite quest to buy purple equipment anytime soon. This is going to be a grind.’

Just as Gu Nan was stressing over this, another message suddenly popped up in the game.

[Host has been detected leaving the Fengqi Coast map area (ten nautical miles from shore). Fishing will no longer yield aquatic life native to the Fengqi Coast.]

This didn’t surprise Gu Nan. Although the game had never explicitly stated it, he already knew he wouldn’t be able to catch fish from the Fengqi Coast once he left the area; he just hadn’t known the exact range.

’Now I know. Ten nautical miles from shore. Or, to be more precise, ten nautical miles from the entire Bazhou City coastline.’

Wang Junhe’s recreational boat was fast. Even at cruising speed, it could cover twenty nautical miles in an hour.

However, his was a Class III recreational boat, which normally restricted its operations to within twenty nautical miles of the coast.

This distance was more than enough for casual fishing and family outings.

So Wang Junhe didn’t venture beyond the twenty-nautical-mile limit. The isolated island he’d mentioned was located southwest of Yangjiang Port, at a direct distance of about eighteen nautical miles.

At around seven o’clock, a small, isolated island came into Gu Nan’s view.

The island had a very interesting shape—it looked like it had a long tail.

In reality, this ”tail” was a long stretch of reef extending from its southern side.

Gu Nan used his hands to roughly size it up and estimated its length to be nearly five or six times the diameter of the main island.

It was currently the slack tide after low tide, so most of the long reef was exposed. He could see about a dozen boats nearby, as well as anglers standing on the rocks, engaged in rock fishing.

”I’m surprised people got here even earlier than us!” Gu Nan exclaimed when he saw them.

Hearing this, Guo Xiao, who was standing beside him, laughed. ”They got here yesterday. They probably never even went back!”

Wang Junhe chimed in, ”If I hadn’t promised my wife and kids I’d take them out today, I probably would’ve come last night, too.”

Gu Nan finally understood. ’That makes sense,’ he thought. ’If you’re going deep-sea fishing, you have to pull an all-nighter to prove you were even here, right?’

”Still, these guys must be professional anglers, the kind who fish for a living,” Guo Xiao remarked after watching for a moment. He’d noticed a few of them getting bites one after another and realized they weren’t amateurs.

For a regular angler, just not getting skunked is a great day. There’s no way they’d be landing fish one after another like that.

As for whether this would lead to the depletion of fish stocks, that wasn’t a major concern.

The reason nobody minds anglers fishing during the closed season—and it’s even encouraged—is that anglers can actually help restore fish populations.

By sacrificing a few of their older members, the school gets plenty of food, which allows the young fish to grow up quickly and the adult fish to produce more offspring.

Gu Nan, of course, understood this principle. As a rock fisherman himself, chumming was a mandatory step for him every time he went out.

’In the past, I’d toss out chum like it was free, yet I’d barely catch a few fish.’

’Even though things are much better now, my haul of local fish still isn’t that great.’

’And if that was the case for me, other anglers had it even worse.’

Don’t be fooled by how happy these professional anglers looked right now; in reality, they had to keep tossing in chum at regular intervals.

They might fish for twelve hours a day, but at least half of that time would be spent with no bites.

So the anglers didn’t profit every time, but the fish population certainly did.

Besides, what percentage of anglers were actually professionals? The vast majority across the country were amateurs fishing for fun, and the amount of chum they collectively tossed into the water each day was no small sum.

Fish pond owners, in particular, barely needed to buy feed for their fish.

”So, are we fishing from the boat or heading to the island?” Gu Nan asked.

”Let’s just fish from the boat for now. Once my wife and kids wake up, I’ll drop them off on the island.”

As he spoke, Wang Junhe steered the boat near the reef area. Plenty of rocks were already exposed, which meant there were likely even more submerged beneath the surface.

It was only because it was the closed season that there were relatively few people here. Once the fishing season officially opened, the place would probably be packed.

Wang Junhe’s boat was plenty luxurious, so of course it had all the right equipment. A fish finder, an angler’s secret weapon, was practically mandatory.

His was even a visual fish finder, which allowed them to see exactly what kinds of fish—and how many—were at the bottom.

”This spot looks good. Lots of black porgy and Yellowfin Gidai. Whoa, was that a grouper that just swam by? Let’s fish here!” Guo Xiao, seeing so many fish on the screen, immediately suggested they set up shop.

Gu Nan and Wang Junhe agreed. As the camera panned, they also spotted mangrove red snappers, parrotfish, and other species that favored reefs. The spot was definitely rich with life.

The three men went to the stern to get ready to fish.

Wang Junhe had already prepared the chum. It wasn’t Antarctic krill, but some small, frozen squid.

He must have taken it out to thaw much earlier, as it was already mostly defrosted.

Seeing this, Gu Nan took a pair of scissors from his tackle box and started helping cut the small squid into pieces.

After busying themselves for a little while, the three of them had prepared a good amount of chum. Then they each picked a spot, tossed in the chum, and began rigging their lines.

The fish finder showed the water was twenty-six meters deep here, with fish concentrated in the middle and lower water columns, so they would need to fish near the bottom.

Gu Nan removed the float from his line, hooked on a Big Fatty lure, and prepared to make a few casts.

’The chum needs time to work. Since I’m just sitting here, I might as well make a few casts to see how my luck is today.’

Wang Junhe, standing nearby, looked at his fishing rod with some surprise. ”Bro, why are you using a rock fishing rod? Didn’t you bring a boat rod or a casting rod?”

Casting rods and boat rods are relatively short—usually between 1.5 and 2.5 meters—making them suitable for fishing from a boat.

In contrast, Gu Nan’s 4.5-meter rock fishing rod would be much more cumbersome to handle on board.

”I didn’t bring one. In the past, whenever I used a casting rod or anything else, I usually got skunked. But my haul has been great ever since I started using this rod, so now it’s my go-to for everything.”

Gu Nan used superstition as a cover, and his explanation immediately drew the gazes of the two other anglers to his rod.

”Bro, it’s hard to fish from a boat with a rock rod. As the host, I’ll make a little sacrifice. Here, you take this boat rod, and I’ll use your rock rod.”