I Can Fish Up Everything!

Chapter 30: Chapter 30: This Boat Owner Knows How to Make Money

After leaving the restaurant and returning to the pet shop, Gu Nan handed the car keys back to Ye Jing and made a hasty retreat.

Compared to him, Gu Nan still preferred hanging out with An Jun.

Ye Jing and Xu Zhina had been together for years, but they were still like glue, stuck to each other day in and day out. Gu Nan couldn’t believe they never got tired of it; he’d never heard of a honeymoon phase lasting this long.

Gu Nan checked the time. It was already a little after three. He normally opened at four, but four-thirty would be fine too.

So instead of heading back to the shop, he went straight to the coast. He planned to scout out a few new, suitable fishing spots and, while he was at it, find a place where he could fish during the day.

Once Yi Chen arrived and had a couple of days to get settled in, Gu Nan would have free time to go fishing during the day.

Fishing under the blazing sun meant risking heatstroke, so he needed to find a shady spot.

As he rode his electric scooter down the road, Gu Nan kept his eyes on the coastline.

However, finding a suitable spot along the coast was actually quite difficult. In fact, there were practically none.

Looking into the distance, a cross-sea bridge came into view, and an idea suddenly struck him.

There was a large island just off the coast of Yangjiang Port. The distance between the port and the island was only thirty-seven kilometers, so the government had built a cross-sea bridge to connect them.

Gu Nan thought, ’There should be plenty of shady places to fish under the cross-sea bridge.’ The only problem was that it was a bit far from the seafood market. It would take at least half an hour on his electric scooter, a journey of about twenty kilometers.

Besides, the area under the bridge was one of the few good fishing spots in Yangjiang Port, so there were bound to be plenty of anglers there. ’I wonder if I’ll be able to grab a good spot.’

’But on nights when I have a big haul, I have to be able to get back to the shop quickly. A long distance would be really inconvenient.’

But no matter what, he was determined to check it out.

Gu Nan rode all the way to the bridge. Just before he reached it, he found a small path off to the side that led down toward the tidal flats below.

When he got down below the bridge, he found a dozen or so anglers sheltering in the shade, poles in the water.

That settled it. He couldn’t fish here. Although there was some space left, it was too close to the other anglers. They would be able to see exactly what he was catching.

’It might be better at night, but there would probably be even more anglers then. It’d be a question of whether I could even get a spot.’

However, just as Gu Nan was preparing to leave, a bald man with a beer belly walked over.

"Hey, you here to fish?"

"Yeah, but it looks like there’s no room," Gu Nan replied politely, unsure of what the man wanted.

"Who says there’s no room? What about all those spots?" the bald man said, pointing to the bridge piers.

There was a platform extending out from the base of each pier, just above the water. People could definitely get on them to fish.

A thirty-seven-kilometer-long bridge had plenty of piers, but the spacing between them wasn’t uniform. Some were closer together, while others were quite far apart.

The closer ones were only about a hundred meters apart, while the furthest were separated by more than two hundred.

’Either distance would be perfect for my needs,’ Gu Nan thought. ’Even if there were other anglers on an adjacent pier, they wouldn’t be able to see what kind of fish I was catching.’

’But... how do I get over there?’

Gu Nan was at a loss for words. "Those spots are great, sure," he said to the bald man, "but what’s the use if you can’t get to them?"

"Who said you can’t get there? See those guys fishing over there? I’m the one who took them!" The bald man pointed to a couple of anglers on one of the piers. "Fifty yuan. You in?"

Gu Nan was stunned. ’You can make money like this?’

"I’m busy right now so I can’t go, but I’ll be back to fish tonight. Will you be around then?"

"I’ll be here. Here’s the deal: it’s fifty yuan for a trip to a pier, no matter what time you come."

"However, I don’t do return trips between eleven a.m. and one p.m., or between five and seven in the evening. A guy’s gotta eat, you know? Night fishing has to end by eleven, too. I need my sleep, and I don’t do all-nighters. It’s too dangerous out here."

"Ah, I see." Gu Nan nodded in understanding.

’Commercial fishing is banned during the off-season, but this guy still found a way to make money. He’s a resourceful one.’

Gu Nan took a closer look. He could see about five people fishing on the piers. There were piers on the other side of the bridge too, but he couldn’t see them from his vantage point.

’If business is good, he could make a good few hundred, maybe even over a thousand yuan a day! I wish I had a small boat to ferry anglers myself. This money is just too damn easy to make.’

After adding the bald man on WeChat and telling him he’d be back that evening, Gu Nan rode his electric scooter back to the shop.

’It doesn’t really matter if I go fish at the pier tonight or not,’ he thought. ’But now that I’ve found such a great spot, I definitely want to give it a try.’

He got back to the shop and opened for the evening, but business seemed a bit slow. It was the weekend, so he figured people were out on dates or at dinner parties. Not many young people were coming to the seafood market.

He only sold a few fish and some of his original stock, bringing in just over three hundred yuan.

Since business was slow, Gu Nan decided to tidy up the freezers. He moved the contents of one freezer into the other.

’By turning one off, I can save a good amount on the electricity bill each month.’

A little after six, Gu Nan glanced out the door and saw that there was hardly any foot traffic left in the seafood market, so he decided to close up early.

But as he was about to pack up the chilled fish from the crushed ice, his eyes landed on the large croaker.

’This is a prize catch. The longer it sits here, the less it’ll be worth.’

After a moment’s thought, he posted the picture he’d taken of the big croaker he caught last night to the fishing group chat he had recently joined.

He added a caption: "Can’t believe there are still monsters like this in Yangjiang Port. What a rare sight!"

Anglers know what gets other anglers excited. Tossing a picture of a monster catch like that into the group chat was like dropping a bomb in a fishpond. Sure enough, the chat immediately blew up.

"Holy shit, that’s gotta be over ten pounds, right?"

"Dude, I’m not drooling over your fish. I’m just worried you can’t carry it. I can come help you with that."

"To the guy above: if you want to know the fishing spot, just ask. But a monster catch like this is pure luck. When your luck’s in, you can catch one anywhere. When it’s not, you’ll come up empty no matter where you go."

"Hey man, is that fish for sale?"

"Dude, I added you on WeChat. Let’s chat privately."

While the group chat was buzzing, Wang Junhe sent him a direct message.

"Bro, where are you? I’m heading over right now. You have to save that fish for me! My wife loves croaker maw and the fish head. Name your price."

Seeing how eager Wang Junhe was, and remembering that he had been a great help in selling out the previous day’s catch, Gu Nan first replied in the group chat: "Sorry everyone, the fish has already been claimed!"

After posting that, he replied to Wang Junhe: "I’m at the shop. The fish was caught last night and has been on ice. If you want it, I’ll wait for you here."

"On my way!" Wang Junhe had clearly been waiting by his phone, because the reply came back instantly.

"Sounds good." Gu Nan put down his phone and picked up a mop to clean the shop. He would close up for the night after selling the croaker.

Only a short while later, when he was halfway through mopping the floor, Wang Junhe rushed in.

He seemed to have jogged all the way, as he was huffing and puffing with sweat beading on his forehead.

Gu Nan was a bit surprised. "Hey, what’s the rush?"

"I was just a little anxious, so I ran," Wang Junhe said with a sheepish grin after catching his breath.

"The fish wasn’t going to run away," Gu Nan said. "Besides, it’s just a ten-pound croaker. You didn’t have to do all that."

"What do you mean? It’s the off-season, you can’t find fresh, big croakers anywhere. A fish this size is rare even when it’s not the off-season. Of course I had to hurry over and lock it down. Now I can relax."

’Well, whatever.’ Gu Nan didn’t understand what was behind Wang Junhe’s urgency, but as long as the fish was sold, he was happy.