Chapter 25: Chapter 25: Fighting
Yun Xiaowu was ecstatic. "Could this be another nest of Moon Clams?"
"Who cares! Let’s dig first!"
Moon Clams were buried pretty deep in the sand. Sometimes, in the middle of digging, they would lose track of them.
There were indeed Moon Clams here, but they weren’t clustered in one spot; they had to search all over.
While Yun Xiaowu and the others were searching for air holes, Yun Jiao had already dug up three large Moon Clams.
In the end, they found eight Moon Clams.
It was getting late. They had to go back.
As they passed the beach where they had met the sea turtle before, they discovered it had come back.
Yun Jiao ran over. "Turtle, what did you bring?"
The sea turtle dipped its head into the seawater, then tossed something over with its mouth.
Yun Jiao picked it up. It wasn’t a clam or a snail, but a big, gleaming yellow fish.
"A large yellow croaker!"
The famous large yellow croaker! And one this big, no less! To think a sea turtle had caught it and brought it to them!
"It’s still fresh."
Yun Xiaowu picked up the fish and examined it, his face filled with delight.
"It’s a shame there’s only one, but this large yellow croaker is huge! It must weigh at least five pounds!"
Large yellow croakers usually traveled in schools, and they weren’t cheap, either—four yuan a pound.
If they could catch a whole net of them, they would strike it rich.
"Turtle, you’re a grateful creature after all! I was wrong about you."
Overjoyed, Yun Xiaowu planted a kiss on the sea turtle’s smooth head.
The sea turtle was speechless.
It buried its head in the seawater and thrashed it about frantically.
It was obvious the turtle was disgusted with him.
This time, the sea turtle really left, but as it headed into the sea, it turned its neck to look back at Yun Jiao several times.
Yun Jiao waved. "Once my family gets a boat, I’ll come see you."
’The turtle is a useful one,’ she thought. ’I should stay on its good side.’
The sea turtle plunged into the sea and disappeared from sight.
They’d had another great haul. The most valuable item was the large yellow croaker, though it had been a gift from the sea turtle.
Returning to where Shen Yunlian and the others were beachcombing, the kids realized it was quite lively over there, too.
They could faintly hear someone talking excitedly about something.
"Mom, what’s happening over there?"
Shen Yunlian replied, her tone envious, "Someone found a large yellow croaker that washed ashore. It’s two pounds!"
Right now, large yellow croakers were four yuan a pound, so two pounds was eight yuan.
Yun Xiaowu wore a smug look. "Is that all? Just a two-pound large yellow croaker."
Shen Yunlian shot him a glare. "What are you talking about? That’s not..."
Before she could finish, Yun Xiaowu plopped a bucket down in front of them. Inside was a large yellow croaker.
It was massive—bigger than any large yellow croaker they had ever seen!
Shen Yunlian’s and Wang Mei’s eyes looked like they were about to pop out of their sockets.
One moment she was envying someone else’s good luck in finding a large yellow croaker, and the next, her own son appeared before her with such a massive one. It felt like a dream.
Shen Yunlian even pinched herself.
"It’s really not a dream."
"Quick, quick! Cover the bucket with a shirt!"
Shen Yunlian promptly pulled her son’s shirt off and used it to cover the bucket.
The weather was hot, and there were plenty of shirtless boys around, especially at the beach. She wasn’t at all worried he would catch a cold.
"Isn’t this a good thing? Why do we have to hide it?"
He’d wanted to show it off, too.
"What do you know? You shouldn’t flaunt your wealth. Our family is already drawing enough attention by building a house and getting ready to buy a boat. If people find out we got this lucky beachcombing and found such a huge yellow croaker, someone’s bound to get jealous and start getting ideas. It’s always better to avoid trouble."
In fact, it wasn’t just about this yellow croaker. A while back, they had also found those Little Green Dragons, an East Star Spot, and a tiger grouper. Their luck at beachcombing was so good that it was bound to make people jealous.
She was afraid of attracting the attention of people with sticky fingers.
"Come on, let’s hurry home."
After returning home, they discovered that besides the large yellow croaker, they also had about two pounds of Blood Clams.
"You kids are just too lucky."
Yun Xiaojiu said, "The turtle brought the big fish."
They all chattered at once, recounting the story of how the sea turtle brought them the fish.
"It even brought a jellyfish before that."
"A jellyfish? You didn’t get close, did you? That thing is poisonous."
"No, we didn’t."
Wang Mei said, "I’ll take the fish to sell first. You kids can play here at home."
"Wait."
Shen Yunlian picked out the eight Moon Clams. "Let’s keep these to eat at home."
’The longing look on her daughter’s face was just too pitiful,’ she thought.
Their family couldn’t afford to eat the yellow croaker right now, but they could at least keep these clams.
Wang Mei also noticed Yun Jiao’s pitiful, yearning expression and couldn’t help but smile.
"In the future, if we can catch a lot of yellow croakers, we’ll definitely keep a few for ourselves."
’The poor kid,’ she thought.
Yun Jiao was quite satisfied. Getting to eat those Moon Clams was good enough.
"I also want to eat a little octopus."
"Alright, alright, we’ll keep one of those too."
Now, Yun Jiao was completely satisfied.
Shen Yunlian and Granny Yun cooked at home while Wang Mei took the seafood out to sell.
Once the adults weren’t paying attention, Yun Xiaowu and his brothers immediately pulled Yun Jiao and ran outside.
’Staying home was out of the question. It was way too boring!’
"Come on, let’s go play marbles."
His marble-playing skills had improved a ton. This time, he was determined to show off in front of all his friends.
But their luck was rotten. They ran into Yun Zhuangzhuang, who they didn’t get along with, and his cousin.
Yun Zhuangzhuang had been a bit afraid of Yun Xiaowu and his brothers before because they had beaten him up.
But this time, with his cousin there for backup, he actually dared to provoke them. His cousin was burly and several years older than Yun Xiaowu.
"Yun Xiaowu, Yun Xiao Liu, you guys are just copycats! I buy glass marbles, and you buy them too!"
Yun Xiaowu refused to let him get away with it and shot back.
"You’ve got a lot of nerve, huh? Do you think you own glass marbles? So you can play with them, but we can’t? Yun Zhuangzhuang, you looking for a fight or what?!"
Yun Zhuangzhuang hid behind his cousin and talked tough. "You think I’m scared of you? See this? This is my cousin. He’s the Golden Horned King!"
Yun Zhuangzhuang’s cousin glared fiercely at Yun Xiaowu and his brothers.
"Ha! You call him the Golden Horned King? In that case, I’m the Great Sage Equalling Heaven!"
The argument escalated, and before anyone knew it, a fight had broken out.
Yun Zhuangzhuang’s cousin was several years older than Yun Xiaowu and Yun Xiao Liu, and with his larger build, Yun Xiaowu was at a slight disadvantage fighting him alone.
But he had plenty of brothers.
Although Yun Xiao Liu was usually a bit lazy, when he saw his brother getting hit, he charged in recklessly. The two brothers ganged up on Yun Zhuangzhuang’s cousin.
Yun Xiaoqi and Yun Xiao Ba also jumped in to help.
When Yun Jiao saw Yun Zhuangzhuang actually pick up a rock to throw at her brothers, she became furious.
She rushed over, leaped up, and smacked Yun Zhuangzhuang across the face.
Yun Zhuangzhuang was stunned by the slap.
"Yun Jiao, you little bitch, you dare hit me!"
Yun Jiao slapped him again.
Yun Xiaojiu rushed over and headbutted Yun Zhuangzhuang in the stomach, knocking him straight to the ground.
The two of them pinned Yun Zhuangzhuang down and gave him a sound thrashing.
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