The Fish I Catch Can Level Up-Chapter 150: The Giant Python of the Sea

Chu Mingcheng dove down to the cave entrance, gripping the fishing line tightly to keep it from scraping against the sharp rocks.
Now that he had leverage, it wouldn't be so easy for the moray eel to retreat further into its cave.
When strength was equal, a tug-of-war became a battle of endurance.
Ordinarily, the moray eel would have the advantage. The terrain was on its side, and a human couldn't stay underwater for long. Furthermore, holding one's breath while physically exerting oneself underwater consumes oxygen at an unprecedented rate.
But this moray eel was unlucky. It had encountered a man with supernatural abilities.
Under normal circumstances, Chu Mingcheng could remain underwater for up to two hours without issue. Even with his accelerated oxygen consumption, he could last at least an hour.
And even if his stamina failed, Chu Mingcheng had Life Conversion to recover.
To encounter such a person, one could only say it was the moray eel's misfortune.
Ten minutes later, the man and the eel were still locked in a stalemate.
Half an hour later, the moray eel had been pulled out a little. Chu Mingcheng could see its head.
He hadn't expected catching a moray eel to be so difficult. After half an hour of pulling and tugging, he was starting to feel the strain.
A few more minutes passed, and the moray eel surged with renewed strength. Chu Mingcheng, his stamina depleted, could no longer hold his ground.
He immediately used one charge of Life Conversion. It didn't bring him back to full strength, but he recovered more than half his energy.
In that instant, the balance was broken.
With his strength restored, Chu Mingcheng pulled again. This time, it was the moray eel that couldn't hold on. It was pulled, bit by bit, from the cave.
When the moray eel's entire head and neck were exposed, he immediately grabbed its neck with his left hand and, with his right, wrapped the fishing line several times around its open mouth, binding it shut like a muzzle.
The moray eel, its most dangerous weapon now sealed, was rendered much less threatening. Chu Mingcheng gripped its neck with both hands while still holding the line and forcibly pulled it out.
Pulling on the line, with the force concentrated on the hook, hadn't transmitted his full strength.
But with both hands on the moray eel's neck, his strength was applied directly, making it much easier to extract.
This moray eel was no smaller than a large python. Its body was incredibly thick; even with his large hands, he couldn't get a full grip around it.
Slowly, Chu Mingcheng pulled out about a meter, only to find there was still a large section inside the cave.
He had pulled out so much, yet only its belly was exposed. One could only imagine how long this moray eel truly was.
The moray eel writhed continuously, and its slimy body made it difficult for Chu Mingcheng to maintain his grip.
If it weren't for the fishing line, he might not have been able to handle it. To bring it back to the boat, he would probably have had to kill it with his fish spear first.
After another ten minutes of struggle, the entire moray eel was finally extracted from the cave.
Seeing the moray eel, which was at least three, maybe even four meters long, Chu Mingcheng couldn't help but be shocked.
At first glance, it really did look like a giant python. It was incredible.
Chu Mingcheng positioned himself, tucked the moray eel's body under his arm, controlled its head with both hands, and began swimming toward the surface.
With no leverage in the water, the moray eel had little strength left. He quickly reached the surface and swam toward the boat.
Taking a moment to examine it, he saw it was a large red moray eel.
He searched his memory for a moment but couldn't recall this species. It seemed he would have to consult his encyclopedia back on the boat.
Despite its impressive length, the moray eel was lighter than expected.
From the feel of it, he estimated it was only about fifty or sixty jin. Chu Mingcheng hauled it onto the boat with relative ease.
He kept the fishing line in his hand for now. He found a zip tie in his tackle box, thoroughly secured its mouth, and only then did he cut the line with scissors.
As for getting the hook out of its mouth… he'd like to see someone else try that.
He had intended to go into the cockpit to get his scale and ruler, but the moray eel on the deck, like a snake, lifted its head, looking very restless.
Chu Mingcheng immediately slapped it on the head. "Your mouth is tied shut—why are you still trying to look fierce!"
He then forced it into the fish box, closed the lid to keep it from thrashing around and getting its slime all over the deck.
Next, Chu Mingcheng wiped the water from his body, went into the cockpit, and flipped through his encyclopedia, finding information about this moray eel.
It turned out this moray eel was scientifically known as the
long-tailed moray
, distributed in the Indo-West Pacific region, including the southern waters of China and the southern Taiwan Strait.
This was currently the longest known moray eel species, with a maximum length of four meters.
No wonder Chu Mingcheng had been startled when he pulled the whole thing out. He had thought at the time that it was about four meters long.
He had thought he'd caught a moray eel that had broken its species' limits, but it turned out it could grow that large naturally.
He then took his ruler and scale back to the deck and measured the moray eel.
It wasn't quite four meters, only three meters and seventy-eight centimeters. It weighed fifty-one jin and seven liang, a bit lighter than he had imagined.
The rain and sea breeze beat down on Chu Mingcheng, making him shiver. It was getting cold!
He put the moray eel back in the fish box, locked the lid, and quickly tied on a new hook before jumping back into the water.
"Ahh, much better!"
The warmth of the water immediately restored the body heat that the sea breeze and rain had stolen. Chu Mingcheng leisurely continued his search for prey.
With such a large moray eel, his afternoon's mission was essentially complete.
But it was only just past one o'clock. He would look around a bit more; it wouldn't be too late to head back at two.
After searching for a while, this time he used his fish spear to poke around in hidden places, to avoid getting bitten like before.
As a result, he searched all the places he could see clearly but didn't find any more suitable targets.
The deeper water was quite dark. He would need to go back and get his headlamp before venturing into the deeper areas.
Chu Mingcheng thought the emperor fish would be perfect. Sea King should like it too.
With that in mind, he first went to that fifty-meter-deep sandbed.
Just as he arrived, a huge figure flashed past in the light.
Chu Mingcheng quickly turned his head and spotted a particularly large emperor fish swimming in the water. Seeing this, he immediately gave chase.
The emperor fish's swimming speed wasn't slow, but this one was quite large, and its movements seemed slower than the smaller ones. Chu Mingcheng easily kept pace.
But he didn't rush forward, afraid of startling it and making it harder to catch.
After swimming for a while, this emperor fish slowly descended toward deeper water. Chu Mingcheng followed.
Below was still a sandbed, but the depth was twenty meters greater than the previous one.
Chu Mingcheng checked his dive watch. When he reached the top of the sandbed, the depth had reached seventy-three meters.
This was the deepest he had ever dived. The ear pressure wasn't a problem, and his body felt fine.
But unlike in the upper water layers, he could feel some weight here, a sensation of being squeezed from all sides.
Fortunately, it wasn't severe. He could still stay at this depth for a long time.
And from today's dive, Chu Mingcheng felt he could probably dive to a hundred meters, and even hunt at that depth.
But it wasn't necessary, unless he encountered some particularly precious fish.
For general deep-sea fish, from a practical standpoint, using an electric reel would be easier.
Having adapted to the water pressure here, Chu Mingcheng took out his fish spear. He wouldn't try to catch the emperor fish alive; the price difference between live and dead wasn't that significant.
And it would probably be eaten by him and the others this afternoon anyway. Dead was easier to handle.
Aiming, he easily pierced the fish's head.
In an instant, the sand on the seabed flew up, obscuring Chu Mingcheng's vision.
He closed his eyes and used both hands to pin the fish to the seabed.
Because it was a headshot, the emperor fish didn't struggle for long before it died.
But Chu Mingcheng still waited until the stirred-up sand had mostly settled before picking up the fish and heading back.
This was to prevent the fish's muscle memory from causing it to suddenly thrash when he picked it up, potentially injuring him with its sharp fins.
The emperor fish's body was wide and flat. If he wasn't careful, its fins could give him a nasty cut.
Back on the boat, Chu Mingcheng didn't bother to weigh it. This emperor fish was large, but probably only about thirty jin. He put it directly in a foam box, then took out the remaining crushed ice from the refrigerator and spread it on top.
There wasn't much crushed ice, so he had to make do.
He checked the time. Only half an hour had passed. Chu Mingcheng decided to go for one last hunt.
This time, he wouldn't go to the sandbed but to the deeper areas of the coral reef.
Although this place had been thoroughly hunted by Chu Mingcheng before, given enough time, the vacancies would quickly be filled.
It wasn't that the fish here reproduced quickly, but that fish from elsewhere would find it suitable for living and would move in.
Of course, Chu Mingcheng couldn't come here repeatedly to hunt. Sooner or later, he would deplete the fish population here.
After today, he wouldn't be back for a while. He would need to go back and find new hunting grounds.
Chu Mingcheng looked down at a rock crevice, his eyes meeting those of a green grouper.
Green grouper:
I'm panicking—what should I do?
However, Chu Mingcheng immediately moved on. It was only two or three jin, not worth much.
Green grouper:
Are you kidding me?
After a while, he found another parrotfish, but it was a bit small.
After circling, he did find some decent-sized fish, but they were either not valuable or species he had already hunted.
His goal now was to find a fish he hadn't encountered before.
Chu Mingcheng swam over a small sandy depression. Suddenly, his body flipped, and he came to an emergency stop.
He then turned his body and looked down at the depression.
Under the light of his headlamp, at the edge of this sandy area, there was a pretty nice grouper.
He estimated it was about forty centimeters long, probably around three jin.
The fish wasn't large, but Chu Mingcheng decided to take it.
Under the light, he recognized this grouper. It was a
hawksbill grouper
, also known as a leopard coral grouper.
This species was usually very small. A slightly larger one would be one or two jin. One forty centimeters long was quite large.
Therefore, he specially took out a squid, cut off a small piece, and hung it on the hook. If the bait was too big, the fish wouldn't be able to swallow it.
The leopard coral grouper, hiding at the edge of the sandy depression and relying on its skin color for camouflage, never would have thought that while it was waiting to venture out for food at night, a piece of food would fall from the sky.
It had never encountered such luck before, and today it finally did.
So what was there to be polite about? It swallowed the morsel in one bite as a show of appreciation.
Who knew that this one bite would spell trouble? The sharp pain in its mouth and an irresistible force left it bewildered.
But its biological survival instinct made it subconsciously want to spit out the foreign object in its mouth and desperately thrash its tail to resist this force.
However, it found that these efforts were all futile.
It was forced toward a massive creature and was seized by its mouth.
At this moment, the leopard coral grouper shed tears of regret, which then dissolved into the seawater.
Chu Mingcheng happily carried this leopard coral grouper back. It was still ten minutes before two o'clock, but today's mission was considered complete.
He brought it to the boat and weighed the leopard coral grouper. It was just over three jin—three jin and two liang, which was quite good.
He tossed the fish into the livewell. Shivering from the cold, Chu Mingcheng quickly grabbed a towel to dry off the seawater and rain, then rushed into the cockpit to shower and change.
After showering, he started the fishing boat and headed home.
When he had a signal, he first called Jiang Luoluo: "Luoluo, have Sea King and the others arrived?"