The Fish I Catch Can Level Up-Chapter 161: Oarfish?

According to the fish finder, the fish were active in the middle and upper water layers.
But Chu Mingcheng had a feeling the water here was very deep. He took out a fishing rod and let out the line to test the depth, and was surprised to find it was over eighty meters.
The waters around isolated islands were usually very shallow. The thirty-meter depth on the other side was already due to a cliff face; he hadn't expected this side to be even more extreme.
But encountering strange underwater terrain at sea was normal. As long as there were fish, it was fine.
Since the fish were in the middle and upper layers, he would target those depths.
He tossed the small shrimp he had caught that afternoon—now dead—into the water to chum the area. Then he cut up the sardines from the afternoon to use as bait, trying a test cast to see what kind of fish were around.
The feel of the fish on the hook was very familiar. As he pulled it to the surface, the leader line suddenly snapped.
It was rare for him to lose a fish, but Chu Mingcheng felt no disappointment or regret. He had already gotten a clear look at what it was: a small-eyed ribbonfish.
No wonder the feel was so familiar; it had just been a while, and he hadn't recognized it at first.
Given the sharp teeth of a ribbonfish, it was no surprise that his thin leader line had been bitten through.
The electric jigging rod was deployed again. Since he hadn't prepared any Tenya hooks, he had to opt for a multi-hook rig.
He lowered the baited hooks of the electric jigging rod first, then continued to tie the rig for another fishing rod.
Ribbonfish didn't need to be bled. After catching one, you just had to remove the hook and toss it in the cooler. An extra rod meant more ribbonfish.
He was halfway through tying the rig on the other rod when the electric jigging rod on the gunwale started to move.
Because the rod was thick and the electric reel was powerful, he had tied on seven hooks.
Coupled with the fact that ribbonfish bite aggressively, the movement was quite significant.
He pressed the button to retrieve the line. The fishing line was reeled in at high speed by the electric reel, with none of the resistance he had felt from the bonito at noon.
In just a short while, a string of three ribbonfish was pulled up.
Not bad, all three were three fingers wide. Compared to bonito, ribbonfish were not only sold for double the price, but they were also easy to sell.
Once the rig on the other rod was ready and he was fishing with both, Chu Mingcheng realized that the ribbonfish tonight weren't as abundant as usual. He had to wait a long while for just a few to bite.
"Could it be the water layer?"
Although ribbonfish swim to the upper layers at night, it wasn't an absolute rule. Many of the larger ones stayed in the middle layer or even at the bottom.
So this time, he tried letting the baited hooks sink to a depth of about forty meters to see what would happen.
But after five or six minutes, the electric reel got a bite again, while the rod in his hand remained still.
Seeing this, he first pressed the button to retrieve the line, then let his baited hook sink further, down to the seventy-meter depth.
In truth, at this water layer, his target was no longer just ribbonfish. He was more interested in seeing if there were any other types of fish.
A short while later, he took the ribbonfish off the electric reel, re-baited the hooks, and tossed them back into the water. Just as he had set the depth, the line in his hand finally showed some movement.
He lifted the rod to set the hook, then quickly turned the handle.
From the movement, it seemed to be another ribbonfish. Unfortunately, it wasn't the large ribbonfish he was imagining. The movement was small, so the fish probably wasn't very big.
But as the fish was about to reach the surface, he saw a flash of red in the light.
When he pulled it all the way up, Chu Mingcheng was a little stunned.
He had indeed caught a ribbonfish, but it was a red ribbonfish.
He had never seen this type of ribbonfish before and had no memory of it, which meant it was an extremely rare species.
Two of them had taken the hook. Pulled up from the deep, the fish were already dead.
He removed the hooks and found that although the fish were three fingers wide, they were shorter and lighter than ribbonfish of the same width, probably weighing only about two liang (100 grams).
From its appearance, it looked like an edible fish.
Chu Mingcheng tossed the fish into the cooler, washed his hands, and took a look at his Aquatic Species Codex.
He then learned that the scientific name for this fish was Acanthocepola limbata, or the blackspot bandfish. It was likely named for the black spot on its red back.
But the Aquatic Species Codex didn't provide any more specific information. However, the fact that it was listed in the codex indicated that this fish could be bought and sold.
He went into the cockpit and took out his encyclopedia to look it up.
After a long search, he finally found the specific information. It turned out to be a benthic fish, generally living at depths of around eighty meters.
The encyclopedia actually said it was a relatively common fish, but Chu Mingcheng had certainly never noticed it before.
The fish felt soft to the touch, so it should taste good. He could look up the price when he had a signal.
If there weren't many, he'd take them home to eat himself. If there were a lot, he'd sell them.
But it was clear that there were quite a few of them down below.
This time, Chu Mingcheng let the hooks of the electric jigging rod sink to the bottom to fish for benthic species.
He would use the rod in his hand to fish for the ribbonfish in the upper layers, sparing himself the constant depth adjustments.
Even though the density of fish wasn't as high as when he had fished for ribbonfish before, he still got bites from time to time, until the time gradually approached three in the morning.
Hearing his phone alarm, Chu Mingcheng yawned and turned it off.
Using Life Conversion once, most of his sleepiness and fatigue instantly vanished.
It was about time. Chu Mingcheng began to reel in his lines. He had to go collect his shrimp and crab pots, then head back to the pier to sell his fish.
After a night of fishing, the harvest was actually decent.
He had caught seventy or eighty jin of ribbonfish and probably about twenty jin of the red bandfish.
As he was reeling in his line, Chu Mingcheng was about to press the button to retrieve the line on the electric jigging rod as well.
Just then, a fish nearly two meters long was slowly swimming by in the depths.
When it sensed the faint smell of blood from the sardine meat, it changed direction and approached.
The few red bandfish nearby scattered in fright.
This fish was completely white, its body long and slender like a ribbonfish. It had a crest on its head, which was actually its dorsal fin.
Its large, kohl-rimmed eyes were bright and looked quite scary in the deep water.
Unlike a ribbonfish, its tail wasn't a thin point, but a scissor-shaped fin like a tuna's.
It moved like a soft strip of cloth, not vertically like a steel plate as a ribbonfish did.
Its mouth wasn't as pointed as a ribbonfish's, but its teeth were just as sharp. When it swam up to the sardine meat, it opened its mouth and swallowed the bait in one gulp.
On the boat, Chu Mingcheng was just about to press the button to retrieve the line on the electric jigging rod.
But before he could, the electric jigging rod suddenly gave a significant jerk.
Of course, this "significant" was in comparison to the reaction from the red bandfish earlier.
From the looks of it, he had hooked an unknown large fish!
He quickly pressed the button. The moment the line was retrieved, it pulled on the slightly loose hook, causing it to sink deeper and more firmly.
The large fish, which might have had a chance to spit out the hook, was now completely trapped.
Although this fish was nearly two meters long, against the powerful electric reel, it didn't even have a chance to struggle.
In fact, as it was pulled from the deep to the shallows, the change in pressure caused its internal organs to rupture.
As a result, the fish was practically dead before it even reached the surface.
"Yo ho!" Chu Mingcheng had thought it was a grouper or something similar, but he hadn't expected such a long, large ribbonfish.
It was just that it looked quite different from a normal ribbonfish. Its back was red, and its belly was a translucent silver-white. It was a very beautiful fish.
Chu Mingcheng lifted it onto the deck, arranged it nicely, and took a picture before putting it away in a separate foam box with ice.
He didn't recognize this fish, so he checked his Aquatic Species Codex and found it was called a narrow-headed ribbonfish.
Then he looked it up in his book and learned that this type of ribbonfish had no commercial value because it wasn't abundant.
But it was an edible fish, so those who liked trying new things could buy it for a taste.
Therefore, even if the customers in his group chat didn't want it, he could still sell it to Brother Sea King or Jiang Yuqi. As food content creators, they would never turn it down.
He went back to the cockpit and started the boat to collect his pots.
Because he had used shrimp bait last night, when he pulled up the lines, they were all loaded with seabream.
And seven of them were black seabream, with the remaining one being a yellowfin seabream. The bait on two of the hooks had been eaten.
The hook-up rate was not bad, but unfortunately, the fish weren't very big, all around two or three jin.
He pulled up the shrimp pots, and there were still no surprises, though he did catch some more mantis shrimp.
He would keep the mantis shrimp to use as bait this afternoon to attract some groupers or other fish.
The crab pots, however, were very fruitful. He had caught over thirty jin of crabs in total, and they were all fat, mostly around a jin each. He only had to release two skinny ones.
The fuel cost for the night was about three thousand five hundred yuan. He would see how much the fish would sell for when he got back to the pier in the morning.
He returned to the pier at exactly five-thirty.
The pier was already bustling. The first batch of fishing boats all came back around this time.
The people who came to the pier to buy fish were not just fishmongers, but also some seafood shop owners and customers who wanted to buy fresh fish.
At the pier, a middle-aged man, dressed cleanly and looking sharp but with graying hair, was picking out fish.
His sharp eyes spotted a fishing boat returning to the pier in the distance.
Thinking there might be some good catches on the fishing boat, he walked over with a hint of curiosity.
Chu Mingcheng was a little surprised to see someone board his boat.
"Boss, what kind of fish do you have here?"
"I have line-caught ribbonfish, red bandfish, and swimming crabs."
"Oh, you have red bandfish?" When he saw the red figures in the cooler, the middle-aged man was tempted.
But he didn't say much, instead opening all the coolers to take a look, and then he discovered the large ribbonfish packed separately.
"Is this... an oarfish?" the middle-aged man exclaimed in surprise.
It wasn't strange that he didn't recognize it. Some large ribbonfish were sometimes called oarfish.
But in reality, this large ribbonfish didn't have that title. It just looked similar, and someone unfamiliar with it would definitely not be able to tell the difference.
Chu Mingcheng shook his head and explained, "No, this is a narrow-headed ribbonfish. It's in the ribbonfish family. A real oarfish is not in the ribbonfish family. They look similar, but they are completely different species and are not closely related."
"I see!" The middle-aged man nodded in understanding. "Boss, how much are you selling this large ribbonfish for?"
"The price is one hundred and fifty a jin, non-negotiable. There's no shortage of buyers for this kind of ribbonfish. Hotel owners love these rare but delicious fish, and they make for good publicity."
Chu Mingcheng had already checked the price. An iced one that had been sitting for several days could sell for one hundred and ten.
His was larger and fresher, so one hundred and fifty was a very reasonable price.
The middle-aged man had originally wanted to haggle, but hearing Chu Mingcheng refuse to negotiate, he couldn't help but give a wry smile.
"Alright, then please weigh it for me, boss. I'll take this one."
"Oh, and give me a jin of the red bandfish. How much is that?"
Seeing him take the large ribbonfish so readily, Chu Mingcheng became more accommodating.
"I'll give you a discount on the red bandfish, fifty a jin. You should know that freshly caught ones like these could actually sell for more."
"Alright, boss, please calculate the price."
Finally, Chu Mingcheng weighed the large ribbonfish. It was one meter and ninety-three centimeters long, but only weighed fourteen jin and one liang.
The price was two thousand one hundred and fifteen yuan. Adding the jin of red bandfish, Chu Mingcheng charged him two thousand one hundred and fifty yuan.
A two-meter-long ribbonfish couldn't even cover his costs.