The Fish I Catch Can Level Up-Chapter 28: Joining the High-Income Bracket

Another day passed, and the National Day holiday was drawing to a close.
First thing in the morning, Chu Mingcheng had to go sell his fish. He loaded all of yesterday's catch into his car and headed for the pier. Fishermen pulled their nets once in the early morning, which meant the fish vendors were always there waiting, along with the dedicated gourmands.
You had to have faith in the foodies from Wenzhou city; they would drive out here first thing in the morning for a good catch.
From his experience selling the horn snails, Chu Mingcheng knew that if he wanted to sell his haul quickly and for a good price, he needed to target these well-dressed, discerning buyers. The fishmongers, who dealt with seafood all day, weren't about to show up in their Sunday best.
So, after carrying his two buckets down to the pier, he didn't call out. Instead, he scanned the crowd. He spotted six neatly dressed middle-aged men and two women in dresses and sunglasses.
Chu Mingcheng headed toward the closest man, ignoring the two women. It wasn't that he looked down on them, but women were natural-born hagglers. He preferred selling to decisive men. Of course, there was always the chance he'd run into a nitpicker, regardless of gender.
"Boss, interested in some wild gobies, mud crabs, moray eels, or sea bass?"
The middle-aged man had already been curious about what was in Chu Mingcheng's buckets. The mention of gobies and eels immediately piqued his interest. "Brother, did you catch all this yourself?"
"Yep, fished all night. Just brought them over to see if anyone was interested." To sell the part, Chu Mingcheng had deliberately brought his fishing gear down with him. It created the illusion that everything in his buckets was line-caught and completely wild.
People these days had better living conditions and were increasingly particular about their food. If a wild option was available, they would never choose farmed. Weren't these foodies waiting at the pier for that exact reason?
But these connoisseurs were also hard to fool. If you tried to pass off farmed seafood as wild, getting yelled at on the spot would be getting off easy.
Chu Mingcheng set his buckets down and let the man inspect the catch himself. It was all genuinely wild, so he had nothing to worry about.
After a look, the man decided he wanted it all.
This immediately attracted the attention of the others. The two women came over, and upon seeing the quality of the catch, one of them said, "Ah Qing, you've got so many gobies here. Share some with us!"
Chu Mingcheng was taken aback. He hadn't realized the women knew the man.
The man, Ah Qing, immediately refused. "Hey, this is barely enough for myself. A few friends, a few drinks, and this will be gone in one meal. Next time. Next time there's good stuff, I'll save some for you."
The two women weren't having it. They insisted on buying some, holding up the whole transaction. Chu Mingcheng, feeling helpless, finally had to chime in. "I have another four or five
jin
of sea worms in the car. If you want them, I can go get them for you."
The women's eyes lit up. "You have sea worms?"
"I do. Dug them up yesterday. I was planning to sell them elsewhere, but if you want them, they're yours."
"Yes, of course, we want them!"
Now the middle-aged man wanted some, too, and it was his turn to ask the women to spare him a few.
In the end, Chu Mingcheng didn't know how the three of them divided the spoils. All he knew was that he sold every last bit of seafood he had from yesterday, and at market price. What's more, all the gourmands at the pier added him as a contact, telling him to let them know the next time he had a good catch.
Chu Mingcheng simply created a group chat and added the three people who had bought from him today. He’d hold off on the others for now; he hadn't dealt with them before and didn't know if they were decisive buyers. He couldn't be bothered with hagglers.
Back in his car, Chu Mingcheng calculated yesterday's earnings. Three moray eels, a total of 4.3
jin
, at 100 yuan per
jin
, came to 430 yuan. Two sea bass, both small, just over two
jin
total, which he sold as two
jin
for 80 yuan. One mud crab, which sold for 90 yuan. The sea worms totaled 5.6
jin
. He was surprised there were so many; he had spent three fewer hours digging yesterday than the day before, but had harvested about the same amount. He had sold them to the noodle shop owner for 55 a
jin
, but here he got 60, for a total of 336 yuan. Finally, the gobies. After feeding over a
jin
's worth to Mimi, he had 16 left, weighing 5.2
jin
. This stuff was expensive—200 a
jin
—selling for 1,040 yuan. Zhang Wei's share was a little over a
jin
more than his, and it sold for 1,280 yuan.
He transferred the money to his friend. His total income for the day was 1,976 yuan. Because it was a mobile transfer, there was no rounding down. Selling to these wealthy buyers was definitely the way to go. He figured they didn't haggle because they wanted him to prioritize them the next time he had something good. Besides, his prices were fair, unlike some at the pier who jacked up the price, knowing these people just wanted the freshest catch.
He had spent nearly five thousand on fishing rods recently. Although he’d made a profit chartering the boat yesterday, he was still out an extra thousand. But in the last few days, he had made nine thousand from the alligator gar, two thousand today, plus nearly two thousand from miscellaneous fish sales before that.
His current savings had now reached thirty thousand yuan. And that wasn't even counting the seven thousand in salary he was due on the tenth.
"Twenty-eight years old with thirty-seven thousand in savings. What a failure," he thought with a grimace.
Chu Mingcheng immediately drove to buy more shrimp bait and headed back to Dongyue. Fishing for gobies was this profitable, and while digging for sea worms earned less, it was stable. He would bleed this spot dry before moving on.
Time flew by, and soon it was October 8th, the day people went back to work. For the remaining days of the holiday, Chu Mingcheng spent his days at Dongyue, digging for sea worms and fishing for gobies. As if that wasn't enough, he spent his nights at the reservoir fishing, bringing his daily income to at least two thousand yuan, sometimes even three thousand.
Not including his final salary, his savings had just crossed the forty-thousand-yuan mark. It was still a long way from buying a boat, but at least the number was growing.
But he decided he wouldn't come back here tomorrow. The main issue was that even though his goby skill level was increasing, the fish he was catching were getting smaller. The big ones were mostly gone. His goby skill had now reached Level 9, but even Codex was useless if there were no fish left. His crucian carp skill was up to Level 12, but he decided to stop fishing the reservoir, too. He'd let it rest and come back later if he felt like it.
His sea worm skill was the highest, at Level 28, the best of all his aquatic species. The effects were much more obvious than when he started. Now, he only needed to dig for four or five hours a day to get five or six
jin
, and on a good day, he could even hit ten.
Today, his parents returned from Dongting Island. Chu Mingcheng skipped his night fishing session. Instead, he took two large mud crabs he'd been lucky enough to catch and half a
jin
of sea worms and went home.
He first fed the crucian carp he'd caught yesterday to Mimi, then locked up and drove back to his family's house in town.
The moment he walked in the door, his mother, An Xiuwen, noticed him. But as she got a clear look, her smile was replaced by shock.
"Son, what have you been doing this past week? How did you get so dark?"
"That dark?" Chu Mingcheng looked at his arms. Compared to before, he was only a shade darker, a healthier skin tone. He was a little speechless. "I've just been beachcombing and fishing. It's not as dramatic as you're making it sound, is it?"