The Fish I Catch Can Level Up-Chapter 42: Mackerel Aren't Worth Much

The fish run drew a growing crowd to the pier. Some were fishing with rods, others with nets—the place buzzed with activity.
Zhao Jun's cast net could only reach the small mackerel in the upper water column. They weren't very big, averaging about fifteen centimeters each.
Chu Mingcheng, on the other hand, was angling for the larger mackerel lurking in the depths. He was landing plenty of them, and every single one was over twenty-five centimeters with a thick, fat belly.
In just over twenty minutes, he had already caught nineteen fish. That was almost one per minute—the hook-up rate was insane.
There were still a good forty or fifty minutes until the sun completely set, and the mackerel school wasn't going anywhere anytime soon. This meant that if his luck held and he kept getting bites, he could easily reel in another thirty jin 【approximately 33 lbs or 15 kg】 or more.
Of course, a swarm of mackerel this large didn't just attract humans. It also drew the attention of other predators lurking in the sea.
Large fish occasionally appeared near the pier, drawn by the schools of smaller fish that gathered there, making it a prime hunting ground. Right now, in the deeper water hidden from view, several massive fish had appeared. Although the mackerel in the lower depths weren't small, these predators could snatch a twenty-plus-centimeter fish in a single bite, swallowing half its body in an instant before gulping down the rest.
Smaller hunters, unable to swallow such large mackerel, swam up to the middle and upper layers to prey on the smaller ones.
Chu Mingcheng was completely unaware of the drama unfolding beneath the waves. His sinking minnow lure was darting through the depths, doing its job of tempting fish to strike. He had originally been targeting mackerel, but its movements had now caught the eye of a large grouper nearby.
The grouper had been attracted by the mackerel school, but the smaller fish were fast, making them difficult to hunt. The slow-moving minnow lure, however, presented an irresistible target, and the grouper immediately switched its focus.
Standing on the boat, Chu Mingcheng gently twitched his lure rod, slowly turning the handle of the reel with his right hand. He wasn't retrieving the line quickly.
Zzzing—!
The fishing line suddenly went taut. Chu Mingcheng instinctively raised his rod to set the hook, and the line sliced through the water with a satisfying zip.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa—!"
The force this time was completely different from before. It nearly yanked the unprepared Chu Mingcheng right off the boat. He reacted just in time, planting a foot on the boat's gunwale to steady himself.
"What's wrong? What happened?" Zhao Jun noticed the commotion and hurried over.
"It's fine! I've hooked a big one!" Chu Mingcheng replied while fighting the fish in the water.
Line peeled steadily from the spinning reel, but he didn't dare apply too much pressure, terrified that the line would snap or the rod would break. From the moment he'd recovered his balance, he knew he was onto a monster. The pull was even stronger than the twenty-jin carp and bighead he'd caught before.
This terrified him. As a novice angler, all he knew was that bigger fish required stronger rods and thicker lines. He had absolutely no confidence in landing a large catch with this light tackle. It wasn't impossible, but it required skill and an understanding of how fish behave—things that only came with tons of experience.
But he'd been thrown in at the deep end. Whether he could do it or not, he had to now.
The taut line continued to transmit heart-pounding surges of power, and the reel was still giving out line. The rod was already bent into a full moon arc, leaving him both nervous and thrilled.
"Stay calm, stay calm! Take it slow!" Zhao Jun had stopped casting his net. He stood beside Chu Mingcheng, barely daring to breathe, looking even more nervous than his friend.
Zzz... Vrrr... Zzz...
After five or six minutes, Chu Mingcheng felt the force from the water lessen slightly. He seized the opportunity to start pulling back on the rod, cranking the handle to reel in the line. The fish's first powerful run was over, and the tension in his chest eased a little. The initial burst of strength had startled him, but now he realized the fish might not be as colossal as he'd first imagined.
If he were careful, he would be able to land it.
The line, which had been angling steeply downward, was now becoming more parallel to the surface—a sure sign that the fish was being pulled up from the depths.
SPLASH!
A huge spray of water erupted twenty meters away, catching the attention of many people on the shore.
"Holy crap, there are big fish out there? Quick, switch rods, switch lines! Who cares about mackerel now!"
Some of the veteran anglers on the shore were fully equipped. Seeing signs of a large fish, they immediately changed their target and broke out their heavy-duty gear.
Chu Mingcheng had also seen the massive splash and a fleeting glimpse of a brown shadow. A delighted smile spread across his face, but he knew it was too early to celebrate. The fish wasn't landed yet.
Playing it safe, he didn't rush to drag the fish in. It was still resisting strongly, so he decided to continue tiring it out.
After another ten minutes, he finally managed to work the great fish close to the boat. Both of them could now clearly see what it was: a dotted grouper, also known as a green grouper.
"Haha, Ah Cheng, your luck is insane! You came out for mackerel and ended up with a grouper!" Zhao Jun acted fast, expertly clamping the fish gripper onto the grouper's massive jaw and hoisting it onto the boat.
Since Chu Mingcheng hadn't expected to hook anything big, he hadn't brought a landing net aboard; for mackerel, you could just lift them straight out. Luckily, the fish gripper was small and light enough to be kept in the tackle box.
"Nice. This green grouper is thirteen jin and three liang." 【Approx 14.5 lbs or 6.5 kg】 The grouper looked to be about sixty centimeters long with a round, bulging belly.
Zhao Jun held it up with the gripper to check the weight, his voice tinged with envy. Wild green grouper could sell for eighty yuan per jin. This one fish was worth over a thousand yuan. He, on the other hand, had been casting his net this whole time and had nearly filled two baskets with about a hundred jin of mackerel, but he wasn't sure if he could even get half the price of this single grouper for all of it.
"Haha, I can't believe my luck!" It was Chu Mingcheng's first time catching a big grouper, and the feeling was incredible. It made him even more excited for the sea rods he had ordered to arrive. Fighting big fish with a light lure rod was nerve-wracking; he was constantly worried that one wrong move would cause the line to break or the rod to snap.
When he removed the minnow lure from the grouper's mouth, he saw that the leader line was severely frayed. A cold sweat broke out on his back.
He'd been incredibly lucky to land this fish. If the fight had gone on for a few more minutes, the rod might have held, but the line would have definitely given way.
Chu Mingcheng made a mental note to go online tonight and research which fishing lines were the most durable and abrasion-resistant. The thought of losing a big fish because his line couldn't handle it was just too painful to bear.
Zhao Jun placed the green grouper in the boat's livewell to keep it alive for sale later. Without wasting any more time, Chu Mingcheng replaced his leader line and went back to fishing for mackerel.
Over the next while, a few other people on the shore also got lucky and landed big fish—some groupers, some other predatory species. But there were also a few unlucky souls whose rods snapped under the strain.
The frenzy continued until the sun finally set and the mackerel school dispersed.
Zhao Jun's net started coming up empty, and Chu Mingcheng went several casts without a bite.
"The school's gone. Let's head back and sell the fish."
"Sounds good." Chu Mingcheng had no objections. He estimated he had caught about fifty jin of mackerel, all of them a good size. The smallest was at least twenty centimeters, with most being over twenty-five. He had also set aside nine particularly fat-bellied ones, which weighed fifteen or sixteen jin by themselves. He planned to try some himself and give the rest away.
Back on shore, many fishmongers were there buying the day's catch.
Chu Mingcheng asked around and found that the small and medium-sized mackerel, like the ones Zhao Jun had caught, were only fetching four yuan per jin. It was dirt cheap. But considering the buyers still had to freeze and process them before selling them in the market for around ten yuan, the low price wasn't surprising.
Even for his larger mackerel, the price wasn't much better—a measly eight yuan per jin. It was almost ridiculous.