novelraw Chapter 229: The Sea Turtle Family's Inside Information
Chapter 229: The Sea Turtle Family's Inside Information
Chapter 229: The Sea Turtle Family's Inside InformationChu Mingcheng didn't want these live sea creatures gradually dying off, so he had to make a trip back tonight—which didn't conflict with his original plan anyway.
Before getting in the water, he closed the small gate to prevent the sea lion from following and getting in his way while he was catching regal mantis shrimp.
Diving into the water, Chu Mingcheng noticed the sea was even clearer today than yesterday, making it perfect for fishing and hunting.
However, since he was going after regal mantis shrimp, the water clarity didn't make much difference to him.
He returned to the regal mantis shrimp territory and used his Fish Gathering ability to lure them out.
This time, he brought two mesh bags, planning to call it a day once both were full.
Following the distribution of burrows beneath the sandy seabed, he unknowingly began moving toward the upper end of the island.
Chu Mingcheng hadn't expected there to be so many regal mantis shrimp living here. He had originally planned to go all the way to the end of the burrows and then head back.
By going back and forth like this, he figured all the regal mantis shrimp would eventually emerge, allowing him to pick and choose as he pleased.
But upon reaching the upper end of the island, he found a delightful surprise on the sandy bottom: a giant tiger prawn, also known as a nine-section shrimp, lying in the sand.This giant tiger prawn was massive—estimated to be close to twenty centimeters long.
Of course, if it had been just this one, Chu Mingcheng wouldn't have been so thrilled.
He deliberately turned off his Fish Gathering function and scouted the area. He immediately discovered this was a huge school of giant tiger prawns.
They came in all sizes, all resting on the sand.
Compared to fish, shrimp seemed more popular with consumers.
This was mainly because many fish had a fishy smell that put some people off.
But fresh shrimp absolutely didn't, and their meat was delicious and highly nutritious.
Dried shrimp were also tasty and more widely accepted than dried fish.
The only downside was that wild shrimp were expensive as hell. It was fine for an ordinary family to eat them occasionally, but eating them regularly would break the bank. ᚱ𝘈𝐍оʙĚs
Fortunately, there was no shortage of farmed shrimp in the country, and many were priced reasonably for most people.
Giant tiger prawns rest during the day and are active at night.
Since they were currently resting in the sand, Chu Mingcheng didn't even need his Fish Gathering function to catch them easily.
However, his second mesh bag was already about a third full of regal mantis shrimp. He thought for a moment and decided to head back along his original route first.
This way, he could catch some more mantis shrimp on the way while also dropping off his current haul on the boat.
It was a shame he hadn't discovered this school of giant tiger prawns last night. If he had, he could have just dropped two shrimp traps here and wouldn't have had to go through the trouble of catching them by hand.
But now was their resting time, so even if he set traps, they wouldn't be very effective. It was faster for him to catch them himself—he'd just have to work a little harder.
Chu Mingcheng moved away from the area, reactivated his Fish Gathering function, and swept his way back to the boat.
It was now nine in the morning. Jiang Luoluo had just woken up and was eating the breakfast she'd made.
Seeing Chu Mingcheng return, she first shot him a resentful glare, then walked out of the cockpit while eating her sandwich.
The glare was clearly her expression of dissatisfaction with his lack of gentleness last night.
Although it had felt incredible, Jiang Luoluo still didn't quite like being so exhausted that she didn't even want to move.
Chu Mingcheng chuckled, completely unfazed by the glare, looking rather pleased with himself.
He was now fully experiencing the benefits of his enhanced constitution from Life Conversion. He had never been this vigorous with previous girlfriends.
Back and leg soreness used to be common. Fortunately, he was young back then, at the peak of a man's stamina, so he never had to resort to sleeping on the sofa.
"Luoluo, I caught loads more regal mantis shrimp. How do you want to prepare them this time?"
Looking at the two mesh bags brimming with regal mantis shrimp—and more importantly, with every single one exceeding twenty-five centimeters—Jiang Luoluo nearly choked on her sandwich.
She quickly went back to take a sip of milk to recover.
"Just how many regal mantis shrimp are there here? Isn't this a bit excessive? Not to mention there are so many, and they're all this huge?"
"It's not that many, really. Including yesterday's haul, it's probably just over a hundred. The sandy seabed is massive—the population's bound to be large."
Compared to the size of this habitat, a hundred or so large regal mantis shrimp really wasn't much.
Jiang Luoluo thought it was a lot, mainly because large regal mantis shrimp were rare and expensive, making them seem scarce compared to other mantis shrimp.
"It's all thanks to the sea lion. If it hadn't brought us here, we wouldn't have had such an amazing harvest!"
Chu Mingcheng patted the sea lion's head, deciding to prepare some regal mantis shrimp meat for it to try today as well.
After finishing breakfast, Jiang Luoluo helped sort the mantis shrimp. Some of the less lively, nearly dead ones had to be separated from the healthy ones to prevent a chain reaction.
In the end, including the five that had died this morning, thirteen total were set aside. These went in the refrigerator in the cockpit, saved for them to eat.
"Ah Cheng, are we heading back this afternoon?" Jiang Luoluo asked.
"No rush. This afternoon, I plan to take you to the coral reef to practice diving and check out the resources there. We'll head back tonight."
"It's still early. Rest on the boat for a while and get your energy back. I found a school of giant tiger prawns resting in the sand, so I'm going to catch some."
With that, Chu Mingcheng prepared to dive again.
"There are giant tiger prawns too? Be careful then. If you get tired, come back and rest. Don't be too greedy."
"Don't you know better than anyone whether I get tired or not?"
"Hmph! I just wasn't in top form. We'll see who's begging for mercy next time."
"Ha!" Jiang Luoluo's blushing, annoyed expression made Chu Mingcheng burst out laughing. As for her getting the upper hand—that was impossible in this lifetime.
Back in the water, he turned off his Fish Gathering function and swam quickly to the area with the giant tiger prawns.
The sea lion was currently sunbathing on deck. Full and lazy, it had no intention of following him. Chu Mingcheng realized his earlier concern had been unnecessary.
The density of giant tiger prawns was higher than that of the regal mantis shrimp—he could find one almost every meter or so.
Chu Mingcheng decided to test the giant tiger prawns' alertness first. He held his foraging tongs in his left hand and used his right hand to catch one.
The giant tiger prawn in front of him, nearly the size of his palm, was a perfect target.
He approached slowly, trying to keep the water as still as possible.
Perhaps because it was morning, the giant tiger prawn didn't react to his approach at all.
He didn't know if it was asleep or just felt safe lying in the sand.
And then, like the Monkey King getting pinned under Buddha's palm, it was caught.
Chu Mingcheng picked up the oversized giant tiger prawn, now knowing that catching them would be very easy.
But there was a downside. Because he was so close to the seabed, the commotion he caused while catching the prawn instantly startled the nearby ones, and they all shot up and fled.
Placing the giant tiger prawn in his mesh bag, Chu Mingcheng decided to try using the foraging tongs.
With the tongs, he wouldn't need to get so close and might not startle the nearby prawns.
Chu Mingcheng swam forward and soon found a second large giant tiger prawn.
This time, he used the foraging tongs—perfect catch. What's more, he didn't startle the nearby prawns. Sure enough, tools were essential for underwater foraging.
Chu Mingcheng immediately began his happy money-collecting journey. A large giant tiger prawn weighed about three liang.
At the market price of two hundred and seventy yuan per jin, one was worth about eighty yuan.
Indeed, working a dead-end job gets you nowhere.
But he didn't exclusively pick the especially large ones—he took some of the slightly smaller ones as well.
The meat of these smaller ones was more tender, though they didn't offer the same satisfaction as the big ones.
Shrimp schools are generally enormous. If caught by fishing nets, the haul could be thousands or even tens of thousands of jin.
Wild giant tiger prawns are rare, but with good luck, catching a few hundred jin wasn't a problem.
At Chu Mingcheng's slow pace of picking them up one by one, he was only taking a drop in the bucket, which wouldn't affect the school's population at all.
Besides, with the current accelerated reproduction and growth rates, the giant tiger prawn school near the island would probably experience explosive population growth in the second half of the year.
Therefore, even if he caught some smaller ones, it wouldn't impact the school at all.
Time passed slowly. Chu Mingcheng soon filled one mesh bag and started on the second.
As he was picking them up, he noticed a blurry shadow approaching in the distance.
Its speed wasn't fast, but its size seemed considerable. Judging by the shape of the shadow, it was probably a large sea turtle.
If he were free, he might have swum over to take a look.
But he was happily catching giant tiger prawns right now—he had no time to bother with it.
Giant tiger prawns tasted fantastic, and he wasn't catching so many just to sell. He also planned to share them with friends and family, so he needed to catch quite a few.
But while he ignored the huge sea turtle, it approached him after spotting him.
It's well known that sea turtles like humans to help them remove barnacles from their bodies.
This group of sea turtles had its own internal information network. They knew that this era's humans were very friendly toward them. Not only would they not harm them, but if they needed help and asked for it, humans would almost always lend a hand. This was completely different from the last century.
This massive sea turtle had lived from the last century to the present—it was probably older than Chu Mingcheng's great-grandfather.
It had experienced a change in human attitudes toward them. If it were in the past, it would have turned and fled the moment it saw Chu Mingcheng.
But now, it needed his help, so it approached on its own initiative.
Looking at the jungle of barnacles that had formed a small mountain on the sea turtle's back, Chu Mingcheng couldn't help but sigh. Trouble had come knocking.
The large sea turtle wasn't shy at all. It stopped right in front of him.
Seeing this, Chu Mingcheng had no choice but to wave his hand for it to follow, giving up his plan to continue catching giant tiger prawns.
The sea turtle didn't quite understand his hand gesture, but seeing the person who could help it leaving, it immediately followed in a panic.
The mountain-like barnacles on its shell were having too great an impact on it. If this continued, it didn't know if it could bear the burden any longer. Its coffin lid might just get nailed shut this year.
Because of these barnacles, its hunting had become much more difficult, and it hadn't had a full meal in ages.
Seeing the sea turtle following, Chu Mingcheng was relieved. He then swam toward the fishing boat at a speed the turtle could keep up with.
He had only caught about thirty jin of giant tiger prawns—he should have caught more, but it seemed his time today was destined to be spent on the sea turtle.
Arriving back at the boat, Chu Mingcheng guided the sea turtle to the stairs at the rear deck, making it easier for Jiang Luoluo to help later.
The sea lion was terrified by its size. It instantly flipped up from its lying position and started yelping as it ran toward the cockpit, its cries extremely shrill.
Jiang Luoluo, thinking something had happened, rushed out and saw a giant sea turtle at the stern of the boat.