As a Fisherman, My Fish Can Level Up
Chapter 419 - Chapter 419 Chapter 302 Some Players Countermeasures

Chapter 419: Chapter 302: Some Players’ Countermeasures Chapter 419: Chapter 302: Some Players’ Countermeasures When Jiang Luoluo was counting, tourists passing by the port gathered around because there were so many golden spearfish, all snapping photos with their mobile phones to share on social media.

When an almost four-meter-long giant black marlin was lifted out of the refrigeration compartment by the crane, it caused a huge commotion.

When had such a breathtaking fish ever appeared in the country without attracting a crowd?

How many people have actually seen such a true ocean overlord with their own eyes?

Even many tourists seeing the ocean for the first time, let alone the on-site staff, could not help but be astounded as they had never seen anything like it before.

Only the few who initially gathered around the refrigeration compartment to take a look remained relatively calm, mainly because they had been amazed already.

This black marlin, Chu Mingcheng had sacrificed some of the space in the refrigeration compartment to preserve its long beak to ensure its integrity.

After being frozen at a low temperature, its body was stiff like a large specimen.

Only the surface frost slightly covered its original imposing presence, making it appear somewhat faded.

But even so, a giant black marlin still stole the show from a bunch of longfin golden spearfish, becoming the star of the scene.

Chu Mingcheng and Jiang Luoluo were then roped in by Cai Xue Ting for an interview, and after the interview ended, the value of all the fish had already been calculated.

The black marlin, because it was large enough, was given the market price by the organizers for sensation, which was sixty yuan per pound.

Of course, though it was referred to as the market price, a black marlin of that size could fetch a much higher premium.

Because the integrity of the fish was so good, some were willing to pay a high price to buy it for collection as a specimen.

As a participant, Chu Mingcheng could only sell the fish to the organizers without any other choices.

The organizers were not running a charity, and after offering a fair price, they would not allow participants’ catches to be sold to other fishing companies or private owners.

The marlin weighed in at seven hundred thirty-one pounds, and after draining all the blood from it, it only weighed six pounds lighter, which obviously wasn’t possible.

But Chu Mingcheng had rinsed out the blood with tap water, so the tap water that replaced some of the blood and then froze made it reasonable for the weight to be reduced by only that little.

This marlin was priced at forty-three thousand eight hundred sixty yuan, close to an ordinary person’s annual salary.

In addition to the black marlin, there were also forty-three longfin golden spearfish.

After weighing, all the longfin golden spearfish weighed over fifty pounds each, with a total weight of two thousand seven hundred thirty-three pounds, which was a few hundred pounds more than Chu Mingcheng had estimated.

Unfortunately, the average price was not high, only fifty-six yuan, so the total price was just over one hundred fifty-three thousand yuan.

This trip’s total earnings were nearly one hundred ninety-six thousand nine hundred yuan, just shy of two hundred thousand.

Chu Mingcheng’s ranking on the leaderboard was one hundred fifty-seven thousand, still in second place, and the participants behind him had not yet returned, so the previous ranks remained unchanged for the time being.

A little while later, the leaderboard showed a new change for the second place, which became three hundred fifty-four thousand.

The ranking hadn’t changed, but the gap with the first place had significantly narrowed.

The change at the top of the leaderboard immediately caught the attention of many participants with fishing boats.

Basically, those who could afford fishing boats and had well-equipped boats were not short of money, so for convenience, they would set up a small mobile base station.

This way, they had a signal while at sea and could be in contact with friends and family; these participants also occasionally checked the leaderboard.

Now, the actual amount for the second place suddenly increased by two hundred thousand, and some participants noticed it right away.

At that moment, the crew members of one fishing boat had just finished their tasks and had gathered together for dinner.

The captain casually checked the leaderboard and blurted out, “Fuck, second place suddenly jumped by two hundred thousand!”

Crew member A: “He went out to sea a night later than us, right? So today is only the third day, and already he has made two hundred thousand?”

Crew member B: “Could he have caught a bluefin golden spearfish?”

Crew member C: “No, no, look at the announcement on the APP, the second place’s catch this time included a seven hundred-plus-pound marlin and forty-three longfin golden spearfish.”

Captain: “Fuck, forty-three? How did he manage that?”

Crew member D: “I remember their boat only has two people, isn’t that a bit exaggerated? Even with five of us fishing simultaneously, it would be hard to achieve that in such a short period of time, right?”

Indeed, the situation seemed somewhat incredible, and anyone who has actually fished for sixty to seventy-pound longfin golden spearfish knew it was not easy.

Without the assistance of an electric reel, it might take an hour per fish.

Normally, with five people working simultaneously, fishing for forty-three would take eight to nine hours, which was feasible in terms of time.

But human endurance has its limits, and catching just one golden spearfish was challenging enough, let alone fishing continuously for seven or eight.

Even the world’s top athletes, those with the best stamina, might not be able to withstand it.

However, there being only two people on Chu Mingcheng’s boat made it even more unbelievable.

Thus, someone immediately suggested whether he had secretly used fishing nets or long lines, as it seemed impossible to catch them with normal fishing.

Out of jealousy, some directly called the organizers, suspecting Chu Mingcheng of cheating and asked the organizers to re-examine their boat.

Suddenly, radio discussions about this erupted, and even Chen Yang and others near the public sea were aware of it.

Out of concern for his brother, Chen Yang immediately made a call to Chu Mingcheng.

“Ah Cheng, a lot of participants are discussing on the radio how you caught forty-three golden spearfish in just three days, and everyone thinks it’s impossible. What’s the situation on your side?”

Chu Mingcheng, looking at a group of staff boarding the boat for inspection, shrug helplessly: “Nothing much, the organizers arranged for ten staff members to come aboard because of this. They even had divers check under the boat, which is just ridiculous.”

Since Chen Yang was on speakerphone, Zhang Wei also heard the details.

His hot temper immediately flared up: “These bastards, if they can’t do it themselves, they smear others. If the organizers are going to do this, then if they don’t search every boat coming back to port in the same way, wouldn’t that be very unfair to you?”

Chu Mingcheng’s eyes lit up upon hearing this, and he looked toward the slightly embarrassed organizer who, because the speakerphone was on, had clearly heard Zhang Wei’s words.

“Mr. Wang, you heard what my friend said. If you don’t search all the returning boats like this, I would feel that you are deliberately targeting me, just because I accomplished what others believed was impossible.”

“And you just mentioned installing surveillance; does this mean that every boat needs to have it installed?”

“Of course, surveillance needs to be installed on all boats upon returning,” he replied.

The organizer, in fact, was also somewhat helpless. Initially, he didn’t want to bother with the matter, but too many contestants had called, and catching forty-three Golden Spearfish in three days did seem a bit excessive.

Therefore, he had no choice but to arrange for someone to come and check the situation.

Furthermore, the decision to install surveillance was made after discussion by the organizers, because the number of patrol boats and monitoring staff was limited, and given the vastness of the sea, many boats hadn’t been encountered in over ten days.

In such cases, it was indeed difficult to discover if contestants wanted to do something shady.

Therefore, it was ultimately decided that surveillance had to be installed on all boats, and if the surveillance broke or something, then the contestant should consider themselves unlucky and must return to port immediately.

If they did not return within a day, they would be treated as having withdrawn from the competition.

This being the first fishing competition, and given the domestic circumstances, it was hard to completely copy foreign standards.

Thus, many procedures had to be explored and perfected step by step, which was unavoidable.

Zhang Wei’s remark was very timely; the competition needed to be fair, therefore all boats must be treated the same.

Chu Mingcheng and Jiang Luoluo were quite satisfied upon hearing this, as it meant they were not being targeted alone, so naturally, they had no objections.

The change in the situation was still unknown to the contestants currently in the Far Sea.

Some contestants, seeing the scores of the second-place contestant, felt an increasing sense of urgency, with Wang Lao Liu feeling the greatest pressure.

His luck on his second trip out to sea was much worse than on his first, and although he had caught seven Golden Spearfish so far, they were only yellowfin, which are not highly valued.

If Chu Mingcheng had no issues this time, and his luck continued to be good, overtaking him wouldn’t be difficult at all.

So, after much consideration, Wang Lao Liu decided to first contact his old friend; this was his ultimate backup plan.

In necessary situations, he felt he needed to prepare some special measures.

He took out his phone and dialed a number.

After a little while, the call connected, and a very awkward voice came through, “Mr. Wang…”

“Mr. Wang,” this term of address sounded very much like it came from Japan.

Fishermen of the East Sea had some discord with those from Japan, given their proximity.

But there were also many fishermen who had formed international “friendships” at sea, selling fish caught or fished directly to Japanese fishermen.

Seafood is generally more expensive in Japan, especially fish used for sashimi.

Their purchase prices were higher than those of domestic fish traders, so when fishermen encountered Japanese fishermen, they would engage in direct sea transactions.

This not only allowed for earning money but also helped clear space on their fishing boats.

The price at which fish could be sold depended greatly on its freshness.

Normally, many Far Sea fishing boats only returned once a week, so fish caught in the first few days were not as fresh, and thus sold for much less.

Selling directly to the Japanese did not have this problem.

Initially, both parties had many difficulties with the transactions due to the different currencies, making transactions challenging.

Lately, the Japanese had started to exchange directly into RMB, and in cash, which made transactions considerably easier.

In the current era, some fishing elites like Wang Lao Liu even had international accounts set up, making transactions even more convenient.

Since the Japanese could directly buy fish, they could naturally also sell fish.

Wang Lao Liu’s backup plan, of course, involved buying Bluefin Tuna from Japan if necessary.

Buying from Japan and then selling to the organizers actually didn’t result in much financial loss for him.

As long as he won first place, his earnings would naturally be much higher than these losses.

However, although Wang Lao Liu had thought of this, it didn’t mean other connected contestants hadn’t considered this as well.

But these people didn’t know that due to some being jealous of Chu Mingcheng, someone had reported to the organizers who were preparing to install two surveillance cameras on their boats.

Originally, they only needed to avoid the patrol boats and the staff on speedboats, but now mandatory surveillance installation made certain backup plans difficult to execute!

Indeed, when they saw the new announcement released on the app, their faces suddenly looked worse than if they had eaten something gross.

“F*ck,”

Just after hanging up the phone and seeing this announcement, Wang Lao Liu nearly threw his phone in frustration. He had just finished his call, and then the organizers pulled this move.

“Who the f*ck reported this, are they just trying to stir up trouble?”

Since the announcement already clarified that Chu Mingcheng was clear of any wrongdoing, didn’t this mean it implicated him, someone who had a backup plan?

Wang Lao Liu felt helpless, it seemed he only had the option to employ his backup plan while he hadn’t yet returned, to create a gap.

He really didn’t want to use this backup plan unless absolutely necessary.

Of course, other contestants with similar ideas had also decided to avoid surveillance and head toward the boundary of the Public Sea to stabilize their positions first.

As for damaging the surveillance during the transaction, no one would do that unless absolutely necessary.

The risks were significant–being discovered would not only lead to embarrassment but also potentially a ban from competition.