Chapter 349 - 231: How Dare It?

Chapter 349: Chapter 231: How Dare It?

In another month, it would probably be too cold to go in the water.

With the matter settled, Yi Chen got up and went to the kitchen to prepare lunch, while Xu Zhina and the others went to help out.

They had a simple lunch, and the fishing boat never stopped, so they ended up reaching their destination a little earlier than Gu Nan had expected.

All six of them had changed into wetsuits and were now on deck, stretching and warming up.

Gu Nan glanced at his wife and nodded in satisfaction. ’She might be the shortest one standing, but she’s the tallest lying down!’

They split into pairs. Naturally, he was with Yi Chen. The three teams chose three different directions, but they stayed close enough to help each other if anything happened.

Gu Nan had a mesh bag and a safety rope tied to his waist, and so did Yi Chen.

They each had a fish stringer attached to their safety ropes, which would make it easy to secure their catches.

Holding their spearguns, they swam toward the deserted island, occasionally diving to check for fish.

After swimming about fifty meters, they finally reached a reef-dense area. Plenty of fish were swimming about, making it the perfect spot for spearfishing.

"Ah Nan, I’m going to go down for a look. Can you time my breath-hold?" This was Yi Chen’s first time on a real spearfishing trip, and she was a little giddy with excitement.

"Sure, I’ll keep an eye on you," Gu Nan said with a nod. He pressed a button on his sports watch, activating its dive mode.

As soon as Yi Chen plunged into the water, he pressed the button to start timing.

As for himself, he had timed his own breath-holds before. Over the past month, he had been practicing intermittently, and now his dynamic apnea time was just over four minutes. His longest static apnea was nearly five minutes.

’This is probably close to my limit, though. Even with more practice, I doubt I could add more than a few seconds.’

With breath-hold times like that, Gu Nan could have qualified for a diving instructor’s license.

He had no interest in being an instructor, though, so the license didn’t matter to him.

Gu Nan slipped into the water as well, keeping a close eye on Yi Chen’s movements to make sure she didn’t run into any trouble.

When he saw her searching for a target with her speargun, he knew she wasn’t just timing her breath-hold.

And sure enough, she soon locked onto a target and speared a fish.

Seeing her swimming upward while pulling on the line, Gu Nan quickly swam over to her.

When Yi Chen saw him approach, she happily pointed to a Red Friend Fish she had reeled in close.

The fish wasn’t huge, but it was a decent catch, looking to be about three or four pounds.

Gu Nan gave her a thumbs-up. He then checked the time—two and a half minutes had passed.

He held his watch out for Yi Chen to see the time, then pulled her toward the surface.

Her dynamic breath-hold could definitely exceed three minutes, so there was no need to measure the exact time.

At least hunting smaller fish in these reefs wouldn’t be dangerous for Yi Chen. As long as she didn’t go after large mackerel or tuna, she’d be fine.

After watching Yi Chen secure her fish, Gu Nan started his own hunt.

He dove headfirst into the water and descended straight toward the seabed. He’d spotted a large, dark shadow earlier and couldn’t tell what kind of fish it was, but it was definitely big. Now was the perfect time to find it.

Unlike Yi Chen, he didn’t like to lie in wait by the reefs for prey to come to him; he preferred to take the initiative.

A dynamic breath-hold of over four minutes was more than enough time for him to do plenty of things on the seabed, which was only about twenty meters deep here.

As soon as he reached the bottom, Gu Nan spotted several whelks as big as Yi Chen’s fist. He casually picked them up and tossed them into his mesh bag.

Though not pricey, the whelks were heavy. He had only picked up five, but they already weighed three or four pounds—an easy hundred yuan.

He ignored the smaller whelks because he’d spotted a lobster hiding under a nearby reef. Its two long antennae were unmistakable.

Gu Nan slowly approached the reef.

Lobsters use their antennae to sense the world around them. As long as he didn’t touch them, the lobster wouldn’t bolt, even if he was face-to-face with it.

He let go of his speargun, letting it float beside him, and reached under the reef.

Lobsters hiding under reefs like this weren’t actually hard to catch. If you timed it right, you could nab one every single time. It would be even easier with the right tools.

Gu Nan had done plenty of diving, and he’d certainly caught his fair share of lobsters.

Dodging the antennae, he shot his hand in and pinned the lobster down, catching it in one swift motion.

Easy peasy. He yanked out a spiny lobster of about two pounds. It thrashed its tail wildly, but Gu Nan’s grip was too tight for it to escape.

Just as he was about to put the lobster in his mesh bag, a dark shadow shot out from the corner of his eye, aiming straight for the hand holding his catch.

Startled, Gu Nan jerked back. Fortunately, the attacker wasn’t particularly fast, and the ambush failed.

When he got his bearings and took a closer look, his expression turned to shock. It was a huge grouper, over half a meter long.

Judging by the patterns on its body, it was a Tiger Stripes—a relatively expensive variety.

’How dare it?’

’Does it think it’s a real tiger just because of its name?’

After seeing the grouper, Gu Nan guessed this must have been the dark shadow he’d seen earlier. He just hadn’t expected this Tiger Stripes to be so brazen.

The Tiger Stripes, having missed its attack, showed no fear of him at all. It actually turned around and came back for the lobster in his hand.

’Damn,’ Gu Nan thought. ’It’s willing to risk its life for a snack!’

Gu Nan dodged sideways again. A grouper over half a meter long was indeed slow. If it had been a different kind of fish, he might not have dodged that first attack.

Just as he was about to grab his speargun, Yi Chen, who seemed to have noticed the commotion, hurried over.

She gestured wildly in front of Gu Nan, not caring whether he understood her or not.

It wasn’t until she pointed to the speargun in her hand and then to the Tiger Stripes that Gu Nan finally understood. He gave her an "OK" sign.

His own speargun wasn’t loaded, so letting Yi Chen handle the fish was perfect.

He quickly moved aside. The Tiger Stripes was in hot pursuit, not even caring that Yi Chen was practically pressing her speargun to its head.

Never mind its suicidal gluttony; it had probably never seen a human or a speargun in its life and had no concept of danger.

Yi Chen took aim and, without hesitation, pulled the trigger. BANG! At such close range, the spear shot straight through the fish’s brain.

The Tiger Stripes thrashed its tail with a powerful SWOOSH and darted toward a hole in the reef, moving with an unprecedented burst of speed.

Its head was probably ringing from the impact; it hadn’t even realized its brain was gone.

Yi Chen reacted instantly. The moment the spear fired, she let go of the gun, grabbed the line, and started swimming for the surface, trying to haul the fish up with her.

Gu Nan had already shoved the lobster into his mesh bag. He’d been holding his breath for a while, so continuing to hunt was out of the question, but he could certainly help her.

He grabbed the line as well, helping her pull up the Tiger Stripes, which had quickly gone limp.

It was strange—even though its brain had been pierced, its gills were still moving. It was hard to tell if the fish was actually dead.

It would lie still for a moment, then after a short while, it would start thrashing its tail again, though with less force than before.

One after the other, they broke the surface. They lay flat in the water, breathing through their snorkels as they continued to reel in the line.

It took a little while, but they finally dragged the huge grouper, over half a meter long, toward them. Yi Chen sat up, her head above the water. After catching her breath, she spotted Xu Zhina on the surface not far away and quickly lifted the fish to show it off.

"Nana, look! I caught a huge grouper!"

Hearing the shout, Xu Zhina looked over and was stunned. "Wow, that’s a huge grouper! Did you really catch that?"

Yi Chen could only struggle to lift half the Tiger Stripes’ body out of the water, but even that visible part was enormous.

Xu Zhina truly couldn’t believe she had caught it. She figured Gu Nan must have speared it and Yi Chen had just helped him.

"Of course it was me! Ah Nan just helped me pull it in. Pretty amazing, right? You can ask Ah Nan if you don’t believe me."

Holding the fish up was getting tiring, so after showing it off for a moment, Yi Chen switched to cradling it, which was much less work.

"Okay, you’re amazing!" Xu Zhina gave her a thumbs-up before diving back under the water.

From the look of it, she clearly wasn’t convinced.

Yi Chen pouted. She knew this wasn’t the best time to be showing off. She’d just have to get the fish back to the boat and wait until everyone returned to set the record straight.

"Give it to me," Gu Nan said. "I’ll take the fish back to the boat. You wait here on the surface. We can dive again after I get back."

The Tiger Stripes had to be at least thirty pounds. It wouldn’t be easy for a woman of his wife’s build to haul it onto the boat, so Gu Nan volunteered for the task.