The boat made small waves as it glided forward very silently. With the expanded solar panels on top of the cabin, the boat looked like a bird with its wings outstretched.
Emily stood at the bow, leaning against the rail, and complimented, “This is the most comfortable boat I’ve ever been on. Quiet, serene. It feels like the great, clean nature itself.”
Zheng Yang chuckled and thought to himself, “I’ve actually installed motors at the stern, but I guess she didn’t notice.”
He noted that she definitely hadn’t noticed that his boat didn’t have a life raft. Otherwise, she definitely wouldn’t have agreed to board the wooden sailboat.
Only he himself knew that if they were to run into something capable of sinking his spirit vessel, that was to say if they ran into something abnormally nasty, lifeboats wouldn’t be of much use.
As soon as they left port, Eva rummaged through her backpack for her fishing rod and bait, which looked very new, as if she had just purchased them the day before.
After finishing his breakfast, Zheng Yang showed her how to fish at sea with a rod and a line.
But then again, he wasn’t that much of an expert himself, and most of what he knew at the moment he’d learned from the online fishing forums. As such, Eva went on to correct him time and again.
And what was supposed to be a demonstration quickly became a discussion instead.
Emily obviously knew about angling out at sea, and he speculated that she’d spent quite some time going out to sea with cute-looking boys when she was younger. She watched the two of them fishing on the desk with a smile on her face as she went about expertly setting up her rod and line, ready to start fishing at any moment.
“Why are you two using big hooks while I’m using a small one?”
Eva pinched her small hook, which was less three centimeters in length, feeling puzzled.
The one Zheng Yang was using was over a dozen centimeters long, while the one Emily was using was about seven to eight centimeters in length, causing Eva to wonder why hers was so small.
Zheng Yang explained, “A big fish can put force equal to twice its own weight on the hook. You’re not strong enough. If you used a big hook, I’m afraid you would end up getting dragged away by the fish, as opposed to catching it.
“Don’t underestimate your hook, though. It can easily catch large fish weighing over 10, or even 50, kilograms.”
Eva was wowed by his explanation and immediately stopped insisting on using a big hook. The fun was in the process instead of the size of the fish, after all.
Sailing with a breeze at number two Beaufort Scale meant that the boat was traveling at a speed less than five knots. It would take them at least four hours to reach their designated region if they continued traveling at such a speed.
The three outboard motors whirled away, and the boat reached a speed of around nine knots. The sail became useless, so he just put it away instead.
“You actually installed motors on the boat. No wonder you need such huge sets of solar panels.”
So, Emily hadn’t noticed after all.
“We’ll try to get there before 10 in the morning, and we’ll head back after fishing for two hours,” Zheng Yang said.
Traveling at a steady speed allowed them to get to the coordinates he’d visited the other day, and which he thought to be his lucky area, before 10 in the morning.
Both Emily and Eva were fishing at the stern since there were chairs over there and an awning. Zheng Yang took out two codfish and a squid weighing about five kilograms from the fish hold. Then, he secretly willed his right hand into bone claws and used them to cut the fish into pieces, which he threw into the sea. It was only then that he grabbed some live bait, net, and his own rod and walked over to the stern.
During the renovation, he had even installed some clips for attaching the fishing rods onto the rails like the permanently fixed rods found on angling boats. In truth, however, such fixtures were seldom used, especially in the case of those who really enjoyed angling, as they would only feel like they were in control when they had their rods in their own hands.
That was what was happening right now. Both Emily and Eva held their own rods in their hands and stood at the stern, not even sitting on the chairs.
Zheng Yang found the sight of mother and daughter fishing side by side to be rather surreal. As such, he put his things down and snapped some photos from different angles.
Eva moved closer to her mother, making space for Zheng Yang, and asked, “Zheng Yang, do you think I’ll be able to catch something big like you did?”
Despite the fact that all three of them were standing side by side, their rods were lowered in completely different directions. Eva’s line was lowered at the rear proper, while both Emily and Zheng Yang’s lines were lowered at the side.
Zheng Yang placed the bait on the hook and lowered the line as he replied, “Theoretically speaking, you could, but your hook is small, and it’s easy for something big to escape.”
Furthermore, her rod was soft, and her line was on the smaller end, meaning that her gear wasn’t meant for catching something big.
Yet, what happened next proved him wrong.
Both his and Emily’s rods remained still after about 15 minutes, yet there was a hard pull on Eva’s line, and her rod bent into an N-shape before it was yanked from her hands.
Zheng Yang reacted quickly and extended his left hand, catching both her hand and her rod, easing the resistance on the rod and letting the fish pull at the line for a bit.
“Man, this thing weighs at least 40 kilograms.”
“Reel in our lines or they’ll tangle.” Emily quickly reeled her line in. Zheng Yang clipped his rod under his arm and started to reel his line single-handedly as well, fearing that Eva’s fish was moving around a little too much and would get everyone’s lines tangled.
After Zheng Yang helped Eva steady her rod, she started to wrestle with the fish under Emily’s instructions. Her moves were crude, and tension was written all over her face.
“Let the line go and ease your pull. Only then can your soft rod and thin line fight against the fish.”
Judging by what she said, Zheng Yang was able to tell that Emily was indeed an experienced angler. Compared to her, he was just a novice.
Under Emily’s instructions, Eva slowly reeled in her line as the fish turned underwater before extending her line again. She wrestled with the fish for over half an hour, yelling the entire time. She was showing signs of exhaustion, and beads of sweat rolled down her reddened face.
Seeing this, Zheng Yang took over for her.
It was easy sitting around barking orders, but when he stepped in to do it himself, he realized that he couldn’t really handle the soft rod, and he felt that it was hardly doing anything useful. If it hadn’t been for Emily’s instructions, he would have had a hard time as well.
“Allow me.”
Eventually, it was Emily herself who took over the soft rod.
It was only when he saw Emily manning the rod that he realized what it meant to look graceful and full of finesse. Her dress swayed in the wind, making her look like a goddess gracing the seas, while her effortless maneuvering as she wrestled with the fish made it seem as if she were indeed toying with the fish, making it go wherever she fancied.
“This is gorgeous.”
Zheng Yang was completely swept off his feet.
Suddenly, he realized that Emily was definitely stronger than ordinary people, and she was definitely more than the potion maker she claimed to be.
“She was hiding something too, eh?” he thought.
“Are you done? Are you done?” Off to the side, Eva kept yapping away. She was very, very excited.
It took Emily less than 10 minutes to reel the big fish into the range of the spirit vessel’s perception.
Zheng Yang was stunned, realizing that it was yet another yellowfin tuna.
Emily smiled when the fish was completely pulled out of the water and she saw what it was. “It’s a bigeye tuna, a third more expensive than yellowfins of the same weight.”
“You really are something, Eva,” Zheng Yang said. “I didn’t expect to see you catch a big, expensive tuna your first time fishing. Come, take the rod and I’ll take a picture of you. You too, Emily.”
Zheng Yang showered the two of them with compliments as he took pictures of the mother and daughter pair. Then, he threw the net, bagged the tuna, and tied it to the stern.