Ah Cai praised with a smile on his face, "It's amazing that you can catch such a big one! I'll call more and see which restaurant offers the highest value."
Ye Yaodong raised his eyebrows, "Why not just call Hongsheng and ask?"
The Hongsheng Hotel is the largest in town and it does the most business. After several transactions, he has a good impression of the prince. He is very generous!
"No, I can't. After the big sturgeon was bought by Prince Hongsheng last time, other restaurants I know said that I was not loyal and didn't inform them. They asked me to inform them next time I have something good. It's their business whether to buy it or not. If I don't inform them, it's my problem."
"Then you go ahead and bid. It would be good if more people bid. There are still good things on the boat. We can go and carry them."
Ah Cai's hand that was flipping through the phone book suddenly stopped and he looked at them in surprise, "Anything else? Anything else? What's better than this giant grouper?"
Ah Guang said proudly, "It's no worse than this one. Wait, we'll go and lift it right away."
"What is it?"
"You'll know when you see it later."
After the two finished talking, they walked back to the shore. A group of curious people followed them and asked, "What else? Did you have a good harvest this time?"
"Is it still a grouper? Or something big?"
After the two men perfunctorily said no, they got on the boat one after another, intending to carry the basket of three-knife fish down first. However, as soon as they got on the boat, they saw one fish fell on the deck, and it was more than one meter away from the basket.
Ye Yaodong bent down to pick it up, frowned and said, "Someone got on our boat?"
Otherwise how do we explain the knifefish falling on the deck and being so far away from the basket? Even if it was alive, it couldn't jump so far.
"A thief?"
Ye Yaodong thought about it. When he came here just now, he seemed to see someone wearing only a short-sleeved shirt, with his jacket rolled up in a ball and walking hurriedly ashore towards the path.
To avoid wrongly accusing anyone, he walked over to the basket of three-knife fish and took a look. The basket, which was originally full, was obviously less.
"It seems to be missing?"
"It must have been stolen. You stay here and watch. I think I saw someone just now. I'll go down and take a look."
"who is it?"
"I only saw the back of his head, so I didn't see it clearly. You stay here and watch, don't let anyone take him away again."
He got off the boat while talking. People on the shore were waiting to see what other good things there were, but they saw him getting off the boat alone with a sour face.
"What's wrong?"
"What's going on? Did you have a fight?"
"Our fish has been stolen. Please help me find it. It seems like someone just walked towards that path over there." After saying that, he ran quickly. We had to catch up quickly to prevent him from escaping.
The path is a long dirt road that is slightly curved, but you can still see from beginning to end.
The man was probably afraid of arousing suspicion, so he did not run, but walked quickly. Ye Yaodong did not waste much time before running out and saw him at a glance.
Feeling the running noise behind him, the man panicked and started running as well. Ye Yaodong then said, "There's a thief, don't run~"
The more he shouted, the faster the thief ran.
"Fuck~"
Human potential is endless. His legs were sore after walking for an hour, but at this moment he was able to burst out and quickly shorten the distance to catch up.
But even though he was about to catch up with him, the thief quickly bent down, turned around, and pushed him to the side, causing him to stagger and support himself on the ground with his hands.
As a result, the thief slipped on the stones under his feet when he was running fast, and fell flat on his face. The clothes in his hands were thrown out, and three knife fish fell all over the ground. At the same time, a scream was heard.
It would be very serious to fall on this kind of gravel road. For a big person, the center of gravity would fall directly down, and blood would immediately appear on the palms and knees.
Seeing this, Ye Yaodong rushed forward and stepped on his back twice, "Fuck you, you can run so fast and dare to push me. I almost let you run away!"
The person under his feet groaned twice and tried to get up but couldn't.
At this time, A Guang also ran over, followed by two curious people, "Did you catch him?"
"Didn't I tell you to watch over him on the boat? What if he gets taken away again?"
"I took the basket of three-knife fish off the boat and brought it to Ah Cai. It doesn't matter if you put the other fish on the boat. There are people watching over them at the dock for us."
"That's good. Go pick up the fish on the ground first."
"Let me see who is so bold as to steal our fish!" A Guang grabbed his short hair and lifted his head up. "Shit, it's A Wei's brother-in-law."
The two people who followed him also pointed at Awei's brother-in-law and said, "Oh~ Why is it him..."
Ye Yaodong looked at it carefully and it seemed to be true.
"Don't let him go yet. Take him to the dock and we'll weigh the goods. We can also ask someone to notify his family to come pick them up."
Ye Yaodong grabbed his collar and said, "Okay, or after we weigh him, we can send him home and talk to him while we're at it."
The three-knife fish is not cheap. Although the theft attempt failed, since he is Ah Wei's brother-in-law, it is not easy to beat him up directly, but an apology is necessary, right? He looks not young anymore, but he still does such a sneaky thing.
After A Guang picked up the fish and wrapped it in his clothes, Ye Yaodong grabbed his collar and was about to walk towards the dock, but he was pushed again, and then A Wei's brother-in-law took the opportunity to turn around and run away.
"Fuck~ this bastard."
Ah Guang stopped him, "Don't chase him. Everyone has seen it. We didn't wrongly accuse him. The clothes are still in our hands and will be delivered to your door later."
"What a bummer. Such a happy thing turned into this. It's disgusting. I'll go to his house later."
The two men walked towards the dock again, cursing.
Two other people who were curious about the situation also said, "It's outrageous that they stole the fish even though they had put it on the boat. This three-finger fish is quite valuable."
"Yes, these are not just some fruits from an ordinary tree that you can steal for fun. These are rare fish. I have to go to my family and talk to them about it..."
As Ye Yaodong and Ah Guang walked back to the dock, everyone asked, "Did you catch the man? How much did you steal?"
"They ran away. We have recovered more than a dozen fish. Thank you for helping to watch the boat. We will first move the other goods off the boat."
After all the goods were unloaded from the boat, they cleaned the dozen or so knife fish at Acai's place and threw them into the basket to weigh them together.
Ah Cai was also there cursing, "Who is so desperate? The cargo was stolen before it could be unloaded in time."
"Let's weigh it first, we are in a hurry."
"Wait, you haven't told me how much money it is yet?"
"Don't worry, you won't lose out. I just made three or four calls and told you that I have giant groupers and razorfish. People will come over to see them soon. The highest bidder will win, and I'll make a commission from you."
“That’s more like it!”
"After deducting the weight of the basket, the three-knife fish is 22.8 pounds. You are really amazing. All the good stuff went into your net. The three-knife fish costs at least 8 yuan per pound."
The cloudy expressions on their faces suddenly turned sunny again. "Weigh the others as well."
Ye Yaodong put the goods from his trap separately. Since they belonged to him alone, they had to be weighed and invoiced separately.
After everything was weighed, Ye Yaodong put the two lists in his pocket and waited at the dock for someone from the town's restaurant to arrive.
There are many restaurants and hotels in their port town, but there are only two or three large ones.
Not long after we finished settling the bill, the boss from the town came over to see the fish.
The first person who came mentioned a price and wanted to take it away immediately, but they stopped him and said that there were other people who wanted to see the goods and the highest bidder would get it. So he waited with regret.
After people arrived one after another, without waiting for Ah Cai to say anything, the three bosses started quarreling among themselves, each of them stiffening their necks and shouting.
Giant groupers of this size are indeed rare, and it may take several years to catch one. Occasionally, the ones caught by fishing boats are not this big. They are all knowledgeable people, and there is no need for them to brag about themselves. The three bosses are competing among themselves.
Occasionally, there will be some knifefish when an ocean-going ship docks, but they are gone for months and rarely dock, and fishing docks are not common either.
The three of them argued their case, while the others just watched and waited for the result.
Ye Yaodong felt that this was a good idea. He didn't have to waste his breath on them, as they raised the price themselves. For a restaurant, only good products could attract gourmets, and there were many wealthy bosses coming and going from port towns.
In the end, Wang Maoquan from Hongfa bought the 190-pound giant grouper for 550 yuan, and the razorfish was divided equally among them at the price of 8.5 yuan per pound, otherwise no one would return empty-handed.
After discussing the price, everyone was shocked. Ye Yaodong and A Guang made more than 700 yuan from just these two kinds of fish, not counting other goods. If they counted other goods, they would have made more than 800 yuan on this trip.
Everyone looked at them with envy.
Ye Yaodong quickly exaggerated the power of the wind and waves at sea, so that people would not think that he made money easily. They were taking a big risk!
"When we just finished dragging the net, the waves rushed up one after another, more than ten meters high, and the waves splashed onto the deck. We almost didn't have time to run..."
"That's right. The boat was swaying so much that we could only squat there and couldn't even stand. It almost capsized. Fortunately, we saw the opportunity quickly and didn't pull it up on the last night. We ran quickly and reached the inland sea. There were no waves, so we pulled it up. Unexpectedly, there was a huge grouper in it..."
Ah Cai smiled and praised, "As expected, young people are the ones who dare to fight and take risks. How can those older people in the village dare to go out to sea when a typhoon is about to come? Don't you think your life is too long?"
"We were just lucky for the time being."
Wang Maoquan smiled and said, "Only those who love to fight can win. It is right for young people to be brave and daring. Next time you have good goods, call me and tell me. Our boss is very generous."
"You can also tell me that as long as the product is good, the price is negotiable."
"Yes, yes, let me know if there's anything good."
The other two followed suit.
"Okay, okay, thank you very much. You've made such a fuss." Ye Yaodong said politely with a smile.