This was a true paradise for diving and foraging, but unfortunately, Chu Mingcheng had to leave by four o'clock.

Just as four o'clock approached, he caught another harlequin mantis shrimp over twenty centimeters long.

Now he had three—one for each of them.

Not only that, but his flower urchin count had reached seven, he'd caught two more slipper lobsters, and two green spiny lobsters hiding under the coral.

Tonight's seafood feast would be absolutely spectacular. The only thing missing was a substantial fish.

Chu Mingcheng hadn't been paying much attention to fish earlier, and his search area had been limited.

Now that he had enough other seafood, he took out his fish spear and began expanding his search.

After a short while, he found a one-jin-plus leopard coral grouper. Chu Mingcheng hesitated for a moment, then left it alone.

Too small. A fish this size wasn't even enough for him alone. Tonight, he needed at least a five-jin specimen.

He searched again, finding three more flower urchins and five large scallops, but no larger fish.

It seemed the water here was too shallow—big fish didn't prefer these depths.

Chu Mingcheng first returned to the boat, transferred his catch to the fish box, and then went back into the water with his speargun.

This time, he didn't venture elsewhere, just hunted beneath the boat.

After he'd startled the fish earlier, they'd all fled their hiding places. A fish spear wasn't ideal for that situation, but a speargun worked perfectly.

Now, nearly an hour had passed, and the large fish should have returned.

As soon as Chu Mingcheng entered the water this time, he spotted a substantial fish swimming leisurely.

It looked like a bream species, but the water was too murky—he could only make out a blurry silhouette.

For spearfishing, seeing the shadow was sufficient.

Locking onto the target, he pulled the trigger. With a sharp crack, the spear shot out, leaving a beautiful trajectory.

The fish was successfully struck, and the impact point appeared to be around the gills.

As the fish struggled, the seawater quickly turned dark with blood.

With this bleeding rate, had he hit the fish's artery?

The fish thrashed violently at first, indicating substantial size.

But the blood flowed too rapidly. After Chu Mingcheng had pulled for a short while, the fish had lost most of its fight.

Seeing this, he swam to the surface. After hauling the fish up, he realized it was a blue-spotted snapper—and not a small one, probably seven or eight jin.

Giving this to Chen Yang and Zhang Wei felt somewhat wasteful!

Blue-spotted snappers were extremely rare, costing over two hundred yuan per jin—twice the price of spotted sweetlips.

But friendship trumped money. He'd already caught several thousand yuan worth of seafood to treat them today. What was one more fish?

Alright, the main reason was his own greed.

When he got tired of eating it in the future, he'd feel comfortable selling it all.

Chu Mingcheng removed the three smaller coconut snails from the fish box. These three, along with the fish he'd caught today, would be sold. The rest he placed in a fish box with oxygen to take home later.

When he arrived at the pier, it was already five-thirty in the afternoon.

Seeing that Zhang Wei hadn't called, he gave him a ring.

"Ah Wei, where are you guys?"

Zhang Wei answered quickly: "Ah Yang and I are already in Xiamen. We'll be at your place in another half hour."

"Alright, I'll wait for you at home then. There's a surprise tonight."

Half an hour was perfect timing. Chu Mingcheng could still sell some fish.

Hearing about a surprise, Zhang Wei was immediately intrigued: "What surprise?"

"You'll know when you get here." A surprise was a surprise because it was unknown. If you knew, what kind of surprise would that be?

After hanging up, Chu Mingcheng first removed the fish and placed them in another empty fish box, turning on the oxygen pump.

As for tonight's dinner, he moved that into the cockpit and locked the door to retrieve it later. The car couldn't accommodate everything.

Perhaps he should get a van. The space would be ample, and three fish boxes in the back would be no problem.

In that case, the sedan Zhang Wei was driving over would be somewhat redundant.

But Chu Yongxin also had a car at home. His vehicle was just gathering dust, so he'd had Zhang Wei drive it over.

Currently, most of the time after returning, he sent fish by express delivery. Only the seafood restaurant required personal delivery. For now, he'd see how things developed.

Arriving at the seafood restaurant, he began calculating the sale.

One spotted sweetlips, seven jin and six liang, at one hundred twenty per jin, for 912 yuan.

Silver seabream was cheap—only fifty per jin, selling for 115 yuan.

Yellowfin seabream 210 yuan, red seabream 532 yuan, black seabream 642 yuan.

All the fish combined totaled only two thousand four hundred yuan.

There were also three coconut snails, each six or seven jin, totaling twenty jin and seven liang. At forty per jin, they sold for 828 yuan.

Today's fuel consumption wasn't large—only two and a half hours, which was over one thousand six hundred yuan. He still made a small profit.

Then Chu Mingcheng returned to the pier, moved the fish box from the cockpit, and drove home.

He didn't enter the complex, but waited for Zhang Wei and the others outside.

After about ten minutes, two cars approached. One was very familiar—his own vehicle.

Chu Mingcheng got out and waved at them.

The two cars stopped roadside. Doors opened, and Zhang Wei and Chen Yang emerged and walked over.

"Well, well, you've gotten a shade darker in a month!"

"You look good though—must be living well?"

"How can you not get dark going out to sea every day? Of course, I'm living well—much freer than working. Not so many annoying things."

With his brothers here, Chu Mingcheng smiled the entire time.

As for his skin tone, it was unavoidable to go out to sea daily. Fortunately, he'd been fair enough originally, so he wasn't much darker than others now.

Then he went to his car and saw Mimi and her family.

Mimi spotted him and seemed puzzled. She approached and sniffed him for a long time before confirming it was her owner, then became affectionate.

The three kittens weren't walking well yet—they were all crawling, curled up in the cat bed, sleeping.

Chu Mingcheng petted Mimi, then closed the car door.

"Let's go to my place first. I'll talk to the security guard and get you guys registered."

The complex didn't allow outside vehicles, but Chu Mingcheng was now considered an owner. When friends visited, as long as they registered, they'd still be admitted—quite reasonable.

He also registered his car while there. He wouldn't need to drive Jiang Luoluo's car anymore when going out to sea. He'd have to get it washed in the next few days to eliminate the smell.

After parking in the underground garage, Chu Mingcheng opened the trunk and moved out the fish box.

He'd drained the seawater at the pier, so it only weighed a few dozen jin—not difficult to handle.

"What's this?" Zhang Wei got out and came over. Seeing it was a fish box, his eyes immediately lit up. "You caught this today? What's inside? Let me see!"

Chen Yang approached without speaking but helped carry it.

"You'll see what it is when we get home. Let's go up first!"

After Chu Mingcheng finished speaking, he had Zhang Wei carry the fish box into the elevator. He and Chen Yang went to moved the cat bed, cat food, and other items, then took the elevator to his floor.

Walking into the house, he had Zhang Wei place the fish box in the kitchen and arranged things for Mimi and her family first.

There wasn't much to arrange. He simply set down the cat bed, took out a basin he'd prepared earlier, filled it with cat litter, and placed it by the toilet. After organizing everything, he went to the kitchen.

The other two were exploring his new home.

After looking around, Zhang Wei came to the kitchen: "Ah Cheng, your place is nice, but there's only one bedroom. It'll be a bit crowded for us to sleep tonight!"

Chen Yang followed and said matter-of-factly, "Do you even need to think about it? I'll make you a bed on the floor, or you can sleep on the sofa!"

Zhang Wei was displeased: "Damn, why me?"

"Because you suddenly curse in your sleep at night!" Chen Yang said with a sidelong glance. He was a victim.

Chu Mingcheng nodded, also having experienced it deeply: "How many days and nights have you been skunked? Maybe your resentment runs too deep, so you dream of being skunked—it's not surprising you suddenly curse at midnight."

"Never mind Chen Yang—you've startled me at least once."

After he finished speaking, he and Chen Yang exchanged glances and finalized Zhang Wei's sleeping arrangement—the sofa.

He wasn't even allowed on the bedroom floor.

Unable to protest, Zhang Wei turned his attention to the fish box. After opening it, he froze.

Chen Yang curiously stepped forward. Seeing the box's contents, he immediately sucked in a sharp breath.

"You're being ridiculous. You caught this yourself—didn't specially buy it?"

Chu Mingcheng was surprised: "Do you two have enough face that I'd need to specially buy seafood to fake it?"

"Damn!" Chen Yang and the now-alert Zhang Wei simultaneously gave him the middle finger.

Then they immediately lifted out the coconut snail. It wasn't that they weren't interested in the other seafood, but this coconut snail was too massive and shocking.

"I heard this thing can have Melo pearls!"

"Hurry, hurry, let's open it and see!"

They placed the coconut snail in the kitchen. The cutting board was completely blocked—a single coconut snail was larger than the cutting board.

"What do we do?" Chen Yang gestured helplessly, somewhat at a loss.

Chu Mingcheng rolled up his sleeves: "I'll reach in and feel around first, see if there are any pearls."

As he spoke, he reached in from the shell's edge, but felt no hard objects.

He was somewhat disappointed, but still held hope.

"It's not easy to feel like this. I'd better cut off this outer layer of meat!"

The other two agreed: "Right, it would be a shame to break such a large shell."

Then Chu Mingcheng took a knife and cut off the exposed meat layer from the coconut snail.

It felt quite tough, like cutting rubber.

The large piece of meat he removed weighed more than ten jin.

He discarded the intestines, then cut it into four pieces. Unfortunately, there were no Melo pearls.

He did notice some parasites, even inside the snail meat.

This couldn't be eaten raw—it had to be cooked.

Then he reached into the shell and dug around, pulling out several jin of messy internal organs. Finally, after ten minutes, he extracted the coconut snail's tail section.

Coconut snails are only easy to remove when alive. The more cooked they are, the harder they become to extract—especially one this large.

He took a knife and continued cutting it open. Zhang Wei, with his sharp eyes, immediately pointed inside and shouted, "There it is, there it is—I see orange!"

"Really?" Chu Mingcheng searched doubtfully and indeed pulled out a Melo pearl the size of a small green bean.

"..." All three were speechless.

This item was naturally more valuable the larger it was. One of these small things had no economic value.

Chu Mingcheng was deflated. If he'd had X-ray vision and known there was only this tiny thing inside, he would have sold this coconut snail and kept a six or seven-jin one to eat. Wouldn't that have been better?

"Actually, it's not bad. At least it could go on a ring... pfft..." Zhang Wei had wanted to console him, but couldn't help laughing as he spoke.

A green bean-sized pearl could indeed be made into jewelry, but it would look ridiculous on a ring!

This was truly a case of being reluctant to discard it, yet annoying to look at.

In the end, Chu Mingcheng still took it upstairs and saved it. Maybe in the future, if he collected more small green beans, he could make a bracelet.

With all the coconut snail's internal organs removed, there were still more than ten jin of meat remaining.

The three of them couldn't finish it all at once, especially with so much other seafood.

Chu Mingcheng cut off about a jin-sized piece and wrapped the rest to store in the freezer.

He filled a pot with water, put the snail meat in to blanch, and added a few slices of ginger.

Then he brought out the other seafood. The slipper lobsters, green spiny lobsters, mantis shrimp, and sea urchins were all handed over to the other two to handle.

Chu Mingcheng handled the blue-spotted snapper himself, filleting the fish.

Today's seafood was incredibly exciting. Zhang Wei and Chen Yang were full of energy, never expecting such a feast as soon as they arrived.