The three of them chatted as they sculled side by side, steering their little boats toward the dock.
The last rays of the setting sun spilled across the sea, casting a faint glow that gilded the smiles on their faces. The satisfaction in their eyes was almost overflowing.
By then, few fishing boats remained out on the water. Most had already come ashore.
By the time they landed, the sunset had set half the sky ablaze. Great swaths of fiery clouds formed in the west, some orange, some purple...
Ye Yaodong could not help saying, "The sunset's pretty beautiful today!"
"It really is!"
"Beautiful, my ass. It's not like we've never seen it before. Hurry up. Let's sell this stuff and go home for dinner."
As he spoke, Xiao Xiao picked up two buckets and headed for the dock first. Ye Yaodong followed with his own two buckets of Fish Catch.
A-Zheng hurried to grab the remaining Fish Catch. "Hey, wait for me..."
A-Cai was astonished when he saw their buckets of Fish Catch. "You got all this in just one afternoon? So many Red Snappers—did you run into a school? You were pretty lucky. We don't see many of these around here."
He peered into Ye Yaodong's buckets too. "Weren't you going out to set Fishing Pots? Where did all this Fish Catch come from? You even have a Large Croaker?"
A-Cai looked delighted, then a little regretful. "Shame it's not as big as the last one."
"This is plenty good enough. We caught them all on hooks. We happened to run into two whales. They took off when they saw the boats approaching, and the fish they'd been herding were all gathered in that one spot. Too bad we didn't bring a net. We could only use our