Catch the sea: start with a sand shovel and take over the entire beach

After dinner, everyone stopped playing cards and got down to business.

Dozens of nets, wrapped in large plastic bags, need to be unpacked one by one, arranged neatly, and inspected.

"Ah Qin, how many pieces should we cut?"

Each net is about 150 meters long, and of course, you can't move it to a different location every time you set one up; that would be too much trouble.

When casting nets at sea, several nets are usually linked together to form a long, continuous net. Zhao Ping's question implies that...

These many networks need to be connected into several long networks.

"Brother, just divide it into two pieces." He then said to Ahe, "Take as many medium-sized buoys as you have on the ship."

The sizes of buoys (large, medium, and small) vary from ship to ship; the most common names are used instead.

All the boats in our house have buoys in three different sizes; the large buoys are each bigger than a basketball.

If you're catching surface-dwelling fish, you'll need these floats to pull the net to the upper water level.

However, the boats at home rarely used gillnets downstream; when they did, they mostly used them on the middle and lower decks.

Zhao Qin is now having Ahe use a medium-sized buoy, precisely to keep the net suspended in the middle layer of water.

If it's a small float, it will naturally be placed under the bottom net.

Some people might wonder why a bottom net needs a float. Without a float, the net won't open and will sink directly to the bottom. Except for crab nets, no one does it this way.

Most of the people here can be considered veteran fishermen, so they are very skilled at this. As they prepare a section of net, someone nearby will tie a buoy to it.

Once one net is finished, someone nearby will open another bag, find the other end of a net, and tie the two nets together.

The reason everyone still had time to play in the morning was because this task was nothing to them; it only took about two hours.

The three groups of people finished tidying up the nets and placed them on both sides of the aft deck.

Ahe fetched water from a bucket, thoroughly soaking both sides of the netting. He then tied the bucket to the railing and said to Zhao Ping and the others, "Let's continue?"

"Walk."

The card game resumed shortly afterward.

Zhao Qin had originally intended to go fishing, but considering the current speed of the ship, he decided against it.

This time, the sea otters didn't follow, so there were no more hooked fish. If you were lucky enough to catch one or two, they would likely be barracuda or mullet.

That thing, not to mention him, even the boatmen at home don't get any food.

He, Qian Bijun, and Chen Xun sat on the railing, casually chatting and boasting.

It's true that being too honest is a bad thing for a man. Qian Bijun is getting married soon; he said the marriage application has been submitted and approved by his superiors.

Chen Xun's wife is still undetermined, not even in her mother's womb.

"Xunzi, Yuanyuan has a cousin who's three years older than her. How about I have Yuanyuan introduce you two?" Qian Bijun suggested.

Zhao Qin frowned. "Peng Yuan is 23 this year, right? Her cousin is 26 and still hasn't found a husband?"

People here tend to get married quite young. Even that coward Ah He, who was still a few months shy of the legal marriage age, got married early.

It's really unusual for a 26-year-old girl to still be single. He's worried that Qian Bijun is unreliable and might introduce her to someone with problems or who's too wild outside.

Qian Bijun looked embarrassed. "They want to marry into the family."

Then they talked about Peng Yuan's cousin's family situation. There were only two sisters, and it was agreed that the eldest sister would marry into the family, so the younger sister was already married and had children.

The eldest is still single.

The family's situation is quite good, so it shouldn't be too difficult for them to find a son-in-law, but the eldest son is conflicted.

On the one hand, she wants men to marry into her family; on the other hand, she looks down on men who readily agree to such arrangements, considering them cowards.

That's why it's been delayed until now.

To be honest, Xun Ge is actually quite suitable. He has a brother, and the older brother already has a son.

Zhao Qin's mind raced, and he asked, "What does she look like? What about her personality?"

"I've never met her, but Yuanyuan said she's very beautiful. Her family used to run a passenger transport business. Yuanyuan also said her uncle is very intelligent."

Several years ago, at the height of the passenger transport boom, he sold several of his vehicles and routes.

I now own a shop in the city that sells tiles.

Yuanyuan's uncle has rarely been involved in the business in the past year or two; her cousin has been managing the shop almost entirely, and she's quite capable.

Zhao Qin really didn't want Chen Xun to leave him. If they could get married locally, with his wife's family living nearby, there would be far fewer problems.

Thinking of this, he nudged Chen Xun and said, "Brother Xun, we can't really help you make a decision about this. If you feel it's embarrassing,..."

Let's just pretend Brother Jun didn't say anything, and don't take it to heart.

Chen Xun grinned, "I know you're doing this for my own good. Whether I marry into your family or not, I don't really care. The child's surname is mine anyway."

Besides, I'm getting decent treatment working for you now, and I don't need any financial support from the woman.

Zhao Qin clapped his hands. "Brother Xun, that's exactly right. I think we should first see who the person is. If they're compatible, nothing else matters."

If you apply for a transfer to civilian work in a year or two, and you're no longer in the military, having another child won't be a problem; it'll just be a fine.

One takes your surname, the other takes your wife's surname.

Furthermore, if things really do get together, I'll arrange housing for you in the town. If you don't want to live with her parents, the two of you can live separately.

Don't worry, if she likes you, she'll definitely agree to all of this.

Seeing that Chen Xun did not object, Zhao Qin then said to Qian Bijun, "It's not appropriate for you to handle this matter. Go back and talk to Grandma, and let her discuss it with Yuanyuan's mother first."

With my brother Xun's qualifications, he should be thrilled to be their son-in-law.

Qian Bijun nodded repeatedly.

If Chen Xun succeeds this time, then there will be one less single man around him.

Next up are the remaining four senior brothers. Once they're all married, I'll be able to relax.

Suddenly, I realized something was wrong. I'm the boss and junior apprentice, so why am I worrying about my father's affairs?

"Brother Xun, if it works out, let's get married together. We'll bring our parents over too, so they can see how things are going for us here."

"What if they think it's good and don't want to leave?" Qian Bijun had long wanted his parents to come, but they were reluctant to leave their hometown, so they hesitated.

Zhao Qin patted Qian Bijun on the shoulder and exclaimed, "This method... holy crap!"

He intended to praise Qian Bijun, but he forgot that all three of them were sitting on the railing. His slap sent Qian Bijun flying into the sea.

Seeing him emerge, Chen Xun said irritably, "At sea, your vigilance is exceptionally poor."

Zhao Qin was embarrassed, "This is my fault..."

"It's his own fault. As a guard, he needs to go back to school."

Qian Bijun was also frustrated. He climbed up from the side, and Ahe happened to look up and saw him. He exclaimed softly, "Brother Jun, why did you go into the water? What did you catch?"

Qian Bijun: ...

Zhao and Chen went back to their cabin to change clothes, and their conversation came to an end.

For dinner, they had fried rice noodles. You'd say Zhao Qin is a picky eater, but he never gets tired of fried rice noodles.

It would be even more perfect if you could add some dried scallops and shrimp to stir-fry together.

I did bring some dried scallops this time, but I didn't have any fresh shrimp.

After dinner, the group stopped playing cards. Zhao Ping took over, and the others began to rest.

Zhao Qin went to bed very early, waking up after midnight. He checked the location of the pipefish again in the system.

He then entered the steering wheel room and said, "Brother, I'm in a meeting. You can go to sleep."

"Ah Qin, you've run for more than an hour longer than we agreed before. Aren't you going to log off yet?"

"I don't think it's here. Let's drive for another two hours and try again."