After Reincarnating as the Dragon King, I Made a Fortune with Seafood – CH14

Chapter 14: Mud Crabs

Lu Ao looked at Song Zhou.

Song Zhou openly let him look, his eyes carrying a smile.

Lu Ao looked for quite a while, feeling a little dazed, then slowly turned his head back.

To be honest, he had still been fully human just last month. He had no idea what original forms these non-humans had.

Perhaps Lu Ao’s expression was too confused and did not match his aura at all.

Song Zhou laughed for a while, then stopped teasing him and said, “It’s Song Zhou.”

“Mm?”

Song Zhou said, “My original form. Song Zhou.”

Lu Ao was confused for a while before suddenly reacting. “The Song Zhou from Zhongzhou, Minzhou, and Songzhou?”

In Chinese history, most dynasties had divided administrative regions by zhou. Now that New China had already been established for more than two hundred years, these old zhou administrative systems had completely withdrawn from the stage of history.

Song Zhou nodded, his eyes full of amusement. “A teachable child. But there is only one Song Zhou. There is no Zhongzhou, Minzhou, Lianzhou, or any other zhou.”

Lu Ao’s eyes widened slightly. So Song Zhou’s original form was an entire piece of land? And only this one piece of land had become a spirit?!

Song Zhou did not intend to say more. He looked at the sky. “It’s too late. I’ll go back first.”

Lu Ao came back to himself and stood up. “I’ll see you out.”

“No need. I’ll leave now.” Song Zhou stood, walked toward the courtyard gate, and stopped at the entrance. He curved his eyes at Lu Ao. “Goodbye.”

Lu Ao waved somewhat awkwardly. “Goodbye.”

Song Zhou’s figure faded, soon disappearing like smoke dissipating into the air.

Lu Ao stared at the place where Song Zhou had been standing, feeling strangely empty.

After a long while, he took the plates back inside, washed them clean, put them in the sterilizing cabinet to dry, and returned to his room to shower.

After returning to his room, he was still thinking about Song Zhou.

This should have been the time he went to sleep, but today, he could not fall asleep no matter what. He simply opened the website Song Zhou had previously sent him, logged into the forum, and searched Song Zhou’s name.

There was only one post related to Song Zhou on the forum. It merely mentioned in passing that the person in charge of the China branch of the Extraordinary Personnel Supervision Agency was Song Zhou.

Other than that, no other information could be found.

He backed out and searched the entire web.

The first result was Song Zhou’s encyclopedia entry.

Song Zhou, abbreviated as “Song,” an ancient Chinese region, with Lingmian Prefecture as its administrative center.

The rest was an introduction to Song Zhou, the ancient place name, and it was very complete.

Lu Ao still found it very hard to imagine that such a huge area had actually transformed into human form.

Lu Ao thought about Song Zhou all night and only fell asleep very late. The next day, he woke up early again to go fishing.

His fishing skills were average, and his catch was also average. He was absent-minded the whole morning, and in the end, he did not catch many fish. It was almost nine before he took them to the market to sell.

At the vegetable market, he happened to run into Lin Gongshang.

The moment Lin Gongshang saw the dark circles under his eyes, he was startled. The cigarette in his mouth almost fell out. “Holy shit, what did you do last night? You look like your kidneys are drained.”

Lu Ao glanced at him.

Lin Gongshang chuckled, bumped him, and lowered his voice. “Don’t tell me you watched too many little movies? Rub too hard and you’ll turn to ash.”

Lu Ao had absolutely no desire to discuss this kind of dirty nonsense with him and changed the subject. “Why are you here so early? How many fish did you catch this morning?”

Lin Gongshang looked dejected. “Not many. The tide was bad this morning, and the water was too muddy.”

As he spoke, he asked, “What about you? How many fish did you catch?”

Lu Ao looked at him expressionlessly, opened his mouth, and spat out a number. “Twenty-six jin.”

Lin Gongshang instantly became unbearably envious. His eyes swept back and forth over Lu Ao. “Twenty-six jin. You must have gotten at least four hundred yuan, right?”

“Three hundred sixty.”

“Three hundred sixty is still not little. We basically didn’t make any money this morning.” Lin Gongshang suppressed the sourness in his heart and comforted himself. “Forget it. I can’t compare myself to a guy like you. We’re planning to go dig for mud crabs later. Are you coming?”

Lu Ao had originally planned to buy geese. Hearing this, he paused and asked, “Where are you digging?”

“By the river.”

Chongxin Village was a large village, but only one river flowed through it. Whether it was Linwu Village or Luwu Village, the river they spoke of was the same one.

Lu Ao nodded. “All right. When do we leave?”

“They said ten.” Lin Gongshang took out his phone and glanced at it. “Soon. We’ll gather at Brother Zhang’s house later. Once everyone’s there, we’ll go dig.”

“I’ll come over after breakfast.”

“Okay. Then I’ll head back first too. Hurry up.”

Lu Ao agreed.

By the time Lu Ao settled his things and drove his tricycle to Lin Manzhang’s house with a bucket and other tools, everyone else had already arrived, including Lin Qiyan. They were all drinking tea.

Seeing Lu Ao, everyone greeted him one after another.

Lin Manzhang smiled and poured tea for him. “Have a cup of tea first. We’re setting off soon.”

Lu Ao did not stand on ceremony. He sat down, picked up the slightly hot tea, and took a sip. The faintly scalding bitterness slid down from the tip of his tongue, followed by a mellow fragrance spreading upward.

He comfortably narrowed his eyes slightly.

With the fan blowing noisily, he suddenly realized that it was already mid-June.

He had been back in his hometown for almost a month.

After everyone drank tea for a while, they each carried buckets and hoes, preparing to go out and catch mud crabs.

Mud crabs were mudflat-dwelling crabs. They generally lived on muddy beaches or sandy-muddy tidal flats in the intertidal zone, and their burrows were also built in the mud of the flats.

People used to catching mud crabs could tell at a glance from the mud holes on the tidal flat which holes had mud crabs and which did not.

They were going to catch mud crabs today to sell, so there was some degree of competition between them. It was not suitable for them to walk together.

Once they reached the river, everyone separated and went to different sections of the river, each catching their own.

Lu Ao had no experience, so he first followed Lin Manzhang to learn. Lin Qiyan also followed with his camera to film.

Lin Manzhang did not keep anything to himself. He crouched down and carefully instructed them. “To catch mud crabs, you have to look at the crab holes. Look, this is a mud crab hole. From here, you can even see the traces of the crab crawling.”

Lu Ao and Lin Qiyan lowered their heads to look. There was a large, dark hole in the mud on the embankment, and at the wide entrance of the hole, claw marks could faintly be seen.

“Once you’ve chosen the mud crab hole, you can start digging. Usually, you use the hoe like this.” Lin Manzhang swung the hoe to demonstrate. “Dig at an angle and be careful. Don’t use too much force. Mud crabs like living in places with stones, so there might be stones hidden near the hole. If you dig too hard, the hoe might bounce back and injure you.”

Lu Ao nodded, and Lin Qiyan specially filmed a close-up.

“The mud here is all very soft. Once you feel like you’ve dug far enough, you need to scoop the mud out and clean up the crab tunnel. Look, this is a very obvious crab tunnel. Once you’ve dug to this point, gently reach in and feel around to see if you can touch the mud crab. But you have to be very careful during this process.”

Lin Manzhang knelt on one knee and stretched his hand, wearing cotton gauze gloves, gently inside.

One of his hands pressed into the mud outside the hole for support, while the other reached in very far. His upper arm sank into the hole, his eyes narrowed slightly as he carefully felt around.

This was Lu Ao’s first time catching mud crabs. His heart tightened a little, and he was somewhat worried that Lin Manzhang would get pinched.

He could feel that there really was a mud crab inside, and it should not be small.

Large mud crabs were valuable, but also dangerous. With one careless move, it could pinch off a piece of flesh.

Lin Manzhang stretched his hand hard inside. After a long while, he said, “Touched it.”

As he spoke, he slowly pulled his hand out.

Lin Qiyan quickly aimed the camera at Lin Manzhang’s hand.

A few seconds later, Lin Manzhang raised his hand and flung it. A blackish mud crab covered in mud was thrown out and immediately brandished its claws as it crawled to the side.

It was quite fast.

Lu Ao and Lin Qiyan were both startled and stepped back together.

Lin Qiyan’s eyes widened. “This mud crab is huge!”

Lin Manzhang shook his hand, the smile on his face quite satisfied. “Probably more than one jin.”

This large mud crab was about the size of a small washbasin.

Surrounded by people, the big mud crab raised its large claws high and still wanted to run.

Lin Manzhang bent down, casually scooped up a big lump of mud, and threw it at the crab’s eyes.

The mud crab’s eyes were covered, and it instantly could not see. It moved left and right.

Lin Manzhang calmly circled behind the mud crab and pressed down on its back shell to grab it.

“Give me the rope.”

Lu Ao quickly handed over the rope hanging by the bucket. Lin Manzhang wrapped and tied it with the rope, binding the crab’s large claws in a few moves, then tied up its whole body, cut the rope, and placed the crab back into the bucket. At the same time, he grabbed a large handful of grass and branches and placed them in the bucket.

“When catching mud crabs, you must put some grass leaves and branches in the crab bucket to separate the crabs. Otherwise, the mud crabs will fight each other. Mud crabs with broken legs won’t fetch a good price.”

Lu Ao and Lin Qiyan nodded.

Lin Manzhang swung the hoe. “After digging out the mud crab, we usually fill the dug-out mud back in. We can’t damage the embankment. Just fill it back in simply like this, and that’s enough.”

The two accepted the lesson.

Lin Manzhang then led Lu Ao and Lin Qiyan to catch three more mud crabs.

Lu Ao had high comprehension, and he could feel the presence of the mud crabs. After catching a few along with them, he felt he could more or less do it himself, so he said, “Brother Zhang, I’ll go downstream and try.”

Lin Qiyan also raised his hand and hurriedly said, “I’ll try too. I’ll go farther downstream.”

Lin Manzhang straightened up. “All right. Be careful on your own. You must wear gloves and try not to get pinched by the mud crabs. If anything happens, call out in time. We’re all nearby.”

The two agreed and carried their hoes, tongs, buckets, and other tools downstream.

Very soon, the two separated. Lu Ao looked for mud crab holes along the riverbank, while Lin Qiyan carried his tools and headed farther down.

Lu Ao could feel the presence of mud crabs, so identifying mud crab holes became his second option instead.

He first sensed where there were mud crabs, then searched for nearby mud crab holes according to that feeling, and finally dug along the crab tunnel.

Digging this way was accurate almost every time.

Very soon, Lu Ao had dug up four or five mud crabs.

Following the method Lin Manzhang had taught him, he clumsily tied these mud crabs one by one, then stuffed them into the bucket filled with plenty of grass leaves and branches.

Digging for mud crabs was physical work.

Lu Ao did not feel tired, but the others soon became exhausted. Their movements when digging for mud crabs lost some of their strength, and after digging one crab hole, they had to rest for a while.

The weather was hot now. The fierce sunlight made everything around them glare white, and the summer heat rose from the ground. It was so hot that cicadas kept crying all around, adding another layer of irritation to this summer day.

At some point, Lin Gongshang had gone to the opposite bank. When he saw Lu Ao from afar, he was sitting under the shade of a tree, fanning himself with a straw hat and resting.

When he saw him, he jogged forward a few steps to the riverside, raised his hand, and shouted loudly to Lu Ao, “Lu Ao, how many mud crabs have you dug up? I caught five, all big ones. At least eight jin!”

Lu Ao looked at his mud crab bucket, which was already nearly full and had to be covered with a lid to prevent the crabs from escaping, then looked at Lin Gongshang across the river, whose face was glowing with delight.

He fell silent.