Back to the Past to Become a Fishing King

Chapter 869 - 582: A Villain in Power

Just now Da Bing had clearly zoned out and didn’t notice the changes in the bobber’s movements. After hearing his boss Xu Cheng’s reminder, he reflexively leaned his body forward, grabbed the rod with both hands, and yanked it up hard to set the hook.

All you heard was a whooshing whistle. The rod held firm for not even half a second, and the刚刚 forming arc snapped straight in an instant.

Crack!

Hook-set, fish lost, hook cut off—the newbie’s "slingshot" fishing operation could be said to flow in one smooth, masterful motion.

"Fuck! That fish was fucking huge! The hook snapped!" Da Bing froze for half a second, scratched his head irritably, and muttered.

"Get down, get down, get down! It’s hard enough to finally get a bite, and look at the scene you make when you lift the rod. No line in the world can take the abuse of that move you just pulled! What do I usually tell you?"

Xu Cheng was very unhappy with his junior’s performance just now. He didn’t even bother to screw the cap back on his unfinished iced Coke, just tossed it to the ground, then quickly stood up to go reclaim his spot.

"Hehe, it’s just that there’s been no bite for over an hour, then suddenly I hear you shout, so I got excited! The 3.0 leader is a bit thin, want me to swap in a size-4 set for you?"

Da Bing laughed sheepishly a couple of times, didn’t talk back to his boss, obediently stood up, and handed the rod over to Xu Cheng, guiding it into his hands.

"A size-3 should be enough. Any thicker and it’ll start blocking bites! Move, move! Don’t get in the way of me landing fish!"

Xu Cheng took the rod, waved him aside, and impatiently sat back down on his own tackle box.

You could see Xu Cheng, still reasonably practiced, snip off the broken leader, then take out a new one and tie it on. After a short flurry of work, he eagerly pinched the bait into shape, baited up, and cast the rig back out.

The rig hit the water, the bobber quickly flipped upright and started to sink steadily. Xu Cheng barely dared to breathe, his eyes locked on the bobber marks, terrified of missing the next hook-set opportunity if a fish took the bait.

But thoughts are beautiful and reality is brutal. His eyes were staring so hard they went sore, yet the bobber turned into a sea-fixing needle again—once it entered the water it stayed motionless, and even after the bait on the hook had completely dissolved, there was still no response at all.

"Damn! That last yank where the fish got off must’ve blown up the swim! Now we’ve got no bites again!" While rebaiting, Xu Cheng relaxed a bit and shot his junior an unhappy look.

"Hehe, that one’s on me, that one’s on me! How about I make a few more casts? You sit and rest on the side, I’ll keep casting to draw the fish in, once there are bites I’ll swap you back in!"

Da Bing put on the full fawning-servant-to-master act, as deferential as could be. Off to the side, Zhang Yang accidentally caught a few bits of their conversation, and in this blazing heat he still felt a wave of goosebumps.

"No need, I’ll do it myself. I don’t believe it—our bait’s this strong, the fish can actually hold back from eating it?"

Xu Cheng waved off his junior’s suggestion and once again cast the line, repeating his previous actions.

Another ten-plus minutes of long waiting followed, still without any movement.

If it were an experienced angler, right after that lost fish they should’ve reacted immediately, but Xu Cheng’s level was limited and he didn’t realize anything was off about how he was handling it.

Reading this, some people might be totally confused—what’s off about it? Watching Xu Cheng swap leaders and keep fishing seems fine, no?

There is a problem, and not a small one.

If it were Zhang Yang, the first thing he’d do is ask his partner whether they’d been fishing the edge of the swim or the dead center.

Once that’s clear, you can get a rough sense of how deeply the fish have entered the swim. With that understanding, your follow-up responses can be handled with proper structure and method.

If you don’t clarify what spot you’re fishing and just blindly resume casting to "attract fish," it looks like you’re working hard, but in reality you’re just wasting your efforts.

Just now they’d chucked a whole basin of groundbait "bombs" in by hand. Now they were only topping up with scattered little bits of bait over those groundbait piles; the chances of getting bites like that aren’t very high.

Xu Cheng cast more than ten additional times and still didn’t see any meaningful bobber movements. Right then, the sidelined Da Bing suddenly felt a lightbulb go off and realized what was wrong.

"Boss, this isn’t right! You’re fishing the wrong spot!" Da Bing shamelessly sidled up, speaking softly to his master.

"Wrong? How’s it wrong? I’m clearly fishing the swim straight in front! You think I’m like you, not even having your basic casting skills down, one cast left, one cast right!" Xu Cheng retorted with full confidence.

Right as he said that, Xu Cheng suddenly froze, slapped his forehead, and realized.

"Shit! You were just fishing the edge of the swim!"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah! I botched the long cast, cast it off line! It went about a meter to the left! Try that spot!"

Da Bing nodded repeatedly, excitedly pointing to a patch of water slightly to the left.

"Fuck, I’ll give it a try!" Xu Cheng didn’t even wait for the current bait to fully dissolve. He hurriedly yanked the rod up, immediately rebaited, and deliberately cast toward the edge of the swim, then went back into intense bobber-watching mode.

And what do you know—after that blown swim and a ten-plus-minute lull, fish schools had slowly started working the outer area again. On this cast of Xu Cheng’s, he quickly saw the bobber start to move.

"A bite! There’s a bite!" Da Bing shouted excitedly.

"Quit yapping! Shut up!"

Xu Cheng snapped at him, right hand gripping the rod at the handle wrap, eyes locked firmly on the bobber’s movements.

You could see the big six-gram, lead-loaded bobber trembling slightly up and down—up a bit, down a bit—with each movement no more than one-third of a mark.

This kind of small bobber action doesn’t have a high hookup rate, especially when you’re targeting silver carp and bighead carp. So, despite his junior’s reminder, Xu Cheng didn’t immediately strike, instead continuing to wait patiently.