Chapter 45: Departure

Regarding the price, Zhao Mu did not have any particularly strong thoughts or objections. As long as it was reasonable, he wouldn't mind even if it were a bit lower. To him, making a living by fishing was merely a transitional phase, not his ultimate pursuit. Besides, autumn had already arrived; once winter set in and the river froze solid, he would have no way to fish even if he wanted to. In his previous life, he had seen the wildly popular winter fishing on Chagan Lake, but that method was time-consuming, labor-intensive, and easily attracted unwanted attention, which was not what Zhao Mu wanted.

His goal was simply to accumulate some initial capital on the premise of ensuring he wouldn't starve. With this capital, he could seek out new ways to make a fortune. For a time-traveler wanting to make money in a feudal dynasty, things were neither as difficult nor as simple as they seemed. On one hand, the absolute power of a feudal dynasty far surpassed that of his previous life; once someone stood out too much, they would easily become a target and end up as prey for others. On the other hand, it came down to the mastery of skills. For instance, making distilled liquor, soap, or refined white sugar relied on relatively simple principles that many people roughly understood. Yet, when it came to actual execution, success was far from guaranteed for everyone.

This was why, while staying temporarily at Wen Zhi's house, he preferred to go out every day to do grueling manual labor rather than attempt those seemingly easy money-making ventures. At the time, he was a guest under Wen Zhi's roof, and Wen Zhi's wife already held a poor attitude toward him; he worried that any failure would invite her to blame Wen Zhi. But now that he had moved out, as long as he had silver in his hands, he had nothing to fear from failure. Should he fail, he would only be losing his own money, and no one else would say a word.

That very night, Zhao Mu, Wang Wu, Wen Zhi, and the others hauled up the fishing nets they had cast, harvesting another fifty or sixty large fish. Combined with the thirty-or-so large fish from before, they now had nearly a hundred fish in total. Transporting all these fish into the city at once would yield at least three or four taels of silver. However, they only had a single handcart, and figuring out how to transport so many fish into the city together presented a new problem.

In particular, keeping this many fish alive during the transport into the city would require at least several hundred catties of water. Yet the fish alone weighed several hundred catties; adding the water would push the total weight to well over a thousand catties. Relying solely on such a dilapidated handcart without even rubber tires was like using a small horse to pull a heavy carriage—while not quite as difficult as ascending to the heavens, it was certainly no easy task. If perchance they were spotted by refugees, they wouldn't even have a chance to run.

Pondering for a moment, Zhao Mu decided to process the fish using the legendary "bow-fishing" technique. He called Wang Wu and Wen Zhi over and instructed them, "Brother Wang, Brother Wen, follow my lead in a moment and tie up all these fish like this."

Wang Wu and Wen Zhi were momentarily stunned, failing to understand why Zhao Mu wanted to do this.

"Brother Mu, what are you trying to do?" Wen Zhi scratched his head and asked in confusion.

Zhao Mu explained, "We're delivering the fish to Manager Qin early tomorrow morning, and the journey will take at least a major portion of an hour. Tying the fish in this manner allows them to live longer and also makes the fish meat much more tender."

Wen Zhi was instantly baffled, his face full of perplexity as he asked, "Won't fish die shortly after leaving the water? How could this possibly make the meat more tender?"

Zhao Mu smiled and replied, "The reason fish die shortly after leaving the water is because of oxygen deprivation and suffocation. The reason this makes the meat more tender is because this tying method forces them to expel their waste matter as quickly as possible."

Wen Zhi remained utterly clueless. Wang Wu gave him a pat and said, "Brother Mu is an educated man who understands more than we do. Just do as he tells you."

Resigned, Wen Zhi could only imitate Zhao Mu's movements, tying up the harvested fish one by one. By the time all the fish were tied and Wen Zhi was about to take a rest, Zhao Mu called out to him again.

"Brother Wen, we've only done the first tying; there's a second round of tying still to come."

Hearing this, Wen Zhi was instantly dumbfounded.

"What? We have to tie them again?" Wen Zhi asked with his mouth wide open in utter shock.

Zhao Mu smiled and nodded, saying, "Don't worry, we can put these fish into the pool first, and after a little over an hour, we can fish them out and tie them up once more."

Learning that they had a good hour or so to rest, Wen Zhi let out a sigh of relief and hurriedly ran back to rest. Although there were fewer than a hundred fish in total—averaging about thirty per person—and the bow-fishing technique wasn't overly complicated, to a roughneck like Wen Zhi, such tasks felt more like delicate craftsmanship, certainly not something someone of his background was suited for. Doing it once or twice was one thing, but doing it multiple times would practically break his lower back!

Watching Wen Zhi lament his plight, Wang Wu couldn't help but ask, "Brother Mu, if we just tie them twice like this, can those fish really live a bit longer?"

Zhao Mu nodded. "The processing method we're using right now is called the bow-fishing technique. To be precise, it consists of three steps: initial tying, water-feeding, and water-binding. What we just did was the initial tying; throwing these fish into the pool is the water-feeding; and once they've finished excreting their waste, tying them again is what we call water-binding."

Wang Wu nodded thoughtfully and then asked, "After this treatment, how much longer can these fish survive?"

Zhao Mu thought for a moment before answering, "In winter, ten days to half a month is not a problem. Right now, they should be able to survive for seven to ten days, and even during the hottest days of summer, they can survive for about three days."

At these words, Wang Wu was struck with profound astonishment. Forget ten days to half a month—being able to keep the fish alive for even an extra day or two would already be miraculous.

"This technique is actually so miraculous?" Wang Wu murmured, a trace of disbelief in his voice.

Zhao Mu smiled faintly. In truth, he had known how to use this bow-fishing technique ever since he first time-traveled. But back then, those fish were all small fry, he had no rope on his person, and refugees were everywhere, so he didn't dare expose the fish to anyone. That was why he had endured eating fish that had already turned foul and stinky for so long.

Though they were told to rest for a major portion of an hour, Zhao Mu ended up waking Wang Wu and Wen Zhi in the dead of night. After re-tying the fish properly, it was time for them to depart.

They loaded the fish onto the handcart, placed a few broken wooden boards around the cart as a simple enclosure, and the trio set off into the pitch blackness straight toward the county town. Because there were very few people around Xiao Wang Village, the first half of their journey went relatively smoothly. However, after pushing the cart along for a short while, they began entering the areas densely populated by refugees.

The three of them exchanged glances, alertness flashing in their eyes. Even their movements became much more restrained. If they were even slightly careless and woke the surrounding refugees, countless people would undoubtedly swarm them.