"Wow, what a cool gun!" Hearing the voice beside his ear, Jiang Hai turned his head to look at the source of the sound.
The source of the sound was none other than Philemon Turner's youngest son, John Turner.
"You like guns too?" Hearing his words, Jiang Hai looked at him—or rather, at them. Besides him, there were also Philemon Turner and Louis Turner. Seeing Jiang Hai look at them, they started laughing and talking.
"Of course, what man wouldn't like this thing!" Looking at the XM-8 in Jiang Hai's hand, he couldn't help but squint his eyes and laugh. Hearing his words, Jiang Hai also smiled; it was true, no man could resist a gun.
Just a moment ago in the room, they had been exchanging gifts. Jiang Hai had given the girls gifts, and naturally, the girls had given gifts to Jiang Hai as well.
Although they couldn't compare in price to what Jiang Hai had given, they were heartfelt, and many of them were handmade.
For instance, Ai Xiaoxi had knitted a sweater for Jiang Hai, which she had learned how to do only after asking her mother.
Feng Yunchen had knitted a scarf for Jiang Hai. It was unclear whether this custom originated in the East and spread to the West or vice versa, but different gifts carried different meanings. A scarf meant eternal love, while clothing meant giving one's all.
Of course, Jiang Hai didn't understand these things. Besides the scarf and the sweater, he had also received a lighter from Liu Ya, which wasn't an ordinary one but a survival-grade lighter, and a gold pen from Qi Jie.
However, regarding Jiang Hai's handwriting—heh, to be honest, if you took a cockroach, dipped it in some ink, and threw it onto a piece of paper, it would look better than Jiang Hai's writing. When he was in school, his handwriting was notoriously like "cockroach tracks."
Besides those, there were keychains, wallets, razors, and so on. There were many gifts, but what Jiang Hai liked the most was this gun.
Speaking of this gun, it was only obtained because of Jiang Hai's connections.
Jiang Hai had helped Azalina and the others obtain American citizenship, as they were stateless after he rescued them.
After gaining American citizenship, they automatically had the right to own firearms. Furthermore, the jobs Jiang Hai had applied for on their behalf included security personnel. While they couldn't keep sniper rifles at home like retired Delta Force members such as Bell,
they could still apply for standard rifles. Although they still couldn't apply for automatic weapons, this was Winthrop, after all.
Jiang Hai was the overlord here; if Azalina said she wanted to apply for an XM-8 for Jiang Hai, was there any chance it wouldn't be approved?
Therefore, this XM-8 was not only an automatic weapon but also came with a thirty-round magazine.
"This is a treasure given to me by my girlfriend, so I can't lend it to you to play with. However, the gun shop in town has the same model; you can go check it out." Hearing John Turner's words, Jiang Hai said with a smile.
"Is that so? Then I'll definitely go take a look." Hearing Jiang Hai's words, John Turner said with a smile.
"Boss, what are you planning to do?" Seeing that the conversation between Jiang Hai and John Turner had ended, Philemon Turner said with a chuckle. Although his son was already quite grown, Philemon himself wasn't actually that old.
In the United States, attitudes in that regard were very liberal, especially among some Black communities, where becoming a father at fifteen or sixteen was perfectly normal. Take NBA stars, for example—nearly seventy-five percent, or at least three out of every four, were already fathers before entering the league. Looking at the NBA and lower leagues, there were quite a few people who became fathers at fifteen or sixteen, which was certainly not common compared to China, where people often didn't become fathers until their twenties or thirties.
Although Philemon Turner hadn't become a father at fourteen or fifteen, he was only eighteen when he did. Now, just over forty, his child was already this big. One had to admit that the age gap really wasn't that large!
"I'm planning to go break in my gun. What about you guys? The three of you?" Hearing Philemon's words, Jiang Hai patted his gun and the ammunition he was carrying, saying with a smile.
"Where John and the others live, there's no ocean, so all the seafood is shipped in, and the taste is quite mediocre. I'm planning to go to the dock, get a boat, and head out to sea to catch some seafood." Hearing Jiang Hai's words, Philemon Turner replied with a smile.
Jiang Hai was quite lenient with the people on his ranch. If they ran out of meat, they would just slaughter a cow. If they wanted to eat fish or shrimp, they would just head out to sea to catch them themselves. They didn't need to wait for the fishing boats to return to get supplies; they could go whenever they wanted, so they had a lot of autonomy.
However, there were some things that were absolutely forbidden to catch. If they were fishing for food, eating some Cod, shrimp, or even Tiger Prawn was fine. abalone and Sea Cucumber were free to eat, and they could eat any lobster that weighed under twenty pounds.
However, firstly, waste was not allowed, and secondly, those high-end fish species were forbidden to be caught. For example, the yangtze river knife fish raised in Jiang Hai's river, and the Large Yellow Croaker, Yellow Croaker, and tuna in the open water were not allowed to be caught and eaten by the crew members and cowboys at will.
Fortunately, they weren't that type of person; they knew the value of these items, so they wouldn't go and eat them.
"It's all the same to me where I break in my gun, so let's head out to sea together! I'll catch some things to eat while I'm at it. The Lamprey we had last night tasted pretty good; we could catch some more." Smacking his lips, Jiang Hai said to Philemon Turner with a chuckle.
Hearing that Jiang Hai was also going out to sea, Philemon Turner naturally didn't mind. The four of them went to the shed in the distance, rode an ATV, and headed toward the dock. When they arrived, they found that there were already people there.
Because Tommy Charles, Enol Cecy, and Andrew Christian were all spending the New Year here, and having nothing to do at home, they were used to hanging out at the dock. They just happened to be there when Jiang Hai and the others arrived.
After explaining the situation, they took out a small boat. Jiang Hai and Philemon's family of three boarded the boat and sped off towards the deep sea. After driving for a while, Philemon slowed the boat down and took out a fishing line. On the line were many bottles; these bottles were all specially made, narrow and long. One end of the bottle was open, and the other end had a cap, and on the cap, there was a small hook. This was the device used to catch Lamprey.
Jiang Hai hadn't done this just once or twice, so he was naturally very familiar with it. He hooked some frozen beef offal onto the small hooks inside, then extended the fishing line so the hooks were firmly stuck on the other side of the small bottles. After getting everything ready, Jiang Hai and Philemon lowered the small bottles into the water one by one, letting them sink to the bottom.
These were the traps for catching Lamprey. To be honest, Jiang Hai originally didn't eat this thing because it looked truly hideous.
Viewed from the front, it looked like a large intestine with teeth—and not just one or two, but many—which looked quite disgusting. Viewed from the side, it was better; with a big eye and seven gills, it even looked a bit cute.
For someone who raised fish, this creature was actually an enemy to Jiang Hai.
Because these Lamprey were fish killers; this creature would bite directly onto the fish, as it was a parasitic organism.
It survived by sucking blood. Once a fish was latched onto, it could only wait for death. This creature could "eat" forty large fish a year, and it would even attach itself to Dolphins. It was an absolute marine pest. Moreover, the most important thing was that this creature could live not only in seawater but also in freshwater. The United States had even sprayed chemicals to curb the spread of this creature inland, killing many of its larvae, to the point where it was almost unseen for a period of time.
However, recently, as people started enjoying eating this thing again, it had allowed the population of this creature to recover somewhat.
Jiang Hai's fishery was so large and located within the active range of the Lamprey, so naturally, there were quite a few Lamprey in his fishery.
At first, Jiang Hai also hated this parasitic creature. After all, the fish it parasitized were his own money.
However, later, Edward Anderson told Jiang Hai that having these creatures as parasites might not necessarily be a bad thing.
It was like what the Chinese people said: if you kept a bucket of Carp or Grass Carp, they might die before long, but if you put a carnivorous Black Carp in there, the fish could live for a long time because they had to keep moving, fearing they would be eaten.
These Lamprey served this function. The schools of fish needed to exercise. Although Jiang Hai had Big Fool, the ocean overlord, here, Big Fool was Jiang Hai's fish, so it wouldn't actively eat Jiang Hai's other fish—it might eat a couple if hungry, but it spent most of its time catching fish in the open ocean. These Lamprey, however, didn't care about that; they would come to eat the fish.
But it was much, much slower than the fish and not as agile.
Any fish it parasitized was either sick or weak. Therefore, it eliminated those weak and sick fish and also forced the healthy fish to exercise. Although Jiang Hai lost some fish, it made the rest of the fish healthier. So, according to Edward Anderson, this might not necessarily be a bad thing.
Of course, the population of this creature had to be controlled. If there were too many, it would truly be a disaster. Fortunately, this creature was very easy to catch, and there were plenty of people willing to pay money for it.
At first, someone told Jiang Hai that this thing was a supreme delicacy, and that in the Middle Ages in Europe, there were even kings who ate themselves to death from it, yet people still flocked to eat it. When he heard that Americans also considered Lamprey one of the top ingredients, Jiang Hai looked disbelieving and disdainful, until he ate a meal of Lamprey with Bordeaux sauce; then everything changed. (To be continued.)