Li Yang scanned the pool and spotted the back of a mud crab slightly exposed in one spot. His right hand shot out and grabbed it.
How fast was he? With his current body, he truly wasn't afraid of a mud crab's big claws.
That was why, while everyone else was carefully using tongs, he just used his bare hands.
Just like that, Li Yang caught four in a short time!
Adding the two from before, he had already caught six!
By now, even the person who had first discovered the spot had only caught six, the same number as him.
The murky little pool was now empty of mud crabs.
"Ah, they're all gone."
"I was thinking of coming over here earlier, but I didn't. Now I've only caught one mud crab."
"I got here too late, I didn't catch a single one."
In reality, it had all happened in just a short span of time; some twenty-odd mud crabs had been completely snatched up.
'These crabs will fetch over a thousand yuan.'
Li Yang was overjoyed. To him, over a thousand was still a lot of money.
He was still in the small pool, about to get out, when he suddenly felt something move in a corner of it.
'Is there another crab?'
His heart skipped a beat. He immediately ducked down, his right hand plunging into the water.
The small pool wasn't large, but its deepest part was ninety centimeters deep. He was bent over, with more than half his body submerged.
The body feels completely different in water than on land; the buoyancy constantly tries to make you float to the surface.
As most of his body was submerged in the seawater, Li Yang's expression seemed to shift slightly. He then stood up, clutching a large mud crab in his hand.
This mud crab looked to be almost two or three times the size of the others. Its two claws were nearly as big as a forearm, brandishing menacingly. If it clamped down on you, it could probably snap a finger right off.
"Whoa, that mud crab is huge."
"That thing must weigh over two and a half pounds!"
"There's a king mud crab in this pool!"
At that moment, all eyes were on Li Yang, filled with envy.
Mud crabs are very expensive. A normal one could go for two hundred yuan a pound, so this king crab, weighing over two pounds, would definitely be even pricier!
"Young man, are you selling that king crab? I'll give you two hundred fifty a pound for it."
Someone from the crowd immediately stepped forward, wanting to buy the king crab Li Yang had caught.
A crab this big could be a signature dish at a major restaurant; it was a rare find.
With two people bidding, Li Yang, of course, wasn't going to keep it. He sold it to the one who offered more.
It weighed two-point-four pounds and sold for six hundred yuan. Additionally, he planned to sell five of the other six crabs he had caught. As for the last one, he gave it to little Tingting.
"Brother Li Yang, are you really giving this big crab to me? For real?"
The little girl's face was full of surprise as she looked at Li Yang, as if she couldn't believe it.
She poked the bound crab with her little finger before quickly snatching her hand back.
She glanced at Li Yang, then at the slightly older girl next to her.
The older girl was named Zhang Qingqing, thirteen years old, and she was Zhang Tingting's older sister.
Zhang Qingqing had been looking at Li Yang with envy. When she saw him handing over a mud crab, she blushed a little and said, "Brother Li Yang, this crab is too expensive. We can't take it."
Her little sister was too young to know how much these crabs were worth, but she did.
The crab before them weighed a full pound and could easily sell for two hundred yuan.
For a normal family, two hundred yuan was quite a lot. Many people didn't even make that much after a full day of hard work.
Li Yang smiled and said, "It's fine. If it wasn't for Tingting's hair tie, I would have only caught two at most."
He gave one crab to the sisters, Zhang Qingqing and Zhang Tingting. The king crab sold for six hundred yuan, and the other five went for two hundred each. In total, Li Yang made one thousand six hundred yuan!
The money was transferred to his phone. Li Yang was overjoyed; this was the first "fortune" he had ever earned on his own.
He had found things while beachcombing before, but the most he had ever made was a little over a hundred yuan.
"Thank you, Brother Li Yang." As Li Yang insisted, Zhang Qingqing had no choice but to fumble and accept it.
She decided not to sell the crab, planning to take it home and let her parents decide what to do with it. She thanked Li Yang again, then took her little sister to find their mother.
Watching them leave, Li Yang's gaze suddenly turned to the sea. He turned and began to walk away.
'Was that feeling in the water just my imagination?' Li Yang wondered.
But before he had taken more than a few steps, his phone buzzed. He glanced at it and saw that his mother, Zhao Rou, had sent him two thousand yuan.
[Zhao Rou: Yangyang, you're home alone, so buy yourself some good food. This is for your expenses. If it's not enough, just let Mom know.]
Looking at the transfer and the message, Li Yang thought for a moment and initiated a video call.
After a few seconds, a slightly haggard-looking middle-aged woman appeared on the screen.
The middle-aged woman was his mother, Zhao Rou, who was also the daughter of Hua Country's top tycoon, Zhao Qianxing.
"Mom, I'm sending this right back. I've got money," Li Yang said with a smile, looking at Zhao Rou.
"What money, Yangyang? Don't hesitate to spend what you need," Zhao Rou replied quickly.
Her face was haggard. Her husband's illness left her with sleepless nights, and she was also constantly worried about her son being home alone.
Li Yang told her what had just happened. "Mom, I got lucky at the beach just now and ran into a group of mud crabs. I caught a bunch, including a king crab, and I made sixteen hundred yuan from them!"
Hearing her son, Zhao Rou smiled. "Oh, really? That's wonderful, Yangyang. You've got good luck."
Living by the sea, this sort of thing was nothing out of the ordinary.
The ocean was full of treasures. Mud crabs were expensive, sure, but fish like groupers or large yellow croakers... their prices were many times higher!
A single large yellow croaker could even fetch over a million!
A few years ago, someone beachcombing in these very waters was lucky enough to catch a grouper and sold it for hundreds of thousands!
Compared to that, catching a few mud crabs was really nothing special.
"Mom, I've already earned my own living expenses for the month. And it feels better to spend money you've earned yourself," Li Yang said with a smile.
Since her son put it that way, Zhao Rou didn't insist. "Alright, Yangyang. Just let Mom know when you're running low."
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