Chapter 26 Beachcombing
☆
When She Ning and her group arrived, the people at the beach were already starting their return journey.
Everyone seemed to have a good haul today, with each person carrying a bucket full of seafood. She Ning even spotted some large conger eels in a few of the buckets.
Thinking of the delicate texture and tender flesh of steamed eel, She Ning watched it go with envy. Next time, she'd get up earlier and bring all the necessary tools to cook it.
The weather is fine today, mostly cloudy and not too sunny.
After tying She Ni's straw hat and rolling up her sleeves, She Ning patted her shoulder and told her to collect seashells on the beach, while She Ning took a shovel and walked towards the sea.
On the vast beach, the seawater surged. After the tide rose, the reefs that were originally exposed above the sea returned to the seabed, with only the sharp black points showing. She Ning did not go far. She stopped when the seawater was just up to her ankles, took out the rake from the bucket, and began to dig like sand being washed away by the waves.
At low tide, these locations are exposed, and the position of the shells can be determined by the irregular lines, bulges, and small holes on the sand surface. Now, those marks have been smoothed out by the seawater.
Having only ever actually gone beachcombing a few times in real life, the rest of the time it was all done online, and all the methods I learned were the low-tide beachcombing method. She Ning shrugged, realizing she had no choice but to use this clumsy method to get things done.
Fortunately, she was lucky. After digging around with the rake a few times, she found a lot of white clams. She picked them all up and put them in the bucket. She straightened up and noticed a rock not far ahead. It should be part of a large rock that had broken off and been washed up by the sea. There were also a lot of oysters on the rock.
From the winter solstice to the Qingming Festival, oysters are plump and glistening. Now is the time when oysters are at their best. However, they have thick shells and little meat, making them troublesome to harvest and clean. Therefore, they are not very popular when going beachcombing.
Perfect timing! Garlic oysters are the most popular item at late-night food stalls in later generations. They cost one yuan each, twenty yuan a dozen, and there are various price options to choose from.
She Ning used a shovel to pry open the oysters.
"Sister, look! A crab!"
After turning over the small rocks on the beach, She Ni quickly threw a handful of sand to cover the crab's eyes, then pinched the sides of the stunned, red-armored crab's body.
She Ni's face flushed with excitement as she ran over, carrying her little bucket in one hand and holding a crab in the other.
The palm-sized crab was waving its eight legs wildly in mid-air, looking quite fierce. She Ning gave it a thumbs up, then tied the crab up tightly with rope and put it into the bucket.
Back when Grandpa She was still alive, her family would occasionally come over to go beachcombing and collect seafood for a meal. If they were lucky, they could find good things like eels, squid, or other sea fish and take them to the market to barter.
She Ni was too young to come with us before, but as expected of a child raised by the sea, she wasn't afraid at all. On her first visit, she dared to catch crabs with her bare hands.
Sheni squatted on the beach, leaned over the bucket, and watched the crabs inside with great satisfaction for a while. Then, she got up and continued to search for her prey with great interest.
She Ning continued her oyster haul, scooping out both large and small oysters. As she shucked them, she envisioned various ways to cook them: oyster omelets, garlic oysters, oysters in a dipping sauce, oyster omelets with eggs…
"Ding, limited-time mission: Catch 20 sea crabs within one hour. The reward for completion is one chance to draw a rare blind box." The system suddenly went online and issued the mission.
Having long been accustomed to the system's sudden appearance, She Ning was not surprised and continued to pry open the oysters according to her own steps until she heard the reward.
He tossed the small shovel into the bucket, picked up the bucket, and ran towards the rocky beach. It wasn't that the oysters weren't tasty, but rather that the rare blind boxes were too attractive.
Rare blind boxes! This is the first time I've ever gotten my hands on one. Anyone who doesn't try to get one is a fool.
The rising tide submerged the nearby rocky beach. She Ning was heading to a rocky island about twenty meters away from the sea. It was on higher ground and would only be completely submerged during high tide. Crabs usually liked to hide under the rocks there.
She threw her water boots on the beach, told She Ni not to run around, took out the rope and pliers for tying crabs from the bucket, put them all into the net, tied the net around her waist, and walked into the sea step by step.
The seawater gradually spread until it reached her chest. She Ning leaped into the sea, swam a short distance underwater, and then surfaced to swim towards the reef island.
The seawater lapped against the beach, carrying a lot of sand and stones. Many small fish darted around on the seabed, swimming against the waves. The resistance was great, and by the time She Ning climbed onto the reef island, she had exhausted most of her strength.
With the system's countdown timer displayed, She Ning took a few deep breaths to calm herself down and immediately began the process of finding and catching crabs.
A large blue crab was sunbathing in a crevice in the rocks. Not far away was its burrow. She quietly reached over with her pincers and, taking advantage of its inattention, grabbed the crab by the sides and pulled it out.
Crab +1
The area under the rocks is a favorite spot for crabs. Wearing gloves, She Ning turned the rocks over with her bare hands and spotted a red-armored crab. With its hiding place gone, it quickly tried to escape, but she leaned forward and grabbed the crab by the skin with her bare hands.
Crab +1
She flipped the rock back over, restoring it to its original state, and continued searching for other rocks.
In the cracks of rocks, under large logs, beneath broken seaweed...
Crab +1 +1 +1 +1...
She Ning pried open two rocks, lay down on them, and dug down. She finally managed to pull out the red-armored beast, only to find it was too small as soon as she touched it.
"This isn't enough for two ounces, so I'm releasing it." After putting it back into the crevice in the rock, She Ning gave it a push, saying, "Try to eat more next time, and I hope you'll be bigger."
After restoring the stone, She Ning sat down on the spot and kept flipping stones without stopping. Her arms were sore and numb, and her waist was also sore. She rubbed her waist with her hands and glanced at the countdown and quantity in the system.
Countdown 00:09:20, quantity 18/20.
In less than ten minutes, she still had two more to catch. She had almost searched through all the rocks around her. The ones she hadn't searched were all too big for her to handle. She Ning propped herself up and, enduring the soreness, continued her search.
Five minutes passed, and she still hadn't found anything.
Rare blind boxes are indeed not so easy to obtain. She Ning shrugged her shoulders and rubbed her waist, unable to help but sigh.
The countdown on the screen ticked away second by second, but the crab had vanished without a trace. It had overturned every rock it could find on the reef. She Ning, leaning against a nearby rock, had a sunburned face and her forehead was covered in sweat.
She Ning wiped away her sweat, then took off the bulging net bag from her waist, tied the opening, and placed it to one side.
At this moment, the countdown is 00:00:60.
She placed the pliers on the rocks as well, and went to the rocks. She took a deep breath and then gently slid into the water. The water on the seabed was a bit murky. She closed her eyes to adjust before opening them.
The ground beneath her feet was still rocky, with many small shrimp and fish swimming and foraging in the crevices. She Ning held her breath and swam toward the rocks on one side, where there was sandy muddy ground not far away. She Ning carefully searched for traces of crabs on the rocks.
There was a lot of seaweed growing on the reef, and pretty fish were swimming among them. She Ning even saw sea urchins eating the seaweed. If she weren't in a hurry, she would have picked a few right now.
Supporting herself on the reef, she peered down. A sea fish that was looking for food in the hole was startled and rushed out of the hole with a "whoosh." She Ning was also startled and jumped to the side in a hurry.
She lost her footing, slipped, and landed on her bottom, her hands bracing against the sand.
At the same time, the system beeped, "Beep beep, countdown 3, 2..."
The mission is going to fail, which is really annoying. It's rare to come across a rare blind box, and she was hoping to get a rare weapon. That would give her a better chance of success tomorrow.
What a pity, we were only missing two.
She Ning was unhappy. She grabbed a handful of sand from the ground with both hands, and just as she was about to let go, she realized something was off. Even through her gloves, she could feel that the texture of her right hand was different. It wasn't sand; it was hard, something like—
She Ning suddenly placed what she was holding in her right hand in front of her. A blue crab was waving its right pincer in the water, while its other pincer was clamping down on another blue crab.
The two little ones were fighting, and she accidentally caught them both.
"Countdown 0, limited-time mission completed, reward: one chance to draw a rare blind box, countdown to opening the blind box 3..."
Glug, glug, glug...
The system reward was so sudden that she didn't have time to react. She exhaled the breath she had been holding, pinched the orchid crab in one hand, covered her nose with the other, and pushed off, swimming upwards.
"Hoo..." After surfacing, She Ning took a deep breath, threw the orchid crab onto a dry spot on the reef, and used her hands to push against the reef wall to climb up.
Those two orchid crabs, perhaps harboring some deep-seated grudge, didn't let go when they were caught, and even now, thrown on the ground, they still haven't loosened their pincers. To commemorate their inseparable friendship, She Ning tied them up in a second and threw them into the net.
On the blind box system's interface, the "Open" button lit up. She Ning pressed the button, and following the familiar process, the interface began to rotate, sprayed fireworks, and a gift box appeared on the interface. It opened with a "bang," and the entire interface revealed a red light that lasted for a minute before dissipating.
Rare Gift Box
Obtain one water-repelling bead
Note: One of the Mermaid King's favorite beads (as the name suggests, it repels water, allowing people to breathe freely underwater).
Number of uses: 5.
On the panel, a transparent, light blue bead lay quietly, surrounded by dreamy colors. It was the size of a glass bead from later generations, not a rare weapon, and She Ning was a little disappointed.
But this water-repelling bead is also good. She put it back in the system storage room, planning to use it when she goes to the deep sea later.
Having completed the timed mission, She Ning was no longer in a hurry. Thinking of the pile of sea urchins in the seaweed, she held her breath and dived back into the sea, picking out quite a few large ones. She then went to collect some small abalone.
Finally, she returned home with a bucket full of water.
"Sister, this octopus is trying to crawl out!"
"It's okay, it can't get out."
"Sister, is this black, prickly thing tasty?"
"It's sea urchin. Try it when you get home and see if it's good."
In the sunlight, their shadows grew longer and longer, their small hands holding their large hands, walking further and further away.
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
