Every winter, Captain Otruny drives the ocean-going fishing boat Red Sea Shark out to sea to hunt whales. It is a rare carnival in Bailu Town. Although only students have annual vacation, for most townspeople, this is also a cat festival.
In winter, with heavy snowfall, it is difficult to find a job, let alone travel far away, so basically people who have nothing to do like to stay in the pub, drink and brag...
Therefore, the return of the Red Sea Shark ocean fishing boat from whaling has become a favorite event for onlookers to watch. Just like the time when the onlookers watched the giant Niros crocodile that Claude and the others hunted, the road beside the pier was crowded with people and very lively.
Clever vendors push their carts among the crowd and sell melon seeds, beer, barbecue and so on...
Claude and Verricro squeezed their way to the dock gate with difficulty, almost sweating profusely. Fortunately, Uncle Peg, who was guarding the gate, was in front of the gate. Seeing them arriving, he quickly opened the door a small crack.
Let them enter the dock.
The ocean-going fishing boat Red Sea Shark is still parked next to the ice on the lakeside, about a hundred yards away from the dock. There are several people on the ice holding iron levers in their hands, beating the ice.
"What are they doing? Are they going to cut through the ice so that the ship can sail to the dock?" Claude asked Uncle Peg.
During last winter's annual vacation, the original owner of this body, little Claude, and his three friends were digging holes in the ice to fish on the lake, and accidentally slipped into the water. Fortunately, the three friends reached out and caught them in time.
His clothes were used to pull him up. But little Claude also fell ill and lay down for half a year, and his body was taken away by the time traveler...
"No, fishing boats cannot be parked at the pier in winter. That will freeze the fishing boats inside due to the ice in the lake, which will cause great harm to the fishing boats." Uncle Peg replied: "Fishing boats can be parked outside the ice, but they have to be parked outside the ice.
As the ice expands, it moves toward the center of the lake to prevent it from freezing. Now they are testing the thickness of the ice to see if it can withstand the weight of a whale."
Whales... Claude turned his head to look at the two whales towed behind the Red Sea Shark. Apart from anything else, it can be seen from just the parts above the water that the bodies of these two whales seem to be stronger than those of ocean-going fishing boats.
Long, you can imagine how big these two whales are. In addition, Claude discovered that the whales in this world seem to be different from the whales he saw in his previous life. Although they all look gray-blue, these two whales
There seemed to be horns on his head, with a large piece protruding from his head, but the horns had been taken away, leaving only a big hole where his head protruded.
Narwhal, Claude thought of the picture of a whale depicted in the biology textbook. The textbook depicts seventeen kinds of whale species that have been discovered, some are large and some are small. Compared with other whales, narwhal is not a big deal.
Compared with the giant blue whale in the ocean, it looks more like an underage child next to a strong man. But the picture in the book is far less shocking than what I saw in reality. It is conceivable that the biggest one in the book is
That kind of giant ocean blue whale is so huge...
"With these two narwhals, the Erikson family has had a bumper harvest this year..." Verricro said with some envy.
The description of the narwhal in the biology textbook is very detailed. Compared with other different types of whales, the narwhal is one of the more common whales that can be captured for consumption. It is said that in the Dark Ages, there were magicians who led fishermen
Go out to sea to hunt whales to obtain alchemy test materials, and use whale meat to make up for the famine caused by natural disasters in the fiefdom...
Legend has it that the horn on the head of the narwhal is a magic material needed by magicians for alchemy experiments. Although no book can prove it, it has been spread among the people even now that magicians have been driven out of the Farea continent.
There are rumors that the narwhal's unicorn can restore men's glory, so much so that the narwhal's unicorn has become a hot rare medicinal material on the market. Every whale hunting ship captain who captures narwhals can use this unicorn.
Make a fortune.
"Uncle Peg, you just said that those people were testing the thickness of the ice. Are they preparing to drag the two narwhals ashore?" Claude asked.
Uncle Peg shook his head: "No, we are going to break up the two whales directly on the ice. There is no need to spend so much effort dragging them to the shore. In previous years, there was only one, but this year I was lucky and caught two. Those who watched
Blessed are the lively people, they can buy a few kilograms of whale meat at a very cheap price and go back to taste it fresh."
Oh, it turns out that the Erikson family still has such a tradition. His father, Captain Altruni, brings back one or two captured whales every year and slaughters them directly on the dock, providing very cheap fresh whale meat to the onlookers.
This can be regarded as one of the benefits of those onlookers. No wonder there are so many people watching the fun. Claude was originally a little surprised why many onlookers brought empty baskets, which were used to hold whale meat later...
…
"Vero, Claude..." Erikson's figure appeared on the fishing boat. He saw Claude and Verrico, and he excitedly took off his leather hat and waved at them.
They even shouted their names loudly.
Claude and Verricro also waved at him, meaning that they heard him and there was no need to shout like this. Then they saw Ericson grabbing a cable hanging down from the boat, like a
The agile monkey slid onto the ice with a "chirp", stood up, patted his butt and ran towards the shore.
"Hey, Claude, Vero, I miss you so much." Ericson rushed over and gave Claude and Verrico a tight hug, then looked around, feeling a little disappointed.
: "Boa didn't come?"
"He can't come," Claude said, and then told him that Bockar went to his aunt's house to celebrate the New Year this year and could not return to White Deer Town until January.
Virikro looked at him carefully, and finally breathed a sigh of relief and gave him a hug: "Congratulations on your safe return. It's really gratifying that you have nothing missing..."
This is the truth. It is very dangerous to go out to sea to hunt whales in winter these days. It is normal for novices to have their fingers cut off when they go out on a boat for the first time. The first is because the weather is cold and they did not pay attention to keeping warm. The second is
Climbing masts and rope nets when operating on a ship or chasing whales is a very dangerous job. If you are not careful, you will be injured by the frozen cables. In fact, it is not a big deal to cut off your fingers. The serious thing is to go to sea.
After returning from a trip, an arm was missing or a leg was broken...
Erikson knocked on Verricro's chest with his fist: "What nonsense are you talking about, you underestimate me too much, and you don't even think about who I am, the future greatest captain of White Deer Town, Erikson!
"
"By the way, Claude, Vero, let me tell you, this trip to the sea really opened my eyes. You must not have imagined that the stormy sea in winter will be so calm. In the early morning, the sun rises from the sea level in the east.
When I jumped up, the entire sea was covered with sparkling golden light. If it weren't for the endless horizon, I would have doubted whether I was sailing on Lake Beringa. To be honest, that moment was really beautiful and spectacular..."
Ericson danced and told Claude and Verikson his thrilling stories of wandering at sea and chasing whales for more than a month. He started talking endlessly an hour ago and continued until Claude handed him a hand.
He stopped after drinking a glass of water.
"Thank you, I'm thirsty..." Ericson picked up the water glass and drank it in one breath. Only then did he realize that he had followed Claude and Viricolo into Uncle Pegg's cabin.
What De handed him was also Uncle Peg's drinking cup.
"Of course you will be thirsty," Claude looked at him helplessly: "You have sprayed saliva all over me and Vero. From the moment we got off the boat to now, I really wonder if you were even mute on the boat.
People talk to people..."
"Haha, um, um, I'm happy to see you, so I said a few more words..." Erikson explained with a smile.
At this time, a whale had been dragged up on the ice. Several sailors were disemboweling the whale with big axes and tree saws, and someone was dragging a large piece of whale meat to the dock on a sled.
Uncle Peg, Erikson's father, Captain O'Trunny, and a few other sailors have set up several log tables by the dock gate, and on the tables are pieces of cut whale meat.
The onlookers outside the dock gate also lined up in an orderly manner. They threw their money into a large wooden box next to the log table, and then took a piece of whale meat back from the table.
"How do you sell whale meat?" Claude asked.
"This is cheap, one sunar and five pounds." Erikson replied.
It is indeed cheap, two pfennigs per catty, which is two cents per catty, one yuan and five catties. Recently, Claude was at home during the holidays, and his mother often asked him to go to the open-air market to buy vegetables. He was very familiar with the prices in Bailu Town.
The current price of beef is one sunar and four pfennigs per catty, mutton is one sunar and four pfennigs per catty, lamb is one sunar and eight pfennigs per catty, pork is five pfennigs per catty, and wild boar is eight pfennigs per catty.
One pound of long-tail saury is six pfennig per pound, and other lake fish that are not rare are basically four to eight pfennig per pound.
With such prices, for Mr. Morsan's salary of one riyaso a day, only five or six sunars can provide a family with three meals a day. But for those who only earn one or two silver towers a month,
For the townspeople in Le, life is good if they can eat beef and mutton once or twice a week. They prefer to buy cheap lake fish.
According to those experts, the meat of narwhal is comparable to beef in terms of nutrition and taste. Therefore, buying a pound of whale meat for only two pfennigs is a very cost-effective deal for the residents of White Deer Town. Even the most popular
It is very easy for poor people to earn two pfennigs as long as they are willing to work hard, so it is not difficult to eat whale meat.
Erikson's father, Captain O'Trunny, was already cutting into pieces of whale meat on the log table in front of the dock gate. Uncle Pegg was standing next to him, simply weighing the whale meat.
Then give it to those who paid.
Many people threw a sunar into a large wooden box, then picked up a piece of whale meat weighing five kilograms, and said a few compliments and thanks to Captain Otruni before leaving.
Captain Otruni smiled and listened to everyone's words of thanks, while using the short knife in his hand to quickly cut into pieces of whale meat.
Verricro pushed Claude and pointed at the whale meat cut up by Captain Otruni's knife. Only then did Claude notice that the pieces of whale meat cut up by Erikson and his father were almost the same size.
Not bad. The weight reported by Uncle Peg next to him was roughly the same: "Five pounds and one tael, please take it..."
Erikson was not surprised by this: "There is nothing surprising about this. I have been dividing fish on the boat for twenty years, and I have already become very familiar with it. I will do the same in the future..."
"Why does your father always cut into five-pound pieces, and those who buy them only take one piece? Why don't they buy a few more pieces?" Claude is a little strange. It's cold and snowy now, and these whale meats are so cold and snowy.
If you buy it in blocks, you can keep it for a while. How come the people who bought it didn’t ask for more blocks? Especially when it’s so cheap...
"They don't dare..." Ericson said proudly. It turns out that it is an old tradition of the Otruni family to capture whales every winter and bring them back to share the meat. It started with Ericson's grandfather, who was also a whaler.
An old captain, there was no Red Sea Shark at that time, but a smaller whaling ship. Every time he went out to sea to hunt whales, it was like a life and death adventure, and many sailors died or were injured trying to catch whales.
Erikson's grandfather dragged a whale back every time. All he wanted was to distribute the whale meat to the families of the dead and injured sailors so that they could have a good year. Only the excess whale meat would be sold to the town.
Poor people, the price is very low.
By the time Erikson's father had the ocean-going fishing vessel Red Sea Shark, whaling was no longer so dangerous. And the families and relatives of the older generation of dead and injured sailors had grown up. If whales were given to them for free,
Instead, meat became like a pity, and some people with strong self-esteem refused to accept it. They would rather pay to buy it like other poor people.
Therefore, the old tradition of the Erikson family has also changed. Free meat distribution has become cheap meat selling. Not everyone wants to buy more, and some people want to wholesale whale meat to make profits, but all of them are blocked by Captain Otruni.
Refuse. One family can only buy five kilograms, which is a quota. And the old sailors at the dock gate know very well who has bought and who has not, so no one will think about the tradition of the Otruni family at this time.