Fishing Livestream
Chapter 405 - 405 394 Determining the Layer

405: Chapter 394: Determining the Layer 405: Chapter 394: Determining the Layer Yue Feng watched as the system’s float inverted upon entering the water.

After a brief pause, it descended—once, twice, thrice—and then, just before reaching his targeted depth, it suddenly sped up a bit.

The movement was crisp, increasing speed for about half a division.

Yue Feng flicked his wrist, lifted the rod to strike, and hit his target!

He was on the board!

With a slight lift of his arm, using the rod’s flexibility to bring the fish up and into his hand, Yue Feng habitually checked the hook’s position in the fish’s mouth.

It was dead on at 12 o’clock—neither slightly off nor hesitating—just perfect, and he casually tossed it into the Fish Guard.

Based on the float’s behavior and the fish’s bite, Yue Feng had a rough idea: the fish were staying in deeper water that morning, and the activity was slightly less compared to the previous day.

Consequently, in the next few casts, he stopped trying to hook more fish and focused again on replenishing the bait in his fishing spot.

Seeing Yue Feng catching fish so early, Duan Peng’s lips curled into a scornful smile.

This guy is still too young, he thought—catching fish before properly establishing his spot.

He has lost the strategic high ground.

Just wait until I start pulling in fish.

That will leave him gaping.

With that thought, Duan Peng increased his pace a bit more, using double hooks baited with lures the size of peanut kernels, one after another.

Both aiming to attract fish by replenishing their spots, Yue Feng and Duan Peng’s baiting strategies were subtly different.

Duan Peng focused on casting large quantities of bait near the surface to create a haze effect, with bait breaking down quickly upon entering the water, leaving almost nothing by the time it sank to the bottom.

Comparatively, Yue Feng’s bait, although only slightly larger than a bean, dispersed much less on the upper layers upon entering the water, only beginning to expand and soak up water in the middle and lower layers, where he was forming his bait spot.

In Yue Feng’s estimation, a forty-minute fishing session left no space for Floating Fishing actions; even drawing fish away from the bottom was considered a high level of skill.

The actual situation was close to Yue Feng’s assessment: the fish were mainly active in the middle to lower layers of water, evident from the float’s behavior, as bites were easier to come by five to ten centimeters off the bottom after it inverted upon entry.

After about a dozen more casts, this phenomenon became even more apparent.

Yue Feng fished at four divisions deep, but many bites occurred at depths of six or seven divisions.

Now that he had a good handle on the fish activity, Yue Feng fished with a relaxed exterior but concentrated focus.

His movements seemed unhurried, but every reaction was perfectly timed.

During the float inversion, if there was a bite, Yue Feng would lift the rod; if nothing happened, he would lift it directly after the bait settled, skipping even the typical teasing of the float.

Five minutes into the competition, unbeknownst to him, Yue Feng had brought in eight fish, Qin Hu had six, and Duan Peng, who had not raised his head from his dual-hook, large-bait, high-frequency casting, hadn’t caught a single one.

During this time, Yue Feng had managed his bait spot to the point where he went from the occasional nibble to almost always receiving action at a fixed fishing depth, a transition from Bottom fishing for bites to fishing a fixed layer, in professional terms.

After five consecutive successful strikes, Yue Feng next lowered his float by about ten centimeters before continuing to fish.

Shortening the length of the line above the water could slightly speed up the time it took the float to settle, and fishing a fixed layer didn’t require the bait to reach the bottom.

Based on the preset depth, if there was no bite at that layer, he would lift his rod and change his bait.

Compared to simply going straight for Floating Fishing blindly, this more reliable approach of adjusting the fishing strategy based on real-time fish activity clearly made more sense.

Yang Wenjian, who stood behind Yue Feng and had witnessed the entire process, nodded repeatedly in approval.

Soon, twenty minutes into the fish-fighting session, despite Duan Peng’s long stretch of high-frequency casting that filled his spot with fish signs, he struggled as the fish refused to rise.

Now, Duan Peng felt a bit defeated.

Glancing at his watch, the time was already past halfway.

Duan Peng knew he had failed at Floating Fishing for this round and, resignedly, pushed his float up to the marked space bean to indicate the water depth and began earnestly trying to catch fish and make up points.

Yue Feng, noticing Duan Peng’s movement from the corner of his eye, also glanced at the time and thought to himself that it was too late for the other to switch back to Bottom fishing now.

Yue Feng was now dual-tasking, not only counting his own haul but also keeping an eye on the fish that Duan Peng and Qin Hu were catching.

Duan Peng had only caught two fish so far, while Qin Hu had 27, and Yue Feng himself, 42.

Catching up in fish catches in the following twenty minutes was going to be incredibly difficult.

Next, without making any adjustments, Yue Feng continued to cast his rod according to the predetermined plan.

The only difference was that halfway through, he pulled down the float once again, adjusting the fixed layer to about fifteen centimeters above the bottom.

The bites still came continuously.

Duan Peng, who had readjusted to bottom fishing, caught a double-tailed fish on his first cast.

After a long time spent casting and baiting the nest, there were fish in the spot, but because the fish behavior was not smoothly handled, the fish layers were very disorganized.

From the start, the float displayed various large and small movements—line collisions, bait stealing, and sometimes what appeared to be very promising bites didn’t yield anything when he lifted the rod.

By now, Duan Peng had repeatedly reminded himself to stay steady and not panic.

With the bites being too erratic, he decisively switched to smaller bait, ignoring the chaotic bites and only going for the forceful nibbles.

By patiently straightening out the bite pattern, another five minutes passed by.

Around twenty-five minutes into the match, Duan Peng finally began to consistently catch fish, and the spot was abundant with bottom-dwelling fish, boasting a good rate of double-tailed catches.

Yue Feng caught a glimpse of Duan Peng pulling up three double-tails in quick succession out of the corner of his eye, and once again glanced at the time subconsciously—11 minutes left until the end.

It was about time!

On the next cast, Yue Feng noticeably pushed the float upwards, adjusting from fishing off the bottom back to bottom fishing.

Behind him, Yang Wenjian watched Yue Feng’s actions, puzzled.

Given that Yue Feng was catching plenty of fish while fishing the fixed layer, with almost every cast resulting in a catch, why did he change his approach again?

The answer came quickly on the following cast!

After deliberately letting the bites go, Yue Feng too caught a double-tail!

The crucian carp, a mid to bottom-dwelling species, prefers to feed on bait at the bottom when there is food in the spot.

After nearly half an hour of frequent casting, Yue Feng’s spot had accumulated a large amount of bait residue and fragments.

This bait continuously emitted the scent of the attractant, gradually gathering the fish into a group.

While fishing the fixed layer, the fish on the bottom hardly moved, which meant Yue Feng’s base catch had remained untouched—the fish he caught from the upper layer off the bottom were just the periphery of the school.

Now with only ten minutes left until the end of fishing time, it was time to harvest the base catch he had accumulated over the last thirty minutes.

After adjusting the waterline, the float began to turn over, descend, and slowly slide towards the preset fishing target.

During this process, Yue Feng’s gaze was firmly fixed on the scale of the float.

The float trembled gently; the fish were chasing the bait.

A slight acceleration, the fish were swallowing the bait, but the float didn’t seem too firm; probably it hadn’t fully taken in the bait.

The next second, it stopped around the six-scale mark; this meant that the fish had taken a piece of bait into its stomach.

Hooked!

No rush to lift the rod yet, wait for the next move.

Half a second later, the float gave a forceful pull, followed by two small nibbles.

Now!