The man kept his cap pulled low over his face, holding a fishing rod with a note of excitement in his voice.
As Chen Ge drew closer, the fisherman suddenly spoke, and the words put Chen Ge on alert.
He stopped in his tracks, scanning the man up and down with his Yin Yang Eyes. Only after confirming the fellow was an ordinary person did he relax, chalking it up to his own overactive imagination.
Chen Ge watched the man fish in silence, careful not to disturb him during the critical moment when a fish might be on the line.
"What a big one!"
The man dragged the rod backward with both hands, the fishing line pulled taut. He discovered he couldn't reel it in at all.
He had been sitting on a small folding stool, but now he stood up, leaning his body back, managing to retrieve the line only bit by bit.
"What did you catch?"
Chen Ge was genuinely curious. Donggang Reservoir wasn't all that large — there shouldn't be any truly massive fish here. That said, exceptions weren't impossible. Jiujiang's waterways were dense, connecting to several major rivers. A big fish from somewhere else could have gotten trapped in the reservoir.
"Need a hand?" Chen Ge stepped up beside the man and asked quietly.
The fisherman's entire focus was fixed on the water's surface. He didn't answer Chen Ge — he was using every ounce of strength he had, dragging the line backward inch by inch.
Chen Ge didn't push the matter. He knew nothing about fishing and didn't dare intervene rashly, afraid that good intentions might lead to disaster.
"Is there really a fish that big in Donggang Reservoir?" Chen Ge raised his phone and shone its light toward the water. Below where the luminous float had sunk, he caught sight of a vague shadow slowly rising beneath the surface.
"What is that?!"
The shadow was roughly a meter and a half long, slender and elongated, and appeared to be moving up and down.
The sky was pitch-black, and with the thing concealed underwater, even Chen Ge would have had trouble making it out clearly if not for his Yin Yang Eyes.
The man summoned every bit of strength in his body. The fishing line was stretched perfectly straight. Seeing this, Chen Ge stepped back to the side — he was worried the line might snap at any moment.
Man against "fish," locked in a tug-of-war. It was the most thrilling fishing spectacle Chen Ge had ever witnessed.
After the stalemate dragged on for a dozen or so seconds, the man's strength began to wane. He looked solidly built, but he clearly lacked endurance.
Having finally hooked such an enormous fish, the man refused to let go. Since he couldn't drag the line toward the shore, he had no choice but to stand his ground and play the waiting game.
A short while later, with a soft snap, the fishing line was severed by something. The man toppled backward onto the ground, landing hard.