Carl hauled up another fish, this one a little over a foot long and a weird shade of dark purple with light purple spots on it. This one's pretty cool. The colors are…

A blue status window appeared.

Angler now rank 6!

6 unused skill points remaining

The other fisherman pulled his rod up. A fish of a similar length hung flailing at the end of his line, but it was a silvery color, had horns, and seemed to be trying to burn through the fishing line with a jet of fire that was shooting out of its mouth.

Carl glared. Are you freaking serious?!

The other man looked over and shrugged. He shook the fish a little until it stopped breathing fire on his remarkably resilient line, then unhooked and tossed it back.

Carl looked back at the boring purple-and-purple fish that was just flopping on the hook like an ordinary fish and sighed. He unhooked the stupid, not-cool fish and tossed it into his inventory with the rest before dismissing the status window out of habit.

Not nearly cool enough to send to Bobby.

He was back to the can of worms now, having exhausted the pellet baits without catching a single fish that was even half as cool as the other fisherman's. How the heck's he even doing it? Looks like he's just using some kind of lure? Guy's a fishing machine.

He tossed his line out again, furrowing his brow. This was an amazing fishing spot, he acknowledged, with both a seemingly endless supply of fish as well as a lot of different types of fish. Sure, none of them were huge—not like the massive, six-foot pacific halibut he'd hauled up that one day on the boat in Alaska with his dad—but size wasn't everything when fishing. Especially when you were using a fishing pole instead of a fishing rod and didn't even have a freaking reel or anything and had to just pull the things out with raw power.

Sure is a good thing none of these fish are that big, I guess. Be pretty hard to catch anything without a reel if any of these fish were bigger or put up more of a fight. Lucky my line's holding out this long, honestly. Maybe even a bit unrealistic at this point. Carl swished the line about, felt a nibble, and yanked another fish out of the water. AI's great with the way the fish start biting, but they should be fighting at least a little bit. He grimaced as he caught sight of yet another small, yellow fish dangling from his hook. These things are the worst. It's like a waste of a cast. He freed the fish from his hook and dropped it back into the river.

A blue status window appeared.

New class acquired:

Fish Conservationist now rank 1!

1 unused skill point remaining

Carl groaned. So many of these freaking classes. Do they even do anything? He tried tapping on the window as he had the Drone one the day prior, the act of which brought him to another skill tree screen containing two skill choices.

The first was named "Preserve the Fishies!", and there was no further description.

The second was named "Rescue Fish" without any other detail.

"Dismiss." Really missed a lot of QA with this. Guess that's why it's all beta content. He tossed another worm on his hook and lazily cast it into the water.

Carl was most certainly not competing at this point. No, he'd long since conceded his not-defeat—since he'd never been competing at any point, of course—and continued along with his very normal fishing, attempting to get some thinking done.

Another memory came back.

Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.

"I got a bite! What do I do?!"

"Okay, now you're gonna want to keep tension on the line—"

"Like this?"

"Yup, that's perfect. Now when the fish stops fighting for a second, you move the rod down a little while you reel it in, then pull it back up."

Marianne struggled for another moment, then copied the motion as he'd described it before yanking back hard on the fishing rod she held in her hands. "Like that?"

"Yeah, just like that." Carl said.

"Always looks so easy in movies and TV," she grumbled, pulling the line to the left.

"I think you've got a good-sized fish there. Just keep working it a little at a time." He looked over her head and saw the line continuing to draw the fish nearer as she followed his instructions, the circumstances causing his grin to widen.

He'd been seeing Marianne for a little under a year now, and she'd agreed to try fishing with him despite her reluctance and claims that she was more of a city girl. The pretty English teacher was dressed in old jeans and a plaid collared shirt with a wide-brimmed hat to keep the early morning sun out of her eyes. She'd said she was going to give it a fair shot, and she always seemed to give everything her all. It was one of the many things he really liked about her.

"Carl! Carl! I think I got it!" she squealed as she brought her catch up out of the water.

He refrained from reaching out to hold it steady for her, having learned by this point that she refused to accept unsolicited help under any circumstance and was more likely than not to grow annoyed at the attempt.

Marianne pulled the foot-long, flailing fish towards herself with one hand, then turned around with visible excitement on her face as she looked up at him. "I caught one!" She held it up between them with a bright smile.

Then she looked more closely at it.

"Oh fuck! What the fuck!" she screamed, dropping her rod as well as the fish that had been hooked through the side of its mouth into its eye. "Ew!"

"Uh…"

Marianne cringed and let out a whine, then bent over and started retching over the side of the dock. She shuffled closer to the edge before dropping to her knees, and her foot kicked the fishing rod she'd dropped previously, knocking it into the water just in time to be vomited on.

Carl sighed. Yeah, fishing isn't for everyone. Gotta be able to deal with a certain level of grossness, that's for sure. He glanced at the time display. Wow, already coming up on eleven? Time really flies when you get caught up in something you enjoy. Didn't catch any really cool fish, but—

"Excuse me."

Carl looked over, then he looked down.

The other fisherman was standing at his side, his wide-brimmed hat tipped back on his head, revealing his weathered face. "You're quite the fisherman," he said, offering a hand. "Garus Horatius Rex. Haven't seen you around here before."

Carl pulled up his line and set his fishing pole against the railing. "Carl…" Ah, shoot, this stupid three-name thing. Don't really wanna use my real one. "…Maximus Weathers," he finished, recalling the name of a character from a movie he'd been fond of when he was much younger. He stuck his hand out and shook. "And yeah, I just got here a couple days ago. Heck of a fisherman yourself, by the way."

Rex chuckled, tapping his fishing rod against his shoulder. "Well, I've been at it a while. Traveled around a bit, learned some tricks here and there. Some days it all comes together."

"Seems to be working for you," Carl said, his eyes lingering on the man's reel-possessing fishing rod. "Any idea where I can get a fishing rod like that around here?"

The man's smile turned lopsided. "I don't know if you'd be able to handle something like this to start with, Weathers."

Does this guy think I'm some kinda fishing noob or something? Carl frowned.

"I'll tell you what," said Rex. "How about a wager. I've got matters to attend to for a while, but after that I think I might just spend the next few mornings fishing at the pond in D-three. If you can catch a bigger fish than me there, we'll talk about fishing rods. A little victory-seeking, if you will."

Ugh, everyone's so obsessed with winning! I just wanna get a freaking fishing rod. I guess this isn't entirely awful though. Fishing contest could be fun. I mean, assuming I'm in the game long enough, which I'm positive I won't be, because how much longer could it possibly take to come up with a usable idea for this networking thing? Carl nodded after a moment. "Alright, you're on."

"Great," Rex said with a smile. "It's been—"

"Do you know anywhere around here I can sell fish?" Carl interrupted.

"Selling, yeah," said Rex. He pondered it for a moment. "Hm, try Lucius Seius Capiton's shop in D-four." He pointed back the way Carl had come. "That way, left on Victory Ave, south two blocks, right on Spear, then right onto Triumph and you'll see it on your left at the intersection of—Well, you'll see it. Nice meeting you, Carl." He waved abruptly and started walking in the opposite direction he'd just indicated at a pace that was neither fast nor slow.

"Thanks. You too, Rex," Carl called after him. Nice, maybe I can get some money for some of these. Mina and I are both pretty tapped out, so we're gonna have to get cash somehow to fix her car up. He eyed his fishing pole for a little while. Alright, well, I'm definitely not competing now since there's nobody I could be competing against, so it's not really cheating.

He switched pages in his inventory from the one that contained however many fish he'd caught to the next one over which contained his fishing supplies and tossed the pole into it.

Then he retrieved his fishing spear.

I don't know how they did it, but this thing feels great even just to hold. Carl grabbed a worm out of his unlimited can and held it up towards the point of the spear. There was a glimmer, and a short length of fishing line with a gleaming hook attached fell out of the small gap between the four sections of the tip. He pulled it out a little more until there was a comfortable length of line available, then set to fastening the worm onto the hook.

"Yeah, this thing is really freaking cool," he murmured to himself. He held the butt of the spear like a fishing rod and cast his line out. Just like a real fishing rod, the available line lengthened and went flying. Be so cool to have something like this in real life. Take all the challenge out of fishing, but just imagining what I'd be able to catch…

He felt a nibble and gave the spear a jerk to set his hook. This fish seemed noticeably stronger than the others. He dipped the spear a little. The awesome fishing spear automatically reeled its line in with the slack he'd created, and he pulled the fish closer. He battled a little, continuing to reel in whatever he'd snagged with almost no effort required. Now this is what fishing in the future should be like.

After a short while, he pulled the fish out of the water, revealing a three-ish-foot, purple, glowing fish that was thrashing wildly enough to cause its body to become perpendicular to the line that held it aloft. Whoa, now that's a cool fish! Yes!

Carl pumped a fist in the air. This is the coolest one I've gotten in a while. Bobby's gonna go crazy over it. He tossed it in with his fishing supplies so he'd remember to send it off. Maybe I'll see if I can catch a couple more of these. Just a few more minutes. Until eleven or so…