chapter 31 learning to swim / second fishing trip (work in progress)

Sophia looked at Daniel and said "well it's not difficult to test your theory, and see if it's true"

Daniel asked "how do you plan to test it?"

Sophia while pointing outside, said "go swim in the lake, if you can hold your breath for more than a couple of minutes, you have the first proof and can continue testing the differences between you and a normal human, we should arrive at a more complete theory after that"

daniel nodded, but then shook his head and said "you are right, but there's a little problem"

Sophia said "what is it?" she was sure her plan was good

Daniel said "I don't know how to swim"

all four of them started laughing, and Sophia said "no problem I'll teach you"

when the conversation was over, the family gathered around the table to enjoy the braised rice carps with spring onion that Vincent prepared

Daniel said "it's delicious" he was already regretting letting the other carps go

after they finished dinner, Daniel went to school like every night, and in the morning went to the deckchair to sleep as usual, and woke up for lunch but he was unhappy that what expected him wasn't fish but legumes soup

in the afternoon, Sophia arrived wearing a swimsuit and gave Daniel a little boxer swimsuit, before sending him to change

when he came back Sophia said "let's start with the basics, come and try to float here, where you can still touch the lake bottom"

he did as she instructed, and he easily floated and said "it's easy"

Sophia said "happy that you feel that way, now give me your hands and try to paddle with your feet"

Daniel easily learned everything she taught him, and after 1 hour he could already swim on his own, but he was bummed by something and asked "why am I so slow compared to you?"

Sophia said "your feet and hands are small, and generally your weaker, now that I think about it, I once saw on another planet some people wearing things on their feet to swim faster, they locked a little like the fins of a fish, and they also had a mask to protect their eyes"

Daniel said "it's true, the more water I move the faster I go" he went out of the water and started walking to the lab, leaving Sophia who was happily swimming

as he arrived at the lab, he searched on the internet for swimwear but he found only images, no one sold them on verulus, so he decided to make a better version himself

he didn't need a mask since the extremely pure and clear freshwater didn't hurt his eyes, but he really wanted to swim faster, so he started trafficking around with tickles, and 40 minutes later he came back to the lake wearing some strange shoes

Sophia was still swimming around, she looked extremely comfortable in the water, as she saw Daniel coming back she noticed his shoes and thought "I said fish fins, why is he wearing high boots"

but her thoughts changed the moment Daniel entered the water, once he was inside enough to float, on the bottom of each shoe a small propeller appeared, they were connected to one of the robot batteries that were in the back of the belt he was now wearing over the swimsuit, in a second Daniel started to swish around in the lake controlling the speed through tickles, it was difficult to control, but soon he started chasing the fishes and playing around before he realized it 10 minutes had passed since he last went to the surface

as Daniel came out Sophia said "it seems you were right, you can easily hold your breath"

Daniel nodded and said "so what's the next step"

Sophia said "it depends on you, you could check your adaptability to heat, cold, pressure there are different ways to proceed" before going back to shower

Daniel didn't need any supervision since he was inside the specter dimension and tickles was with him

the family had noticed that when they showed too much concern, for his well-being, he translated it to them not trusting him because he was a fragile human who couldn't cultivate, so on occasions like these they left him to look after himself

Daniel went back to play in the lake and found out that there wasn't only the little white perch, there were also some mean-looking fish, that looked like blue slimy snakes, some yellow shrimps, and many plants, the lake was big but daniel saw most of it this afternoon, thanks to the speed his new toy provided

after he was tired, he went back to the lab and putting aside the robot project for a while he started working on the tactical swimming shoes 2.0

when they gathered again for dinner, Daniel had a lot of questions for Vincent

Daniel said "grandpa how are the little fishes you usually grill called?"

Vincent said "pearl perch"

Daniel asked "and the slimy blue snakes, what are they called?"

Vincent said "sapphire eels"

Daniel asked "and the yellow shrimps?"

Vincent said "yellow jade shrimps"

Daniel asked "why are there only these 3 types?"

Vincent said "because they create a perfect equilibrium, and are very tasty, so I keep them in the pond"

Daniel asked "can we go fishing tomorrow?"

Vincent said "sure, do you want to try to go after a new fish, or go again to fish rice carps?"

Daniel was torn, on one side the rice carp was really good, on the other, he wanted to try a new fish, after thinking for a while he found the perfect solution "a new tasty fish"

Vincent said "we can go to a place where there's a bunch of different species"

Daniel smiled happily and said "ok"

afterward, instead of going to school, he went back to the lab, while researching the swimming shoes 2.0 that for more stability they became swimming leggings 2.0

while he was at it, he wanted to install the battery inside, then he wanted them more hydrodynamic, then it became too heavy so he added small hydraulics from the robot leg to assist in movement, Daniel kept adding features to it, till in the morning the tactical swimming leggings 2.4 blueprint was ready

when morning came, half of tickles was left in the lab to build a pair of black leggings armor, that no matter how much Daniel tried, they made his legs almost triple the normal thickness, and gave him 6 cm more in height, they needed to be coupled with a thick shirt, to make him more hydrodynamic, that tickles also had to make

the next afternoon vincent came to Daniel, and said "today we are going to fish in a small creek called gravel creek, 10 minutes from here, so we need to use a different rig"

then the table appeared again and he gave daniel a small rectangle "you can use this to keep the old rig aside for the next time"

he showed him how to put it away and then said "we are going to use the same method but different dimensions, the float will be a 1.5 g so we will need more sinkers and this time no swivels, everything will be on the same line, and the hook will be an 18 instead of a 25"

Daniel followed Vincent's actions like before and worked on the rig, he was doing well so Vincent said "good, you even got all the sinkers right from biggest to smallest, since the water will not be as clear as the lake we don't need the invisible line"

both of them finished preparing the rig, and Daniel said "I'm ready, I just need to pick up something in the lab"

Vincent nodded and said "then let's pack up and go"

once again Daniel had his cylinder backpack, accompanied by a new pair of big black leggings and big boots, it was like he was wearing just the pants of the armor and left the rest at home

Vincent noticed it but just thought Daniel cooked up something and ignored it, so they exited the dimension and got on the little boat while flying Vincent changed face again, and in 10 minutes they were already at gravel creek

when they arrived Vincent started to make way and said "in this direction after passing through those trees, there's the creek"

Daniel looked in the direction of the tree, and said "why is it called gravel creek?"

and vincent responded "because whoever named it was lazy naming a place we will only visit once"

Daniel baffled asked "what?"

Vincent smiled and said "Don't worry about it"

soon later they passed the line of trees, Daniel massive metal legs were strangely quiet, Vincent expected a boom boom boom noise, but in reality, they were making less noise than a man with heavy-duty boots

they arrived at the creek and as expected it wasn't sandy, but pebbly, obviously staying in one place wouldn't work on a creek, the water in most of it was a few inches, so the fish would gather were pools formed or where there was structure they could hide in, in general, the fish were still small and perfect for the little daniel to catch, but since they had to look for them, this time they would be mobile

vincent took out a small plastic box full of loose brown bits, digging in the brown bits he took out a small redworm and while showing Daniel how to fix it on the hook he said "like this, you poke it a little over the middle, then slide the hook in, and exit a little under the middle, so this two bits keep dangling and attract the fish"

Daniel said "I understand, like this" fixing a worm on his hook

Vincent said "exactly, now follow me and try to put your bait near structure, like that fallen tree there, or the tree roots in front of it"

Daniel nodded and with the pole in hand was ready to catch some fishes

he threw the line in the first structure, but after a couple of minutes he got nothing so he went to the next hole following Vincent

in the second hole, he also got nothing, but like in mount kelipor, he didn't feel restless, instead, he was looking curiously everywhere, the bugs, the birds in the sky, the snake coming at him

Daniel looked at the little snake and smiled, Vincent saw it and decided to keep looking instead of intervening, since the snake was not poisonous

while the snake tried to bite Daniel's leg, his float went down and he immediately raised the pole to hook the fish, he did so successfully and landed a small green chub, in the meantime a snake was dangling on the right side of his leggings armor

vincent came and said "it's a leaf chub, if we needed bait it would be good, but you can release it now, it doesn't taste good"

Daniel said "goodbye bad tasting fish" releasing him back into the water

then he looked to the side and said "I don't want to hurt you, but if you don't stop scratching my leggings, I will have to remove you" to the snake

and went to the next bit of structure, in the meantime, Vincent caught something, another green chub, and released it

after a couple of holes Daniel float went down again, but this time it was violent, Daniel immediately set the hook, and started to fight with the fish, luckily he had the elastic that helped quite a lot, and after a minute or two, he landed his biggest fish yet, a mean-looking one, with blood-red eyes

Vincent came to check and said "that's a blood-eyed bass, a very tasty fish, and it must be a little less than half a kg, good job kiddo, you can put it here"

Vincent took out a box again, but this was smaller ad worked like a backpack

Daniel said "yay, tasty fish go inside" happy, now he was in fishing ecstasy

after 10 minutes the snake was still there and Daniel had enough, he grabbed the snake, pulled and as soon as it detached from the leg he threw him in the weeds by the side of the river

a couple of minutes later Vincent caught another fish, as he pulled it out he said "it's a bluebell these little things are everywhere, but it's good so we can put it in the box"

Daniel happily said "let's catch more"

then Daniel and Vincent kept fishing for two hours, and went back home with 4 blood eyed bass and 6 bluebells to make dinner