Eighth day, six-thirty in the morning, the horizon was still immersed in a deep indigo, with only a few of the brightest stars stubbornly twinkling.

Lin Yu’an had already opened his eyes, his biological clock waking him up on time.

Last night’s high-intensity labor, but thanks to the physique strengthened by the Golden Finger, he felt no discomfort at all, clearly the fatigue had completely disappeared after a night’s recovery.

He did not linger in bed, as in survival challenges, time is an even scarcer resource than food, and every minute must be carefully accounted for.

He quickly got out of his sleeping bag, dressed, and walked out of his temporary shelter.

The biting morning wind invigorated him, and then he began his routine morning tasks as usual.

He first walked towards the coniferous forest; this time, the multiple elastic snare traps still stood quietly there, showing no signs of having been triggered.

He was not surprised, not even saying a word in front of the camera.

The harvest from the traps is highly random, and the daily checking is more like a mandatory routine task, a continual investment in probability.

No harvest means there’s no need to spend time processing the catches.

He immediately changed direction, heading toward the bulrush gathering area, spending over an hour digging bulrushes, harvesting over ten pounds.

Then he hurried to the coastline, as today’s golden window period of low tide was approaching.

He easily arrived at the abundant rocky area, moving as efficiently as a precise gathering machine.

Bending down, searching, prying with a knife, placing things into the collecting bag… each action was crisp and clean, like a seasoned harvest worker; mussels, limpets, and sea snails were all his.

Just as he was about to leave, in a large tide pool surrounded by huge rocks and into which sunlight could penetrate, he made an unexpected discovery.

He turned over a stone submerged in water, seeing a hint of dark red deep in the cracks beneath.

It was a palm-sized rock crab, its movements slowed exceptionally due to the extremely low water temperature, almost like being frozen.

It just feebly waved its pincers once before Lin Yu’an easily grabbed it from the crevice.

“A surprise,” Lin Yu’an showed the nearly defenseless crab to the camera.

“Finding it in this season is quite lucky. It can add some extra flavor to tonight’s soup.”

He placed this sole, precious crab along with other seafood into the collecting bag.

In just over two hours, he harvested nearly twenty kilograms of seafood.

He swiftly returned to camp and began preparing a simple but high-protein brunch at the fastest pace possible.

He put the mussels, sea snails along with the rock crab, and at least two pounds of bulrush roots into the pot, adding a bit of lake water to cook them directly.

Soon, the water in the pot boiled, and the crab shell quickly turned an enticing bright red under the high temperature.

He first took out the crab, skillfully opened the shell, and a burst of fresh ocean aroma greeted him.

Although there’s not much crab meat, every shred was extremely delicious; this unexpected find added a rare delight to the monotonous breakfast.

By now it was already past eleven in the morning.

The sunshine was perfect, the wind had slightly weakened, yet he didn’t immediately start heavy masonry work.

Instead, he raised his head and glanced at the calm freshwater lake, a more efficient plan forming in his mind.

He said to the camera, “During intense construction periods, I can’t have a solid block of time to fish actively.”

“So, before starting today’s physical tasks, I must first set up a passive fishing system that can work automatically for 24 hours.”

“With some luck, this small effort might secure food for the coming days.”

He took out his Fishing Set from his backpack, that roll of sturdy Dyneema PE line and a small box of Gamma Kaze Hooks.

The first step was not to head to the water but to walk into the nearby woods, starting to seek perfect materials for making elastic rods.

“We can’t rely on there being suitable elastic trees along the water’s edge,” he explained to the camera while searching.

“The more reliable approach is to make fishing rods ourselves and then install them wherever we desire.”

“The best materials are saplings of birch or willow trees; their wood fibers are long and excellently tough.”

He quickly found an area in the forest with young birch trees growing, choosing three saplings about wrist-thick, straight, and over four meters long.

Using the Axe and saw, he swiftly felled them from the roots and cleaned off all the side branches, obtaining three smooth, slender elastic poles.

He carried these three future “automatic fishing rods” back to the freshwater lake.

Only then did he start surveying the terrain, looking for three perfect “workstations.”

Eventually, he picked out three spots several meters apart.

Next up was installing the fishing rods, which is not simply putting the poles into the ground.

He first used the back of the axe to deeply drive a sturdy, half-meter-long stake into the ground beside the first fishing spot.

Luckily, the soil by the riverbank was quite loose, not too hard to hammer it in without much effort.

Then, he tightly braced the thick end of the first birch pole against the rear of this main anchor point.

To prevent lateral movement of the pole, he pounded a thinner auxiliary stake into the ground on each side of the main anchor point, forming a stable “U” shape slot.

Finally, he used a piece of dismantled marine rope to firmly bind the base of the birch rod to the main anchor point, along with two auxiliary piles.

This way, no matter how strong the fish underwater is, it’s impossible to drag this fishing rod into the water.

This main anchor point + slot + binding triple fixation system forms the basis of an automated fishing device.

In the same manner, he firmly installed the other two birch rods in place.

Only then did he begin to focus on making the core trigger mechanism.

He decided to adopt the same, and what he believed to be the most classic and reliable “4” shaped trigger mechanism for all three fishing spots.

He picked up a dry stick as thick as his wrist from the shore, sharpened one end with an axe, and then “thud! thud!” hammered it firmly into the soil about a meter away from the shore.

This was the “pillar” of the first mechanism.

Next, he began finely crafting the other two components of the trigger mechanism with that Damascus hunting knife.

For the crossbar, he carved out a piece about 20 centimeters long, with a shallow groove for the fishing line at one end and a smooth contact surface at the other.

For the support rod, he precisely cut both ends of another branch at a 45-degree angle.

After making these three components, the most crucial “loading” step arrived.

He walked to the first birch rod that was already fixed in place, took a deep breath, and began to “wrestle” with this elastic rod.

Grabbing the slender tip of the birch rod with both hands, he used his entire weight to pull it step by step towards the ground.

The four-meter length made the seemingly slender rod burst with astounding resistance, trembling violently in his hands and making a “buzzing” sound.

Gritting his teeth, he pulled the tree top almost to the ground, forming a huge bow shape full of tension and potential energy.

He then positioned one end of the crossbar against the pillar and used the angled support rod to brace it precisely between the crossbar and the pillar.

As the final step, he looped a rope around the bent tip of the birch rod and over the end of the crossbar.

Let go!

In that instant, the immense tension was fully exerted on that small “4” shaped mechanism.

The three fragile sticks made a slight “creaking” sound, as if they would break apart at any moment, but they miraculously held firm!

A “bow” containing tremendous energy was tightly locked by an extremely intricate “trigger.”

The entire setup was filled with imminent tension, where any slight touch on the crossbar would cause the entire balance to collapse instantly.

In the next half hour, he meticulously “loaded” the other two fishing spots in the same way.

Three powerful devices quietly stood on the lakeshore.

With all the mechanisms completed, he began configuring the final fishing gear.

He cut a length of PE line several meters long for each spot and tied on appropriately sized hooks.

The bait was the liver and intestinal scraps left from processing a rabbit the day before, something that could attract fish.

He cast the first baited hook into the deep water area not far from the shore.

Then, he tightened the fishing line and carefully placed it in the groove of the “4” shaped trigger mechanism’s crossbar.

For the other two spots, he completed the final setup meticulously in the same exact way.

An hour later, when he finished all the arrangements, three loaded ‘automatic fishing rods’ stood quietly by the shore, ready to work.

They were like three set hunting traps, monitoring the underwater movement for him 24/7, waiting for the target to trigger the fatal mechanism.

“Alright.” Lin Yu’an brushed the mud off his hands, a satisfied smile on his face.

“The passive income system is established. Now, we can wholeheartedly focus on physical work.”

A little past noon, Lin Yu’an put on his gloves and headed towards the pit awaiting him.

The real tough battle was about to begin.

“Alright, everyone.”

He calmly stated to the camera, “Starting now, we officially enter the construction phase!”

“The weather is getting colder by the day. Our biggest enemy is time! So my plan is to have the stone wall built by today.”

With both hands gripping the crowbar, he began the core construction work of the day.

His build method involved starting directly from the uneven bottom of the pit to dry-lay the stone wall, leveling and stabilizing the foundation synchronously during the placement.

He chose to start from the southwest corner of the pit, where two walls intersect and bear the greatest stress.

He didn’t look for a perfect “foundation stone,” instead placing a selected, large main wall stone in the lowest position at the corner.

Standing on it, he pressed down to make it tightly bond with the soil.

Then, he took out another stone, attempting to place it adjacent, but due to the uneven ground, there was a noticeable gap and wobble between the two stones.

“This is the challenge of directly laying the wall!”

“We must resolve the ground’s unevenness issue from the first layer of construction.”

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep