"...I remember that game vividly. At the start of the second half, Ah Gan came up to me and said that the reason he only scored 7 points in the first half was that he didn't want to." I told him that was just self-comforting, but he responded, "No, this is a preview for you."
Back then, I was just 15 years old. I thought to myself, 'Damn, I'm in for trouble.' Honestly, I never care much about trash talk. Most people just blow hot air, blabbering away—it's more about venting and means nothing.
But Gan was different. Every word he uttered was meticulously crafted, part of a grand scheme, a delicate trigger for the trap he laid.
Of course, this was something I only understood much later, and at that time Gan was only 16 years old. To tell you the truth, if Gan ran for mayor against me in 2008, I would have dropped out and become his assistant, pushing him to the governor's seat or even higher."
