There is no negativity without reason.

Niu’er had been Bai Haonan’s closest friend since their days at the youth sports academy. Back then, Chen Sufen was the little tagalong who trailed behind their group of boys. Only those who were truly close called him Niu’er; everyone else used his nickname, Oxherd. Of course, Niu Haisheng wasn’t his real name either. That year, when they’d just joined the professional ranks, a famous movie had come out with a protagonist called Oxherd—a role that seemed tailor-made for Niu’er: honest-faced, always bullied by girls, lacking any of that cinematic halo, a classic fool in Bai Haonan’s eyes, forever unable to win a girl’s heart, yet stubbornly determined to find a beautiful and virtuous wife. For someone barely out of the beginner’s village, he insisted on setting himself a final boss-level challenge—if he ended up single for life, it was his own fault!

Merging onto the expressway, Bai Haonan pulled out the SIM card from the small county town and tossed it aside. Once he entered the provincial capital, he switched back to his original Jiangzhou license plate, unwilling to let the police catch him on such details.

After leaving the convenience store, he opened a water bottle, hydrating Ada as he dialed Oxherd’s number. The other side answered groggily: “What the hell… who is this…”

Bai Haonan kept things simple, as he did with Chen Sufen: “It’s me. Know I’m in trouble yet? Are you free?”

The voice instantly sobered: “Lao Nan?! Is it really you?”

Bai Haonan, infected by his friend’s energy, smiled more broadly: “It’s me. Still sleeping alone?”

The other side erupted into cheerful curses: “Damn it! Where are you? When can I see you? I don’t have much here, but if you come, anything you need, I’ll get it!”

Bai Haonan, ever the tease, pressed on: “You know my hobbies—just two things!”

The voice grew even more animated: “Lao Nan! Screw you!”

Bai Haonan, basking in the sunny warmth of this coastal province, replied, “Come on! North City Science Avenue gas station. I’m all cleaned up, waiting for you.”

The other side was almost incoherent with excitement: “Holy crap! Wait—wait, wait…”

Bai Haonan had to hang up, as the receiver was filled with nonsense. This guy was truly hopeless. Couldn’t he see it was a local number?

He really was a bit slow; half an hour later, he actually called back to say he was lost. Bai Haonan rolled his eyes and enlisted the gas station staff to help him figure out the location, then drove off through the newly developed grid of streets to find Oxherd.

For a Jiangzhou native, this wasn’t surprising. Jiangzhou was built along the mountains, so locals had no sense of cardinal directions. Whenever they encountered neatly laid-out streets in other cities, they got confused. Still, Oxherd had been here three or four years and seemed to rarely leave his place.

A perfectly ordinary Wuling Hongguang seven-seater van sat stupidly by the roadside. When Bai Haonan’s little white car pulled up, a slightly chubby fellow nearly leapt onto the hood, grinning so hard that Bai Haonan hurriedly braked and jumped out: “Don’t mess with my car! I might have to give it back to Fen’er one day!”

Oxherd—skin dark, hair wild—rushed over and hugged Bai Haonan’s waist, squeezing him with the fervor of a woman desperate to melt into her man: “Damn! No wonder you disappeared for months—you really were hiding out with Fen’er!”

Bai Haonan struggled free, inspecting his friend’s face: “Damn, can’t you tidy yourself up? You look like a stray mutt from an African mine!”

Oxherd retorted, “Like you’ve been to Africa! Look at your beard—you really could have come from there! If not for your car, I wouldn’t have recognized you. When I heard you were in trouble, I just waited for news. I knew you’d be fine—always so smart and sly!” Despite his words, the big man’s eyes grew a little red.

Bai Haonan slapped his shoulder, carefree: “Alright, alright, I obviously went after girls first before coming to you. Come on, help me find a place to stay. If I can, I’ll stick around; if not, I’ll just see you and go.”

Oxherd was so reluctant to part, he almost didn’t want to drive separately. If Bai Haonan hadn’t for once cleared the passenger seat, he would have abandoned his own car to squeeze into Bai Haonan’s. Bai Haonan introduced his new companion: “Ada here already helped me score with a girl! So, any luck with women lately?”

Oxherd shot him a disdainful look: “I believe in real feelings!” But still, he seemed energized. “I have a girlfriend now!”

Bai Haonan was genuinely happy for him: “That’s great! Dinner’s on me tonight!” Then he remembered that after filling his tank, he was nearly broke—otherwise, he wouldn’t have called Oxherd from here in the first place.

Luckily, Oxherd bailed him out: “Not here, we’ll talk when we get there. Come on, I’ll go first. I want to chat—why don’t you ride with me? I’ve got air conditioning!”

Guixi was definitely hotter than Rongdu; even in autumn, the sun still beat down. Bai Haonan mocked his honest friend again: “Haven’t you heard of hands-free calling?”

Oxherd suddenly realized and did as told. For the past few years, he’d only returned to Jiangzhou for New Year’s, still working here as assistant coach for the club. In a province without a top league team, this so-called club was just a semi-professional ragtag group. They’d tried for three years straight to get into the Second Division without success—still not at professional level.

Bai Haonan, having drifted through the football world for twenty years, knew exactly what the state of the game was in China, but when he saw where Oxherd parked, he was still shocked. This was called a club?

The entire club consisted of two prefab cabins.

Yes, the kind you’d see on a construction site, not even two stories—just two containers, really, housing both coaches and players.

The cabins stood beside a patch of artificial turf—a rented private university sports field. The university itself, short on funds, had never been built; ironically, they’d constructed the sports field first, to cut the ribbon and swindle investment. So, the club sat at the edge of this half-finished, half-abandoned lot. Thank goodness this was Guixi, a tropical region where it was spring or summer year-round. Next to the field stood a bamboo pavilion almost as long as the pitch, the kind used for farmhouse restaurants—five or six meters wide, dozens of meters long, with half-height bamboo railings and black shade cloth hanging above. This served as gym, meeting room, indoor training facility, and most of the time, a cool place to sleep—as long as it didn’t rain or storm, the players preferred to sleep here.

Such was the state of Chinese football. Except for the top two leagues, the real grassroots were worse off than construction workers.

And yet they still babbled about breaking out of Asia and conquering the world. From the moment he got out of the car, Bai Haonan’s face was full of scorn.

Damn it all, after more than a decade of so-called professional leagues, nothing had changed!

Not even the slightest improvement.

In fact, it was worse than before.

Once again, Bai Haonan felt a chill in his heart at this reality.

What dreams or future were worth talking about in this situation?

He’d been asking himself this for over ten years. What else could he do besides football?

He didn’t understand why things were this way—whether it was the system or the economy. For twenty years, all he’d seen was this bizarre, incomprehensible mess.

So, he might as well just muddle through.