Sports Medicine Master System

At the Retirement Center, Sun Keming cautiously approached Han Zhilu's door. He looked left and right, making sure no one was around.

The Retirement Center was quite large. With over thirty of them, each person could have several rooms to themselves.

He knocked on the door, but there was no answer.

Sun Keming wasn't surprised. In his eyes, Han Zhilu was an oddball, especially his personality—it was particularly strange. It wasn't that he didn't understand social etiquette; he just couldn't be bothered to talk to you most of the time.

He pushed the door open. Sure enough, Han Zhilu was inside, engrossed in a book.

Sun Keming glanced at it. The title was *Basketball Tactical Theory*.

Chen Yu had arranged for someone to deliver them the day before yesterday, one for each person.

The problem was, it was the basketball team that got one copy per person. Why would a soccer player like him be reading up on basketball tactics?

That was why Sun Keming always found Han Zhilu strange—he did things his own way.

Pulling a chair over, Sun Keming sat down in front of Han Zhilu. He slyly pushed down the book in Han Zhilu's hands and said, "Old Han, stop reading. I've got something cool to show you."

He looked at Han Zhilu expectantly, hoping he would curiously ask what this "cool thing" was.

But clearly, he had miscalculated. Han Zhilu's calm expression offered no emotional feedback whatsoever.

'What am I even expecting?' he muttered to himself. Making a "Ta-da!" sound with his own mouth, Sun Keming pulled a phone from behind his back as if performing a magic trick.

"Look, a brand-spanking-new Motorola Razr V3!"

His pronunciation of the word "Razr" wasn't quite right.

Waving the new phone in front of Han Zhilu's face, Sun Keming said smugly, "Look at how thin it is, thinner than paper! Isn't it cool? And check out the feel in your hand—it's incredibly comfortable. And the sound of the flip... just listen to how crisp that is."

"The best part is the price. It just came out back home, and you might not even get it for seven thousand yuan. But here? 500 US dollars. You can buy it at any roadside shop. It's half the price!"

"Now I get why those people from my mom's workplace always ask others to bring stuff back for them when they go abroad on business trips. After the currency conversion, it's a real bargain with the US Dollar."

"So, what do you think? Tempted? Call me 'bro,' and I'll let you play with it for a couple of days."

Going by their birthdays, he was actually two months older than Han Zhilu, but in front of the mature-beyond-his-years Han Zhilu, he always felt like he was the younger one.

Han Zhilu silently rolled his eyes at Sun Keming, then casually opened a nearby desk drawer, pulled out an equally new V3, and tossed it on the table.

Seeing Sun Keming's jaw drop, and as if that shock wasn't enough, Han Zhilu opened the cabinet below and pulled out three more brand-new, unopened V3s in one go.

"Still want me to call you 'bro'?"

Han Zhilu gave Sun Keming a faint glance before lowering his head and returning to his book.

Sun Keming's eye twitched violently. Han Zhilu was so low-key that it was easy to forget he had a billion-dollar fortune waiting for him to inherit.

"Let's not talk about that."

Sun Keming pressed down on Han Zhilu's book again. "Old Han, we've been here for a few days now, right? Four days, if you count the day we landed. And what's the result? They have us cooped up in these dorms all day, not letting us wander around. It feels like we're in prison."

"Also, they said we were coming abroad for training. So, where's the training?"

He spread his hands and lowered his voice. "Old Han, you don't think we've been tricked, do you? Lured overseas to be illegal laborers?"

Han Zhilu frowned slightly.

But Sun Keming was just getting warmed up. "And this foreign country isn't what I imagined. What did *Yi Lin* say? That public safety abroad is great, people don't even lock their doors at night. But I keep hearing people say that lots of places outside are a total mess, with people carrying guns all the time and police not caring if someone gets shot. Are they just trying to scare us?"

Han Zhilu cut him off. "Is this all you came here to talk to me about?"

Sun Keming pouted. "I'm just worried, okay? My mom calls me every day, crying and saying she regrets it and all that. By the way, Old Han, your family is so rich, and you're good at school. Did your parents just agree to let you come abroad?"

At the mention of this, a flicker of emotion passed through Han Zhilu's eyes.

'Agree?'

'When I suggested I wanted to give up my studies to play soccer, my mother nearly smashed the house to pieces and threatened to go on a hunger strike.'

'Han Zhilu had expected his mother's reaction to be intense, but not *this* intense.'

'For a moment, Han Zhilu had also thought about backing down.'

'But his love for soccer, and his desire to escape a life that had been planned out for him, made him persevere.'

'The only thing that brought Han Zhilu comfort was that his usually silent father had actually supported him.'

'For the first time, Han Zhilu sat with his father and they polished off a bottle of aged Maotai.'

'In his drunken haze, Han Zhilu didn't remember much, except for his father telling him that if he wanted something, he should strive for it, and no matter what difficulties he faced, he had to hold on.'

'Han Zhilu had heard those words at least a hundred times, and read them in books even more, but only at that moment did he truly understand their meaning.'

Snapping out of his reverie, Han Zhilu was as calm as ever. "A world-class miracle doctor has nothing better to do than trick a little brat like you into being an illegal laborer? You've got some imagination. Just sit tight, don't mess around with Song Jun and the others, and wait patiently for instructions."

This trip wasn't for a few months, but for several years. They had all the time in the world.

Sun Keming flopped back onto Han Zhilu's bed, staring at the ceiling. "To be honest, I'm just a little lost. Back then, on impulse, I thought I truly loved soccer—the kind of love that lasts a lifetime. And I thought about the day I could wear the National Team jersey and play for our country. What an honor that would be."

"Old Han, do you think we can make it?"

Sun Keming abruptly propped himself up, his expression serious as he asked the question.

He had neglected soccer for two or three years. He had no idea why Chen Yu had chosen him.

This time, Han Zhilu's expression grew uncharacteristically serious. He thought for a moment and said, "I don't know if we can make it or not. But for the sake of that dream in our hearts, why not give it our all? Even if we fail, at least we won't have any regrets."

Sun Keming was stunned for a long moment.

The reason he had come in the first place was, just as Han Zhilu said, mostly for that dream in his heart.

The dream of one day playing for his country and winning glory for it.

A hot-blooded teenager couldn't resist such a temptation.

Pouting, Sun Keming said, "Of course *you* won't have regrets. If you fail, you can just go back and inherit your family fortune. What about me? It's not easy to get a job at my mom's workplace, and they say you need a diploma and stuff now."

After saying that, Sun Keming felt agitated himself. He glanced at the wall clock and said, "Ah, forget it. Let's not talk about it. Come on, let's go eat."

It was time to eat.

He got up and dragged Han Zhilu out the door.

By the time they strolled over to the cafeteria, quite a few people had already arrived.

A few kids they knew waved them over to sit down.

"Chen Mo, why is everyone here already?" Sun Keming asked as he sat down.

At their age, they rarely ate at a set time.

Just as they were talking, Chen Yu appeared in the cafeteria with a group of people.

Chen Yu scanned all the boys present. They were trickling in, but it seemed everyone was here now.

Chen Yu clapped his hands, signaling for everyone to be quiet.

"We can talk about things while we eat. Come on, line up to get your boxed meal when your name is called."

At Chen Yu's signal, a chef behind the serving counter began to call out their names awkwardly.

Confused, the boys went up one by one to get their food.

"What's the meaning of this?" Sun Keming asked, a bit dumbfounded as he held a meal box the size of a washbasin.

Before, it had always been a buffet where they could take whatever they wanted.

'The thing is, I don't have this big of an appetite.'

Sun Keming opened the box. Rice, vegetables, shrimp, pan-fried steak, fish, and so on.

Over by the serving counter, Chen Yu, Nelson, and the others also got their meal boxes and found a place to sit.

While opening his meal box, Chen Yu announced, "Your training officially begins today. And the first phase of your training, the most important task, is to eat."

As he spoke, a staff member handed each of them a form.

"Holy cow, they want me to eat my way to 70 kilograms in three months? I'm only 58 kilograms now!" Sun Keming couldn't help but exclaim after glancing at the form.

He turned to look at Han Zhilu's form.

Han Zhilu also needed to gain weight up to 70 kilograms.

"Should be easy enough," Sun Keming muttered.

'Gorging yourself every day, gaining 10 kilos in three months should be a piece of cake.'

"Easy?"

Han Zhilu snorted softly.

'He had a feeling that when Chen Yu talked about gaining weight, he didn't mean just any kind of weight.'

'It's easy to gain fat, but gaining muscle? That's not easy at all.'