Chapter 1: The Boy Who Shared a Name with Tsubasa Ozora

“Don’t worry, I’m doing just fine. Mom, come on, you know the winters here are about the same as back home—there’s no way I’d catch a chill,” Dai Zhiwei said, holding the receiver, leaning against the rooftop railing, gazing at the scene through the apartment windows across the street.

“Yeah, Mom, I know. I promise, this New Year I’ll bring Tingting home with me.” As his mother’s nagging filtered through the earpiece, Dai Zhiwei silently sipped his Budweiser, then forced a bright laugh. “Just the other day, she was saying she wanted to buy you a designer handbag. Yes! That LV everyone’s always talking about online. Mm, it didn’t cost that much.”

“...”

“Oh, you mean my boss? He’s really easygoing, a great guy. Just yesterday he said if we have to work overtime during the holidays, he’ll see about giving me a bigger year-end bonus. Not that I expect it to be much...”

It was New Year’s Day, 2021. There was still a month to go before the Spring Festival, and those far from home missed most keenly that place which, though perhaps neither grand nor even comfortable, was still their home.

Going home for the New Year—it’s an attachment no one in our country can ever truly sever.

“Yeah, I need to get back to work in a bit… You and Dad take care of yourselves, okay? You know, there aren’t any holidays abroad, so we reporters just have to stick around here… I’m hanging up now, bye!”

No sooner had Dai Zhiwei put down the phone than he let out a long sigh. His face instantly shifted from exuberance to dejection. He ran a hand through his hair in frustration and cursed under his breath, “Damn it.”

Dai Zhiwei had majored in Chinese literature, with a minor in journalism. Upon graduating, he’d earned dual degrees and stayed in the city where he’d gone to university, working as a football reporter for an online sports channel for three years now.

As a football reporter, Dai Zhiwei was hardly a success. His passion was the Premier League, but lacking inside information, he could only fabricate sensational “exclusives”—one day Mourinho and Pogba would come to blows, the next Courtois would be “cheating” on a Real Madrid teammate.

Imagination: the survival skill of sports reporters in his country.

Yet these fabrications brought little real progress. Nearing thirty, Dai Zhiwei saw no future. As for the girlfriend and the year-end bonus he’d just mentioned on the phone—those were pure fiction.

He sighed, tossed the empty Budweiser can into the trash, and opened a well-worn comic book—“Captain Tsubasa.”

For many born in the ‘90s, their love for football was sparked by Ronaldo, Beckham, or perhaps the national team’s first entry into the World Cup in 2002. But for Dai Zhiwei, it all began with “Captain Tsubasa.”

There was a special reason: in the Cantonese-dubbed version, the protagonist—Tsubasa Ozora—shared his very name, Dai Zhiwei.

The comic was a pirated edition, smelling of cheap paper, but Dai Zhiwei still treasured it.

The title page was yellowed and torn, the ink nearly faded away.

“Are you happy with your life?
Is this really how you want to spend it?”

Annoyed, Dai Zhiwei sat up abruptly and kicked the can hard.

The empty room echoed as the can hit the wall, but no one answered him.

...

A whirlwind of questions spun in his groggy mind—faces both familiar and strange, fragments of memories he almost recognized yet couldn’t grasp, flickering past like shadows.

Suddenly, Dai Zhiwei’s eyes snapped open. The world spun in dizzy confusion. He closed his eyes, steadied himself, and waited for the vertigo to fade before cautiously opening them. Instinctively, he stood up from his seat, his mind still in disarray.

He found himself in a modest room that looked like a locker room. A dozen or so young men were talking excitedly, and a few glanced his way, their expressions tinged with envy.

“Hey! Zhiwei, you can’t be like this!” A handsome young man squeezed over and slapped him on the shoulder.

Startled out of his reverie, Dai Zhiwei turned to look at the man, mind racing. “Wait, isn’t this Zhang Linpeng? Why is he talking to me like we’re close? This feels so familiar…”

“Can you tell me where this is?” Dai Zhiwei realized everything around him felt foreign—maybe he’d been kidnapped? The question slipped out unconsciously.

The other man was taken aback for a moment, then grinned. “Zhiwei! Are you joking, or just overexcited? Didn’t Coach Cannavaro just say you might get to play in the second half? Come on! This is Tianhe Stadium—our home ground!”

“Tianhe Stadium?” Dai Zhiwei repeated. Of course he knew it: the home of Guangzhou Evergrande in the Chinese Super League. But how on earth did he get here?

“Hey! Zhiwei, how long are you going to zone out? The second half is about to start. Are you scared you’ll embarrass yourself on the pitch?”

“Second half?” Dai Zhiwei was still bewildered.

“Alright, Linpeng! Stop teasing him. Everyone’s nervous their first time playing pro—no one’s that much better than the rest,” another man interjected.

“Zheng Zhi?”

Zheng Zhi, captain of Guangzhou Evergrande, came over and clapped Dai Zhiwei on the neck. “Zhiwei, you only just made the first team this year, but we’ve all been there. You did great in the reserves—don’t be nervous. The Super League’s not as scary as all that.”

“Okay, captain.” Once he got the answer he wanted, Dai Zhiwei muttered an apology and stumbled into the bathroom. He stared at the young, handsome face in the mirror, a sense of unreality washing over him.

He was no longer the man he used to be, but his university-aged self—same face, same physique.

Suddenly, a wave of dizziness hit, as though something massive was being forced into his mind. If he hadn’t braced himself against the wall, he might have collapsed into the toilet.

“So… is this a rebirth?” It took a while before Dai Zhiwei could make sense of the new memories that had flooded his mind.

This Dai Zhiwei’s life had started out just like his own, but diverged in middle school. Instead of entering the city’s top high school, he’d been selected for the Genbao Football Academy, and at nearly eighteen, had been recruited by Guangzhou Evergrande’s reserves for a 300,000 yuan training fee. At the start of this year, impressive performances had seen him promoted to the first team, where he’d become part of Evergrande’s Super League and Asian Champions League squad.

“Zhiwei, you feeling better? Don’t be nervous—it’s just your first time playing for the first team!” Zhang Linpeng’s voice called from outside the bathroom.

Suppressing his shock, Dai Zhiwei replied, “Zhang, I’m much better now—just give me two more minutes and I’ll come out!”

“Alright!”

After dealing with his closest teammate, Dai Zhiwei looked at his fresh, youthful face in the mirror, feeling a strange blend of familiarity and alienation.

Cold water cleared his head. The phone in his pocket clearly showed the date: March 9, 2015—his first day after being reborn.

Dai Zhiwei had no idea why he’d woken up in 2015. In cheesy online novels, people usually got reborn after some freak accident, but him? He’d just gone to sleep.

He touched his still-youthful, slightly handsome face, lifted his shirt—his beer belly of six years was gone. In its place were six-pack abs, and his former 160-pound bulk had vanished, replaced by a perfect 175-centimeter frame.

“If only I’d been reborn as a third-generation red aristocrat—aren’t there plenty of political novels where that happens?” Dai Zhiwei grumbled, still a little dissatisfied.

But then…

“Huh? Why… why is the phone in my pocket my old Huawei P20? Did Huawei even make this model yet?”

Just then, he heard music.

When the ringtone sounded, Dai Zhiwei didn’t react at first—everyone else should be in the locker room, and the bathroom was deserted. The noise startled him.

The grating sound continued. Then it dawned on him—could it be his phone ringing?

“This phone?”

Hesitating, Dai Zhiwei opened the phone’s operating system again, but found no incoming call. He wondered if someone was playing a prank, or if he was using it wrong.

“Ding!” Suddenly, a voice sounded in his ear.

“Personal data read complete. System binding successful!”

Another deep, magnetic voice echoed in his mind, startling Dai Zhiwei.

He quickly lowered his head, staring intently at the phone screen, which glowed with golden light—so bright it was blinding. As the light faded, Dai Zhiwei peered anxiously at the display.

“What the hell is this? Some kind of cheat code?”