1998: The Prophetic Billionaire

No status screen, no gacha. His only advantage is a fragmentary, hazy memory of the future, steeped in regret.

In his previous life, Jiang Yi watched one opportunity after another pass him by. Betrayed by his partners, burned by bad investments, left with regrets about his loved ones, he came to a miserable end. Then he opened his eyes and found himself back in the height of summer, 1998.

The aftershocks of mass layoffs had yet to fade. The golden age of real estate was about to begin, the domestic internet was still in its infancy, and undercurrents were stirring in factories beyond the Shanhaiguan Pass, southern wholesale markets, and Hong Kong's trade channels.

With only a few hundred yuan in his pocket, he started by running a street stall, trading spare parts, and building small websites.

The dot-com bubble, SARS, the 2008 financial crisis, the mobile internet boom, the turning point for new energy... His memories could point him in the right direction, but they couldn't warn him of the traps.

Suppliers going under, competitors ganging up on him, investors trying to poach his people, old brothers falling out over their visions, sudden shifts in policy: one wrong step could send him plunging into an abyss.

He didn't put his faith in financial speculation. Grounding himself in real industry, he expanded into supermarkets, manufacturing, the internet, and new energy.

He wasn't a chosen one, just a tide-chaser who'd seen the script of the times ahead of schedule, but still had to fight his way through the mire of reality.

When the Forbes list was updated, the world finally saw that not a scrap of luck from heaven had gone into the making of this business empire, raised from the depths of the tide.