"That's different. I teach sports, but I know that education gives you success, which sports can't guarantee. Look at me—I teach sports, but my real security comes from my government job, not from playing games."
"Dad, I'm not asking to become a professional player. I just want to get fit and healthy. It will help me concentrate better on studies too."
Mom, who had been listening from the kitchen, joined the conversation. "Jacob, let the boy play. He's been sick, and some exercise will do him good. Besides, he's promising to keep up with his studies."
Dad looked between us, considering. "Fine, but your grades better not slip. The moment I see any decline in your performance, you're out of the team."
"I promise, Dad. Thank you!" I couldn't contain my excitement.
Later that night, as I lay in bed, I thought about my plans. Bitcoin was still in its infancy, but I knew its potential. I needed to find a way to access computers regularly, maybe at the cyber café in town. But that would require money, and more importantly, I needed to be strategic about it.
I also thought about the land Dad had bought with Mom's insistence. At 150,000 rupay, it seemed like a huge investment now, but I knew it would be worth 2.5 million in the future. Mom's instincts about money were incredible, even though she had only studied till sixth grade.
"Tomorrow," I whispered to myself, "tomorrow I start changing everything."
The ceiling fan continued its rhythmic creaking above me, and for the first time in years—or perhaps in this new timeline—I fell asleep with hope instead of worry weighing on my mind. The future was uncertain, but it was mine to shape. As morning arrived, I Knew a loophole to get money which is crypto currency, I was a miner myself in 2018-19 but there was very little profits and more loss crypto was very unpredictable at that time.
Now, about the ideas for bitcoin mining—I think it would be possible, right? I had 110 rupay in my savings, money I'd been collecting from relatives during festivals and birthdays, carefully hidden in an old pencil box under my bed. I should go to the cyber café, but there was a problem—my mother wouldn't let me go alone, especially not far from the house.
There were two cafés where Kane and I used to go play games like GTA and Counter-Strike, which were just mythical experiences at that time. It cost 5 rupay per hour, and I had saved money exactly for going to play those games. But now I needed to check something else entirely.
"Kane, want to come with me to the cyber café?" I asked him the next Saturday morning after our football training session. "Sure, bro! Got money for games?" His eyes lit up with excitement.
Kane lived in the neighborhood too, so having him as company meant Mom wouldn't be stressed about where I was going. We walked to 'Digital Dreams,' the closer of the two cafés—a cramped room with about ten ancient computers that felt like pure magic to us kids.
"Two hours," I told Ramesh uncle, the owner, placing a 10 rupay note on the counter.
"Computer number 7 and 8," he muttered without looking up from his newspaper.
Sitting in front of the PC, I felt that familiar craving I'd always had for a computer at home. The feeling of touching a PC, the possibilities it represented—I'd made such a fuss about wanting one that Dad eventually bought a second-hand PC from his senior staff member in 2013. When that finally happened, I was on it day and night.
While Kane immediately launched Counter-Strike, I quietly opened the web browser and searched for bitcoin. My heart raced when I found what I was looking for—there was already mining code available on the official website. I copied it and installed it on the particular PC I was using, then started executing the chain of commands.
It started working! The mining process began, and according to the display, it was easy—about 0.5 bitcoin per minute was being mined. I couldn't believe how simple it was. but i will only get harder going further as this was initial phase of mining till GPU's kick in the game and make complexity to mine harder and Pool prizes will be introduced where multiple miners will mine a single bitcoin . but this initial phase only allowed to mine the bitcoin individually.
"Jake, what are you doing? Come play!" Kane called from his computer.
"Just checking something quickly," I replied, my eyes glued to the screen.