Chapter 55 - Chapter 54: Pangu Capital

David Chen's breathing had grown uneven. He could already see the dazzling future taking shape on the whiteboard in front of him. Each number he wrote down made his heart pound faster; each new zero seemed to echo like a drum in the quiet room."Yo… Yogan," he stammered at last, "this plan… it's perfect!"His voice trembled slightly with excitement, but also with apprehension. "But it also means the capital you'll have to invest will far exceed the previous budget!" He pointed to the string of zeros at the bottom of the board and swallowed hard. "The initial investment to become a controlling shareholder in AKA alone will be at least five million dollars. The complete renovation and remodeling of the gym? Another five million. That's already ten million in the first phase." He paused, wiping his palm on his trousers. "And that doesn't even include the annual scholarship fund or the ongoing operation and maintenance of the new team. Oh my God…" He glanced again at the numbers. "The total early-stage investment will exceed ten million U.S. dollars! And after that, the ongoing annual investment required to maintain all of this will surpass three million U.S. dollars. This…"He trailed off. For any ordinary athlete, this figure was astronomical, unthinkable.But Yogan's face did not even flicker."Money is not a problem," he said lightly, as if he were discussing the weather.The words hung in the air. For a second, David thought he'd misheard. But Yogan had already turned, walking back to his chair, his movements unhurried, deliberate. He opened his laptop—an encrypted, custom-built machine—its matte black casing absorbing the light like a predator in the shadows.Three layers of dynamic passwords slid away beneath his fingertips. An iris scan followed; the screen flickered once and unlocked with a soft chime. A simple interface appeared, stripped of any unnecessary ornamentation, the way a racing car has no extra weight. This was his main investment account.The header read: Private Bank Portfolio – Switzerland. The cool, professional interface had none of the flashy charts of public platforms. It was the digital vault for his war chest.He had deposited every dollar he earned from his earliest competitions and sponsorships here, moving it like a general deploying troops to a hidden base. With the memories of his past life as his secret weapon, he had swooped on technology companies that would become trillion-dollar giants in the future with the precision of a hawk diving on prey.The Total Assets line blinked back at him, stark and almost surreal:$385,000,000.Three hundred and eighty-five million U.S. dollars in liquid, accessible funds.Yet even this staggering sum was not the root of his confidence. The real power lay elsewhere—in high-potential investments that the market had not yet learned to measure.He had spent a considerable sum contacting a brilliant but then-obscure young entrepreneur and, as an angel investor, placed a critical amount of money in the startup still called "Toutiao" (Today's Headlines). In return, he received 5% of the original shares of what would one day be known to the world as the ByteDance Empire.He also held early shares of several companies that were now little more than names on an NDA list but which, in his memory, would rise into towering commercial empires.And that was still not all. With a keystroke, the interface changed to a simpler page: a single string of characters, modest and unadorned, but powerful enough to tilt the world.Assets: 50,000 BTC.This was the "digital gold" he had quietly accumulated through multiple channels, spending around five million dollars back in 2013, when Bitcoin hovered at about a hundred dollars. At that time, it had been almost all of his liquid capital—a complete gamble, a test of nerve.At current prices in mid-2015, this asset alone was already worth close to fifteen million dollars. Yet in his mind this was still only a seed, a "financial nuclear bomb" he had buried in the ground, waiting for the right moment to detonate. He knew better than anyone that a few years down the line, when the crazy wave swept across the globe, the value of these fifty thousand coins would dwarf his entire current portfolio.Tens of millions of dollars in investment? It was just a drop in his ocean.He was no longer a fighter clawing his way up for paychecks. Mixed martial arts had become something else for him—a passion, a calling, a dream. And this vast fortune was his fortress, built on the advantage of his rebirth, designed to clear every obstacle from his path.Yogan closed the laptop with a soft click and leaned back in his chair. His gaze swept across the stunned faces of his team—David Chen frozen mid-gesture, Isabella wide-eyed, Dr. Phil's pen suspended above his notebook."David. Isabella," Yogan said, his voice calm but carrying the firmness of a command. "Start the process now. Keep it low-key when you approach Coach Javier. Tell him this isn't a win, and it isn't charity. It's a champion fighter's most sincere gesture of gratitude toward the place he calls family."He paused, letting the words sink in. "You don't have to worry about money. From today on, get used to something." His lips curved in a faint, confident smile. "The only standard for what we do is 'the best,' not 'how expensive.'"He rose and walked to the window of his study. Outside, San Jose's evening sky glowed in bands of orange and violet. Somewhere beyond those clouds lay the arenas where his next wars would be fought. But here, in this quiet room, another battlefield was opening—one of capital, strategy, and influence."Fighting is my first battlefield," he thought to himself, watching the horizon. "But to sustain that battlefield, I need a stronger support."It was time.To manage and operate this enormous wealth systematically, he needed a professional family office—a central command center for his financial army. He would call it Pangu Capital. Like the mythical giant who split heaven and earth, this entity would be the foundation of his business empire during future wars and long after retirement.After David Chen and the others left, the study grew quiet again. Only Yogan remained, the glow of the laptop screen reflecting in his eyes. Cold numbers lined the display: three hundred and eighty-five million in liquid funds, not counting the original shares and the hidden Bitcoin fortune waiting to erupt.He exhaled slowly. If he left this money idling in a bank to earn meager interest, or if he deployed it carelessly based only on memory, it would be a waste—a dull knife instead of a sword.More importantly, he knew that money alone did not equate to power, especially in America. Money was at best the ticket into the casino. Real power was having a seat at the table, the right to speak—and the confidence to flip the table over if the dealer tried to cheat.As a Chinese rising in a fiercely competitive, often opaque environment, he knew his path would not be easy. He had no intention of becoming a fat sheep building an empire only to be slaughtered in the end. He would weave his money into an invisible protective net, a network reaching into both political and business circles, binding them like a hidden web.He didn't just want to be a player in the game; he wanted to be a chess player who could sit anywhere on the board, moving pieces on equal terms with the most powerful old men in the country."It's time," Yogan murmured, his eyes sharpening, the same glint appearing as when he prepared to knock out an opponent in the Octagon—calm, yet edged with madness.He picked up his phone and scrolled to a frequently used contact. The line rang three times before a deep, measured voice answered. It was a voice trained to sound calm under pressure, with the crisp enunciation of Wall Street."Yogan," the man said. "Congratulations on becoming champion. I watched the fight—it was fantastic. I assume you're not calling this late just for congratulations."A faint smile crossed Yogan's lips. The man on the other end was Li Wei, a high-ranking Chinese-American attorney who moved effortlessly between Wall Street boardrooms and Washington corridors of power—a "sharp knife" Yogan had prepared long ago."I'm calling," Yogan said quietly, "because it's time to begin."---