“What a twisted sense of humor, taking advantage of someone who doesn’t understand Chinese to give them a nickname like that. But honestly, it’s pretty fitting…” Brian Carter thought about his predecessor and this best friend who was doing the best among them—both had personalities just like Teddy…

Brian Carter didn’t call back right away. Even though he had the original Brian Carter’s memories, he was a completely different person now.

It wasn’t like he’d get dissected if he slipped up, but explaining things would always be a hassle.

Just then, a text message came in, from “Teddy.”

“Noah, there are a few new girls at the East Suburb Hotel tonight. Want to try something fresh?”

Seeing this message, Brian Carter immediately understood what it meant and couldn’t help but be exasperated!

After checking their previous chat history, Brian Carter had a rough idea of how to communicate with Teddy and replied, “The girl from last night is still with me. You go have fun, and tell me how it was afterward.”

A while later, Brian Carter received a reply: “OK.”

Sure enough, just as Brian Carter remembered, the other party didn’t find anything odd about this kind of response.

That evening, as planned in the morning, Brian Carter got ready to have a good meal.

But when it came time to call the restaurant he frequented—according to the notes in his memory—he hesitated. In the end, he only ordered a few dishes that, after asking, he learned were low in calories and fat, and high in protein.

Since the tryout was in just two days, and since the goal was to have a stunning performance, Brian Carter felt he needed to prepare right from the start.

Maybe skipping one high-calorie meal wouldn’t make a huge difference in adjusting his body, but he’d do his best.

That was the key to how Brian Carter survived in such a harsh environment in his previous life: whatever he did, he had to give it his all—everything was for survival…

……

……

The next morning at six, Brian Carter set an alarm on purpose and got up early.

Yawning, he checked the time: April 10, 2009…

“So it really wasn’t a dream…” Brian Carter didn’t feel upset or depressed, nor did he particularly want to travel back.

Since he was here, he might as well settle in.

However, Brian Carter felt his body’s strong resistance to getting up early and couldn’t help but complain, “Man… even if I keep wasting my youth and don’t play basketball, I might not even get my diploma!”

In this timeline, the original Brian Carter had paid to attend a private university in the U.S. but hadn’t studied seriously. American universities are different from those in China—the entrance exams here are relatively easy, especially for private universities. No matter how good a private university is, if you have money, getting in isn’t too hard.

But relatively speaking, at a place like the University of Phoenix—the largest private university in North America—graduating is actually harder than at public universities…

You can enroll and pay tuition, but if you want a diploma… the school won’t just hand one out to a poor student and let them tarnish its reputation.

Why did the original Brian Carter have a shot at joining the NCAA? Precisely because the University of Phoenix isn’t a Division I NCAA school—it’s just a large private university.

Of course, with over 200 campuses and more than 300,000 students, it’s not a bad university. In fact, as a private university, it receives billions in federal education funding every year.

But in the NCAA sports world, the University of Phoenix is just one of thousands of unremarkable schools. In over 30 years of history, its basketball team has never even made the round of 64. The only NBA player even remotely connected to it is Shaquille O’Neal, who studied for a master’s in business administration there after being traded to the Suns.

At a school like this, a tall guard like Brian Carter with good athleticism and decent skills wouldn’t have much trouble making the basketball team—at least, before Brian Carter wrecked his body to the point of kidney deficiency…

Also, there are quite a few Asian students on various college sports teams in the U.S. There are so many Asians—making up two-thirds of the world’s population—but basically, they’re not on Division I college teams.

There were still classes in the morning. If it were the original Brian Carter, after working so hard the night before and still feeling exhausted, he probably wouldn’t have gone to class. The school was lax about attendance, and as for whether you could graduate… they’d already collected your tuition, so who cared.

But the current Brian Carter wasn’t like that. When it was time to study, he studied. The NBA path looked almost impossible, but if there was a chance to change his life, Brian Carter wouldn’t refuse—he’d prepare as best he could for any opportunity. Still, he needed a backup plan, and studying was important.

It was still early for class, so Brian Carter got up at six to test his physical condition.

After washing up, Brian Carter ran a few laps around the hill where the villa was located, then did a quick sprint. He was soon gasping for breath and could only jog slowly for the remaining laps.

“Whew… I really… whew… want to strangle that bastard. Wait, I guess I already am him now…”

Brian Carter hadn’t expected that the athletic star in his memories—who was first in both long-distance and sprints at his high school sports meets in China—would be almost ruined after just a year in America!

This physical condition was even worse than Brian Carter had imagined.