When I first entered the crypto world, I really didn’t understand anything. My friends kept whispering in my ear that Bitcoin would skyrocket, but I couldn’t listen at all, thinking it was just a pipe dream. Later, with nothing to do, I decided to try my luck with 2,000 yuan, since I was in a casual mood anyway.

Just a few days later, those 2,000 yuan turned into 4,000. My mind was buzzing, sitting there repeatedly checking my account balance, afraid I was seeing things.

From that moment on, I was completely hooked. During the day, I still pretended to work seriously, but at night I would sit in front of my computer, eyes glued to the candlestick charts, afraid of missing any buy or sell point. Any market movement would make my heart race.

The money I made early on wasn’t much, but as I became more skilled, I grew bolder. From spot trading to futures, from mainstream coins to various altcoins. Any strange coin or dog coin, as long as I heard it might rise, I dared to buy directly. At my peak, I could earn several thousand yuan a day, and my account balance once soared to over 2 million.

Back then, I was floating on cloud nine. Work? I had long stopped caring about it. All I thought about was retiring by 30, taking my parents abroad for vacations, driving a Tesla to a café for afternoon tea, sipping coffee while watching the market. I was living in this wealth fantasy.

But the market is never merciful. How brutal can the plunge of an altcoin be? A 50% drop in a day is just the appetizer. The day before, I was still calculating my account figures, and the next day, half of my funds had evaporated. That feeling of falling from heaven into hell is indescribably painful.

It made me realize that my previous small gains were purely luck and chance. The real market risk is far more ferocious than I had imagined.