If Shen Xiao followed his current path, looking toward the future, he might actually succeed in building a property management company or a third-party service. It is hard to say how successful he would be, but at the very least, he would be positioned to capture the initial wave of market dividends.
However, it was still too early. It was only 1980, and the real estate industry wouldn't even begin to emerge for at least another decade. The odd, unconventional way they collected "protection money" was, in reality, simply because Shen Xiao and his friends weren't bad people at heart. As for their fierce reputation, it was likely the result of local gossip and hearsay, gradually becoming mythologized.
"Aside from collecting protection money, where do you usually hang out, and what do you do?"
Chapter 77