Kobe's Success Made Li Fei's Teammates Jealous!

Inside Madison Square Garden's practice facility, the atmosphere was nowhere near as frenzied as Wall Street. Instead, a subtle stagnation hung in the air.

The basketball bounced rhythmically against the hardwood, producing dull thumps—bang, bang.

Kobe Bryant was running shuttle drills, catching passes and pulling up for jumpers. Sweat had long since soaked through the practice vest bearing the Li Fei Brand logo.

Every leap of his was explosively powerful, every release textbook-perfect. The basketball traced a graceful arc through the air before swishing cleanly through the net.

The unprecedented success of Mamba I had propelled him overnight from a promising young prospect into one of the league's hottest icons. The media flashbulbs, the fanatical adoration of fans, and the rapidly climbing numbers in his bank account all told him clearly that he was on a broad road toward greatness.

Yet in this arena that belonged to the Knicks, he could keenly sense that something was quietly changing.

"Larry, beautiful pass!"

Allan Houston took a clever bounce pass from "Grandmama" Larry Johnson and calmly knocked down a mid-range jumper. The two high-fived in celebration, professional smiles on their faces, though those smiles did not seem to reach their eyes.

When Kobe finished a set and walked to the sideline for a towel, he could feel those seemingly casual glances.

Larry Johnson, the former king of the Charlotte Hornets, an all-around forward known for his toughness and power, was now looking at him with complicated eyes.

There was satisfaction in that gaze. After all, Kobe's success also meant enormous profits for both the team and the brand they had invested in together. But even more than that, there was wariness at being challenged by the next generation, along with a faint distance that was hard to detect.

Allan Houston, the league-renowned