Recently, I looked back at a legendary chapter in the history of the crypto market, and I have to say: V God’s story is truly worth telling.

In 2014, during that trip to China, V God came to Hangzhou with a bold idea. At an exhibition, he distributed 5,000 Ethereum tokens, aiming to introduce people to his vision. At the time, nobody supported him—some even骂ed him to his face, calling him a scammer. But you know what happened? Those 5,000 tokens he gave away for free later surged to $150 million. That’s where the Ethereum story began.

Speaking of V God himself, his background is quite interesting. When he was 13, he became obsessed with World of Warcraft, and especially loved playing a Warlock. Then one day, Blizzard removed the skill he loved most, and the incident deeply shook him. He realized that in centralized systems, players are always in a passive position. This moment of clarity changed the trajectory of his life. At 17, he discovered Bitcoin, but the more he studied it, the more he saw Bitcoin’s limitations. So V God decided to create a stronger platform—Ethereum.

At the end of 2013, V God published that famous paper, “Ethereum: A Next-Generation Smart Contract and Decentralized Application Platform.” Once it was released, it caused a sensation in the Bitcoin community, and many people proactively sought to collaborate with him. In July 2014, Ethereum officially launched its crowdfunding and raised 31,000 Bitcoins in one go. Behind this was V God’s deep understanding of blockchain’s decentralization.

The story that followed became even more exciting. After the DAO incident in 2016, 3.6 million ETH were stolen by hackers. To make up for the losses, the Ethereum community decided to hard fork. But some insisted on not changing the on-chain data, and that ultimately led to a split—Ethereum Classic (ETC) and Ethereum (ETH) went their separate ways.

The 2017 bull market completely changed everything. ETH’s rise lifted the entire ecosystem. Prices for graphics cards skyrocketed because everyone wanted to take part in mining. Even crazier was the ICO wave—almost every project chose to issue tokens on Ethereum to raise funds, and EOS, Quant Chain, and others were all part of it. This frenzy lasted until September 2017, when countries began banning ICOs, and it gradually came to an end.

In the March 2020 crash, ETH fell from $1500 to $87, and it scared a lot of people. But then the explosion of DeFi rewrote everything. In 2020, DeFi’s total value locked exceeded $10 billion, growing by more than 2,000%. Projects like YFI saw gains reaching 1,000x or even 10,000x—these all rested on the Ethereum network.

2021 was another high point. ETH’s price surged to $4,850—an increase of 16,000 times compared with its initial issuance price. Virtual-world land and NFT projects took off alongside it, and the hype at the time was unimaginable.

In recent years, V God has been pushing Ethereum’s transition from PoW to PoS, and L2 networks have gradually matured. This also created new opportunities—many people earned airdropped tokens by participating in new projects through testnets, and some even made tens of millions of dollars this way.

Today, competition in the L2 track is fierce. ARB, OP, STRK, and others each show their strengths, and it’s still hard to say who will win in the future. But no matter what, V God and the Ethereum he created have already become legends in the blockchain world. At present, the ETH price is fluctuating around $2290; ETC is at $9.41; and YFI is at $2770. Behind these numbers are a series of exciting stories.

Whether you’re a newcomer or a veteran, Ethereum’s development path is well worth a deep dive. This project has already rewritten the landscape of the crypto world, and it has given everyone the chance to take part. V God’s story is still unfolding, and the future of Ethereum is definitely worth looking forward to.