Why is Mahjong considered the essence of Chinese culture? (Rhetorical)

We all know that Mahjong is the quintessence of Chinese culture, but how many people know why it is considered as such? The original name of Mahjong should be "Ma Jiang", which refers to the 108 heroes of the novel "Water Margin". It was said that there was a man named Wan Bingyao in the late Yuan Dynasty and early Ming Dynasty, who highly admired the Liangshan heroes depicted by Shi Nai'an. In order to let the nobles also know the stories of "Water Margin" and thus care for and protect the people, he invented Mahjong and incorporated the Water Margin heroes into this game.