The Way of the Blind Girl Chess Saint

How should we approach this situation? Wang Xi frowned.

"Looking at her... was she serious? Or was she just fooling Senior Wang Xi?"

A boy wearing large black-rimmed glasses murmured softly.

That corner can only be ignored for now. Wang Xi was afraid of making a wrong move. Wouldn't it be very embarrassing for the president of the Go club to lose to a new member?

In that case, we can only move the star position that Ji Yingting is in on our side, in the lower left corner.

After thinking for only a dozen seconds, Wang Xi made his decision.

"F-17, small skid plate"

Ji Yingting picked up the teacup with both hands, took a small sip of tea, and kept her hands flat on her knees when she wasn't making a move.

After thinking for a moment, Ji Yingting reached into the chess box with her right hand and slowly picked up a white piece.

"I16, two high-clamped bays"

Another crisp sound rang out as Ji Yingting placed her piece with exceptional grace, leaving Wang Xi mesmerized.

"But... what does 'two rooms high clamping Xiaofei' mean?"

Shaking her head, Wang Xi was confused again. She only knew some basic star patterns and was only at the amateur 2-dan level. She didn't know many other moves.

However, Wang Xi's sense of the game is still quite good.

She dealt with the situation succinctly in a few moves based on her intuition about the board positions, after all, she had occasionally studied the game records of professional players.

The placement of pieces by both black and white was very unpredictable and elusive. It looked strange, yet it had an unexpectedly graceful feel to it. Soon, the layout of one corner was completed.

This stance is called "Crane Stretching its Leg".

The boy with black-rimmed glasses looked at his phone and explained that he had taken advantage of Wang Xi's moment of thought to do some simple online research.

The two continued to place their pieces one by one, but Ji Yingting did not make the same aggressive moves as before.

Wang Xi hadn't hung up the outer eye located in the lower right corner of his head, and Ji Yingting had a slight idea of ​​what was going on.

It seems that even after more than a hundred years, the dividing line in amateur Go remains.

Players below the amateur 4-dan level do not have many opportunities to engage in outside-point and high-point games.

"It's already been more than 30 moves... Sakuraba-senpai hasn't made a single mistake. It seems her Go skills are really high, especially since she's playing blindfolded."

"No... I think it's more impressive to be able to place a piece accurately with your eyes closed."

"I feel like Senior Wang Xi's score is at a slight disadvantage..."

Wang Xi would naturally be at a disadvantage. Facing a low-level amateur, Ji Yingting only needed to make a few simple moves to expose the opponent's numerous weaknesses.

Chapter 4: The Chess Game - Starry Sky Blue Cat

P.S.: I know that Go is a very niche subject, but I still want to write about it. I want to write content that readers will find interesting, and I want to write about moves that readers can appreciate even if they don't understand the game.

Because there have been virtually no novels of this genre before, I've been experimenting and constantly refining it. Although I'm prepared for it to flop, I'm already very happy to have nearly 1500 favorites after only 7000 words… In short, I'm currently revising each chapter based on reader feedback. I hope readers who are considering dropping the book will stay a little longer and read a few more chapters before making a decision. I also hope readers with some knowledge of Go can offer some suggestions. Even readers who don't like Go will enjoy the slice-of-life sections of the book [there will probably be a lot of them]. Thank you for your support!!

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Wang Xi would naturally be at a disadvantage. Against an amateur, Ji Yingting only needed to make a few simple moves to expose the opponent's numerous weaknesses.

However, as a style more common for girls, Wang Xi has always been very conservative.

These were all basic moves, and Ji Yingting wasn't given a chance to fight during the opening, but the score difference between Black and White kept widening.

Wang Xi made many useless moves, but Ji Yingting didn't respond. She simply played the more common moves for enclosing territory.

Don't you even know basic form judgment and point counting?

She was already 20 points behind in black, yet she was still moving so steadily. Ji Yingting shook her head inwardly.

If both sides focus solely on securing territory, the game will quickly enter the middle game. Since there has been no opportunity for combat, Ji Yingting simply made some adjustments to the shape of the pieces before deciding to end the game.

"Let's move into the final stages early; there's nothing of value left in this game."

Ji Yingting moved her lips slightly, but did not make a sound.

[Endgame: The final stage of a Go game (opening, middle game, and endgame), referring to the stage after the middle game battles, when the territory and the life and death of the stones are roughly determined, and the boundaries of the competition are established.]

Moreover, Ji Yingting still has the first move, and the biggest difference between professional and amateur players lies in the endgame.

Wang Xi's expression was somewhat unpleasant, and she habitually started biting her fingernails. After all, no matter how much she felt that the odds of winning were about the same, after Ji Yingting's several consecutive super-profitable first moves, she gradually felt the difference in the number of black and white points.

The game is over... "Sigh..."

Ji Yingting sighed softly. Her first time in this life had been given away so simply.

"Wang Xi, do you want to count more?" Ji Yingting tilted her head and asked softly.

"Let's count the black pieces..." After racking her brains, Wang Xi leaned back in her chair, feeling tired. She was too lazy to even count them.

"I'll do it..."

A male member from the second year of junior high school volunteered to come over and started fiddling with the black pieces on the chessboard.

If you're counting pieces, you only need to count one side. Black wins with 185 points plus pieces, and White wins with 177 points.

A more formal way to count pieces is to remove the extra pieces from an empty area and make it into a square or rectangle shape that is easy to count.

This method is the fairest, but the counting rules in Japanese Go are actually full of loopholes. For example, they only count the pieces, not the stones, and they don't fill in single-point marks (pieces that only account for one point at the end of the game).

For example, in the case of a double-life situation, regardless of the form, no points are counted. [Go terminology. A double-life situation is a type of living group, also known as "shared life," "public life," or "two-way life."]

The results of the chess game were in, and many people stared at the chessboard in disbelief.

“Black...154 points, losing by 31 points.” The boy said in a slightly trembling voice.

How could there be such a big difference between White and Black? I didn't make any big mistakes. After a long silence, Wang Xi shook his head with a wry smile. It seems that Ji Yingting's Go level is really very high.

"Can you play another game with me?" Ji Yingting asked excitedly, she was in a very good mood after winning the game.

Can I download it?

The eighth-grade boy who had been counting chess pieces asked Wang Xi a question, and after receiving her nod of permission, he excitedly sat down opposite Ji Yingting, though he kept his head down and dared not look directly at her.

"Sakuraba-kun is amazing! Have you ever achieved a ranking?" Wang Xi asked, sitting down next to Ji Sakuraba after finally calming down.

"No," Ji Yingting said, squinting and shaking her head.

"So you were self-taught, but it's really impressive that you've learned to this extent on your own," Wang Xi exclaimed.

"By the way, is it alright if I let you go first?" Ji Yingting asked softly.

“Of course, my name is Lin Hao, a second-dan amateur Go player.” He replied immediately. The boy was the very ordinary type, with average looks and a buzz cut with black hair.

I will cherish every single second of playing chess with Sakuraba-senpai!! Lin Hao was secretly excited, and his fingers holding the chess pieces were trembling slightly.

[The most basic form of handicap play is to give the opponent the first move (black), and black does not give komi. The player who reaches 181 points wins.]

"Oh no, if she really joins the Go club, then I won't have a chance to attend the junior high school league in two weeks."

A little girl with freckles on her face and black hair in a single ponytail stood at the back and tugged at her collar in frustration.

Each junior high school league team has five slots: captain, vice-captain, center, forward, and second forward.

The competition format is a best-of-five series. She is a first-year junior high school student and has only been learning Go for a year.

As an amateur 5-kyu player, she ranked fifth in the Minghaiji Middle School Go Club. If Ji Yingting joined the Go Club, she definitely wouldn't have a spot in the competition...

However, how could she possibly compete for a spot in the competition with Ji Yingting, a senior student who was extremely famous throughout the school... She was an incredibly dazzling figure.

The layout of this game by Ki Sakuraba is the same as that of the previous game by Wang Xi, which is a double star formation, meaning it occupies two star positions.

Lin Hao's approach was the most basic small flying hook, with white pieces in a pincer movement. Ji Yingting easily played a fairly common encirclement pattern.

Lin Hao's chess playing style is completely different from Wang Xi's; in terms of tactics, he is extremely fierce.

Such people improve their chess skills very quickly.

However, given the vast difference in their skill levels and calculation abilities, his approach was simply courting death.

"Cosmic flow, huh..." A few drops of cold sweat trickled down Lin Hao's forehead. In this game, Ji Yingting chose to focus on thickness and external influence with her white pieces. Gradually, a large area of ​​white pieces, as thick as a city wall, took shape under Ji Yingting's hands.

The Cosmic Style is also a very popular way of playing. Before the Cosmic Style appeared, most Go strategies focused on practical gains in order to acquire territory on the sides. However, the Cosmic Style advocates that the stones should move towards the center, rather than developing on the sides.

Because this style of play does not focus on the ground but rather on the battle in the entire central sky, it is called the Cosmic Style.

"There's no other way but to go deeper and fight!"

Seeing that Ji Yingting's white pieces were about to take shape, Lin Hao gritted his teeth and, with determination, pointed his black piece at the center of Ji Yingting's territory.

but……

In that instant, Lin Hao suddenly froze. He felt as if the movement of his right hand back had slowed down considerably. No, it wasn't just him... time seemed to have slowed down for everything around him.

"What's this?"

Lin Hao's eyes darted around a few times. He felt as if he were in a vast starry sky and galaxy. His eyes were now only on himself, the chessboard, and Ji Yingting.

The chessboard is the starry sky, the chess pieces are shooting stars. Ji Yingting rests her hands on her knees, thinking quietly. Her pale green, dark pupils are like fireflies in the moonlight, extremely beautiful.

Lin Hao was stunned.

Is this starry sky an illusion? Lin Hao wondered.

"Speaking of which... was she playing Go with her eyes open...?" Lin Hao stared at Ji Yingting's moonlit eyes, her expression incredibly focused as she looked at the Go board.

On the starry chessboard, Lin Hao continued his game against Ji Yingting.

But why does he feel that the starry chessboard is gradually getting bigger?

No!!! It's me who's becoming insignificant...

Suddenly, he was horrified to discover this fact. Moonlight-colored eyes shone on his body, and he realized that a huge blue object was hovering above Lin Hao's head.

"Why...did Sakuraba-senpai turn into a cat??"

Lin Hao looked up and saw an adorable giant cat lying on the chessboard, staring at him with its pale green eyes.

"Awoo!" The cat's bluish-green fur looked fluffy. The bluish-green cat stuck out its tongue and licked Lin Hao's face, opened its big mouth and swallowed his head in one gulp, then bit it off with a "crunch".

At this moment, Lin Hao was unaware that he was the first chess player to witness Ji Yingting's "strategic advantage" since Ji Yingting's birth.

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