Chapter 454 This is my last chance in this life
finally.
After a while, Kong Zi slowly closed his eyes, then grabbed two white pieces from the chess box. The moment he let go, the pieces fell onto the chessboard.
Even if this game of chess continued, it would no longer have any meaning, so Kong Zi simply chose to give up.
It was silent all around.
Everyone was deeply shocked by the shocking reversal in the second half of the game.
Originally, White had the advantage, but in the subsequent changes, Black made extremely subtle changes in the order of moves, which led to a sudden change in the overall situation.
It is hard to imagine what kind of calculation is needed to calculate the stickiness of white chess pieces and what profound impact it will have on the entire battle.
It is also difficult to imagine what kind of imagination and observation the black chess piece needs to make the move that will kill the white chess piece at the moment when the white chess piece realizes the problem and turns back!
all in all--
The chess game is over.
An Hongshi, wins in the middle game, Kong Zi!
"It's really... a beautiful game."
Seeing this scene, Yu Shao slowly exhaled, even though he was full of praise for this game of chess.
Yu Shao couldn't help but look up and look at An Hongshi deeply.
"An Hongshi, his reputation is well-deserved."
At this time, some chess games had not yet ended. Seeing that the game between An Hongshi and Kong Zi had finally been decided, everyone came to their senses and finally turned around and left one after another.
It’s just that everyone’s expression was inexplicably heavy, and their mood was even more complicated and difficult to calm down.
They originally thought that after two years of illness and recuperation, An Hongshi might have started to go downhill, but the fact was obviously not the case.
An Hongshi is back!
Among the crowd, Arakino did not go to watch other chess games, but left the competition venue alone in silence.
He came to the entrance of the competition venue, took out a cigarette box from his trouser pocket, took out a cigarette, put it in his mouth, and lit it with a lighter.
"Ahem."
Arakino just took a deep breath, but the next moment he started coughing violently uncontrollably.
After a long time, Arakino finally recovered, then took another deep puff of the cigarette. This time he did not cough like before, but his face was slightly pale and sickly.
"An Hongshi... is stronger."
In the smoke-shrouded Anzhong, Araki Ye's eyes flashed with memories of the chess games he had played during his battle with An Hongshi ten years ago.
At that time, he was famous for his strength and calculation. Even An Hongshi was dwarfed by him in this respect. Therefore, when playing chess with him, An Hongshi had to temporarily avoid the edge and did not dare to fight with him.
For quite a long time, his name was synonymous with attack.
However, An Hongshi's chess style is balanced and changeable, with no weaknesses in any aspect. His play is sometimes light and sometimes heavy. Sometimes he slowly and carefully entangles with his opponent, and sometimes he fights with his opponent with great momentum.
In the end, during that period of competition between the two, he finished second eight times, which eventually ended with his semi-retirement.
During the time when he retired behind the scenes and worked as a Go teacher at the Go Academy to train the next generation of Go players, he actually still paid attention to every game of An Hongshi.
It was not until two years ago that An Hongshi had to temporarily give up the competition due to illness, and it came to an abrupt end.
And two years later, he saw An Hongshi's chess game again, and it was... the same game just now.
However, An Hongshi's performance in this game was completely beyond his expectations. Compared with himself two years ago, he was completely transformed.
Araki took a few puffs of his cigarette and coughed uncontrollably a few times. His mind was still constantly recalling every move made by both sides in the game between An Hongshi and Kong Zi.
"My time is running out..."
Arakino silently looked at the cigarette between his fingers that was about to burn out, with an inexplicable look in his eyes.
Ten years ago, since he decided to step back and start training the next generation, he never thought about making a comeback.
However, after learning that he was in the late stage of cancer not long ago, his first reaction was to come back and participate in the World Championship.
He always felt that he would not make a comeback, although he had never been idle in the past ten years and had been constantly studying the chess records of major competitions.
Over the past year or so, the emergence of the Dot Three Three, the Point Top, and the Shoulder-Chong Wuyou Corner, the three most difficult Go patterns to solve, have been proven to be invalid. Moreover, the emergence of even more difficult large-scale patterns, such as the Big Rain, which far exceed the three most difficult patterns, has caused a turmoil in the world Go scene.
Faced with the unprecedented changes in the Go game over the past thousand years, he worked day and night, forgetting to eat and sleep, and even worked harder than most active Go players.
But he told himself that everything he did was just for the students and the next generation.
It was not until he realized that he had not much time left that the first thought that came to his mind was to participate in the world chess competition. He knew that he could not deceive himself.
Arakino watched quietly as the cigarette between his fingers burned out bit by bit, then he took a deep breath and finally threw the cigarette butt into the trash can.
He closed his eyes, and slowly opened them after a long time. Then he slowly turned around and strode back into the competition venue.
His eyes were so calm that it made people feel a little chilly for some reason!
"This World Championship should be my last chance in this life."
In the competition venue, most of the chess players' games have ended, and the sounds of chess moves are no longer as frequent, but have become much sparser.
Compared to yesterday, the atmosphere at today's competition venue has become more depressing.
The players who are eliminated in the second round will only feel more unwilling and disappointed than those who are eliminated in the first round, because people are always greedy. Once they take a step, they want to take another step forward no matter what.
This is why chess players who get runner-up are often more miserable than those who are eliminated in the first round, and may even shed tears on the chessboard uncontrollably.
Araki endured this kind of pain eight times.
Time passes by every second.
Not long after, the much-anticipated match between Jiang Hanen and Hans finally came to an end.
In this game, Jiang Hanen played with white and Hans played with black. The two fought fiercely from the middle game onwards. It was obviously a fierce game and everyone thought that the winner would be decided in the middle game.
As a result, the two of them had to go to the endgame. After the points were finally awarded, the black pieces were still half a point behind, so Jiang Hanen won with white pieces, and Hans was eliminated, and the game came to an end.
Many people sighed at this ending and felt a little sorry for Hans.
Hans's level is undoubtedly very high, and his performance in this game was also extremely outstanding. Although Jiang Hanen also won this game by relying on his hard power, if he plays another game, the winner may not still be Jiang Hanen.
If Kimurago and Hans are given another chance, they may not be able to reach the finals.
Unfortunately, the single-elimination tournament is so cruel because there is no second chance. Two players who have the potential to win the championship are destined to leave the stage hastily in the first two rounds, which is a pity.
Luck is also a kind of strength.
This sentence is really valuable.
After another ten minutes, the winners and losers had been decided for most of the players, and for the remaining games, both sides had already run out of time and entered a tense countdown, with the final official moves to decide the winners.
Being able to get to this point means that both sides are evenly matched and the situation is very tense. Unless all the official pieces are cleared, it is even impossible to tell who will win or lose.
There was once a chess player who felt that he had lost after playing a game. He covered his face with his hands, looking very painful and almost crying. But in the end, after the referee counted the points, he found that he had won by one point. This kind of example is actually not uncommon.
In an overly intense game, the chessboard is too scattered, with tiny gaps everywhere, making it difficult to calculate who wins and who loses.
As the remaining games drew closer to being decided, the atmosphere became increasingly depressing and heavy.
Not long after, the winners of several tables were decided one after another. Some people felt relieved and collapsed in their chairs, while others fought hard but lost, and finally shed tears of unwillingness on the field.
The strong prey on the weak, and the strong are respected.
Choi Jun-cheol, qualified!
Matsuda Sakaichiro qualifies!
Zheng Yiyang, qualified!
…
Finally, after the last twenty minutes of hard and fierce battle, everyone finished the game. Half of the players were eliminated, and the remaining half were able to move on!
"The players who advanced to this round are: Yu Shao, Araki, Su Yiming, An Hongshi, Zhuang Weisheng..."
Zhao Zhengyang, the chief referee, stood on the stage, holding the list of qualified players and reading out the names of the qualified players.
Hearing the names of these qualified chess players, the audience was filled with emotion and engaged in heated discussions.
"I can't believe that Mr. Hans was eliminated in the second round. I can still vividly remember the moment he defeated Zhuang Weisheng and An Hongshi to win the world championship."
"It's not just Mr. Hans, it's also Mr. Kong Zi. It's such a pity that they met Mr. An Hongshi. Mr. An Hongshi is still too strong."
"Yu Shao's chess game also left me dumbfounded."
Some people recalled Yu Shao's game and were still deeply shocked. They shook their heads and said with some emotion, "I really want to know what kind of game will play out between An Hongshi and Yu Shao."
"That would be absolutely incredible. I'm afraid it would cause the avenue to collapse, gods and ghosts to tremble in fear, and the river of time to flow backwards?"
Upon hearing this, someone made an exaggerated expression and joked.
"Did you guys watch Toyama Xun's game? I was dumbfounded too. He swiftly defeated Zhao Xunheng on the opposite side. I'm starting to believe that Toyama Xun really did win against Kimura Go yesterday."
"And Su Yiming. He's had very good luck in two consecutive rounds. His opponents are not strong and are no match for him at all. I don't know if Su Yiming will meet Yu Shao again in the World Championship, and whether he can successfully take revenge in the World Championship."
"I'm really looking forward to the match between Mr. Zhuang Weisheng and Su Yiming. They haven't played against each other yet, right? I hope they can meet. It should be very exciting!"
"Haha, I'd like to see Zhu Huaian go up against Master Zhuang Weisheng. After all, the vengeance of losing the 'Tenth Dan' title is irreconcilable. That was an unbreakable Tenth Dan title, and he just lost it abruptly."
"It's a pity that Teacher Jiang Changdong is not in good shape. He made a terrible mistake in this round and lost to Go Saint Zhang Dongchen. Otherwise, I would like to see Teacher Jiang Changdong fight Yu Shao again!"
The crowd was engaged in a heated discussion, each with their own feelings and expectations for the upcoming game.
After watching today's game, everyone is full of anticipation for the next game. They feel that no matter how the event is arranged, there will be great highlights and will not disappoint.
Not long after, the third round of draws finally ended.
After carefully checking the sign numbers, Zhao Zhengyang announced the match arrangements for the third round of the competition and projected the match schedule onto the large screen at the front desk.
The number Yu Shao drew in this round was "three", and he quickly found his name on the battle list, and also saw the name of his next opponent.
Number three, Yu Shao (China, title: national player), versus, Wu Lai (Malaysia, title: 10th dan)
"Ten stages?"
Yu Shao was a little surprised.
Although Wu Lai holds the tenth-dan title, Yu Shao has no impression of the name Wu Lai, which is not surprising to him.
Most players from countries whose overall chess strength is not high, even if they are title holders, may not be as well-known as the five or six players with better records from some Go powerhouses.
Because the fifth and sixth dan players from Go powerhouses are often regarded as future top players and potential opponents, they will attract a lot of attention at home and abroad.
If a country's overall chess ranking is not high enough, even if it wins a title, it will not be taken seriously. This also leads to major sponsors not sponsoring the country's competitions at a high enough level.
Therefore, the lower the overall ranking of chess strength, the more frequent the chess competitions are held. On the contrary, the top-ranked countries such as China, Japan, South Korea, the United States and the United Kingdom are relatively cautious in holding chess competitions.
Because there is no need to worry about event sponsorship, sponsors will come to you without you even having to pull them, and the difference in sponsorship fees between the leading countries will not be too big.
In this case, fighting for chess is purely a fight for pride over seating, and the benefits are not that great.
After seeing the battle schedule, the crowd couldn't help but discuss it heatedly.
"Oh? Su Yiming's opponent in the third round is Xu Taiyang, 6th dan? His luck wasn't that good, but Su Yiming's game was finally worth watching!"
"Seo Taiyang, 6th Dan, played brilliantly at the North Korea-Korea Gwangmyeong Cup not long ago, defeating several top players and ultimately winning the championship. This was also his first time participating in a world championship, right?"
"However, the matches between the other players didn't produce the matches I expected. This third round feels even less exciting than the second."
"Hahaha, why are you in such a hurry? This is only the third round of the single-elimination tournament. There will definitely be more to come. It's quite rare for the second round to end up like today, right?" someone said with a smile.
"That's true. When I watched the World Championship before, I always started directly from the double elimination stage..."
Finally, after looking at the match schedule for tomorrow, the participating players and amateur players began to walk out of the competition venue one after another.
What is different is that today's games obviously left a deep impression on the amateur players who were invited to watch.
They seemed very excited and were still talking about today's game with great relish, discussing today's chess games with great intensity.
The professional chess players who made it to the third round of the single-elimination tournament all had solemn expressions. Although there was a hint of fatigue in their eyes, compared to yesterday, their eyes were more determined.
Now that we have come this far, let’s keep going, keep going!
…………
ps: Please give me your monthly vote!
(End of this chapter)
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
