Renewal, Day After Day
NJ Fire & Casualty Cup, Integrated Preliminaries.
“….”
Before White's last-ditch strike could land on Black's vital point, Black slackened its grip on the strength it held and simply lay down, powerless.
She had steeled herself for death—and yet, before she could even confirm whether that final attempt had succeeded, the battle fizzled out in anticlimax.
A move that stood in direct opposition to the level of Go Black had played until now. At that absurdly botched move, 9-dan Park Pilgyu looked up at the girl.
“Hhh….”
The girl, clutching her head in both hands, was breathing in ragged gasps, her face flushed with pain.
Each player's allotted two hours had long since run dry. She had burned through four periods of byo-yomi; 9-dan Park Pilgyu had exhausted all five.
Well over five hours had passed since the match began.
He had been so absorbed that the world beyond the board had ceased to exist. Now, as the tension drained away, a crushing fatigue arrived all at once, tardy and merciless.
If even a grown adult found this exhausting, it was a stretch of time far too cruel for a young girl. How desperately must she have held on? Her stamina would have emptied out long ago.
If she had endured this far on sheer willpower alone, then the girl possessed a spirit and a patience almost impossible to believe.
The final ten seconds in which 9-dan Park Pilgyu had to place his stone.
The best thing he could do for her was to end her suffering as quickly as possible. Without hesitation, Park Pilgyu brought his blade down in a single stroke and cut the head off Black's massive dragon.
“…Khh.”
She had held out to the very limit, but she too must have sensed that the end was coming. Before long, the girl picked up two black stones, set them on the board, and surrendered.
Such a hollow ending for a contest so long and fierce.
If the girl had been in her normal condition—if she had been able to play her very best move—would his final strike have reached her? He found himself unable to bear not knowing.
But her condition was far too poor to suggest a review of the game.
And not just her body. Both of the girl's eyes had sunk into a somber darkness.
Park Pilgyu himself was an old knight facing his body's limits head-on. He knew intimately how bitter it felt to lose because your flesh would not obey you.
Wordlessly, he picked up the fan he had set down beside him and spread it wide open.
The inscription he had carved himself came into view: Guri-sin Il-il-sin U-il-sin (苟日新 日日新 又日新)—'If you can improve yourself in a day, do so each day, and keep improving forever.' It was said to be the motto engraved on the washbasin of King Tang, the founding king of the old Shang dynasty who overthrew the tyrant of Xia.
Truly renew yourself in one day, and let every day be renewed, and renewed again. Even as the world pointed its fingers and declared that this year, this time, was surely the end, the reason he had been able to hold on in some corner of this merciless world was that he had never once neglected his daily self-cultivation.
Human beings can never reach perfection—but they can always improve. If even small changes happen steadily, one day they become a great change. Every time he read these words, 9-dan Park Pilgyu had believed exactly that. And he would go on believing it for the rest of his life.
It was an object he had carried with him to every important match for well over twenty years. Whether he lost or won, he would look at this inscription and take stock of himself, so that he would neither despair nor grow lazy.
9-dan Park Pilgyu folded the fan and gently offered it to the girl, who was scanning the board with a troubled gaze. She was a girl with boundless possibility still ahead of her. All he wished for was that she simply kept getting better. And then, someday, the chance to find out whether his attack would have landed would surely come around again.
“It's a trifling thing, but take it as your match fee, Ryu Sabeom.”
“…I'm sorry? Something this precious—I couldn't possibly.”
“Haha, precious? It's nothing but one of an old hermit's worn-out knickknacks.”
Park Pilgyu took the girl's hesitant hand and pressed the fan into it, refusing to take no for an answer.
When the girl carefully opened the fan, her pupils widened for a moment, then narrowed again. There was no way to know whether she understood the meaning of the words written there. But her gaze was unmistakably calmer than before.
“…Thank you. I will repay this kindness, I promise.”
“Someday, when Ryu Sabeom becomes a fine professional player, you'll have a fan inscribed of your own to make. When we meet again, just bring one along for me. Haha.”
“Yes. I will, absolutely.”
Ryu Seoa nodded with resolute eyes.
“Phew. Well then—both I and Ryu Sabeom are in for quite an ordeal. I'll go out first and draw the reporters' eyes, so you slip out quietly, Ryu Sabeom.”
Camera flashes kept bursting at regular intervals, as if announcing the scorching heat of the reporters' attention. Dazzling.
9-dan Park Pilgyu rose first, dusting off his trousers, and gave a smile.
“…Heh. Yes. Thank you for the consideration, Teacher.”
“Haha, it's no consideration at all. For an old man with no decent company, talking is the pleasure of his life. If anything, the reporters interviewing me will be the ones to collapse from boredom first.”
At the faint smile from the girl who could have been his granddaughter—a smile so refreshing it swept away all the fatigue of the match—Park Pilgyu looked on with fond, doting eyes and was the first to leave the Special Match Room.
On the way back to Grandfather's house after the final of Group I of the NJ Fire & Casualty Cup Integrated Preliminaries ended, I hugged the inscribed fan I'd received from 9-dan Park Pilgyu tightly against my chest. A fan faded with age, its color worn by the traces of passing years.
To someone who didn't know, it might look like a shabby old thing. But to me, who knew its worth, it was more precious than anything else in the world.
This was the fan 9-dan Park Pilgyu had carried with him to every international title, winning prestigious world tournaments even before the concept of a world championship circuit had properly taken shape. It was his pillar, his companion—practically a partner in his life.
“Cough, cough.”
A cough, and a low fever—my body was an absolute mess.
Perhaps because, over the four days the integrated preliminaries had run, this frail body of mine had pushed through a schedule that was more than a little harsh to endure.
And yet, though my body was heavy, my heart was light.
It was laughable, really—after collapsing from sheer exhaustion and even entertaining the thought of quitting Go, one little fan had lifted my whole mood. But the inscription on that fan had seized hold of my heart.
This is not my limit.
There was surely still room for me to grow. Thinking positively like that, I found my heart settling down, at least a little.
-Buzzzzz.
My phone vibrated in my pocket.
I flipped open my clamshell phone to find a call from my mother.
“Hello? Mom?”
“Hi, Seoa! We watched your game today! Honestly, it was enough to get your grandfather all worked up. Your dad and I don't know the first thing about Go, but we listened closely to the commentators the whole way through!”
“Haha, if I'd known you were watching, I should have won… You must have been disappointed. I'm sorry.”
“Oh, come on, what's there to be sorry about? I heard your opponent was a truly remarkable person—how on earth would you even win, having never studied Go properly?”
“Hah… that's fair.”
Truthfully, I had set my goal as merely reaching the main tournament; I'd never been certain of getting through. Still, the lingering disappointment was unavoidable.
“By the way, how is Dad doing?”
“He's fine! Aside from raising a fuss about how much he misses you! Oh, and the doctor said he can be cured with chemotherapy alone—he won't need to find a donor or get any transplant!”
“Really? That's really, truly such a relief….”
A deep wave of relief washed over me, and I let out a long breath. So this was what they meant by a blessing hidden inside misfortune.
“He kept holding out just to talk to you, but the game ran so long he fell asleep again. By the time school starts, he'll probably be able to leave the hospital for a little while, so we'll see each other then. I'll call again tomorrow once your father is awake.”
“Okay, Mom. I love you. Please tell Dad I love him too, so, so much.”
“I love you too, Seoa. But next time we talk, call us Mom and Dad instead of Mother and Father. Your dad says hearing you call him 'Dad' is the dream of his whole life.”
“…Okay. I'll think about it.”
I was already calling Lee Jiah 'unnie.' Was there really any reason I couldn't call my own father and mother 'Dad' and 'Mom'?
Though admittedly, it would take a fair amount of mental preparation….
“Right, you must be exhausted—let's hang up for now, Seoa. Your grandfather talks your ear off anyway, so don't bother passing the phone.”
“Yes. You rest well too, Mom.”
Listening to that voice I hadn't been away from for all that long, and yet had missed so dearly, I folded the phone shut.
“Yeah.”
I hadn't achieved what I set out to do, but there were still plenty of chances ahead. If not for my own sake, then for Mom and Dad, and Grandfather, I had to push myself harder.
I opened the fan and closed it again, steadying my resolve.
“…Yawwwn.”
As soon as the call ended, the fatigue came flooding in.
For a moment, I leaned my back against the seat.
Before long, my eyelids grew too heavy to hold up any longer.