Pair Go
Lunchtime after the morning game ended. After much agonizing over what elementary schoolers like to eat, I had picked out a tonkatsu restaurant.
Yu Jeon-hun, 9-dan, stole a glance at the girl sitting across from him.
All day long she had seemed to be in a foul mood, radiating an air of decadence.
Her blue eyes shimmered with a turbid, murky darkness that called the deep sea to mind.
He didn't dare ask what emotions lay behind that gaze, but he suspected it was something that would be hard even for a grown man to bear.
The morning game. Black wins by resignation at move 165.
By the stone-placement order of Pair Go, Ryu Seoa, 2-dan, had to answer the moves of the opposing male player, Qing Huoyi, 8-dan.
Yet she was not overwhelmed. On the contrary, she handled him with consummate ease, riding the recoil of his attacks to crush the opposing female player instead.
Perhaps her suppressed emotions had leaked through against her will, but she relentlessly dug into her opponent's most painful weak points with unmistakable aggression.
Like an aristocratic young lady in high heels, gracefully—no, elegantly and cruelly trampling her opponent underfoot, she forced their surrender with both grace and brutality.
As a rule, a professional player being swayed by emotion is considered taboo.
Go is a game that demands problem-solving at every single moment, and that is precisely why one must banish stray thoughts and concentrate solely on the board.
But the girl was seasoned enough not merely to control her emotions, but to put them to use. She turned her feelings not into impurities clouding her thinking, but into fuel that accelerated her focus.
After Ryu Seoa, 2-dan, placed her stone, the maximum time allotted for him to read her intent was 120 seconds. Her opponent could play quickly, and he also had to be ready to answer whatever came next, so realistically he got less than half of that.
Yu Jeon-hun, 9-dan, had used six of his ten one-minute byo-yomi periods; the girl had used exactly one.
Astonishing speed of thought.
Frankly, he was only half convinced she had managed to steer even half of the position changes she had intended.
She had played Go far more powerful than in their games together online, so all he could do was assume that their coordination had improved since then.
"Shall we go?"
Her plate was already empty; she must have been quietly eating away at it with that small mouth of hers.
"I'll get the bill."
A small hand pressed down firmly on the hand of Yu Jeon-hun, 9-dan, as he rose and reached for his wallet.
"Thank you for the meal, Master Ryu."
Faced with the girl's overbearing presence, which he felt he could hardly defy, Yu Jeon-hun, 9-dan, smiled wryly and shoved his wallet back into his pocket.
After spending the time in silence with Ryu Seoa, 2-dan, who was unusually talkative today—unusually quiet, rather—the third round of the afternoon tournament began.
Since this was effectively the round of sixteen, plenty of familiar faces were in evidence.
Their opponents: Taira Sumiyoshi, 9-dan, and Miura Chisa, 5-dan.
The nigiri came up black for them again this time.
It wasn't like the morning, but the opponents still showed signs of delight.
The dry, listless eyes of Ryu Seoa, 2-dan—already in a sour mood—swept over them.
He thought the game might once again veer in a savage direction, but her opening play was more restrained than he'd expected.
A wordless message: this afternoon's game I leave to you.
At her consideration, Yu Jeon-hun, 9-dan, felt a smile spread across his face.
A doubleheader. Matching the girl's ferocious crescendo twice in one day did, admittedly, demand a little more stamina than he had.
He searched for moves.
He didn't spare a single second worrying about whether she could keep up; he devoted himself entirely to exploring his own best play.
His faith in Ryu Seoa, 2-dan, was absolute. And he was certain she would not let him down.
-Tak.
The stone touching the board tickled his ear with a crisp, clear ring.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
I'd worried I might end up being a burden to Yu Jeon-hun, 9-dan, but he and I had successfully fought our way past tough opponents and secured our place in the quarterfinals.
The quarterfinals and semifinals would be held next Saturday and Sunday respectively, so the schedule left us some breathing room.
My school, considerate of the tournament, had me come in only for the morning, and I'd come home and was playing Go at a leisurely pace when—
"Haah…"
When I lowered my head and sighed, the enormous wings that sprouted from either side of me drooped limply.
A soft, yielding mass of living pure-white feathers.
And there I stood, forlorn, under the cameras and the lights, dressed in a sanctimonious pure-white gown that looked like it had come straight out of the Bible.
Somehow or other, I had ended up in a commercial filming studio.
"No, I was told I wouldn't have to do anything at all—"
Somehow sensing my grumbling as I kicked the floor, the director barked at me with fierce urgency. "Teacher! We're starting soon, so get ready!"
"Ah—yes, yes! Understood!"
It was a personal favor from Jung Woon-il, president of WY Corporation, the man who had given me a seed spot in the WY Amateur Cup thanks to our connection at the Ever-Green Baduk Parlor. Apparently he'd been aggressively expanding his cosmetics business lately.
If not for Jung Woon-il, it would have taken me considerable time to reach the position I hold now.
It was less about the money than about repaying a debt to him, so I had reluctantly agreed—but I never imagined it would be this.
A men's cologne commercial.
The rough premise seemed to be that some man smells so atrocious that an "angel" descends from heaven herself to throw him a bottle of WY cologne. The man who anoints himself with the cologne delivered from on high is promptly surrounded by women flocking to his side.
Good lord. What lunatic came up with this concept?
The descent-and-landing scene had already been filmed. The faster we finished, the faster this agony would end.
"All right, everyone—let's run through it once!"
At his signal, the staff snatched the script from my hands, fussed with my costume here and there, and pressed the prop into my palm.
"Please look at me as if I were a bug."
"Excuse me?"
Out of nowhere, the director was making a bizarre request.
Wasn't I just supposed to mime throwing the cologne?
"Um… specifically, what kind of—"
"Look at me with contempt! Glare at me with that murderous expression you wore in the finals of the Chinese tournament!"
The director was shouting, inexplicably worked up. No matter how I thought about it, I had a feeling this man was the mastermind behind the entire concept.
Thinking that this getup was entirely his fault, my irritation began to build.
"How's this?"
"Haah… ah, wonderful! Though it's just a little lacking."
Watching the director's face grow redder and redder, I—as a fellow 'man'… well, no longer in body, but as someone with a man's ego all the same—grew thoroughly disgusted.
I hear he's a legend of the advertising world, but do people really think consumers are such idiots that they'd buy a product after seeing an ad like this?
I tried my best to keep my composure, but I could feel my face warping further and further out of shape.
"Ah! That's perfect, right now! Say your line!"
"Haah… Oppa, you reek."
Exactly as he'd directed, I clamped a hand over my nose as though assailed by a vile stench and tossed the plastic bottle over with total indifference.
Then, to finish, I whipped my head away as if I couldn't stand the sight of him a second longer.
"Ahh, I'm sorry, Seoa! Big brother will spray it right now!"
The director snatched up the plastic bottle like a dog fetching a stick.
"…That's the reaction we're hoping for, Teacher. That last take was great, so let's do one more, exactly the same."
The director had returned to the placid expression he'd worn at the start, as if nothing had happened.
I found myself wondering how much of that had been acting, but deep down, exactly one thing had been settled beyond all doubt.
I would never, ever film another commercial again.