The WY Cup Amateur Tournament
The WY Cup Amateur Tournament — Day 2 of the main bracket.
The semifinals in the morning, and then, after a lunch break, the final goes straight ahead.
I've made it to the semifinals, but my mood isn't particularly good.
Washed up or not, I was still a professional 9-dan. This is the equivalent of an Olympic track athlete entering a local amateur meet.
I'd considered holding back, playing just enough to get by — but that felt like humiliating and insulting them, so I played at full strength instead. Even if an opponent seems weaker, treating them with full respect and giving them your best is simply good manners.
But apparently, losing by a huge margin came as a shock to them. I made two talented young girls cry.
"Haah."
An existence that shouldn't be — like some kind of illegal move, something unreasonable. That's what I am now.
Maybe I did something unforgivable to those kids who came to the tournament carrying such bright expectations.
But just as they entered this competition with a clear purpose, I have my own reasons I can't yield on.
"Time to pull myself together."
I face the mirror in the restroom and lightly slap both my cheeks.
Getting carried away over a few wins — that would make me no better than someone fussing over other people's feelings.
They're talented girls; they'll surely overcome it just fine. All I need to worry about is my next game. My semifinal opponent is Lee Yoonhye, amateur 7-dan.
They say she's a heavyweight of the women's amateur scene, touring amateur tournaments and sweeping up prize money. She reportedly earns more than female pros with lackluster tournament records, so her presence in this competition is nothing to take lightly.
I wash my face, steady my mind, and head for the tournament hall.
As if reflecting the weight of the matches from the semifinals onward, the recorder and timekeeper have taken their seats, laptops open and chattering away, and a large broadcast camera has been set up in front of the boards.
It's a familiar sight to someone who lived the professional life, so I don't feel nervous.
I exchange brief greetings with the tournament staff and take my seat.
There's still quite a while until the game begins. Arriving well in advance to settle my mind before a match is an old habit of mine.
"Player Ryu Seoa?"
Someone calls out to me. A tall, well-dressed man wearing glasses.
"Yes? That's me…."
"Congratulations on fighting your way through such formidable opponents to reach the semifinals! If you have a moment, would you be open to a brief interview before your game? It'll only take a few minutes."
A reporter, then. Honestly, I'd rather not be drawing this much attention already.
"I'm sorry, but I'd like to clear my mind…. Um, if it's all right after today's schedule is over…."
I politely decline.
"Oh dear, sorry for distracting you! Then make sure you win, and I'll come find you for the winner's interview. You have to keep that promise!"
The reporter shakes my hand with an energetic face, urges me on, and soon disappears.
"Whew…."
With that much enthusiasm, even if I tried to run off after the tournament, he'd catch me on the spot.
Well, interviews are a hassle, but I can manage one well enough — and an article about a Go tournament probably wouldn't get all that many readers anyway.
I erase the reporter from my mind and check the clock. About twenty minutes left.
Enough time to play out a game in my head.
I close my eyes and begin my meditation.
Seated across from the blonde girl, Lee Yoonhye 7-dan leans back and steadies her breathing.
What is strength in Go?
Fuseki? Middle-game play? Fighting? Endgame?
All of them are important elements, of course — but Go is not a game decided by pure skill alone.
The mind. An unshakable, immovable heart.
Toughness of spirit matters more than anything.
Humans are not cold, precise machines. Let the mind waver even slightly, and you act impulsively, inconsistently.
Anxiety, tension, impatience, obsession, frustration.
These affect physical sports like golf or soccer enormously — so what about Go, a battle fought entirely in the head?
Play a pointless liberty-filling move just to erase the unpleasant aftertaste of anxiety, or force your way into a solid enemy position out of the desperate urge to do something and hand him an extra stone — either one alone is a losing move.
Lee Yoonhye has watched countless opponents collapse like that, undone by their own hands. The reason she — never having studied Go systematically — has beaten academy trainees with officially recognized elite talent again and again and taken titles is that she was mentally tougher than her opponents.
She looks up at the girl across the board. Charitably, innocent and guileless; frankly, a little dim-looking.
But the atmosphere is completely different now, as if she'd swapped in another personality entirely.
Despite falling behind after a few small mistakes early on, she watches the board with a detached calm. Not a trace of urgency or impatience — just mechanical, methodical moves.
Cold and hard as steel, enough to make your breath catch.
The girl doesn't even have the small habits players usually show when nervous or deliberating. She simply sits straight and unmoving, surveying the board with an unwavering focus.
The game has slipped into the late middle game before anyone noticed.
I'm winning.
By a narrow margin, but I'm still ahead.
Lee Yoonhye repeats this to herself over and over, yet she can't shake the feeling of being hunted.
If her opponent were some brute chasing her down with shouts and roars, that would be fine. He'd be human, with limits, and he'd tire eventually. She could just run her own race and shake him off easily.
But now it feels like a slaughter machine fitted with enormous saw teeth is chasing her without ever stopping. And at a speed minutely faster than her own.
Try as she might not to notice, her steps keep unconsciously quickening.
To reclaim some breathing room, Lee Yoonhye shifts her gaze to the skirmish on the lower side.
The initiative is with her.
If she presses the weakness in the center and wraps up the lower side cleanly, the variables shrink. The black stones in the center are thin, so like it or not, her opponent will have to respond on her terms.
"…"
But the girl doesn't reinforce the weakness. She meets her head-on.
In the skirmish, White's shape is far thicker. If it comes down to a life-and-death fight, the position is overwhelmingly in White's favor.
There's a boldness here that suggests she's trusting in something — and it makes Lee Yoonhye uneasy — but she accepts the fight.
Two unsettled groups that cannot both live become entangled. Lee Yoonhye first seals off the escape route of the black group.
Black responds by blocking White on the lower side, and a full-scale capturing race begins.
Kill first, or die.
Whoever captures first wins.
By her count, she wins by exactly one move. And Black's sequence is unfolding exactly as she predicted.
"Tch…."
As the possibilities dwindle one by one, Lee Yoonhye notices a single black stone sitting in a strange position.
A move she had assumed was clearly a mistake.
The girl places her stone with the same composed posture, utterly devoid of tension.
A two-stone race — a nakade.
White has two eyespaces to fill.
But whichever way she fills them, the move becomes self-destruction. She dies.
The girl who reversed the one-move deficit with a brilliant move still shows no change in expression.
No triumphant fire, not even a flicker of pleasure — only the sight of her counting territory and thinking through the next possibilities.
The lower side has been taken from her and the position turned unfavorable, but against any other opponent she would have played it out to the end.
Against an opponent with cracks, she could have forced out moves in the endgame or the closing stages.
But facing this girl, she feels not the slightest conviction that she could turn the game around.
Perched impossibly high above, yet so modest it's infuriating — an insufferable existence.
She's met all kinds of opponents across countless tournaments, but this is the first time she's ever faced someone she never wants to sit across from again.
"A fine game. Thank you for playing."
Lee Yoonhye sighs inwardly and begins clearing the stones.
"Oh — you played so well! Thank you for the game!"
Only then does the blonde girl, motionless until now, light up with those round, innocent eyes and bow her head deep in the most adorable, endearing way.
The chill of the thought that maybe none of that is her true nature, but a manufactured mask, makes Lee Yoonhye shiver lightly — and she heads straight for the restroom.