Chapter 62: Retirement
Chapter 62: Retirement
"Mr. Rui Zhao, how many years have you been playing chess?"
"I have been... ah no no!
"Yeah! I practiced chess for about two and a half years!"
"It's not that long indeed! Then why did you participate in this 'Metropolitan Cup' competition? Is it because of your love for Go?"
"Of course! Go is the most interesting! If I could, I would like to play Go every day!
“But there are two other reasons.
"One is that I want to participate in this year's dan ranking tournament, but I have never taken the amateur dan exam before and I don't have the qualifications to participate. So I hope to win the championship of this tournament, so that I can directly enter the amateur dan level 5!
"Also, I have caused a lot of trouble to my teachers in the past three years, but I have never done anything to make them proud. I just want to at least win a championship in the last moments of my high school years and bring glory to my alma mater!"
"Ah, I want to win the championship... Rui Zhao is very ambitious, worthy of being a student of the prestigious Dongjiang Middle School!
"Also, you just won the first round of the audition smoothly. I heard that your opponent in the first round was very strong. Did you have a hard time?"
"Huh? Are you alright?
“Although there is no such thing as easy in this world, it was still pretty easy to beat that uncle…
"He's the weakest one among all the people I've played against recently... When I play against other people, I basically have to let them give me a hand in order to win..."
"Ah...Is that so? Rui Zhao is pretty lucky! I hope he'll have such good luck in the future and go even further!"
"Thank you sister!"
After the interview, the female reporter went to the camera to check out the finished product. From the smile on her face, it was clear that she was very satisfied. She immediately gave Rui Zhao and Ai Jianan an OK gesture, then walked up to Rui Zhao and said.
"Little sister, open the payment code and I will transfer the 500 yuan interview fee to you!"
Unexpectedly, the girl was stunned for half a second and then immediately began to shake her head:
"Ah? No, no! I just talked to Sister An An. It's just two or three questions. It's free!"
"Here! You're helping your sister!"
"No need! Your interview also helped promote our school, so you're doing me a favor!"
Hey, your alma mater doesn’t need any promotion at all!
The female reporter shook her head helplessly when she saw this, and then looked at Ai Jianan. Seeing that Ai Jianan just shrugged and shook his head, she smiled and said:
"Okay! Then I thank you for your kindness!
"I just gave you my business card. If you can help me with anything in the future, please feel free to contact me!"
"Well, that's okay!"
The beautiful girl then smiled sweetly again.
After the reporter and photographer duo finished interviewing Rui Zhao, they quickly packed up and left.
Before leaving, the female reporter did not forget to thank Ai Jianan again, and said jokingly: "It seems that your information about the opponent's strength is not very accurate~ But it's a good thing that it's not accurate!"
For the female reporter, although winning or losing the first round is not really important given Rui Zhao's identity and appearance, if the interviewee can enter the next round of competition, it will always make the audience more excited about the event and subsequent news.
At this time, Ai Jianan could only laugh dryly twice, "Ha, ha".
After the duo left, she walked over to Rui Zhao and began to ask about the situation seriously.
"Xiao Zhao, did you really... defeat that old man?"
"We won! Sister An An, if you don't believe me, you can go ask the organizing committee!"
Rui Zhao answered naturally:
"But he's still a little strong. I'm sorry that I couldn't make him cry and help you, Sister An An, to get revenge!"
Crying?!
Help me get revenge?!
Ai Jianan didn't expect Rui Zhao to say that. These words instantly flowed through her body like a warm current.
As expected, Xiao Zhaomiao has me in her heart!
Oh no, I can’t be silly now... I have to ask about serious matters first!
Ai Jianan shook his head slightly:
"Nothing! It's been so many years since I lost to him!
"But... you just said that he was the weakest opponent you had played against recently. Isn't that a bit exaggerated?"
"Ah... yes, that's a bit exaggerated."
When Ai Jianan asked him about this, Rui Zhao felt a little embarrassed:
"He said such harsh words before we played chess. I was a little upset and wanted to insult him, so I didn't tell the truth..."
Ah, as expected!
Ai Jianan nodded repeatedly.
I knew it, this uncle is as good as Qiangye 5!
Even if Xiao Zhaomiao really beat him this time, he couldn't be the worst person Xiao Zhaomiao had played against recently!
But Ai Jianan could never have imagined that the girl had not finished speaking yet.
"…Objectively speaking, if we exclude the five or six-year-old boy who just learned to play chess, he should be the second weakest person I have played against recently…"
Huh? The second weakest?!
Ai Jianan, who had just nodded repeatedly, was stunned for a moment, and subconsciously asked:
"Who is the weakest one?" "Huh?"
Rui Zhao didn't seem to expect Ai Jianan to ask such a question directly, so he could only answer hesitantly:
"The weakest... the weakest Sister An An, don't you know who it is?"
Ai Jianan was puzzled for a moment: "I know? Please! How could I know...
"...
"……Eh?"
...
...
Just when Ai Jianan finally realized who the worst player was, in a classroom at Yanbei Middle School that temporarily served as the competition office, the staff of the organizing committee began to get busy.
For this "Urban Cup" audition, nearly 12 people registered from the Dongjiang Division. A total of six rounds of single-elimination were held, and finally people were selected to participate in the preliminaries.
As the first batch of the first round (because there were too many matches in the first round, it was divided into two batches) ended one after another, each competition room gradually summarized the results to the competition office in order to organize the results and arrange the matchups for the next round of single-elimination matches.
Ke Mulan is the vice chairman of the Dongjiang Go Association. The "Metropolitan Cup" Dongjiang Division competition is the largest amateur Go competition in Dongjiang City throughout the year, and it is also a major focus of work every year, so as the vice chairman, he always comes in person to supervise the competition work and even often helps with some work.
The work of counting the wins and losses in the first round of the auditions was the most demanding, so Vice Chairman Ke took the lead and started directly sorting out the statistics.
Normally, this kind of work is the most boring, but while Ke Mulan was busy, he suddenly found that there was something wrong with a piece of information.
"Huh? Why was Zhao Nantian eliminated in the first round? Wasn't he good enough to qualify for the finals in previous years?
"Let me see if I was unlucky and ran into other masters... No! The one who lost was... an 18-year-old girl?!
"Rui Zhao... I've never heard of this name!"
Ke Mulan's eyes widened. No matter how she thought about it, she felt that it was impossible. She immediately called the supervisor of the second competition room.
"Hey, Xiao Huang, I want to ask you something! Did you get the results wrong on the fifth channel in the competition room? I saw that the girl won...
"Hmm? You said this is the result? Are you sure?!
"Eh? What do you mean 'it was over in 20 minutes, and the girl was so pretty, so I remember it very clearly'?! Wait a minute! I'll come up and take a look!"
After Ke Mulan finished the call, he was about to briefly explain the situation to the other staff members and then go up to inquire about the situation, but as soon as he stood up, his cell phone rang again.
He looked carefully and found that the caller was another staff member of the Chess Association. He had arranged for this staff member to deal with a misunderstanding a few days ago, and he thought there was a result.
"Hey, Xiao Li, has Bai Yinhua's seventh-level player figured out who's behind the prank?
“The registration information and facial recognition were all verified, making it look like the real thing! Technology is really getting more and more advanced these days!”
"Chairman Ke, we figured it out!" The staff member's voice was full of anxiety: "But... it's not a prank!"
"Not a prank?" Ke Mulan didn't understand for a moment: "What do you mean it's not a prank? It can't be that Bai Yinhua is really going to participate in the 'Metropolitan Cup' competition, right?"
"That's what it means!"
"?
"No! Bai Yinhua is a professional chess player! How can he participate in an amateur competition?"
"Yes, but he just retired!"
"Resign?!" Ke Mulan's pupils shrank slightly: "He is a professional in his prime years, and he wants to resign?!"
"Yes, he cancelled his professional rank and qualifications on the chess association's website a week ago. At that time, the leader in charge of the chess association thought that his account must have been hacked, so he has been contacting him and is ready to restore his account at any time. However, he learned that he was in a low mood recently and didn't want to talk to people, so he decided to let him take a break and contact him again when he is in a good mood...
"But who would have thought that he finally replied this morning. He first confirmed with the Chinese Chess Association that he would cancel his professional rank and return to amateur status. Then he contacted us and confirmed that he would register for the semi-finals as an amateur 6th rank, and all the registration information was correct!"
"This... How can this be..."
Ke Mulan's breathing suddenly became rapid.
He understood that it didn't seem like much of a big deal for a mid-level professional chess player in his prime to suddenly announce his retirement to participate in amateur competitions...
But if you think about it carefully, you will realize that this is a huge matter!
"Has Chairman Shang learned about the situation?! Chairman Shang must be informed of this matter immediately!"
"I just found out! According to the news from Dajingna, Chairman Shang is now urgently organizing a meeting of the top leaders of the Chess Association!"
[Stack armor first]
The plot in this chapter about a professional player retiring to participate in an amateur competition has a certain real-life prototype, but it is definitely not as smooth, easy, and quick to execute in reality as in the novel. The novel mainly made some adjustments for the sake of drama, and everything is set as a parallel world.
Please understand this plot as a system loophole in the Go world of the parallel world. I will also explain the whole thing in detail in the next chapter to make it more reasonable. Don't get too hung up on the details.
【Reverse milk】
Looking at the growth of collections in the past two days, the word "miserable" is not enough to describe it. I feel like I have no smart recommendations... I really can't count on the third round of recommendations.
But if I really accidentally get into a third round... I promise to update six times a day.
(I can’t get in anyway, so I can say anything about that book. I don’t believe that Mr. Bacon will be so partial to me!)
(End of this chapter)