Chapter 15: The Coolest Mistake
"Brother Ding...Brother Ding'an, what do you mean by this move?"
Li Xiangping was also surprised to see Shi Xiangxia suddenly make a "single official" move. You should know that the so-called "single official" in Go is a move without purpose, or it can be considered a move without any value. Playing such a move before the game is over is of course a problem move.
Even though there was a problem with the move, Li Xiangping did not dare to question it immediately. It was not because it was too complicated, but because the problem was too simple. You know, placing a "single official" before the official pieces are completed is a mistake that even beginners would not make.
How could a master like Shi Xiangxia make such a mistake? Therefore, Li Xiangping's reaction was the same as that of the Chinese Chess Academy. His first reaction was to be stunned, and then he re-examined the chess game to see if Old Shi had discovered any problem with the black chess shape and needed to make up for it.
But Li Xiangping was, after all, a person who was close to professional level. The current situation of this game could be said to be very simple. Almost every part had been finalized, and the largest piece on the board was a small endgame with 3 points for the second hand. So after watching for a while, Li Xiangping could not help but ask.
"Oh, what a mistake. I forgot you explained to me that the rules of Go are different nowadays. I just did it out of habit..."
Before Lao Shi could finish, Li Xiangping jumped up and said, "Ah?! It really was a mistake. Lao Shi, what's wrong with you? You are a great chess master, how could you make such a mistake? Don't you know that today's game is very important to me?"
After making a mistake, Old Shi seemed quite embarrassed. He explained in a low voice, "I'm sorry, my friend Xiangping, in the era we live in, this move... this move is indeed the biggest official move on the board..."
"Um?"
After hearing this, Li Xiangping seemed to be lost in thought, as if he remembered something. After he re-examined the chess game, Li Xiangping burst into laughter. He finally understood why Shi Xiangxia made such a low-level mistake that would seem so low-level to modern people.
This is actually related to the rule of "returning chess pieces" in medieval chess.
The so-called "returning the chess pieces" means that in medieval chess, the number of pieces is compared after the game ends. If at the end of the game, the black pieces have 4 pieces on the board, and the white pieces have 5 pieces, then according to the ancient people's thinking, to keep a piece alive, at least 2 eyes need to be alive, and 2 eyes are 2 points. According to the rules of medieval chess, these 2 points cannot be calculated and need to be deducted at the end of the game. The more pieces there are, the more points will be deducted. If the black pieces survive 4 pieces, 8 points will be deducted, and if the white pieces survive 5 pieces, 10 points will be deducted.
So, in a nutshell: "one piece deducts 2 points", this is the core idea of "returning the chess piece head".
It was because of this that Li Xiangping immediately understood why Shi Xiangxia made the mistake just now. Because if the "return chess piece head" rule was implemented in this game, then the move just now was indeed valuable.
Because the move that Lao Shi just made not only connected the two large black pieces, but also cut off the two white pieces. So with this increase and decrease, this move, which is considered a "single official" by modern people, has a value of 4 goals in medieval chess.
This is why Shi Xiangxia said "it's a habit". This is actually where medieval chess is more complicated than modern Go, an increase in complexity caused by rule issues.
In later life, Li Xiangping often saw some shallow and ignorant people slandering ancient Chinese chess on the Internet. Some of the players at the third and fourth level dared to criticize Huang Fan and Shi Xiangxia. The extremely confident ones even dared to comment on their chess records, saying that Fan Xiping's move was incomprehensible and Shi Xiangxia's move was full of mistakes.
However, to be honest, among such reviews, more than 90% are unreliable, and more than 90% of the reviews are truly incomprehensible and full of errors.
Some people don't even understand the core idea of "returning the chess pieces", yet such people dare to comment on ancient chess. Li Xiangping can only say "haha" to this.
Take today's game for example, this "one increase and one decrease" game with a value of 4 points is the most complicated problem caused by the "returning the chess head" rule. If a connection or disconnection also involves the problem of robbing... Anyone who knows a little about Go knows that, then the complexity here will increase exponentially.
If you want to comment on ancient chess, you must first understand the complexity of it.
Well, Li Xiangping thought he was not a superficial person, so he could understand Lao Shi's mistake. But how should I put it? Today's game is a competition after all, right? Although it was just an online game, Li Xiangping defined this game as "a battle to defeat the opponent", especially now that the end is near and victory is in sight, will this move affect the final outcome?
"This... this is equivalent to stopping a move. Currently, the maximum advantage of the second move is 3 points, so this move is likely to lose 3 points. If it loses 3 points... Hurry up, Brother Ding'an, hurry up, no, no, no, let's do it together and see if this move will not affect the final outcome..."
Just when Li Xiangping was busy preparing to re-evaluate the situation, something even stranger happened. After Shi Xiangxia made this technically demanding move, no one knew what the opponent was thinking. They did not make a move for a long time. Three minutes later , with a "pop", the Axe Gang* Honinbo Shudou actually chose to admit defeat in the middle game.
"Huh, you admit defeat? What does Yan Qing mean by that? He has been resisting stubbornly here before, but now he finally waited for me to make a mistake, why is he admitting defeat so readily..."
Li Xiangping certainly didn't know that at this very moment, at the Chinese Chess Institute, the members of the national youth team had a different interpretation of Lao Shi's move.
When they first saw this move, the national youth team was just as stunned as Li Xiangping. However, their level was higher than Li Xiangping, so they realized it was a mistake more quickly. But why did the opponent who had shown such a high level of skill make such a low-level mistake? While everyone was discussing it, Kong Erjie suddenly spoke up:
"Ha, I know!"
"Hmm? Xiaomei, what did you figure out? What does this move mean? "
"What else can it mean? They are trying to persuade us to surrender."
"Persuade to surrender?"
"I just checked carefully. Even if the black chess piece stopped here, in the end the opponent still had 6 points on the board. It won by exactly half a point."
Kong Erjie shook his head and said, "Tsk, this guy is really amazing. Who is he? The game was so intense before, and everyone should have no time to judge the situation, right? Anyway, I didn't see it clearly. But this guy is good. Not only did he judge, but he also judged very clearly. He made this move to tell us clearly: Look, I will stop at this moment, and I will win you by half a point, not more or less. Don't you think this is not a way to persuade you to surrender?"
Yan Qing and Ao Lang looked at each other, while Hu Yaoyu and Qiu Jun looked at each other. Although Kong Erjie's statement sounded a bit strange, it must be admitted that this seemed to be the most reasonable explanation.
You have to know that this is an online game. This kind of "persuasion to surrender" may rarely happen in real life, but it is not uncommon in online games.
For example, Li Xiangping once saw a game of chess played online by the "spy", the top chess player in China in later generations. His opponent was a Korean chess player. After he had killed two large pieces of his opponent's chess, the opponent was still fighting stubbornly. The little spy finally lost his patience, and he dropped the piece "one, one" with a "pop", which was in the corner of the chessboard. This was a typical "stop move", meaning why are you still playing?
After listening to Kong Erjie's explanation, Gu Dali was not a Korean chess player after all, so he laughed:
"Haha, so he wanted to persuade me to surrender. That's great. However, judging from how clearly he can see, he does have the qualifications to persuade me to surrender. Fine, I'll admit defeat now. Brother Niu, come here quickly. If you want to help me get revenge, you have to invite him as soon as possible..."
So just like that, at around 10:10 pm, the match between Honinbo Xiuqin from the Beggars' Sect and Honinbo Xiudou from the Axe Sect ended in this unexpected way.
When Li Xiangping pressed the "Confirm" button, before he had time to be happy, all kinds of private messages came flooding in to him, especially the news about the gang leader Hongqiao Wolong.
Beggars' Sect*Hongqiao Wolong: "Is that you in white? Haha, congratulations."
Beggars' Sect* Honinbo Xiuqin: "Haha, it's nothing. I've already said that this Honinbo Xiudou is no match for me. What do you think, Boss Hongqiao? I volunteered to take on the task, so I guess I'm lucky enough to have done my job, right?"
Beggars' Sect* Hongqiao Wolong: "Haha, is that you in white?"
Honinbo Xiuqin of the Beggars' Sect: "It's me... eh? What do you mean, Boss? You asked the same question twice."
Beggars' Sect* Hongqiao Wolong: "Haha, nothing, Bai Yi..."
Honinbo Xiuqin of the Beggars' Sect: "Boss, what do you want to say? I feel like you're acting weird."
Beggars' Sect*Hongqiao Wolong: "Haha, nothing. I actually want to tell you something. You know who your opponent was just now, right?"
Honinbo Xiuqin of the Beggars' Sect: "I know. I know this guy's background very well. I knew long ago that he is no match for me."
Beggars' Sect* Hongqiao Wolong: "Bai Yi, let me tell you the truth. The person who played chess with you just now was Gu Dali."
Beggars' Sect* Honinbo Xiuqin: "Ah?!!!"
Beggars' Sect*Hongqiao Wolong: "This news comes from Lao Mei. You know Lao Mei, his source of information must be correct."
Beggars' Sect* Honinbo Xiuqin: "Ah?!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
By this time, Li Xiangping certainly knew that it was no wonder that Hongqiao was hesitant in his words. He must have begun to doubt his true identity and was trying to find out who his gunman was in a roundabout way.
Just as Li Xiangping was about to continue chatting with Hongqiao, another prompt appeared on the computer screen:
"Axe Gang*Honinbo Shudou has invited you to a game."
"Um?……"
