Chapter 5: A Dream of Eighteen Years

August 2000, Qinhuai District, Jinling City.

The annual national Go ranking competition has just ended here.

Since the participants are mainly minors, this competition is usually held in the summer. This is also the practice of the ranking competition.

In this year's professional chess tournament that just concluded, the most eye-catching player was not Liu Yuanbo, who won the championship with 12 wins and 1 loss, nor was it Chen Yaoyue, the youngest player to be promoted to professional chess this year, nor was it even the beautiful chess player Mao Jiajun, who finally succeeded in becoming a professional chess player this year, but a 13-year-old boy named Li Xiangping who failed to succeed in becoming a professional chess player.

Among the chess children participating in this year's competition, Li Xiangping stood out. Even before the competition, he was unanimously favored by the domestic Go community, and it was believed that it was almost certain that he would win one of the 22 qualifying places.

In fact, after the start of the competition, Li Xiangping did live up to everyone's expectations. He won 9 consecutive games in the first 9 rounds. Even from the perspective after the game, the only game that the champion Liu Yuanbo lost was to Li Xiangping.

However, just when everyone thought that Li Xiangping's early promotion was a foregone conclusion, an accident occurred.

Or, tragedy struck.

In the 10th round, Li Xiangping was blocked by Chen Yaoyue and failed to realize his wish of being promoted to the professional league in advance.

In the 11th round, Li Xiangping unexpectedly lost to the beautiful chess player Mao Jiajun, which once again delayed his progress towards promotion.

Yes, at this time everyone thought it was an accident, and Li Xiangping's progress towards becoming a professional player was just delayed.

However, a small number of experts who were familiar with the situation knew that Li Xiangping was already in danger at this time.

For no other reason than that in the 12th round, Li Xiangping met Yan Qing.

Although this young man named Yan Qing had average chess skills and talent, and judging from the results after the game, he barely made it into the professional professional league with the 19th place, he had one characteristic, which was Li Xiangping's "negative opponent".

Li Xiangping started participating in the ranking tournament at the age of 11. His outstanding chess sense and sharp reaction have long won unanimous recognition in the Go community. However, there is a fact, a fact that many people have not noticed. In the first two competitions, Li Xiangping was defeated by Yan Qing.

Now that this is the third time, can Li Xiangping defeat his “nemesis”?

The result was as expected by some experts. Li Xiangping lost to Yan Qing again as fate would have it, and still failed to get the one win he needed to successfully enter the professional league.

At this point in the game, everyone knew clearly in their minds: Li Xiangping was in danger, he was in real danger!

Although Li Xiangping is extremely strong and his chess talent is unanimously recognized in the chess world, he has a weakness that is also known to everyone: that is, he has poor psychological quality and extremely poor ability to withstand blows.

Just three days ago, the last round of this year's qualifying tournament kicked off, and the result was not unexpected. In the competition, Li Xiangping's technical movements were seriously deformed, and he showed signs of defeat early on.

So just like that, after 9 consecutive wins, Li Xiangping suffered 4 consecutive losses. While he failed to qualify for the professional league again, he also became one of the most eye-catching figures in the entire arena.

Especially something that happened after the game, you can even remove the "one of", making him the most eye-catching person in the entire tournament.

That was after the competition was over. Perhaps because of the deep stimulation or some other reason, the 13-year-old boy Li Xiangping suddenly fell into a coma. He has not woken up for two days and two nights and is still in the hospital for observation.

Qinhuai District, Jinling First People's Hospital, in a high-end ward, Li Xiangping was lying on the hospital bed, his eyes closed and unconscious.

Although he was not conscious, he looked ruddy and his breathing was steady. There were four people standing around the bed, watching him closely.

Among these four people there is an elderly couple, they are Li Xiangping’s grandparents. The two old people are now looking at their grandson with worry.

In addition to the two of them, there were two others, a man and a woman. The man was in his 40s, Li Xiangping's attending physician, and his surname was Ren. The woman was a nurse in her early 20s, and her surname was Yang.

"Doctor Ren, what is the current condition of my grandson?" Li Xiangping's grandfather asked.

"this……"

Doctor Ren is in his 40s. He is no ordinary doctor. He is one of the best doctors in this hospital and even in the whole of Jinling. He is a well-known authority in pediatric medicine in China. However, when faced with the question from Grandpa Li Xiangping, Doctor Ren didn't know how to answer:

"It's strange. We have conducted various tests on the child, from brain waves to electrocardiograms to various blood indicators, and we have not found any abnormalities. But why is the child still in a coma?"

"Humph! A bunch of quacks."

Mr. Li snorted, then ignored Doctor Ren and turned to Grandma Li Xiangping and said:

"My dear, I don't think it will work if we continue like this. We need to transfer Xiangping to another hospital! We need to consider transferring Xiangping to Shencheng or Beijing for treatment."

Although Li Xiangping's grandmother also looked anxious, she looked calmer than her grandfather and seemed much more decisive. After hearing what her grandfather said, she nodded without any hesitation:

"Yes, we can't delay any longer. We can't even find the cause of the disease. What kind of lousy hospital is this? Old man, I think you should contact Lao Zhao right now..."

Look, grandma has already thought about her next move.

Seeing the two old men's attitude, Doctor Ren didn't dare to say anything. Not to mention that he couldn't find the cause of the disease, which made him feel a little guilty. What's more, he knew the identities of the two people in front of him. They were typical old revolutionaries and he definitely couldn't afford to offend them.

Without mentioning anything else, just from the "Old Zhao" mentioned by Li Xiangping's grandmother, Doctor Ren knew that this was a big shot in the province. The reason why this child was able to stay in this high-ranking cadre ward was because of the greeting from that "Old Zhao".

Just when the atmosphere in the ward was a little awkward, another person suddenly rushed into the ward, shouting as :

"Xiang Ping, what happened to Xiang Ping..."

Seeing the person coming, Li Xiangping's grandfather was immediately furious and started to scold him:

"Oh, it turns out that it's our Boss Li who's here. What a rare guest. What's the matter, Boss Li? Why didn't you take time off from your money-making plan and finally remembered that you have a son?"

The person who came was naturally Li Xiangping's father Li Yuanhu. During Li Xiangping's competition, he happened to be in Beijing to discuss a business. After learning the news that Li Xiangping was in a coma, he only rushed over now.

Faced with his old man's anger, Li Yuanhu, the boss of the Li family, naturally did not dare to refute. Seeing that there were outsiders present, he had to pretend that he didn't hear it and turned to Li Xiangping's grandmother:

"Mom, what's going on with Xiang Ping?"

"Alas, he suddenly fell into a coma two days ago and hasn't woken up yet. When I asked him what the cause was, the doctor said he couldn't find any problem. It was really frustrating."

"oh?"

Li Yuanhu turned an inquiring look to Doctor Ren.

"You are Mr. Li, right? The situation is like this..."

Seeing that Li Yuanhu looked somewhat friendly, at least not as fierce as his old man, Doctor Ren pushed his glasses and prepared to ask someone else to explain.

It was a pity that his explanation was interrupted again, and this time it was the beautiful nurse named Yang who interrupted him:

"Blink! Blink! I seemed to see the child blink just now."

As soon as Nurse Yang said this, Doctor Ren naturally didn't bother to explain. Everyone, including him, stopped talking and stood around Li Xiangping again.

And at this moment, as if he had just finished a very long dream, a strange and even weird dream, Li Xiangping woke up slowly.

When Li Xiangping opened his eyes, the first thing that caught his eye was the anxious looks of his grandparents, and a feeling of warmth surged in his heart.

"grandparents."

"Hey, good grandson ."

Grandpa's face was beaming, and grandma was crying with joy:

"Xiang Ping, tell grandma what happened. By the way, how do you feel now?"

"I...I'm a little tired now and want to rest for a while."

Of course Li Xiangping was not really tired, he just wanted to take this opportunity to digest the dream he just had.

"Okay, okay, you take a rest. Have a good rest. Then you can talk to grandma after you've rested."

The world is big and the patient is the most important. Since Li Xiangping has made this request, others will naturally follow his advice.

It was a pity that Li Xiangping was destined not to have a "rest", because at this moment, someone else came to the ward:

"Oh, Xiangping is awake already? Haha, Xiangping, look who's here, Grandpa Zhao brought Daokai to see you."

Li Xiangping finally didn't want to "rest" anymore. He stared at Zhao Daokai with his eyes fixed:

"This kid, did he travel through time like me?"