A solitary pavilion on a lonely mountain.

The mountain wind blew through Song Qian Ji’s long hair and sleeves.

His fair skin took on a slight flush as the effects of alcohol rose.

The rich aroma of fruit wine in his nostrils, the bright stars overhead, the chess match in the valley below.

On such a fine night, Song Qian Ji leaned against the weathered pavilion pillar, feeling as if he were floating in the clouds, drifting up and down.

The yellow-dressed girl curled her lip: “If you truly understand, why didn’t you register to compete and win a championship, instead of drinking alone?”

“I just don’t want to compete, I just want to drink!” Song Qian Ji mumbled.

The girl frowned. This drunkard was unreasonable; perhaps she should knock him unconscious and wake him after the chess match was over, to prevent his drunken babbling from disturbing her master.

Boasting about “understanding chess” in front of the Chess Demon was like demanding a sword match at the door of the Sword Immortal.

Overestimating oneself, not knowing life from death.

She walked in front of the drunkard, just raising her hand when she suddenly met a pair of eyes as clear as snow—

Starlight reflecting in them created ripples, like the sparkling spring waters of Yao Guang Lake.

Or like the moonlit sea, boundless, accommodating all things.

This demeanor was completely at odds with the arrogant drunken words he had spoken.

He said: “Go to four-three, ha, freely offering a midnight snack! Better to play ‘Ping five-eight’!”

His laughter wasn’t loud, but extremely light and carefree.

The girl came to her senses and saw him changing the white piece’s move. She instinctively looked at the board, silently calculating this move.

He did understand a bit—a mediocre move, neither good nor bad. Not necessarily more brilliant than Li Er Gou’s “Qu four-three.”

She couldn’t help but sneer: “Even ‘Qu four-three’ can hold the fortress. If you play ‘Ping five-eight,’ I’ll counter with ‘Shang seven-three,’ cutting off your retreat with one stroke!”

After speaking, she felt a bit regretful.

I, Li Ying, am after all a disciple of the Chess Demon’s side. Though not his direct disciple, what is there to argue about with a drunkard?

Isn’t that embarrassing my master?

Song Qian Ji, without thinking, called out another move position.

Li Ying’s expression changed slightly: “I was careless just now; one move behind in chess, but you still can’t beat me! I advise you not to provoke me into making moves, lest you become trapped in the formation and suffer the consequences.”

When cultivators play chess, they often use divine consciousness to calculate and deploy troops. Those with fragile divine consciousness or exhausted calculating power may experience dizziness, chest tightness, and irritability at best, or cough blood and faint at worst.

Song Qian Ji smiled: “What if I win?”

Li Ying said angrily: “If you win, I’ll call you ancestor or grandfather, whatever you want; if you lose, you must kneel and kowtow, calling me good auntie! Ru six-two!”

She followed Song Qian Ji’s words and forcefully placed a piece.

After speaking, she remembered to check her master’s expression, and seeing his indifferent look, eyes slightly closed, with no sign of blaming her, she grew even bolder.

She had lived a fortunate life since childhood, knowing no hardship, lively and innocent. Having seen many so-called geniuses wanting to become the Chess Demon’s disciples, she always felt they were nothing special, inevitably developing a sense of pride.

Song Qian Ji neither agreed nor disagreed, only responding with another move.

The mountain pavilion was high up in the clouds and sounds from the valley should be inaudible, yet in Li Ying’s mind, she heard the clear sound of pieces being placed.

It was a blindfold chess match between her and that drunkard.

She was determined to make him submit wholeheartedly, her moves becoming increasingly ruthless.

From the moment Song Qian Ji entered the pavilion, the two players in the valley had already placed forty pieces, each with gains and losses.

Zhao Lin played with furious anger, Li Er Gou played jumping up and down. The viewing platform was brightly lit, with spectators sometimes exclaiming in surprise, and sighing.

The two people in the pavilion had also exchanged forty sentences.

The girl’s voice was as melodious as a yellow oriole, but sometimes urgent, sometimes hesitant.

Song Qian Ji’s voice was loose with drunkenness, but no matter how the opponent attacked or encircled, he always maintained a smile.

After fifty moves, the deadlock suddenly changed, like clouds breaking and the sky shocking.

The girl’s pretty little face paled slightly, and she turned suddenly, staring at Song Qian Ji in surprise:

“Who-whose disciple are you?”

Song Qian Ji tilted his head back, drank a mouthful of fruit wine, and sighed with satisfaction: “I am an outer sect disciple. Ping three-nine!”

Li Ying didn’t believe him. This person wore simple, plain clothes, yet the purple jade wine jar in his hand was priceless. His background and origins were unknown.

With extraordinary calculating power, an isolated chess style, and remaining silently unnamed.

When had such a figure emerged in the cultivation world?

She still wasn’t convinced and closed her eyes to calculate.

Calculating a hundred moves ahead, fine sweat covered her forehead, soaking her bangs, as tens of thousands of possible variations moved simultaneously in her sea of consciousness.

After an unknown time, the horizontal and vertical lines on the chessboard suddenly twisted and deformed, tightly entangling her. White pieces fell like boulders pressing on her chest.

She suddenly found it difficult to breathe, her vision repeatedly darkening.

“Pat!”

Just as she was at the end of her rope, sinking into darkness, someone suddenly patted her on the back.

The palm was light and effortless, yet it was like a giant blade descending from the sky, instantly shattering the boulder on her chest.

“There are always others better than you, realms beyond realms. Little Ying, you should understand this now, right?”

The elderly man sitting in the pavilion said indifferently.

“Master!”

The girl opened her eyes, suddenly seeing stars in the sky, silver light pouring onto the ground; in the valley, stewards carried lanterns, lights illuminating everywhere, with figures moving about.

A feeling of having survived a disaster washed over her, making her nose tingle, as if she had suffered a great injustice. “Thank you, Master!”

The old man opened his eyes: “Qu nine-four.”

He took over the black pieces, taking over the endgame, but didn’t look at Song Qian Ji, his face still bearing a kind of weariness.

But as one piece was placed, a brilliant move revealed itself, like clouds parting to reveal the moon.

Song Qian Ji shook his head, mumbling: “Chased away the little one, here comes the old one. The little one is foolish, the old one is sick. Why am I bothering?!”

“How dare you!” Li Ying reprimanded, still breathing unevenly.

“It’s fine,” the old man laughed instead.

Li Ying glared at Song Qian Ji, thinking that her master had just been tricked by the Calligraphy Saint, with nowhere to vent his frustration, so he would certainly strike hard.

You foolishly delivered yourself to the door; that can only be counted as your bad luck.

But she saw the drunkard about to speak, then suddenly stopping as if calculating the power of this chess move.

His smile disappeared, his eyebrows slightly raised, with a kind of dignified loneliness between them.

He suddenly shouted: “Well done! Shang eight-six!”

His voice shook the sea of clouds, the forests sighing.

Li Ying was startled, inexplicably becoming tense.

The spring breeze blew, wine fragrance pervaded, and the flush on Song Qian Ji’s face deepened.

The old man’s calm eyes gradually gathered a sharp radiance.

Li Ying listened to the blindfold chess, pieces falling in her mind, seeing the two exchanging a hundred moves, back and forth, sometimes black pieces like dragons soaring into the clouds, white pieces like rivers, surging endlessly.

She listened with increasing alarm, not daring to calculate too much, taking out a notebook and a small calligraphy brush from her storage pouch, and concentrating on recording the chess game.

She still felt tonight was extremely absurd. When her master was despondent, a drunkard barged in, and he turned out to be a drunkard with exceptional chess skills.

Master had said before that enduring the torment of illness would bring blessing. Could this be the reward today?

The crowd on the viewing platform suddenly erupted in cheers, shaking heaven and earth.

People rushed toward the valley, shouting about an incomparable match.

It seemed the chess trial finals, between Li Er Gou and Zhao Lin, had been decided. The chess trial champion was determined.

But in the mountain pavilion above, who cared?

Intoxicated in the spring breeze, Song Qian Ji swayed, stepped forward, and examined the old man’s face.

The old man’s eyes shone with a brilliant light, like the deepest whirlpool in the Dead Sea, about to suck away one’s soul.

His spine was as straight as a sword, completely different from his withered sitting posture earlier.

Song Qian Ji thought, this old man looks haggard and thin, but his spirit is quite good.

Perhaps he isn’t sick?

Then I won’t hold back.

“Qu eight-seven. Fly!”

Placing a piece at the “sun” character-shaped intersection point is called “flying.”

Li Ying’s spirit shook; amid this light shout, there was a domineering air that looked down on the world.

She seemed to truly see an eagle striking through the sky, soaring upward.

The Chess Demon frowned: “Qu nine-two, cut!”

A high mountain sprang up out of nowhere, cutting off the flying eagle.

Song Qian Ji stood on the star position of the chessboard, trying to withdraw and move.

All around, smooth black pieces rose one by one from the ground, transforming into tall mountains, pressing toward him.

Mountains coming to block.

Song Qian Ji’s wide sleeves fluttered, his right hand’s five fingers spreading open.

“Swoosh—”

A long sword arrived, breaking through space.

A piercing sword light flew out, mountains collapsed, and black stones shattered.

With sword in hand, who could stop him?

Song Qian Ji slashed down with one sword, sword energy soaring to the sky, a great river descending from heaven!

His feet trod on wave crests, and towering white waves followed his sword momentum, rolling and surging.

Black mountains rose again, each higher than the last, cutting through heaven and earth, intercepting the river flow.

Song Qian Ji was almost knocked over, controlling the white river to pass between them, the roaring water sound deafening.

The sky shook, countless huge black pieces fell like meteoric rain from beyond the sky, crashing down upon him.

Song Qian Ji waved his sleeve, and beneath his feet, thousands of white waves rose layer by layer.

The long sword swung out, and the snow-bright sword light split from one to ten, from hundred to thousand, finally becoming ten thousand swords launching simultaneously.

Black meteors were penetrated by swords, bursting into tens of thousands of white lights, disintegrating.

More meteors crashed down, filling the entire sky densely.

The sun and moon lost their light, everything became pitch black.

Only a white river remained, its vitality undiminished.

Song Qian Ji had forgotten the chess game, forgotten the mountain pavilion, forgotten everything.

He charged against mountains, pursued seas, faced the sky, and slashed with his sword.

Heaven collapsed, meteors shattered.

Earth sank, and the great river dispersed.

…

Song Qian Ji opened his eyes, his expression slightly dazed.

The mountain pavilion remained, the spring breeze remained, and starlight quietly filled his lapels.

He gradually regained his senses.

The old man laughed heartily: “Refreshing!”

His eyes were bright, like the fire of life burning, returning to his prime.

“It’s been a long time since I set up a formation,” he said.

If used normally, it would just be a casual application, not worthy of being called a formation.

“It’s also been a long time since I held a sword,” Song Qian Ji praised. “What formidable formation skills.”

The Chess Demon said: “What a ruthless sword technique!”

They looked at each other and smiled.

Li Ying was dumbfounded: “Who won?”

Her recorded chess game had stopped abruptly, and the two had already entered a meditative state.

“Cyclical impasse, no winner or loser,” the Chess Demon said.

Li Ying was stunned.

Even if Master didn’t use spiritual energy, but formed a formation with the chessboard in the sea of consciousness, could there still be someone in the world who could break out of Master’s entrapment?

The Chess Demon asked in a deep voice: “Young man, have you suffered a broken home and family, bearing a deep blood feud?”

He thought, if you have a feud, I’ll avenge it for you.

Song Qian Ji said: “I don’t.”

“Are you enduring humiliation with a great injustice?”

If you have an injustice, I’ll also redress it for you.

“I don’t have that either,” Song Qian Ji shook his head.

The Chess Demon was stunned: “Then why, at such a young age, is your sword technique so ruthless?!”

Song Qian Ji gave a drunken hiccup: “I have no choice.”

This statement was incomplete. Li Ying was extremely puzzled and extremely curious.

The Chess Demon saw that the other seemed to have difficulties and didn’t press further, only saying:

“Whose young disciple are you? Who is your master?”

“No master, no sect, self-taught,” Song Qian Ji said.

“Why self-taught?”

“Be-because…”

Song Qian Ji’s mind suddenly became foggy. Breaking into dangerous places to get zither scores, falling into trap formations to learn chess, breaking through mechanisms—these were things from many years ago.

He didn’t want to say more, but after the previous match, he had developed a closeness to this old man enjoying the cool air, so he briefly said:

“To put it simply, it was for a woman.”

This answer shocked the old and young in the pavilion.

Song Qian Ji was quite surprised too.

He thought, with my chess skills, able to walk out alive from the tomb of the powerful King of Thousand Channels, able to take away his treasured zither score, I thought I was quite skilled.

Yet tonight I couldn’t win against a sickly old man, only managing a draw.

Damn it. King of Thousand Channels, you’re not good enough!

Indeed, there are always others better than you, realms beyond realms. Your superior will always be your superior.

He no longer dared to say he “especially understood chess.”

In the sea of learning, of course, he only knew a little.