Chapter 679 – #137_Turning Point (4)
#679
1.
A public society teeming with opportunists, no different from hungry jackals.
The inept cannot survive.
Even Rosie Aludo, who appears as flimsy as tracing paper, has lived in that environment for over 170 years.
Rosie deduced many truths and formed hypotheses from Shin Siwoo’s sudden visit alone.
His excuse of wanting to compete on the position board was so transparent that it made her suspect there might be another trick.
It wasn’t difficult to infer his true purpose, disguised by a shallow deception.
It must be Manya and Malisha.
The circumstances strongly suggested it.
He bought Alice to make her his servant, and Alice was a woman who acted like an older sister to Manya and Malisha.
If a vast power gap exists between a man and a woman, it’s as natural for sexual favors to be exchanged as moss growing on rocks in a valley.
How many people wouldn’t harbor lewd thoughts when they can freely control a witch who is beautiful by nature?
After a few times of skin-to-skin contact, affection and favors are bound to deepen.
If Alice had charmed Shin Siwoo well, there’s no guarantee she wouldn’t have whispered a request from her pillow to rescue her former lovers, using her position as an unofficial ‘disciple’ of Linne.
‘Aaaah, how pathetic.’
Rosie, having grasped the situation more through her keen intuition than logical judgment, chuckled in two senses.
One was because of Shin Siwoo’s attitude, acting as if being Linne’s disciple made him something special,
and the other was the ridicule she felt towards him for showing off to impress a woman.
Well, she didn’t express it outwardly.
She was bored anyway, and she was also interested in male witches.
If she could subtly get what she wanted while having fun with the position board, that was enough.
The moment he showed a strange obsession with the position board, Rosie succeeded in figuring out the tool he had prepared to achieve his goal.
A bet using the position board.
The first round was merely for entertainment, but after it ended, he would naturally say that it was boring and suggest playing for something.
The stakes would undoubtedly be the rental rights for Manya and Malisha.
For Rosie, it was a welcome development.
The fact that he chose the position board as the betting subject only made her chuckle again.
Shin Siwoo probably came thinking Rosie was just a witch obsessed with the position board…
But she could confidently say that was the worst possible move.
Rosie had never lost a game she had ever wanted to win.
She was so immersed in it, almost to the point of autism, that she had thoroughly explored the position board, which was just a game to other witches.
She even knew all the rune placement patterns, which were commonly thought to be arranged by a random algorithm.
There was no prey easier to catch than an opponent who mistakenly thought they were the hunter.
She would lose the mock game with no stakes to ensure he had enough confidence to agree to the bet.
‘If I win the bet, what should I ask for?’
She was already considering that.
She would prepare a gift for Mama, who had been reacting listlessly to everything lately.
It would also be fun to make him say that he had violated Pina and then observe Mama’s reaction.
What kind of reaction would Mama have if he found out that the apprentice witch he had tried to protect through so much devotion and sacrifice had been defiled by a man just days before her release?
And if she teased Mama, who was furious, by telling him that it never happened, it would be a major highlight to see how he would change his attitude and act submissively.
Rosie, lost in happy fantasies that made her lower body tingle, had to reverse her assessment about 30 minutes after the first match.
‘This guy, huh?’
Shin Siwoo was indeed skilled enough to be confident.
Although Rosie hadn’t even used half of her true power, any ordinary witch would have already been defeated.
She was about to naturally lose to him, but…
The game kept going on and on.
Even though Rosie had shown him the timing to end it several times, he naturally diverted his attention and didn’t seize the victory.
Rosie smiled.
There was no way someone with that much skill wouldn’t be able to read the situation.
Shin Siwoo was trying to entertain Rosie with a match and lead her to a bet,
He had the exact same idea.
Rosie was momentarily dumbfounded by his audacity, but from the perspective of the result, nothing changed.
Rosie willingly accepted his bet.
2.
“……”
“……”
The burning ends of the cigarettes in their mouths were reminiscent of the fuse of a bomb.
That’s how much tension was flowing between the two.
The second match, with ‘Malisha and Manya’ and Rosie’s ‘request’ as stakes, had begun.
About 50 moves had been exchanged.
Siwoo was filled with dismay.
He had been tricked.
He had already been so skilled that he hadn’t considered the possibility that his opponent had held back.
He had judged that if he used his magic eye to its full potential, he could easily win the next game.
But it wasn’t so.
In the previous game, Rosie, like Siwoo, hadn’t used her full power at all.
As evidence, the moment the second match started, her chaotic play style, which had been like a child playing with a ball, transformed into that of a perfectionist who considered all variables and possibilities.
Her attacks, clinging to occupy the runes, were as fierce as a raging tide, yet when he tried to counterattack, she would immediately lock the doors and go into a localized consolidation.
Her thoroughness didn’t allow for even the slightest loss.
She perfectly avoided the dispel pins scattered like landmines, predicting their preparation from the pre-completion stage.
The moment he showed even a slight opening, she would pounce like a school of piranhas smelling blood.
It felt like he was competing against a high-performance AI that was both offensive and defensive.
There wasn’t a single false move.
She only made one move each turn, but that one move was as cautious as if she had considered all variables and probabilities in advance.
She was probably seeing the board all the way to the late game, not just the mid-game.
“Hoo…”
However, the match was still tight.
Even though the fact that Rosie had been hiding her power was unexpected, it didn’t mean Siwoo had become weaker.
Siwoo’s magic eye was working normally, and the game records he had memorized for fun were still in his head.
Compared to magical battles where he had to process all sorts of complex calculations in a split second, recalling hundreds of game records was a piece of cake.
He cross-checked the advantages and disadvantages based on the database in his memory.
He predicted the flow of the game and guessed Rosie’s schemes that hadn’t yet been executed.
Siwoo exhaled cigarette smoke and looked at the battlefield for control of the center.
As with all wars, occupying the center is important in the position board.
If he built a magic battery here, he could quickly attack the enemy’s magic source from a close distance.
Conversely, if he established a solid defense system here, the enemy would have no choice but to bypass the center, forcing long-term inefficiency.
Therefore, if the early game is the stage of occupying the runes around the magic source and securing resources to increase efficiency, the mid-game can be seen as the phase of competing for this key point.
“……”
He thinks.
It’s still difficult to say that the early game has been completely settled.
It feels too early for either side to step into the center.
But he also thinks.
Play styles can be changed like masks.
However, it’s impossible to completely alter the underlying style of play.
The style of play embodies not only methodology but also the philosophy of how to approach victory.
Judging from the first match, Rosie’s style of play was a textbook snowballing pattern.
She doesn’t take excessive risks.
She does her job step by step, interferes with her opponent’s job, and gains even the smallest advantage.
Even if it’s an advantage that doesn’t contribute even 0.001% to the overall match, it’s fine.
She rolls that half-of-a-half advantage to create a half-move gap.
And she rolls that half-move advantage to create a one-move gap.
She repeats this throughout the game without making any mistakes.
That’s the biggest problem.
If Rosie had been the type to set traps or draw big pictures,
If she had been a player with a so-called gambler’s temperament, she would have been easy prey for the magic eye.
No matter how meticulously she concealed it, she would have been naked in front of the golden magic eye.
However, the effectiveness of the magic eye is reduced against an opponent who prioritizes taking small gains without a grand plan.
If the early game went smoothly and they clashed in the center with both sides fully prepared, he honestly didn’t have the confidence to win.
A slight gap had already been created in the advantage of going first.
If things continued smoothly, the hair-thin gap would eventually become a huge crevasse.
Therefore, he absolutely couldn’t have a smooth game.
The position board is not a game where you do what you want, but a game where you prevent your opponent from doing what they want.
This was the sentence that permeated Siwoo’s philosophy of victory.
-Tap!
Rosie wants to have a stable fight.
Having judged that, Siwoo threw a move into the center three breaths faster than planned.
The ensuing battle would be a fierce dogfight.
Since neither side had a sufficient base, they would have to squeeze their magic sources, and the key would be how efficiently they could recover the magic used in the battle.
Whether Rosie’s style of play could be demonstrated in a series of localized battles where shrapnel flew like grenades.
That was something he could test from now on.
“…Tsk.”
Just as she was about to finish the early game.
His move, advancing about three breaths faster than Rosie had expected, was enough to catch her eye.
Rosie’s impression, which had continued since the start of the game, was summarized in one word in the face of this bold decision.
‘What the hell is this guy?’
Rosie lit a new cigarette.
The stinging smoke gave a moment of rest to her head, which was spinning and heating up.
Rosie considers all the possible scenarios that could arise from each of her moves and her opponent’s moves.
She basically looks ahead about 50 moves.
Even though the position board is just a childish game of magic, this kind of behavior is not something anyone can do.
It was possible because Rosie’s skill, as a great witch who was ridiculously serious about the position board, far exceeded the level of a mere game.
For Rosie, if the game had progressed to the end of the early game, it was usually a time when she could be confident of victory.
The opponent might think, ‘Oh, I’m at a slight disadvantage? I’ll turn it around later,’ but that gap would never narrow until the late game.
But Shin Siwoo was different from the opponents she had faced so far.
He had taken advantage of the first move, but after that, no matter how many moves she made, she couldn’t snowball.
That meant he was aware of the gap between him and Rosie and was wary of it.
Even a tiny gap, no bigger than an ant’s antenna.
At least in this position board, Rosie always makes the ‘best move’.
The fact that the gap wasn’t widening meant that Shin Siwoo was also making the ‘best move’.
A master recognizes another master.
Rosie felt a thrill run down her spine.
Shin Siwoo was the first formidable opponent she had ever encountered.
