Better to sacrifice a few stones... than to lose the initiative...
One wrong move... and all is lost!
And all is lost...
Lost...
Wang
...So you found me.
Wang
You've been following me for quite a while. Show yourself.
Wang looks back. The mixture of weeping and lament moves away gradually, but it does not stop for even an instant.
Wang
Hmph.
Wang
Let me see what you've got.
Wang follows the eerie voice to a decrepit weiqi stall.
A man, presumably the owner of the stall, sits on the ground weeping. There is no one around.
Strange Man
One wrong move... and all is lost...
Strange Man
And all is lost!
Before Wang has a chance to take in the situation on the weiqi board, the man falls upon it and begins to wail, sending stones flying.
Wang
Ridiculous.
As Wang turns around to leave, the man's crying begins to abate.
Strange Man
Don't go, sir, please, I'll set up the board again...
Strange Man
This game cost me my life savings, my home, my farm, even my family scattered and some of them died because of it... I am very sick and don't have long to live.
Strange Man
A game. A game of weiqi, that cost me my home, my family, my life...
Strange Man
I couldn't let it go. Take a look for me. If you can find a solution...
Strange Man
...Perhaps fate can still be changed!
The man goes from sobbing to howling. As Wang stands motionless, the man picks up the stones from the ground, and quickly sets up the board.
The man's hands move at a breathtaking pace. The game begins to grow as though it is alive, the war raging from the corners to the center, then to the other side which still lies empty, so fast the eyes can hardly keep up.
Before Wang can react, the man has put a black stone in his hand.
Strange Man
Your turn, sir.
Wang
...How?
Strange Man
Yes. How, indeed?
Strange Man
Black and white should have taken turns placing stones. But no black stone can be seen on the board, once you hold one. How should the game proceed?
Wang
This is ridiculous... I'll take my leave.
Strange Man
You ought to understand, sir.
Strange Man
This board is like an abyss. Every white stone is the size of a mountain, while the black ones that I have presumptuously placed upon it... are no more than game pieces.
Strange Man
We are so far from the board that even the mountains are no greater than the size of a thumb. How could we possibly see a tiny weiqi stone?
Strange Man
I held on as long as I could, but at this point I was dazed and exhausted. One wrong move...
The man begins to weep bitterly again—
Strange Man
...And all is lost!
Strange Man
Look! I gave each stone a name, but I couldn't save any of them! There is no way out for any of them!
Strange Man
This one is Shuo. This one is Wang. This one is Ling. This one is Jun—
Wang draws his blade and stabs at one of the white stones, only for it to make a sharp cracking sound as it bends, as though he were stabbing a boulder.
Strange Man
Pointless, like striking a rock with an egg...
Strange Man
Why did I play this game? I shouldn't have. Why...?
The sword turns and pierces the man's throat. He slumps to the ground, but no blood flows from the wound. The weeping grows even louder, though it is no longer intelligible.
The man's eyes glow with a strange expression. Is it fear or joy? He stares straight at Wang's face.
Wang instinctively reaches for the writing knife on his belt, but stops mid-way.
Finally, he ponders for a moment and puts the black stone in his hand on the board.
Wang
All is lost? Nonsense.
Wang
Set it here, and the game remains a toss-up.
No sooner have the words left Wang's mouth than the body on the ground turns into smoke, and the invisible black stones on the board reveal themselves.
Patrolling Candleholder
Mr. Wang!
Wang
You...
Patrolling Candleholder
I watched you stand in front of the door to the Sui Regulator before turning around again. I came to find you as I thought you might have met with a strange happening too.
Wang
Strange happening? You already know?
Patrolling Candleholder
Yes.
Wang
...I suppose I shouldn't be surprised.
Wang
There was a madman here crying about some omen of misfortune. He didn't make any sense.
Patrolling Candleholder
Where is he?
Wang
Vanished. His weiqi game remains.
Patrolling Candleholder
Understood. I'll have someone copy it down.
Patrolling Candleholder
One more thing. The Supervisor says Jie should be about done with the book copying, and that you probably brought the copies. Have you...?
Wang
Here.
Patrolling Candleholder
One moment please while I count them.
Patrolling Candleholder
Three poetry anthologies for a total of thirty-two scrolls...
Patrolling Candleholder
Five volumes on philology for a total of sixty scrolls...
Patrolling Candleholder
One volume on divination for a total of five scrolls...
Patrolling Candleholder
This is... the Jijiuzhang? Looks like it got mixed in with the divination books.
Patrolling Candleholder
Jie is such a genius. She wrote this in a single night, all one thousand and four hundred words of it, without a single character repeated.
Patrolling Candleholder
Her calligraphy is still so beautiful. There is truly no equal.
The Candleholder heaps praise upon the scroll. Wang follows his gaze—
I remember this... five hundred years ago, in the capital.
Wang
The first time she proposed an actionable hypothesis for destroying Sui.
Wang
She gave me the writing knife, but I don't remember what the article was about, what she wanted to tell me...
Wang
Hah. By 'repeat', did you mean making me repeat the events of the past in dream?
Only to make you see for yourself how many fantasies have appeared in your dreams over the past thousand years, dreams about destroying me, dreams that were doomed to fail.
I should turn these memories into a cage, and drown you in the shame of countless failures.
See, now... all the memories that you have forgotten.
The sky has completely darkened by the time the proxy arrives at the inn.
Wang
'Ji Jiu Qi Gu Yu Zhong Yi, Luo Lie Zhu Wu Ming Xing Zi.' The Jijiuzhang is distinctive, unlike other books: it lists the names of many things and persons.
Wang
...I should have remembered.
A breeze turns the pages. Wang seems to see a piece of paper in a different color on the back cover.
Wang
She was then trying to tell me something...
Wang picks up the thin booklet from the table and opens it.
'Ji Jiu Qi Gu Yu Zhong Yi, Luo Lie Zhu Wu Ming Xing Zi.' The Jijiuzhang is distinctive, unlike other books: it lists the names of many things and persons.
'Fen Bie Bu Ju Bu Za Ce, Yong Ri Yue Shao Cheng Kuai Yi, Mian Li Wu Zhi Bi You Xi.' They are classified into different sections by kind, so that nothing is confused or mixed together. With but little time expended, it suffices for daily use—truly to one's satisfaction. If one studies it with diligence, one is sure to taste the delight of success.
These should have been the words written on the first page. These were the words, when Wang scanned the page for the first time.
But now, the paper is covered in strange ink markings.
Sui Sui Sui Sui Sui Sui Sui, Sui Sui Sui Sui Sui Sui Sui
Sui Sui Sui Sui Sui Sui Sui, Sui Sui Sui Sui Sui Sui Sui, Sui Sui Sui Sui Sui Sui Sui
Wang instinctively raises the writing knife and aims it at the first fierce-looking 'Sui' on the page.
???
One wrong move...
Wang
...!
Wang
Who's there?
???
And all is lost...
The wind howls outside the window, but there is no one there.
Wang
Still trying to be our nightmare?
Wang
The same old tricks from centuries ago. Have you not grown tired of it yet?
???
When at a disadvantage, seek a draw...
Wang
There is no such thing as a draw between us.
???
When in danger, make sacrifices...
Wang
In your dreams.
Sui
The writing knife strikes the first 'Sui'.
Wang has used his sister's writing knife before. A slight cut, and the incorrect word is completely erased, leaving the page intact.
But he feels a great resistance, as though he is trying to scrape a boulder, a mountain even.
He tightens his not-too-strong arms and pushes down—
Ji
A crack of thunder outside the window.
The first 'Sui' finally disappears. The paper is blank for a moment, then the word that Jie wrote is revealed, the lines intentionally plain yet vigorous to make for easier recognition by learners.
The lone 'Ji' stands eerie amongst a page full of 'Sui'.
Wang
...'Ji.'
Wang
Is that it?
Wang
Is smearing and dabbing the worst you can do?
???
Do not give in to haste...
Wang
Hmph.
Sui
Wang takes aim at the second 'Sui' and scrapes it. The resistance seems even stronger than the first time.
Jiu
Wang
'Jiu.'
The night wind invades the room, trying to turn the pages, but Wang keeps the paper firmly under his palm.
Sui
Qi
Wang
'Qi.'
Sui
Gu
Wang
'Gu'—
The room starts to shake violently as the fourth word reveals itself.
Sui
Yu
Wang
'Yu'...
The thunder outside rumbles endlessly, accompanied by constant lightning.
Sui
Zhong
Wang
'Zhong'...
A bolt of lightning strikes the inn, setting it ablaze.
Sui
Yi
Wang
'Yi'...!
The room burns fiercely, but Wang remains at the desk, utterly focused on cutting the page.
Each 'Sui' requires greater exertion than the last. Each time a 'Sui' is erased, a different hellish vision appears around him.
The sky sunders, the earth trembles, winds shriek and thunder roars, and fires burn red and bright.
The beams, the bed, the desk, the shelves... until there is nothing in the room left to burn, and even the ground has been burned through.
Wang can feel himself drop straight down like a stone, but his hands do not stop.
The last 'Sui' is erased, and he finds himself in the dark room again.
Nothing in the room has changed, except for Wang sitting in the middle of the room, his face gaunt and yellow, his clothes tattered, as though he physically journeyed through all these hellish visions.
Wang
...
Wang
(Heavy breathing)
Wang
What other weiqi wisdom do you have...? Spit it out, won't you?
???
...
Silence.
Wang turns the page. There is indeed a paper between the last page and the back cover. It is not words that are written on it, but a nineteen-by-nineteen weiqi board drawn with writing ink.
Wang
Not a classic match, but a handicap game of clearly mismatched sides.
Wang
Wait, this is...
It's one thing to make me play weiqi with you because you're bored, dear brother, it's another to use the stones to form the character for 'bored.'
As if that would help me against you.
Why don't you find something else to pass the time, if it's not really a weiqi game that you're after? Go hiking, learn an instrument... I could teach you calligraphy, if it comes down to that.
Oh? What thoughts did you read this time?
Wang
There are words on the other side...
Through the paper, Wang can see that the writing is different from the simple, straightforward lines that she used when copying for learners; it is the unique style of calligraphy that she uses when writing to her siblings.
He flips the paper over, trying to see what the message he never managed to see was—
After more than a century of plotting since your last failed attempt, this is how it ends, I the strategist, I the schemer?
Wang
You're delusional.
The proxy stands beside his bloody corpse on the floor, perfectly unharmed as he was when he entered the Tomb of Sui.
The body on the ground dissipates like the morning dew, until only three shining black stones are left—
Until they, too, disintegrate.
Turning yourself into weiqi stones. This was your idea.
Wang
Three black stones in exchange for killing you once. A fair trade.
Pathetic. You are fooling yourself.
Wang
Fooling myself?
Wang
I've visited many of your kind. I know how incomprehensible you are... how incomprehensible we are.
Wang
I know about the faint consciousnesses that were born from the primordial void, and I know how they have transformed themselves into colossal entities in the course of an infinity.
Wang
Time, space, quantity, structure... the things that mortals take for granted, the things that seem to be everlasting, unchangeable, are merely a temporary roost for you.
Wang
I have seen one of your kind continue to disrupt what should have been the calm flow of time, even though it had died long ago and been turned into a machine at the hands of others.
And you still dream of killing me?
Wang
Perhaps you have no need to die. But you will fall into eternal slumber, Sui, the dreamer of evolution.
Wang
Mankind has no use for your arrogant design, and I have no use for your endless dream.
Wang
Every death in your memory is real, a genuine death of a small part of your enormous consciousness.
Wang
Don't believe me? Think back to the day I encountered that 'madman', back when your methods were so primitive they were downright laughable. What did I do?
Wang
Did I give the book back to the Sui Regulator? Did I destroy it? What was written in it? Was it really a book?
Wang
See? You've forgotten.
You dare...!
Wang
Your memory has died, the price you paid in exchange for three black stones.
Wang
To be precise, you died by the writing knife imbued with a proxy's entire life force.
Wang
He scraped clean every instance of the 'Sui' character across all Great Yan, and with it any trace that a creature called 'Sui' ever existed.
The recklessness... the blasphemy!
Wang
I would do it again, had I the writing knife in my hand right now.
Wang
I would be happy to create for you a nightmare, from which you would never wake. Even at the cost of my own life.
...You cannot.
The more parts of me you kill, the more you think you have weakened me, and the sooner I will wake.
Wang
I know.
Wang
Death hurts. Each and every one of your memories is real. They are happening somewhere. The pain of your death cuts straight to the heart.
