On the second day of the competition, Li Xiangping walked from the hotel to the arena according to his previous habits. Because the distance is still far this time, Li Xiangping set off from the hotel relatively early, and arrived early when he left, at 9:40 in the morning, Li Xiangping arrived at the venue nearly 20 minutes in advance.

However, when he arrived at the arena, he found that Zhang Xu arrived earlier than him, and he had already made all the preparations before the game.

"Oops, I'm sorry, I'm sorry......"

Since they arrived so early, it was impossible for the two of them to sit like that, so Li Xiangping began to chat with Zhang Xu. Zhang Xu is Chinese after all, so there is no problem in language communication, and when Li Xiangping went to Japan to compete in the past, he was often received by Chinese chess players such as Lin Haifeng and Mr. Wang Mingwan, so although he and Zhang Xu are not particularly familiar, they have not yet reached the point where the two of them are staring at each other face to face.

The conversation between the two began with today's "Tie Match".

Today's game was held in a place like the castle tower, so the organizers had the ingenuity to decorate the entire room into a traditional Japanese "Japanese-style game room", where a high board was placed on a tatami mat, and the players were required to "kneel" to play the game.

Li Xiangping started talking here, after all, he had never played chess on tatami mats before, well, when he came to step on the spot yesterday, he tried to sit upright----- this is the real kind of "sitting upright".

However, he found that this kind of "kneeling and sitting" was really uncomfortable, and if he kept the correct posture, Li Xiangping thought that he couldn't even hold on for 10 minutes, let alone a game that lasted six or seven hours.

"You don't have to do it all the time, when you start to have reporters taking pictures, you can use this sitting position to pose, and when the reporters are gone, you can ...... like this."

Speaking of this lifelike posture of sitting cross-legged: "It is much more comfortable to sit this way." ”

"Hehe, thank you, thank you." Li Xiangping thanked Zhang Xu, and then he asked curiously:

"What about you, I heard that you came to Japan to learn chess at a very young age, so it's okay now."

"I'm used to it." Zhang Xu smiled shyly, his Chinese is actually quite good, but it may be because he usually speaks less, his speed of speech seems to be relatively slow:

"Xiangping, you should know, Japan's most important games, that is still always adhere to the tatami game, and since I came to Japan, I have been yearning to play chess in the "Yugen" special game room of the Japanese Chess Academy, so over time, I am now used to it, and I will not tell you, now, every time there is a critical moment in the game, it will unconsciously change from sitting cross-legged to sitting in the front seat, thinking that this way can I concentrate. ”

"Hehe, I forgot to congratulate you when you mentioned "Youxuan", congratulations on your ascension to the throne of "Ben Yin Fang". ”

In Japan, the traditional "Big Triple Crown" is a symbol of a player's status.

"Chess Holy War", "Celebrity War", and "Honinbo War", as long as you can win one of these three titles, you can be called a "great chess player" in Japan.

Not long ago, Zhang Xu just won the title of "Ben Yin Fang" from Masao Kato, which greatly improved his coffee position. And judging from the situation in real history, this year is also the last year of the replacement of the old and the new in the Japanese chess world, at this time, the "chess saint" is still Wang Licheng, the "celebrity" is Yitian Kiki, and the "Ben Yinfang" is Zhang Xu.

So wait until next year, Zhang Xu in the "celebrity battle" and "Ben Yin Fang battle" in the "double kill" Yitian Kiki, Wang Licheng's "chess saint" was also snatched away by other young chess players, which means that the Japanese chess world has officially entered the "Heisei Four Heavenly Kings" era, the reign of these four people lasted about 10 years, and it was 10 years later in 2013, with Zhang Xu's "chess saint" being taken away by Iyama Yuta as a symbol, the Japanese chess world officially entered the era of Iyama dominating the world.

The two chatted like this, the start time was coming soon, around 9:55, the referee and notation staff came in, the referee was nothing, one of the notators aroused Li Xiangping's interest, because this is none other than Japan's current reigning "Female Stream Honinbo" Kobayashi Izumi 6th Dan.

Kobayashi Izumi is the daughter of Mr. Kobayashi Koichi, originally with her kind of coffee with a title in hand, she would not normally come to be a notor, but she still has an identity, she is now Zhang Xu's girlfriend, and it is the kind that chases backwards, in real history, the two of them should be engaged in the second half of this year, and then officially get married next year.

"Hehe, it's not easy to do, I guess it's going to be quite difficult to play today."

Today's "Lihe person" is none other than Zhang Xu's mentor Mr. Lin Haifeng, after listening to Li Xiangping's words, he asked curiously:

"Why is it so difficult to play today?"

Li Xiangping said with a smile; "Mr. Lin, think about it, I'm only one nineteen paragraphs, but Zhang Xu and Quanmei's sister have fifteen paragraphs, these nine paragraphs against fifteen paragraphs, can chess be played well?"

After listening to Li Xiangping's words, everyone who could understand Chinese smiled, Mr. Lin was the kind of elder who smiled generously, and Zhang Xu was shy and shy. Li Xiangping especially noticed that Miss Kobayashi Quanmei seemed to understand, so she showed a smug smile.

"Tsk, this sister Quanmei is still amazing, not only has a good eye, but she is also fast and hateful, it seems that she is a few years older than Zhang Xu, right? This tender grass is so fragrant for her to eat......"

10 o'clock soon came, and as Mr. Lin announced the start of the game, Li Xiangping also dispelled all distractions and focused on the current game. After guessing first, this game was Li Xiangping who guessed the black chess.

I have to tell the truth, before coming to Japan this time, and even for a long time after the start of the match, Li Xiangping was still very confident in this match.

The source of his confidence lies in nothing else, but because this time he is facing a Japanese player.

In the future, what is the concept of "Japanese chess player"? Well, Li Xiangping thinks that Chinese football can be compared with it. It is rumored that before Li Xiangping's crossing, some young domestic chess players went to participate in the qualifiers for the World Series, and if they met Japanese chess players in some games, they met people after the game to inquire about the outcome of the game.

The young players usually don't answer directly, and a simple sentence of "I met a Japanese in this round" is basically a statement.

It is precisely because the weakness of the Japanese chess players has impressed everyone so much, so there is no doubt that Li Xiangping, as a crosser, will be no exception, and he believes that he certainly has reason to be "cautiously optimistic" about the prospects of this semi-final.

However, after the game started, Li Xiangping felt that something was not right, and as early as the morning, he felt that the chess game was a little awkward-----

It must be pointed out that the two sides only played a total of less than 50 chess moves in the morning, and although Li Xiangping did not feel that he had any advantages, he also did not think that his chess was already inferior. The main reason is that the pattern formed this morning is completely inconsistent with what Li Xiangping expected, he didn't expect that he would be like this with Zhang Xu.

The pattern formed in the morning is the typical "terrain" confrontation pattern in Go, where Li Xiangping, who is in black, is in charge of the field, and Zhang Xu, who is in white, is in the big picture of running himself wholeheartedly.

Such an extreme pattern was of course beyond Li Xiangping's expectations.

To say that Li Xiangping subconsciously despises Japanese chess players, when he is not the kind of crazy person after all, so in order to play this game of chess, he has done the necessary preparations, and he can see a few of Zhang Xu's recent chess games before the game.

According to his understanding of Zhang Xu in his previous life and present life, he believes that Zhang Xu's chess actually belongs to the "evil masters" of Sakata Rongnan, Zhao Zhixun, and Chen Xiaoqiang. Most of the people in this genre are lacking in the "big picture", but they are very sensitive to the ground and very sharp about some small local means.

In addition to these common characteristics, Li Xiangping has another feeling after watching Zhang Xu's chess games, that is, compared with others, Li Xiangping feels that Zhang Xu's chess is still more flexible, which should be regarded as his biggest personal advantage.

It is precisely because of this that Li Xiangping thinks that there is nothing wrong with his strategy today, don't you like to make real money? Then I'll take the first step and let you have nothing to catch.

However, although Li Xiangping thought that his strategy was fine, the process of not fighting in the morning was a bit unexpected by him------

In Li Xiangping's expectations, he thought that when he was fishing for the field, the opponent should be not to be outdone, and according to his style, Zhang Xu should rush to fish with him.

However, what Li Xiangping didn't expect was that the opponent's strategy today was not "not to be outdone", and a more accurate description should be said to be "-for-tat".

Zhang Xu chose not to be moved, not only was he unmoved, but his attitude was even extremely resolute, and he was wholeheartedly managing his own appearance.

Not only that, but because Zhang Xu's attitude is extremely resolute, and Li Xiangping cannot quickly adjust his strategy after the game starts, so the pattern on today's chessboard is even a bit extreme, which is the extreme "terrain confrontation" pattern.

To tell the truth, it is precisely because of this "extreme" that Li Xiangping is a little awkward.

Not because of anything else, because this extreme pattern in Go is actually difficult to grasp most of the time, and most of the points on the board are usually relatively "empty------

Since it comes to the "virtual calculation road", Li Xiangping still has this self-knowledge, and he thinks that at this stage, of course, the "real calculation road" is far more than his "virtual calculation road".

So since he played like this today, Li Xiangping has a feeling of being in the middle of the game, and he thinks that today's chess has not followed his familiar chess path.

However, there is no way, since the pattern has been formed, Li Xiangping certainly has no time to regret it, he must have a good competition with his opponent in this extreme pattern.

In the 2 hours of play in the morning, the overall game is exactly 49 moves, which means that the first move in the afternoon will be Zhang Xuluo.

This move is very important, because Zhang Xu's move will actually determine the skeleton of this game.

"Where will the opponent become......?"

At the moment of the closure at noon, Li Xiangping began to think about this problem.