Chapter 125: Traveled Across the Ocean Just to See You

On the bright side, the Nihon Go world was spinning crazily around her.

Since becoming a professional, she had won all official games.

Just last week, she forcefully broke into the Kisei tournament league, which was hailed as the "Golden Chair"—meaning this seventeen-year-old girl had already stepped one foot into the top dueling arena of Nihon Go.

Seventeen years old, female, professional for half a year, enrolled in the league!

The media fell into complete revelry.

NHK Go Channel urgently produced and broadcasted a special documentary "Godly Young Girl? The Impact of Kirigaya Nuo";

"Go Weekly" ran consecutive three-issue front-page banner headlines, upgrading from "New Rising Storm" to "Era Transformer," ultimately settling on "Is She From the Future?";

Even "Bungeishunju," always known for being serious and profound, rarely published a fifteen-page feature article "The Aloof Genius and the Twilight of the Collective," exploring the social and era metaphors behind her phenomenal rise.

The latest issue of the fashion magazine "VOCE," its cover impressively a close-up of Kirigaya Nuo's side profile deep in thought holding a Go stone.

The young girl's eyelashes were lowered, the black stone pinched between her fingertips forming a strong contrast with her cold white skin tone, the background a misty ink-wash artistic conception.

The cover headline had extreme impact:

"The Ice Queen and the Absolute Laws of the 19x19 Board—Kirigaya Nuo, an Aesthetic Revolution Overturning a Millennium"

In Go fan forums, her exclusive section "Nuo's Domain" exploded in popularity.

The fan club expanded rapidly. They made uniform support colors and logos, assembling outside the venues where she competed. Their shouts were neat and uniform, resounding through the clouds:

"Your Majesty Nuo! Please use your Go stones to conquer the sea of stars!"

Flashbulbs, an ocean of praise, worshipful gazes, commercial endorsement invitations flying like snowflakes... attempting to package her into the most dazzling, perfect, and mysterious cultural symbol of this era.

However, besides that shadow existing only deep in her consciousness, no one knew that when she sat properly in the Yugen no Ma watched by the masses, as the commentator exhausted rhetoric to praise her eyes that were "like still water in a deep pool, like the vast starry sky, as if able to illuminate all falsehoods and truths on the Go board"—

(TL: Yugen no Ma is the most prestigious game room in the Nihon Ki-in.)

What she "saw" was never the life and death of a large dragon(group of go stones), nor the subtleties of the endgame.

But rather, possibly the brute-force cracking process of some multi-layer encryption algorithm.

Or possibly optimizing the automated intelligence scraping script she wrote halfway through last night.

Even more likely, the penetration probability of a .38 caliber bullet entering the junction of the lower jaw and skull base at a 15-degree elevation angle from seven meters away.

...

Besides "Yamamoto Ryuichi" dealt with last time, over the past few months, she had cleanly and neatly completed the second task handed over by Gekka-ki.

Causing a bureaucrat named Suzuki Shoji, who colluded with other yakuza and massively embezzled public construction funds, to "accidentally" end in a "sudden cardiovascular and cerebrovascular disease" induced by drunkenness in the back alley of an izakaya late at night.

There were no signs of a struggle at the scene, the autopsy report conformed to medical logic, everything was flawless.

The mission report was as concise as the final record of her Go games:

"Target cleared. Method: Physiological failure. No collateral impact. Over."

...

The seventh day of the seventh lunar month.

A day hyped up hotly in Great Xia in recent years, known as the "Chinese Valentine's Day."

(TL: Qixi Festival.)

While in Nihon, although there is also the tradition of Tanabata, the time is July 7th on the Gregorian calendar.

(TL: Tanabata is the Japanese star festival derived from Qixi.)

So on this day on the streets of Edo, besides a few Chinese cuisine restaurants pasting up festive promotional posters on their windows, the entire city was immersed in the busy rhythm of an ordinary workday, without much romantic atmosphere.

But for certain people, this day was different after all.

Kirigaya Nuo had just come out of the Go Institute's study group. Rejecting Isumi Yoshitaka's invitation for dinner, she walked toward the subway station alone.

"Teacher, that Isumi Yoshitaka is very weird."

She spoke softly in her consciousness, her tone carrying detachment and annoyance:

"Clearly knowing I have a boyfriend, yet always wanting to ask me out on a date."

Xu Yunzhou's illusory figure surfaced beside her, his posture leisurely. Hearing this, he chuckled lowly:

"Who asked our family's Xiao Nuo to become prettier and prettier."

His voice was gentle, yet like stating the simplest fact:

"Go skills advancing, temperament settling, light in your eyes—for a girl like this to be thought about by others is too normal."

As he spoke, he quickly searched for information on his phone.

Isumi Yoshitaka, Nihon nationality, Go player, professional 4-dan.

Main records mediocre, no title records.

In January 2017, died at his own residence due to sudden myocardial infarction, aged 28.

"Mhm... let me look at his physiognomy."

He paused, adding calmly:

"Won't live past this year."

Kirigaya Nuo's footsteps didn't stop, but her eyes grew a fraction colder.

Serves him right.

Passing by that post office where she sent the chocolate last time, her footsteps paused imperceptibly.

The post office glass door was pushed open.

A teenager wearing a simple white T-shirt walked out scratching his head.

He looked seventeen or eighteen. His face was clear and handsome, his brows and eyes carrying the cleanliness and vitality unique to this age, as well as confusion.

He stood on the sidewalk less than five meters away from her. Looking up at the post office signboard, then looking down at a slip of paper in his hand that seemed to have an address written on it, he finally sighed, turned around, and walked toward another direction.

Kirigaya Nuo's breathing almost stopped at that moment.

"Teacher..."

She spoke softly in her consciousness, her voice carrying a subtle tremor that even she herself hadn't noticed.

"That... is the current you?"

Xu Yunzhou's somewhat embarrassed voice sounded:

"...Mhm, looks like it. The 'me' at this time point just finished the college entrance exam, scores are probably okay, so... came to Nihon to travel, I guess."

Choosing to come to Nihon, coming to this remote post office, was naturally because deep in his heart, there still remained the obsession and curiosity about that box of chocolate.

The seventeen-year-old Xu Yunzhou, harboring a bit of a teenager's romantic reverie and adventurous psychology, tried to find that mysterious sender.

Of course, besides getting a few stylized answers like "it's been too long, can't remember clearly" and "many people send things every day" from the post office staff, he gained nothing.

Kirigaya Nuo silently watched that teenager's somewhat desolate back merge into the flow of people getting off work.

"Teacher,"

She spoke again, her voice suppressed very low, carrying an almost cautious request,

"Can I... go find him?"

Xu Yunzhou thought for a moment:

"It's not the time yet, Ah Nuo."

The light in Kirigaya Nuo's eyes dimmed slightly, but she immediately nodded, returning to her usual calmness:

"I understand. The current me... will bring him danger and trouble."

The Crescent Group's gaze might not be staring tightly at her at all times, but any unplanned contact could leave unpredictable variables.

She couldn't take the risk.

Because this teenager she was meeting for the first time was the person she treasured the most.

However, when that teenager's figure was about to disappear at the street corner—

Kirigaya Nuo's footsteps, as if having a will of their own, gently followed.

Xu Yunzhou sighed in his consciousness, but didn't stop her.

He knew that some bonds cannot be completely severed by rationality.

Some gazes, once they land, can never be moved away.