I Have Too Many Money-Making Talents - Chapter 13

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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A Talent for Profit — Episode 13
‘I have to carry this thing back myself?’
Grunting under the weight of the Go Board, transferring lines and all, I took the subway home.
My vision swam.
“Is there any chance you could ship this?”
I asked awkwardly, forcing a smile.
“I’m afraid not. Event prizes are handed over on-site as a matter of policy.”
Damn. I’d miscalculated.
My elation deflated fast, and reality crashed down on me like ice water.
“Then… could you at least keep it until the finals end?”
“Of course.”
The staff member nodded and set the board in the corner of the booth.
I shelved the Go Board problem for now.
What mattered was the championship match coming up.
“Huh? Who’s that?”
My eyes drifted beyond the booth without thinking.
Two familiar figures were talking over in one corner.
Kang Hyuk, the 9-dan who’d announced the Problem Solving winner.
Facing him was one of the semifinalists who’d been seated next to me during the earlier matches.
Lanky build like a dried anchovy, with forward neck posture. Straight-line eyebrows and round glasses.
The kind of face you’d instinctively peg as a gaming prodigy.
‘Are they acquainted?’
From their manner, they seemed quite close.
When the man bowed respectfully, Kang Hyuk tapped his shoulder with warm encouragement.
If that man was going to be my finals opponent—
‘…I can’t afford to be careless.’
I didn’t know much about the culture or hierarchy of the Go world.
But being acquainted with Kang Hyuk suggested
he was more than just a competent player.
When I returned to the Game Hall, the manager greeted me warmly.
“Kim, where’ve you been?”
“Oh, just needed to use the restroom for a moment…”
I spoke evasively, and the manager handed me a Tonic Drink.
“Here, drink this. You’ve been playing back-to-back matches—this is the best thing for recovery.”
“Thank… you.”
I was still dazed.
The fact that someone could show such goodwill toward me simply because of our shared connection through Go felt unreal.
‘Not that I mind.’
There was something pleasant about being acknowledged, respected.
The Tonic Drink the manager gave me was lukewarm, but swallowing it brought a cool, refreshing sensation.
—The championship matches in each category will begin shortly. Finalists, please come to the Game Hall.
The manager took the empty bottle without a word.
“I’ll handle the trash. You just focus on the match, Kim.”
Feeling oddly touched by this endless encouragement, I took my seat at the board.
Soon enough, my finals opponent appeared.
‘Right. That’s the guy from before.’
The lanky man who’d been speaking familiarly with Kang Hyuk.
His name on the tournament bracket was probably Han Tae-min.
“You’re Kim In-ha, correct? And you’re Han Tae-min?”
“Yes.”
“That’s me.”
Since this was the finals, an official organizer came to verify our identities personally.
“Then let’s begin the match.”
I moved the go containers from the center of the board to the side.
Shwip.
Han Tae-min scattered a handful of Go Stones across the board to determine color.
‘Click.’
I’d guessed right.
Eight Black Stones.
I was White.
“I look forward to playing.”
“I’ll learn much from this.”
The final began with Han Tae-min, holding Black, playing first.
Snap.
The opening move: the 3-3 Opening in the lower-left corner.
I answered naturally with the 3-3 Point in the upper-right.
The standard progression would have been for Black to claim the remaining corner—one of the four critical positions.
But Han Tae-min did not.
‘Already pressing down on my 3-3 Point?’
He was testing my reaction, intent on reading my response and shaping the Opening Formation to follow.
A classic probe.
‘Irritating.’
I lifted a stone.
I didn’t respond to it.
A deliberate snub.
Instead, I quietly placed a stone on the remaining 3-3 Point in the lower-right and withdrew my hand.
‘What will you do now?’
Now the game had shifted.
I was the one asking questions; Han Tae-min was the one answering.
……
A thin silence.
It was enough.
‘He feels it.’
Han Tae-min across from me didn’t place his stone right away—he fell into thought.
Only five moves in.
In a Rapid Go match with a ten-minute limit, he’d already burned a full minute.
Snap.
Han Tae-min answered with a Double Pincer against my White stone in the upper-right corner.
Aggressive rather than solid.
My White stone felt isolated and precarious from the start of the game.
It was a move that conveyed his determination not to surrender the initiative.
But this time as well, I didn’t follow Black’s intent.
I withdrew and secured the last remaining corner.
Neither provocation nor evasion—a pragmatic move.
‘You won’t be able to keep pace with my rhythm.’
The initiative was already in my hands.

* * *
Inside the tournament organizer’s booth.
Jang Yu-na, 2 Dan, sat in her chair and rubbed her shoulders.
“Oof, exhausting.”
Not that a thirty-year-old should complain, but it’d been a packed schedule.
Two autograph sessions.
A special event to oversee.
Even a Simultaneous Exhibition match.
And tonight a regular streaming broadcast was scheduled at the studio.
Without steady Pilates to maintain her stamina, she’d have been bedridden with the flu by now.
“More than that—why won’t Myeongmyeong check their messages?”
Jang Yu-na, 2 Dan, logged into Samgukji Go on her smartphone and muttered to herself.
Looking at Myeongmyeong’s record, he was playing several games a day, consistently.
And of course, his win rate was undefeated.
At this pace, a two-rank promotion to 7 Dan seemed all but certain.
Timed perfectly, she’d been planning content called “Viewer Revenge Match.”
But the real problem was:
‘No response!’
She’d already sent over three messages, and nothing—radio silence.
He hadn’t even read them.
If he’d at least read and ignored them, she could keep trying, but it seemed he didn’t even know the messages had arrived.
“Producer Huh will sort it out. Let’s call it a day.”
Jang Yu-na, 2 Dan, stretched and stood, grabbed her bag, and left the booth.
She returned their smiles with grace, acknowledging the few participants who recognized her.
Though she’d failed to leave a major mark as a professional Go player,
‘I’m satisfied.’
She maintained a decent income through various tournaments, streaming events, and her personal YouTube channel.
Then.
“Oh? Isn’t that Instructor Kang?”
In the distance, Kang Hyuk, a 9-dan master, stood watching a game with his arms crossed.
She’d actually meant to greet him.
But after waiting over ten minutes without seeing him, she’d been about to leave.
‘I should say hello before I go.’
She turned her steps toward him.
Up close, Kang Hyuk’s expression was heavy and grave.
The atmosphere made it difficult to approach him casually.
He looked as absorbed in thought as if he were playing in a tournament, deliberating over each move.
‘What kind of game could captivate him like this?’
It wasn’t even a national championship division—just the Gyeonggi Province strongest division.
Technically a tier below.
She’d heard something about a student from a provincial research center playing, but
given Kang Hyuk’s nature of separating pure Go skill from personal relationships, he wouldn’t normally watch for this long.
The game itself must have genuinely captivated him.
That pure professional curiosity drew Jang Yu-na closer as well.
‘What is this?’
The game, progressed to the midgame, was chaotic.
There was little defined shape or coherent form.
The unresolved stones on both sides were tangled together, making Position Evaluation difficult.
‘I can’t anticipate the sequence. What kind of game are they playing?’
Jang Yu-na was drawn into the game as if by suction.
Looking, then looking again.
Analyzing, then analyzing deeper.
What fascinated her was that within this complex arrangement of Go Stones, order was emerging.
A scattered, chaotic flow.
Yet beneath it lay a definite current.
‘They’re both playing at an exceptional level. Especially….’
Jang Yu-na tilted her head slightly.
A familiar face.
It was Kim In-ha, the winner of the Problem Solving demonstration event the tournament had held.
‘Playing unconventional moves, yet never losing cohesion.’
Recently, Go study had become grounded in artificial intelligence.
Ever since Lee Se-dol played against the world’s first Go AI program,
the very paradigm of Go research that had continued for thousands of years had shifted.
Classical patterns had been shattered; efficiency mattered more than shape; thickness had been redefined.
Those moves that AI could play, which the current Go community treated as orthodoxy,
but the moves Kim In-ha played with White were something… different.
Unconventional like AI, yet strangely sensible and persuasive.
‘Why does this feel so familiar? Ah. That time!’
Jang Yu-na’s eyes sharpened with focus.
The “Viewers’ Game” from not long ago.
Not only had an amateur 5-dan dared to play even with a professional like her,
but the viewer “Myeongmyeong” had devastated her.
Click.
White’s next stone was placed.
A pincer move.
A single move that seemed to pierce through this unsettled board.
Familiar.
So familiar it sent a chill down her spine.
And that strangeness pressed down all the harder.
‘Could this person possibly be…?’
She knew.
How many people played Go, how countless the skilled ones were.
Besides, she hadn’t been watching this game from the beginning.
But still.
A professional Go player’s intuition speaks louder than doubt.
Moves that defy prediction.
The sensation of reading several moves ahead.
A depth of skill that commands the entire board and strips away even the will to resist.
It resembled the Go of Myeongmyeong—the style that had crushed so many, the moves ingrained in my head and body’s memory.

* * *
“I resign.”
My opponent in the finals, Han Tae-min, ground out the words like he was chewing gravel.
“Thank you for the match.”
I bowed respectfully, observing proper courtesy.
‘This man plays well.’
Intuition doesn’t lie.
His skill, measured by feel, was nearly identical to Jang Yu-na’s 2-Dan level.
Which meant, by Samgukji Go standards, he was playing at around 8 or 9 Dan.
‘But if he’s at this level… doesn’t that violate the tournament rules?’
His strength clearly exceeded the tournament requirement of 4 to 6 Dan by Samgukji Go standards.
Perhaps sensing my thoughts.
“I was a Research Student in the provinces, but I quit. My parents didn’t approve.”
Han Tae-min smiled wryly as he gathered the stones.
“I got a job and picked Go back up recently. I don’t have an Official Rank certificate yet, and I’m only 6 Dan in Samgukji Go.”
I said nothing, simply observing him, then nodded.
That made more sense.
He had the qualifications to compete under the regulations, after all.
‘Damn, I keep putting on colored glasses.’
After running into someone like Shin Byung-ha—a walking embodiment of cheating—at my first tournament.
Distrust of people had taken root.
“I was wondering why you play so well… so you’re from a Research Student background.”
“I’m from the provinces. But your Go is far more impressive than mine.”
“Mine?”
“Yes. I barely held on, but in the end, it all fell apart.”
Han Tae-min laughed.
His face held a certain clarity.
The expression of someone who’d given their all and found meaning in the loss itself.
“Where did you learn Go?”
“Ah, I’m self-taught.”
I chose words carefully, offering a plausible answer.
I couldn’t very well tell him a talent simply appeared one day.
“Self-taught?”
“Yes. For about two years.”
“…Two years?”
Han Tae-min’s reaction was odd.
He couldn’t quite tell if I was being truthful.
‘Did I make it sound too careless?’
Worried I’d made a mistake, I bowed as soon as I finished collecting the stones.
“Thank you for the match.”
“Thank you as well.”
After our exchange of courtesies, the surroundings came into focus as the game concluded.
Perhaps because it was the finals.
Quite a crowd had gathered.
I saw the branch manager looking elated by my victory, beside him the other manager with his perpetually sour expression, and the associate director as well.
And then.
“Hello.”
A composed voice, with sharp, intelligent eyes.
A well-tailored jacket that emphasized her lines in perfect proportion.
‘Wait—that’s Jang Yu-na, isn’t it?’
What was she doing here?
“Excuse me. Could it be…?”
She gazed at me steadily, waiting.
“You’re Myeongmyeong?”

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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