I Have Too Many Money-Making Talents - Chapter 84

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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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Too Many Lucrative Talents — Episode 84
The morning of the quarterfinals.
I opened my eyes on the hotel bed.
The ceiling was no different from yesterday, yet somehow my vision felt brighter.
My body felt light, my mind clear.
The hotel bed suited me well enough, but the real difference was how much better my body felt.
‘……I’ve built up my stamina.’
Last night, after dinner, I ran on the jogging track inside the hotel.
As my breath grew ragged, a breeze blew in—and within it, I read the subtle flows.
Then came the pull on my core, my muscles, my balance.
At some point, it all became natural to me.
This was the change I’d experienced since acquiring the Archery talent.
Thanks to that talent, I’d started using my body, and in turn, building it up.
In the end, better stamina elevated my condition, and better condition maximized my focus at the Go Board.
‘This is good.’
With each talent I accumulated, I felt myself being refined more and more precisely—designed into something better.
A better version of myself.
A better life.
Apart from the practical application of each talent, they were growing me as a person in their own right.
“Perfect.”
I rolled my wrists lightly and adjusted my appearance.
I took the elevator down to the lobby.
Reporters crowded around and asked for interviews, but I waved them off with an easy refusal.
For me now, an interview was an extension of the match itself.
Psychological warfare outside the Go Board.
But.
‘Today’s opponent—there’s no real reason to provoke her.’
I headed straight to the studio.
Lights embedded in the ceiling.
A photo wall set against the far side.
The game board placed beneath it.
It all felt deeply familiar.
Somewhere along the way, I’d blended seamlessly into this landscape.
At this point, playing anywhere else would feel strange.
‘Viewership will be high today too.’
The match with the highest number of viewers.
Live chat reactions, short-form video views, social media and community reposts—all of it.
People were always talking about me.
As I sat at the board and slowly steadied my breathing, Cai Lan entered the studio.
She settled quietly across the board from me.
Up close, her features were striking.
Though partially hidden by her glasses, her face was sharp and unwavering.
Her eyes held no trace of emotion.
‘I’m looking forward to this.’
My first official match against a female professional.
And one ranked highly in China at that.
Clink.
We drew for color.
‘White.’
Cai Lan took the Black Stones.
The opening move.
Upper right, Small Point Opening.
I played on the opposite diagonal.
And the next move that followed.
Lower right, 3-3.
A position rarely played these days.
Yet still effective for securing profit.
Clink.
I responded calmly with the upper left Small Point Opening and began developing my Opening Strategy.
A familiar rhythm.
Expanding the board step by step.
Cai Lan, an 8-dan player, was a Go master who wielded AI-style strategy aggressively.
Mechanical, calculated, precise moves.
The way she leveraged practical advantage from territory secured via the 3-3 Opening was similarly relentless.
‘……The polar opposite of Mother’s Go.’
Once the tournament bracket was finalized, I searched for game records of Gui Ling, a 9-dan master who had been invited to the National Championship in the past.
My first impression was…….
‘This Go is beautiful.’
It was profoundly striking.
Neither reckless nor hesitant—her Go was deliberate.
She maintained the balance between influence and territory while fighting harder than anyone when battles erupted.
The more chaotic and scattered the board became, the fiercer her style grew.
Her Go had a distinct color to it.
‘Perhaps she really is similar to me.’
Certainly, the Go in those records was plainly different from mine.
Yet that instinctive rhythm of grasping and shaking the board felt kindred to something within me.
And yet.
Even if they were alike, ultimately they were not.
Click.
Cai Lan’s 8-dan Go bore a striking resemblance to that of an AI.
Every stone told the tale of how much effort she had poured into her craft.
But.
‘……She won’t be able to keep playing like that.’
AI’s moves may be flawless, yet human thought cannot match an AI’s speed.
The fundamental circuitry itself is different.
That was my assessment.
‘My mother’s Go and I want to surpass her.’
The resolve Cai Lan had declared at the opening ceremony.
I’m sorry to say it, but that determination would not come to pass.
Because.
Compared to the Go of her mother, whom she claims to resemble…….
I am simply stronger.

* * *
Cai Lan, 8-dan.
She had learned Go when she was very young.
She played with stones before she could even think clearly, and it brought her only joy.
One day, while working to become a professional player following in her mother’s footsteps.
AI arrived, and the very mechanism of Go transformed.
The young girl adapted faster than anyone else.
She memorized AI joseki and opening strategies, repeating mechanically precise move readings.
She standardized, calculated, imitated.
And finally, she defeated her mother, Gui Ling, a 9-dan master.
‘……I thought she’d praise me.’
How long had she waited for that moment.
She had even imagined what words might fall from her strict mother’s lips when she won.
But.
‘This isn’t the kind of Go I hoped you would play…….’
That was all she said.
At first she was bewildered, then anger dawned on reflection, and over time came only disappointment.
So she grew colder still.
She excised emotion, pursued efficiency, steeled herself to play like an AI.
As a result, she climbed to the third-ranked female player in China.
Then one day.
Her mother watched Korean amateur Go and showed genuine delight.
‘……What beautiful Go.’
Kim In-ha, 9-dan.
A style oddly reminiscent of her mother’s Go from the pre-AI era.
What was astonishing was that he had won the Ciel Bank Cup with such a style.
‘……I cannot accept this.’
Cai Lan, 8-dan, quietly picked up a stone.
Click.
The move the AI recommended.
The position with the highest expected win rate, where the next move could be predicted.
The Go that had guided her all this time.
Precise, cold Move Reading.
And the method that had surpassed her mother.
But Kim In-ha showed no disturbance whatsoever.
He responded quietly, calmly.
Click.
Cai Lan’s brow furrowed slightly.
An odd move.
Placed somewhere between form and formlessness.
At first glance, a move the AI would never recommend.
And yet.
‘The board state keeps… twisting.’
From that stone as its starting point, the flow began to curve subtly.
Not a simple exchange, but a context designed to scatter her Move Reading.
Kim In-ha’s Go was not about structure—it was about momentum.
Within precision lay intuition; within rhythm lay chaos.
‘Is this what mother was talking about……?’
Stones collided, flowed, overlapped.
The straight rush of the game bent like a curve.
Beautiful, intense Go—every move imbued with meaning and feeling.
Go that might be inefficient in the AI’s eyes, yet moved the human heart.
And Go that ultimately won.
‘It’s not over yet.’
Cai Lan fought back fiercely.
To prove her mother’s words wrong.
She had believed only the AI’s Go could be perfect.
But then.
It collapsed as it passed the midgame.
Or rather, melted away—a more accurate way to describe it.
Of course, the precision of her moves might still be higher.
But this momentum born from sensation, something no machine could create.
A flow of Go that tore through convention to create its own path.
And human Go that held even the machine’s incisive next move in its embrace.
Before such moves, all her prepared readings crumbled.
Everything she had rejected to win became the decisive weakness in this game.
Cai Lan stared blankly down at the board.
It was neither a reversal nor a mistake.
Yet she was losing.
‘Ah.’
Only then did she begin to dimly understand.
The Go her mother had spoken of.
The masterpiece Kim In-ha had named.
A picture drawn together by black and white stones.
A picture where ‘a person’ exists in that process.
Go that was imperfect, yet undeniable.
Cai Lan quietly set down her stones.
A complete loss.

* * *
A stone was placed.
And then it stopped.
Cai Lan set the captured stones beneath the wooden cover.
Resignation.
In that moment, even the clock seemed to hold its breath.
“……I’ve lost.”
Her voice was composed, yet layered emotions resonated beneath it.
Pride.
Admission.
Confusion.
And perhaps, a kind of cathartic release.
I lifted my gaze and met her eyes directly.
She held my stare and spoke quietly.
“I think I’m beginning to understand why your mother loved your Go…”
For a moment, I found myself at a loss for words.
I chose each word with care.
Then, slowly, I opened my mouth.
“Your Go is also captivating. It was Go suited to its time.”
Fluent Mandarin.
And the sincere conviction that her Go wasn’t wrong—merely different in direction.
Whether it reached her or not, Cai Lan smiled faintly.
“…Thank you. And you really do speak Chinese well, just as I’ve heard.”
I smiled without answering.
My command of Mandarin was no secret anymore among Chinese Go players.
Cai Lan regarded me for a long moment, then quietly removed her glasses.
She lifted her hand to gently touch the corner of her eye.
That single gesture transformed her expression.
‘Glasses as a restraint’—was that the phrase for moments like this?
The features that had been hidden now revealed themselves, commanding complete attention.
“…When the Jinlan Cup opens in spring, you’ll have reason to visit China, won’t you?”
She asked quietly.
“Will you contact me then?”
“…Contact you?”
She nodded and held my gaze steadily.
“Yes. I’ll treat you to a meal. With your mother…together.”
I blinked.
An unexpected proposal.
Perhaps carrying an undertone that could be misunderstood.
‘Surely she doesn’t mean it that way?’
For a moment, some drama-like fantasy flickered through my mind.
But I quickly brushed it away.
There was no need to read meaning into everything.
Kindness was simply kindness.
“I’ll be waiting.”
She rose from her seat with a subtle smile.
She bowed slightly, then turned to leave.
Alone, I gazed down at the board for a moment.
Black and white stones scattered across it, unfinished.
Imperfect perhaps, yet a beautiful flow.
Go that could linger in someone’s heart, apart from victory and defeat.
Even if it wasn’t a masterpiece.
‘Another work of art.’
I smiled quietly.
This kind of Go wasn’t bad at all.
And the next day.
In the semifinal that followed, I defeated Kang Jun-su by resignation and advanced to the finals.

* * *
Park Ji-man’s Go Channel.
With the National Championship finals, Game One approaching, live viewership had surpassed thirty thousand.
Normally, the audience would grow only after the match began.
But any tournament featuring Kim In-ha was an exception.
An interview more anticipated than the Go itself.
He had refreshingly shattered the stuffy notion that Go required decorum and respect for one’s opponent.
And he always proved his victory in the end.
Against the world’s strongest Chinese player, no less.
Could anything release more dopamine than this?
Today, too, the viewers were waiting for that moment.
The spark had come the day before—an interview with Ci Hao, 9-dan.
—I did say that. I wanted to apologize sincerely after winning the National Championship. Now there are just two games left.
On Park Ji-man’s broadcast screen, the interview with Ci Hao played on.
A scene of him answering the host’s questions with a confident smile.
—Ah, Kim In-ha, 9-dan? Well, if he can manage it, let him try. I won’t stop him.
A rather provocative interview.
Yet Park Ji-man sat with his arms crossed, laughing at ease.
“You see, ladies and gentlemen, a proper villain has to be like this. We need that satisfaction of defeating him, or we wouldn’t have anything to cheer for, isn’t that right, In-ha? You’ll win for us, won’t you?”
In that moment, the broadcast switched, and the Korea Baduk Association press conference room came into view.
Kim In-ha walked out slowly and took his seat.
The host picked up the microphone.
“Ci Hao, 9-dan, told Kim In-ha, 9-dan, ‘If you can manage it, let me see you try.’ What do you make of that?”
In-ha answered briefly.
“That’s why I’m going to stop him.”
Concise. Unadorned.
As more questions followed, he answered with calm composure.
There was none of his usual wit or provocative remarks.
Instead, his tone was refined, measured.
“In-ha’s interview seems a bit dull today, doesn’t it?”
Park Ji-man and the viewers smacked their lips in disappointment, half joking.
Just as the interview was about to end, Kim In-ha reached for the microphone again.
“Ah, I forgot something I meant to say.”
In-ha took a breath, then looked directly at the camera.
“Chinese journalists—could you pass along an apology to Ci Hao, 9-dan, for me?”
In an instant, tension rippled through the conference room.
The moment the translation reached the gathered reporters, a murmur spread like a wave.
What was he getting at now?
The emotion from the Ciel Bank Cup came flooding back.
In that charged atmosphere, Kim In-ha continued.
“……The Jinlan Cup—the world championship title that Ci Hao currently holds.”
He smiled slightly.
“I’ll be coming to take it this spring.”

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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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