I Have Too Many Money-Making Talents - Chapter 9

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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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Talents That Pay Off — Episode 009
“……Even Match?”
-Handicap against a pro? Is she underestimating us?
-This person’s lost their mind.
-An amateur 5-dan talking like that? Way too cocky.
-ㅋㅋㅋㅋ She must have thought we were easy marks
-Let’s teach Yuna a lesson about respect, yeah?
My provocation set the chat ablaze.
Most of the messages mocked me or sneered at my ignorance.
‘I don’t care.’
Insults didn’t bother me.
What mattered was seizing this opportunity.
To test how far I could push against a professional.
For that, I needed equal footing — an even match to play on level terms.
“Well, this is awkward. We do get people like this sometimes……”
Jang Yuna, 2-dan, trailed off uncertainly.
The hesitation lasted only a moment.
Then her expression shifted to quiet confidence.
“Fine. Let’s play. But, Mumyeong.”
Jang Yuna’s eyes narrowed as she glanced at my nickname on the waiting room screen.
“You’d better play well. My pride’s been stung, and I’m not going easy.”
It sounded playful, but I read something else in it.
‘She means it.’
Jang Yuna accepted my rematch request.
[Handicap. Six and a half stones. Time limit: 10 minutes. Byoyomi: 3 attempts.]
The colors were distributed automatically — I drew white.
‘White.’
I regretted missing first move, but it wasn’t worth dwelling on.
“Phew.”
I set down the mouse and took a slow breath.
I lowered the volume on Jang Yuna’s broadcast so it wouldn’t interfere with my focus.
‘More nervous than a tournament.’
But it was a good kind of nervousness.
A touch of tension and pressure honed my senses sharper.
Click.
On the Go board that filled the monitor.
Jang Yuna played the opening stone at the upper-left hoshi point.
I answered in kind with my own hoshi play.
The opening unfolded smoothly.
We both left room for exploration, neither rushing to define shape or influence.
‘It’s different, all right.’
She maximizes Black’s advantage of first move to its fullest.
And when needed, she shifts flexibly through joseki, knowing when to retreat.
An unorthodox opening.
Masterful rhythm and pacing.
Intuitive, flowing moves.
‘This is professional Go.’
Nothing like anyone I’d played before.
Maybe PePe came close, but not quite to this level.
My fingers moved the mouse across the board.
Just because she’s a pro didn’t mean I had to shrink back.
I would play the best Go I’m capable of.
Click!
From the corner to the side, from the side toward the center.
Small collisions kindled a spark that spread into a battlefield across the entire board.
“The shape is set.”
A complex position.
A melee.
Exactly the kind I fought best in.
Now came the rest……
“It’s a matter of winning.”

* * *
“Hmm, your Joseki choice is rather old-fashioned, I’d say.”
Jang Yuna, 2-dan, maintained constant communication through the microphone even as she played against the studio audience.
“This formation favors White poorly. That’s why it’s barely used anymore.”
Jang Yuna, 2-dan, added commentary as she went.
It was part of a streamer’s duty, but it was also the composure of a professional player.
‘Something’s off. It’s clearly a weak opening, yet… it doesn’t feel nearly as bad as it should.’
Go evolves rapidly, with new research emerging daily.
The old and obsolete are discarded just as quickly.
Mumyeong’s opening fell into that category.
Intellectually, she knew it was a formation that had been deemed inferior.
But sitting across the board, she felt no such weakness.
The White stones’ arrangement, which should have seemed inefficient.
As the sequence progressed, she found those very stones occupying key positions across the board.
“And here comes another nimble play. This opponent… they’re unpredictable.”
It wasn’t for broadcast.
Jang Yuna, 2-dan, felt herself being swayed by Mumyeong’s shifting style.
Wasn’t there a saying about this?
A lack of foundation is itself a foundation.
‘No, wait. Each move carries too much weight for that.’
Moves that expanded territory.
Moves that defended it.
Moves that guided the flow.
Loose as the surface appeared, there wasn’t a single wasted stone.
“I’ll cut here and ask for your response. How will you handle it?”
Jang Yuna, 2-dan’s nickname during her peak was the Bull.
She was known for fearless, direct combat—the kind who would stake everything on a single decisive struggle.
Fiery Go, pure and simple.
Tap!
White played, as if waiting for this very moment.
-Wait, she cut it off?
-Yes! This is the move Yuna was waiting for
-I thought she’d be scared, but she’s actually resisting?
-It’s wonderful to see Jang Yuna’s true style
Jang Yuna, 2-dan, responded with an aggressive continuation, as though she’d been waiting for exactly this.
Not a skirmish, but all-out war.
Now the real battle was beginning.
And from this moment on, Jang Yuna, 2-dan’s commentary dwindled sharply.
The board convulsed across its entire surface.
Somehow, White had seized the initiative, transitioning from defense to offense, launching an unrelenting assault.
-Is Yuna entering serious mode?
-She went silent, so maybe she’s getting pushed back?
-Wait, why is the opponent playing so well?
-Is this AI?
-At this point, doesn’t it look like cheating?
Jang Yuna, 2-dan, didn’t even have the luxury of checking audience reactions.
‘Am I actually losing ground?’
Her mind had gone half-blank, unable to regain her footing.
The deadlocked position flipped in an instant.
Managing the chaos erupting simultaneously across the board was almost beyond her.
‘Suffocating. The strength is suffocating!’
A wall—the kind only felt when facing top-tier professionals competing for championships in world tournaments.
Sensible, yet so unwavering it seemed immovable.
These two contradictory qualities pressed down on her simultaneously.
“…AI cheating? I don’t think that’s it.”
Despite being steadily pushed back, Jang Yuna, 2-dan, refuted the audience’s suspicion.
“There aren’t the characteristic moves AI typically makes. No responses from pure optimization, no sense of dissonance at all. It’s all seamless.”
And that made it all the more terrifying.
I hadn’t seen this style of Go in quite some time.
“And you know what? Samgukji is incredibly good at catching AI cheating…… uh, um?”
Jang Yuna couldn’t continue her commentary.
The board position had deteriorated too much while she juggled the streaming.
[Byoyomi time begins.]
Forced into rapid time, Jang Yuna’s Go lost its center and wavered.
She tried everything to find a thread of reversal, but time was against her.
In the end, she crumbled under the pressure.
“I resign.”
The margin had grown nearly five points, so she abandoned the count and conceded.

* * *
“I won.”
The tension shattered in an instant, and I slumped back in my chair.
Every muscle in my body had gone slack.
“I beat a professional?”
It still didn’t feel entirely real.
Every single move had been a turning point.
Had even one stone been placed differently, it wouldn’t have been Jang Yuna throwing down the next piece—it would have been me.
“If this hadn’t been streamed, the game would’ve been even better…”
‘Spectator matches’ were content in themselves, which meant Jang Yuna was operating under considerable handicaps.
An environment where she couldn’t fully focus on the game.
Of course, that didn’t mean I wanted to diminish today’s victory.
I was simply assessing myself a little more coolly.
I brought up Jang Yuna’s broadcast window from the taskbar onto my monitor.
I turned up the volume I’d muted earlier.
“Mumyeong, well played.”
At Jang Yuna’s greeting, I left a message of thanks in the chat.
-Thank you. I learned a lot from that game.
Viewers who recognized me flooded the chat.
-Mumyeong really plays well.
-Are you a trainee?
-Thanks for the great match.
-See you in 9-dan soon lol
The flood of praise didn’t sit badly with me.
Being recognized was what it was.
“Mumyeong, you’re not actually a professional, are you? Playing mysteriously under a false name or something?”
I answered Jang Yuna’s playfully probing question in the chat.
-Just an ordinary office worker.
“I see. That was really fun today. If the chance comes up, I’ll request a rematch.”
Once the conversation wrapped up, Jang Yuna started drawing lots for the next spectator match.
I watched the ‘spectator match’ with an easy heart.
What was amusing was that the amateur 3-dan and 4-dan who challenged next both also demanded Even Matches.
My doing, surely.
“So these people think I’m easy prey, huh?”
Jang Yuna laughed coldly.
Anyone could see she was sharpening her blades.
Sure enough, the other two were demolished.
This must be what it felt like to show no mercy—just pure domination.
‘She does have that relentless attacking style.’
What was funny was the chat’s reaction.
They’d provoke Jang Yuna, get steamrolled one-sidedly, and still seem to enjoy it.
“People really are all kinds of creatures.”
Marveling at the diversity of taste, I stretched out on the bed.
Today’s victory suddenly felt more meaningful.
Now I could see more clearly how far my Go could take me.
‘Maybe I can go a little farther than I thought.’
I closed my eyes quietly.
Sleep came gently, wrapped in a pleasant exhaustion where contentment and weariness blended together.

* * *
“I’ll say goodbye here for today. I hope we can play again next time. Good night.”
Jang Yuna, a 2-dan professional, ended the stream with a respectful bow.
Once she confirmed the broadcast had stopped, she leaned back in her chair.
“Good work out there, Jang.”
Producer Heo Beom-ho handed her a cold drink, adding his words.
“We broke 1,900 concurrent viewers.”
Producer Heo laughed with satisfaction.
Since they’d started official streaming from the Studio, they’d set a new record for peak viewers.
Most encouraging of all was the influx of Chinese viewers.
When all was said and done, the go-playing population was overwhelmingly dominated by the Chinese anyway.
With advances in real-time translation, the language barrier was gradually disappearing.
“Jang, why do you look so lost in thought?”
“Oh, that… Did you see that person’s go earlier?”
“Who? Mumyeong?”
“Yes.”
“I saw it. I never thought you’d lose an Even Match. Must be a research player or an amateur ranker?”
Producer Heo’s playing strength was amateur 3-dan.
He’d become a go specialist producer precisely because he loved the game.
Naturally, he’d developed some eye for evaluating go as well.
“I don’t think they’re a research player.”
“How can you tell?”
“There’s none of the subtle irregularities that mark the boundary between professional and amateur play.”
Recent research players were heavily influenced by artificial intelligence.
They were familiar with the latest joseki and played theoretically sound openings.
Particularly, they tended to use creative moves frequently, learned from AI training.
But this was different.
‘None of that applied here.’
It was the complete opposite of research player go.
Human go from before the age of artificial intelligence.
Familiar yet strange.
Outdated yet solid.
More precisely, it felt like watching ‘perfected human go.’
“So an amateur ranker then? Plenty of top amateurs from Samgukji play with two-stone handicaps against low-ranking professionals.”
“It’s not amateur level.”
“Then what? Are you saying they’re a professional?”
“Possibly.”
Jang Yuna answered with conviction.
“Okay, say they’re a professional hiding their identity. But why play on an amateur account? The staff would issue them a dedicated account right away.”
“I don’t know that either.”
“Are you joking?”
Producer Heo responded with exasperation.
“But I hope they’re not a professional.”
“You just said they probably were.”
“It’s not about who they are—it’s about what they show us, right?”
“Wait, Jang… you don’t mean…”
Producer Heo’s eyes widened.
“Mumyeong isn’t the type to stay quiet, is it? You felt that yourself?”
“That’s for sure. With that level of skill, they wouldn’t broadcast and take viewer match requests and attract attention with an Even Match unless they had something to prove.”
“They’re someone who’s going to make waves.”
“Someone who can’t sit still.”
The drive to be noticed was part of their nature.
Nature can’t be suppressed, no matter how hard you try.
The two of them met each other’s gaze and smiled knowingly.
“Let’s grow our game.”

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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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