297: Exquisite Chess Game

Elder Mo led Su Ming through two stone doors covered in Restrictions and arrived at a quiet room located on the top floor of Lingshu Hall.

There was no Earth Dragon here, and the temperature was much lower than outside. The four walls were made of blue-gray Basalt, and aside from a star map and a Go board set on a low table, there was nothing else.

"Sit."

Elder Mo didn't waste words, sitting down directly at one side of the board. With a wave of his wide sleeve, the scattered black and white stones on the board seemed to come alive, returning to their positions on their own.

Su Ming sat down as told, his gaze falling on the board. This was no ordinary Go; the board had nineteen vertical and horizontal lines, each glowing faintly with spiritual light. The intersections were not solid but slightly recessed holes, like miniature Formation hubs.

"This is 'Linglong Chess'," Elder Mo said, picking up a black stone. "It does not test slaughter, but demonstrates the principles of Formations. In this game, I have set the 'Trapped Dragon Formation'; you are to break it."

Pa.

The black stone landed, and a murderous Aura instantly rose from the board.

Su Ming felt his vision blur; the board seemed to transform into a towering cage, and countless black chains appeared out of thin air, strangling toward his position.

"Master?" Su Ming called out in his Sea of Consciousness.

"Don't look at me, this old man is testing your basic skills," Lin Yu's voice rang out lazily. "On this board, the black stones are Evil Qi nodes, and the white stones are spiritual power hubs. What you need to do isn't to take his pieces, but to make your Qi survive within his encirclement."

Su Ming took a deep breath and picked up a white stone.

The moment his fingertip touched the stone, the icy sensation instantly calmed his somewhat heated mind.

Pa.

The white stone landed, driving a wedge into the gap where the black chains were about to close.

Elder Mo remained expressionless and immediately placed a second stone.

The two placed their stones extremely fast. At first, Su Ming could barely keep up, relying on the rigid patterns from the Basic Rune Deconstruction Essence to counter every move, using white stones to build a defensive line and stubbornly resist the erosion of the black stones.

But by the thirtieth move, fine beads of sweat broke out on Su Ming's forehead.

Elder Mo's playstyle was too bizarre.

That black Evil Qi wasn't just blindly attacking; it was like mercury spilling on the ground, penetrating everywhere.

Just as Su Ming built a defensive line, one of Elder Mo's black stones would land on the weakest connection point, and with a gentle pry, the entire defensive line would come crashing down.

"It can't be blocked."

Su Ming's finger hung in mid-air, unable to descend for a long time.

On the board, the black stones had already formed an encirclement, and the white stones were cut into fragments, like the remains of a dam washed away by a flood.

"What are you thinking?" Elder Mo didn't hurry him, only asking calmly, "Still thinking about how to repair that wall?"

Su Ming's heart jolted.

Earlier in the waste warehouse, when facing that piece of Cursed Bone, Elder Mo had said: "Blocking is not as good as dredging."

"Master, if the dam is destined to collapse, where should the water flow?" Su Ming asked in his mind.

"Nonsense, water naturally flows to lower ground," Lin Yu sneered. "Since you can't block it, then dig a ditch for it and let it flow to where you want it to go."

The confusion in Su Ming's eyes vanished, and a hint of deep blue appeared in the depths of his pupils.

He didn't place the white stone on that obvious defensive gap. Instead, with a turn of his wrist, he placed the stone on a seemingly unrelated empty space outside the black stones' encirclement.

Elder Mo raised an eyebrow, and the speed of his moves slowed down slightly.

Su Ming stopped defending.

The placement of the white stones in his hand became more and more scattered, seemingly without order, hitting here and there. But under the Micro-Observation vision, extremely weak strands of Water Spiritual Energy were quietly connecting between these scattered white stones.

He no longer tried to build a solid city wall but instead laid out a porous net.

The black Evil Qi rushed over and passed through the gaps in the net without breaking the ropes. On the contrary, the moment the Evil Qi passed through the gaps, it was diverted and guided, eventually following Su Ming's preset trajectory to flow to the edge of the board and dissipate into nothingness.

"Interesting."

Elder Mo leaned forward slightly, and the force of his moves became a bit heavier.

The situation on the board changed.

The originally aggressive black dragon seemed to have fallen into a swamp. No matter how it lunged left and right, that seemingly weak white stone defensive line could always deform with its offensive but never broke.

Water has no constant shape.

Su Ming played more and more smoothly, and the Ruoshui Art within him began to circulate on its own. He felt as if he were no longer playing chess, but dredging a clogged river.

When the hundredth move landed.

The black and white colors intertwined on the board, actually forming a balanced pattern like a Taiji.

Though the black stones were many, they could not swallow the white stones; though the white stones were few, they were full of resilience and firmly occupied half of the territory.

"A draw."

Elder Mo threw the stone in his hand back into the chess box, making a crisp sound.

Su Ming only then came back to his senses, feeling his back soaked with cold sweat. The exhaustion after extreme mental tension surged in like a tide.

"This Disciple... used a trick." Su Ming stood up and bowed.

Elder Mo didn't look at him but stared at the board for a long time before slowly speaking, "Those skilled in defense hide beneath the nine levels of earth; those skilled in offense move above the nine levels of heaven. Your previous way of playing was dead defense, mere craftsmanship. Your later way of playing can be considered to have touched the threshold of the Dao of Formations."

Elder Mo reached into his sleeve and took out a Jade Slip that glowed with an old yellow color, placing it on the low table.

"The Formation Masters within the pass mostly come from the Artifact Hall or are Combat Cultivators. Their actions are more than fierce but lack spiritual flexibility. When encountering a Yao Beast assault, they only know how to reinforce the light barrier and resist head-on."

Elder Mo looked up, a glint flashing in his somewhat cloudy old eyes. "But Formations are meant to borrow the power of heaven and earth. Since you are borrowing power, you must follow the trend. Blocking is not as good as dredging, and dredging is not as good as guiding. Since you cultivate a water-attribute technique, you should understand this principle."

Su Ming took the Jade Slip with both hands. Sweeping it with his Divine Sense, he saw four ancient seal characters carved on it—'Exegesis of the Formation Hub'.

"This isn't some profound Secret Manual, just some insights I've gained from repairing Formations at Iron Wall Pass over the years," Elder Mo waved his hand. "Take it back and read it."

"Yes, this Disciple takes his leave."

Su Ming tucked the Jade Slip close to his body and respectfully exited the quiet room.

Only when he walked out of Lingshu Hall and was hit by the cold wind outside did he let out a long breath.

"Master, did that old man see through something?" Su Ming rubbed his nose.

"He saw that you're a slippery brat," Lin Yu rolled over in the Sea of Consciousness. "But that Jade Slip is good stuff. It doesn't talk about how to set up Formations, but how to 'modify' them. For someone like you who started halfway and has an unstable foundation, it's exactly what you need to make up for your shortcomings."

Su Ming looked back at the towering stone tower, then turned and disappeared into the wind and snow.