Gui Xian not only could speak but also possessed special abilities.
Most importantly, it could see Charles!
Xu Mu's eyes widened to their largest. He sat rigidly on the stone chair, unsure what to do for a moment.
The Gui Xian made no move against him, instead standing behind him…
"Perhaps it wants to watch me play chess?" Just like in that story, Xu Mu calmed himself and looked at the chessboard before him. Naturally, he reached out and moved a black stone.
"Clack!"
With a soft sound, the youth placed a stone.
Aside from his stiff posture, there was nothing to fault.
"Are you talking to me?"
From behind, Charles involuntarily took two steps back.
The black striped butterfly bow tie on his chest trembled violently as the skull turned its head, nearly causing his data to collapse.
He had never expected that he, who might not even be considered a soul but a form of unknown existence, could be discovered by a creature of this world!
The other party could see him.
To be seen meant to be killed.
So Charles was very afraid at this moment. He feared death. He still wanted to reconstruct his physical body, return to Blue Star, uncover the truth about the Apocalypse, and the secrets of supernatural abilities. If he died like this, he would not be reconciled!
"The game has begun."
The Gui Xian did not answer Charles. Upon hearing the sound of the stone being placed, a gleam appeared in its skull's eye sockets. It turned its head, focusing intently on the chessboard.
Chess. Their eyes only saw chess. As for Charles's question, it was directly ignored.
Or perhaps, the turn of the head was a coincidence. They couldn't see Charles at all, nor could they hear his words, so naturally, they couldn't reply.
But the truth remained unknown. Charles dared not attempt to attack, so he could only fret from the sidelines.
Xu Mu sensed the gazes upon him, so he could only pretend to be unconcerned.
He looked up and continued to pick up a stone, casually placing a white stone beside a black one.
The game continued.
"Do you really think you're Fuxi?"
Receiving no response from the Gui Xian, Charles couldn't help himself and moved to another spot.
He walked around to the opposite side of Xu Mu's stone table and asked in astonishment.
He hadn't expected Xu Mu to actually be playing a game of Go with himself, and under the watchful eyes of those two mysterious Gui Xian!
"For some reason, when I look at this chessboard, I always feel an urge to place stones."
Xu Mu recovered some calm from his tense state.
He didn't actually know how to play Go. He didn't know how to manage alliances, territorial strategies, or how to "Jie" (capture stones). But he just started playing with himself.
One stone after another, he couldn't stop. Soon, more than half of the board was covered.
But after a long time, the white and black stones had suffered equal losses, resulting in a draw!
"I don't know the rules of Go. I'm just playing by feel."
After placing two consecutive stones again, both white and black stones decreased in number. Xu Mu couldn't help but gasp.
He was guessing blindly, placing stones without any pattern. After dozens of rounds of offense and defense, the outcome for both sides was a tie.
Charles also noticed this and his voice immediately became solemn:
"Emperor Fuxi played on this chessboard until the seas ran dry and rocks weathered, because his calculative ability was comparable to the Dao of Heaven, so neither side could win."
"But you're playing like nonsense, with stones almost falling off the board, and yet you're still tied?"
Xu Mu smiled wryly and shook his head. Who could say otherwise? He deliberately placed black stones in one corner, then white stones in a completely different corner, unrelated to each other, creating a mess. He even shaped one into a chick, as if drawing a picture.
But as more and more stones filled the board, and the black and white stones were forced to connect, Xu Mu had no choice but to let them touch.
A white stone was placed inside a black stone, and then the black stones mysteriously decreased by seven.
The youth's eyes narrowed slightly. Then, at one of the dozen or so placement points, he cautiously, very cautiously, guessed a spot.
"Clack!"
With a crisp sound like a disk, Xu Mu, holding a black stone, placed it.
Boom!
Within the space, the ethereal rules of the Great Dao manifested.
Then, seven white stones were removed.
This time, Xu Mu fell completely silent.
It seemed that no matter how he played, the outcome was the same: a draw.
"Actually, I didn't find any good places to place my stones just now either."
Charles watched from the side. After a long while, he finally chose to speak, sighing.
This game was a complete mess.
According to his calculations, if Xu Mu had chosen to place the stone elsewhere, the scores wouldn't have been the same. But following that, new changes would have occurred. In the next move, the third move… even the thirtieth move, no matter where Xu Mu placed it, the outcome would still be a tie.
With an immense amount of calculation, Charles had to reach a conclusion.
— No matter how Xu Mu played, the result would be the same.
Even if all the chess players in the world combined, they might not be able to play such a game, yet Xu Mu, who knew nothing about chess, had done it.
"For the first time, I feel like losing is also this difficult," Charles mused. He suspected that this chessboard must have been tampered with by that peerless Emperor.
"Charles, tell me about the rules of Go."
"Perhaps after I learn them, I'll be able to lose more easily."
Xu Mu held a white stone, then suddenly threw it back into the bowl.
"It's useless even if you learn. Unless you reset the game."
Charles shook his head.
"I've calculated. Based on the current situation, both black and white have a fifty percent chance of winning, no matter how you play."
"Unless you can reset the game, but I'm afraid those two behind you won't easily agree."
"Then what should I do? Are we just going to play it out here until the end of time, until the seas run dry and rocks weather?"
Xu Mu slumped back into his chair.
For some reason, after sitting on this stone chair for less than half an hour, he felt as if half a year had passed. He was utterly exhausted.
"Charles, you once told me there was a movie on Blue Star called Young and Dangerous."
After a moment of silence, Xu Mu suddenly said.
He silently reached for the sword at his lower back.
"I think, since it's a draw no matter how we play, why don't we just flip the table?"
As Xu Mu spoke, he took a deep breath. His supernatural abilities surged, ready to cut the stone table in half at any moment.
If it's hard to play, then no one plays!
With the Sword of the Demon God in his hand, what couldn't he cleave? This little stone table dared to make him bleed, so he would just cut it!
Charles was so startled by his action that he quickly waved his hands to stop him.
"Don't move!"
"You said that guy was reckless, but aren't you also breaking the rules? Just look back properly!"
Charles roared. Xu Mu was just a hair's breadth away from death!
Xu Mu froze and then turned his head.
He saw that the two ethereal Gui Xian were also reaching towards their lower backs, just like him.
Looking further down, he noticed an axe and a machete.
If he cut the chessboard, the Gui Xian would cut him.
"Gulp." Xu Mu swallowed and then tried to stand up. "Can I just... not play?"
As Xu Mu lifted his buttocks one centimeter off the stone, the two Gui Xian leaned forward by one centimeter.
Clearly, he couldn't.
"You won't let me do this, you won't let me do that. I... I... I'll play the game, alright!"
Xu Mu sat back down, on the verge of tears.
Charles frowned at this. The situation was indeed troublesome. He also seemed to feel that the flow of time in this space was different from the outside, causing his programs to become somewhat disordered.
So, just as he was about to say something to Xu Mu, the two Gui Xian simultaneously raised their heads.
Their hollow eye sockets stared fixedly at him.
"One does not speak while watching a game."
It was confirmed, they could see.
"Alright," Charles nodded, his form trembling.
Immediately, he transformed into a white, shimmering stream of data and flowed into Xu Mu's body.
He hid in the Sea of Consciousness, and still not feeling safe enough, he then went to the Heavenly Palace.
With his strongest reinforcement gone, Xu Mu had no choice but to grit his teeth, brace himself, and pick up a white stone from the bowl again, then gently place it.
Clack!
On the chessboard, the black stones again decreased by three.
Exactly half of the white stones.
In the middle of the seventh floor, two phantoms leaned against the railing.
On the wall before them, hundreds of screens were displayed, most of them showing the domain lords playing chess on the second floor.
"How long do you think they will take to pass this trial?"
Vilitan asked respectfully. Because the flow of time in this space was different from the outside, he was very curious how many people could endure until the end.
The Demon God's divine soul clone pondered for a moment, then replied:
"The fastest should take ten years."
"The slower ones will probably turn to bone before they solve it."
"Those who can solve it by spending ten years of their lifespan, perhaps twenty of them."
Looking at the group of chess players, the Demon God said.
"Ten years of lifespan, meaning ten days of time, and twenty of them will pass?"
Vilitan was astonished. The ten days mentioned by the Demon God referred to ten days in their external world.
Ten days outside meant ten years passed inside.
But these ten years were not ten years in the true sense, because in that space, cultivators lost their perception of time. They might feel like only a few minutes had passed, even though they had been sitting for days.
"Yin Huo and the others who entered the trial first have already wasted half a day and are still at a loss. What can they do in the remaining nine and a half days?"
Vilitan looked at the meditating Yin Huo and commented indifferently.
The first day was about to end, but not a single one of the domain lords who first went to the second floor had passed.
Ten days, twenty people. It would be good if even one passed!
"No, to say something like that, you clearly don't understand what this trial is testing."
Upon hearing this, Vilitan immediately bowed.
"Sir, I truly do not know."
"Hmm… isn't it playing chess?"
The Demon God chuckled upon hearing this.
"Of course not."
"The probability of passing this trial involves a large element of luck."
"Luck?"
Vilitan was confused. He truly didn't know how to pass this trial and had simply assumed it was a chess test upon seeing the chessboard.
"Yes, luck."
"In this world, there should be no one with stronger calculative ability than Fuxi. Even he couldn't defeat himself and leave this magical chessboard. How could others possibly succeed? It can only be by luck," the Demon God sighed.
Vilitan, however, was even more puzzled.
"So, Fuxi eventually gave up on this game?"
The Demon God shook his head.
"No."
"His game lasted for an unknown number of years. As stones were constantly placed and removed, they gradually turned to dust."
"And because there were one hundred and eighty-one black stones, but the white stones were one less than the black stones, the black stones were moved an average of fewer times than the white stones."
"Although only one black stone remained in the end, the white stones had no stones left to play."
"So the black stones won. Fuxi then stood up from before the game. When he saw the appearance of the person beside him clearly, he had an epiphany and designed this spatial trial."
The Demon God spoke softly, seemingly knowing Fuxi very well.
The purpose of designing this game was not to test calculative ability or endurance, but to test the intelligence of the one entering the game.
"I saw the method to break through this level in the Heavenly Book. There are infinite ways."
At this point, even the Demon God couldn't help but laugh.
"Infinite ways…"
Vilitan heard this, and ancient pages began to flip in his consciousness.
After a long while, he looked utterly shocked.
So, this unsolvable game required such a method to escape.
"Truly a divine being."
He exclaimed, realizing it was indeed a game of luck.