Ryuuou no Oshigoto! - Volume 7 - Chapter 3.4

  B-2 DIVISION 9TH MATCH

“Well, I’ll be off.”

After keeping the Kiyotaki Classroom running like usual the day before his match, Kousuke Kiyotaki casually bid his daughter Keika farewell at the front door.

Both Kanto and Kansai had scheduled B-2 9th round matches to be held on this day simultaneously.

As the last match before the finale, players referred to it as L-B.

A simple way of saying last before the final.

B-2 plays ten placement matches, therefore making the 9th round L-B. As promotion and demotion scenarios were coming into focus, tension befitting the looming life and death matches took hold over the arena.

This was it for Kousuke Kiyotaki. Lose today, and his demotion would be guaranteed.

Even with that fact looming over him, Kousuke was much more relaxed than he usually was the morning before a match.

Playing Shogi was all he could think about–––an unbridled excitement to get the placement match underway.

“Ahh …… That’s right.”

No sooner had Kousuke slipped on his shoes than he turned to speak to Keika.

“I’m playin’ Mr. Muroga from Kanto. Ya know him?”

“Muroga 9-dan? Of course, I do. He’s Mr. Three-Sheets, right?”

This nickname was not an attempt at humor.

“Match recorders use record sheets that can hold 80 moves, and his matches last so long that the recorder needs three sheets to get everything down, yes?”

“Yeah. I’ve gone against him ten times, and we’re at a 5-5 split …… Couldn’t get more evenly matched if we tried.”

Kanto’s Muroga and Kansai’s Kiyotaki.

Considering they never met in preliminary matches, the two play against each other quite often.

With similar ages and playing styles, hard-fought slugfests ensue whenever they square off. The pair never interacted with each other anywhere other than across the board. Each considered the other to be a worthy foe.

“Playin’ him means I ain’t gettin’ home ’til real late. I’ll grab a drink with somebody when we’re all said an’ done, so don’t bother waitin’ up for me.”

“………… But ……”

“Don’t go makin’ that face. I ain’t gonna run again, trust me.”

Kousuke poked fun at the recent incident with a hearty grin and his daughter saw him off with a quick, “Good luck!” Saying any more, she feared, would result in sending her father off in tears.

Of the 13 matches taking place simultaneously in Kanto and Kansai, the one between Kousuke Kiyotaki 9-dan and Hiroshi Muroga 9-dan was drawing the most attention.

Kanto’s veteran, Muroga 9-dan, was playing on defense.

Particularly adept with anaguma, his stubbornness was well documented.

“When swords break on the battlefield, I’ll fight the enemy with my bare hands. If I lack the energy, I’ll glare daggers into them. Should I become blind, I’ll stab them with my tongue!”

That was the motto he lived by. He always signs things with the word dauntless.

–––Both of us are sittin’ at 1 win an’ 7 losses. Further still, we both got a demotion point ……

Kousuke waited for Hiroshi’s arrival in the upper seat within the Kansai Association’s Onjyoudan no Ma Arena, possessing both the match’s first move and the determination to win even at the cost of losing blood.

Only the top two B-2 players would promote to B-1, the bottom five would receive demotion points.

The loser of this match would be immediately demoted to C-1, while the winner would be forced to wait for other matches to conclude to learn their fate. This battle would take place at the edge of a cliff where the margin for error was razor-thin.

“…… Or we could both fall hand-in-hand, too.”

Kousuke grinned, the whiskers of his mustache arching with his lips as Hiroshi Muroga stepped into the arena, coat still draped over his shoulders.

Removing it, Hiroshi said a few words of greeting before he sat down and began lining up pieces.

“The time has arrived. Please begin the match,” said the match recorder Hiuma Kagamizu 3-dan, sitting on his ankles without a cushion. It goes without saying he never intended to break that posture.

Both players and the match recorder radiated such an intense, focused aura that other people kept their distance from their board as if a barrier were pushing them away.

Hiroshi wasted no time in deploying an anaguma in the early game, pinning all his hopes on his bread-and-butter strategy.

Meanwhile, Kousuke decided to use a well-balanced attack similar to his apprentice Yaichi Kuzuryu’s playing style rather than his own well-defended yagura castle.

–––With youthful vigor!!

That thought filled his mind, front and center.

Each player was granted six hours of waiting time for placement matches. That’s more than players received for one-day title matches.

However, that time melted away at a surprising rate.

Sun setting before they knew it, the lactic acid buildup in their brains weighed their bodies down like unseen shackles.

Neither player was aware of their own posture, be it sitting on their ankles or cross-legged, as everything from the waist down had gone numb.

Sense of balance fading, Kousuke placed his fists on the tatami mat to support his upper body as he leaned forward and continued pondering his options.

Fatigue was starting to set in as the last of his waiting time slipped by.

“…… Oops, bumbled that one up.”

Kousuke lightheartedly smirked at himself after trying to abbreviate his new outfit. As it went with fashion styles, learning how to coordinate new fresh off the shelf strategies was going to take some time.

“But …… Nobody breaks them in without wearin’ them!!”

“Kiyotaki-sensei. Please proceed playing one-minute Shogi.”

“Alright!!”

The late game had arrived. Kousuke held the advantage, though just by a thread.

However, not only was Hiroshi’s anaguma solid, he had over an hour of waiting time on his side.

A winning recipe for anaguma. All Hiroshi needed to do now was draw out the match until his time-constrained opponent made a mistake.

Yet, Kousuke was strong from here on out.

Revitalizing his reflexes and battle instincts through numerous training clashes with younger players resulted in one of the most accurate and precise sessions of one-minute Shogi ever played.

Above all, Kousuke forgot about everything except the match in front of him in that moment.

He was entirely focused on getting through one-minute Shogi in his yet-to-be-broken-in clothing.

He forgot to be scared. He forgot what was riding on this match, what he would gain with a win and lose with the loss. Shogi was all he thought about. He was youthful.

Meanwhile.

“Two options ………… Two options ……,” Hiroshi mouthed to himself, barely making a sound, as he tended to do when reading deep into the board.

The options were to attack or to defend.

So long as he chose correctly, the anaguma would win. That’s how Hiroshi saw the big picture.

Unfortunately for him.

“Two …… aren’t there?!”

Hiroshi’s two options had disappeared from the board without him realizing it.

His chance to turn the tide of battle slipped through his fingers at some point while he was defending, waiting for his opponent to make a mistake, right along with his waiting time.

Only then did Hiroshi realize the weight of the battle had shaken him.

That quiver deprived him of distance, the most important aspect of playing an anaguma. He was unable to attack when it was necessary.

Then came the recorder’s emotionless countdown.

“50 seconds–––one, two, three, four ……”

Hiroshi’s panic reached its zenith. The two options that normally came to him on the spot were nowhere to be found in the chaos that had overtaken his mind.

“Seven, eight, nine–––.”

When Hiuma called the 59th second.

Hiroshi reached out to the board to move a piece, any piece, to avoid losing. However, his hand came to a halt over the board once he realized that it was already too late and said:

“I have lost.”

12:14 a.m. Kousuke Kiyotaki claimed victory after 209 moves.

“……… I’m incredibly sorry.”

“Not ya fault ……”

Hiroshi apologized right after his surrender.

Whether he was apologizing for running out of time, to all the fans who had been supporting him, or to the Shogi gods …… Kousuke wasn’t sure.

There was one thing he did know.

––– ………… I won ……

Only that.

Since all other matches had concluded, the review session and interviews with reporters all took place over the next 30 minutes in the arena.

Then, the review session over and pieces neatly returned to the box, Hiroshi Muroga donned his coat but continued to sit quietly in front of the piece-less board with his arms folded across his chest.

With that L-B victory, Kousuke still needed help to remain in B-2 but his hopes lived on.

Which two players would promote from B-2 was left to be determined on the day of the final match.