Rebirth 07: Start adding points from elementary school students

Chapter 7 Teacher, I Really Didn’t Act
In the chess room of the Youth Go Training Class of Smart Game, 27-year-old Go teacher Xiao Hao and fifth-grade elementary school student Li Yan faced each other and started a battle without any suspense.

"It's a little after one now. I will teach you until the 2:30 p.m. class. If you want to continue, you can finish the afternoon class, but you cannot ask questions or disturb other students."

"Teacher, be careful not to be defeated by me if you are distracted."

"Heh." The gentle Xiao Hao adjusted his glasses, his expression becoming slightly serious for a moment.

Sure enough, children's provocations have a miraculous effect on adults.

Li Yan still remembered the three moves at the beginning of the game. There would be no funny plot like starting with Tianyuan. He would fight honestly for the corner with black pieces, "gold corner, silver edge and grass belly". At least in the first few moves of the game, both sides were evenly matched.

Xiao Hao nodded with satisfaction, and did not aggressively start a corner confrontation early in the morning.

Both sides laid the foundation safely. Xiao Hao hesitated for a while, nodded three threes, and the situation immediately became one-sided. Xiao Hao's expression changed from slightly nervous to complacent to puzzled. In the end, he couldn't help but stand up a little bit inappropriately:

"That's it?"

He didn't even use the set pattern after clicking 3-3, but he directly broke through the two corners that Li Yan had laid out. Soon, only a few black pieces were left fighting alone on the board, and the outcome was decided early on.

"Alas, as expected, my level is only enough to understand what robbery and sniping are. I have no power to fight back against the teacher."

"You've only just started, how can you be so arrogant at such a young age?"

"No, teacher, now that you know my level, you can teach me better according to my aptitude."

"..." Xiao Hao's eyes twitched, and he was speechless for a moment, but his good professional ethics allowed him to quickly devote himself to teaching, "Your understanding of Go is still too shallow. Take the example of my move of three-three just now. In fact, there are many fixed patterns..."

Li Yan was not impatient and devoted herself to trying to understand the new concept of "fixed pattern". Xiao Hao gave a few examples and tried to get Li Yan to play chess with him based on the fixed pattern.

Li Yan's memory has always been outstanding, but unfortunately it has not been improved yet. I don't know what the basic value is. Compared with 24 years old, he may be at his peak now. So it is not difficult to remember the fixed formulas. In a few minutes, he went through the commonly used formulas and remembered most of them.

Ding!
[Go +1, total 18]

Finally! He, who was originally struggling to follow the routine, suddenly had a profound understanding, as if he had gained enlightenment:

"The set pattern provides a routine solution, but the opponent often also understands it. How can both sides use the set pattern to lay the foundation while destroying the opponent's set pattern, that is, how to use the various set patterns to respond in time, should be the focus of set pattern learning."

Xiao Hao held the white piece in the air, with some surprise in his eyes, "You have some understanding, Li Yan. Very good. Do you know why there is..."

"Why do fixed patterns exist? This is the experience summarized by our predecessors. It can be roughly understood that in most basic situations, the playing and solving methods of fixed patterns are the optimal solutions. However, there are many fixed patterns, which shows that there must be a commonality between them."

Xiao Hao was full of surprise. He looked at the child in front of him with a childish face but a somewhat mature expression and slowly raised his head:
“This commonality is the core of Go competition.”

Ding!
[Go +1, total 19] As expected, the worse the foundation, the faster the learning and improvement. Li Yan was very excited. He wanted to find the next blind spot for improvement as soon as possible.

"Okay, okay, you're being mysterious. I understand you well. Let's go through it again and try to learn the most basic routines today."

"No need, teacher. I have memorized some of the routines. I will memorize the more complicated ones at home so as not to waste precious teaching time. How about this, let's simulate it. I will read the horoscope and you can click on three three."

Xiao Hao wanted to teach Li Yan a lesson, but when he saw Li Yan's sincere and confident eyes, he got angry:
"Do you think Go is just about playing some set patterns? The mysteries are still to come."

After a very smooth game of point-three-three, Xiao Hao and Li Yan both frowned. Xiao Hao was secretly shocked. He had just changed several possibilities, and Li Yan responded quickly and correctly. He had seen many children with outstanding memory, but remembering the pattern and using the pattern were two completely different things. The main purpose of teaching the basic pattern was to cultivate the basic feeling of "playing chess", not to use it flexibly right away.

"Is this kid playing me?"

Li Yan seemed to have plunged into a fog. The set-piece fight was a back-and-forth fight, but it was just a fight in a small corner, and the set-piece fight did not stipulate who would win or lose. Between evenly matched opponents, a stalemate would often be forced into the end.

and then?
Such a big chessboard is empty, how can we expand the territory?
"I can't just memorize them..." Li Yan muttered, "Even if I memorize all the moves, what should I do if my opponent doesn't fight me?"

Xiao Hao seemed to enjoy Li Yan's puzzled look. After a while, he pressed the white word on the chessboard. "Go can be understood as a war. We are attacking cities and territories. We must not only consolidate our own defenses, but also attack the opponent's cities, and quickly occupy advantageous positions. But this does not mean that we can just put the chess pieces in the blank space. Why do we say 'gold corners, silver edges, and grass belly'? Because the corners..."

"Setting the pattern is equivalent to close combat, and as the head coach, our main task is to make a good layout!"

The expected ding sound did not appear. Xiao Hao looked up, and could vaguely see his speechless eyes under the reflective lenses. "The ultimate winning rule of Go determines that the ultimate way to play is the layout, and everything else is just means. There is no need to be so excited about this kind of understanding."

Without specific knowledge, cognition will be limited. Li Yan said that he did not speak and listened carefully to the teacher's lecture. Xiao Hao also regained his calm demeanor, pushed his glasses and began to explain patiently.

An hour passed quickly. Xiao Hao drank a sip of tea and looked at the messy handwriting on the blackboard. Suddenly, he was startled:
"Already learning the layout?"

When did this kid lead me in the right direction? Xiao Hao was a little confused. He had set up a two-month beginner class, which taught students to learn the rules and basic terms, learn basic patterns and tactics, practice killing, and finally understand the layout. Two months! Condensed into one hour? This kid kept asking questions, and he did come up with many brilliant insights, but he also invisibly accelerated the teaching speed.

"Li Yan, although you are very talented, I still want to emphasize to you that Go is very complicated. There are elementary, intermediate and advanced patterns, and it is impossible to memorize all the changes in the opening. Teaching you the basic patterns is to help you understand how to play Go; teaching you the basic tactics is to let you know that Go is played against people, not just mechanically solving problems; teaching you to practice killing and living is to let you experience the intrigues on the board and feel the charm of Go beyond the patterns; as for the layout, it is actually just learning the basics... In the final analysis, these contents are like swallowing them whole, and there is no real improvement. If you want to learn Go well, you still have to guard against arrogance and impatience. I have a few books here, you can also borrow them to take a look first."

"I understand, teacher. Shall we have a plate?"

"No, did you listen to what I said? Be humble and cautious."

Li Yan has already spread out the chessboard. "I'm playing black. I still have twenty minutes. That's enough."

Of course, he would not tell Xiao Hao, who was sitting across from him with a sigh, that in the past hour, his mind had been ringing thirteen times:
【Total number of Go games: 32】

The appearance of the chessboard in his eyes has changed.

(End of this chapter)