Chessboard and Chess Player: Contest of Deduction (2)

Those within the game were blinded. For several months beneath the sea, stationed in Bright Hall Palace and linked to the dharma avatar of the Demon Lord Huiyuan, this warning had hung over Gui Yan's heart like a sharp treasured sword, its cold edge pricking him at every moment. Wan Mi and Qin Xing had walked into the trap because they had dreamed of gaining something for nothing, of using a small stake to win big. Yet here he was, standing outside the chessboard, controlling the whole board and deciding others' lives and deaths—this was not his own true standard either. Was he not relying on Old Crow's formation diagram and borrowing the Demon Lord Huiyuan's might? At the end of the day, there was no fundamental difference between him and the nine people on the board. No, he was even worse. Experts like Night Lion and Zheng Mancheng, though they too received the Demon Lord Huiyuan's empowerment, kept their minds clear and their wills firm. They merely treated the Devil Master's power as a tool, using it when needed and discarding it when not, never depending on it. More importantly, they had that freedom. Compared to them, did Gui Yan have any possibility of refusing? Clearly not. Time trickled away bit by bit. Like a chess player entering a long contemplation, before the boundaries of time had nearly blurred away, Gui Yan finally made his move. The place where Gui Yan's spirit now wandered was the "border" between the Nine Palaces Demon Domain and Old Crow's formation diagram. Every movement brought changes to both sides at once. He shifted the chess piece corresponding to Wan Mi by one square. Almost simultaneously, Wan Mi, before the Sky Shuttle Tide, spun around and rode the gale, slanting hundreds of feet away.