Go: Is the portable old man the nine-time champion?

Chapter 404 Artificial Intelligence
"What was expected was swept away."

Seeing Ethan concede defeat, the people in the research lab felt no emotional fluctuation, not even a sense of boredom. They were calm to the point of numbness, as indifferent as stating "braised pork ribs are served in the cafeteria today."

From the very beginning, no one believed that Ethan could defeat Yi Zheng, and the match itself was uneventful.

So when it ended, there were no gasps of surprise, no sighs of regret, and even the quiet exchanges of opinions that players often exchange during post-game debriefings disappeared.

There was a sense of relief in the air, like watching a train that was destined to reach its destination, and simply waiting for it to come to a stop.

After suffering a huge loss in the upper right corner, Ethan became increasingly timid, practically giving Yi Zheng whatever he wanted, and the final result was predictable.

Even in the middle of the game, many people in the research room had already left, so there was no need to continue watching.

Even the two players only did a simple debriefing after the game. Yi Zheng pointed to a few key points on the chessboard and explained the variations in a calm tone.

Ethan's eyes were somewhat vacant, and he made muffled responses like "um," "Ah, yes," and "I see," as if he was trying to maintain a semblance of politeness rather than listening.

So Yi Zheng didn't say much, the debriefing ended hastily, the whole process took no more than five minutes, with more silence than conversation.

After taking a group photo with the Americas team to receive their runner-up prize money, they left immediately.

Watching Ethan leave, Yi Zheng sighed slightly.

"Pity."

"What a pity."

Hearing Jiang Mobai's words, Yi Zheng shook his head: "It's such a waste that he can't realize his potential with such great talent."

While Lee Zongrui and others might be slightly inferior to him in terms of pure Go talent, his talent in other areas has made up for it and even surpassed him.

Talent encompasses many things; even hard work can be considered a talent, since not everyone can keep working hard.

Just like Yi Zheng said in a previous conversation, Go is not a fun thing and it is impossible to get addicted. He plays Go every day and he has never gotten addicted.

"Congratulations on winning another major championship."

"Just the team championship."

Yi Zheng didn't take these words to heart, but defeating nine opponents in a row was indeed a legendary feat, and it would probably be talked about for a long time to come.

However, it will probably be more than ten years before Yi Zheng wants to do this again, because it is highly likely that Yi Zheng will appear as the main player even if he participates in the arena in the future.

After all, everyone believes that even if Yi Zheng is strong, there is still a chance that something unexpected might happen if he is placed in the vanguard position, but if he is placed in the ballast position to take care of the last few people, it would be an easy task.

More importantly, if Yi Zheng continues to do this, the competition will probably have to be canceled.

Not everyone can turn the other cheek after being slapped on the left.

Looking at Yi Zheng's nonchalant attitude, Jiang Mobai silently curled his lip. He felt that Yi Zheng was subtly showing off! Don't think I can't see through him!
So when faced with Yi Zheng's pretentious act, Jiang Mobai decisively changed the subject to prevent him from showing off: "So what exactly do you want us to do tomorrow?"

"God knows."

Although Yi Zheng said that, he had already made a certain prediction in his heart about what Old Ke had said before.

The next day, Yi Zheng and Jiang Mobai arrived at the headquarters of Muyehu Company. A staff member was already waiting for them at the entrance and led them to a room with a sign that read "Research and Development Center".

Looking at the pile of computers in the lab, Jiang Mobai felt bewildered. Why had he been brought to a place like this? He didn't know how to program.

"Welcome, both of you national team players."

Upon hearing the sound, a middle-aged man stood up and walked over. Jiang Mobai immediately went to greet him. "Mr. Zhang, it's been a long time."

Yi Zheng also went up to greet him. He was no stranger to this man, after all, he was the team's big spender and the boss of Muyehu Company, Zhang Xinping.

But at this moment, his gaze was more drawn to the "spectacle" in the room: the flickering screens and the roaring server racks, silently conveying a huge amount of information.

"When we first signed the contract, I really didn't expect Yi Zheng to suddenly become so amazing. It seems like you won all the championships in this year's competitions, right? You're a force to be reckoned with. Let's have a meal together sometime and talk about the future development."

Zhang Xinping was planning to build a new generation of teams, expecting to spend three to five years developing them into championship contenders.

But no one expected that signing just one right person would lead to winning the championship in the very first year.

It's fair to say that the return on investment in Yi Zheng is truly astonishing, but the downside is that many teams are already trying to poach him for transfer.

However, Zhang Xinping did not mention this matter. Such things need to be discussed privately between the two of them, and today's matter is the most important.

Jiang Mobai was clearly getting impatient: "President Zhang, stop keeping us in suspense. You didn't bring us all here just to hear you praise Yi Zheng, did you?"

Zhang Xinping was already very familiar with Jiang Mobai. He gestured to the staff next to him to bring over a chair and sat down himself. "Please make yourselves at home. The main reason I came here is to ask you two to help with an internal test."

"Testing? Is Kinoko planning to launch some new feature?"

Jiang Mobai found this strange. If the website had any functions, why not just test them internally or create a user version? Why bother with people like him?
Although Muyefox is an online Go platform with many professional players, most of its features are geared towards ordinary Go enthusiasts.

Upon hearing this, Zhang Xinping smiled slightly: "That's right, we've collaborated with USTC on a project that applies artificial intelligence to Go, using Go to train the AI."

This refers to what you often call Go AI, which attempts to see if artificial intelligence can defeat humans in the field of Go and has stronger learning capabilities.

The tests have shown some results so far, but we also want to help this AI grow quickly through training by professional players and finding bugs. That's why we found you two, currently the strongest active players in China.

Of course, this isn't something done without compensation; we will provide some form of payment.

"Go AI?"

Upon hearing this, Jiang Mobai and Yi Zheng reacted completely differently.

Upon hearing this, Jiang Mobai seemed to have thought of something amusing. The curiosity and excitement on his face froze for a moment, then were replaced by a strange expression that was a mixture of disbelief and a forced attempt to suppress laughter.

However, considering that the person in front of him was one of the largest sponsors of Chinese Go, Jiang Mobai held back.

Go AI? Everyone knows that the harshest insult in the Go world is that you play like a computer.

Can artificial intelligence crack Go? Don't be ridiculous. We'd be lucky if AI even reached a professional level; do we really need to test it?

Any random pro player who just achieved their professional ranking this year could probably easily beat the AI.

However, Yi Zheng's expression was rather solemn, because he knew that something big was about to happen.

Having heard so many stories about the supposed power of Go AI, like blind men touching an elephant, are we finally going to experience it firsthand from a direct, first-person perspective?

Thinking of this, Yi Zheng couldn't help but turn around and glance at Old Ke behind him, but to his surprise, he found that the other party had an excited expression on his face.

what?
Yi Zheng looked at Old Ke, who seemed eager to try it out, and felt completely bewildered. In the past, whenever Old Ke talked about artificial intelligence, he always looked uncomfortable, and even gritted his teeth.

Why is Professor Ke so excited about the emergence of artificial intelligence today?

Could it be that Mr. Ke is...

(End of this chapter)