It was a long time before Kevin got a hold of himself and let go of her hand.
"Sister, I… will go home!" Kevin said, turning to the neighborhood.
Normally, he would say thank you at this moment to thank her for being with him and comforting him.
But he didn't want to say it. And he didn't want to say it to her in the future.
Just like with his sister, no matter how much you do for each other, you never need to say "thank you."
When Sophia got home, it was seven o'clock in the evening. Kate had prepared dinner and was waiting for her. After dinner, Sophia turned on her computer, and the second stage of the contest had already begun.
When Sophia opened the ranking list, she was just as confused as the other competitors across the country.
What did those rows of neat M plus numbers mean? From number one to thirty-nine, they were all Ms.
Among them, it also included "M378" who had played chess with her.
Has the server been hacked by hackers?
She opened the official blog and saw that people were also talking about the tournament. They all said that the Ms were very strong. It was like a team of chess masters had come to join the tournament.
But it was just a three thousand dollar prize. Could it really attract so many chess masters?
Sophia couldn't help wondering whether these chess players were... poor?
Sophia quickly got into her next game.
There were five hundred contestants in the second round of the competition. According to the ranking scores, four hundred contestants would be eliminated, and only one hundred left to enter the third stage. The match was getting quite brutal. Basically, losing a game or two meant it was all over for you.
Sophia had seen the comments and was a bit afraid of these Ms. The M she had met strongly, and now there were even more of these Ms. It was nerve-racking.
When Sophia got to the third game, she met another M.
It turned out that her opponent's chess skills were very high. But Sophia tried her best and managed to win this game in forty minutes.
She took a rest for a while, drank some water, and continued to play.
At the beginning of the second stage, no one had any points. Three hours after the start of the round, those Ms had quickly sprung to the top of the list again, neat and eye-catching.
Sophia had encountered three Ms in this round. Each of them was skilled, and it took more than half an hour to finish the game. As for the other players, Sophia could defeat them in five minutes.
By the end of the second round, "Knowing A Person" had jammed itself into the top part of the scoreboard, squeezed into tenth place. It stood out in a row of Ms and destroyed the neat formation.
Naturally, the current ranking did not represent the final result. These points represented only the number of wins. Some lazy people, like Sophia, stopped playing when they saw that their points were good enough to enter the next ground.
The other players who had lost confidence in the tournament began to make jokey remarks on the forum.
"Call the manager, get that "Knowing A Person" down, keep the formation neat! Hey! People with obsessive-compulsive disorder can't stand it anymore!"
"I suspect that KAP is a traitor to the M Army! M Army is the alien who conspired to capture the earth! Come on, Miss KAP. The earth is under your guard."
"Eh? Am I here for the game or for the show? I'm out now, but I'm still so excited."
She opened her blog and saw a notification in the upper right corner that there were more than five hundred people following her and more than one thousand messages. The game was directly linked to her blog account, so everyone could see each other's blog name. This nickname couldn't be changed during the contest. Otherwise, they would lose their right to continue in the tournament. There were so many people writing to her: teasing her and inviting her to play chess, including some of the Ms.
She didn't want to play more chess! After two rounds, she had played dozens of games. She did not want to continue playing anymore for fun!
Unbeknownst to Sophia, the words' chess match' started trending.
Usually, not many people care about chess. Such a small match would only be noticed by some chess enthusiasts. But it had become a hot topic because people were talking of 'Knowing a Person" was a takedown of the M Army.
Many internet users who didn't know anything about chess had joined the discussion.
"It feels like a group of students in a group fighting, and the teacher has come to instruct them."
"M378 must be the top student in the class. They never fail, and they've even tied with the teacher!"
"Have you noticed that the sponsor is 'Flying Network'? Does it seem to be owned by Pearsons? Why is the prize money so low then?"
"It is Pearsons! Oh, it's such a small amount. Wow, what are you thinking about?"
Then there were many comments about Albert Pearson. Though this Albert Pearson never made public appearances and no one knew what he looked like, people were intrigued. He was the richest and youngest head of a company. It didn't matter what he looked like.
Mr. Pearson could just be whatever he liked.
The next day was Monday. Sophia had to go to school.
Yesterday's match restored her confidence in winning the Excellence Award. So she was in a particularly good mood.
In the first class of the day, Ms. Acheson presented a new student to the class. He introduced himself as Louie Delgado.
The arrival of Louie Delgado had an immediate effect on the girls, for no other reason, then Louie Delgado was very, very handsome.
After class, many of the more confident girls approached Louie and chattered away to him. Louie seemed a little intimidated. He lowered his head and didn't utter a word.