Pathway to Japanese Literature

From the afternoon onward, a faint wind began to rise.
The alcove scroll tapped with intermittent knocks.
The nape of his neck abruptly turned cold.
When he stood to fasten the storm shutters, the pond's surface puckered faintly with gooseflesh—it was winter rain.
Having ordered the hibachi lit, he hovered his left hand above its warmth while keeping his right tucked in his sleeve, leaning back slightly,

"A proper match ain't one where you cozy up to a hibachi," I suddenly remembered, and felt an abrupt yearning for Sankichi Sakata.

From February to March of Shōwa 12 (1937), under the sponsorship of the Yomiuri Shimbun, two matches between Sakata versus Kimura and Hanada were held.
Kimura and Hanada were both veritable star players of their era, each holding 8th-dan ranks at the time.
Though Sakata's official rank stood at 7th dan, he styled himself as Meijin.

In his prime, he had wielded skill sufficient to defeat even Meijin Sekine Kinjirō while amassing achievements; thus it might have been acceptable for him to boast of being invincible. Yet an undeniable contradiction persisted: here stood Sekine—the legitimate Meijin formally anointed by shogi's traditional authority, the Ōhashi family school—while another man proclaimed himself Meijin from the periphery.
Compounding matters, Sakata himself enjoyed backing from a particular newspaper company, rendering straightforward resolution increasingly unattainable.
Inevitably, the controversy surrounding Sakata's self-proclaimed Meijin status escalated to its zenith, culminating in his severance of ties with Tokyo-based players and eventual withdrawal from all matches across both Kanto and Kansai.
He ceased even attempting to meet others.

His playing style was a defiant, fiercely individualistic one—so much so that it birthed the term "Sakata Shogi." That was something people could no longer witness. There had been a time when, during a match against Ōsaki 8th Dan, he abruptly played the bizarrely inventive move of pushing the pawn at the bishop's head. It was a move akin to tightening one's sandal straps mid-duel. Even knowing he would lose, it had been an audacious recklessness that left observers dumbfounded—such was the defiance of this man. The shogi world stood nearly stunned. As this single instance suggested all others, Sakata's matches—whether major or minor—would see such unorthodox moves emerge, leaving spectators gasping in awe. Yet this same man had suddenly withdrawn into prolonged silence. Had it been after achieving success, that might have been understandable—but this was precisely when Sakata Shogi should have demonstrated its true worth. The public felt his absence keenly.

However, it wasn’t as though the shogi world declined because of Sakata’s silence.
Kimura, Kaneko, and other rising players came to prominence, while Hanada demonstrated breathtakingly brilliant endgames worthy of his title "Hanada of the Endgame."
With the advancement of standard move research, Hanada, Kaneko, and others had nearly completed a new form of shogi called modern shogi.
And then, just as the shogi world had finally become lively, Meijin Sekine announced his retirement from the Meijin title.
The lifetime Meijin system was abolished, and a league tournament to acquire the Meijin title was initiated by all 8th dan players.
From Osaka, Kimi 8th Dan participated.
Kanda 8th Dan also joined midway.
However, Sakata alone remained silent.
Sakata’s true strength eventually became an enigma within the shogi world.
Amidst the thriving shogi world, only there remained a gaping hole-like absence.

Filling this void was, if not the sole remaining issue for the shogi world, certainly a significantly intriguing and substantial problem.
Shizen Dai Shimbunsha negotiated exhaustively through every conceivable means to revive Sakata’s matches.
The tactical interplay of feints and counterfeints among newspaper companies went without saying.
Yet the tangled web of emotional grievances and matters of honor between Sakata and the Tokyo faction players—extending even to the Shogi Taiseikai—remained profoundly fraught.
Even consolidating opinions within the Shogi Taiseikai itself proved no simple endeavor.
To compound matters, Sakata himself—the indispensable linchpin—remained an intractable figure beyond all reason.

Most newspaper companies had been worn out just by the effort of persuading Sakata.

"He was the sort of man who would say, 'The silver weeps.'"
Ah, I played a bad silver! Neither able to advance nor retreat... Ah, the silver weeps at being placed in such a wretched spot.
It meant that the silver had become Sakata’s very heart and was weeping.
For Sakata, each and every piece was his heart.
And thus, there was no place for the heart but the shogi board.
The board was everything in life.
He was a man who had nothing but shogi—who could conceive of nothing else.
He was uneducated, could not read newspapers, and could not socialize.
Therefore, approaching him with ordinary societal common sense proved futile.
Upon receiving the proposal for a match,

“Then I’ll just have a word with the board.” This declaration carried no pretense.
Hearing this, any logic they marshaled proved hollow.
The negotiating reporter retreated in fury.

To call him merely “Meijin-tempered” would be gross understatement.
A man devoid of common sense or logic beyond shogi—formidable enough for that alone—yet even within shogi, his essence lay in flouting norms and spurning theory, like opening with the pawn at the bishop’s crown.
Given these truths, sixteen years of failed overtures from every newspaper became inevitable.
Only Yomiuri Shimbun endured—assailing him biannually across ten springs and autumns until persuasion finally took root.

The mere fact that this was the first match in sixteen years already gave it sufficient value as a spectacle.
Moreover, his opponents were none other than the era's top star shogi players—Kimura and Hanada, both 8th Dan.
These two had secured first and second place in the ongoing Meijin title tournament, with the prevailing view being that the title would almost certainly be contested between them.
If these two were to lose to Sakata, the Meijin title they had fought so hard to secure would likely become meaningless.
In essence, Sakata's match against both 8th Dans challenged the very legitimacy of the Meijin title.
For Hanada and Kimura, this was a match they absolutely could not lose.
On Sakata's part too, this match—breaking sixteen years of silence—would be the first true test of so-called Sakata Shogi's worth.
There must have been stubborn pride toward the Tokyo faction at play.
Even dubbed the match of a lifetime, it wasn't entirely just publicity by the sponsoring newspaper.

"For sixteen years, I stayed away from all matches, but not a single day passed without me studying."
"Well, you'd better watch Sakata Shogi," he had boldly declared before the match—a game he absolutely could not lose after making such a proclamation.
This bold statement, unimaginable from a sixty-eight-year-old man, was undoubtedly meant to suggest his confidence in victory. But it also carried another meaning: against Kimura and Hanada’s modern shogi, Sakata would demonstrate just how unorthodox his strategies could be—a challenge for them to witness.
The public marveled at this statement.

In any case, it was the great shogi match of the Shōwa era. From the time allotment alone—thirty hours per player spanning seven days—everything carried an air of solemn grandeur. Even in the Meijin title tournament, the time allotment had been thirteen hours each, with matches concluded in two days. As for the match venues, of the two decisive matches, the first one against Kimura was specially chosen to be the study hall of Nanzen-ji Temple in Kyoto, where Sakata had inspected before the match,

“It’s too grand for me, too grand! All this just for playin’ shogi,” he was said to have remarked—a magnificent hall built entirely of hinoki cypress, its wood still fresh with fragrance.

However, having long resided in Kyoto myself, I know this well—the penetrating chill of Kyoto around February 5th, when their match began, held such severity each year that one might think the entire winter's cold had concentrated itself on that single day.
Particularly, Nanzen-ji Temple is nestled deep within the Higashiyama mountains, its grounds lying lower than the surface of Lake Biwa.
Moreover, Sankichi Sakata was sixty-eight years old.
It goes without saying that the organizers had paid meticulous attention to the heating.
Since ancient times, major official shogi matches had tended to face disruptive intrusions.
Given that it was a seven-day match, there were even more concerns about this.
Even if there had been no external disruptions, there was still the possibility of the players themselves falling ill.
Were they to have carelessly caught cold from the match venue's chill, that would have been the end of it.
Of course, a stove had been lit in the corner of the room, and furthermore, a fiercely blazing hibachi had been prepared on each side—one to the left and one to the right.

That sixty-eight-year-old Sakata declared, “Ain’t no proper match where you’re warming yourself by a hibachi,” and pushed them away. This I had recalled. Why had this particular memory come to mind?

While Kimura had no attendant, Sakata was accompanied from Osaka by a daughter named Tamae who served as his caretaker. She was the one who had attended to all her widowed father’s daily needs since his wife’s passing.

For the seven days of the match, both players were to remain sequestered at Nanzen-ji Temple under their agreement. However, Sakata—being advanced in years—required care that could not be delegated to others. Dealing with people was impossible; he couldn’t even inscribe the characters for sealed moves. His meals too had to be handmade by his daughter. Thus during the match, Tamae attended to Sakata without respite—though one reason he had brought this woman who remained unmarried to care for him was to show her his shogi.

“You must find it unbearable too, watchin’ your ol’ Pa suffer like this from the sidelines,” he said, “but hear me out—I had my own reasons for askin’ you to come.”
“I may be yer father,” he said, “but I ain’t got a single scrap o’ property to leave ya.”
“At least… see for yerself how your ol’ Pa’s been grindin’ his bones to dust over this shogi. Make sure you watch that real close—that’s the only legacy I got to give ya.”
“This here’s my only legacy, see...”

To Tamae, who after witnessing her father’s agonizing deliberation—six hours per move, like wringing blood from a parched rag—had ultimately been unable to endure remaining in the match venue and fled to the adjacent room only to fall ill, Sakata spoke these words.

But could it be that Sankichi Sakata truly wanted to show that shogi match to his deceased wife? Could it be that he thought of substituting his deceased wife with at least his daughter?

This was because, unlike today, shogi players' lives in those days were not blessed.
During his training years in particular, Sakata caused considerable hardship for his wife and children.
Born in Meiji 3 (1870) as the eldest son of peasants in Funamatsu Village outside Sakai City, he took up shogi at thirteen and was finally recognized as a full-fledged player in Meiji 39 (1906) when granted fifth dan rank by Sekine 8th Dan—but through those long years, no, even then, Sakata continued to live a hand-to-mouth existence.
"As long as I could play shogi," he thought, "even without food—well, that was paradise enough for me." But for his wife and children, things didn't go so smoothly—he was constantly subjected to their complaints.

Each time this occurred,

"If I quit shogi, life wouldn't be worth living."
"If you hate me playin' shogi that much, you can just up and leave."
"You knew damn well from the start this’d make life hell for ya."
“That’s why I kept tellin’ ya back when we only had one kid—‘Get out now while you still can!’—didn’t I?” he’d been scolding them like this, but one night when he swept through the house, there was no one left.
The house stood hollow as a cave, pitch-dark and silent. Finding this strange, he lifted the lid of the rice tub only to find it empty.
When he peered into the pot, only water was sloshing around.
A sudden, sharp premonition struck him.
In the darkness, having become utterly listless and sitting vacantly—how much time had passed since then?—the mother and her four children returned home dejectedly, looking like beggars.
Ah, they were safe—she sighed in relief,

“Where’d you go, out this late…?” he asked.

“We went lookin’ for a place to die.……”

The loan sharks were hounding us; there was no food; the husband kept wandering out to play shogi instead of trying to scrape together money—I thought it’d be better to just die, so I left home to search for a place to end it all. But then the boy I carried on my back started crying ‘Father! Father!’ longing for his dad, so I couldn’t go through with it and came back,’ she said.

“…………”
Tears spilled—Ah, how grateful he was! Even a father as cruel as this, born of the same blood—had they still called him "Father" and remembered him?—more tears spilled, and though he thought intensely of quitting shogi, Sakata could not do it.
Having such a husband, the wife had cursed shogi until her death, but ten years ago when she finally drew her last breath, she said: “Shogi is your life, so whatever you do, don’t play foolish shogi.”
Encouraged by these words for ten years, and now as he prepared to play the shogi match that would stake his entire life as a player, Sakata’s sole regret was likely that he couldn’t tell his wife: “Look at me—I became this kind of shogi player after all.”
Could it be that he couldn’t have his wife see that shogi match?

When considered thus, the match against Kimura was for Sakata not merely a matter of professional honor as a shogi player, but a game staking the accumulated hardships of his long-suffering wife and children.
That he could not permit himself to warm at the hibachi was only natural.—When considered thus, Sakata’s earlier declaration suddenly gained weight, steeped in tragic solemnity.
Yet by the third day of the match, he was already clutching the hibachi carelessly—what could have brought this about?

Had the reporters, his opponent Mr. Kimura, and his daughter—concerned for the elderly Sakata’s well-being—insisted he use it? Or had he, despite his earlier bold declarations, finally succumbed to the penetrating cold and requested the hibachi himself?
Had he grown so senile that he’d forgotten the declaration he himself had boldly made—“Ain’t no proper match where you’re cozying up to hibachi”?

Or perhaps he had reconsidered—that his resolve not to warm himself at the hibachi was in fact an undue fixation on the match itself.
For some time now, Sakata had often been saying, "You must play with the mind of a corkless gourd."

One time, when coming to Osaka Station’s platform to travel to the capital, amidst the bustling crowd stood a peculiar man.
Amidst the passengers boarding and alighting in busy motion, he stood vacantly with his hands tucked into his sleeves.
Even as the whistle blew and the train began to move, he remained alone on the platform, staring vacantly upward with his mouth agape in a corkless gourd-like posture.
"What a strange guy," he had thought at the time—"is that fellow an idiot?" But later, when his shogi play worsened and anxiety began taking hold, he would inexplicably recall that man’s figure.
He would remember that vacant stance like a corkless gourd—that weightless feeling of a rubber ball with its air let out—that attitude bound by nothing.
If he became too worked up over the immediate match and lost his composure, he could never play good shogi—he must play with the mindset of a corkless gourd—and when he remembered this principle, his mind would strangely calm down.

In essence, when he became fixated on the hibachi, it was precisely when he had grown too heated over the match before his eyes, his mind agitated with impatience. Could it be that upon realizing this and thinking "This won't do," he had requested the hibachi?

But all such conjectures were likely my own overthinking. According to the match records, February 5th—the day the game began—had been unseasonably warm in Kyoto, a stark contrast to the previous day when they had inspected the venue. Upon reading that, I had been easily taken in. To put it bluntly by exploiting that person’s weakness, it was merely that he had avoided the hibachi because it was warm—yet he had declared, “A match where you’re warming yourself at a hibachi...” Dramatizing such matters with tragic airs was too theatrical. Could it be that Sakata himself had been deceived by his own feelings? Yet in such moments, I found myself sensing Sakata’s appeal all the more. I concluded that when it had grown cold, he must have hastily retracted his earlier declaration and sought the hibachi; moreover, I found myself sensing this man’s honesty directly in that very act.

Be that as it may, it remained a fact that by the time Sakata requested the hibachi, he had already found it necessary to recall the state of mind of a corkless gourd. By then—that is, by the third day after the match began—Sakata’s position had already deteriorated significantly. After the match concluded, his daughter told the spectator reporters, “From around the fourth day, Father began saying it was my fault and made me give up,” but this “fourth day” was merely Sakata having delayed admitting it by a day—in truth, hadn’t Sakata himself known from the third day onward that things had already been untenable? But even if we didn’t specifically cite the third day, the outcome might have already been decided before the battle began. Admittedly, such talk wasn’t meant to invoke his usual argument that “the outcome is decided before the pieces are moved.” To put it another way—hadn’t Sakata already lost the moment he declared before the match, “Just watch Sakata’s shogi”?

The match commenced at 10:05 AM on February 5, with Kimura Hachidan taking the first move.

Kimura considered for eighteen minutes, then opened the bishop’s diagonal with the 7-6 Pawn.
It was first and foremost a safe move straight from standard playbook sequences, devoid of any surprise.
The choice lay between pushing the 2-6 Pawn to advance the Rook’s front line or this 7-6 Pawn maneuver.
That he had pondered it for eighteen minutes was likely meant to steady his nerves.

When he removed his hand from the piece, Kimura looked up sharply at his opponent’s face.
The eyes held an eerie gleam from their depths.
As Sakata registered with visceral clarity those confident eyes—eyes that belied their owner’s youth by appearing already poised to engulf him whole—a restless itch suddenly stirred within him.
To respond to the 7-6 Pawn by conventionally opening his own bishop’s diagonal with a 3-4 Pawn, or pushing out the Rook’s front Pawn with an 8-4 move—he felt certain he could no longer play such ordinary strategies.
Watch what unorthodox move this Sakata will make—I’ll play some earthshaking maneuver that’ll leave them gasping—as if seized by a street-corner demon’s whim, Sakata abruptly turned his gaze toward the window.
Nandina berries glowed red in the garden.
Mountain spring water flowed through channels, washing the white roots of a solitary narcissus plant where winter sunlight slanted across them.

Twelve minutes had passed.
Sakata’s eyes returned to the board.
Then, tilting his head—distinctive as Hokusai’s depiction of Son Goku atop a thick, short neck—slightly backward, he smoothly extended his right hand toward the board’s right edge.

Seeing where his hand had positioned itself, Kimura instantly thought he would push his rook’s front pawn to 8-4 in an ordinary move.
But Sakata’s hand shifted one line further right to hover over the edge pawn at 9-3.
Then soundlessly sliding the 94 Pawn forward, he fixed his gaze upon the board.
It was a quiet method of moving pieces—no friction of wood against wood.
A stillness unbefitting the first move in this once-in-a-lifetime match played after sixteen years.

Sakata was someone who never produced sound when moving pieces, even during ordinary play.
"There's those who go clack-clack bangin' their pieces down," he would say, "but that ain't my way."
"Makin' noise means their shogi hasn't yet become the genuine article."
"True shogi—what I'm talkin' about—is when a player's spirit pours itself clean into the pieces till you become like an empty soul-husk, floatin' weightless as a rubber ball with all the air let out."
"If there's sound, that's proof you're still clingin' to yourself."
"...Snap a lotus root in two, and out comes a thread finer'n a spider's silk, see?"
"Your shogi's gotta be like standin' on that wisp of a thread."
"When all your strength drains from your body and gets sucked into the pieces—that's when you can balance on that hair-thin line. That's the only shogi worth callin' real."
"When your game reaches that state, there ain't no sound comin' from the pieces you move."

Once, Sakata spoke thus.
Therefore, he never makes any noise with the pieces.

The 94 Pawn was also a move pushed softly and soundlessly.
It was, so to speak, a silent move.
However, this move seemed to shout *“Just watch Sakata’s shogi,”* thrashing wildly and writhing about as it did.
It was an unprecedented, outlandish move.

Kimura thought, "Ah!"
He had indeed anticipated that Sakata would make an unusual move.
But never in his wildest dreams could he have imagined that Sakata would play such a move—one never before seen in shogi history—as his very first.

“Mr. Sakata’s first move—the 94 Pawn—was a play I had not anticipated in the slightest, leaving me struck by its peculiarity,” Kimura later recounted, and this was likely exactly as he described.

Since Kimura’s reaction was exactly as described, the public’s astonishment proved extraordinary.
In their past match against Ōsaki Hachidan, when Sakata had pushed the pawn at the bishop’s head, the excitement had indeed reignited as expected.
The newspapers’ match commentaries declared that even this single 94 Pawn move alone made the entire match worthwhile, devoting an entire day’s coverage to explaining this one move—but I can never forget reading those articles.

I imagine it still exists now, but back then, I used to frequent a dingy shogi club in the basement of the Sennichimae Osaka Theater with a sullen expression.
The heavy, stagnant air unique to basements—murky with cigarette smoke and gritty dust rising from ping-pong tables and game areas—forced me into an unpleasant hacking cough halfway down the concrete slope leading there, but in those days, the only place that offered even slight solace to my heart was that shogi club.

As you might surmise, I was sickly and lonely.
Last summer, from an elevated train car, I saw through the flung-open windows of shabby apartments along the tracks—cramped, dingy rooms where people squirmed like shadow puppets under dull electric lights as they slept—and suddenly my chest tightened as I recalled my own apartment life from those days. Truly, that period of my life held not even a speck of hope or emotion scooped up by an earpick; it was something that had turned its back entirely on youth.
Moreover, that back was being singed by the flickering flames of remorse and impatience.

The only thing that offered me slight comfort was that basement shogi club, where the fee was five sen per hour, the board and pieces darkened with hand grease and grime—a place perfectly suited for gathering down-and-out speculators, travel-weary salesmen, and sickly souls like me who had lost their youth.
I would blend into that crowd, leaning against a splintered chair, bringing down my slight fever with aspirin while mournfully grieving over the king—trapped in a predicament mirroring my own fate—as it desperately tried to escape.
In winter, when my hands and feet prickled with pain and I sniffled back a runny nose, a vile heat would flare crimson within me until I lay utterly spent, casting aside the pieces—it was on one such day that I read that match report.

On leaving that basement, I happened to stop into a café, and when I casually picked up the newspaper there and looked through it, there it was.
The first installment of the match report had just been published, introducing only two moves: Kimura’s 7-6 Pawn and Sakata’s 94 Pawn.
Gazing at the peculiar diagram showing only an opened bishop’s diagonal for the first player and a single edge pawn pushed forward by the second player—as if I meant to lick it up with my eyes—I did not think the headline’s phrase “Sixteen Years of Biding Time: Tears of Endurance Radiate Through the 94 Pawn’s Brilliance” sounded exaggerated in the slightest.
I felt as if my eyes had suddenly brightened,

“Sakata did it! Sakata did it!” I muttered aloud, truly feeling moved for the first time. I found myself entranced rather by the youthful spirit inherent in that 94 Pawn move.

My happiness in that moment would likely remain incomprehensible to those who’ve never known such profoundly desolate loneliness. All through that night, I kept company with this single 94 Pawn move. I was no longer alone. That I remained a shogi amateur proved fortunate instead. How would Kimura answer this 94 Pawn? Would he push the edge pawn at 96 in response as before? Or would he advance the 16 Pawn instead—another edge pawn? My mind whirled with such imaginings as I anxiously awaited tomorrow’s newspaper.

At sixty-eight years old, Sakata’s youth—manifest in this 94 Pawn move that soared like Pegasus itself, so spirited and unconventionally bold—made me feel as if lashed by a whip’s crack. While yearning to model my own future after Sakata’s attitude, reading those newspapers became my daily solace. Yet while this move granted me days of happiness—had it been a happy one for Sakata?

In amateur thinking, there may be situations where it makes sense, but when you push an edge pawn first, there’s a risk of having your move ignored by the opponent.
In other words, it easily becomes a tempo loss.
Considering this—Sakata playing second and perhaps unaware of how the midgame would unfold—by first pushing the 94 Pawn at the edge and then having that move predictably ignored by Kimura, he ended up with a two-move tempo loss.
However, this might have unexpectedly been Sakata’s intention.
It might have been a strategy to first vaguely relax his strength, let the enemy launch a reckless attack, then counterattack during that opening.
It could also be considered that he had already tried to make his shogi into something vague like a corkless gourd from the very first move.
It might not be impossible to say he had applied the theory of “letting the opponent make moves to secure victory” in his own unique style.

However, in the end, the two-move loss proved disastrous as Sakata found himself overwhelmingly attacked by Kimura, suffering total defeat without ever finding an opening to launch a counterattack.
Facing modern shogi—which prioritizes speed of attack—with a two-move deficit indeed proved reckless.
Sakata Shogi, lacking any theoretical foundation, had relied too heavily on that very absence of theory and was thus defeated before the principles of modern shogi.

Following his remark of being "struck by a peculiar feeling," Kimura

“—But at the same time,” he continued, “ever since seeing that 94 Pawn, I found myself—strangely enough—with my mind settling decisively. By the time I pushed the 5-6 Pawn, I had gained considerable confidence.”
“And from the positional advantage of the 5-5 Pawn,” he added, “I became convinced this move would surely demonstrate its offensive power.”

The 5-6 Pawn marked the third move following Kimura’s initial 7-6 Pawn and Sakata’s 94 Pawn.
The 5-5 Pawn came as the fifth move.
This meant Kimura had already become certain of victory after making just three moves.
Or rather—he had likely reached that conviction the instant he saw the 94 Pawn.

Considering this, Sakata had already lost the moment he pushed the 94 Pawn.
The reason such an arduous game had been created—one demanding six hours of deliberation per move—lay in this 94 Pawn.
Moreover, he had spent only twelve minutes on this move.
It was a premeditated act.
When he had struck a grand pose before the war by declaring, "Watch Sakata's shogi," had he not already conceived of this move?

“The one under the waterfall don’t just feel cool,” he muttered during the meal break at the match venue. “Takes real patience when you’re the one standin’ there.”
He must’ve already known he was in trouble.
Fightin’ with a wild move like that 94 Pawn—sure, that’s what makes a true shogi player, but meant he had to endure that waterfall poundin’ him raw.
But was it goin’ too far to say he brought it on himself?
Wasn’t he the one who jumped into that whirlpool, pushin’ himself to make folks gasp at his crazy moves?

For Sakata, unconventional shogi had already become almost fateful. He became so absorbed in shogi that he forgot all characters learned in school, remaining illiterate his entire life. Beyond reading characters on shogi pieces, his literacy extended only to this: once when trying to board a Tokyo streetcar, he couldn’t read “train.” Flustered, he finally recognized “Shinagawa-bound”—the character for “kawa” (川) resembling Sankichi Sakata’s “San” (三) turned sideways—and was saved. Therefore he couldn’t read past or present game records to learn from them. Having no teacher, he had no choice but to devise his own shogi through solitary deliberation. Naturally relying solely on talent and individuality, he pursued his unique path, creating self-taught shogi that overturned conventions like whirling everything with a ship’s prow. A lack of education, no teacher, and an overstrong personality. Partly that playful streak of Senshu natives. Yet precisely this made Sakata Shogi temporarily dominate and gain popularity. Confidence welled up. He pushed pawns at bishops’ heads, proclaimed himself Meijin—boldness breaking conventions emerged. But this boldness forced long silence. For three years he met no one, went nowhere, touched no pieces—solely examined his heart. What he contemplated or discovered—I have no way of knowing. Yet during that contemplation—“the sitting cushion still bears its dent”—I imagine him deepening his corkless gourd shogi philosophy. Had he not strengthened his conviction that good shogi requires shedding self-assertion? And wasn’t that manifestation the 94 Pawn—rebelling against modern shogi’s attack-speed obsession? In other words—wasn’t the 94 Pawn a move to shed self-assertion? Yet no move so embodies Sakata’s self-assertion as this. Sakata remained Sakata.

He undoubtedly knew about the tempo loss of the 94 Pawn.
But in an even game of shogi where both players start with equal pieces, no matter how one makes the first move, one can form a position without gaps—this wasn't Sakata's shogi, the kind to stumble over something like the first move. His confidence lay stronger in the belief that even when making forced moves, the true essence of Sakata Shogi was to handle them with flexible, effortless ease.
It was this confidence that had led him to return after sixteen years.
And so, he played the most reckless move in the most important shogi game of his life.

This was no longer something that could be called possession by demons. For Sakata as a person, there had been no move more natural than this. It was simply him single-mindedly adhering to his artistic realm. There was nothing mysterious about it. Yet it seemed certain that at that moment, he had become possessed by the ghost of what was once called Sakata Shogi - that style which had once captivated the masses. Moreover, he was sixty-eight years old. One might think he needn't have concerned himself with popularity to such a degree. There was something heartbreakingly artificial about his aged visage.

The masses naturally applauded.
But when it became clear he had finally lost, he made a face that seemed to say, "What the..."

“Who in their right mind would play such an idiotic move?” someone whispered through callous lips.
Even among professional shogi players, there were those who uttered such words.

The match concluded on the seventh day, Kigensetsu.
The match began at 9:05 AM on a morning when rain veiled Nanzen-ji Temple’s cedar groves from the previous day, took a break at noon, resumed at 1:00 PM after a wordless lunch, and by 1:07 PM, Sakata had already resigned.
The rain had not stopped.

The players all visited Nanzen-ji Temple's main hall together, then viewed the temple treasures.
Sakata,

“Thank you ever so much for your trouble,” he said, walking as he bowed with such exaggerated politeness that it startled those around him. It was a bow so refined that one might wonder where the razor-edge intensity of his fifty-five years as a gambler had vanished to.

Even when served tea and sweets by the legal affairs director in the shoin, he pressed his forehead to the tatami,

“Thank you ever so much for the meal,” he said.
His characteristically thick, short neck had suddenly grown gaunt, as though the seven days of grueling labor had stripped away its flesh.

As he was about to board the waiting car, raindrops from an umbrella held behind him fell onto his neck.
His daughter Tamae saw this, and suddenly her chest grew hot.
Winter rain veiled Kyoto in mist, its blue dimness clouding the car window, and Tamae felt she could hear confidence crumbling with a rattle within her father's body sunk into the seat cushion beside her.

Sakata was muttering something under his breath with a sullen expression when the car suddenly swerved,

“Oh! That’s it, that’s it!” he exclaimed.

“Huh? What is it?”
Tamae looked at her father’s face, which had suddenly come alive.

“For the next game with Mr. Hanada, I’ve just thought of pushing the pawn on the left edge this time,” Sakata tried to say, but for some reason fell silent.
And so, he drifted for a time within the numbing bliss of this inspiration.
In his match against Kimura, he did not consider that pushing the pawn on the right edge to 94 Pawn had been the primary cause of his defeat.
And he never dreamed that pushing the pawn on the left edge—with the same significance as that move—in his match against Hanada would again become his downfall.

The rain suddenly intensified.
Sakata was muttering incoherently as he listened to the sound of the rain.

(August 1943)