Heart's Gambit

"Why don't you castle?"

We were only 10 moves into the game and I was already destroying my opponent in every conceivable way. My knight sat on B5, ready to fork the black king and rook. Covered by my bishop, she wouldn't dare to take with her queen. The only way to save herself was to castle her rook and king.

Of course, castling or not didn't really matter. You would be severely doubting my skills if you believe I didn't already have countermeasures in case she castled. Castling would only prolong this pitiful game for another two moves.

"So, why won't you castle? Don't waste my time, just give up. You know you've lost already."

I looked up at my opponent for the first time since this game started. She was a girl with messy, long black hair, soft brown eyes, and a school uniform. Her face was deep in thought, probably trying to not cry at how badly I was destroying her.

"Hm? Oh, sorry, I was thinking, I didn't hear you."

This girl... it's like talking to a wall, except walls probably play better than her. Now she's looking at me all apologetic. Seriously, what does she take me for?

"Go, your turn. My god, I wished this stupid club had a timer."

"Ah sorry, uhhh. Let's move my queen here?"

An immediate blunder. She moved her queen straight in the line of fire of my bishop after staring at the board for a full 5 minutes. I almost laughed but luckily I kept my cool.

"Bishop takes on g5."

I'll spare her from the fork this turn. Not that it really matters anyway.

"I did it again... Ok, I surrender."

"Seriously? Again? Why do you give up every time you lose your queen? This is not how chess works!"

"Well I don't want the king to be lonely without his queen..."

Laughingly pathetic. I don't even know why she's still in chess club. In fact, nobody is in chess club anymore, they all stopped coming after I continuously decimated them.

I came to this club looking for an actually decent opponent. This high school is boring after all. Sadly, it seemed like all the club members were incompetent, even the best were probably around 1500 Elo. I wiped them out with my eyes closed. I don't really know why I come anymore, it's just me and this girl now who wouldn't leave no matter what. I guess I just have time to kill.

Me, Yamada Yuiga, age 17 and one of the reigning chess champions in Japan. With Elo enough to be considered a super grandmaster, I can easily beat any challenger excluding the legends.

Imagine if I lost to this girl, I would be a laughingstock.

"Ah, it's 5:00 PM already. Sorry I couldn't give you a good game Yamada-san."

The club meeting was 2 hours after school and we only played three games. What a waste of time. I'm not going to say it out loud though, I'm not that rude.

"Let me clean up, don't worry about it. I understand you're pretty busy so you should hurry home. It's my way of thanking you for playing me every week since school started"

"You're right, I have an international tournament in two weeks. Although I can beat those guys on the roster easily, so I'm not too worried."

"Ah, that's great! I look forward to it."

"Thanks... uhh... what was your..."

"It's Tanaka Kasai ."

"Thanks Tanaka-san."