Dec 27, 2025
Author's Commentary #27:
Time to talk about Chapter 27: The Tumbleweed Gambit.
Originally, this was actually the first chapter to follow Okisato's second victory over Red Reaper, however, I decided to have it occur more naturally in the revision in the original. The original pacing of Season 5 was the one glaring issue I had with it, but now that has been rectified. Obviously here in the volume, all that is a mute point.
Though speaking of which, I actually made Xiao Lin's beatdown here a bit more brutal than in the original. There, she simply got a few ribs busted and twisted her ankle, but here, Okisato flat out breaks her ankle and sends her rolling down the hill.
As for the game, I'd been sitting on this one for a while and had been itching to use it. Believe it or not, this was actually played against the 2900-rated level 24 engine bot on Chess.com, with assisted mode on of course. I was genuinely surprised at how quickly the bot fell, and decided that this would be the Okisato vs Xiao Lin game.
And now, Xiao Lin has been completely humiliated. And to add even more insult to injury, I'll now be dubbing her the biggest jobber in the series, since not once has she won a game on-screen. There will be some competition for that title though.
That's all for this commentary. I hope you enjoyed it.
