A normal boy plays to pass time.
Shino played to see the future.
Every game was more than a game — it was a battlefield dressed in disguise. Chessboards, debate stages, even lunch-break conversations — they were all training grounds. Where others laughed, joked, or moved without thought, Shino's eyes dissected. He didn't just see the move in front of him. He saw the ten that could follow.
It began with chess. The board was simple: sixty-four squares, thirty-two pieces. But to Shino, it was a mirror of life. Each pawn was a person who thought they were limited, but could transform into something greater if they reached the other side. Each knight's unpredictable leap was like the chaos of human impulse. Bishops cut diagonally like ambition, queens moved with terrifying freedom like destiny itself. And the king — fragile, slow, yet essential — represented what every person tried to protect, whether pride, power, or secret weakness.
When Shino sat at the board, silence sharpened around him. His opponent saw wood and plastic. Shino saw traps hidden three turns away, sacrifices disguised as mistakes, victories disguised as defeat. He learned not just how to win, but how to let others think they were winning until it was too late.
But chess was only the beginning.
Debates in school became duels. While his classmates shouted louder and tripped over their emotions, Shino spoke less and listened more. He measured the rhythm of their words, the crack in their voice when they lied, the impatience that exposed insecurity. He didn't need to humiliate them — he only needed to let them destroy themselves. To everyone else, it looked like Shino was "lucky" in arguments. But luck had nothing to do with it. He was simply playing ten moves ahead.
Even casual conversations became simulations. Someone would say, "I think we should do it this way." Shino didn't just hear the words — he heard the ego behind them, the need for validation, the hidden fear of rejection. He could predict what they would say if challenged, and what they would do if ignored. Slowly, he realized that people were not unpredictable at all. They were patterns. And once you understood the pattern, you owned the game.
What unsettled others was Shino's gaze. His eyes didn't just look at people, they looked through them. It was as if he was not listening to their words, but running calculations behind his stare. Friends began to joke, "You're always plotting something." They weren't wrong.
To Shino, life itself was a grand board. Teachers were kings with fragile egos. Classmates were pawns desperate to cross into adulthood. Rules of society were like chess rules — strict, but bendable if you understood loopholes. He realized that strength wasn't about who shouted loudest or who stood tallest. Strength belonged to the one who could see the whole picture while others only saw their next step.
And yet, there was a danger in seeing too much. The Strategist's Eye made him restless. He could no longer enjoy games for fun, or talks for comfort. Every moment became calculation. Every person became a potential study. He started predicting jokes before they were said, arguments before they were fought, betrayals before they arrived.
Most people lived in the present. Shino lived three moves ahead.
But this vision was also intoxicating. He knew that those who could see the unseen always ruled over those who couldn't. It wasn't brute force that shaped history — it was foresight. The general who won battles before they began. The thinker who saw patterns where others saw chaos.
And now, Shino was becoming one of them.
The boy once trapped in a dark room had turned solitude into silence, silence into strength. Now, that strength evolved into vision. The Strategist's Eye had opened, and once opened, it could never close.
Because once you see ten steps ahead…
you can never go back to living one step at a time.