Regarding the origins and evolution of mahjong, there are numerous legends, but the vast majority of them are hard to verify or suspected of being fabricated.
Fortunately, in this book, we don't have to worry about these unprovable issues. A simple "This is Great Ming" suffices, and what follows is entirely up to the storyteller.
Thus, we could assume that the current mahjong duel between Sun Yixie and Murong Ji is a game with rules similar to Japanese mahjong, but without the rules of declaring one's hand or riichi.
The number of rounds they were to play was a "half game," which consists of four rounds in both the East and South rounds, totaling eight rounds.
The victory conditions were also very simple: each of the four players started with 2,000 points in chips, and at the end of eight rounds, whoever's team had the highest combined score would win.
