As he watched Zhou leave the restaurant, Toshiro smiled slightly, amused by the stubborn insistence of a child who seemed at first so shy and quiet. He supposed that it could be attributed to Zhou's want for independence, to not have to rely on anyone else, even only for a short while.

It was an admirable quality, to be sure, yet it also seemed a bit unfortunate that he had had to become independent so young. He was only nine, an age where it was certainly excusable for one to look to adults for guidance and support. But Zhou had never gotten that opportunity, which drew at least a little sympathy.

Although Zhou had indicated that he didn't want to be pitied, as Toshiro watched as his retreating figure slowly became smaller, it was hard not to. Once he had faded into the distance, Toshiro turned around, planning to make his way home too. He checked the time, which the display on his phone announced as 2:26.

"Shoot," he muttered. He had arranged an Oasis challenge with another player at 2:30, and although there were definitely things valued more than punctuality in the game, it was better to be on time if possible. Besides, now that he was pretty high-ranked in the game, he had an image to maintain.

Home was probably a good ten- or fifteen-minute walk away, but if he was fast, he might be able to make it.

Speeding up to a quick run, he apologetically dodged past the few other pedestrians that were outside in this weather. The sidewalk was slippery with the light covering of snow that was beginning to melt, but he was nimble enough to race across without falling.

He hadn't run in quite some time, but he was still decently fit. Only slightly out of breath at the exertion, he arrived at his building and jogged inside.

Impatiently tapping his foot, he waited for the elevator to come to the first floor. Another glance at the time told him 2:33, and he pressed the button a few more times.

Within a few minutes, though, he was outside the sleek entrance to his home. Raising his hand to alert the motion sensor to his presence, the facial recognition system scanned him and after a short processing time, the door glided open.

Toshiro rushed inside, causing the automatic lights to turn on, and found the headset on the table where he had left it earlier in the day before he had gone outside. It was the newest design that he had upgraded to only a week or so ago.

He put it on, and after a brief loading screen, it took him to where he had been before logging out. He scanned the notifications page and saw a few new messages from Parcival, the player he had planned to go on a quest with, asking where he was.

Parcival was another high-ranked player he had worked together with on a few challenges before. Although Toshiro was a solo player for the most part, he would team up with others occasionally for some of the more difficult challenges. He still wouldn't consider them friends, per se, they were still fairly well acquainted in the game.

Toshiro had never met any of his Oasis acquaintances in real life, though. Maybe he was too cautious, but revealing anything about one's identity in a massively multiplayer online game had its dangers.

Opening up the map of the worlds, he teleported to the location Parcival was currently at, and found his avatar soon enough.

"Hey, sorry I was late, I was out and lost track of time," he apologized.

"Ay, no problem, as long as you've finally shown up," Parcival joked. "Now, which challenge shall we take on today? There's a few; you can check the list."

While Toshiro investigated the list of quests that were available for the day, Parcival continued the conversation. "Have you seen the leaderboard recently?"

Toshiro continued scrolling. "No, why? Have there been any significant changes?"

"Mhm, a few."

Honestly, Toshiro didn't particularly care all that much, but Parcival was clearly waiting for him to ask, so he obliged.

"What happened?"

"A new player's appeared on the leaderboard."

That was moderately rare; the leaderboard usually stayed the same for the most part, but there had been some shifts in the past and new ones weren't a particularly big surprise. And it definitely wasn't enough to get Parcival so inquisitively excited.

He then continued. "It's pretty strange, though, none of the well-known players have heard of him before. He's probably a solo player, but even so, it's strange that he hasn't worked on anything with someone high-ranked before and got good so fast."

That was a bit out of the ordinary, but Toshiba didn't think much of it. He replied, "I guess that's true. Maybe he just joined the Oasis and practiced a lot."

Toshiro was somewhat intrigued now, though, so he pulled up the leaderboard to see what all the fuss was about.

He had viewed the leaderboard frequently enough to quickly notice the change. The original number 20 was no longer on the list, and players that had 17,18, and 19 before had each been pushed down. The username at number 17 now read Sho.

"Hm, interesting," Toshiro remarked absentmindedly. He then closed the leaderboard and went back to the challenge list.

"Yeah. Anyway, have you decided on a quest yet?"

"Yup. Shall we begin?"