Akira's Korean was much better than his Mandarin. Nevertheless, when his father invited him on a trip to China during a rare lull after Akira was knocked out of the competition for the Ouza title, Akira accepted.

Shindou was furious, of course, that their games would be interrupted, but Akira promised him dozens of new moves to assimilate into their play – moves Shindou would have to improvise quickly to overcome. He was mollified by that.

The Chinese Go Institute was impressive in size, dwarfing the Japanese Go Institute, but otherwise quite dull in appearance. Not that architecture was that important, just that Akira had been under the impression that Go was taken seriously here.

That was probably just a childish fantasy – a dream of a place where the game was respected above baseball and video games. Akira smiled to himself, amused at his mild irritation and at the reaction it might have gotten had he shared it with Shindou.

"What you smiling at?"

The strangeness of hearing Japanese spoken with a heavy accent started Akira out of his thoughts. "Pardon?"

"You smiling. What at?"

The boy, a few years younger than Akira, seemed oddly familiar. But Akira was certain he'd never seen him before; the only Chinese go pros he knew around his age were from the Hokuto cups (both years he'd competed) and none of them had this child's wide eyes and memorable spiked hair. Akira was certain he'd never seen him before, and yet…

"I admired the building," Akira said in careful Mandarin, no doubt making errors. "It's very…" curse his small vocabulary, "…big."

The boy's curious expression transformed into one of surprised joy, and he started talking at about the speed of sound, gesturing and waving his hands as Akira tried to understand what he was saying. He got a few words, here and there, (understand, Japanese, message, two years) and thought he heard something like "Isumi", which wasn't any Mandarin Akira had learned, and sounded rather Japanese, in fact.

He held out his hand, a fairly universal signal to indicate that he really didn't understand that well, and waited for the excited prattle to come to a halt. "My name is Touya Akira."

"Le Ping," the boy replied, still smiling. "Are you staying here?"

Ah, right. That was why the building was so vast – it doubled as dormitories for the younger pros. Akira had misplaced his father somewhere, along with their guide, but he somehow doubted he would – there were usually a few free beds in some of the more elite go professional's houses when a Touya came to visit and it was nearly impossible to refuse such invitations without sounding abominably rude. "Probably no."

Le Ping's face fell. "You don't play go?"

"Of course I do!" Akira objected, sliding back into Japanese in his indignation. Not that it mattered; the words, and more importantly, the tone got through to Le Ping perfectly.

"Then come play!"

It was a tempting invitation, and wherever there was a chance to play, that was where his father would look for him first. Akira smiled. "Yes, thank you very much."

The room he was led to was full of fairly young players, some too old to be insei, but most around their late teens, early twenties at most. Young pros, then. Akira wondered if Le Ping was a pro as well; it seemed likely given his comfort with using these facilities and his ease grabbing a free table as soon as it opened.

"Black or white?"

Akira smile. "White, please." Shindou favoured black, so Akira had become used to white. Le Ping set their timers for ninety minutes and they started.

The game was interesting. Le Ping's style was somewhat different from what Akira was used to, but the basics were the same, and familiar patterns started emerging. He itched to ask how old Le Ping was, to compare his strength with Akira's at his age. He was stronger than Akira had been at twelve, but not as strong as he'd been once he'd become a pro at thirteen. Still, the game was interesting.

Five hands after Le Ping should have resigned, he sighed. "I have nothing."

Akira smiled. "Thank you for the game."

"Le Ping, you're still too timid when attacking formations."

"Well I can't help that! He's too xxxxxx."

Akira frowned, wondering if he'd just been complimented or insulted. "I'm sorry, I don't understand that last word."

"Ah, Japanese!" One of the spectators said in fluent, if accented, Japanese. "Le Ping said you were intimidating. I think he was expecting a push-over like Isumi-san."

"Isumi…" That name sounded familiar. "Ah, Isumi Shinichiro?" Akira remembered him now, tall and serious-looking, Kuwabara-sensei's second favourite victim after Ogata-san (possibly favourite if Ogata-san won the Hoinbou title this year), often hanging around with Shindou and Shindou's other friend… "Oh! That's who he reminded me of."

Le Ping's eyes widened. "You know Isumi-san?"

"Ah, a little…" Le Ping was like a littler, happier, less annoyed Waya. "He's a colleague." Le Ping made a face. "Um… he's a pro, like me." And hardly a push-over, Akira had played him a few times and his go was solid.

"You a pro? Then you can stay here!"

"That's not…"

"Yang Hai still has open bed."

"Oi, don't volunteer my room." The fluent spectator said. Yang Hai, Akira assumed. He turned to Akira. "I'm terribly sorry for this brat's," he roughly tussled Le Ping's hair, "presumption. But if you wanted another game…"

Akira smiled. "Thank you very much."

He was in the middle of the game with Yang Hai (playing black and somewhat more aggressively than usual, hoping to draw out signature or interesting moves) when his father found him. The atmosphere in the room sharpened, and Akira easily hid his smile, used to that by now. At least Yang Hai didn't seem affected, continuing to play well, if not overly imaginatively.

Akira won by three and a half moku and thanked Yang Hai for the game before turning to his father. "Is it time to leave?"

Before his father could answer, Le Ping latched onto his arm. "No! Stay! You can have my bed."

Yang Hai laughed nervously. "Sorry about this. I think Le Ping just wants to adopt every pro from Japan."

Akira smiled and waited for his father to make their excuses.

"Well… why not?"

What?

"It's a generous invitation, Akira. What do you think?"

Akira thought about it seriously. Given the choice between a rough bed, a hyperactive young pro as a roommate, and dozens of new opponents who were clearly eager to play him next, versus what would almost certainly be a comfortable room to himself, surrounded by old men who talked over his head, and polite formalities that took up more time than game play… "I would be honoured. Thank you, Le Ping." The choice was obvious.

"Yay!" Le Ping held on to him, possessively now. "Alright, who wants to play Akira-san next?"

Akira tried to feel insulted at being treated like a piece of meat, but really he just wanted to play. He smiled indulgently as Le Ping dismissed one of the challengers as "too weak, sit down", herding Akira to one of the other tables. He met his father's eyes and saw warm approval and more than a little amusement.

As Le Ping sat him down with a firm clasp on his shoulder and a "Don't lose, now.", Akira decided that of all the connections and alliances he could have made on this trip, this one would probably be the most important.

And the most fun.