Guess who's back, back again? No, it isn't Slim Shady, it's me!

"What are you doing here?! Aren't you a girl?" blurted out a shocked Hikaru. He did not understand what was going on. There was absolutely no way he was mistaken about her gender, but what was she doing in the boy's tournament?

"Hoho, looks like you finally remembered how to speak," she replied, taking pleasure in taunting the poor boy who was turning red out of embarrassment, "I don't blame you for being surprised really, it's a common misunderstanding that this tournament is split up into two sections determined by gender. In reality, this is the main tournament and anyone strong enough can be on the team. I don't know why it is, maybe because there are way more boys than girls who play this game, but it just so happens that the top players at a school are almost always boys. That's why a girl's tournament is being held on the side, to encourage girls to join go clubs and give them something to work towards." It was easy to tell that this subject was dear to her. Her speech was getting faster and louder. Getting carried away, she continued, "the professional Go scene is dominated by men at the top and except for a few shining lights, pro women are often weaker. I intend to be the brightest light to ever hit the pro scene! I will make it to the top of the Chinese scene and then obliterate all competition internationally! With the world's greatest player a woman, younger girls will look up to me! There will be a massive influx of young female go enthusiasts! In this way, I will eliminate the disparity between genders in the Go world and in doing so; reduce the amount of misogyny in the Go world! Who are you to deny me that right! How can you even think to defeat ME, when I have the hopes of womankind riding on MY shoulders!" she yelled. By now, she was standing up with her fist in the air.

The whole room had gone quiet, no one knowing how to react to the girl's overreaction, except for the Hikaru, who wouldn't let a direct challenge go unanswered.

"Oh is that so..." replied the boy sarcastically, "then please do tell me why you are here and not studying with pros like your friend Touya."

"The only reason I'm not a pro yet is because I'm staying for year in Japan with my cousin! I'm almost as good as he is and he's the prodigy of Japan!" she said angrily.

"Yeah right, excuses, excuses," taunted Hikaru, the whole exchange having helped him overcome his previous shyness towards the girl.

"THAT'S IT!" Yue shouted loudly. How dare the boy! She had thought he was cute but he was clearly too arrogant for his own good. "Sit down and nigiri, I will crush you!"

Not needing to be told twice, Hikaru sat down and took a bunch of white stones in his hand. Yue put a single black stone on the board. Hikaru counted his white stones two by two and was left with a lonely stone, she had guessed right. Once the boy had cleared the board, she slammed down a black stone in the upper corner and then hit the game clock so fiercely she almost broke it. This game was going to be a bloodbath.

"Ummm... excuse me, the tournament hasn't started yet," informed the tournament overseer.

"I DON'T CARE!" screamed both teens in unison.

"Ummm... well then, what an exciting turn of events this is! I would ask the other team members to sit down and start their games," he replied, trying his best to salvage the situation.

An hour later, a tall, handsome young man could be seen entering the tournament room with a younger friend. The latter had ear length hair that was all over the place and was wearing a hoodie. His friend was wearing a leather coat and had slightly shorter and neater hair. They approached the center of the room, where the games were being played.

"So Isumi, which one of them do you think he is?" asked the younger of the two, looking at the 6 players.

"I don't know for sure Waya, but I'm guessing he's the guy on first board with yellow and black hair." answered his friend.

They walked passed the players and took a seat at the other side of the room. In the back of the room, there was a huge magnetic board on which the captain's game was being reproduced. It was an angry mess of continuous fighting. The fight had first broken out in the lower corner earlier, with an aggressive invasion by white. Unable to live locally, white had escaped all the way to the top right side. However, black was not willing to give an inch to white and had prevented him from making life once again. Forced to turn left with his group, white had continued his escape all the way to the top left and was now trying to find a tesuji to live. While fighting, both players had played in such a way as to take as much as possible while still answering the opponent's threat. This resulted in a messy board with unresolved situations all over the place. Huge moves were screaming out to be played, but the most urgent of all was the life and death of white's dragon.

Meanwhile, the situation on boards two and three was much less complex. The weaker pair's game was almost already settled, with Hase High's Yamagi on the way to suffering a convincing defeat. Truth be told, the result was expected. The other two boards were evenly matched, but Kaio High's team had incredible depth, resulting in the difference between their third and second board being minimal, whereas Yamagi was probably two and half stones weaker than Kaga. That being said, Yamagi was proud of his game. Instead of backing down in the face of adversity, he had taken up his opponent's challenges during the game and had fought it out. This was the only possible path to victory. Trying to cut his losses would only have ended up with him slowly being suffocated, seemingly keeping it close but in reality not once threatening a win. No, this was much better. Although he was beginning to sense that the weaknesses in his shape were on the verge of causing his whole setup to collapse, he had at least come close to killing off his opponent's group. Had it not been for a brilliant tesuji a few turns earlier, the victory would have been his. Risking it all to win and then losing was definitely better than losing by 10 but never having had any hopes of winning.

Surprisingly, the game one board over was going exactly in the opposite direction. Kishimoto was well acquainted with Kaga's rough fighting style. He knew how their styles matched up and the strategy needed to overcome his opponent. All he had to do was avoid fights by accepting a small loss and then come back and overtake him with solid play and exquisite yose, an area in which he surpassed his opponent. Of course, he sometimes fought back, but only if Kaga was clearly overplaying.

At first, the game had gone as planned, with him falling behind around 10 moku. This was not a problem as in past confrontations he would often regain up to 20 moku before the game was over. However, as the game progressed, Kishimoto had come to a startling conclusion. He was not going to win this game. Previously his opponent's style had been brilliantly agressive but very rough around the edges. Now though, it seemed to have been refined. The holes in Kaga's play had been covered up and his aggression was sharper and cleaner, leaving no easy way for Kaio High's second board to come back. The game was headed towards a 3.5 mokuvictory for Kaga and there did not seem to be a way to stop him.

The first game to finish was the all important first board. Hikaru had found a brilliant way of bringing his dragon to life, but it had ended up costing him an entire corner, which had left the game undecided, with no clear leader. The whole board was a mess of unresolved situations and precise calculations had been necessary moving forward. To the untrained eye, what had followed seemed to be a random trade of moves, the players spending two or three moves in an area before leaving it open and moving elsewhere. Even the two insei in attendance had not understood it completely. However, to Hikaru and Yue, everything was following a logical progression. There were huge moves all over the place and the value of these moves changed constantly as they played. Therefore, while invading one area might be worth twenty points at first, after a couple of moves the value could change. By abandoning it, the invader could seize sente. The defender could choose to either kill off the invasion or leave it as is. Capturing the invasion was not always worth as much as it seemed, since threatening to reawaken the dead group could be used to reduce the opponent's framework. Because of this, other areas that had previously been less urgent suddenly activated and moved up in priority. The incredible thing about it all is that they had calculated their exchanges so precisely, that after all the sacrifices, the exchanges, the dead groups coming back to life and the complicated ko fights, the game had ended with only a 0.5 moku difference. The two young prodigies had just played their first master level game. While both had played out of their minds, only one could be the victor and today that happened to be Yue.

"Thank you for the game," mumbled Hikaru, feeling down after his loss, but mostly exhausted.

"Thank you for the game," replied Yue, feeling an immense satisfaction at having won the hardest game of her life. As the game had went on, the original animosity between them had disappeared and had been replaced by a great amount of respect. Little did they know it, but that day one of the greatest modern rivaleries had been born, a rivalry that would produce games for the ages.

"Mr. Shindou?" someone said from behind Hikaru as he and Yue were silently looking at the board. The boy in question turned around and saw a tall young man and his friend, both smiling at him.

"That game was incredible!" exclaimed the younger of the two.

"Err thanks," replied the teen, feeling a little bit better about his loss, "but do I know you?"

"We played go on the internet I believe. My name is Isumi, both in real life and online. Besides me is Waya, but I think you know him better as Zelda."

"Oh yeah! I had forgotten we were supposed to meet up," said Hikaru, scratching the back of his head.

"That's quite all right. Do you want to go get some coffee? I know I could use some liquid energy if I were you."

"That is an awesome idea!" answered Hikaru.

"You know, I would have thought you would be sadder after having just lost," observed Waya.

"Ehh, I did my best and I'm used to losing, so it's all good," replied the teen. It was true, losing constantly to Sai had rendered him immune.

"What do you mean you're used to losing? Do you play with pros or something? There's no way the amateurs over on NetGo can beat you!"

"Hehe, something like that... Oh that's right!" exclaimed Hikaru, suddenly getting an idea. He turned around to face the winner of the match, who had been listening to their conversation. "Would you like to join us? We could go over the game with these two," he asked, giving her his brightest smile.

"I'd like that," she said, smiling back at him.

A cough interrupted the sweet moment.

"Ummm... sorry, but the other games aren't over yet and there is still the award ceremony to go through," interrupted the tournament overseer.

Yue and Hikaru looked at each other and smiled mischievously, both thinking the same thing.

"DON'T CARE!" they shouted as one and then ran out of the room laughing. The two insei looked at each other in confusion and then ran after them, leaving the poor tournament overseer with another complication to take care of.

Looking out of his dorm room window, Hikaru could see the moon shining up high. Tokyo had lots to offer, but there were some things that his Island had that weren't available here. Hikaru missed the moments where he could lie down in the grass and gaze at all the stars in the sky. Stifling a yawn, Hikaru focused on re-reading the letter he had just written.

Dear Sai,

Thank you for your quick reply, though it was quite short and did not answer much of my questions.

What do you mean when you say that I will find out your past soon enough, can't you tell me now? Anyways, there are so many things that happened since I last saw you. I played the craziest game ever at the tournament. Sadly, our team lost in the finals, but we had a great time and we were all pretty happy with our results. Especially Kaga, he finally beat an old rival and he might try to become a pro as well. Oh right, I forgot to tell you, I decided I want to be a pro! I met some inseis who told me all about it and I will be taking the pro exams coming up next month. To do that however, I first need a pro to recommend me since I am not an insei myself. Waya's teacher is a 7 Dan pro and Waya said he could convince him to recommend me. Waya is one of the inseis I told you about, the other one is called Isumi. Waya is 16 years old and he says that's old for an insei. Isumi is even older, he is 18! Apparently, if he doesn't pass this year, he'll quit trying to be a pro. Waya tells me Isumi is one of the two strongest inseis so I'm not worried about that.

Speaking of the pro exam, can you ask my grandfather to send me a bit more money for the exam fee, tell him I'll repay him when I'm a pro. He also needs to sign the permission slip I'm sending you.

Log on to NetGo soon, so I can play you and also show you my final game. I was paired up against Yue Li, she's a chinese exchange student who is currently staying with her uncle. You will never guess who her uncle is; it's Touya Kouya, the Meijin! His son is my age but he's already a pro. Yue's going back to China soon to become one as well, which is kind of a bummer because she's awesome but I hope she makes it. It seems that everyone I meet wants to become a go pro! I never knew the world of Go was this vast, just thinking about it makes me excited.

That's all I have to say, please relay my message to grandfather and tell him I miss him too.

Sincerely,

Hikaru, future Meijin.

Satisfied with his work, he set his pen down and got ready for bed. What a crazy day today had been.

There you go, chapter 4! Coming up next, will be an encounter with Waya's sensei and the rest of the study group! A trip to Touya's go salon? Maybe, who knows! The start of the pro exams? Maybe, maybe not, but they are coming up soon. More known faces will appear, such as Ochi, Nase and that dude with a beard! How strong exactly are Hikaru and Yue? How strong is Akira? How do they compare to lower and top pros? How will they do internationally? We will discover all this and more in the future. Unless I decide to stop writing for another 2 years, but I'll try not to. Also, I made Waya one year older than Hikaru, like in the manga, but Isumi is a bit younger than in the manga, (he was like 23 at the end, so he should have been 22 right now.) I don't want to completely mess up the timeline from the manga, but try not to think about it to much. (For example Waya at this age should be a pro) Finally, I will be going over my previous three chapters to fix language mistakes (though I'll miss a lot, since I'm not great at English) and also to fix inconsistencies within the story/spelling. (Such as capitalizing Go or not)

Go terms :

sente = initiative

dragon = a large group with no eyes that is trying to escape

moku = points

tesuji = hard to describe. It's a skillful move, one that isn't the obvious choice and that allows you to reverse the situation in which the play seemed to be headed.