2 1.1 Games or Friends?

[Friday afternoon, A school in a small town, somewhere in Japan]

'Quest Completed!' Showed up on the display in Kyaga's Hands.

"Phew!" He sighed "That was really hard!"

"Wow, well done!" Kyaga was startled because he didn't know someone was watching him.

He turned around and saw his friend Satoko.

"You're amazingly fast with your fingers, you know?" She made some random movements with her hands in order to imitate the movements of Kyaga's hands.

"Thanks… I guess?"

"You know what?" Said Satoko somewhat excited.

"Huh?"

"Why don't you come over to me and sleep at my house tonight, like you used to in the old days?"

Kyaga was friends with Satoko since he and his family moved in a few houses next to hers when they were around 4 years old. But since he was playing AOS all day long he didn't really had the time to do anything with her anymore, and just played his game, because he liked the virtual world more than the real world. When he first started playing with the VR-Force he tried to get Satoko to buy one as well, so they could play together. But she just wasn't really into all that VR and gaming stuff, so they kinda went separate ways.

Despite all that she seemed to try to do more stuff with Kyaga since the announcement that the VR-Force is getting shut downed. And it worked for her, because Kyaga knew that he wouldn't have anything once AOS gets shut down. So he didn't keep rejecting all of Satokos attempts to get in contact with him again now. Even though he tried to play as much AOS as possible as long as it was still running on the Japanese server.

"Nah, thank you. I have some plans for tonight. But how about tomorrow?"

Satoko looked at him sad. "Oh Okay… I understand. Today is the last day of the VR-Force, am I right?"

"Yeah, I'm sorry but I kinda wanna be there when the servers shut down at 0 A.M."

"Don't worry, I understand that."

The school bell ringed and Kyaga got up from his chair.

"Wanna go home together Satoko?" Kyaga smiled at her.

"Sure!" Answered Satoko cheerfully.

He took his backpack over his shoulders and they started to walk towards the school's exit

"Do you already know what you want to do with all your new free time after the shutdown of AOS?"

"Since you're pretty much my only friend, spending more time with you."

"I heard there will be a PC-Version of AOS, which-"

"I don't know if I will play it" Interrupted her Kyaga. "I don't really like the looks and stuff."

"Oh, I see." There was a short moment of silence, until Satoko began to talk again. "And all your online friends?"

"I heard that most of them will meet up again in the PC-Version, and wanna restart out guild there."

"I'm still thinking." Interrupted Kyaga her again. This time a bit annoyed. "But like I said, I don't think so."

"Okay…" Satoko lowered her head. "I'm sorry for being so pushy about it."

"No, don't be sorry." He smiled at her. "It's okay. I'm just pretty frustrated about it."