Quaden Bayles has led the NRL's Indigenous side onto the field for the All Stars game on the Gold Coast, three days after the story of his bullying caught the world's attention.
The Indigenous All Stars were some of the first big names to reach out and offer him the chance to lead them out for the clash with the Maori All Stars at Robina Stadium.
Before leading out his uncles in the Indigenous team, every member of the Maori squad shook his hand as they walked onto the field.
He then took Indigenous captain Joel Thompson's hand and they led the team out together.
The Maori side overcame the Indigenous squad at full time, 30-16.
If Quaden was at all overawed by the experience, superstar winger Josh Addo-Carr drew a smile from the nine-year-old as they reached the middle of the field.
As Thompson and his Maori counterpart, Adam Blair, posed for a pre-game photo, referee Gerard Sutton called him over to stand in the middle of the photo with the game ball.
That came before a moment's silence to remember the stolen generations, a hongi between all members of the teams and then war dances by both teams, with Addo-Carr emulating the famous pose of AFL star Nicky Winmar, lifting his jersey to point to his skin.
Latrell Mitchell led the Indigenous dance, with the high-profile South Sydney recruit — who had a busy and turbulent off-season, including contract negotiations, fighting fires with family in central New South Wales, while enduring online abuse — brought to tears before approaching the Maoris for another hongi.
The national anthems were not sung, which came after a number of Indigenous stars last year made clear they did not feel the anthem represented them.
The NRL consulted with the ARL Indigenous Council and decided Advance Australia Fair did not need to be played, with the New Zealanders doing the same in a gesture of solidarity.
The game then got underway with some help from Bayles, with the youngster, sporting a pair of noise-cancelling headphones, giving the thumbs up for Sutton to blow the opening whistle.
At a press conference on Friday, Quaden's mother Yarraka, who posted the original video that sparked a global outpouring of support, said her son had always dreamt of being a rugby league star, but they knew this was probably as close as he was going to get.
Rapper Cardi B joins celebrity supporters
While the experience since the bullying incident has no doubt been positive, with US comedian Brad Williams raising more than $660,000 to fly the Bayles family to California and take them to Disneyland, Yarraka admitted her son was exhausted and described the attention as a "media frenzy".
As of Saturday, social media accounts for Quaden and Yarraka, including the initial Facebook video, have gone private or been deleted.
The family has received criticism in some corners of the internet, where people felt the need to call into question the validity of the fundraising efforts and support for a bullying victim because some images posted on social media showed him holding cash or wearing stylish clothes.
Even US rapper Cardi B felt the need to weigh in with an Instagram Live video, which Yarraka shared on the advocacy page she runs, called Stand Tall 4 Dwarfism.
"Just because there's vids of him flossing money and acting all gangsta and acting all cool and everything, it doesn't mean that kids do not pick on him. Come on now," Cardi B said in the video shared with her 59 million followers.
"So just because he looks a little fly, it doesn't mean people do not pick on him in school, it doesn't mean that he [feels] like the other kids. I saw that video and I was so sad."
