Ah'Ming tilted his head, offering his hand to the little kid once more. The little bugger was shy, socially anxious, just like the also-not-meant-to-be-there person that was standing in front of them.
The kid, finally, after hesitating a long time, took his outstretched invitation.
He took faltering little steps, unstable after a seemingly long time of not walking. Anyways, it was clear the kid had no caretaker. The only question was, how he was alive after so long. More points towards the ghost theory, but the sub-story clearly wouldn't have such a brilliant red herring. Would it?
Ah'Ming smiled at the kid, who merely glared back. "So, wanna go meet the rest of the group?"
A hesitant nod was his only answer.
Welp.
He suddenly realized something.
"Can you even walk?"
The kid's legs looked really skinny. Maybe it was something normal kids were like, being really gangly. Though, it didn't look like the kid could support himself.
In one smooth motion, he pulled the kid up, and over his shoulder. For his own sake, the kid kicked a massive fuss, thrashing and screaming. Though, he'd have to do it a lot stronger to even make an effect.
He was even screaming and screeching darling little threats. Ooh, entrails expulsion! Oh, they grow up so fast.
At least he knew the child wouldn't die fast, if he had this much energy.
Humming and skipping, Ah'Ming made his way back up the slippery tunnel of doom and medieval-ness, trying to chat with the kid on the way.
"So, kiddo, do you have a name?"
The child blinked at him. Hate filled eyes (well, eye. The other was still swollen shut) glared at Ah'Ming, even though he had no idea what the cause was.
"Obviously."
Ah'Ming: "Can you tell it to me?"
The kid narrowed his eyes (eye) even further.
Ah'Ming: "Will you tell it to me?"
"No."
Ah'Ming gasped in mild outrage, playing up his hurt from the rude remark. For a few seconds, the kid looked alarmed, then apologetic. It was a brief few seconds, since the kid was smart enough to realize that Ah'Ming was mostly just a loud idiot. (Normally, he was a quiet idiot, but little kids kind of had a duty to listen to adults be stupid. Most adults were.)
Sniffling, as if grievously wounded, he asked "Is it…. Is it because I'm old?"
Not that he really was that old anyways. In fact, he'd only been on earth for a few years!
At least the kid didn't look very mulish anymore. Just confused, and somehow exasperated.
Hmm. Somehow, Ah'Ming seemed to have that kind of effect on people.
If only he was able to cultivate the same aura that the tamer guy had. Cool, suave, charming. Even if they were both lookers, in Ah'Ming's opinion, the tamer's vibe was just… on another level. Part of it was clearly from his skill, yet the other? Maybe it was just inborn charisma.
The kid went back to ignoring him.
Exiting the rough, scattered debris that had once been a wall, Ah'Ming sauntered cheerfully, trying (and failing) to navigate his way back to the main table. It wasn't truly his fault, since the bookshelves sprawled in an increasingly complicated labyrinth, likely by design. It really would help pick off any stragglers during the night. Well, the dark period. It did kind of seem like day and night, if you ignored the fact that day was only forty-five minutes, and that night was even shorter.
Voices echoed, not in the distance, but it did provide a very enlightening piece of information of where the others were. He walked faster. It was still a little bit slow though, so he started running.
Before long, Ah'Ming was back at the main table. A lot of people were still there, seemingly rooted in place. Almost as if they'd never even left in the first place. Cowards.
He smiled, walked up to the tamer man, and offered the child up like a prize. Funnily enough, the pose was reminiscent of the Simba pose. Though, instead of awe and inspiration, the kid was met with disgust, and almost fear.
"I found a child!"
The tamer looked visibly confused.
He coughed a few times.
"Ahem. Where? Where did you find the child?"
Ah'Ming blanked.
He could sort of tell that it wasn't a very good idea to tell people that he punched through a wall. For one thing, he sort of felt that it wasn't very looked well upon by the system, or the substories.
It was rather understandable. Why carve out (not-so) intricate plot lines with (boring) characters if the way to solve it was to punch through a wall?
"Um. I saw a torch stand, so I put a torch in it. The wall opened up, and there was the kid?"
There were quite a lot of hushed whispers now, which Ah'Ming really couldn't understand. He'd hidden his strength, and found an important NPC. What was there to complain about?
The tamer smiled, and Ah'Ming nearly felt his breath catch. He could tell the man everything, there was no way that the tamer would be cruel to him? Obviously, a man who had gained the trust of so many people would be strong. Living for the tamer would be ju—
Wait.
That didn't seem right.
He squinted.
"Did you just try to use mind-magic on me?" He gasped, in faux-outrage.
The tamer's eyes widened considerably, almost shocked that Ah'Ming had even been able to notice, let alone throw it off.
A woman next to the tamer laughed nervously. "Ah, honey, we don't do that here. We only use skills on monsters, or sometimes NPCs!"
Another player chimed in. "Yeah! Nobody would use a skill on another player!"
Ah'Ming kind of assumed that if you weren't meant to use skills on other players, you weren't meant to kill them either. Rather counter-intuitive, if the system really was a massive game like it seemed. What would happen if there was a battle royal, or a werewolf game?
At this point though, it seemed the child was fed up with him. He kept banging on Ah'Ming's arms, demanding to be let down.
"Let… Let me down!"
Ah'Ming looked down at the child, and did as it bade.
The kid landed in an undignified heap on the ground.
Ah'Ming looked back at the tamer, raising an eyebrow. "Say, now what?"
The tamer sighed, softly, and almost immediately, the entire group seemed to shift, single-mindedly deciding to dislike Ah'Ming for the sole reason of disappointing the tamer.
"Listen, pal. I'm a ranked player, and I know what to do. You have a key NPC right there, you should hand him over."
Okay then. Ah'Ming's opinion of this guy just dropped from 55% (on one hand, he was rather good looking. On the other hand he was mean, and had used mind magic on him.) to barely above zero.
He sniffled, still pretend hurt. "Hey kid, d'you wanna hang out with me? Or him?"
The child looked at Ah'Ming, then looked back at the tamer.
He took a hesitating step towards the tamer.
Rats.
He'd forgotten.
Taming skill.
Right.
Suddenly though, the kid stopped. He halted, with his eyebrows furrowed. He looked back at Ah'Ming, confused and uncertain.
He tried to reach back but—
The rest of the group had already surrounded him, pulling him away.
It was similar to how ants swarmed a drop of honey. Or, more similarly, humans to a lotto ticket. Fear and knowledge that it would do more harm than good, yet still walking closer, crowding around.
At first, the people there, the followers, had been afraid. Why had they suddenly changed their minds? Ah'Ming glanced back at the tamer, who was now blocked by many layers of people. From the knowing look in his eyes? Ah'Ming knew that all the sentences he'd heard about not using skills on players was absolute bull.
Ah'Ming rolled his eyes, and walked away.
With his last look though, he saw the woman from earlier touching the child's cheek. With it, the child's eyes flashed with… undisguised fear?
Something was wrong.
Very wrong.
For one thing, it was impossible for that kid to be so scared.
He barely had any reaction to any of the other players.
Whipping around like Phoenix, he pointed and yelled.
"You're the ghost!" He hit the lawyer pose too.