บท 72: Ming's Story
"What did you say?" A vein popped out on Tyron's forehead.
The spoilt boy's biggest pet peave is definitely when people do not respect him. In fact, those that do not grovel at his feet, will be bullied and abused by him.
"Are you not scared that I can make your life in University Z as miserable as possible?" Tyron lifted Sato slightly by pulling his hoodie upwards. He stared daggers at Sato.
Sato smirked back at his comment. Swiping Tyron's hand away from his hoodie, he tidied up his attire. This was a clothing given to him by Gray. He didn't want anything to happen to it. Sato walked away without care.
"Just because you have gotten yourself a backer from the board of directors in the university, you started to get cocky eh?" Tyron spoke to Sato, while he was walking away. "Mark my words you wrench! You are nothing! Nothing outside of this school!"
The conflict that just went down was placed aside in Sato's head. He couldn't be bothered to deal with it right now. Since his lesson started in 10 minutes, Sato went to class early. In the classroom, he noticed that Ming was already sitting at their usual spot. He was looking rather absent-minded today.
Sliding into the spot beside Ming, Sato tapped on his shoulder. "Morning Ming."
When Ming noticed that Sato was here, he flinched reflexively. "Oh hi."
"Why the long face?" Sato knew something was up.
"I.. I.." Ming hesitated for a bit. "I'm sorry for what happened last night."
"Oh is it about the war?"
"Yes... I wasn't able to help you that fight against Tyron and was just sitting duck the whole time. I even caused your death. I do not really know how I could repay you."
"Ah that fight..." Sato rubbed Ming's messy hair and laughed loudly. The overly worried boy clearly didn't sleep well because of this. "I'm not even mad about the fight, Ming. Besides, I lived in the end and got first place in the war!"
"What? Are you serious? You're not joking me right now, right?" Ming's face lit up when Sato told him what had truly happened. He sighed in relief. "I thought you would be so mad that you wouldn't talk to me anymore."
"Hahaha why would I? We are best buddies man! Even if I did die in the game, I wouldn't be mad at you at all."
"Well, I still feel guilty about this. What are friends for if I couldn't help you when you needed it the most?"
"Mmm... I personally think that friends should only help you when they can actually make a difference in a situation, " Sato explained his reasoning. "In that fight, the stakes were against you from the very beginning as you wouldn't have been able to harm your Faction members in the war. Not only that, if you had helped me, you would most definitely be kicked out of your guild and chased down by them. What then?"
"I could just be like you and create another account!" Ming answered back.
"Yeah, but at what cost? You would have to restart on ROL all over again. I suggest you play on with Tyron's guild for now. I may have a solution to your problem in the near future. So for now, just bear with it."
Sato managed to convince Ming to stay put in Tyron's guild. Ming trusts anything that Sato say. From the start of university, ever since they became friends, he knew that Sato is trustworthy and not fake. It was also why, he had gradually developed a crush on him.
Back then, he was discriminated for being gay in high school. The one that he thought was the one in his junior year of highschool, turned out to be just a prank that his crush wanted to play on him.
From that point on, his life lost colour. It became a pain to live his life. It became a nuisance to keep breathing. It became a hassle to move about and study. Yet, he pushed on.
So why did he? Well, he had a purpose of living. Ming lived in a family of 4 siblings. His parents both worked long hours in low paying jobs. Ming being the oldest out of the five, (Their family had 5 year old male twins, a 10 year old boy and a 9 year old girl) had to work a part-time job while studying to support his family.
Luckily, Ming was a hardworking and smart child. Even though, he struggled with many things in his monochromatic life, he lived on. Ming got into the top university in country Z and received a full scholarship that allowed him to lesson his parent's financial load. Things started to turn out for the better.
It was also then that Ming met Sato. He would always remember the day that he met him. He was trying to look for the Ray Of Light extracurricular club, when he accidentally bumped into Sato and dropped all of his books.
Ming realised he was that boy in his engineering lecture that would attentively copy down notes regardless of how boring the teacher was. Back then, he had already classified Sato as that 'Hardworking, yet cute asian boy' that every girl liked. Though, he never approached his eye-candy.
On that fateful day however, Ming had gotten his chance to interact with Sato. Oh how the rays of light were all pointing at the cute young man. The way Sato smiled without showing his teeth, his eyes creased into two cresents. Even after knocking over his notes, Sato wasn't even angry at Ming.
What surprised Ming even more was that Sato took the initiative to become his friend. From that time on, Ming's life started to have colour again. Every day being next to him in class, being able to study and work together on projects and even playing ROL, it gave his life meaning and happiness. It made him feel human again.
It was all thanks to Sato. And even if he didn't like him in a romantic way, Ming was completely fine with that.
ความคิดของผู้สร้าง 
Over_The_Horizon
Over_The_Horizon This was one of those chapters that I had to dig deep down to write.
I'm sure there are many people out there that are just like Ming, who were or currently are bullied by people that cannot accept their gender identity.
I hope this story will one day be read by someone that really needs to hear this. That there is indeed light at the end of your dark tunnel. So don't give up on your life because of a bully or some complication. Push on and eventually, it will all be worth it.
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