Chapter 6: Seventeen and Thirty-Three

Caught by the pervert, I pleaded for help from the doctor who came running.

Save me. With a hoarse voice, I sent a desperate gaze to those surrounding the bed and pushed the pervert away.

I had no strength in my arms, so I only pushed him lightly, yet the pervert rolled far away under the bed.

Even in my filthy pain, I was flabbergasted.

“Are you okay?”

My trust plummeted when one of the nurses checked on the pervert instead of me and helped him up.

Furthermore, my fear was about to intensify at the first words from the attending physician, who was flipping my eyelids and examining my face.

“Esper Kim Chul-soo. Are you conscious?”

Fck, an Esper?* Don’t tell me these people are all… patients?

“Calm down. You mustn’t overexert yourself. First, take a deep breath—”

“F*ck… off….”

At just the words ‘f*ck off’, the man pretending to be a doctor got scared and stepped back.

My conviction that he wasn’t a real doctor grew stronger, and my breathing quickened.

As my anxious heart pounded, it felt like my heating eyeballs were about to pop out, so I covered my face with my hands.

Only then did the bandages wrapped around my hands come into view.

Not just my hands, but my entire body was wrapped in white bandages.

“Ha, haa….”

Now, even breathing was a struggle.

I couldn’t tell if my body was sick or if my mind was sick like those people.

I just thought I was going to die like this.

“It’s okay!!”

Suddenly, the pervert shot up from the floor and filled my blurring vision.

When the pervert’s hand touched my trembling shoulder, the shaking lessened for a moment.

It was probably just my imagination.

“It’s okay! Everything is okay!!”

The pervert held onto me with his large, tear-streaked eyes, forcing eye contact and repeating the same words.

Transparent tears fell endlessly from the pervert’s bloodshot eyes.

I only belatedly noticed the red blood moistening the area under his nose.

“It’s okay, Hyung! Just trust me.”

I can only trust someone if they’re trustworthy.

If it weren’t for the gown the nurse had covered the pervert with, I might have thrown a punch.

He didn’t seem to care at all about his exposed white, naked body, even with so many people watching.

“It’s okay….”

The pervert, who looked to be at least a high school student, cupped my face with hands that trembled more than mine and said “it’s okay” dozens of times.

As if that would really make everything okay.

“This is the Medical Center. It’s not a scary place.”

The pervert, whose voice had gone hoarse from shouting “it’s okay,” whispered lowly.

He seemed to be trying to reassure me, and surprisingly, it worked.

My heart, which had been pounding as if it would burst, was calming down at the pervert’s touch.

As his trembling voice got closer to my ear, the pain subsided as if by magic.

Am I dreaming right now?

“These are people here to help you, Hyung. All of them.”

The pervert started to shed cold sweat in addition to his tears and snot.

He diligently wiped away the tears that were also streaming down my cheeks and comforted me.

Even though he was crying more.

“It’s okay. You’ll heal completely.”

Led by the pervert’s skilled hands, I found myself lying back down on the bed.

My heart wanted to shake off and push away his finely trembling hands, but my body wouldn’t listen.

Even with a naked man who was casually touching my face right in front of me, I obediently followed his words.

At the pervert’s words not to be scared, my mind ridiculously began to ease a little.

It was surely just words to soothe me, but just as the pervert repeated, it really felt like everything would be okay.

“Just sleep for now. You need more rest, Hyung.”

If it weren’t for him calling me ‘Hyung’, I think I could have overlooked the nudity.

“Chul-soo Hyung. Don’t worry.”

“Who….”

Calming my breathing, I with difficulty opened my mouth and asked the pervert looking down at me.

To the suspicious pervert who even knew my name.

“Who are you….”

At that, the pervert gave no answer, and only cried more.

Blood dripping from his small, sharp nose mixed with his tears and fell drop by drop onto my cheek and neck.

I watched the pervert shed his incomprehensible tears, then let out a sigh at the throbbing in my heart and closed my eyes.

A moment ago, my heart felt like it would explode, and now it throbbed as if it would shrivel up.

Surrounded by unfamiliar sensations and people, I let go of my consciousness, hoping this was all a dream.

The pervert’s suppressed sobs lingered in my ears until the very end.

He should put on some clothes.

I was in a major accident when I was fifteen.

It was an accident so big that it was reported in the news and on articles for a while.

A C-rank Esper suffering from depression had intentionally avoided guiding, wandered around downtown Seoul, and rampaged after grabbing hold of my family, who were resting in a park.

My mom and dad, who had been laughing and chatting idly, were caught by the C-rank Esper’s wrist and engulfed in flames.

I, who was tall for a fifteen-year-old and had never lost an arm-wrestling match against my peers, ran away, leaving my parents behind.

Using my mother’s scream to run and my father’s shout to flee as an excuse, I ran without looking back.

I didn’t get far before my legs gave out and I crumpled to the ground, a searing heat touching my back.

By the time I turned around, my parents’ screams had stopped.

I cowardly just shed tears and watched my parents burn to death.

Only when my parents had turned into ashes with no form left did people who called themselves Center staff rush in to handle the situation.

The events after that remain only as a blur.

I lost my parents in that accident and developed a short-lived panic disorder and sleep disorder.

There were many days when I would fall asleep in bed but wake up in the living room or sitting at the dining table.

When it was severe, I would even wake up walking outside the house barefoot.

There were more than one or two moments when I thought I was going to die in an accident.

I think I even waited for an accident to happen, hoping to die, by intentionally not seeking medical help.

In my young mind, I wanted to follow my parents in death.

It was a time when I was exhausted by the guilt of being the only one to survive.

The one who held me together was my grandmother.

My grandmother, who became my only family.

Thanks to my grandmother, who would sleep on a blanket in front of the door in case her sick grandson wandered out of the house barefoot in his sleep again, I slowly regained my daily life.

Because of my grandmother, I couldn’t go astray.

Following my grandmother, who didn’t show her grief over losing her only daughter, I too buried the pain of losing my parents.

As I did, my originally bright personality naturally found its way back.

After entering high school, I forgot the past and lived very well.

The sleepwalking episodes disappeared, and I frequented the walking trails and parks that held terrible memories.

I even took out my parents’ picture frame, which I had hidden in a drawer, and greeted them every day.

I wanted to quickly show a normal side of myself to my grandmother, who had taken on her grown grandson and raised him with all her heart and soul.

At my young age, I thought that was the best filial piety I could offer my grandmother.

But to mess it up like this.

“An Esper, you say. Me.”

To my repeated question, the doctor with the angular glasses adjusted them and repeated the same answer several times.

Esper.

They say I’m an Esper.

And an A-rank Esper at that.

It was far, far too distant from ordinary.

“Because you’re a Barrier Specialist, your wavelength is fundamentally stable, so the risk of rampaging is remarkably low. However, since you also use the teleportation ability, your stamina consumption is high, so you must pay special attention to managing your body. You also need to receive guiding as often as possible, preferably every day.”

The doctor, who I thought was a patient but was actually a real specialist, rattled off a long-winded explanation that was hard to understand, glancing at the machine out of the corner of his eye.

On the monitor screen of the machine connected to the electrode pad on my left chest, an unknown number was fluctuating between 65 and 67.

“For the time being, you must get absolute rest. Your external injuries are recovering quickly, so don’t worry, and just focus on maintaining a peaceful state of mind. A calm state of mind is the most important thing for an Esper.”

A calm state of mind? I glared at the doctor spouting such placid words and cursed him with my eyes.

Not only did I become an Esper, but my twenties evaporated overnight and I became a guy in his thirties, and he’s telling me what?

Not to worry?

“Well then, call us anytime if you feel unwell. And the use of your abilities is forbidden for at least two weeks.”

The doctor, observing me clenching my jaw, hastily left his final words, checked the numbers, and left the room.

Exhausted from being moved between examination rooms, having my brain scanned, and even having my blood drawn, I couldn’t even think of any more questions to ask.

My complicated mind felt like it was overloaded, flashing white.

The doctor had also told me not to try to accept too much at once and to take it one thing at a time.

But I didn’t want to accept either of the biggest changes—the fact of my awakening or my age—so I stopped thinking altogether.

“Should I help you lie down?”

A woman who approached me as I bit my lip and took deep breaths adjusted the angle of the bed’s backrest.

The woman had introduced herself as Lee Aran.

She said she was a member of Barrier Team 3, where I was the team leader.

“How old did you say you are now?”

“…Seventeen.”

At my answer, the woman was silent for a moment.

The woman, who had calmed me down after I fainted upon seeing the pervert and woke up again, had slowly explained the situation with the doctor.

She had followed me to all the examination rooms and answered all my fumbling questions.

Contrary to her cold impression, she seemed like a good person.

“Feel free to call me Aran-noona. You used to call me something similar anyway.”

Aran-noona said she was thirty-five.

Two years older than me, who had become thirty-three.

…Thirty-three.

I, who was seventeen, had become thirty-three.

I, who had just entered high school, was thirty-three.

My twenties, which I had never even gotten a glimpse of, had vanished.

“You see that yellow number.”

Aran-noona, who had been watching my expression gradually darken, pointed to the monitor screen the doctor had been glancing at.

The number that had been fluctuating between 65 and 67 had now risen to 69.

“That’s the wavelength level flowing through an Esper’s body. As explained earlier, it’s dangerous if it gets high. It’s not good if it goes over 70%.”

“Ah… yes.”

So that’s what that number was.

The fact that my body was an Esper’s didn’t feel real, so it just looked like a number that had nothing to do with me.

I didn’t think I’d be surprised even if that yellow number went over 90.

Everything was just f*cked up.

“You must be tired, so get some sleep. Tell me if you’re hungry.”

I was tired and hungry.

But I chose sleep over food.

My body, which had been so painful earlier that it was hard to breathe, felt much better after sleeping.

My arms were still stiff to move, but my fingers were fine.

The problem was my legs.

There was no sensation in my legs hidden under the blanket.

“…….”

I cut off the train of thought and decided to blindly trust the doctor’s words that everything would return to normal.

There was nothing else I could do right now.

I felt like I had been dropped alone in a foreign land where the language was completely unintelligible, but enduring was the best I could do.

“Um, Aran-noona.”

Aran-noona, who had poured water and placed it on the bedside table, paused at my call.

She had told me to call her Noona, but she seemed a little awkward about it.

“I need to contact my grandmother.”

I had meant to mention it while being examined but almost forgot.

Was this also because of the shock to my head, that my thoughts kept getting dull?

Was there a hole in my head where 16 years of memories had disappeared?

It felt like precious things were constantly slipping out from within me.

Sniff.

As I waited for Aran-noona’s reply with tired eyes, I suddenly heard a sniffling sound.

It was definitely a very small sound, but I heard it vividly.

Hic….

This time, the sound of someone holding their breath followed.

Puzzled by the presence I felt beyond the footboard of the bed, I tried to lift my head, but Aran-noona gently pressed my forehead with her fingertips.

“Just sleep for now.”

At her indifferent yet strangely gentle voice, my eyes closed on their own.

“Don’t think about anything when you sleep.”

I opened my mouth to reply that I would try, but fell asleep just like that.

In the dream that came quickly, my parents visited me for the first time in a very long while.

I don’t remember the content, but I think it was a sad dream.

I think I was smiling in the dream, but when I woke up, I had shed so many tears that my pillow was soaked.

Just like that pervert.