Chapter 111: Not Answering

“Don’t ever call me again!!”

Bodam, who was about to hang up, threw his phone in a fit of rage, his anger swelling.

It felt as if he could still hear Lee Tae Hwan’s shouts from the shattered phone.

‘How could you do this to me again…’

“Wow. O-our Bbo-dam curses so deliciously.”

“Right? Hyungnim curses well too.”

Jo Yeon’s team members and Yeon Yeok, who were seeing Bodam angry for the first time, shrank back.

They say a gentle person is scarier when they’re angry.

If he showed that much combat power against Esper Lee Tae Hwan, it seemed he would have no trouble living with Team 3.

“Honestly, I thought the story of you throwing your resignation in Han Seung Ho’s face was exaggerated, but wow…”

Yeon Yeok, who was so impressed by Bodam-hyungnim’s rough charm that he sobered up, clapped his hands.

Jo Yeon pushed the admiring Yeon Yeok aside and sat next to Bodam.

“Bodam. Want to go to the bathroom?”

Jo Yeon, who wrapped an arm around Bodam’s shoulder, patted him soothingly.

Bodam, whose earlobes had turned bright red, was panting and gripping a soju bottle filled with water instead of his phone.

“I’m going to drink more.”

“Okay. Drink more.”

At Bodam’s trembling voice, the expressions of those seated around the table turned serious.

Jo Yeon just calmly filled Bodam’s glass with water.

“Right, let’s solve it with alcohol. Anyway, those bastards’ personalities won’t go anywhere. Once a trash, always a trash!”

Ga Bi, who had been emptying her glass, shouted, seeing the sniffling Bodam, and criticized Attack Team 3.

Jin Beom and Yeon Yeok also joined in the cursing, bringing up the names of Team 3 one by one.

“There’s no one who doesn’t know that Team 3 is ill-tempered and pulls all sorts of crap! I truly respect hyungnim for enduring there!”

“Top-tier mentality.”

Na Woon, who was quiet in everything, also chimed in briefly.

At Bodam’s reaction of even shedding tears, the backbiting grew even more intense.

“They’re just bastards with a lot of money who’ve sold their decency. I hate that team leader bastard the most. What kind of name is Han Seung Ho? Han Seung Ho.”

Even at Ga Bi’s words, which were picking a fight for no reason, Jin Beom and Yeon Yeok nodded in agreement.

“The upper water has to be clear for the lower water to be clear! That Han bastard should have managed his team members properly! They say he’s a lowlife who only cares about money, right?”

“You heard right, Yeon Yeok. He’s a psychopath. He ignores even a dying person, so how would a struggling guide catch his eye. Ugh, what a disgusting bastard.”

“Those kinds of guys should all be thrown in jail. They’re a harm to society. What’s the point of having a healing ability! That good ability went to a devil.”

Jo Yeon silently stroked Bodam’s back and looked at only one place.

He didn’t take his eyes off the place where the target of the curses stood.

“They say that Han Seung Ho didn’t even go to his own mother’s funeral. Said it was a waste of time.”

“Wow, is that even a human being?”

“His character was rotten from the start. Why would they give a position of power to a person like that.”

“Trash pretending to be human is best suited for a prison cell or a hospital room- shit.”

Yeon Yeok clamped his mouth shut at the curse that had popped out.

He blinked his eyes, the drunkenness completely gone, and looked at the person Jo Yeon was staring at.

‘H-Han Seung Ho… how did he get here.’

“That son of a b*tch needs to be reborn for his character to change. No. Why increase the population. It’s better for him to just get bitten by a creature and die. What. Yeah. I’m right.”

Ga Bi, who still hadn’t noticed Seung Ho’s presence, furrowed her brow at Yeon Yeok and Jin Beom, who were giving her a look.

Na Woon pretended to be asleep and lay his head down.

“Am I wrong? The thought of my son not even showing his face when I die is terrible. Ugh. The way he treats his parents is like that, so-.”

“How much.”

Bodam, who suddenly opened his mouth, didn’t know Seung Ho had come either.

Bodam, who had cut off Ga Bi who was deeply engrossed in the backbiting, wiped his eyes and mumbled.

“How hard must they have made it for him, made it so hard… that he couldn’t go.”

Bodam, his words slurring from the alcohol, rubbed his eyes.

He knew they were cursing Team 3 for his sake, so he was grateful, but it hurt a little.

“Han Seung Ho is a person too, but. How sad must his mother have, made him…”

Bodam had gone to his father’s funeral, no matter how much he hated him.

He had cried a lot there too.

Bodam, who had experience with losing a family member, became more curious about Han Seung Ho’s inner world.

‘Was he so hurt that he didn’t even want to see his mother’s last moments?’

“So that’s why, shi-, his personality is so fucked up.”

Even when he threw his head back and let out a deep sigh towards the ceiling, his tears didn’t dry.

Like a drunkard, he also muttered to himself.

It was all related to Seung Ho.

‘Han Seung Ho’s name is cool. It’s his choice whether to use his healing ability or not. What’s it to anyone if he decides not to use his own ability. I wish he would just fix his personality. That Han bastard.’

His stream-of-consciousness muttering stopped only when the real Han Seung Ho’s face came into view.

“Oh.”

“Get up.”

“It’s Han Seung Ho…”

“Let’s go.”

Bodam, who stood up following the force that was slowly lifting his body, continued to mouth words.

‘Han Seung Ho, it must be hard. It must have been hard.’

“How did you know to come.”

Jo Yeon asked Seung Ho, who was supporting Bodam.

He downed a shot of soju, stood up, and straightened Bodam’s open collar.

Seung Ho just pointed to his watch with his long fingertips.

Inside the Center, Espers and their exclusive guides could track each other’s locations.

If the team leader’s permission was granted.

“Bodam is still sick.”

Jo Yeon took off his own coat and put it on Bodam, speaking in the firmest voice he could muster.

‘So please take good care of him.’

***

While moving to the waiting room with Seung Ho’s Teleport Esper, Bodam’s anger, which had subsided after his crying, returned.

He was embarrassed at himself for being scared by Lee Tae Hwan’s shouts.

Even though he had cursed at him even more severely, his anger hadn’t been appeased.

‘He promised. The nerve of him to curse and yell again after promising not to.’

“Kang Yi Jun has disappeared.”

Seung Ho, who had brought him to the end of the waiting room hallway, told the Teleport Esper to come back in 3 minutes.

“Who, what?”

“Kang Yi Jun, has disappeared.”

Bodam, who blinked his eyes at the news that was enough to sober him up slightly, was at a loss for words.

‘Kang Yi Jun has disappeared? I’m going to go crazy.’

“No, that crazy bastard…”

“Don’t be alone. At least stay by Min Ji Oh’s side until we find Kang Yi Jun.”

It meant to stay by the side of the safe Lee Tae Hwan and himself.

By the side of an Esper who can protect you.

“Did he really disappear? Did you try calling him?”

“……”

“He’s not answering?”

“Go in and rest.”

Seung Ho, at the sight of Bodam’s hazy eyes which were glaring as seriously as they could, decided he would have to talk to him again tomorrow.

For now, it seemed a conversation would be as impossible as the smell of alcohol he was exuding.

“Yoon Bodam.”

“Yes.”

“This way.”

Seung Ho caught Bodam, who had immediately turned towards the door at the words to go in and rest.

He grabbed his wrist and turned him around, then opened his lips slightly as if he had something to say.

“No. Our team is over there.”

Bodam, who pointed directly at the team’s waiting room door, squinted his red eyes from crying.

‘Is Han Seung Ho drunk too? Why is he… staring at me like that.’

“Han Seung Ho. Are you crying?”

He had intended to ask if the team leader was drunk too, but the words came out on their own.

Because he had felt a subtle change in Han Seung Ho’s cold expression, which to others would look the same as usual.

Seung Ho just gently held Bodam’s wrist without a word.

He counted the weak pulse detected from his fingertips and slowly slid his hand down to meet his palm.

The drunk Bodam kept asking if he was crying, with a worried expression.

Unaware that his hand was being held by an Esper.

“Don’t drink.”

“I don’t want to.”

“Then cut down.”

“I don’t want to.”

Bodam, whose face had turned sulky at the dare to tell him to stop drinking, turned his head.

Because of that, he didn’t see Seung Ho’s fleeting smile.

“It’s over there. Our team is over there. Han Seung Ho must be drunk.”

Bodam, who grumbled about him not even being able to find the waiting room door, shook off Seung Ho’s hand and walked away.

When Bodam, who had arrived at the door, turned back towards Seung Ho, he was already gone.

An emergency measures meeting, opened due to the disappeared Crow and Kang Yi Jun, was already in progress.

Seung Ho was long late for the meeting.

Clank.

As soon as Bodam turned the doorknob, someone from inside threw the door open.

“……”

Tae Hwan, who had opened his mouth wide and then closed it again, greeted Bodam.

Ji Oh, despite Seung Ho’s orders to wait in the waiting room, couldn’t stand it and was searching all over for Bodam.

“Move.”

Bodam, reeking of alcohol, practically threw himself at Tae Hwan, shoulder-checking him.

Bodam, who had entered the waiting room without even taking off his shoes, furrowed his brow at the high stairs.

‘When am I going to climb all that.’

“Ah, you scared me.”

Tae Hwan, who had approached without a sound, knelt in front of Bodam.

“What, what, you bastard.”

“Your shoes.”

Tae Hwan, in a tone uncharacteristically calm for him, slowly took off the sneakers Bodam had worn inside.

Once he had taken off both and there was no longer a reason to hold onto him, he finally got to the point.

“I’m sorry.”

Whack.

Bodam’s fist, made even more unhesitating by the alcohol, flicked Tae Hwan’s head.

The fist, not satisfied with one hit, went down, hitting his broad shoulders and hard chest.

He, who had been throwing jabs diligently, lost his balance and sat down.

“I’m sorry.”

“Bullshit. You’re just going to get angry again.”

“Sorry.”

“I don’t believe you anymore.”

“I’m sorry. Yoon Bodam.”

“I said I don’t believe you.”

He must have been really drunk, because while he was pushing Tae Hwan away with his words, his limp body was sticking to his warm body heat.

Bodam, who had closed the distance with Tae Hwan under the pretext of grabbing his collar, let the thick arms that were hugging him be.

“Why did you cry.”

Tae Hwan, who had picked up Bodam, whose eyelids looked heavy, and stood up from the floor, spoke carefully.

It seemed his red eyes and nose were not just from being drunk.

Seeing him wear Jeon Jo Yeon’s coat, it looked like he had had a good time.

“I cried because of you, you bastard. Because you swore and got angry.”

Tae Hwan, who had stopped in the middle of climbing the stairs, suppressed a sigh and hugged Bodam tighter.

‘I’m sorry for cursing. I’m sorry for breaking my promise, etc.’

He couldn’t lift his head until he had sat Bodam down on the bed.

Tae Hwan knelt again in front of the bed.

Even as sleepiness washed over him, Bodam didn’t send Tae Hwan away and listened to his apologies until the end.

His foot, which had been hitting his stomach, was now on Tae Hwan’s thigh.

“I’m really sorry, but.”

Tae Hwan’s voice, who had his head bowed for several minutes, gradually trembled.

“Don’t suddenly disappear. Just contact me.”

Tae Hwan’s shoulders, still stiff from the unabated tension, slumped.

He buried his face in the end of Bodam’s knee and begged in a damp voice.

Not to go without a word.

“I feel like I’m going to go crazy.”