Chapter 23: No Leash

Lieutenant Colonel Miles let out a hearty laugh.

“You must be joking.”

“I’m not joking. He looked like he didn’t want to tell me.”

“…Why would that be?”

At once, Lieutenant Colonel Miles’ expression turned serious.

Colonel Shan looked at him with an unreadable face.

“One thing is certain. When he guides espers who are unnecessarily powerful like us, he suffers.”

“He didn’t look like he was in pain when he was guiding me, though?”

Lieutenant Colonel Miles tilted his head as he spoke.

Colonel Shan’s expression darkened even further.

Lieutenant Colonel Miles muttered to himself.

“So it must be the kind of burden that builds up in the body. Even so, we can only hope it’s not a strain that shows too obviously.”

“Yeah. He kept trying to guide without resting, so I practically forced him to take leave. If only you hadn’t shown up trying to get yourself killed.”

“Oh dear. I suppose I was oblivious.”

Lieutenant Colonel Miles chuckled.

Colonel Shan Pei did not mention that he himself was receiving Contact Guiding from Lee Juju.

Nor did he mention that this contact guiding was carried out in a very special way.

He merely stared silently out the window.

On one side of the base, construction was already well underway to expand the facilities for incoming new troops.

He didn’t even know what exactly displeased him.

Perhaps…

It was simply the fact that Lee Juju was guiding other espers, an unknown number of them, that he couldn’t stand.

Colonel Shan Pei curved his lips into a faintly bitter smile.

If the astonishingly selfless Lee Juju ever found out, he would never look at Colonel Shan again.

Even now, Juju was probably running around everywhere, not content with having guided Colonel Shan’s longtime friend Lieutenant Colonel Miles, but also mingling with other members of the battalion.

He liked people.

He was kind.

And everyone genuinely cherished and loved the small guide.

Perhaps it was only natural that a desire to monopolize him would arise.

But still…

How had it come to this, such irrational possessiveness?

Colonel Shan thought that he hadn’t been like this when they first met, but in truth, from the very beginning…

From the moment he saw that clumsy man with brown eyes staring at him in fear, he had wanted to lock him away in his arms and hide him from the world.

Colonel Shan thought this emotion was dangerous.

No matter what happened, he resolved to suppress it from now on.

Unaware that once emotions broke free of their reins, they never accepted a leash again.

****

Lieutenant Colonel Miles was, sincerely, an incredibly annoying man.

From early morning, he hovered around asking when they were going to eat together, until Lee Juju finally shouted at him.

“We literally had lunch together yesterday! What is wrong with you?”

“In a remote mountain village like this, eating rationed food in a base cafeteria doesn’t really count as a meal, does it? That’s a bit cruel, don’t you think?”

‘Food is food no matter what…’

Lee Juju stared at Lieutenant Colonel Miles with a thoroughly sour expression.

“You’re doing this because you want guiding, aren’t you?”

“Ah, you caught me.”

Again, that shamelessly sly smile.

It was unbearable to look at.

The matching rate seemed to be barely 30 percent, but normally, even guides and espers wouldn’t bother looking at each other at that level.

But in this world, Lee Juju was the only guide.

Grasping at straws, Lieutenant Colonel Miles lingered around him, yet from Juju’s perspective, it was nothing but bothersome.

Especially since he already knew an esper like Colonel Shan Pei, whose matching rate was absurdly high.

There was a good chance Miles himself didn’t even know why he was acting like this.

Pestering Juju to eat together was probably just instinct, a way to win over the only guide and lure him in.

‘He is kind of pitiful.’

Lieutenant Colonel Miles, still wearing that ingratiating smile, made a huge fuss about going to eat, about stepping outside the base to look around.

Moved despite himself, Lee Juju let out a deep sigh.

“I told you I’ll guide you anyway. You don’t have to do all this.”

“I just feel bad. You’re on leave, aren’t you?”

“Oh.”

Right.

Now that he thought about it, he was on leave.

Without even properly resting, half of his week-long leave was already gone.

In the past, he would have been horrified that such precious leave had vanished so pointlessly.

But given the circumstances, it didn’t feel quite so wasteful.

Still…

“If you’ve got nothing to do anyway, how about checking out a nearby city? I’ll treat you properly.”

“Treat me to what?”

Though Juju snapped back gruffly, his thoughts slowly tilted toward the idea of enjoying his leave.

He still hadn’t reconciled with Colonel Shan.

To be precise, it was closer to being unilaterally ignored, just like the past month, when Colonel Shan had avoided him.

The difference was that this time, Lee Juju was firmly sulking as well and wasn’t going out of his way to look for Colonel Shan.

‘I did guide him properly, at least.’

Of course, it wasn’t enough to fully restore Colonel Shan Pei’s condition, but Juju could confidently say he’d guided him to a reasonable extent.

With many guides came many different guiding styles, but most were capable of Intimate Contact Guiding.

‘It’s not like I was a guide who did that as casually as eating, but still…’

At that level of efficiency, you could at least gauge how far the guiding had progressed.

He’d put some safety measures in place, so now it wouldn’t matter if he acted according to his own temperament.

No, Colonel Shan might have already completely forgotten about him.

If so, then Juju enjoying his leave in his own way should be fine too.

“You’ve got to grease the wheels once in a while. If you don’t like steak, there’s lamb. Oh, did I tell you there’s a famous cream pasta place around here?”

“Ugh. Fine.”

Lee Juju grumbled.

The moment he heard that, Lieutenant Colonel Miles’ face lit up.

“Then let’s go right now!”

“I said fine… Michael, I’m heading out.”

“Alright, Juju. You worked hard coming all the way to the infirmary even though you’re on leave.”

Michael, who had been treating Lieutenant Colonel Miles like a piece of furniture while doing his work, waved with a relieved expression.

Juju wasn’t the only one who found Miles annoying.

When Lieutenant Colonel Miles turned his back and told him to climb on, Lee Juju recoiled in disgust, but in the end, he had no choice but to climb onto Miles’ back.

They couldn’t use a military vehicle, and he didn’t even know whether there were buses or taxis around.

“We’ll be there in no time. Trust me!”

Should he really trust that?

Lee Juju eyed the boastful Lieutenant Colonel Miles uneasily.

True to his nature as an elemental esper, Miles used fire as propulsion, soaring straight into the air before shooting forward like a bullet.

“Aaaah!”

Dangling from Lieutenant Colonel Miles as they rocketed forward together, Lee Juju screamed.

“How is it? Fun, right?”

With an excited face, Miles asked like a dog wagging its tail.

When Juju regained his senses and looked around, the familiar battalion base was gone, replaced by a perfectly ordinary city bustling with people.

Gritting his teeth, Lee Juju replied.

“We are not coming back like this.”

“Then how do you plan to go back?”

“Walking. Or running!”

“Alright, alright.”

Lieutenant Colonel Miles agreed with an easy grin.

After giving him a suspicious look, Lee Juju turned his gaze toward the city.

“Welcome to Shankriti, Juju.”

“Yes, yes. Let’s hurry up and eat.”

Looking around, Juju shrugged at the cityscape, which was neither particularly advanced nor especially run-down.

‘They said it was completely destroyed by a massive gate explosion and rebuilt, but it’s not like science vanished and the world went full medieval.’

It felt more like looking at a less-developed 20th century.

Finding it interesting, Juju continued walking.

The place Juju chose was Shankriti’s specialty, cream pasta.

True to Miles’ words, a long line of people was already waiting for their turn.

Instead of joining the end of the line, Lieutenant Colonel Miles strode straight into the pasta restaurant.

“Call your manager.”

“Who are you?”

A staff member came out, looking flustered.

“I’m Lieutenant Colonel Miles.”

Miles said with a pleasant smile.

Before long, the pasta shop’s owner, no, the manager, sporting a stylish mustache, came running out.

After exchanging a few words with Miles, the manager said he would prepare a table at once and led them inside.

“Isn’t this kind of rude?”

As Juju muttered while glancing at the whispering onlookers, Miles replied indignantly.

“What are you talking about?”

“So this is the sweet taste of power…”

“That’s strange. Do lieutenant colonels usually have power?”

“Haven’t you been in the military?”

“No. Guides don’t enlist.”

“A lieutenant colonel is a pretty big deal, you know.”

“Colonel Shan is a colonel. Aren’t you two the same age? Why is one of you a lieutenant colonel and the other a colonel?”

“…”