Chapter 24: Apology and Revelation

“F*ck, I’m so damn sorry!”

“I committed a mortal sin by hurting him!”

“There, happy now?!”

“…”

“Right?!”

“I apologized!”

Without saying a word, I gave him a look that clearly asked, ‘Does that sound like enough?’

The man, who had been insisting he’d done his part, finally yielded after a ten-minute staring contest in silence.

“Fine, I’m sorry!”

“I didn’t mean to throw him.”

“I just failed to control my strength.”

“You won’t do it again, right?”

“Hey, but if your Guide hadn’t bitten me first, I wouldn’t have!”

“You won’t do it again, right?”

When I asked again, the man ground his teeth and made a promise that sounded more like a curse, clenching his fists.

“I won’t.”

“I said I won’t!”

“You think I wanted to throw him?!”

The man’s monologue, filled with his sense of injustice, continued from its second verse into a third.

Watching his f*cking fit, I was suddenly reminded of an article I’d read stating that many Espers were either overly sensitive or had personality disorders.

It said the higher their rank, the more severe it was.

At this rate, that man seemed well beyond S-rank.

I watched the man, a living example from that article, to the very end.

He no longer felt threatening to me.

He just looked like a patient suffering from anger management issues.

The man, having vented his anger to his heart’s content, irritably scratched his head.

The motion caused his ponytail to come undone, making him even more annoyed.

With that much anger, he’d probably develop an illness even if he didn’t have one.

I looked at him with pity and offered him the water bottle I had brought.

“What do you want me to do with this!”

“Drink it.”

“Calm down a little.”

“Where’d you get this used thing?”

Contrary to his grumbling mouth, his hand honestly took the water bottle.

It was understandable that he’d be thirsty after spewing all those words by himself.

“Are you going to take the test or not.”

“Decide now.”

The man, who had quickly emptied the entire bottle of water, finally brought up the real issue.

Aran-noona hadn’t been able to find out anything about the test.

She said it was treated as classified information within Attack Team 1, led by the Esper Director, so no one outside their team knew anything about it.

“How can I decide when I don’t even know what kind of test it is?”

“I can tell you if you decide to do it.”

“I need to know what it is to decide.”

“It’s not dangerous, and there’s no harm to you.”

“Just do it.”

Tying his hair back up, the man kicked his chair back and stood up, heading toward the vending machine in the lounge.

One bottle of water must not have been enough, as he came back with three 500ml bottles of cola.

“You think we’re doing this for our own benefit?”

“If you don’t cooperate, the problem gets bigger.”

“This is no time for you to be f*cking around like this.”

“What problem?”

“…You really don’t know anything?”

A fizzing sound came from the man’s hand as he twisted the cap off the PET bottle with a dumbfounded expression.

I replied that the only things I knew for sure were my name and age, and that I didn’t know anything else.

“Do you know what a Gate is?”

“A portal connecting to another world.”

“Do you know why they appear?”

“I know all the basics like that.”

I was, of course, familiar with the information known to the general public.

Even elementary school students knew that monsters move by following the wavelength containing an Esper’s ability, and that a Gate opens where monsters gather.

“To eliminate a Gate, you have to go inside and pierce the Core.”

“You don’t know this, do you?”

It was the first I’d heard of it, so I kept my mouth shut.

The man straightened his shoulders, his eyes shining as he continued his explanation.

“You got trapped inside a Gate while trying to destroy that Core.”

“But given the nature of your ability, there’s no way you shouldn’t have been able to get out.”

“You should have naturally gotten out before the Gate collapsed.”

“But why…”

“That’s what I want to ask.”

“Why couldn’t you get out?”

The mouth of the PET bottle in the man’s hand was pointed at me.

It wasn’t a question I could answer right now.

“You don’t know either.”

“That’s why we’re suggesting a test.”

“Got it?!”

The man, who had been speaking calmly, habitually snapped and chugged his cola.

“After your accident, that b*stard of a Director issued a ban on entering Gates.”

“Then doesn’t that mean you can’t eliminate Gates?”

“Not unless you’re one of the exceptional ones.”

“But he banned it because he’s afraid others will end up shattered like you.”

“He said the ban will remain in effect until it’s revealed what the hell is going on inside the Gates.”

The man tossed a new cola to me and said my memories needed to come back quickly.

He shuddered, saying that at this rate, all the Espers would die from overwork, not from monsters.

“Are you just waiting for my memories?”

“You think we would?!”

“The 4th District is full of crazy b*stards, so they’re volunteering to handle Gate exploration.”

“I’m just saying that extracting your memories is the fastest and safest way.”

“I’ll do it.”

“Let’s go now.”

I couldn’t jump to my feet, but I placed my hands on the handrims of my wheelchair.

If I had heard the full situation sooner, I would have gone right then and there.

“Not right now.”

“What?”

I thought that if I said yes, he would take me straight to a testing room or somewhere, but the man just sat glued to his chair and took out his phone.

“You said you’d do it with your own mouth.”

“This isn’t forced; you decided on your own.”

“What on earth is this test, anyway?”

“It’s nothing special.”

“I just can’t reveal it because that b*stard Director said it’s classified.”

“I’m going to find out eventually, so can’t you just tell me now so we can start?”

“F*ck, I wish.”

The man, who had sent a text somewhere, tossed his phone onto the table.

“Your teammates probably didn’t tell you on purpose, thinking they were being considerate.”

“But this is not a situation where we can just sit back and wait.”

“And even if your memory doesn’t come back, you’re returning to the field once your legs heal.”

He clicked his tongue, saying that what they lacked most right now were Barrier users, and then chugged the remaining cola like it was alcohol.

“When do I take the test?”

“I’ll come back when it’s possible.”

“When I do, just follow me without any complaints.”

The man, whose speech was as laced with commands as it was with curses, had his phone ring.

While he took the call, I engraved the unknown test and the newly learned situation about the Gates into my mind.

My head, which had felt dull since the accident, felt a little heavier.

“Yeah, he agreed to do it.”

“No.”

“How would I know.”

“It’ll probably take longer.”

“You son of a b*tch, then come here yourself!”

I was massaging my temples when I frowned at the man’s shouting.

I thought I might get used to it if I kept listening, but when combined with my headache, it was enough to make my eardrums ring.

“Hey, Kim Chul-soo!”

“Answer your d*mn calls.”

The man paused his call and stood up from his seat.

Before I could even give him my new phone number, he left, having said only what he needed to say.

Thanks to him, I waited for my headache to subside in the now calm atmosphere.

Just from hearing the story of what happened at the time of the accident, my head throbbed as if it were overloaded.

Without forgetting, I checked my wavelength level on my wrist watch first.

51%.

Fortunately, it hadn’t risen, but it hadn’t dropped either.

Once it passed 50%, the first digit remained stubbornly in place.

Even with a Guiding Machine attached all day, the level I had worked so hard to lower would sneakily creep back up whenever it had the chance.

It wasn’t like this when I received Guiding from Guide Seo Yeong-u.

After that early morning filled with embarrassment, my wavelength level, which had dropped sharply, had only continued to decrease.

As expected, it seemed the effects of a machine and actual Guiding were very different.

“Of course they’d be different…”

I scratched the back of my hand, where the needle marks had faded, and pushed the wheels of my wheelchair.

The strange sensation of his body heat transferring to mine kept coming to mind, just as much as the Guide’s face.

‘Should I try contacting him?’

Ever since I installed the messaging app, I found myself pulling up Guide Seo Yeong-u’s profile picture whenever I had a spare moment.

Even though it was just the same cats and my face every time I opened it, my hand reached for it frequently.

It was a very scary app.

‘He could have at least put up one picture of himself.’

Thanks to the strong first impression, I thought I would never forget his face, but since I hadn’t seen him for quite a while, it was starting to become a little blurry.

The peace I felt from not seeing his face was, as time passed, becoming more and more uncomfortable.

The image of his dejected back as he left the hospital room was the only thing that remained vivid, making me worry even more.

If he was going to make me worry whether he was in front of me or not, I figured it would be better to be together.

So I could at least check if he was okay.

“I’m the one who told him to leave…”

I gave up on the idea of contacting him, chiding myself, and pushed my wheelchair.

My frequent headaches were particularly bad today, so I had ended my rehabilitation therapy early and was on my way back to my room.

Pushing the wheels for a long stretch down the empty hallway, I gripped the handrims tightly just before reaching my hospital room door.

Someone was in my room.

From beyond the door, I heard the faint rustling of a plastic bag.

‘Did the Guide come…?’