Chapter 43: What You Couldn’t Say

‘Where does it hurt?’

I thought something was a little off before he even got on the elevator, but Yeong-u-hyung didn’t even recognize me and just screamed until he finally lost consciousness.

The group of Guides surrounding him insisted indignantly that they were only trying to help because he looked like he was in pain.

The CCTV footage also proved their claims to be true.

I planned to ask him calmly once he woke up.

There were so many things I hadn’t been able to ask him properly.

Other than the fact that he was my lover and partner of eight years, I still knew nothing about him.

At best, I only knew his personality.

Hyung didn’t contact anyone else and spent all day at home with the cats.

I just thought he was an introverted person unsuitable for group life, as Aran noona had said.

But seeing him today, his condition looked more serious.

Much more.

“……”

While changing the clothes of the unconscious Hyung, I discovered the bruises that had spread all over his arm.

At first, I thought I had seen it wrong.

I wondered if something had stained it, but they were all bruises.

From his wrist to his upper shoulder, his white skin was covered in dark blue bruises to the point it was barely visible.

There were also quite a few yellowish marks from old bruises.

How did this happen?

I watched the deeply sleeping Hyung for a long time before finding the answer to my question.

It was an answer so obvious that I was dumbfounded at myself for only noticing the change now.

Yeong-u-hyung, who had only worn long sleeves since my bad sleeping habits started.

Hyung never rolled up his sleeves even when he was sweating, and I would throw pillows in my sleep.

Why couldn’t I have thought that the pillow could have been Hyung?

“I did this, didn’t I.”

Yeong-u-hyung’s expression was the answer.

“Since when has it been like this?”

I already knew but asked for confirmation.

Even though I expected Yeong-u-hyung to say no, I threw the water glass in front of his pale face.

The surge of emotion was uncontrollable.

I wanted to escape this space with Hyung right away.

The anxiety over Hyung not trying to protect his own body felt like it was driving me crazy.

“If not me, then who. Tell me. Who.”

I was curious to see how much bigger Yeong-u-hyung’s lie would get.

Whoever came out of his mouth, I was planning to kill them.

It wouldn’t be difficult, since it would be me anyway.

It felt like it would be easier on my mind to just die too.

I was so tired.

“I’m okay.”

‘If I die, will Hyung follow?’

Hyung, left alone, would surely wither and die from crying or starving, even if he didn’t try to kill himself.

Yeong-u-hyung’s life revolved around me.

Even to my eyes, who had only spent a month with him, that was visible.

“You didn’t even grab it hard. If it hurt, my bones would have broken. But look, I’m perfectly fine.”

Hyung truly believed that this situation and he himself were fine.

He wasn’t saying it to appease me.

It seemed that those dark blue bruised arms were really nothing to him.

“Then what if it did break. What would you say then.”

He would probably smile and say it doesn’t hurt.

Yeong-u-hyung was the type of person who would insist a broken arm was fine.

“It’s okay because I didn’t die?”

‘Then should I suggest we die together? Right here, right now.’

I rubbed my lips and smiled at the horrible thought that crossed my mind.

I had genuinely been on the verge of asking Hyung to die with me.

‘I’ve really lost it.’

I knew my mental state hadn’t been normal lately, but I didn’t realize it was this bad.

“We’d be better off staying apart.”

For Hyung’s sake.

But before my words could even finish, Yeong-u-hyung pulled me into a hug.

“I don’t want to be alone….”

Hyung, wrapping his bruised arms around my waist, buried his face in my chest.

The Guiding that seeped in even deeper made it hard for me to breathe.

It felt completely different from before.

“Don’t go. Chul-soo. Don’t go.”

Hyung tried to hold me with his Guiding.

The more strength he put into his faintly sobbing body, the more Guiding flowed out.

A strange sense of repulsion welled up from the energy transmitted through our touching skin.

It was clearly an energy meant to soothe my Wavelength, but I didn’t want to absorb it.

It felt like being force-fed food I couldn’t eat.

“Don’t touch me.”

I unwrapped his arms and pushed him onto the bed.

His body, sprawled on the sheets, swayed precariously.

If he had fallen to the floor, it would have made a loud noise.

“…Let’s just, live separately.”

Could there be a more dangerous existence to Hyung right now than me?

Even I felt like a danger to myself.

“You said you’d listen to everything I say.”

I moved and placed the rolling water glass on the bedside table.

I wanted Hyung to know that this was not a decision I made in a fit of anger, swayed by emotion.

“Until when.”

Hyung, clutching the crumpled sheets, asked in a sobbing voice.

“Until my memory returns.”

At my calm reply, Yeong-u-hyung’s crying grew more intense, and he bit his lip.

Without looking at him, I walked toward the bedroom door.

‘I wish he would just let me go.’

But Hyung wouldn’t let me go easily.

Even though he knew better than anyone that we would have to see each other again, he got down on his knees and clung to me.

“Get up.”

The sight of his knees on the floor turned my already scorched insides to complete ash.

Yeong-u-hyung reached out his arms with a desperate face, as if he would never see me again if I walked out this door.

“I said get up.”

“You can’t go.”

The hand gripping my pant leg trembled.

“Only I… can Guide you.”

His mumbled words didn’t register in my ears.

All I could see was the figure of Hyung, kneeling before me, looking so small.

Hyung, whose wet lips trembled as he hesitated, squeezed his eyes shut and gripped my pants even tighter.

“We’re Imprinted.”

As if those were such difficult words to say.

Yeong-u-hyung’s face, after forcing out the words with great effort, was completely soaked with tears.

His black eyes, shedding tears without a sound, looked at me with a trembling gaze.

I left that gaze behind me and fled the room as if running away.

I couldn’t bear to watch him kneeling on the floor, crying, any longer.

I was even afraid to touch his body.

My aching chest felt like it was about to explode.

After leaving the house and confirming that Hyung wasn’t following, I Teleported.

The results of the training I had been secretly continuing were showing.

I had reached a level where long-distance travel was now possible.

Although it was still far from enough.

“Be careful.”

An Esper entering the main Center building said to me.

My left fingernails had been torn off during the Teleportation process, and blood was flowing.

All the nails except for my thumb were gone.

It was the first time this had happened.

I had been mastering the ability at a speed that surprised even Hong-gi and had been sequentially increasing the travel distance.

I thought that going from Hyung’s house to the entrance of the main Center building would be possible by now.

Actually, even if it wasn’t possible, I just wanted to get away from Hyung quickly.

I had used the ability a bit rashly.

“They’re completely gone….”

Looking at my bleeding hand, I felt nothing.

It just hurt a little.

That was all.

I roughly clenched my left hand and walked to the team’s waiting room.

Aran noona had given me the location of Barrier Team 3’s waiting room in advance.

She said the high-rank team waiting rooms were equipped with almost everything and were often used as living quarters.

I looked around the quite spacious waiting room, walking slower than usual.

My eyes weren’t taking things in well, so I shifted my gaze slowly.

With a private bedroom and even a kitchen, it was a space no different from a dorm.

Seeing clothes strewn about inside the open bedroom door, it seemed to be Seung-jun hyung’s room.

I had heard that Seung-jun hyung spent more time in the team waiting room than at his own home.

I would have to stay here for a while too.

Until my memory returns, just as I told Yeong-u-hyung.

Not knowing which room was mine, I first sat on the large sofa in the center of the waiting room.

The sofa was large enough that it could be used instead of a bed.

Tap, tap, tap.

Leaning my arm diagonally on the sofa’s armrest, I tapped the floor with my crutch.

The bleeding from my left hand, where the nails had been torn off, had already stopped.

No matter how I looked at it, it was a monstrous body.

Just when I thought I was getting used to it, I would be surprised, and just when it became familiar, I would be newly surprised again.

Was it because my nerves were weak?

“Wow.”

Even when I pressed on the spot where the nail was torn, no blood appeared.

Rather, it felt like the flesh was filling in.

They said the more the pain receptors were stimulated, the faster the recovery.

My eyes fell on my leg, and I raised my crutch high and brought it down.

Along with the pain spreading through my knee, the broken handle of the crutch rolled on the sofa table, making a loud noise.

When I threw the now useless crutch, it made an even louder noise.

This was nowhere near enough.

The body of a great Esper did not break easily.

Rather, it was a body that regenerated the more it felt pain, so it wasn’t human.

It was a monster walking on two legs and a ticking time bomb, this couldn’t be called a person.

I had to live the rest of my life with this monstrous body.

Here, where my family was all dead and gone.

“F*ck….”

After punching my leg like a madman, I collapsed onto the sofa.

Tears poured from my eyes just as much as Yeong-u-hyung was crying.

Water constantly pooled in my eyes to the point where I couldn’t see properly.

As I closed my eyes to the blurred vision, drowsiness instantly overcame me.

Funnily enough, I fell asleep just like that.

With a smirk on my lips, I slept a very deep sleep.

What woke me up the next day was a call from that punk from Attack Team 1.