Chapter 48: Held Under the Pretense of Guiding

The haze clouding his mind cleared all at once, and Chaewon reflexively tried to sit up.

But a firm hand wrapped around his waist pressed him back down, making it impossible to move.

There was no room for confusion anymore.

Chaewon was lying on the bed beside Su-ha, held securely in his arms.

“I’m sorry…!”

Before he could even grasp the situation, an apology spilled out of him out of habit.

He didn’t know what had happened, but somehow it felt certain that he had done something wrong.

Even holding hands with him probably wouldn’t have been welcome for Su-ha, so how had he ended up being held like this in his arms?

His memory stubbornly refused to return.

But whatever the reason, things turning out this way had to be his fault.

Before Chaewon’s apology could even finish, Su-ha hurriedly spoke.

“I’m sorry.”

Chaewon wondered if he had misheard.

He couldn’t understand why Su-ha was apologizing at all.

Su-ha continued without hesitation.

“I know it was improper, but guiding was urgent at the time… I made a unilateral decision to hold you to improve efficiency, even if just a little.”

“Ah…”

“If it made you uncomfortable, I’m sorry.”

“No, no! It’s not that! I- I mean… if anything, Su-ha, you’re the one who must have felt uncomfortable…”

At those reflexive words, Su-ha instinctively cupped Chaewon’s face and made him look up.

The distance between them was far too close.

Their quiet breaths were close enough to brush against each other’s skin.

It was awkward and embarrassing, but something else mattered more right now.

Meeting his gaze, Su-ha spoke.

“I wasn’t uncomfortable.”

Chaewon’s eyes were still stained with unease.

It was obvious he couldn’t quite believe what he was hearing.

Su-ha continued.

“It didn’t feel unpleasant or uncomfortable. I’m not enduring it out of obligation. I’m ‘truly’ fine with it.”

Truly.

Su-ha put extra emphasis on that word.

What had already happened couldn’t be erased.

No matter how carefully he dressed it up now, the words he’d said before couldn’t be wiped from Chaewon’s memory.

So all Su-ha hoped for was that Chaewon would notice what had changed.

That before, he had been trapped in foolish, pathetic feelings and unable to accept Chaewon properly, but not anymore.

That Chaewon’s existence no longer bothered or burdened him in the slightest.

No, rather, that he had come to support him even more.

He wanted Chaewon to know that.

“…Thank you.”

Still awkward about hearing such words, Chaewon lowered his gaze and replied in a small voice.

He didn’t seem able to fully accept Su-ha’s change yet, but Su-ha tried not to rush him.

After all, the two of them were now bound together as a pair.

Anything Chaewon couldn’t quite grasp yet could be explained again and again, as many times as needed.

While Su-ha was making that quiet resolve, Chaewon was struggling to recall what had happened.

Why he had woken up in bed, being guided in Su-ha’s arms.

His broken memories slowly began to return.

He had been talking with Su-ha at the café when an esper attacking civilians suddenly appeared.

He had tried desperately to stop the indiscriminate assault.

And then-

“…! What happened to that esper? And the people… did I stop the explosion…? I passed out, so…”

“Shh, Chaewon. It’s okay. Calm down.”

Chaewon’s memory stopped at the moment he had exerted his power to block the esper attacking the people inside the building.

Not remembering what came after meant he hadn’t confirmed the outcome before losing consciousness.

That could mean he hadn’t protected them properly.

His heart dropped.

Chaewon tried desperately to sit up as he asked, but Su-ha wrapped an arm around his back again, gently soothing him and calming him down.

Even without hearing the explanation yet, Su-ha’s touch strangely settled Chaewon’s heart.

Su-ha spoke immediately.

“The esper was safely apprehended. No one else was injured.”

“Ah…”

“Thanks to you, Chaewon… because of the barrier you deployed at the end, everyone inside made it out safely.”

“That’s…”

“Chaewon, you protected them all.”

Chaewon looked dazed for a moment at Su-ha’s words.

Everyone was safe.

You protected them all.

Those words felt distorted, failing to fully sink in.

“Me…?”

Even though he knew it must sound foolish, Chaewon couldn’t help asking.

It didn’t feel real.

It felt like a dream.

After a life spent constantly losing people, the idea that he had protected someone was impossible to believe.

Su-ha’s hand gently stroked Chaewon’s back once more.

Perhaps he was still guiding him, because warmth flared wherever his hand passed.

As he lightly tidied Chaewon’s disheveled hair, Su-ha whispered.

“Yes. You did. You protected everyone there.”

“That can’t be true…”

“You don’t have to believe it if you can’t. Facts are facts. I saw it, and so did the people you protected.”

Seeing Chaewon unable to believe himself even after accomplishing something so great made Su-ha’s chest tighten again.

He kept repeating the same words.

He could say it again and again, as many times as needed.

Until Chaewon could truly feel it.

Until he could escape the belief that he was an incomplete, useless esper.

Su-ha wanted to make that happen.

“I think… it’s because you helped me, Su-ha.”

Still curling inward as if he couldn’t endure being praised, Chaewon said quietly.

Su-ha responded immediately, his voice firm.

“I was able to help because you did well.”

“But…”

“Chaewon. I’m a guide. On my own, I could never have subdued that esper. You did it.”

The weight of Su-ha’s voice was too solid to dismiss as empty reassurance.

Chaewon mulled over his words and replayed the memories of that moment.

As details returned one by one, regrets slowly surfaced.

He could have done better.

At the scene, even using half the strength he showed in the training room had been difficult.

Focusing on and controlling his power in an uncontrolled environment was nothing like training.

He hadn’t neglected his training.

Chaewon had truly done his best at every moment.

But facing his limits in the field made him question whether that had really been enough.

Couldn’t he have done more?

Endured a little longer, pushed a little harder?

If he had, wouldn’t he have held out better and subdued the enemy faster?

Those thoughts were hard to shake.

“What you did today is something you can be proud of.”

It was Su-ha, no one else, who said that to him.

That he did well.

That what he accomplished today was enough.

That he had saved many people.

Strangely, that made Chaewon want to believe it.

It felt like maybe he could.

He knew it was shameless, but these were Su-ha’s words.

If Su-ha, who Chaewon believed judged him more coldly than anyone, said he did well, then maybe he hadn’t been a burden after all.

“But more important than that right now is your condition.”

Between his sinking despair and faint lift of hope, Su-ha’s voice slipped in, softer than before.

Chaewon raised his gaze and met Su-ha’s eyes again.

The sense of distance he had momentarily forgotten returned, and he realized he was still in Su-ha’s arms.

Chaewon instinctively tried to pull away, but Su-ha didn’t release the hand supporting his back.

“Your wavelength is still unstable. And there are internal injuries left inside you.”

Su-ha wasn’t making things up.

Chaewon’s wavelength hadn’t fully stabilized yet, and the side effects, rougher than before due to his first real combat, had left wounds in his energy that only a guide could detect, still unhealed.

Chaewon didn’t seem to have noticed yet, but his worn hands were wrapped in bandages.

By every measure, he still needed guiding.

That much was certain.

“Then… I’ll continue guiding you a little longer.”

But at the moment Su-ha said that and pulled Chaewon’s small body back into his arms…

As Chaewon fit against him like a perfectly matched puzzle piece, and an inexplicable sense of satisfaction welled up.

Su-ha found himself unable to avoid asking the question.

Was he truly holding Chaewon right now for nothing more than ‘guiding him’?