“Why didn’t you come home yesterday? Mom said she’d go out looking for you, and I had to tell her you’re not a seven-year-old. You know I barely stopped her, right?”
“Ah, really? Sorry.”
“Did you drink yesterday? With who? I couldn’t even contact you yesterday, do you know how worried I was?”
Ilkyung had a weak tolerance for alcohol, but still, he didn’t usually drink so much that he couldn’t come home, but somehow yesterday ended up that way. This is all because of Director Ha. Ilkyung wanted to lie down on the floor and throw a tantrum.
“Noona, really, can Espers not kill Guides?”
“Why is he like this again? Would that even work?”
Ilkyung became depressed at the all-too-obvious answer. Why can’t they kill them? Espers can do everything. Couldn’t they easily kill one measly Guide? Even though he’s S-rank, a chaebol grandson, and from the family that donates the most to our Center, they can kill him, right? After getting rid of Director Ha, he should kill that quack shaman bastard next.
They say a cornered rat bites the cat—Woo Ilkyung’s crazy streak was exploding because of today’s incident!
* * *
Bullshit, what exploding crazy streak.
“Ah, shit. Did I come here for nothing?”
With the mindset of a struggling worker, he hugged the clothes to his chest and stopped in front of Director Ha’s office with a determined resolve, but he couldn’t bring himself to knock. What are you going to do after coming here? Throw the shopping bag right in his face? Then what will you say? That you’ll sue for sexual harassment? No, you could get counter-sued. Because you said something about being a eunuch first.
While Ilkyung was standing there drawing numerous thought bubbles, he heard voices from over there.
“Tell them I won’t be doing matching rate tests for the time being.”
“But Director. The Center hopes that as an S-rank Guide, you’ll become a pair with an important Esper and go out to the field…”
“I’m aware of that.”
“Then why do you say you won’t do it…”
Secretary Min trailed off. While Ilkyung, who was eavesdropping from afar, was just fidgeting his feet not knowing what to do, the footsteps were getting closer and closer.
“Ah, what should I do?”
Unintentionally, he had ended up in a strange position, standing in the hallway listening to other people’s conversations. In the current situation, he couldn’t even make excuses about having other business. Because on this 15th floor, there was only Director Ha Daehoon’s office. Here, he had to either stand like this and wait until Director Ha Daehoon came down those stairs, or quickly move his steps and head toward the other staircase.
“Secretary Min.”
Director Ha’s low voice echoed through the empty corridor. Why is his voice so nice? Even in this situation, Ilkyung found himself absurd for thinking such things.
“Since when have you been raising objections to everything I say? If I say I won’t do matching rate tests, you just need to know that I’m not doing them. Am I in a position where I need to persuade Secretary Min?”
Secretary Min flinched. It seemed he had lost his touch because the Young Master he’d known since childhood had been away from Korea for a while. Ha Daehoon didn’t have such a good personality to begin with. This Young Master didn’t abuse his power, but he knew very well that his position was superior to Secretary Min’s. Secretary Min immediately bowed his head.
“I apologize.”
“Secretary Min just needs to do the work I assign well. If you really don’t have anything to do, go suppress the rumors about me or something.”
“What? What rumors are you referring to?”
“Someone said. That I’m a eunuch.”
Secretary Min stopped in his tracks.
“It seems Secretary Min knows of different rumors. What rumors do you know? Womanizer?”
“No, Director. That’s not it…”
“Secretary Min knows all that and didn’t report anything to me—what exactly have you been doing? I’m disappointed.”
The closer Daehoon’s words sounded, the more Ilkyung realized now was not a good time and quickly turned his steps around. Ilkyung practically ran and urgently caught the elevator on the opposite side.
Ding— the sound of the elevator coming down and the doors opening could be heard. Ilkyung quickly entered the elevator and frantically pressed the close button. It felt like he was the source of the rumors. It felt like Director Ha Daehoon was going to tell Secretary Min to bring that bastard’s head right now, so Ilkyung shook his head frantically and closed the elevator doors. If he wasn’t careful, he would die first before killing the S-rank Guide.
Woo Ilkyung, who had gone up to the 15th floor like a heroic general but couldn’t even break even, came trudging back down to the 7th floor where his office was, still clutching the shopping bag.
“Where did you go?”
“Ah, just to the bathroom for a moment.”
“To the bathroom with that huge shopping bag?”
“Ah, that’s right.”
Ilkyung replied weakly to Section Chief Kang’s words and plopped down in his seat.
Something seemed seriously tangled up. That shaman bastard, I’ll make you die young! What part of this year is supposed to have great fortune! Ilkyung had such thoughts as he skimmed through the matching rate list. Since people who were newly confirmed as pairs due to good matching rates had to be excluded as general Guiding partners next time, updating the list daily was also Ilkyung’s job.
Ilkyung tried to focus on work while suppressing his wildly raging heart. While he was peacefully organizing the list like that, suddenly an announcement began echoing throughout the building.
―Anti-government forces occupy roads! Protest occurring! Announcing once more. Anti-government forces are now occupying the roads and starting a protest. Espers are asked to return to their respective positions and follow orders from above.
Everyone on the Field Support Team stopped typing on their keyboards and listened to the announcement.
“Okay, everyone heard the announcement, right? Since there’s no accurate information about the scale yet, everyone stand by at your stations. I’ll go into the meeting first, come back, and relay what was discussed.”
Team Leader Park Eunji quickly grabbed her tablet and left her seat, and the rest were now on standby. When situations suddenly arose where they had to deploy for protests or accidents like this, Ilkyung, who had to jump in last, was fated to keep standing by.
“Assistant Manager Woo, overtime again today?”
“I hope they handle it quickly and everyone comes back safely. I don’t know who’ll go though.”
Ilkyung answered Section Chief Kang’s words and let out a sigh. Since they didn’t know the scale yet, he didn’t know how late the overtime would be today, but he hoped pairs would go. Because pairs handled work and did Guiding on their own.
“Haah, I hope I don’t see Director Ha today.”
But exactly 2 hours later, Ilkyung cursed that quack shaman once more.
* * *
The anti-government forces were those who were dissatisfied with Espers and Guides being managed only by the government’s Centers. They thought the government monopolized Espers and Guides, and said that was unfair. However, if they destroyed the rules that had existed from before, it was obvious that chaos would ensue. If any of the Espers went on a rampage right now, who would take responsibility for that, and how would they control it?
The anti-government forces were composed of Espers not registered with the state and Espers who used to belong to Centers but were expelled for causing problems. The Center had strict rules about how to manage an Esper when they kept causing problems. Even if expelled, if they still possessed abilities, there was potential for problems at any time, so generally, even ability users who caused problems were managed by the Center. But if that wasn’t possible, they would seal their abilities and then expel them.
The Center’s Espers left the anti-government forces alone as long as they didn’t protest with force, just maintaining a standoff. But if a violent protest broke out, the Center’s Espers couldn’t just stand by either. That’s why suppressing such protests was always nerve-wracking and tense. Because no one knew when and where bloodshed would occur.
Fortunately, the feared bloodshed didn’t happen at today’s protest. As they were leaving the protest site, a loud ‘grumble’ sound came from somewhere. Only then did people each feel their hunger.
“Since we worked hard until late, if you have time, how about we have dinner together?”
At someone’s suggestion, everyone headed to a meat restaurant. Ilkyung was also among that group.
Ilkyung prayed and prayed again not to meet Director Ha Daehoon from afternoon to evening. Because it was awkward to see him anyway. There was the incident yesterday disguised as a kiss, and anyway, Ilkyung had snapped at him unable to control his temper, and there was also the fact that during the day he had eavesdropped on Director Ha and Secretary Min exchanging words about rumors in front of the Director’s office. While assigning Guide duties, Ilkyung prayed to all the gods—’Oh Lord, oh Buddha, oh Allah’—please don’t let him run into Director Ha Daehoon.
