There was nothing to be embarrassed about. It was fine, so he could confess honestly. Yoon Minoh chattered away like a fish in water. This was because he had been inwardly rooting for Yeo Dowoon’s impure tastes.
Watching his heated reaction to his own chest muscles brought him such satisfaction that a smile naturally formed on his face.
Moreover, the plump chest with thick muscles built up on it was a special area he had sculpted specifically to physically appeal to him in the first place.
So if he had responded indifferently, he might have felt even more disappointed instead.
“……Crazy bastard.”
Yeo Dowoon’s throat bobbed greatly as he answered like that. His Adam’s apple, just the right size to put in one’s mouth and roll around, moved up and down. Soon he let out a bitter laugh.
“Would I even be human if I coveted a twenty-year-old’s chest?”
As he muttered self-deprecatingly, Yoon Minoh belatedly realized his mistake. With a “Huh?” he examined Yeo Dowoon’s expression and had no choice but to taste bitter defeat.
Yeo Dowoon sincerely advised him.
“You have to protect your own body.”
“No? I don’t need to protect it……”
“I’ll protect you too, but if you don’t protect yourself, it’s a useless effort. Your chest…, haa. I understand your chest is pretty, but don’t get too hung up on it.”
Damn it. Anyone watching would think a village schoolmaster had arrived. Yoon Minoh wrinkled his brow terribly at Yeo Dowoon’s lofty teachings. Even if it was well-intentioned advice, he couldn’t help feeling displeased.
“If you’re going to the hospital today, get counseling for split personality too. Going back and forth like this, it’s really confusing me to death.”
One day like an adult, one day like garbage. Sometimes thinking maturely, sometimes loafing around like a wastrel. Yeo Dowoon was a person impossible to describe in one line. His moodiness was like a rollercoaster.
“Being too unreasonable is also a sin.”
“Nice self-introduction.”
As he grumbled irritably, Yeo Dowoon responded as if uninterested.
Leaving Yoon Minoh behind, he got out of the car and crossed the parking lot filled with musty smells with quick steps. The sound of whining that he couldn’t wait even a moment echoed like an echo.
The indifferent feet that had been striking the asphalt floor stopped for an instant, and Yeo Dowoon killed time as if waiting for Yoon Minoh to arrive.
“Hyung!”
Yoon Minoh, who had rushed over in a hurry, vigorously embraced his back. Yeo Dowoon, who bumped into his steel-bar-like solid chest, groaned, “Ugh.” Even after getting smacked on the back of his head, Yoon Minoh lifted the corners of his mouth in a grin.
“Hyung, you actually like me, don’t you?”
The way he asked cheerfully seemed soaked in joy.
“At least you don’t hate me, right?”
Now it was too tiresome to even say he disliked him, so Yeo Dowoon didn’t respond and walked ahead of him.
***
May 2nd. A season that seemed like spring had fully arrived yet the chilly air had not yet dissipated. A season when an itchy wind blew, resembling somewhere between warm and cold air.
—Expected success rate 48.5%
Sitting on a bench, Yeo Dowoon read and reread the middle paragraph of the operation plan. The sheets of paper made of several layers crumpled with a rustle in his hands.
He had printed out the file contained in the external hard drive Kwon Jeonghoo had given him, but he didn’t want to look at it anymore. This was because what the black letters meant was far from ordinary.
—If the second attempt fails, Delta’s personnel reduction and reorganization will be set as a prerequisite.
Even though he had confirmed the content with his own eyes, he couldn’t believe it. It was called reduction to sound good, but wasn’t it actually meaning they’d exile people to the cleanup crew rather than freely releasing them?
Let’s pause here for a moment and judge with common sense.
The base also wouldn’t want to waste the abilities of S-class Espers, so ultimately it was clear it would become a token punishment for show. They would pick out one person who had been the biggest eyesore as an example, and that target would very likely be him.
Especially if this clause was by Kwon Hyeokun’s order, the answer was practically already predetermined.
‘Kwon Hyeokun. This sneaky bastard.’
Yeo Dowoon thought as he tossed the round bundle of paper up in the air and caught it.
‘Isn’t this too obvious?’
The nasty intention to screw him over was blatantly revealed from this scrap of paper.
He was about to tear it to shreds but held back out of consideration for Kwon Jeonghoo. This was because it was immediately obvious this was a proposal Jeonghoo had written while holding his head between the Secretary General and himself.
—In the event that Delta-affiliated Espers are seconded to other departments, a temporary supervisor shall accompany them for a minimum of 1 month to a maximum of 3 months.
The special clause added above the personnel reduction section was able to prevent Yeo Dowoon’s anger.
No matter how much the base tried to intimidate him, the fact that he always had a reliable support to lean on oozed from the letters themselves.
“Kwon Jeonghoo……”
Even though he didn’t want to admit it, the fact that this man with this name was supporting his back came to him more tangibly. Even if he ended up working in the cleanup crew for up to three months, a firm belief surged that he wouldn’t be alone.
A temporary supervisor. Wasn’t this just openly stating that he himself would accompany him?
Yeo Dowoon laughed weakly.
Still, he didn’t agree with the operation content. Moreover, he had completely erased the items related to Guides from his memory. It seemed more convenient for him to treat it as if the operation didn’t exist at all.
Restructuring defense personnel into combat personnel to attack the Sirens. In all my life, this is the first time I’ve heard such dog-shit nonsense. There wasn’t even a proper reason specified.
“We’ll just screw up the operation trying to protect the Guides.”
In a situation where even risking their lives jumping into the operation wouldn’t be enough, if they had to protect others’ lives too, who would proceed with the operation with peace of mind? Yeo Dowoon doubted whether the Esper base had really approved this thinking it was an actual operation plan.
If it was a proposal they’d carelessly permitted without much thought, it wasn’t too late yet, so he wanted to recommend correcting it. The residents of the Gate area wouldn’t want this kind of operation either.
The coastal Gate that occurred in Incheon Yeongjongdo had started around the time when the late cold snap was raging, and they were still struggling with the situation.
To urgently restore Yeongjongdo, which had been thrown into chaos by the sudden appearance of monster hordes, the Esper base hastily put together the so-called <Atlantis> Project.
Currently, a total of two types of monsters had appeared: parasitic monsters that had coiled around marine life, and Sirens, the boatman’s nemesis.
“Why did two troublesome bastards have to stick together… It’s sickening to watch.”
Yeo Dowoon added after a light whistle.
It would be cleanly finished if they found the Gate’s origin point and blew it up, but the process of approaching that damn Gate would be very far from smooth.
Since the Sirens were standing guard like neighborhood bullies, if they weren’t careful, it would inevitably become a repeat of the first attempt.
Even if S-class Espers joined forces and pushed through, the success rate seemed to be less than half, yet they wanted to insert Guides here.
Yeo Dowoon spat out his irritation again. He wondered if this was truly a plan that could be presented with a sound mind.
“Just whose mouth did this plan come from……”
No matter how much he thought about it, it didn’t seem like an operation Kwon Jeonghoo had framed. Rather, the hypothesis that it was an operation that popped out of Kwon Hyeokun’s head was more persuasive if anything. Yeo Dowoon muttered without reserve.
“It’s not like his head is made of rocks.”
As he had been emphasizing all along, he wasn’t stubbornly refusing operations with Guides because he underestimated their abilities.
However, he believed that each person’s domain definitely existed.
Delta’s principle was the right person in the right place. A team that had taken on too heavy a mission to conduct operations based on a spirit of challenge.
He hoped they wouldn’t use Delta for the purpose of giving Guides field-realistic combat training. Setting that aside, Yeo Dowoon ruminated on Yeongjongdo’s current situation and formulated his own plan.
‘Whatever the reason and basis, I can’t accept an operation accompanying Guides.’
It couldn’t be done even if it was dangerous. Parasitic monsters borrowing the shells of large predators were dozens of times more aggressive than ordinary coastal monsters.
The Sirens that appeared with them were so cunning and wicked that just imagining them in his head was enough to make him shudder with rage.
“Ah…, imagining it makes me nauseous.”
So the order to suppress the Gate and return together with Guides was no different from nonsense asking him to pluck stars from the sky.
“Let’s rest, rest……”
He was sitting on a bench sprawled out, enjoying a leisurely rest.
“Hyung! Why are you here? If you went outside, you should have told me!”
Yoon Minoh, dressed in functional training clothes that stuck tightly to his skin, came running over shouting. The epitome of an Esper’s appearance.
“I was startled thinking you’d disappeared.”
Just a moment ago, he had thrown a tantrum about going into a single-person changing room together, but he had been kicked out after getting kicked hard behind his knee.
Annoyed, he had changed clothes in one side of the corridor regardless of whether there were CCTVs or not, but when Yeo Dowoon, who had gone into the changing room, had evaporated like water vapor, a dejected sadness rushed over him.
Wondering if perhaps he had only come to work together and left him behind.
“And what’s with the difference in our outfits?”
“Let’s go since you’re out.”
“Go where? Answer first before we go. Why didn’t you change your clothes, hyung?”
After searching thoroughly and finally finding him, Yoon Minoh interrogated him with hawk eyes. He had properly put on the full-body training uniform he was issued, but Yeo Dowoon looked very comfortable and simply dressed.
