Chapter 4
The vast amount of guiding energy continued to pour out.
Perhaps it made him feel good? Geonwoo’s face relaxed into a languid expression.
Jaehee took in the sight of Geonwoo. Without saying a word, he simply gazed at him. The trembling of his lips grew more intense, and tears fell without pause. Emotions welled up, and his heart ached painfully.
And amid all that, expectation gradually rose.
‘I want to see Geonwoo alive… Geonwoo looking at me…’
Such desire began to creep in. Even if it was for the last time, just once… he wanted to see Geonwoo like this.
Perhaps his desperate wish came true. Geonwoo’s eyes slowly opened. Jaehee’s heart pounded fearfully. Just as he had always dreamed. Just as he had desperately wished. The image of Geonwoo always dying with closed eyes was breaking.
Afraid that Geonwoo might disappear if he blinked, Jaehee took in every bit of Geonwoo without even blinking. He didn’t want to miss a single moment.
‘If this is a dream, I hope it never ends… If it’s a hallucination… I wish to be trapped in it…’
Please…
Jaehee silently begged over and over. For Geonwoo’s final moments to be erased from his mind. For this current image to wrap over that one. He wished desperately.
Geonwoo, with his eyes open, stared blankly at Jaehee. His eyes were hazily unfocused from the excessive guiding energy. Nevertheless, instinctively, he followed Jaehee with his gaze as Jaehee poured out guiding energy.
While Jaehee was captivated by that gaze, Geonwoo’s low, deep voice resonated in his ear.
“…Guide…nim…”
His voice was slightly slurred from the guiding, but it was definitely that familiar voice. It was also the voice he had longed for.
“…Why… are you crying…?”
At the following question, Jaehee’s face finally crumpled. It was Geonwoo. It was definitely Geonwoo’s voice. Geonwoo was asking why he was crying. At that question, Jaehee’s upper body trembled, and his sadness burst forth.
‘If it’s like this, if I can see you like this… I don’t mind being drugged for the rest of my life…’
That was Jaehee’s true feeling. Even if he was trapped in this hallucination, if he could continue to see Geonwoo like this, that’s what he wanted.
But knowing that couldn’t be, Jaehee just looked at Geonwoo and cried. Just as suddenly as it appeared, this hallucination would suddenly disappear when it broke. This fleeting moment that he couldn’t hold onto felt so sad.
Jaehee continued to cry sorrowfully. Then, suddenly, a gentle hand touched his face. A familiar touch. It was Geonwoo’s hand. Intoxicated by the guiding, Geonwoo had instinctively reached out to Jaehee.
“…Ah!”
At that touch, Jaehee’s eyes widened. A short, startled moan escaped, and Jaehee stepped back in surprise.
It wasn’t Geonwoo’s touch that surprised him. Though faint, it was the vivid sensation of an esper’s wavelength that startled him. The small tingling wavelength felt so real. So without realizing it, he reflexively avoided Geonwoo’s hand.
“…Guide…nim…?”
But Jaehee wasn’t the only one surprised by the physical contact. Geonwoo was just as startled.
The pleasant feeling that had been surrounding him flowed directly into him when he touched Jaehee. Geonwoo, experiencing guiding for the first time, didn’t know what it was and just reached out again.
He wanted to feel it again.
Geonwoo’s large hand touched Jaehee again. As if telling him not to move away, Geonwoo gently wrapped Jaehee’s hand in his large one. In that state, he carefully pulled Jaehee toward himself. The closer Jaehee came, the more languid Geonwoo’s expression became.
Conversely, Jaehee grew more and more confused. Following the wavelength, even the sensation of Geonwoo’s hand firmly holding his own felt too real. Even Geonwoo’s body temperature.
“Guide…nim…”
Only then did strange points begin to register.
‘Guide-nim?’
Geonwoo kept calling him that. But Geonwoo didn’t usually call him that. He called him ‘hyung,’ ‘Jaehee hyung,’ and sometimes in bed, ‘Jaehee-ya.’ Guide-nim?
‘…Just like… when we first met…’
Realizing this, his vision, obscured by sadness, peeled away one layer.
Come to think of it, Geonwoo’s appearance was different too. The Geonwoo before him looked much younger. And he was smaller than Jaehee remembered. The S-class esper’s physical enhancement ability was beyond imagination, making Geonwoo grow to the point where Jaehee, of average height, seemed tiny in comparison, but the Geonwoo before him, though taller than Jaehee, wasn’t that big.
It was as if he was facing the 20-year-old, fresh-faced Geonwoo who had just entered the Center, before he had manifested as an esper.
‘What… is this…?’
Only then could Jaehee properly see his own hand held by Geonwoo. Distracted by Geonwoo’s appearance, he hadn’t noticed, but his hand was completely clean, without a single needle mark.
The same was true for his body. Due to continuous treatments and self-harm, his body had certainly been damaged. He had been so gaunt that only bones and skin remained. How could it be this intact now…
‘A dream? A hallucination?’
If not for the vivid sensations, Jaehee would definitely have thought he was dreaming of the past. But the sensations were too clear. Almost like reality.
‘Reality…? That’s impossible…’
It couldn’t be.
Jaehee couldn’t understand what was happening. He was just confused. The current situation, where reality and hallucination, past and present were all mixed together, was dizzying.
So he just looked at Geonwoo. As if seeking answers, he could only stare. Jaehee, not knowing how to handle this familiar yet unfamiliar feeling, stood rigidly frozen.
While Jaehee was filled with confusion, Geonwoo continued to pull him closer. Very slowly, carefully, toward himself.
Geonwoo felt strangely good as Jaehee got closer to him. So, without even realizing what he was doing, he guided Jaehee’s hand to his cheek. This made him feel even better as his body melted languidly.
Geonwoo added a small whimper.
“Guide-nim… I don’t know what this is… but it feels so good… It feels even better when you touch me…”
It was a mumble induced by instinct. Direct guiding energy was being transmitted through Jaehee’s hand touching his hand and cheek. Geonwoo’s eyes, intoxicated by the excessive guiding, took on a dreamy light and slowly closed again. As if falling asleep, even his breathing settled peacefully.
Seeing Geonwoo like this, feeling him, Jaehee smiled slightly. Unlike his painfully contorted eyes, Jaehee’s lips were smiling with joy.
He wished that the peaceful-looking Geonwoo, this current situation, was simply reality. Even though he didn’t know why his senses were screaming that this place was real, he wanted it to be true.
Even if he was feeling this way because he had gone mad, he was just so happy to have Geonwoo alive before him.
Jaehee continued to not fully accept that the current situation was reality. But that denial didn’t last long. Many sensations followed one after another, telling him to accept that this was reality.
It was the same now.
“Ah!”
Someone suddenly grabbed Jaehee’s wrist from behind and pulled him forcefully. Jaehee staggered away from Geonwoo, pulled by the strong force.
And he was surprised. From his grabbed wrist, he felt an esper’s wavelength completely different from what he had felt from Geonwoo moments ago—a rough and massive wavelength.
Without even having time to calm his surprised heart, Jaehee immediately turned around. Behind him, several Center employees had entered—when, he didn’t know. Their expressions were filled with bewilderment, as if they had all rushed in at the noisy warning sound of the guiding machine.
But they weren’t the ones who had grabbed Jaehee.
Behind him,
“Lee Jaehee, are you crazy? Stop guiding right now!”
It was Kang Dohyun, looking down at him with his brows tightly furrowed. The esper who had lost his leg in a gate long ago and left the Center. The friend who had taken care of Jaehee the most when he first entered the Center and knew nothing—he was there.
“…Kang…Do, hyun…?”
Jaehee, surprised, stammered Dohyun’s name. But Dohyun, full of anger, didn’t wait for Jaehee to finish.
“Can’t you hear me saying to stop guiding!”
Dohyun grabbed Jaehee’s shoulders firmly and pulled him toward himself, shouting. He seemed very angry, as Jaehee felt strong pain where Dohyun was grabbing him.
That wasn’t all. He could also vividly feel Dohyun’s body absorbing the tangled, rough wavelength of the esper and the guiding energy.
Sensations that continued to awaken him to reality. And Dohyun’s fierce gaze pouring down from above. Startled, Jaehee stopped the remote guiding.
‘What’s going on…?’
Kang Dohyun standing intact before his eyes? And the sensations he just felt were definitely… real.
‘…Then, this is…’
What is this…?
But Jaehee couldn’t continue his thoughts.
Dohyun didn’t leave him be.
