“Monsters can’t evade ability detection. So they’re either all gathered in some corner we haven’t searched yet, or this is a Gate that opens under completely different conditions….”
“Have you ever cleared a Gate like that?”
“The first kind, yes. That one’s actually easier. You just have to find where they’re hiding. But the problem is that this one is more likely to be the second kind.”
“Why?”
“We haven’t seen a single Special Abilities Agency Gate strategy team yet.”
A full day had passed. The Special Abilities Agency would have registered the Gate the moment it formed, and by now, the first strategy team should have already entered and swept through the entire Gate at least once. Special Gates in particular always had at least one Esper specialized in rapidly assessing Gate environments sent along with the team.
If things had proceeded normally, the two of them should have come across at least some small trace of them during their thorough search of the Gate interior today.
Hae-il finished explaining the Special Abilities Agency’s protocol and added:
“So there’s another reason the Special Abilities Agency couldn’t enter either. There must be a different condition needed to find the entrance and open the door. Whether from the outside, or the inside.”
Having to find that condition without a single lead was a daunting prospect. He didn’t know the exact details, but if they hadn’t found it from the outside in over 24 hours, it wasn’t going to be easy from the inside either.
Fortunately, thanks to Hae-il’s ability, water wasn’t a concern — but food was the problem. Not only had they fallen into the Gate empty-handed, it didn’t seem like there was anything to scavenge in here either. All around them were nothing but crumbled debris — not a single animal or plant in sight.
Both of them could manage roughly two weeks on water alone without food, but there was no way of knowing how long it would take to open the door to a Gate this unusual.
“Then there’s no choice but to figure out that condition somehow.”
Moon Woo-shin summed up the situation in a single line and squeezed their joined hands once, firmly. Then he let go immediately.
The moment contact broke, the guiding that had been flowing like a gentle spring breeze cut off in an instant. The air around him suddenly felt a little more desolate.
Hae-il found himself glancing sideways without thinking.
Guiding… I can’t ask for just a little more, can I.
The thought swept through his mind before he could catch it, and a faint echo of something close to defeat — self-loathing — quietly raised its head again.
Either way, once they got out of here, he’d have to cut it off again.
In the past, at least they’d been on the same side. Now they were enemies. Enemies who were only cooperating briefly in order to survive.
The moment he let his guard down and leaned on his guiding to get through this — that same guiding might be what caused him to ruin the mission.
Only when absolutely necessary. As little as possible.
Deliberately reinforcing that reality with extra firmness, Hae-il clenched his empty hand tight, as if steadying a resolve that kept trying to go slack.
“Let’s get moving.”
Moon Woo-shin stood up first and brushed off his clothes. The suit that was always neatly pressed had become thoroughly wrinkled from two days of rough going. It should have looked awkward on him — the opposite of his usual polished appearance — yet somehow it suited him naturally, as though it had been styled that way on purpose.
Hae-il ran a hand through his own hair for no particular reason and moved to walk beside him. At the same time, as if testing the body now full of guiding, he drew water out in a thin, long shape and extended it far into the distance.
“We’re going all the way to the end of the Gate first, right?”
“We have to. Need to confirm it ourselves, and find the clearing conditions.”
He nodded in easy agreement.
The two of them began walking side by side again, maintaining a reasonable distance.
The entire time they walked, Hae-il kept the gap consciously, never releasing the hand he kept clenched at his side.
***
They reached the end of the Gate the following evening. The Gate was long vertically, but not particularly wide horizontally. At normal speed, sweeping a Gate of this size entirely wouldn’t have taken more than a few days — but since neither of them was in peak condition, moving slowly was unavoidable.
The slower pace meant a more thorough search of every corner —
“How is there literally nothing here?”
Not a single unusual trace worth using as a lead. Truly nothing. And of course, no sign of ordinary monsters either.
It seemed like the only things that existed inside this Gate were barren ground and the debris that had been sucked in and fallen from outside.
Hae-il dropped down to sit on the ground and stared ahead at the wall in front of him as if glaring at it.
The one thing that had at least let them guess this was the end — was this wall.
The wall looked as though the ground had simply been running along before abruptly changing direction and shooting upward, soaring into the sky with no visible top. Walking along it for a long stretch, all that continued on both sides was the same brown wall, with no end visible in either direction. The fact that it was a dead end in every sense confirmed that this was indeed the boundary of the Gate.
Hae-il craned his head back to look up at the towering wall, then let his gaze drift sideways.
Moon Woo-shin, standing right beside him, was also facing the wall, lost in thought.
“Should we just try breaking through it?”
“Right now?”
“Yes.”
Acting without any plan in a Gate was something to avoid — but at this point, they genuinely needed to try something.
“There’s been nothing all the way here, so there might be something on the other side of the wall.”
“We should at least confirm a minimum level of safety before attempting anything.”
“When do we ever get to confirm everything before acting? We couldn’t be certain we’d confirmed it properly anyway. We just need to try something, anything.”
“So your plan is to launch a direct attack, right now, in the middle of the night. If something suddenly comes at us, we fight all night?”
“That’s even better. Whether it’s a monster or a lead — if it comes out on its own, we can deal with it quickly and get out.”
Moon Woo-shin let out a short, humorless laugh and looked down at him. Several seconds of that flat, unblinking gaze followed without a word.
Hae-il had been looking back without much thought, but as the quiet stretched on, he gradually found it harder to hold the eye contact. He already had a habit of not looking Moon Woo-shin directly in the eyes — consciously angling his gaze or looking slightly downward — but for some reason, right now even that felt difficult.
In the end, unable to hold out any longer, he spoke first.
“…What?”
“You haven’t even properly absorbed radiation guiding yet, and you think you can use your ability at full capacity?”
Moon Woo-shin reached down from above and pressed firmly on Hae-il’s shoulder. Through that point of contact, a dense, concentrated guiding seeped in.
Oh. So he had been doing radiation guiding just now.
He hadn’t felt it at all. That fact was something of a shock. Even so — had his condition really been that far gone?
“Don’t go starting trouble without a plan. Find somewhere to rest. Whatever it is, deal with it tomorrow morning.”
He lifted his hand away quickly, then turned around to survey the area. As though looking for a place to shelter for the night.
Following that movement, Hae-il rose to his feet and began looking for a resting spot without complaint. Though his actions were composed, his thoughts were a little more tangled.
Granted, his condition not being normal was one thing — but Moon Woo-shin had noticed it before he himself did, and was acting like he was looking out for him? They weren’t even Team Leader and team member anymore.
Actually — if anything, back when he was on his team, Moon Woo-shin had responded more sharply whenever their opinions diverged like this.
Registering that fact anew gave him an odd feeling.
It’s probably just because getting out of here alive is the priority.
Just like how Hae-il had no choice but to accept his guiding, at least while they were inside the Gate.
Hae-il clenched his empty hand shut again and pushed himself to his feet.
“So once we wake up, we start by trying to break through that wall. After that….”
He was about to list out a few things he’d been thinking through — when he stopped mid-sentence.
Something had caught at the far-reaching edge of the ability he’d spread along the wall just in case. It was the first time anything like this had happened since they entered the Gate.
Whatever the unknown thing was, it was closing in fast, headed straight for them.
“What is it?”
Moon Woo-shin, reading the shift in his expression, sharpened into a guarded stance and scanned ahead.
The fact that he hadn’t sensed it himself meant it wasn’t a monster.
