Almost all SS-class espers and guides had arrived at the conference room. Among the seats prepared for each country, Kim Haewon’s seat was in the center. The espers deployed to the Pamundong incident seemed to be arranged in the middle. Gabriel, whose face I’d seen a few times, waved her hand in greeting.
{Haewon, Garam!}
I awkwardly accepted the greeting with a nod and sat down. Fortunately, the seats by country were separated, but making that arrangement meaningless, I could feel everyone’s gazes turning toward me and Kim Haewon. It felt like being a zoo monkey, but Kim Haewon ignored it as if accustomed to it.
He seated me and then put the ring he’d brought into the device in the very center of the conference room. Thanks to his action, all the gazes that had been pouring on me shifted to the ring.
{It’s been a while. Sealing an ability itself in a crystal like that.}
Josef Böll from Germany narrowed his eyes. Like Nam Ihyeon, he was an esper who used fire. Unlike his pale skin, his red pupils were impressive. Taking over his crisp words was Ahmet Hasan from Turkey.
{It’s childish, but traditional methods are the ones that catch you off guard.}
Ahmet Hasan examined the ring sharply. He was an esper who used sand, and was more interested in research than esper activities. He continued while checking the real-time data being output by the device containing the ring.
{No new or special technology was used. It seems they used the old method as is. However, the amount of energy is too high. It’s comparable to the full power energy of an average SS-class esper.}
{So Hasan’s saying the ability itself is special, but the energy amount itself is overwhelming?}
At Emily’s question, Hasan nodded. Gabriel clapped a few times to refresh the heavy atmosphere in the conference room.
{Let’s not talk too specifically yet. There are still countries that haven’t arrived.}
I looked at the empty seats. Six seats were empty, including Akutagawa Yu and his guide. The countries that hadn’t arrived yet were Italy and Russia.
“Is today’s meeting agenda about how to handle that ring?”
“Which country will keep the ring will be discussed by the Diplomatic Management Bureau. Our main agenda is this.”
Kim Haewon showed me the contents organized on his tablet PC. The agendas were the handling of Pamundong and MK, and matching the countries of espers who would be dispatched when new gates appeared. Everything was related to combat.
However, rather than a strategic battle about how to win, it seemed like part of a diplomatic battle. Looking at Kim Haewon’s notes, the position of Korea, America, and Spain was that excessive work had been poured on the espers deployed to Pamundong.
Kim Haewon had already organized how to form teams, distribution according to ability levels, and even efficient movement routes. A yawn came out naturally at content that became boring just from looking at it.
I picked up the tablet PC’s pen and wrote letters. All the espers had good hearing so I couldn’t carelessly speak out loud.
You should have shown me the agenda in advance. This is really boring
“I told you it wouldn’t be fun.”
Wake me up if I doze off…
Kim Haewon nodded. I wondered what I would write and looked at the side of his face as he looked at the tablet PC. His face, strangely devoid of laughter, was fascinating. Kim Haewon looked at me as if feeling my gaze. I wrote crooked letters while maintaining eye contact with him and tapped the tablet PC.
But how long are we going to hold hands?
Kim Haewon took the pen from my hand and wrote an answer below my letters.
Until the meeting ends. It’s for protection
“Once it’s over, you won’t get any.”
When I spoke quite firmly, Kim Haewon laughed quietly. The moment Kim Haewon laughed with a “pfft,” all the gazes in the conference room touched Kim Haewon and fell away. Their gazes were as if they’d seen something they shouldn’t have. Some people blinked as if in disbelief.
{I told you. Haewon cares tremendously. About his pair guide.}
Gabriel spoke lightly like a joke. However, no one easily responded to her words. Alma Green from South Africa propped her chin and looked at me for a while before continuing.
{He looks like that? He’s a bit like a cat. A small cat.}
Alma Green’s eye color was a mystical emerald. When she made her pupils shine and imitated a cat’s meow saying ‘meow,’ I suddenly thought of the author HatefulCat.
She, as the author, would know what everyone in this room was thinking. What would she have written in the next content? In this boring meeting where jokes and sincerity mixed and went back and forth, who was hiding their dark intentions? My eyes touched and fell away from the faces of people speaking in different languages.
There were scary-looking impressions, and people smiling softly. There was also a disgusting person who sent me a wink. Still, I could just let it all pass. It was because of Kim Haewon’s hand firmly holding my left hand.
‘What he said about it being for protection really does seem to have an effect.’
I laughed with a “pfft” and moved my fingers on Kim Haewon’s hand as if playing piano. Kim Haewon just firmly held my hand and then released it.
* * *
“Wow, really the worst!”
I said while collapsing onto the sofa. The meeting went on for three hours. Because there were many people, there were many words coming out here and there. People who didn’t participate in the Pamundong incident had many questions, and people who participated had many grievances.
If Kim Haewon didn’t cut them off at the right timing, they would just list out what they wanted to say. I dozed off slightly in the middle. Kim Haewon didn’t wake me and just continued the meeting while letting me lean on his shoulder.
However, I woke up quickly at the loud voices and attended the meeting while dozing off like a sick chicken. We couldn’t even bring up the agenda about how to handle Pamundong and MK, what kind of attack we should make.
“Why do they only talk about such useless things? Is it always like that?”
“Full meetings are usually like that. There’s no nutritional value, but since it’s the principle to discuss and decide together, there’s nothing we can do.”
“Still, shouldn’t we talk about combat? Everyone just talked about how hard their country has it, and where was that place earlier that said their national happiness index dropped? Russia? I really thought he was crazy.”
“The government probably told them to get out of dangerous situations as much as possible. In emergency situations like this, espers are no different from diplomatic corps representing each country’s interests.”
Kim Haewon spoke as if not surprised. He sat on the opposite sofa and was organizing today’s agendas in order.
Kim Haewon and I were assigned the same room. It was the same for other espers and guides. Since we didn’t know when gates might open, it meant we should have sufficient guiding time. It wasn’t an atmosphere where I could raise objections, so I kept my mouth shut tight. I watched Kim Haewon working then awkwardly opened my mouth.
“So… everyone except us does it all the way?”
“What do you mean?”
Kim Haewon raised his head and looked at me. I continued with a reddened face.
“Ah, just understand roughly.”
“How can I understand when you’ve left out all the important words?”
“Th-that… I mean the guiding method. There are various kinds, right? Did everyone… go all the way?”
I continued with my face turning bright red. Kim Haewon reacted briefly with “Ah,” then turned his gaze to the tablet PC.
“I don’t know because I’m not interested. They’ll do as they please.”
At Kim Haewon’s indifferent tone, I just nodded. Does not being interested mean he doesn’t care what kind of guiding method it is? Or does it mean he’s not interested in other people’s guiding? Perhaps it could be both. Looking at his face, it was utterly ascetic.
‘Right. This is better than a rotten pepper anyway.’
With a much more relaxed mind, I watched his face as he worked. Lounging around like this watching Kim Haewon seemed more fun than the meeting that ran for three hours.
After watching him concentrate for a while, I yawned long. It seemed like me resting well would help him. Since my condition was also important for good guiding. I stood up from my seat and stretched here and there while continuing.
“I’ll wash up first.”
Kim Haewon raised his gaze, perhaps because of my bustling movements. I gestured as if telling him to finish his work and examined the things brought from the Esper Association. Since the Association had prepared everything including clothes to change into and underwear, I could just use those.
The clothes were dark brown or black like the combat uniform. The underwear was the same. All clothes had the Esper Association logo and country initials written small. In our case, it was KR.
“They even engrave it on underwear. Terrible people.”
I clicked my tongue at the Association logo engraved small on the edge of the boxer shorts. Still, I thought it was somewhere within the range that didn’t ruin the design. In the earlier meeting, SS-class espers were no different from representatives of each country. In that context, I should be thankful that combat uniforms didn’t have national flags printed on them by country.
I gathered my share of underwear and training clothes and stood up, when I felt Kim Haewon’s gaze.
“What? Are you uncomfortable? Do you want to wash first? No, you looked busy so I was going to wash up first.”
I mumbled excuses. Kim Haewon quietly scanned me up and down then continued.
“Park Garam-ssi has too little awareness in that aspect.”
“What? What do you mean…”
Kim Haewon withdrew his gaze while saying.
“Never mind. Go wash up first.”
I just scratched my chin for no reason and turned around. I looked back several times, but my gaze didn’t meet Kim Haewon’s.
