Espers alone were extremely rare, but guides were even fewer in number than such Espers. Moreover, guides were indispensable to Espers. Espers who didn’t receive guiding grew closer to rampage the more they used their abilities.
Before guides appeared, Espers were another name for disaster.
The world was split into twelve continents due to natural disasters, and new borders were created for each continent. Each of the twelve newly formed countries adopted names from ‘January’ through ‘December.’ Even after the new system had somewhat settled, the world remained very chaotic for a long time through a period when various races, cultures, and religions mixed. That’s when beings capable of wielding strange abilities appeared—Espers. People who suddenly awakened abilities tried their best to do good deeds. However, Esper abilities were like trains without brakes—the more they were used, the more they would rush forward without knowing limits and eventually rampage.
Espers who initially played active roles in rebuilding the ruined world quickly became burdens. No, they were closer to time bombs that could explode at any moment. It was such an ominous period that in places like the January Continent, rumors poured out daily of the awakened’s families being stoned to death.
If public opinion had deteriorated as it was, Espers might have been killed as soon as they appeared. However, at the rampage scene of a certain Esper, someone who calmed him down appeared, opening a new phase.
It was the appearance of guides.
Unlike Espers, they couldn’t handle water and fire, nor did they possess superior physical strength, nor did they have mental abilities like psychometry. But guides could use a power called guiding.
Guiding worked only on Espers and was the only power that relieved their pain and prevented rampage.
However, unlike Espers, guides possessed power that wasn’t outwardly prominent, making it difficult to secure sufficient personnel. Even Espers couldn’t know someone was a guide until direct contact, so their existence was inevitably rare.
Thus, unless they met an Esper, there was no opportunity for guiding ability to manifest, so there were likely many in the population who lived ‘not knowing’ they were guides.
Therefore, nearly all discovered guides belonged to the Esper Union. Entering Northern Light, which guaranteed welfare, safety, and all kinds of benefits as a guide, was the best choice. Guides could calm and heal Espers, but they themselves had no power to protect themselves.
The Esper Union guaranteed guides daily life and safety, and in return asked for guiding of affiliated Espers.
Thus, Northern Light’s Espers were provided with periodic guiding, and Union members poured their power into rebuilding the world.
The Esper Union, Northern Light, was the only legitimate channel for receiving guiding. So Espers lined up to register with the Union just to survive. Naturally, securing guides became one of Northern Light’s top priorities, and they had a guide-friendly system with various welfare and preferential policies for guides.
In fact, it was safe to say there were no guide safe zones outside Northern Light.
Especially from the November Continent where the harsh season of winter resided to the February Continent, it was no different from lawless territory, so guides born there were bound to be dragged into the underworld without anyone knowing.
The four continents collectively called ‘Winter Continents’ were known as hotbeds of all kinds of crimes, even aside from frequent guide kidnapping incidents. Since there wasn’t enough manpower to prevent everything happening in that lawless territory, the Esper Union, which could be called the current system’s central government, was plagued with headaches, unable to do this or that.
The drug distributor arrested this time was also presumed to have come from the November Continent.
“I heard you contributed greatly to this arrest. The investigation department is determined to take you, saying an incredible rookie has arrived.”
“It was thanks to my sense of smell.”
Chris answered modestly.
“I heard your observation skills also played a part?”
Anong, who always guarded the third-floor entrance to the inner building, was interested in gossip and quite chatty. Having heard that Chris had achieved great merit in an operation for practical training, she had been waiting to hear the detailed story from him.
Originally, Espers tended to get excited before meetings with guides, so their mouths became loose with just a little prodding.
But the man before her was as stiff as a stone sculpture.
“Who’s assigned today?”
Well, even if he looked calm on the outside, the essence of the Esper species was ultimately bitches in heat for guides. Anong was no different.
“Just a moment. Hmm. The cycle hasn’t changed yet, so it’s someone named Luca.”
Chris, who had turned on his terminal to check the guiding schedule, answered.
Northern Light’s Esper-guide matching changed at regular intervals. This was to prevent Espers from committing crimes by becoming obsessed with one guide.
Chris had learned this fact through Northern Light’s onboarding curriculum.
It was around that time that he encountered a famous interview with Rosenhower, co-founder and former CEO of the Esper Union, Northern Light.
[Guides are not accessories of Espers but partners. If we cannot understand that fact, it will be difficult for us to move toward coexistence.]
Since these were the words of Rosenhower, who survived an era when Espers rampaged and turned into disasters, the interview penetrated public perception with weighty resonance. This soon became Northern Light’s fundamental tone.
Guides are Espers’ partners.
“Ah, that guy who looks like cotton candy? He’s C-rank so I’ve never met him—how was the guiding?”
Anong was an S-rank Esper and always activated her abilities, so she would naturally meet guides of the highest ranks counted on one hand even in the association. So it wasn’t strange that she hadn’t met lower-ranked guides.
“I’m not sure.”
“Seeing how indifferent you are, you two don’t seem to match well.”
Although it was neither visible to the eye nor countable by hand, guides and Espers instinctively realized how compatible they were with each other.
One guiding session was enough to gauge that degree numerically.
The better the match with a partner, the higher the guiding efficiency. To the point where guiding from a well-matched C-rank guide was far better than guiding from a poorly matched A-rank guide.
Some romantics called this fate. And those as rather caustic as Anong called it ‘an Esper’s leash.’ The moment an Esper met that one perfectly matching guide, they became bound to them.
Anong, about to say something more, stopped and turned her head. As the ivy that had been naturally positioned where her gaze reached withdrew, a door was revealed.
A guide in white clothes was waiting. An ordinary person who had made a ‘vow’ to a mental-type Esper.
“Have a good time.”
Behind the brightly smiling Anong, trees swayed as if greeting. It was indoors without a breath of wind.
The guide put something like a metal bracelet on Chris’s hand. Without this, he couldn’t move a single step in the inner building. Chris was soon guided to a meeting room. As he waited quietly, the door across opened and the guide appeared.
“Hello.”
“It’s been a while.”
Luca, whom Anong had described as looking like cotton candy, was certainly a handsome man with a soft appearance. Since Chris had never held any particular impression of Luca’s appearance until hearing Anong’s assessment, he exchanged perfunctory greetings with him with a stiff face. As soon as they sat across from each other, Luca began guiding.
Though they were merely holding hands, just being in the same space as a guide began to stabilize the power that had been instinctively boiling up.
However, a corresponding discomfort came to Chris.
Though he didn’t show it, all the guiding Chris had experienced so far had been nauseating. A feeling like immersing his body in filthy water. But seeing his tense nerves gradually relaxing, the guiding was proceeding perfectly normally.
Chris had once asked a fellow trainee about their post-guide meeting story, wondering if all Espers felt this way.
‘It was amazing. I really felt like I’d melt right there on the spot.’
‘If an angel descended to earth, wouldn’t that be a guide?’
‘You can’t feel that kind of ecstasy with any drug.’
Whether it was because he hadn’t yet found a well-matched guide, Chris had never experienced the ‘amazing guiding’ they spoke of.
“You’re still a man of few words.”
Luca spoke. Compared to other guides who would just do guiding and withdraw, he was quite friendly and would speak warmly whenever they met, but Chris’s attitude hadn’t changed much from the beginning.
“Ah, I apologize.”
The guiding ended before long.
“Is my guiding really that terrible?”
Luca asked carefully. He had been at Northern Light for quite a while, but this was the first time he’d encountered an Esper so expressionless even after finishing guiding.
Perhaps it was because of rank differences. Since guides were so rare in number, he, a C-rank guide, had been assigned to Chris, a B-rank Esper.
“Not at all.”
“I’m still worried that the rank difference means I can’t cover everything. I’m fine with hugging too, so let me know if you need it.”
It was a well-known fact that the more intimate the contact, the more maximized the guiding became. Scientists had defined guiding as a type of empathic ability. So the more emotions and sensations were maximized, the higher its efficiency.
However, Northern Light strictly monitored indiscriminate contact between Espers and guides. This was to prohibit Espers from touching more than holding hands without the guide’s consent, even if it lowered guiding efficiency. If non-contact guiding had been possible, they would have forbidden even holding hands.
“Really, I’m fine.”
Chris drew a line. It was a firm attitude.
