# Chapter 76
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“What I requested was something different.”
Junwoo looked at his younger brother, who had confidently entered his private laboratory without an appointment and was showing his displeasure. Junwoo rose leisurely from his chair and walked toward Junseo. His long lab coat swayed below his thighs with each step.
“I was wondering why there was no contact despite my expectations, and you were upset enough to rush over?”
“Someone who looks like me is hovering around my Esper.”
“You should speak properly. You resemble me, Junseo. I was born first.”
His voice was gentle despite the reprimand. Curiosity filled Junwoo’s eyes. Lately, he had been enjoying observing his brother, who had emerged from a long period of lethargy and was now glowing with vitality.
Though Junwoo and Junseo were born of the same blood and raised in the same environment, their personalities were completely different.
Junwoo was the type who had firm convictions about what he wanted to do, while Junseo behaved as if it didn’t matter what he did. Unlike Junwoo, who became a researcher in the ability field like a protruding ridge despite coming from a legal family with a prosecutor-turned-politician father and a judge mother, it was a natural outcome for Junseo to follow his parents into law school. If not for that accident, Junseo would have graduated from law school, gone through law school again, become a prosecutor, built his career until his mid-thirties, and then entered politics. All while wearing a face that said life was boring.
“My Esper probably thinks you resemble me.”
He would never have made an expression like this.
“Well. Is that so? Dohyuk-ssi and I were already acquainted. I met him before you did.”
Junwoo spoke smoothly, hiding the fact that Dohyuk didn’t remember him. “Dohyuk-ssi?” Junseo raised one corner of his mouth toward Junwoo. It was a look that clearly showed he disliked that term.
“How could someone who’s been stuck in Sokcho for years, saying they don’t even have time to visit home, have had any occasion to meet ‘Dohyuk-ssi’?”
“He was a little boy I met when I worked at headquarters long ago. He grew up handsome just as he was then, so I remember him.”
“Why would someone working in the research building meet a facility-raised child?”
“Because he was from a facility supported by headquarters. They come to the research building for regular physical examinations. I thought we were getting close, but then he suddenly disappeared, which was disappointing. It was nice to meet him again.”
Though he pretended to be romantic as if reunited with destiny, Junwoo was simply a genius. The reason he remembered Dohyuk for so long wasn’t special. It was thanks to his tremendous identification ability and excellent memory that never forgot anyone he had met even once in his life.
The way he grinned and probed to tease others was obvious to Junseo as well. His observing gaze was so blatant that if it had been a different subject, Junseo would have consistently ignored it.
“He had a physical examination with me once too, right? He was smaller than his peers back then. His body was very thin.”
That is, if it had been a different subject.
“Do you conduct physical examinations with such lecherous thoughts?”
“What should I do? The pure older brother can’t even imagine what’s in our Junseo’s mind to know which part of my words was lecherous. Anyway, it’s interesting. Usually, children who awaken as high-ranking Espers show signs from an early age, but when I met him, he was just an ordinary person.”
“Your memory is too detailed.”
“A small child smiling brightly while telling me I’m pretty—how could I not remember that?”
Though he frowned, Junwoo looked as if he found it hilarious whenever Junseo did so.
That face is pretty? Junseo folded his arms and quietly observed Junwoo’s face. A face that looked gentle due to its long eyelashes and round eyes looked back at him. While appearing as someone who couldn’t hurt even an ant, the slight upward curl at the corners of his eyes strangely made him look like he had character. His jet-black hair, as dark as Junseo’s, was neatly groomed and adorned his white skin. It might be hard to refute that he was quite handsome since blood doesn’t lie, but still, even their skin ages were different. Despite looking young for his age, he was approaching forty.
Junwoo reached out to Junseo, who was gauging the win or loss from an objective viewpoint. An expression that plainly said he knew what Junseo was thinking suddenly shadowed his face. Junseo responded indifferently.
“If it’s when you were working at headquarters, that would be 13 years ago. Aren’t you being overly sentimental about a child?”
“Are you jealous? Because I was called pretty by a child 13 years ago?”
The corners of Junwoo’s mouth loosened fluidly, but Junseo’s face remained rigid, almost pale.
“Yes, I’m quite jealous. If you want my attention, do it with something else, not by acting childish.”
A small laugh, like chirping, echoed at his bold response. The soft fingers characteristic of an office worker familiar tousled Junseo’s hair. To Junwoo, his thirteen-year-younger brother always felt like a small baby.
“Alright, alright. I was hurt that my brother, whom I’m seeing for the first time in nearly half a year, didn’t give me any contact or attention. Your insomnia worsened after you went to headquarters, right? It’s been 5 months since your last check-up, so you should get a wavelength test again. Your big brother is worried. I would have rejected this headquarters request if it wasn’t for your plea.”
Junwoo joked that he didn’t even want to work with the research team here.
“When I had a wavelength test at headquarters, there was no particular problem.”
“I don’t trust headquarters’ Guide welfare or examinations. They’re completely neglected compared to Espers.”
Junwoo’s words had a point. Despite reforming laws and regulations several times, there was still an implicit atmosphere at headquarters that didn’t treat Guides as proper ability users. One aspect of this was that unlike Espers, who had a high risk of going berserk, Guides didn’t receive proper care.
While Espers received various types of precise examinations such as regular physical examinations, mental wavelength tests, and energy tests with the latest machines, Guide examinations were conducted with outdated machines that could have been made 10 years ago, only once every 3 weeks for about 10 minutes. It was quite telling that Junwoo, who didn’t trust headquarters, had brought in the latest equipment to his laboratory to regularly examine Junseo’s condition.
Moreover, Junseo had a peculiar constitution where he didn’t gain stability from guiding but rather felt stress. Since his reaction was completely different from ordinary Guides, he had to measure his current state anew with regular examinations.
“And it’s a ‘professional organization’ that still doesn’t know you have an Esper wavelength too, so how can it be trusted?”
“Haha. That minuscule wavelength?”
Unlike Korea, the United States was more systematic in Guide management. This was because there were frequent cases of Guides filing class action lawsuits against the government. Junwoo had barely imported one of the latest machines used by American centers to Korea five months ago. It was currently the only machine in Korea that could perform not only Guide wavelength tests but also fatigue tests and guiding efficiency tests. Even at headquarters, which promoted itself as using cutting-edge technology, they were using a 9-year-old Russian development model for Guide machines, so the possibility of any other place having a better machine was non-existent.
The test with the newly imported machine revealed that Junseo’s wavelength was mixed with about 10% Esper wavelength. Of course, not everyone with an Esper wavelength can use power like an Esper. Junseo’s wavelength was also too weak to utilize an Esper’s power. It just meant his physical abilities were innately slightly superior to ordinary people.
There was only one case where both Guide and Esper wavelengths appeared simultaneously, like in Junseo’s case.
Ordinary people.
Unlike ability users who possess only one type of wavelength, non-ability users generally have both minimal Esper and Guide wavelengths simultaneously. One might wonder if having two wavelengths would be beneficial. However, Esper and Guide wavelengths were completely different in nature. Even people with only one wavelength found it difficult to awaken, so there was no way to properly handle energy entangled with two different natures. In the end, they would live as ordinary people without being able to properly manifest either one. It was highly likely that Junseo was diagnosed as an ordinary person in the national ability test at age 17 because both Esper and Guide wavelengths appeared simultaneously.
The problem was that such a Junseo had belatedly manifested as a Guide.
Although the cause is still unknown, Junseo was essentially a mutant. Someone who originally shouldn’t have awakened did awaken. Junwoo was still piecing together various hypotheses in his mind out of perplexity.
“Just because the wavelength is weak doesn’t mean it has no influence. Both your physical abilities and the hostility you’ve felt every time you’ve guided until now.”
“It’s fine now.”
“Thanks to Dohyuk-ssi?”
“What are you so curious about?”
“You know what I’m hypothesizing right now.”
How could the Esper Choi Dohyuk be compatible with a mutant Guide? This was Junwoo’s biggest recent curiosity. If the main reason Junseo had mutually felt resistance to guiding with various Espers so far was due to his Esper wavelength, then Dohyuk shouldn’t be compatible with Junseo either.
