# Chapter 29
Appearing with a stream of filthy curses, he stood in front of the blocked road and faced Yoon Minoh, who was being showered with camera flashes. He realized his life was sinking into an even deeper quagmire.
BANG, BANG, CRASH!
With each step Minoh took, cracks formed and asphalt fragments dramatically flew up. Dowoon felt dizzy watching the scene that resembled a hero’s entrance in a movie.
“Haha, huhaha!”
South Korea is an internet republic.
By now, messages about an unfamiliar Esper appearing without warning and flaunting his abilities like a rare show would undoubtedly have circled the globe via social media.
Naturally, the Esper base would send a suppression team to collect him. Anyone could see that the current Minoh was causing a disturbance in a state just before going berserk.
“Yoon Minoh!”
Perhaps that’s why Dowoon urgently called out Minoh’s name.
Though he himself had never called for a suppression team in over 10 years of activity as an Esper, he had witnessed several Espers being transported, bound by electric whips.
He’s still only twenty years old… He’s not acting out; he just drank the sinkhole monster’s fluid… Unconsciously defending Minoh, Dowoon whistled loudly.
“Kid, you should be playing hide and seek with me!”
As Dowoon stood alone blocking his path and dropped an ice glacier, people who had parked their cars and were leisurely observing the situation raised their phones high, murmuring excitedly.
Someone set off a bright flash while shouting his name like a cheer.
The famous “Yeo Dowoon.”
The maverick who began Esper work at the young age of seventeen, recording a dungeon conquest rate superior to any other Esper, becoming the main protagonist of the Delta Project!
The handsome-faced Esper, who might be evaluated as arrogant but never as lacking in skill, made a spectacular leap through the hailstorm of glaciers.
The abundant rumors surrounding him were also major contributors to his exceptional popularity.
Illegal miner, orphan, and chimera.
Starting with voices criticizing Espers who simultaneously use two abilities of different natures, but when seeing the marvelous scenes captured in paparazzi cuts, one couldn’t help but be intrigued by rumors that the Esper base was creating chimeras by mixing humans and monsters.
“Haha, sunbae…”
As the attention he had been monopolizing scattered to someone else, Minoh cracked his knuckles and muttered to himself. As expected, Dowoon was blocking him while building an ice barrier.
Unlike previous barriers, this one had quite an opaque color, a result guided by his sense of responsibility as a senior who didn’t want to expose the rookie Esper to the media any further.
The color of the ice was getting deeper and deeper.
“When I see you, fuck… I feel like I’ll die from excitement.”
Despite the inevitably emerging sexual innuendos, Dowoon replied as if it were nothing.
“When I see you, I feel like I’ll die from wanting to kill you, you disgusting bastard.”
“That ‘bastard’ thing again… Will you curse at me like that in bed too? While crying and begging?”
Don’t engage. Don’t respond.
Dowoon simply did his best to create blade-like ice while driving him back toward the vehicle control area.
He intended to capture Minoh before the suppression team arrived and take him to the base.
Damn it. No matter how perverted and clueless the kid was, he didn’t want to subject a snot-nosed twenty-year-old to torture wrapped in electric whips.
Moreover, the Esper wielding the electric whip was Gu Seohyun, another natural Esper who possessed capabilities comparable to Delta Team members despite not belonging to it.
Knowing how mercilessly she handled fellow Espers, Dowoon had no choice but to harshly pursue Minoh to resolve the situation on his own as much as possible.
“Whoa! Almost got my face skin torn off…!”
The tide had turned in an instant.
Minoh stammered as he looked back at the ice fragments that had grazed his face.
As the distance from people widened considerably, Dowoon stopped, twisting his stiff shoulders.
Almost killing but not quite—applying ability with just the right pressure requires extreme caution. It would be disastrous if he accidentally blew off Minoh’s head.
Though he still desperately wanted to give his perverted junior a lesson, he didn’t want to return to the base holding his severed head.
But Minoh, perhaps thinking he really would kill him, shouted with his chest wide open. His eyes still lacked clear focus, and his voice overflowed with a sinister energy.
“I want to roll around with you once before I die! Please!”
Dowoon didn’t bother to answer and touched the ground.
CRASH!
The moment both hands made close contact with the ground, pointed ice spires rose from beneath Minoh’s feet. Just as the tips of the ice were about to pierce through him—
“Ugh…! My foot!”
Minoh, jumping up like someone with fire on his feet, swung his hand in a circle as if counterattacking.
In the hotel, he said he couldn’t use his power because there weren’t proper coordinates to grab, but in a space like this with a wide open view, he too could use his ability to fight back.
BANG, CRASH!
The asphalt shell that rose with a thunderous sound poured over Dowoon’s head. This must have been an attack calculated with that principle of centrifugal force or whatever.
Creating ice of the same width to push the asphalt back toward Minoh, Dowoon surveyed the road that had turned into chaos as if hit by a bomb and thought.
This is the first time I’ve destroyed something like this… That’s when it happened.
Along with a crackling sound of torn tape, an inexplicable headache struck.
“Ugh…!”
<…Don’t.>
A desperate voice of unknown origin struck his mind.
<The hand…>
A feeling as if the humanity constituting him was sinking.
<Don’t touch the hand…>
Dowoon, who had lost his senses to inexplicable grief, ended up making the worst mistake of failing to control the intensity of the ice heading toward Minoh.
CRASH, BANG!
The ice stem, which rose so powerfully that it raised dust, pierced Minoh’s abdomen without giving him a chance to avoid it.
“Kuhak…!”
The scream stopped after a very short duration. Minoh, who had firmly grasped the ice to prevent it from digging into his organs, weakly raised his face.
When Dowoon discovered the two eyes bursting with bloody tears, he had to face the agony as if something inside him was being destroyed.
In truth, since Minoh was an S-class Esper, even called superhuman, he wouldn’t lose his life from such an injury if guiding was given at the right time.
Nevertheless, Dowoon couldn’t escape the frustration of having injured someone due to his mistake. Just as he was hurriedly trying to withdraw the ice—
“…Kheuk!”
Silent electric whips flew in and wrapped around Dowoon’s neck, arms, and legs, pulling in different directions.
As current beyond what a human could endure overflowed and restrained him, Dowoon was immediately forced to kneel, tilting his head back so that his larynx protruded.
Ting, the sound of the whip vibrating flows into his ears.
The sight of the suppression team appearing from all directions, breaking the ice that had pierced Minoh, and rescuing him filled his vision. With the current crossing his veins in reverse, Dowoon gritted his teeth and moaned.
Gu Seohyun. It’s Gu Seohyun.
He never imagined there would come a day when he’d be bound by her whip…
Thump, thump. The exaggeratedly large approaching footsteps were certainly Gu Seohyun’s, but it was inexplicable why he felt such affection and why his breathing was becoming comfortable.
It even seemed that the pain from the electric shock was diminishing. Dowoon belatedly raised his face, which had red marks from the whip burns.
Ah, damn it.
The scent of the beloved, the fragrance of the beloved spreads thickly.
“…Are you alright?”
Cha Haseong, kneeling on one knee in front of Dowoon, asked while examining his limbs bound by the whip.
That expression again. That kind face that always made it impossible for him to give up on him.
Just as he had in the wave inspection room, Cha Haseong opened his mouth as if perplexed.
“I’ll ask them to release you. …Since I’m here now.”
That’s why Dowoon occasionally became confused.
Is he really disgusted with me? Is he really feeling burdened? Do his continued rejections truly mean rejection?
So he wanted to ask at least once.
Guide-nim, do you really dislike and avoid me? Then why, why do you always show these openings?
The current shook Dowoon again.
“Ugh…!”
“Dowoon-ssi?”
As Dowoon trembled at the pain grazing his neck, Cha Haseong immediately reached out to him in surprise. But a voice seemingly dissuading contact descended even faster.
“…You’ll, get hurt.”
“…”
“Guide-nim… since you’re not an Esper, you’ll get hurt if you touch me.”
“…Dowoon-ssi is hurt too. Please bear with it a little longer.”
Just as Cha Haseong was about to stand up, saying he would go and talk to them, seeing Dowoon’s rapidly paling complexion—
“Yoon Minoh first… please guide him.”
