Chapter 114
After running a hand over his face, hyung opened his mouth again.
“Does he know about your decreased matching rate?”
“Yes, of course. We took the test together.”
“And he still asked you to stay by his side?”
“…Yes.”
Unlike my embarrassed demeanor, Gi-jun hyung’s expression turned serious. The gaze we shared looked equally complex.
“I don’t want to badmouth someone I’ve never met, but I’ve heard things. That Esper, I heard he doesn’t have the gentlest personality… Won’t you end up struggling or getting hurt, Su-hyeon?”
I immediately caught what hyung was trying to say. It was the same concern that had plunged me into a quagmire of worry these past few days. It was a tactful question about whether there would be problems between us if I could no longer provide full guiding like before.
“That’s possible.”
I’ve already experienced Song Ji-hyeok changing his mind. He had stubbornly insisted he didn’t want a C-rank Guide, but eventually chose me as his pair Guide. Similarly, although he’s holding onto me now, as my incompetence becomes more apparent, he might someday turn away from me. I was all too aware of this fact.
But…
“You know, hyung. I want to be with Ji-hyeok too. I’ve always been bound by reality, enduring and giving up on so many things… Just once, I want to live following my heart.”
I don’t know what awaits at the end. It would be nice if it was a fairy tale-like, eternally beautiful happy ending, but even if not, I decided not to regret this choice.
“Are you firmly resolved?”
“Yes.”
“Confident you won’t regret it?”
“Yes, hyung.”
“…I see.”
Hyung answered with what sounded like a sigh and took another sip of his tea. He seemed lost in thought for a moment, then looked at me again and spoke.
“There’s absolutely no chance you’ll change your mind? If you come with me, you can really receive excellent treatment. There are many good people too.”
“Yes. But I still want to stay here.”
I remained unwavering even as he repeatedly confirmed my intention. I was about to change the subject when hyung called my name first.
“Su-hyeon.”
“Yes?”
“Listen carefully to what I’m about to say.”
I unconsciously swallowed hard. Hyung’s expression was so solemn and resolute that I felt slightly intimidated by his aura.
Sensing it was something important, I focused intently on hyung. What followed from Gi-jun hyung was first-class confidential information that exceeded my imagination.
“Two years ago, there was an awakened individual who, like you, received a dual assessment. Esper rank B, Guide rank A. According to the rules, they were assigned as a team Guide, but they didn’t neglect their skill training either.”
“Really? That’s amazing.”
A genuine exclamation of admiration escaped me. With just their Guide rank alone, they would receive top-tier treatment in the industry, but to voluntarily commit to Esper training as well was beyond ordinary diligence.
On the other hand, being human, I felt a bit envious. If I had the same rank as them, or even if just one of my abilities was B-rank, my treatment would be very different from now.
“They enjoyed going into the field too. During a guide assignment in a maze-type dungeon, a major incident occurred. A horde of monsters appeared in the room they had cleared and were using as a base camp. Because they hadn’t left any Espers to guard the camp, that Guide entered combat and, while facing several monsters alone, eventually went berserk.”
“That’s… impossible…”
I couldn’t continue speaking. Having been to maze-type dungeons several times myself, I could easily picture the situation that Guide must have faced. Monsters flooding into the room with no Espers present—just imagining it made my breath catch.
“It’s a principle to station defense-oriented Espers when setting up a base camp, but they misjudged, thinking it would be safe since they’d cleared it. Anyway, with no personnel capable of teleportation, they escaped the dungeon after three days, and by then, they were as good as dead.”
“Ah…”
“A Guide was urgently teleported in to attempt guiding, but severe rejection symptoms appeared, making it impossible to help. They were transported to the guild. Afterward, every time guiding was attempted, they showed symptoms of hemoptysis or seizures, and medication had no effect, leaving no solution. Everyone could see it was an irrecoverable state, and they were all glumly hoping for a miracle… and that miracle actually happened. After ten days, that Guide opened their eyes.”
“…!”
I expected to hear they had died from post-berserk complications, but this completely unexpected news made my eyes widen.
“Really? Is that possible?”
If recovery from going berserk were possible, Espers wouldn’t be so desperate for guiding. They could just go berserk and then recover. But I had never once heard of such a case before.
“Everyone was surprised. Moreover, apart from some parts of their body turning completely white due to post-berserk effects and their physical strength weakening, the Guide was in surprisingly good health. Following the doctor’s assessment, various tests were conducted, and the results were unbelievable. Their abilities as an Esper had completely disappeared, but their abilities as a Guide measured much higher than before.”
My mind raced upon hearing this. They were already an A-rank Guide, and if their abilities measured even higher than that…
Suddenly, my heart began to race. Unable to endure the brief silence, I urged hyung with a question.
“So, what happened to them? Did they become a perfect Guide? …They’re still alive, right?”
“Yes, they’re living healthily and well. And…”
Gi-jun hyung briefly trailed off, then looked at me with determined eyes.
“What comes next is important, Su-hyeon.”
Already listening attentively, hearing that “what comes next is important” made me focus even more on hyung’s words. With this level of concentration, I felt I could hear even an ant walking by.
“Afterward, they ran the matching system with all Espers in the guild, and the matching rate came up as 99.9% for everyone.”
“…What?”
I was dumbfounded for a moment. Gi-jun hyung has a great voice and clear pronunciation, making him easy to understand, and this was no exception. But I couldn’t believe what I had just heard and unconsciously asked again.
“You said the matching rate was 99.9 percent?”
“Yes. The result was the same even after running it three times, and during actual measurement, it showed 99.9 percent with all Espers who participated in the test.”
I couldn’t even respond anymore. The standard for pair contracts is a matching rate of 80 percent, and even that is as rare as finding a needle in a haystack… For the matching rate to be 99.9 percent with not just one but all Espers was utterly unbelievable. If it had been anyone other than Gi-jun hyung saying this, I would have scoffed and taken it as a joke.
I even briefly wondered if hyung might be joking, but his expression as he looked at me was nothing but serious. Besides, hyung knew better than anyone how much I’d struggled because of my relatively low rank, and he wasn’t the type to joke about such things.
‘But that’s impossible…’
My mind was in intense conflict trying to determine if this could be true, and I hadn’t even thought to close my gaping mouth. Looking at me like this, Gi-jun hyung continued calmly.
“Since it could have been another anomaly caused by going berserk, the guild observed closely, but after several months, their abilities remained the same. Only then did everyone consider it a very special happening, like someone being struck by lightning and surviving unscathed, attributing it to divine grace. But half a year later, the exact same thing happened in another region. A dual awakened who experienced going berserk due to unavoidable circumstances awakened as an S-rank Guide, and later in Mexico, another dual awakened awakened as an S-rank Esper. By that point, the research institute determined ‘there’s something here’ and started recruiting low-ranked dual awakened from around the world, keeping it under the radar.”
“…”
“Various experiments were conducted with consent, and they discovered two major findings. First, when using Esper energy after depleting a lot of energy through guiding, or conversely, when performing guiding immediately after engaging in combat as an Esper, the two powers greatly conflict, presumably causing serious after-effects.”
I quickly lowered my gaze to hide my agitation. My heart was beating so loudly it echoed in my ears. This was because I had experienced a similar situation.
Since Song Ji-hyeok liked me accompanying him in the field, I followed him to dungeons a few times as his pair Guide. Sometimes I just performed guiding and returned, but there were also several instances where I fought monsters as an Esper. I remembered using both powers most intensively in the Regular dungeon where I lost consciousness while coughing up blood.
Suddenly, a thought crossed my mind, and I raised my head again.
‘What’s the other finding the research institute discovered?’
The perceptive Gi-jun hyung didn’t keep me in suspense and immediately addressed my question.
“The other finding was that when dual awakened were artificially induced to go berserk, five out of six reawakened as S-rank. Witnessing this, all researchers, including myself, came to the same conclusion.”
“…”
“When one ability disappears in a dual awakened, as a counterbalance, the remaining ability rises to its peak. …This is the conclusion our research institute reached.”
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
