Baek Seo-ha shut himself away in the guiding room. As soon as he sat at the desk, he pulled out his notebook and flipped through it, aimlessly searching for an empty page. His hand moved without purpose—whether he found one or not didn’t really matter. Flipping through the pages was nothing more than a distraction, a futile attempt to calm the chaos in his head.
That’s how tangled his thoughts were. Everything about the matching rate with Han Ju-oh felt off, like a knot that wouldn’t come undone.
“It didn’t go up.”
The moment he woke up, he could tell the energy inside his body wasn’t flowing. Han Ju-oh would’ve noticed too, of course. The watch was only a supplementary device—there was no way he wouldn’t have sensed the actual changes happening in his body.
That’s why the two of them only showed up at the guild around 2 p.m., well past the usual start of the workday. They each went their separate ways without a word, implicitly agreeing to take time to think things over.
Seo-ha propped his chin up with one hand and began scribbling aimlessly in the notebook.
“What should I even call this emptiness?”
Holding hands, hugging, kissing, even sex—they had done it all. Especially the sex. Or more precisely, the penetrative guiding. Even though it was his first time, he had given it his all.
“I mean, I passed out in the middle of it, so that should count as doing my best, right?”
Since it was his first time experiencing penetrative guiding, the whole thing had felt awkward—but he’d done his best to take it in stride. Now, rubbing his sore lower back, Seo-ha tapped it absentmindedly before slamming his pen down in frustration.
He let out a heavy sigh, slumping over the desk entirely.
A conversation with Moon Roi floated to the surface of his mind.
“We’ve cleared over half the area, but things are still touchy.”
Having just come back from a gate, Moon Roi understood the current situation better than anyone. When he mentioned that things were “touchy,” he was probably referring to the Gate Control Center—and the higher authorities above it.
“They’re hypersensitive to the condition of Espers and Guides. It’s gotten to the point where they’re assigning me my gate partners themselves.”
The look on Moon Roi’s face after returning with one of those government-assigned Espers had been far from pleasant. Maybe the matching rate had been decent, but something else clearly didn’t fit—probably the guy’s personality, which Moon Roi must’ve hated.
“Anyway, staying off the radar is the safest bet. It’s not like we have much control over that, but still…”
Not something they could control—that went for him and Han Ju-oh as well.
“Things have been quiet for a while.”
In his frantic attempts to raise the matching rate with Han Ju-oh, he’d ended up spending unexpectedly soft, intimate moments with him. And now, the consequences of that were hitting hard. With the rush to eliminate gates intensifying, the number of active combatants kept shifting.
“Casualties are piling up, and people are more hesitant. Why don’t you try entering a gate now? Not an S-Class one—just something manageable.”
Seo-ha had told Moon Roi he’d think about it, but they both knew it wasn’t that simple. Letting an S-Class Esper like Han Ju-oh enter anything below his class?
“Like hell they’d sign off on that.”
In that case, it made more sense to put together a larger team for whatever S-Class gate Han Ju-oh would be thrown into. With gate-tier restrictions temporarily lifted, it was the perfect chance to bring in as many capable Espers as possible.
“It sucks that the matching rate didn’t improve more, but maybe this is where I draw the line and plan for what’s next.”
He lifted his head slightly and rested his chin on his hand again, picking up the pen to scrawl something only he could make sense of.
“Han Ju-oh only wants me as his Guide, but I’m not exactly satisfied with that.”
No matter how many backup plans he made, that kind of idealistic, one-sided devotion wasn’t going to help him in the slightest.
“I know the Guild Leader will handle things, but isn’t there something I can do?”
It was one of those moments when his head was just overflowing with thoughts.
And then it happened.
The door burst open with a loud bang, and Seo-ha jolted upright. For a second, he thought it might be Han Ju-oh—but it was a man he’d never seen before. A complete stranger.
“Huh?”
A foreigner, no less.
They locked eyes in an awkward silence. Once Seo-ha gathered his senses, he scrambled to his feet.
‘Should I tell him he’s got the wrong room? Or should I say I already have a partner?’
Flustered, Seo-ha struggled to find the right words. Since the man was a foreigner, he wanted to say something clear and simple to quickly resolve the situation. But just as he was murmuring to himself, the man suddenly spoke.
“Guide Baek Seo-ha?”
“Huh?”
Shocked that the man knew who he was, Seo-ha froze again—more so at the man’s fluent Korean than anything else.
***
When someone applies for a guiding session, the system displays a brief profile of the applicant. Since Seo-ha was under contract with Han Ju-oh, he normally didn’t receive guiding requests—unless it was something urgent. That didn’t mean there was no way to learn who the Esper was.
The Esper could upload their own information directly to create a visible profile.
Name: Ian Poulter
Rank: S-Class Esper
Type: Physical (Electrokinetic) Esper
Affiliation: Black Mamba Guild
Holding the pad, Seo-ha was struck by a strong sense of déjà vu. Has something like this happened before?
‘Ah. Yeah, it has.’
It wasn’t exactly the same, but the situation was similar. Like when Han Ju-oh had shown up and he looked over his profile. The only difference now was the man standing before him had a very friendly smile on his face.
“So, you’re Ian Poulter.”
“Just call me Ian.”
His warm gaze melted into his blue eyes, and Seo-ha let out an awkward cough. It wasn’t like there weren’t foreigners who spoke Korean well, but it was still fascinating to hear.
“So… you’re an S-Class Esper.”
And not just any Esper—an electrokinetic, a rare ability type.
“But how did you even know to come here? You seem to know my name, and from the way you’re talking, it sounds like you know I already have a partner.”
“Ju-oh.”
“Huh?”
“I came because of Ju-oh.”
“Ah.”
Now it made sense. Black Mamba was one of the most prominent guilds in the United States. A foreign Esper—of course there was likely some connection to Han Ju-oh.
“Are you a friend of his?”
“That’s right.”
Ian extended his hand warmly, and for once, Seo-ha didn’t hesitate to accept it. Ju-oh, he said. When Seo-ha didn’t call him Ju-oh, he was the stiff, impersonal Esper Han Ju-oh. It felt oddly novel to hear someone refer to that difficult, guarded man as a friend.
“Oh, and I’m older than him. But we’re still friends.”
His pronunciation was so smooth that Seo-ha hadn’t noticed it at first, but now he felt a slight disconnect.
‘A man who’s Ju-oh’s friend and based overseas. And…’
As his thoughts sped along, Seo-ha looked at Ian with a new kind of expression—a remarkably pleasant smile unlike any he’d shown before.
“Should we be friends too?”
***
“Recruiting members for the gate team isn’t going smoothly. If we don’t get enough, we’ll have to force some in later, but voluntary applicants are always better.”
Guild Leader Kim Mi-yeon let out a sigh, clearly frustrated by how things were unfolding.
“At this rate, you might have to shoulder everything yourself. That’s a serious problem.”
It was obvious Han Ju-oh would be leading the team inside the gate, but if the team members weren’t up to par, the burden on him would increase significantly.
“What’s the matching rate like?”
“Thirty percent—if we only hold hands.”
“Even that isn’t helping, huh.”
After being stuck at 3% for so long, 30% sounded high—but in reality, it still fell far short of what one would want from a partner.
“If there were enough time for a proper guiding session, maybe—but we both know there won’t be.”
And they knew better than anyone just how impossible that scenario was.
“Forget it. I’m going in too.”
Since establishing the guild in Korea, Kim Mi-yeon had distanced herself from frontline duty. But now, she voiced her intent to join.
“No.”
With even one more person needed, Han Ju-oh still refused her outright.
“What? I used to be hot shit too, you know.”
“I don’t doubt your ability.”
Han Ju-oh’s recognition of her skill calmed her down—just a little.
“Then why are you against it? Don’t tell me you’re worried about my image or something. Come on, it’s not like I’m gonna be dripping sweat out there…”
“You’re rusty.”
“……”
Kim Mi-yeon, who had been confidently showing off, suddenly scowled.
“What? Did you just…?”
He was referring to the fact she hadn’t been in a dungeon for some time.
“You said you don’t doubt my ability…”
“It’s not about that. If your dulled instincts lag for even a second in a place where anything can happen, it’s dangerous.”
That acute sensitivity to the battlefield’s rhythm—the kind only an active combatant possessed—was something Kim Mi-yeon currently lacked.
“God, this is frustrating. And it’s not like I can just pick another gate and jump in now… Anyway, is it even okay for you to still be here?”
Pressing her fingertips to her temple, Kim Mi-yeon suddenly shot him a questioning look. Han Ju-oh merely lifted one brow in response, and she pointed towards the door.
“They should be meeting around now.”
She didn’t specify who they were, but Han Ju-oh’s instincts—sharpened by years in the field—immediately flared with a sense of unease.
