Song Songi had never been someone with great consideration for others, but she had never put me in such an awkward situation either. I looked at her with disbelief, but her eyes were no longer on me. She seemed so excited about the research she wanted to do in the near future that she couldn’t even see my expression.
I opened my mouth to put a damper on her happy imagination.
“Director, wait a moment. I think you’re getting ahead of yourself. No matter what, they’re temporary guides, and they have their own private lives too.”
I calmly spoke to try to change her mind. Song Songi wasn’t a dull person, and if I spoke carefully, I could get her to take back this suggestion. Realistically, living together with temporary guides wasn’t something that could be decided so lightly with just words.
“Above all, I don’t want to live with the temporary guides…”
—Baby kitty meow meow meow!
A cheerful children’s song interrupted at a crucial moment. I tried to ignore the sound and finish what I was saying.
“I don’t want to…”
—Cute meow meow meow!
The “meow meow meow” sound that kept cutting off the end of my sentences made a vein bulge on my forehead, and Song Songi searched her coat pocket with an apologetic look.
“Let me take this call quickly.”
The inappropriately cheerful children’s song was coming from the phone inside her white coat. I knew this song. It was the “Baby Kitty” song that Woo Jeonghyun, who loves cute things, had been obsessed with lately. I didn’t know it was Song Songi’s ringtone, but I was someone who could respect others’ tastes. I even gave her a generous smile and gestured for her to answer the call.
‘Right, it’s not urgent, so let’s talk properly after she finishes her call.’
Though Song Songi had suggested living with temporary guides, this wasn’t something she alone could decide unilaterally. My direct superior, the Center Director, would have to agree with this opinion, and the Center Director would need to find and approve housing for us.
‘Realistically, this isn’t something that can happen immediately, and I was being too hasty.’
It wasn’t a feasible idea from the start. Living with temporary guides?
Even if I did nothing, the Center Director could probably moderate this situation appropriately. With that thought, I felt much more at ease.
‘As soon as she hangs up…’
“Yes, Center Director.”
But I was shocked when I heard Song Songi’s voice, less than a second after deciding to wait patiently.
Of all people, the caller was the Center Director.
Thinking she might actually mention it now, I watched her mouth with wide eyes.
“Ah, I see. Actually, I was just with Esper Woo Jeongjae…”
The moment Song Songi mentioned my name, my heart started to race madly. All sorts of thoughts ran through my head.
‘Should I knock that phone away and smash it? I could say my hand slipped. Apologize and offer to pay for it, and they’d probably let it slide, right? Or should I cover her mouth? I could say a fly was about to enter her mouth, and I had no choice—they’d buy that, right?’
While I was agonizing over which option to choose from many, our eyes met.
I chose the easiest method. I made a large X sign with my hands. Song Songi raised her eyebrows slightly in confusion and nodded her head. Since I couldn’t hear what the Center Director was saying, I couldn’t tell if she understood my gesture or was responding to the Center Director, so I was burning with anxiety.
“Yes, we’re about to begin training now.”
I wasn’t sure if my message had been properly conveyed, but at least Song Songi didn’t mention our previous conversation. As the call seemed to be wrapping up, she was answering with simple “yes” or “no” responses, but then added one last comment.
“Then I’ll relay that to Esper Woo Jeongjae as well.”
She hung up the phone, and I wiped my forehead, which felt like it was covered in cold sweat despite the cool weather, and breathed a sigh of relief. She hadn’t said anything problematic, and now all I had to do was clear up the misunderstanding.
“Let me finish what I was saying before your call.”
“Esper Woo Jeongjae.”
But this time, Song Songi cut me off. I responded, puzzled by how her demeanor had changed after the phone call.
“Yes?”
“The Center Director has a message for you.”
She spoke to me with her expression hidden behind her thick glasses.
“When you go to Gate A tomorrow, he says to send your belongings to the center.”
“Why?”
“He says you’re going to live with the temporary guides?”
For a moment, I felt my hair stand on end. It was a strange conversation, as if I’d been possessed by a ghost.
“What are you talking about?”
“The Center Director said he’s getting consent forms from all the guides today. Are you saying you didn’t know?”
“…”
“Even if I hadn’t suggested it, this was going to happen anyway, so I feel like I stepped in unnecessarily. As expected of an S-class Esper, your treatment is certainly different.”
Only then did I understand why her demeanor, tone, and expression had changed after taking the phone call.
She was misunderstanding the situation. She thought she had been the first to suggest living with the temporary guides, but it turned out that things had already been progressing without her knowledge.
But there was a huge trap here. Why had the Center Director made the decision for me to live with temporary guides without even telling me? This was on a completely different level from my first mission being moved up by two days—it was something that wasn’t even in the plans.
“I suppose it worked out well in the end, but I don’t feel great about being deceived.”
Her reaction to being so thoroughly deceived left me breathless with frustration.
“No, really, I didn’t know about this either.”
I was the biggest victim here, but however the Center Director had explained it, she no longer seemed to believe in my innocence.
“You don’t have to make excuses on my account. Hearing that doesn’t make me feel any better. Anyway, I’m only going to allow 50% today. After you return from your mission tomorrow, there will be no restrictions, so you can train as much as you want.”
“Really, I don’t even want to live with them!”
Song Songi waved her hand dismissively, cutting off my response.
With that one gesture, I had to swallow all the other denials that were lingering in my mouth.
‘Well, the person I should be saying this to isn’t Song Songi, but the Center Director.’
I knew that nothing would change even if I objected. If the Center Director had already set things in motion, it would proceed regardless of my wishes. This had happened frequently even before my regression. The only thing the government had failed to change was my insistence on changing my exclusive guide.
We hadn’t even started training, but I felt drained of all energy. I recalled how I had been running around desperately trying to get rid of Joo Seolhyeon for days.
After all that effort, I was back at square one. No, it was actually worse—I was now saddled with three additional burdens and facing unwanted misunderstandings, so it was a net negative.
‘But why did the Center Director push this forward on his own?’
As I resigned myself to the situation, I naturally became curious about the Center Director’s intentions. The interest he had shown since my regression seemed excessive compared to the past.
‘What does he gain from doing this?’
It was a question without an answer no matter how much I pondered it, but once the suspicion had sprouted, it remained in a corner of my mind for quite some time.
“Wear this band. You don’t have any other physical issues, do you?”
While I was lost in thought, Song Songi, who had brought a band from the lab, asked me. I nodded lightly and put the band she handed me on my left wrist.
“Alright, let’s start training.”
Thinking about what the Center Director had done was draining, but I couldn’t stay depressed forever. I entered the training room entrance, leaving Song Songi behind. Unlike the gates that appear with dungeons, this artificially created gate made a “woong” sound as it swallowed me.
‘Even if I’m depressed, I still need to do what needs to be done.’
The training room on the 10th basement floor had been modified to connect with an abandoned dungeon. Dungeons belong to another world, not Earth. The space was separated to allow me, an S-class Esper, to use my abilities freely.
There was only one purpose for coming here today: to check my abilities. I took a deep breath to calm my chaotic mind. Negative emotions are the biggest hindrance to using abilities, so mind control was crucial.
As my mind quieted, I slowly closed and opened my eyes, releasing the supernatural power within me. The numbers on the band rose rapidly, and the moment they hit 50, restrictions were placed on my abilities. It was just for an instant, but I frowned at the sensation of my breath being blocked as if water was suddenly rising and cutting off my airway.
I felt it every training session, but having my abilities forcibly controlled was extremely unpleasant.
“Let’s see how wild I can get.”
The coordinates of the dungeon changed with Song Songi’s preferences each time, so the surrounding landscape had changed again. This training session was set against the backdrop of a wasteland adjacent to a desert.
When I lightly stamped my foot, dust rose. After doing some light stretching, I began to leisurely walk across the barren land. And as I passed a certain point, monsters that had been randomly generated for training rushed at me from all directions.
I easily dodged their attacks while throwing fireballs, and when a monster tried to create a sand pit from beneath the ground, I jumped and landed lightly on a nearby rock. I maximized my energy by creating dozens of arrows from the flames that rose from my hands. The simultaneous shower of arrows accurately pierced the heads of the monsters that had gathered like ants on the ground.
With a beep, a number appeared on the band. A red number, different from the green number that had appeared when I first released my power, showed 30.
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
