Instead of answering, Woo Jeonghyun firmly pressed my face with his palm like a steamed bun and nodded with a “hmm.”
“There’s an adult world you don’t know about, hyung.”
Regardless of whether my face was distorted or not, Jeonghyun turned over with a satisfied smile. He lay down properly facing the ceiling and closed his eyes.
“Let’s sleep now, hyung. It’s past midnight.”
I was still troubled, but Jeonghyun acted as if everything had been resolved.
“But hyung, you never cared about the Center Director at all. When you suddenly brought him up, I thought you’d finally developed some awareness, but as expected, you’re barking up the wrong tree…”
Jeonghyun mumbled with his eyes closed, and his voice faded at the end. I still couldn’t sleep, but feeling a bit hurt that Jeonghyun was so peacefully getting ready to sleep.
Experiencing an inner conflict about whether to tell him not to sleep until I could sleep, Jeonghyun suddenly opened his eyes like a jujube tree struck by lightning. I was reaching for Jeonghyun’s nose, and I froze in surprise without even thinking of withdrawing my hand.
“Hyung.”
“Huh?!”
“It’s not that you’re interested in him, but that he did something to get your attention?”
I had big temperature differences in how I treated people depending on whether I was interested in them or not. This unintentionally created enemies around me. Usually, when I was focused on one thing, I only saw that, and people around me would get tired of my insensitivity or get hurt. Perhaps the foundation of my unrequited love that I couldn’t give up even in death lay there.
‘Another useless thought.’
Restraining my mind from naturally drifting to thoughts of Joo Seolhyeon, I looked at Jeonghyun. He had already turned his body from lying straight to facing me. He was smiling with a somewhat sly expression.
“It was the Center Director who arranged for all the guides to live in one house, right?”
My mouth fell open. I had always thought my brother was smarter than me since he was young, but I figured, how smart could he really be? But that thought vanished in an instant. It was so accurate that I was at a loss for words.
Is it possible to deduce all this from a question like “What do you think of the Center Director?”
“This time, the Center Director crossed the line.”
Jeonghyun clicked his tongue.
Why did he say the line was crossed?
He looked even more indignant.
“Are the temporary guides punching bags?”
“Explain it so I can understand.”
Could it be that he also deduced that the Center Director threatened the temporary guides?
I pretended not to know and tested Jeonghyun, and he promptly threw a question at me.
“Hyung, do you know why I’ve only been a temporary guide?”
“Because there’s no esper who wants to use you as a dedicated guide?”
“No.”
“Because you want to play around?”
“No.”
“Then?”
It felt like the indignation that had been directed at the Center Director was now directed at me, but I ignored it lightly and asked.
“It’s because if I become a dedicated guide, I can’t live with you, hyung.”
Of course. Dedicated guides are obligated to live with their espers.
Not understanding why he was stating such an obvious thing, I blinked a few times before realizing that the subject of the current conversation wasn’t my brother Jeonghyun but the four temporary guides I had contracted with.
“So you’re saying that living with these four is an unfair contract in itself?”
At my words, Jeonghyun immediately nodded as if I was right.
“Of course. It’s clearly being pushed forward recklessly to care for an S-class esper. Even if they got the guides’ consent, can you call that consent? It’s half coercion. If this got out to the media, it would cause quite a stir, wouldn’t it?”
Was he also at that cafe when I met Do Wonjin?
For a moment, I had such a stupid thought.
How does he know so well? No, Jeonghyun is also a temporary guide, so he would definitely understand the dynamics. No, still, how can he be this smart?
“Are you really my brother?”
“You’re just too naive, hyung.”
Surprised by my brother’s unexpected talent, I reached out to touch Jeonghyun’s face. His eyes, nose, and mouth all confirmed it was Jeonghyun, but it was still amazing no matter how much I checked. Jeonghyun glared at me as if to say “what are you doing,” and when I stretched his cheek like a rice cake, he frowned and pushed my hand away.
“What are you doing?”
“You’re fine with burrowing into my arms, but you don’t like it when I touch you, is that it?”
“…”
Looking at Jeonghyun’s expression of disbelief, I pursed my lips.
“Wow, banso. You’re sulking just because I avoided that a little?”
“Banso,” short for “bandaengi sogalttakji” (anchovy head), was one of the many terms my brother used to refer to me. Always sulking, he grumbled. Though the sound was very low, it reached my ears clearly. I raised my lips crookedly and grabbed Jeonghyun’s shoulders. No matter how big he was, he wasn’t stronger than me.
“Have you ever contributed when I was always sulking?”
Gripping his shoulders tightly and blocking his escape route, I grabbed the nose of my brother who dared to take me lightly.
“This is punishment, you rascal!”
“Ow, ow, ow!! It hurts!!”
I let go after only three seconds because Jeonghyun was screaming as if he was dying, even though I had controlled my strength.
“Argh, my nose.”
Jeonghyun backed away from me and quickly clutched his nose. Even though I hadn’t squeezed that hard, seeing Jeonghyun with tears in his eyes made my heart soften, and I tentatively reached out my hand.
“That’s what you get for talking back to your hyung. Does it hurt a lot?”
Just as I was grumbling but also regretting if I had squeezed too hard, Jeonghyun grabbed my hand as it approached his nose. His grip was quite strong, and I was about to shake him off when Jeonghyun stuck his head closer to me again.
“Since you hurt me, grant me one wish.”
Where had the guy who was screaming in pain gone? Jeonghyun’s eyes were gleaming. Indeed, I hadn’t squeezed hard. It was Jeonghyun’s exaggeration that had been upgraded over time.
While feeling relieved internally, I opened my mouth to tease Jeonghyun.
“If it hurts, should I put my spit on it?”
“Ugh! That’s disgusting!”
The corners of my mouth that had been smiling dropped as Jeonghyun looked at me as if he genuinely despised me.
To hate me this much just for joking around once. He was only cute when he was young. When did he stop following me around calling “hyung, hyung” and start talking back like this now that he’s grown up? What could he possibly get from his hyung, he might as well try to extract a flea’s liver.
“Thinking strange thoughts again?”
By the time I came to my senses, the look of contempt had long since changed to a look of pity. I could just flatly refuse this, but curious about my only brother’s wish, I cleared my throat and asked.
“Ah, Jeonghyun, you’re developing bad habits. What is it? Tell me your wish.”
Though my words were testy, I was curious about what his answer would be. After my brother died, one of my biggest regrets was the fact that I hadn’t done anything for him when he was alive.
“I’ll tell you if you promise to grant it.”
Instinctively, I had a strong feeling this was a “Pandora’s box.” But I couldn’t stop my curiosity.
“Okay, I’ll grant it, so tell me.”
I thought that a wish made in this situation would be trivial. But it wasn’t.
“Give me Jeong Seyeon, the guide you contracted with.”
Not understanding what this bizarre request meant, I asked again.
“Guide Jeong Seyeon?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Though I was asking calmly, my heart was pounding as if it would burst.
“You know the esper I met today? It turns out I wasn’t the originally matched guide.”
As I was wondering why this topic suddenly came up, Jeonghyun continued.
“Originally, there was a B-class guide with a 92% matching rate. But they signed a contract with someone else a day earlier.”
I inhaled in surprise. Looking at me, Jeonghyun drove the point home.
“That guide is Jeong Seyeon.”
The implications of Jeonghyun’s words were clear. I was the cause of the changing future.
‘To think that I was the reason Jeonghyun met the mental esper.’
Originally, Joo Seolhyeon should have become my dedicated guide, and Jeong Seyeon should have met the S-class esper that Jeonghyun encountered and formed a dedicated guide contract. But because I tried to break the ill-fated relationship with Joo Seolhyeon by contracting with other guides, this relationship had been completely twisted. And the fallout didn’t disappear to some unknown part of the earth but directly landed on my family right beside me.
It was a result I had vaguely anticipated when I felt the future changing, but the actual feeling was different from what I had imagined. It felt like all the blood in my body was turning cold.
“Hyung, why do you look so terrified?”
Jeonghyun looked down at me when I suddenly went silent, and asked in surprise at my expression. I didn’t know what my face looked like right now, but at Jeonghyun’s words, I hurriedly composed my expression.
“You must like Jeong Seyeon more than I thought.”
Unaware of my circumstances, Jeonghyun soon inferred this reason and made a disappointed face.
“Have you already received guiding from him?”
I had unintentionally received his guiding on the day we contracted, but it had only happened briefly while escaping from a nightmare, and there was nothing particularly special between us. But since I had received guiding in the end, I couldn’t bring myself to deny it.
Watching Jeonghyun’s gaze change from disappointment to jealousy as I didn’t deny it, I understood why he was reacting this way.
“You still can’t let it go?”
“What?”
“Don’t pretend you don’t know. Your eyes right now look exactly like an ex-girlfriend.”
“You’ve never dated, hyung.”
“Ah, do you have to get hung up on that? It’s just a saying.”
The first thing Jeonghyun did when he discovered his qualities as a guide at 19 was to try guiding me, an esper. Unlike his confident attempt at guiding, when I just stared at him blankly, Jeonghyun became determined and tried guiding forcefully, even sweating profusely.
But surprisingly, there was no feeling at all, and finding this strange, we both went to the Center to learn the cause. Our matching rate was 1%, almost unheard of throughout the world.
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
