“……”
“You’re here? Ah, I only just saw your text…… I didn’t even reply, and you’re already here.”
Rion said with an awkward smile. For Rion, who had no memory of the time he’d been asleep, it felt like seeing Yu-won again after a full day.
“You must’ve really missed me.”
“Are you feeling any better?”
Yu-won ignored Rion’s joke and asked instead. Rion lightly swung his casted leg back and forth as he replied.
“Well, everyone’s making a big fuss…… aside from this, I’m fine. Besides, I can move around by flying anyway.”
“That’s a relief.”
“Right? If it had been someone else instead of me, it wouldn’t have ended this lightly. It’s a good thing it was only this mu—”
“A good thing?”
Yu-won, who had been quietly looking at Rion, frowned. Startled, Rion checked Yu-won’s expression. His voice sounded faintly angry.
“What about this is a good thing? You couldn’t even get up for nearly a week. If Min-hyeon hadn’t been there……”
“If he hadn’t been there, sure…… it could’ve been bad. But he was there.”
Rion spoke calmly, as if he were talking about someone else’s problem. His tone made it sound as though his own injury was nothing of consequence.
“I went in fully prepared for the worst-case scenario, and that didn’t happen, so it’s fine. I know you must’ve worried, but that’s why I went in in the first pla—”
“You didn’t go in to get hurt. You went in to clear the Gate. Did you go in planning to get injured?”
“Ah, that’s not what I meant.”
Because he took the possibility of getting hurt as a given, Rion had misspoken. Still, he didn’t think he was wrong.
“I didn’t go in to get hurt, but I knew getting hurt was a possibility when I went in. That’s what I was trying to say.”
“You were struggling inside the Gate, though. Then what was that?”
Yu-won asked. Watching Rion struggle inside the Gate had been painful—but at the same time, it had made him realize something undeniable.
That Rion, too, was just a person. That even he could be overwhelmed by absurd situations, that he could want to lean on someone else. Seeing that had felt like confirmation.
“You can’t just take your sacrifice for granted like that.”
“That’s…… that wasn’t because I was hurt or struggling. It was because I felt like I wasn’t helping the team, like I was messing things up.”
Rion answered, flustered. Of course he was human, and of course he struggled at times—but the reason for that struggle was a little different from what Yu-won thought.
Just when Yu-won thought he’d finally begun to understand Rion, their thoughts and perspectives slipped past each other again. The frustration made him bite his lip.
“You don’t need to worry. Everything worked out fine.”
Still unable to properly understand Yu-won’s feelings—and likely never fully able to—Rion patted Yu-won on the shoulder.
To Rion, Yu-won’s reaction was nothing more than a rookie being shaken after seeing a colleague injured in a Gate.
“I know watching someone get hurt isn’t easy. And since you and I are a matched pair, you’ve seen it every time we go into a Gate, so it probably hits harder. But being an Esper is that kind of job. You should get used to it little by little.”
Why did that calm, non-angry attempt at reassurance make him even angrier? Yu-won found himself thinking that it might’ve been better when they’d just shouted at each other.
“Anyway, I felt kind of off not seeing you, but it’s nice to see you, even if it’s late. Thanks for coming.”
“There’s something I want to ask.”
“Huh? What is it? Go ahead.”
After looking at Rion with a complicated expression, Yu-won slowly opened his mouth. Rion nodded without hesitation.
“If there was a way to finish the Gate quickly by having you get injured, and another way to finish it safely without taking that risk but with a slight delay in clearing it, which would you choose?”
He hoped—desperately—that what Rion had done this time was a spur-of-the-moment decision. He wanted Rion to hesitate, even just for a moment, to show that he considered his own safety.
“It’d be better if I got hurt. If the Gate clearance gets delayed, who knows what could happen. There’s no need to take that kind of risk over something like that.”
As if the answer were obvious, Rion chose the option where he got injured without the slightest hesitation.
“Do you…… do you ever think about what would happen to you if you got hurt?”
“Ah, sure. If I got seriously injured, the Center staff would all have to split the workload, so I do try to take care of myself. You know how understaffed the Center always is. But there are situations where it can’t be helped.”
They were clearly talking in the same space, yet Yu-won felt as if they were living in completely different worlds.
“I told you. I need to be someone who can do anything for others. That’s the only way I feel even a little at ease.”
“Does it feel like you’re atoning for something?”
“Yeah…… even if it’s just that.”
“You make it sound like it’s wrong for you to be alive.”
Yu-won let out a small, bitter laugh. Only then did Rion realize why Yu-won’s expression had been so stiff.
“It’s not about guilt…… it’s just how I feel. And even if I think that way, it’s not hurting anyone, is it?”
“That’s not what I’m trying to argue about.”
“Then why do you keep going on about something meaningless? You look frustrated, but this is how I’ve lived, and this is how I’ll keep living. When I live like this, my life feels the most worthwhile. In my own way, I’m doing this for myself, too—”
“I’m just worried about you.”
Without realizing it, Rion’s voice had grown louder as he spoke. The one who cut him off was Yu-won, in a calm voice.
When arguments broke out between them, Rion usually lost his temper and ended up shouting, while Yu-won responded with calm but biting remarks.
But this time, there was no sarcasm at all in Yu-won’s voice. If anything, it sounded hurt.
I’m the one who got hurt—so why does he look like he’s the one in more pain?
That thought suddenly crossed Rion’s mind. After staring at Yu-won’s face for a moment, Rion spoke as if possessed by something.
“Are you really that worried about me?”
“……Yes. If that’s a problem.”
“I’m stronger than you. Even now, with my leg injured, I can move around without touching the ground, and I can get out of dangerous situations more easily than you think.”
“So what if you can? You’re not going to do that.”
Yu-won said with a self-mocking smile. He knew well that Rion was strong—but having great power didn’t mean one’s inner self was just as solid.
“You want to save everyone in the world. But then who’s going to save you? I know you’re strong. But in the end, you’re still just a person.”
“I…… I don’t really need anyone to save me. I can handle things on my own.”
“There’s no such thing as someone who can do everything alone. And even if there were…… the real problem is not having the will to let someone else do it.”
His words were sharp, but once Rion became aware of it, the concern dripping from Yu-won’s tone was impossible to miss.
While Yu-won burned with frustration, Rion was having a surprisingly hopeful thought—one completely unrelated to his injury or Yu-won’s distress.
“So you don’t actually hate me.”
Rion said, his eyes sparkling. His tone wasn’t exactly gentle, and the atmosphere was far from good, but it was clear: Yu-won was worried about him.
Compared to the past, when all they did was bicker, wasn’t their relationship definitely better now? If so, maybe—just maybe—if they measured their matching rate again, even that remaining 1 percent would be filled.
“Maybe our matching rate went up.”
“…What?”
Yu-won stared at Rion in shock at his excited voice. But Rion kept talking, seemingly oblivious to Yu-won’s expression.
“Think about it. You seem to like me a lot more than before, and I’ve realized you’re not such a weirdo anymore…… you never know.”
“You’re saying that now?”
Yu-won glared at Rion as if he couldn’t believe this. But to Rion, that 1 percent possibility mattered more than Yu-won’s expression.
“99 percent is already amazing, but hitting a real 100 percent would be insane. I mean, sure, the matching rate matters, but it also means we’ve gotten that much closer—”
“Is that really so important?”
“Of course it is. The reason we got tangled up like this in the first place was because of that matching rate.”
At Rion’s completely guileless answer, Yu-won pressed his lips together. Rion hadn’t meant it that way—but it felt like a final nail, a sign that nothing would change no matter how much they talked.
“Fine. Then after you’re discharged, let’s measure it again.”
“Right? You think so too. It’d be a shame to just let it go without checking.”
“I don’t know if the result will be what you’re hoping for, though.”
With that, Yu-won left Rion’s hospital room. Just like when he’d arrived, his exit was sudden.
