A faint trace of laughter lingered in the voice of the man who was gentle only toward him. For some reason, Choi Tae-hoon couldn’t bring himself to speak, so instead of answering, he gave a small shake of his head. He couldn’t even meet his eyes.
Because if he saw the man who had carved his Name into his back smiling at him so tenderly, it felt like there truly would be no other choice left for him anymore.
But Esper Ji Gwan-young had a bad habit. Before he kissed someone, he looked into their eyes.
…I’m seriously fucked.
Choi Tae-hoon thought that as he parted his lips slightly, willingly allowing the intrusion of his one and only Esper.
***
It probably wasn’t his imagination that the familiar faces at The Center looked unusually haggard today.
And today, inside this conference room, it wasn’t just the usual researchers like Lee Mihyun and Oh Yeon— even the Director herself had come down in person. As the head of the National Esper-Guide Research Center, she possessed one of the most exceptional abilities among Intelligence-type Espers. The fact that she had become Director while still only in her late forties said enough about her capabilities.
Watching the Director’s stiff expression, Choi Tae-hoon rubbed his clammy palms together in nervousness. He had been going in and out of The Center since he was too young to remember, but he personally had very little connection with the Director.
By the time Tae-hoon had become old enough to understand things, she had already been a top-ranking researcher, and after he became an adult, the only times he ever saw her were from afar during major Center events.
The most recent occasion had been during the Minister’s visit to The Center, so there wasn’t much more to say.
Director Kwon Dahee tapped the table rhythmically with a single index finger, looking somewhat bored.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
To Tae-hoon, it sounded like a reprimand directed squarely at him, making his eyes dart around anxiously. It couldn’t be helped. Right now, all these high-ranking officials gathered here were waiting for a single Esper.
And Choi Tae-hoon, guilty of having him as his Pair, was quietly dying under the pressure all by himself.
You said your Name hurts if I call you! Was that all bullshit?
Inside, Tae-hoon desperately searched for the man who shared his Name.
Ji Gwan-young, Ji Gwan-young, Ji Gwan-young, Ji Gwan-young. You insane bastard Ji Gwan-young. Fucking Ji Gwan-young. Please just get here already.
Apparently, the very culprit making all these people wait had simply sent a text saying he’d come after his suddenly extended drama filming wrapped up.
When Mihyun had delivered those words with a face that looked ready to collapse on the spot, Tae-hoon had genuinely wanted to crawl into a hole somewhere.
Good lord. I really fell for a man who could be this shameless.
Glancing at his wristwatch, Tae-hoon’s eyes brimmed with anxiety. It had already been over forty minutes past the scheduled time. It was enough to drive anyone insane. The more time piled up, the paler Tae-hoon became. From farther away, Lee Mihyun and Oh Yeon noticed and quietly swallowed their sighs.
Whether fortunately or unfortunately, Ji Gwan-young did appear before a full hour had passed.
Though despite being late, he entered frowning deeply while holding an iced Americano packed full of ice in one hand.
Still, he had come.
And the moment he stepped into the conference room, instead of apologizing, he walked straight over to his Guide and grumbled in irritation with a slight frown.
“Choi Tae-hoon, stop overdoing it. It hurts.”
“…….Ha. Hahaha. Ha. Ha……..”
Thanks to the cryptic exchange that only the two of them could understand, the researchers’ eyes widened in confusion as an added bonus.
At that moment, Tae-hoon sincerely wanted to strangle that arrogant neck of his.
But Tae-hoon was both a civilized person and a functioning adult.
Suppressing his heartfelt rage with all his might, Tae-hoon lightly kicked his Esper in the shin before dragging him down into the seat beside him. Naturally, Ji Gwan-young stared at him like, Did you seriously just kick me? but Tae-hoon wasn’t remotely afraid of that look.
Once the final and most important witness had taken his seat, everything moved quickly after that.
The conference room lights dimmed, and the projector flickered on. Sitting upright, Tae-hoon swallowed dryly as he watched Oh Yeon walk forward.
On one side of the conference room sat his Guide, Park Seungwon, wearing an unusually cold expression.
It was the first time Tae-hoon had ever seen that look on him. Unlike the always-stoic Oh Yeon, Park Seungwon was usually the kind of man who smiled with his eyes curved warmly.
But today, the atmosphere surrounding that Pair felt anything but normal.
“……We’ll begin.”
But whether the atmosphere was grave or not, Ji Gwan-young looked entirely unconcerned, merely glancing sideways at the tense Tae-hoon.
Choi Tae-hoon was definitely too kind.
Truthfully, Gwan-young had never particularly liked the word kind. To him, it carried almost the same implication as stupid. But somehow, every word suitable to describe Choi Tae-hoon was like that.
‘Upright,’ ‘proper,’ ‘good-hearted.’
My Guide.
Quietly, Gwan-young intertwined their fingers and held his Guide’s tense hand. Whenever Choi Tae-hoon got nervous, his palms became slightly damp. That was why he usually tried to avoid physical contact during moments like this.
But honestly, Gwan-young quite liked it.
Holding tight so Tae-hoon couldn’t pull away, Gwan-young slowly traced over his hand with his thumb.
Tae-hoon’s heartbeat sped up slightly.
“The following footage is CCTV of Esper Oh Jinwoo and Guide Lee Hansol appearing in Itaewon-dong, Yongsan-gu on XX date.”
The voice sounded rougher than usual, metallic and slightly hoarse.
Trying hard to ignore the man absentmindedly playing with his hand, Tae-hoon focused on the screen.
It was the first time he was seeing the face properly of the Esper who had grabbed him in Itaewon.
Inside the rectangular frame of what looked like an ID photo, the man’s features appeared far healthier and more vibrant than the state Tae-hoon had seen him in recently.
Tae-hoon listened closely to Oh Yeon’s explanation.
“These individuals are directly connected to the murder case of a Center-affiliated Guide ten years ago. Until now, they were believed to have been directly and indirectly involved in multiple terrorist incidents, but this is the first time their appearances have been captured. Judging from the circumstances of this incident, Esper… Oh Jinwoo appears to have formed a Pair with Guide Lee Hansol.”
Lee Hansol.
Choi Tae-hoon couldn’t take his eyes off the image of the young man with delicate features filling the screen one after another, and only a beat later did he fully process Yeon’s words.
‘The murder case of a Center-affiliated Guide ten years ago.’
Tae-hoon knew about that incident too.
No— anyone affiliated with The Center would know it.
It had happened when Tae-hoon was still in high school: a horrifying case where a Guide inside The Center had been brutally murdered by an outsider. Because of that incident, all matching tests had been suspended for several months.
But for that Pair to be connected to the incident from ten years ago—an inexplicable chill crept over Tae-hoon, and unconsciously, he tightened his grip on the Esper’s hand clasped with his.
Gwan-young looked oddly pleased by that, his expression turning faintly languid.
But separate from that, he was also the only person in the room unfamiliar with the ‘incident from ten years ago.’
“What exactly was the incident ten years ago?”
“A Center-affiliated Guide was murdered inside The Center by an outsider. Afterward, all Center security codes were revised to change every two hours, and—”
“Haha. That’s not what I wanted to know, though. You’re dodging the question even though you know exactly what I mean.”
Ji Gwan-young’s eyes curved narrowly.
Tae-hoon frowned slightly at the strange barbs hidden beneath his Pair’s polite exterior. But that reaction was nothing compared to what the surrounding researchers felt.
Mihyun bit her lip anxiously.
An Esper as powerful as Ji Gwan-young had clearly noticed Oh Yeon’s condition long ago. And it was true.
Ji Gwan-young had already picked up on the fact that Oh Yeon’s heartbeat was beating twice as fast as usual, and that he had uncharacteristically paused and stumbled over his words several times.
The Esper who hadn’t even blinked when Gwan-young destroyed the training room and attacked the control room wasn’t the kind of man who would tremble over a mere briefing like this.
Which meant the real issue lay elsewhere.
“What I want to know is how Esper Oh Jinwoo is connected to the incident ten years ago,”
“…….”
“and what kind of relationship that man has with Researcher Oh Yeon.”
Choi Tae-hoon’s eyes widened.
He had gone in and out of The Center since he was very young, but he had never heard anything like this before. Even regarding the incident ten years ago, all he had ever heard was that “a Guide was murdered inside The Center.”
Tae-hoon vividly remembered the day he first met Oh Yeon back in high school.
A difficult-looking hyung with a cold impression.
That had been his first impression of him.
Of course, their matching rate had been terrible— barely over ten percent, if that.
Digging through old memories, Tae-hoon eventually managed to recall something else.
After they first met and gradually became familiar with each other, Oh Yeon had suddenly disappeared the following year without even saying goodbye, supposedly leaving to study abroad.
Tae-hoon vaguely remembered feeling rather hurt about it at the time.
After losing contact like that, Tae-hoon didn’t meet him again until he turned twenty.
Now he stared blankly at Oh Yeon, who had his teeth clenched tightly.
It was the first time he had ever seen an expression like that on him.
“The Esper belonging to the Guide who was murdered ten years ago… was Oh Jinwoo. Oh Jinwoo is believed to have participated in the murder led by Lee Hansol.”
“……”
“That Esper, Oh Jinwoo…”
Every word slipping through the gaps of his teeth carried deep emotion, as though he were forcing himself to say something he never wanted to utter.
At the very least, Tae-hoon could tell that whatever swirled inside those eyes was anything but warm.
“He’s an Esper related to me by blood.”
“By blood?”
“……He’s my biological younger brother.”
Tae-hoon tugged on his Esper’s hand as if telling him to stop. But Ji Gwan-young had no intention of letting this slide.
What tragic backstory the researcher before him carried didn’t matter to him in the slightest.
No matter what, Oh Jinwoo was the Pair of the Guide who had been spewing nonsense about killing Tae-hoon, and he had openly subdued Choi Tae-hoon right in front of him.
Any information available— whatever it was— needed to be known.
“A family member of a Center researcher holds a Center-affiliated Guide hostage and creates a standoff. That’s hardly a normal situation.”
“Let me correct that. He was my younger brother.”
“So what? You want us to understand and overlook it?”
“I’m saying you should do whatever the hell you want, Ji Gwan-young! Capture him and drag him back, or beat him to death for all I care!”
BANG!
The sound of someone slamming the podium rang out violently.
The hoarse voice shouting with veins bulging sounded almost like a scream.
For a moment, Tae-hoon unconsciously held his breath before finally exhaling shakily, unable to even let the sound out properly.
Everyone else was the same, overwhelmed into silence by the freezing atmosphere.
To them as well, this side of Oh Yeon was utterly unfamiliar. No— saying it was the first time would be more accurate.
Oh Yeon had always been the most rational and composed Esper among them. That was why he had earned the nickname The Center’s Brain, capable of handling even highly sensitive classified information with dry calmness.
Park Seungwon also ran a hand irritably through his hair.
Seriously, there wasn’t a single thing he liked about Esper Ji Gwan-young. He never imagined the man would so openly prod at one of the very few ways to shake his lover emotionally.
One eyebrow lifting slightly, Ji Gwan-young finally seemed willing to back off and answered reluctantly,
“Thank you for answering.”
Truthfully, there was still far more he wanted to confirm, but he knew very well that if he pushed any further, Choi Tae-hoon would genuinely get angry.
The one responsible for easing the suffocating tension filling the conference room was, naturally, the head of this place.
The Director rose to her feet, accompanied by the crisp sound of her heels.
“Researcher Oh Yeon. I’m sorry. This was something I should’ve handled myself.”
“…….No. I apologize.”
“Ji Gwan-young-ssi. Do you have anything else to ask Researcher Oh?”
“I do not.”
A clean resolution.
Director Kwon Dahee was the kind of woman whose sheer presence alone radiated authority and charisma.
Her shoulder-length wavy hair, somewhat classic pearl accessories, even the tweed jacket she wore— her meticulous personality showed through in every detail of her appearance.
Watching the Director now standing where Oh Yeon had been moments ago, Choi Tae-hoon blinked nervously.
