Woo-chan’s face twitched ever so slightly.
“Do you even understand what you’re doing?”
His finger pointed toward the burning document clutched in Seo Won’s hand.
“That data no longer exists in the Administrator’s memory. It’s been erased. Do you even know what that means?”
“I do. Which is why this is for the best.”
“You little…”
Woo-chan couldn’t make sense of Seo Won.
That document held precisely the information Seo Won had been desperately seeking—what Han-gyeom had been after all along. And yet, the moment Seo Won confirmed it with his own eyes, he set fire to the evidence with his own hands.
Woo-chan, staring at the paper now halfway reduced to ash, raised his voice in disbelief.
“Han-gyeom believes you are the client. Until I saw that document, I believed it too.”
“I’d like to erase it from your memory too, if possible.”
Seo Won’s voice, laced with a bitter smile, scraped against Woo-chan’s tangled emotions.
Bang!
Woo-chan’s fist slammed hard against the table. From outside, Lee Ji-hye shouted, “What the hell? What’s going on in there?!” but it seemed she was being held back by Du-hyuk.
“You know why Han-gyeom won’t leave your side. Why he’s so desperate to guide you. And you’re just going to accept that?! If we had that info, then maybe—”
“Don’t you want me dead too, just like the rest?”
Seo Won’s blunt words made Woo-chan flinch.
The fire consuming the paper had crept to Seo Won’s fingertips, as if ready to devour him whole.
But the flames only feasted on the paper that held the truth, and then gently kissed Seo Won’s cold fingertips before flickering out.
Seo Won gave a faint chuckle as he watched the fine ash of the burnt pages scatter.
“I already suspected what was in it. Even with a hard rule like ‘contracts must be made with the person involved,’ he would’ve been the type to ignore it if he wanted.”
He had only needed solid proof.
Not to prove that he wasn’t the client. But to confirm that the one who dared to rip an Esper’s heart out in exchange for their own life was that man.
Only then could this whole affair be put to rest.
And that evidence? Seo Won alone needed to know it.
For Cha Han-gyeom, who was barely hanging on, driven by vengeance—it would only poison him further.
Seo Won looked down at the lighter he’d barely mustered the strength to use to burn the evidence. The nearly empty gas chamber reminded him of Han-gyeom’s unsteady hands when he discarded it.
Clutching the lighter gently, Seo Won finally spoke.
“Kang Woo-chan. Let’s make a contract.”
“A contract…?”
Woo-chan, drained the moment the hard-earned information was reduced to ash without a trace, responded with a weary voice. The fact that Seo Won could so nonchalantly propose a contract in such a situation was beyond astonishing.
Then, Seo Won spoke words that Woo-chan could not afford to ignore.
“The ‘cores’ of the Espers that were disposed of at the Fourth Ability Analysis Research Facility are scheduled to be transferred to my lab.”
The Esper Association had described them as nothing more than condensed ESP, but by now, he had a much clearer idea of what they truly were. If he hadn’t seen all the disposal footage from the Fourth Ability Analysis Research Facility with his own eyes, he never would have known.
The word core sent a razor-sharp chill down Woo-chan’s spine.
Because he knew exactly how that word had come to be.
Esper core conversion.
At the Fourth Ability Analysis Research Facility, disposal meant just that.
Living Espers were shoved whole into a massive centrifuge. Inside, a hollow core—capable of continuously absorbing ESP—waited.
The Esper, still alive, would be spun at an unbearable speed, feeling their body shred and break apart under the force. While their horrific, desperate screams echoed through the machine, the Esper—driven mad by sheer survival instinct—would pour out every last drop of their ESP in a final, violent outburst… and die.
Espers, slaughtered in the most grotesque way imaginable, would then stain the empty core black with their ESP.
Disposal.
The fate of research Espers who had outlived their usefulness.
When he thought of such atrocities committed by the Fourth Ability Analysis Research Facility, he couldn’t help but think—maybe death at another lab, one that at least killed cleanly, was better. At least the bodies weren’t desecrated in the name of post-mortem research.
Despite the icy fury radiating from Woo-chan, Seo Won didn’t stop speaking.
“My research is already nearing completion. Soon, as per the contract with the Association, those cores will be put to practical use through the containment devices I developed.”
Clatter!
The moment Seo Won finished speaking, Woo-chan shot to his feet, knocking over his chair.
But he didn’t even glance at it. His eyes flared wide, murderous intent seething from his whole body. He knew it wouldn’t matter to Seo Won, who was already Imprinted, but even so, the GP boiling inside him from that murderous intent turned his eyes a blood-red hue.
“So I was right. No matter what Han-gyeom says, I should’ve killed you. Hell, it’s not too late now.”
He couldn’t believe it had already reached the brink of practical application.
Woo-chan already knew about Seo Won’s deal with the Association. Knew that Seo Won had developed devices that allowed ordinary people to use ESP and GP-infused mediums without issue.
But that wasn’t what the Association truly wanted.
No matter how much ESP an Ability User poured into one of those devices, no matter how much GP they guided into it—it was still a consumable. The more it was used, the more it depleted. At best, it could be considered rechargeable.
But right now, within those things called cores, the ESP wasn’t dispersing.
It regenerated endlessly.
The vessel containing the core was essentially a physical shell infused with the dead Esper’s life force. Within it, ESP created stable channels and flowed freely, undisturbed.
The one holding all the cores created at the Fourth Ability Analysis Research Facility was none other than Kim Cheol-min, the Vice President of the Esper Association.
He was the man who, five and a half years ago, approached Seo Won—who was on the brink of death—and offered him a contract under the pretense of a heart transplant.
Kang Woo-chan, who knew full well just how ruthless and depraved Kim Cheol-min truly was, could not allow his ambitions to come to fruition.
Kim Cheol-min, a powerless man who longed to be an Ability User but never could be, sought to gain access to various abilities for himself—and beyond that, to create a military force capable of trampling over the entire world. If he could harvest the abilities of shattered and broken Ability Users and imbue them into his chosen people using the cores, his power would become absolute.
Knowing this, Woo-chan resolved that even if it cost him his life in a fight against Seo Won right here and now, he had to stop him at all costs.
Because the first to be sacrificed in the core conversion process would undoubtedly be the unregistered Ability Users—those who could be dragged away by the Association at any time.
Woo-chan’s eyes flushed with blood as he raised his killing intent to its peak.
Seo Won, on the other hand, remained calm.
“Don’t jump to conclusions. It won’t go the way you think.”
“And why the hell should I believe that?”
Seo Won had staked his own life as collateral in the contract with the Association. The fact that his life was on the line meant that if the contract were ever breached, his fate would be sealed. Which also meant—it wasn’t a contract that could be broken easily or unilaterally.
“That’s exactly why I’m offering to make a contract with you. So you can believe me.”
Woo-chan stared into Seo Won’s deep, unwavering eyes and gradually let the killing intent fade. Since he had mentioned a contract himself, he figured it was at least worth hearing what it entailed.
After righting his fallen chair and taking a seat, Woo-chan finally heard the details of Seo Won’s proposal.
“I’ll destroy all the cores without leaving a single trace. So thoroughly that no one will even dare attempt to use them for research again.”
“What…?”
“Of course, since the cores will be destroyed during the development stage, there’ll be no question of putting them into practical use.”
The more Seo Won spoke, the wider Woo-chan’s eyes grew.
Destroying the cores—there was nothing he wanted more.
He didn’t know what Han-gyeom might think, but to Woo-chan, the Ability Users of the research facilities were no different than his own siblings. Because of that, he wanted to free their agonized ESPs, stolen after such cruel deaths, so they would no longer be violated.
That’s why he had to stop Seo Won’s research and destroy the cores himself. And now Seo Won was the one saying he would do it.
“You’re saying you’ll break the contract with the Association?”
“Strictly speaking, it wasn’t with the Association. I made the deal directly with Vice President Kim Cheol-min.”
“That’s the same thing. He may be called the Vice President, but let’s be real—his actual power surpasses even the President’s. If you break the contract, not even being the heir to the Kangsan Group will keep you safe.”
“Then I’ll just have to drag him down. From that throne he sits on, stripped of the Association’s backing, nothing but an old man.”
Every word Seo Won uttered was more shocking than the last.
So much so that Woo-chan could only let out a hollow laugh before asking, almost reflexively, what it was that Seo Won truly wanted.
“Then what is it that you want? If you’re willing to abandon everything you’ve built and even throw away your life, the terms must be pretty damn steep.”
“It won’t be that hard for you.”
Seo Won spoke as if savoring the weight of the price he was paying in this contract, reciting it slowly, one line at a time.
“Tell Cha Han-gyeom: ‘The client who stole the heart of the living Song Yeon-woo was Seo Won, just as expected.’”
It was a statement that directly contradicted what had been written in the document Seo Won had burned.
