At that moment, Lee Haru was overcome by a strange sensation—as if all the strength had been drained from his body. Startled, he blinked rapidly, but there was no feeling of movement.
This can’t be happening.
With a dazed expression, Lee Haru struggled to make sense of the scene unfolding before him.
It felt eerily familiar. Like that time in the hospital, when he had fallen asleep and watched Yu Je-hyun and Kang Min as though his spirit had left his body.
Yu Je-hyun had been on the verge of death. Haru had reached out to him, but his hand had passed right through. He couldn’t touch him.
The only difference now was that the body—Haru’s body, or rather, the one he had been inhabiting—was moving on its own right before his eyes.
He reached toward the body that, just moments ago, had been his. His now semi-transparent hand slipped right through it.
It seemed his soul had been ejected. And in its place, the original owner had returned.
Step by step, the rightful owner of the body began walking toward Kang Min. He came to a stop just a few paces away.
“……Why are you looking at me like that? Do you feel sorry for me?”
That wasn’t Haru’s voice. The original owner had reclaimed the body and moved its lips. His voice, steeped in sorrow, made Kang Min flinch.
Haru could only watch in a stupor, like an audience member at a play, as his body acted on its own.
“……You know I really liked you, right? Back then, I thought the world of you. Honestly, I can’t even remember why anymore—but at the time, you were everything to me.”
There hadn’t been any grand reason he fell for him. It was before Haru had even awakened as a Guide.
A month before the college entrance exam, a Spontaneous Dungeon appeared on his way to school. It was a quiet route, and he had been the only one around.
Just when he thought he was going to die, Kang Min appeared.
“Are you all right?”
It was probably something he said out of habit. After all, Kang Min had awakened early as an S-rank Esper and had saved countless people.
But to Haru, he had been a savior.
After losing his parents as a child, Haru was raised in his aunt’s house, where he was treated like a burden. They didn’t even buy him a school uniform—he wore hand-me-downs donated by graduating students.
He never received pocket money, and a haircut at a salon was a luxury he couldn’t afford. His self-cut hair was jagged and uneven. With a constant cloud of gloom around him, he looked like someone born under a curse—friendless, withdrawn.
Even when he got injured during PE, no one asked if he was okay. Over time, he forgot that he, too, was someone others could worry about.
It wasn’t until he reunited with Kang Min that he realized he’d fallen for the man who saved him in that moment of despair.
“I’m Kang Min. I look forward to working with you.”
Even though Kang Min had forgotten their brief encounter, Haru had been happy just to meet him again—as equals this time, unlike before.
But that joy had faded quickly.
“Forget everything I ever said or did in the past. None of it matters anymore.”
“……Why are you saying this?”
Kang Min still wanted to fix things between them. At some point, Lee Haru had started to matter to him. And once he found out what Hong Seong-jun had done, he was overwhelmed with guilt.
It wasn’t his fault, but he still felt a deep sense of remorse toward Haru.
He’d planned to offer a proper apology, then do all the things Haru once wanted—have meals together, visit charming cafés, go on a relaxing drive on their days off.
But Haru’s eyes told him everything.
It was too late.
Kang Min’s hand clenched into a fist.
While he had been too caught up in the past and blind to his feelings, Haru had grown closer to Yu Je-hyun.
He recalled how, not long ago, Haru had kissed Yu Je-hyun in front of everyone without hesitation to perform Guiding. The memory brought a faint, bitter sense of defeat.
“You know who Esper Yu Je-hyun is, right?”
Instead of responding, Haru suddenly turned to Yu Je-hyun and asked a question. Kang Min, just as confused, looked at him as well.
“……Who are you?”
Yu Je-hyun’s face turned deadly serious. The cryptic question made Kang Min furrow his brow.
Haru smiled faintly as Yu Je-hyun watched him warily.
“That’s a relief. I don’t think someone like you would be foolish enough to lose something so precious.”
Then Haru turned to meet the eyes of Hong Seong-jun, who had been holding his breath in silence. The moment their eyes met, Hong Seong-jun looked away.
Haru had to breathe slowly to keep the rage from spilling over. That coward—he couldn’t even meet his eyes at the critical moment.
Everything Hong Seong-jun had done to him flashed through Haru’s mind like a reel of film.
As Haru stepped closer, Kang Min moved beside him.
Though Hong Seong-jun was already restrained, Kang Min remained tense. There was no telling what kind of desperate move he might make.
“Can you make sure this bastard doesn’t move?”
At Haru’s request, Kang Min tightened the net around him even more.
Haru looked down at Hong Seong-jun, lying helpless like a fish on a chopping board. Then he calmly lifted his right foot.
Even for an S-rank Esper, the groin was a vulnerable point. Haru stomped down mercilessly.
Hong Seong-jun furrowed his brow in response—but nothing more.
No matter how hard Haru stomped, it wasn’t enough to cause him pain.
Yu Je-hyun, quick on the uptake, had timed it perfectly—channeling magic into the strike just as Haru brought his foot down.
Thwack—
“Ghh….”
Hong Seong-jun’s eyes widened. The first strike had only been mildly irritating, but now the pain was real—excruciating.
A burst of agony shot through his crushed groin, and veins bulged at his temples. Lee Haru briefly glanced at Yu Je-hyun, then turned his full attention to smashing Hong Seong-jun’s lower half without restraint.
“W-Wait, just… hold on—”
A broken bone and gushing blood would have been preferable. Desperate, Hong Seong-jun reached forward as if to plead, but Haru, unmoved, pressed down harder, as if it still wasn’t enough.
A deep, dark red spread between Hong Seong-jun’s legs. He tried to summon magic to defend himself, but each time, Kang Min and Yu Je-hyun blocked it.
Unrelenting blows to his most sensitive, unguarded spot left him utterly defenseless. Eventually, his eyes began to roll back.
“He’s foaming at the mouth now. Guess it really is hurting.”
Yu Je-hyun took a small step back as white foam dribbled from Hong Seong-jun’s lips.
There was nothing left in Lee Haru’s expression—no anger, no pity. Just a chilling, foreign emptiness. At first, it had seemed only slightly off.
The way Haru had looked at Yu Je-hyun—with cold, mournful eyes—he had felt like a stranger.
When Haru, in that flat, emotionless voice, confessed that he had once loved Kang Min, something in Yu Je-hyun’s chest tightened.
He had always known—perhaps not in exact words, but the truth had been there, unspoken. Still, hearing it aloud from Haru’s own mouth felt like the final confirmation, like watching the door close on a chapter he hadn’t realized was ending.
At least it was past tense. Had loved. That was the only small mercy.
But even as he tried to focus on that, a gnawing sense of wrongness crept in. Haru was someone he had come to cherish deeply—someone he would risk his life to protect. And yet, the person standing before him now felt… off.
Their eyes met.
And in that instant, Yu Je-hyun was sure.
This was Lee Haru. But not the Haru he knew. Not the one he had fallen for.
That faint smile Haru gave him in response to the silent question in his gaze—calm, distant, almost hollow—only made the feeling stronger. Yu Je-hyun’s thoughts flashed back to the moment Haru had started to change, as if under the influence of something he couldn’t see.
He didn’t know how or why, but the Haru standing here now was exactly like the one from before the mansion. The Haru before everything had started to unravel.
Which left him with just one question—where had his Haru gone?
He wanted answers. But Haru had wanted vengeance on Hong Seong-jun, and Kang Min had allowed it. At first, it felt justified.
There was something deeply satisfying about watching that arrogant bastard get his comeuppance—especially where he had so carelessly mocked and tormented others.
But as time dragged on, Yu Je-hyun felt like he could feel the pain himself. Cold sweat trickled down his back.
“Haa…”
Eventually, Hong Seong-jun blacked out from the pain. Haru exhaled deeply and wiped his forehead with the back of his hand.
It was both relieving and hollow. He had thought everything ended the moment he died. But then he met Kim Min-hyeok, and was dragged back into this world.
He had avenged himself against Hong Seong-jun. He had confessed his feelings to Kang Min.
Now, he could feel the end drawing near. His strength was draining away, little by little.
He looked back at Kang Min, who was still watching him—as if he had more to say. But this man—he never truly saw him. Not like Yu Je-hyun did.
If Kang Min had recognized him… would he have hesitated to let go?
Even imagining it now, it all felt meaningless.
Then he noticed Kim Min-hyeok nearby, circling anxiously around him—and with that, whatever traces of regret had been left in him quietly faded.
He looked at Kang Min one last time and smiled.
It was a smile of true relief. Of final release.
