Chapter 24
Before falling asleep, I asked the two people lying on either side of me.
“Did you think I wouldn’t go if you asked me properly when I was fully awake?”
“That was part of it…”
“And you didn’t think I’d get angry?”
“I knew you would. That’s why I’m more sorry. I was wrong.”
Their voices were barely audible.
We’ve known each other for 7 years since I first met them when I was 8.
These two must have anticipated my reaction.
They surely knew I would frown as soon as things deviated from what I had planned or expected.
I haven’t just been angry with them as they’ve grown up.
When something went wrong with these two, I also needed time to organize my thoughts and developed a habit of trying to understand what they were thinking.
I always thought before speaking, and only nagged or got angry if I still couldn’t understand.
As a result, I tended to need some time when making decisions, but these brats seized the opportunity while I was distracted and got my half-hearted permission.
Honestly, I could be angrier and they would have nothing to say, but I just felt like letting things happen as they may.
In Guide classes, we learn that “there’s no need to enter gates for safety reasons.”
Yet these two were insisting it was absolutely safe.
I let it go somewhat easily because I wondered how different it could really be.
“Do you really think it’ll be okay?”
“The school said it would be fine. No one has ever gotten hurt.”
“They said students from second and third year who went had a really fun time.”
“They say the atmosphere inside the gate is different from outside, so we should think of it as a field trip, but if we go by ourselves, you won’t be able to see it. We didn’t want you to only see us, so even if we were going, we really wanted to go together.”
I focused on what the two of them were saying.
It was one of the reasons Espers had a different sense of reality from others.
The words of teachers, heard within the school where they spend their teenage years after entering at a young age, become their world.
Of course, unlike before the regression, the kids around me now also learn some things from me, so I can somewhat offset the idea that everything taught at school is the absolute truth.
Nevertheless, since gate-related content is covered in Esper classes, I couldn’t know and verify everything.
When it comes to gates and Esper classes, children end up accepting their teachers’ words verbatim.
I can help with their daily lives, but I can’t fix the school.
It will be the same when they go outside later.
Guides ultimately push Espers back into the battlefield.
I couldn’t separate before and after the regression.
Rather, memories from the past were constraining the present.
Judging from my mother’s words before the regression and the kids’ reactions after it, it seemed to be correct.
Now it was certain.
All Espers in our country are supposed to enter a gate at least once during their teens.
The entire system of schools and society was forcing Espers to enter a gate at least once at a young age.
Though the two seemed quite excited, my worries piled up.
As soon as the sun rose, I was led by the two who had woken up early, and heading outside the school, there was a tour bus waiting.
Is this really like a field trip?
“It says ‘School 3’ over there. Where should we sit?”
“I want to sit next to Soo-young hyung.”
“The high school students will sit in the back row. No way. We can’t sit together.”
“You can sit alone. I want to sit next to Soo-young hyung.”
There were emergency rations but also snacks.
With snacks in one hand and holding my hand with the other, the two bickered about where to sit.
Whichever side I sat on, the other side would probably be noisy… After watching the two for a moment, I got on the bus and had them sit together.
“If you two start fighting now, I’m going back to school right before we enter the gate.”
“…”
“Stay quiet, just be quiet. Got it?”
Then, knowing that someone would complain about proximity if I sat across from them, I deliberately sat in the seat behind them.
I smiled contentedly at their aggrieved faces visible through the small gap in the seat, then closed my eyes.
And I just slept during the journey.
When I woke up after sleeping for a while, we were almost at our destination.
As I opened my eyes slightly, the kids looked sullen but seemed to have been quiet the whole time, and in the seat next to me, a handsome older boy I hadn’t seen before was smiling at me.
“Hello?”
“Hello…”
“I thought my face was going to get holes in it.”
“The kids in front kept staring at me,” he said with a laugh, and I could guess what he meant.
Those two are a bit like that. Even when kids just come for guiding, they stare so much that those who come only get high fives and leave.
“Are you that Moon Soo-young?”
“I am Moon Soo-young, but… ‘that’?”
“Yes, that. That Moon Soo-young. S-class Guide. Provisional member of Calling Guild.”
“The first two are correct, but the last one isn’t.”
“No?”
“I haven’t signed a contract.”
“What~. I haven’t signed one either. I’m also listed as a provisional member, though at a different guild.”
The older boy next to me kept talking, and the older girls sitting beside him and the boys behind me were staring at me, watching our conversation.
This boy kept talking with a smile, but I felt like my face was going to get holes in it from all the staring.
Yoon Cheong, Ji Yeohoon, and I were wearing gray uniforms, but surprisingly, the high school students, both boys and girls, were wearing comfortable-looking activewear.
From the high school students’ perspective, it would naturally be interesting to talk to and chat with the only three middle schoolers on board, but the two in front were exuding a “don’t approach” aura and bristling aggressively at people near me, so they were probably only talking to me, who had just woken up.
Moreover, judging by the positive expressions of the older students nearby, I was confirmed to be surrounded by Espers.
“Are you in the same grade as those little ones in front?”
“The one sitting by the window is in the same grade, and the one by the aisle is one grade below.”
“We’re not little ones.”
I thought he knew the two in front since he knew me, but apparently not.
At the prickly voice, I gestured for them to look forward, and the two grumbled and turned to face ahead.
I wondered how he knew me, and he said I was famous because School 3 had two of the rare S-class Guides.
The list of people entering the gate today had already been submitted, and as soon as they confirmed my name was on it, the high school Espers had cheered.
The S-class Guide in the senior year apparently doesn’t provide guiding very often.
“That noona really doesn’t do it. She only does it after checking matching rates and only for people with high rates.”
“Why?”
“I heard she experienced reverse guiding once. So she absolutely never does it casually. Do you also refuse if the numbers don’t match?”
“No. I’ve never experienced reverse guiding.”
“Then, when we go in today, could you gui–“
“No.”
Ji Yeohoon answered immediately as if he was listening to the conversation and knew what was being asked.
You’re asking the Guide, so why are you answering…
Yoon Cheong seemed to have the same thought, with a firm expression saying it wasn’t allowed.
Even if temporary or provisional, guild members’ guiding does take priority.
When I also agreed with them saying it wouldn’t be possible, the older boy didn’t seem particularly offended and nodded.
He smiled, saying he understood that even though they learn to overcome their instincts at school, it’s not a pleasant feeling when a Guide who always looks after you touches someone else.
“We have teachers with us anyway. Should we get off since we’ve arrived? I feel like I’ll get scolded inside the gate if I talk to you more.”
“It’s just you~.”
“We didn’t even talk to him?”
“What? Just me?”
The handsome high school student naturally chatted with his friends as he got up and left first.
As soon as we got off the bus, I sighed deeply at the two who immediately stood close to me, then said “Let’s go” and grabbed their arms.
With so many high school students, the leader was naturally the high school Esper homeroom teacher, who was telling everyone to line up in order.
“The people joining us at the gate today are from ‘Spiral’ Guild. Two A-class Espers and three B-class Guides have come.”
The number of observers was smaller than I expected, but that wasn’t bad. Spiral Guild is ranked 9th globally and 2nd in Korea. People dispatched from there wouldn’t be incompetent, and with thirty student Espers participating and only two Guides including me, there shouldn’t be any problems in an F-class gate with this scale.
Given School 3’s characteristic that only those affiliated with guilds or high-class abilities can transfer, everyone should be excellent, so there shouldn’t be any issues.
“The device we’re distributing now is a gate gauge meter. You’ll carry this meter into the gate interior. Some Espers purchase them individually, and sometimes guilds use them communally. What color and text do you see on it?”
“Blue!”
“F!”
“The meter measures the gauge of the nearest gate, so it’s telling us about the status of the gate we’re about to enter. We’ll be entering an F-class gate-“
Yoon Cheong and Ji Yeohoon were pressing various buttons, finding the device fascinating.
I also checked it by pressing different buttons, as it was an older version of the device I had used.
The basic framework isn’t different.
“Before entering, check the meter like this and confirm the exact number of people entering. If the reported number differs from the actual number of people conquering the gate, you can be legally punished-“
She explained that gate conquerors need to be accurately identified to be listed in the globally managed system, and because a country’s national power varies according to gate conquests, this is an essential measure.
Additionally, since gate conquerors or conquering guilds receive compensation for conquests, if a gate disappears but the conquerors aren’t accurately identified, only the conquest completion gets recorded while the compensation vanishes into thin air.
Since gate conquest applications are made by guilds anyway, they were only providing confirmation details here.
“Now, let’s follow the ‘Spiral’ Guild members and enter.”
The gate appeared like a crack in the air.
Actually, this is my first time directly entering a gate.
I had seen gates many times and checked people entering and verified people coming out, but I had never gone in myself, so I felt more excited than I expected.
With a strange sensation, the interior of the gate we entered was truly bizarre.
The sky was bright, but it was so clear it gave me goosebumps, and what were clearly not cherry blossom trees had pink and purple leaves.
“First thing when entering a gate, check the gauge meter once more. This is because sometimes the gauge changes as people enter the gate, and in that case, people starting from the back should leave.
Gates close once after the first entry, as briefly as 1 minute or as long as 10 minutes. Most gates reopen when all monsters are eliminated or the boss monster is conquered.”
Everyone checked their meters.
Fortunately, the meters still showed it was an F-class gate, unchanged from what we saw outside.
Now that we were inside, I felt more tense than I expected. The high school students, having entered at least once before, pushed us middle schoolers to go in first.
The guild members escorting us were veterans who had cleared B-class and C-class gates multiple times, so it should be fine… but then Ji Yeohoon stared at me blankly while holding the meter.
“Hyung, does this normally move around like this?”
“…”
The meter gauge was fluctuating wildly.
It felt like something I had seen many times before.
It was a memory from before the regression, the day I got hurt.
‘Huh? Why is this suddenly acting like this?’
The wildly fluctuating meter overlapped with that memory.
One of the Spiral Espers who checked the meter shouted.
“Everyone entering now, run outside immediately!”
The high school students who were just entering the gate ran outside urgently.
With the gate entrance growing dim, we who were already far inside stuck close to the guild members at their gesture.
Ah, we’re screwed.
Having quickly assessed the situation, I felt everything go dark.
Before the regression, Ji Yeohoon caused the gate explosion, and Ji Yeohoon’s power is an enhancement buff type.
It’s a buff type that can enhance abilities for a targeted subject, but everyone fell into the trap of thinking it would only apply to Espers, and no one knew that Ji Yeohoon’s power also affected gates.
Everyone learned later when the truth about the terrorism was revealed, but now after the regression, the people here don’t know that fact, the people of Calling Guild don’t know, Ji Yeohoon’s parents don’t know, and Ji Yeohoon doesn’t know.
Only I know, and I forgot about it.
How could I forget this?
Before the regression, Ji Yeohoon used his ability to cause a gate explosion.
An explosion means releasing energy beyond what you possess, which means drawing up the gate’s energy.
Ji Yeohoon, who couldn’t yet control his ability accurately, had affected the gate interior upon entering.
Now I could understand that before the regression, the first gate level increase for Yoon Cheong and Ji Yeohoon was also due to Ji Yeohoon’s power.
“Slimes.”
The blobby slimes in the distance had a strange color.
The jelly-like creatures with no eyes, nose, or anything were bouncing around in a blood-red color, not the green we had heard about outside.
“Blood slimes.”
“The door is completely closed. Kids over there, come over here quickly. The door is completely shut so we can’t leave, we need to resolve this. Where’s the Guide?”
“Two student Guides came, but one was just entering and went straight back out.”
“With four of us, there shouldn’t be any issues using abilities.”
“Someone check the meter. Ah, little Guide. Can you check the meter?”
When I showed them the meter I was holding, the guild members’ expressions tensed up.
The blue gauge that had been moving was changing to green, to the yellow of C-class.
Yoon Cheong raised his hand as if using his power to defend the surroundings, and Ji Yeohoon grabbed my hand with a restless face.
“…Hyung. Maybe this is because I, because my power is unstable,”
“Quiet.”
Before and after the regression, during his first gate practice, Ji Yeohoon realized it.
That his power doesn’t only work on Espers.
He couldn’t help but know, since it was power that had escaped from him.
He had realized that his unstable power works anywhere.
“Ji Yeohoon, support Yoon Cheong. Yoon Cheong, you’ve never skipped practice, right?”
“…Yeah.”
“You said you’d protect me, so protect me until the end.”
And just wait until we get out of here.
Seeing my expression, though I couldn’t grab them by the collar, the two started hiccupping.
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
