“…….”
“…….”
Large eyes rolled this way and that, as if trying to gauge the atmosphere. Slouched sideways and aggressively jabbing at the TV remote like he meant to break it, Lee Han-seo didn’t even glance back as he barked, “Raise your hands properly.”
Rustle!
The sound of fabric rustling was especially sharp and quick, likely from moving in a rush. Park Woo-jun, who had been sitting with his arms sloppily bent, hastily raised them straight again and began inching forward on his knees without changing position.
He crawled forward at a pace slow enough to drive someone mad, finally stopping right at the foot of the sofa. There, he cautiously rested his head on Lee Han-seo’s knee, trying to read the mood.
“Ow.”
“Mm.”
“Babe, Han-seo. My arms hurt.”
“…….”
“I really did reflect on what I did, a lot……”
He wasn’t from the physical enhancement category, true—he was Nature affinity. But he was still an S-class Esper. His physical capabilities clearly surpassed that of any normal person. There was no way holding his arms up for a mere thirty minutes would actually cause him pain. It was a brazen, cutesy little lie from someone who hadn’t even bothered to lick his lips before whining.
Lee Han-seo almost cracked a smile out of habit, but caught himself just in time and forced his expression back into place. His firm lips and sharp, sulky gaze made it obvious that he wasn’t someone to be taken lightly.
“Hey, Park Woo-jun.”
“Yeah?”
“What did I say last night? I told you not to come anywhere near, didn’t I?”
Those big, blinking eyes quickly lost their light and dropped downward, unable to come up with any sort of excuse.
“B-but……”
“But?”
“It’s your first time standing on a stage like that…… I just really, really wanted to see you……”
His hesitant voice trailed off into a whisper. Lee Han-seo knew better than anyone that he wasn’t doing this on purpose, and yet, whenever Park Woo-jun played the pitiful puppy like this—despite that broad, grown-up frame—he couldn’t help but suspect the guy knew exactly how to make him melt.
“Baaabe, I was wrong. Don’t be mad anymore, okay?”
What could he do? For someone so ridiculously lacking in many ways to still want to show only his best, most confident self to his one and only Pair—that fragile psychology was lost on Park Woo-jun.
And once again, Lee Han-seo caved with a soft sigh.
Even though he lacked a shred of social sense elsewhere, when it came to Lee Han-seo, Park Woo-jun had top-tier radar. Sensing his chance, he slowly lowered his raised arms, clambered onto the sofa with a dopey grin, and peppered Lee Han-seo’s soft, mochi-like cheeks with loud kisses. Smooch, smooch.
“Pfft,” Lee Han-seo snorted through his nose, but didn’t actually push him away.
Had things gone as usual—where one touch led to another, clothes riding up, and a fiery session right there on the sofa—it would’ve ended in a perfectly happy conclusion.
Unfortunately, the moment Lee Han-seo’s mood seemed to thaw, Park Woo-jun suddenly scooped up his guide—who was a whole head shorter than him—and stood straight up.
Lee Han-seo felt no sense of danger. Surely the bed’s better than the sofa anyway, was the only thing bouncing around in his head.
He only started getting a weird feeling when Park Woo-jun walked right past the living room and stopped in front of the fridge.
Holding Lee Han-seo with one arm like it was nothing, he flung open the fridge door with the other.
Just this morning, the fridge had been half-empty. But now it was stuffed to the brim with all kinds of side dishes and lidded containers.
Grinning from ear to ear, Park Woo-jun began pointing to them one by one.
“This is soy-braised beef, this one’s stir-fried baby octopus with vegetables, and this container has the stir-fried shishito peppers and anchovies you said you were craving……”
The perfectly stacked boxes were only the beginning. There were individually portioned bags of prepped fruit, and the freezer was packed with bags of ox bone broth.
“Things that last longer, I put in the back. Try to eat the stuff in front first, okay?”
Something about this whole scene felt off.
Park Woo-jun had just returned to the guide center’s dorms yesterday around noon, after clearing an A-rank dungeon.
This time, they’d gotten lucky—the monster type had been a good match, so he didn’t even need an amplifier, and he came back without any major injuries.
For the first time in a while, Lee Han-seo had been blissfully carefree. After confirming his Esper was safe, the two of them had shared an intense Guiding session that left them both exhausted.
“Hey. I’m just asking… but really, just asking, okay?”
“Yeah, babe? You’re kinda scaring me, but let’s talk with a smile, huh? Smiiile~”
It was possible, theoretically, that while Lee Han-seo had left early this morning to prepare for the New Guide Induction Ceremony, Park Woo-jun had spent the time cooking up a storm.
He was always good with his hands, and he loved feeding people his own cooking. Maybe he just got into the groove of a hobby he hadn’t touched in a while. That should’ve been the end of it.
But somehow, it didn’t sit right. At all.
“You’re going into a dungeon again, aren’t you?”
“……”
“Park Woo-jun.”
“……I’m sorry. But there’s no one else who can go—”
“YOU BASTARD!!”
Lee Han-seo squeezed his eyes shut and screamed at the top of his lungs. This… this damn sweet potato of a bastard… He’d gone and found himself work again.
Unless it was an emergency-level S-class alert, what reason could there possibly be to drag an S-class Esper who’d just returned yesterday back into the field? And if there had been an S-class alert, the entire center wouldn’t be this quiet. So clearly, that wasn’t the case either.
“H-Han-seo… Are you really mad?”
What kind of question was that? Who wouldn’t be furious right now?
Still keeping his eyes shut, Lee Han-seo inhaled deeply, exhaled slow, and repeated the cycle to keep his fiery temper under control.
How many years had it taken just to raise this timid, perpetually flustered self into someone even this composed? No matter how hot-tempered he was, he didn’t want to be the kind of person who just lashed out irrationally at the lover he cared about so deeply.
Even if, emotionally, it felt like he’d eaten two whole boxes of sweet potatoes without a drop of water—his insides completely jammed and suffocating.
“I made lots of curry with just the meats you like. So for dinner, eat that first, okay?”
…Wait. Did that mean he wasn’t even leaving tomorrow morning, but tonight?
“I’ll be back soon.”
“…….”
As that smooth, smiling face beamed at him, a familiar nickname flashed through Lee Han-seo’s mind.
“I love you, Han-seo.”
‘Sweet potato. Giant. Sweet potato.’
***
“Uuuugh…”
“Enough with the sighing. Just finish your incident report, Guide Lee Han-seo.”
A firm voice came down on top of his small, perpetually sighing head.
Lee Jung-hyuk—his direct superior, whom he respected deeply and willingly followed—usually had a calming effect on him. But today was an exception.
It was all because of Park Woo-jun, who had walked back into danger of his own volition not even 24 hours after returning from a dungeon.
“Uuuuugh…”
“Lee Han-seo.”
“You don’t get it at all, Team Leader… Kim Joon-young doesn’t get sent out nearly as often as our Woo-jun does these days…”
Kim Joon-young, Lee Jung-hyuk’s Pair Esper, was not only Park Woo-jun’s predecessor as Chief of Espers but also the current Director of Esper Affairs—a highly capable S-class Esper.
Technically, both Espers were S-class. But since Kim Joon-young had taken on more administrative duties, it was true that Park Woo-jun was being dispatched more frequently to fill in the gaps.
Which is why even Lee Jung-hyuk, as Guide Team Leader, had been going out of his way to accommodate Lee Han-seo and Park Woo-jun’s Pair.
That’s why, today too—when he heard reports at the crack of dawn that Lee Han-seo had caused a scene at the New Guide Induction Ceremony—he had immediately clamped down on the incident, silenced the witnesses, and called in the involved party as discreetly as possible.
If word got out, it would inevitably cause a scandal. The plan was to smooth it over with a single incident report and bury the whole thing quietly.
“Come on, Jung-hyuk hyung, just hear me out. I wouldn’t even complain about A-rank dungeons. But B- and C-ranks? There’s no reason they need our guy for those! Why the hell do they keep calling him in for that crap?!”
“…Yeah. I get why you’re frustrated.”
Lee Han-seo’s voice, loaded with rage, grew louder and louder with each word. Even the grip on his pen was tight enough to snap it. The “I’m sorry” written on the report form looked so sharp it practically reeked of attitude.
With a scowl, he flung the one-line incident report across the desk like it was burning his hands. Lee Jung-hyuk didn’t say a word.
Back in the day, when Kim Joon-young was still gaining experience, he’d been just as busy with missions. But even then, he hadn’t been forced to take on every single low-rank dungeon that popped up.
Which meant, ultimately, some of the blame lay with Park Woo-jun himself—who never once refused when Deployment called and just wagged his tail like an eager puppy.
“I hate Park Woo-jun the most when he just jumps up all happy whenever someone calls him!!”
And from the look on his face, Lee Han-seo was well aware of that fact.
