Though Lim Haeyul tried desperately not to show it, his body betrayed him, trembling uncontrollably. His tightly clasped hands, far from warming up, only grew colder by the second.
In truth, Jo Gyeong-hoon, who had known a Gate would occur and had lured Cha Jae-woo there without informing anyone else, had ultimately fallen into his own trap.
It was pitiful that someone would devise such a plan against him, but thinking back to when he himself had once been easily ensnared by Mental Esper abilities as a child, he could understand it to a degree.
Besides, Jo Gyeong-hoon hadn’t known that Cha Jae-woo had eventually awakened the ability to wield mental powers himself, so it wasn’t surprising that things had ended so futilely.
No—It hadn’t ended. Cha Jae-woo had read the article today about Espers who had perished during an unexpected Gate. The Gate had been anticipated and deliberately concealed, yet the report wrapped the situation in a palatable narrative. It was laughable, really.
But what mattered more was that there was no mention of Jo Gyeong-hoon anywhere.
The same went for Lee Jae-hoon.
Had their corpses been discovered, the media would have gone into a frenzy. The fact that nothing of the sort had happened suggested that Lee Jae-hoon, who had been thrown into the Gate without even a hypnotic suggestion, had somehow woken up. Turns out he was at least worthy of being called A-Rank.
Considering he had thought they’d met a pitiful end, he should’ve felt at least somewhat pleased that they had survived like cockroaches.
Yet hearing news of their survival only left him feeling disgusted.
“……Ha.”
He didn’t even know what he wanted anymore.
The hollow laugh that escaped him only seemed to provoke Lim Haeyul, who had shriveled even further into himself.
“Ah…….”
Lately, Lim Haeyul’s Guiding had been disappointing. It was significantly lacking compared to before.
At first, Cha Jae-woo had thought it was simply an issue of physical contact. Likely, Lim Haeyul had thought the same. That would explain why, despite trembling like a leaf, he had still opened his arms and clung to him.
But the more he tried, the worse the efficiency became. Lim Haeyul’s mana failed to properly stabilize the wavelengths, scattering far too easily.
If it were intentional, it might have been easier to accept. But Lim Haeyul wasn’t the type to manipulate Guiding like this.
He was desperately trying to make it work—it just wasn’t working.
Which only made it more frustrating.
If even the person involved couldn’t fix it, there was nothing Cha Jae-woo could do either.
In the end, today again, Lim Haeyul’s mana, which should have lingered within him and stabilized his energy for a long time, dissipated without having any significant effect.
“I’m sorry…….”
Sensing this first, Lim Haeyul bowed his head and fidgeted nervously with his hands.
He seemed so desperate, unable even to shake off the hand that still gripped his own.
“…….”
Cha Jae-woo already knew when exactly Lim Haeyul had started failing at Guiding, so there was no need to ask why he was acting this way.
Still, he couldn’t help but find Lim Haeyul incomprehensible.
They were all people less than worms.
Following Jo Gyeong-hoon meant that Lee Jae-hoon had shared aligned interests with him—nothing more.
Wasn’t that enough?
Would it help if he listed all the vile things Jo Gyeong-hoon had done, asserting that he deserved to die?
Would that make anything better?
Would that stop Lim Haeyul from flinching and lowering his head every time he saw him?
Would that stop him from desperately trying to avoid running into him?
Would it erase the endless hours he spent holed up in his room, silent and withdrawn?
“It’s fine.”
At Cha Jae-woo’s words, Lim Haeyul’s shoulders quivered, and he bowed his head even deeper.
For some reason, he had a feeling that no matter what he said, nothing would change.
He had the certainty that Lim Haeyul would continue trembling with fear whenever he looked at him.
“……Um, then, I’ll just…….”
Lim Haeyul hesitated, unable even to pull his hand away.
Cha Jae-woo kept his hand clasped around Lim Haeyul’s, silently watching him.
“…….”
Now that the Guiding session was over, there was no further need to act like lovers.
Not that it mattered; Lim Haeyul wouldn’t accept it anyway.
Had he known it would turn out like this?
He had resorted to hypnosis simply because arguments were a hassle and because it had been frustrating trying to convince Lim Haeyul, who always responded to him with anger.
For someone like Cha Jae-woo, who had never once tried to persuade others to see things his way, it had been the only method he could come up with.
Yet, that method didn’t work on Lim Haeyul.
Cha Jae-woo remained frozen, stuck in place.
He wondered how he could bring back the Lim Haeyul who would blush deeply and smile bashfully at him.
……Only then would Guiding return to the way it used to be.
“Um…… Cha Jae-woo-ssi…….”
Since he didn’t let go of Haeyul’s hand first, Lim Haeyul, who had been fidgeting the whole time, finally mustered up the courage to call out to Cha Jae-woo.
Cha Jae-woo lifted his gaze, and for a brief moment, he met those light brown eyes looking back at him. Of course, they were soon hidden behind drooping eyelids.
“Yeah.”
Cha Jae-woo released Lim Haeyul’s hand. Immediately, Haeyul sprang to his feet as if he had just been freed. Not wanting to watch him bow his head hurriedly and rush out of the room, Cha Jae-woo turned his eyes toward the window.
“Haa…….”
The door closed, and the sound of running footsteps echoed faintly. Along with it, the rapid and anxious thumping of Lim Haeyul’s heart gradually faded into the distance.
Cha Jae-woo shut his eyes and pressed against his temple. Headaches were something he had lived with for as long as he could remember, so this should have been nothing. And yet, he must have forgotten, because even this slight headache felt unbearably distracting now.
Cha Jae-woo shifted his gaze toward the closed door. He could no longer hear Haeyul. No sounds of movement either. Since that day, Lim Haeyul had spent his days holed up silently in his room.
It grated on his nerves. The absence of any sound was so irritating that he had more than once found himself walking all the way to the door, only to turn back.
Yet the faint sounds—of breathing, of a heartbeat, of clothes brushing softly against the skin whenever Haeyul shifted slightly—those absurdly faint noises somehow soothed Cha Jae-woo’s mind.
“Haa…….”
He let out another long sigh. Jo Gyeong-hoon and Lee Jae-hoon had made it out of the Gate. And undoubtedly, they were already scheming something. He knew this. And yet, all his focus remained on Lim Haeyul. He worried more about how his own actions might appear in Haeyul’s eyes than about getting his revenge.
Cha Jae-woo rubbed his face.
He knew it would be better to find another Guide than to receive this level of Guiding. But even knowing that, he couldn’t bring himself to do anything.
He had never once cared about how someone else might view him. And yet, these days, his head was filled with nothing but thoughts of Lim Haeyul.
How could he bring him back? How could he turn things back to the way they were before? How could he return to that moment?
But no answers came. It felt as if there truly was no way—and the weight of that thought made him grind his teeth and rake his hands through his hair.
It had been a very long time since he had felt this lost and confused.
***
Time passed startlingly fast. Even though all he did was lie still, staring at the ceiling, night quickly turned into morning once again. And then, it would be time to go to Cha Jae-woo for Guiding.
Dragging himself as long as he could, Lim Haeyul finally forced his heavy steps toward Cha Jae-woo’s room. It felt as if invisible hands were grabbing at his ankles, trying to hold him back. But he had to go. He had to do the Guiding properly. He had to prove he was still useful.
“…….”
Lately, he couldn’t even remember how Guiding was supposed to work. He used to do it so much better than this. Yet, standing before Cha Jae-woo, it was as if everything evaporated from his mind.
His current Guiding was so wretched that it couldn’t even be compared to before. Because of that, Cha Jae-woo’s mana wavelength was gradually, unmistakably, becoming more and more unstable with each passing day.
Cha Jae-woo surely noticed too. That knowledge filled Haeyul with dread. He worried—what if Cha Jae-woo thought he was deliberately withholding his Guiding?
But that wasn’t it. He was trying. He was trying so hard to do it like before, but it just wouldn’t happen. Even managing Guiding with what little mana he once had felt like nothing more than a distant dream now.
“…….”
Haeyul pressed down a sigh that threatened to escape. He had been trying his best to make no sounds at all while Cha Jae-woo was home. He didn’t want to do anything—anything at all—that might irritate him. Because if he didn’t, maybe he could stay safe.
‘But… how much longer?’
The frustration in his chest made him feel like he was choking. The chunk of darkness he had tried so hard to shrink seemed to swell up inside him again.
More than anything, even Haeyul himself could tell how awful his Guiding had become. And yet Cha Jae-woo still accepted it without complaint every time. Haeyul couldn’t understand it.
His Guiding clearly wasn’t worth anything anymore. There was no other reason Cha Jae-woo would tolerate it unless—unless he had some reason he couldn’t say.
“…….”
Haeyul wrapped himself tightly in his blanket, holding his breath as he closed his eyes.
He had no way of knowing what Cha Jae-woo was thinking. And frankly, he didn’t want to know. Even if he found out, he wouldn’t be able to understand it anyway.
No— He was afraid that if he found out, he would come to fear Cha Jae-woo even more than he already did. And that terrified him.
‘……Why does it hurt so much?’
Haeyul clutched at his aching chest, biting down hard on his lip.
He didn’t want to fear Cha Jae-woo. He didn’t want to hate him either. But because he couldn’t stop, because those feelings kept growing—It hurt all the more.
