This Bratty Esper’s Karma? I’ll Handle It - Chapter 4.2
Suddenly, the hospital room door shut with a click.
“Guide Lee Yoon-gyeom. Let me offer my congratulations first.”
“……Th… thank you.”
Lee Yoon-gyeom instinctively lowered his head in greeting. Then he slowly raised his gaze and stared at the two people beyond the Center Director.
Silver-gray hair and reddish eyes. He looked well over 190 centimeters tall, and his hard body seemed ready to burst through his uniform. As the corners of his lips curved gently upward, the beauty mark set into his cheek stood out.
SS-rank Esper Baek Han-gyeol.
Feeling Lee Yoon-gyeom staring at him, Baek Han-gyeol met his eyes without looking away. Then his eyes curved like crescent moons.
Whoa, that startled me. Lee Yoon-gyeom abruptly turned his head away when their eyes unexpectedly met. Then his expression immediately hardened.
Because he’d met the eyes of the person standing beside Baek Han-gyeol.
The man who had driven Lee Yoon-gyeom to jump from the rooftop, the man who had made Yoon-gyeom feel unbearably miserable…
S-rank Esper Yoo Hae-seong.
Lee Yoon-gyeom let out an involuntary scoff. Yoo Hae-seong’s eyebrow twitched. Ignoring that, the Center Director seated himself on the sofa and brought up the main point.
“Do you need a separate explanation about Guides? From what I can see, you should know enough.”
“……”
“Since you’re Guide Lee Taehyeok’s son.”
The Center Director wore a pleasant smile, but perhaps because of his sharp eyes, the atmosphere remained somewhat heavy.
“Yes, well… I know enough.”
Lee Yoon-gyeom knew more about Guides than almost anyone. During those long years when he hadn’t awakened, he’d studied and studied again.
This area might once have had some other geographical name, but now everything was simply called the Surface.
The Surface was protected by a transparent barrier called the Dome.
Spring and autumn had disappeared after Gates, whose timing, method, and cause remained unknown, began opening. As the environment became too harsh for people to survive, humans had created the Dome for their own survival.
And the ones maintaining it were Espers with supernatural abilities.
That was only natural, because whenever a Gate opened, the seasons were driven to extremes.
Lee Yoon-gyeom knew why those two men had come in. One of them was probably the Esper who would form a pair with him now that he’d awakened as a Guide.
But there was something slightly strange about it.
‘Don’t they usually test the matching rate first…?’
He still couldn’t even comprehend the fact that he’d awakened as a Guide, yet one incomprehensible thing after another kept happening.
Normally, forming a pair wasn’t something the Center Director personally involved himself in either. Seeing Lee Yoon-gyeom’s rather grave expression, the Center Director spoke.
“Why are you getting so serious?”
“The order of things feels a little strange… and I still can’t really believe I’ve become a Guide.”
At his calm tone, the Center Director burst into hearty laughter.
“It’s only natural you’d feel that way. It was a first for me too.”
“…….”
“This is the first time an SS-rank Guide has ever appeared, so naturally, we originally planned to match you with Esper Baek Han-gyeol.”
Some of the amusement faded from the Center Director’s face as he continued.
“It’s what we want, and it’s what Esper Baek Han-gyeol wants too. But Esper Yoo Hae-seong made a claim.”
A claim? About what? Lee Yoon-gyeom’s expression tightened slightly. The Center Director stroked his chin with one hand and continued.
“He claims the two of you were lovers for eight years. Is that true?”
“……That bas… no, Esper Yoo Hae-seong claimed that?”
“Yeah. There have been cases like this before, after all.”
Lee Yoon-gyeom knew why the Center Director was asking him something like this and verifying whether it was true.
It had happened a long time ago.
There had been an incident where an Esper and Guide, after being denied the chance to form a pair with their lovers, both threw away their lives inside a Gate.
It was said that neither of them dodged even an attack from a beast they could have avoided.
After several incidents like that, the Center began making accommodations so lovers could form pairs with each other. But Lee Yoon-gyeom didn’t need that consideration. Unable to control his expression, Lee Yoon-gyeom lowered his head for a moment. He was so angry that his tightly clenched fist trembled.
Then a calm voice settled over the air.
“Yoon-gyeom wanted it, so I had no choice but to form a pair with someone else, but I… I only have Yoon-gyeom, Center Director.”
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