“Ghk…! Hah…! Hah…!”
His eyes flew open.
The sharp sensation of a blade cutting through flesh and churning his guts was still so vivid that bile rose in his throat and goosebumps crawled over his skin.
It wasn't as if he'd lived a clean life without ever taking a knife before, but this was the first time he'd been stabbed so deeply, and so many times. He had felt the blood surging up his throat and knew instinctively that it was the end of his life.
Yet somehow...
He had survived again.
Flailing his arms and legs, he reached for the spot on his side where the final, deepest stab had landed. His fingers found thick gauze and layers of bandages wrapped around the wound.
Dripping with sweat, he barely managed to lift his upper body and look around.
It was a luxurious private hospital room.
Click.
As he awkwardly pushed himself upright, a nurse walked in without even knocking, looking exhausted. The moment she saw him awake, her eyes went wide in horror and she rushed over.
"You're awake? Mr. Yu Huiyeong! No, wait... Please calm down, take a deep breath. I'll call your attending physician right away, so please stay still! Lie back down! Please calm down!"
She looked like she'd only come in to change his IV bag. Waving the new IV bottle around in panic, she spoke so frantically her words nearly tumbled over each other. She seemed like a rookie who had only just started working, fumbling around helplessly before spinning on her heel and bolting out the door.
Calm down yourself, miss...
And that's not my damn name....
After thinking for a moment, the throbbing pain in his wound returned, and he slowly lay back down.
Well...
At least he was alive.
He raised the hand with the IV needle in it and scrubbed roughly at his eyes. His skin felt unusually soft and smooth beneath his fingers, but he'd only just regained consciousness. What the hell would he know? Maybe lying in bed after getting stabbed had softened him up.
A pleasant breeze drifted in through the large open window.
The weather was damn nice too.
After dying and coming back, the whole world looked beautiful.
People said even rolling around in a pile of dog shit was better than dying. If that was true, then lying in a top-class private hospital room savoring the sweetness of being alive hardly needed any explanation.
He slightly turned his head toward the wide-open door and quietly stared at the IV stand.
The IV bag had already emptied, hanging flat. Instead, he could see blood slowly flowing backward through the tubing connected to the back of the hand resting on his forehead.
"Hah...."
Miss...
Hurry the hell up....
What kind of bullshit is this? The patient's already bled enough.
Oddly enough, he wasn't angry.
He'd always been hot-tempered, ready to explode at the slightest provocation. Yet now he felt strangely forgiving.
Guess dying and coming back really does change a man.
Right now, it felt like nothing in the world could make him angry.
Listening to hurried footsteps racing toward the room from somewhere in the distance, he contentedly closed his eyes.
***
Yeah right.
People don't change.
It was so ridiculous he couldn't even laugh.
Feeling anger welling up inside him, he held his breath until his body trembled. Since he was lying down, the blanket visibly rose and fell with every rough breath.
What kind of dumbass doctor is this?
"So then, Mr. Yu Huiyeong..."
"The hell's wrong with you? Keep getting my damn name wrong like that? Go look at the patient's chart again."
His dialect burst out instinctively in his irritation.
He'd tried hard to fix it over the years, but living in that rough world made it damn near impossible to keep speaking elegant Seoul Korean. Whenever he got angry, his thick hometown accent inevitably came back.
His own shout sounded strangely thin and youthful, so he cleared his throat.
No...
Scolding a doctor with a voice this weak?
That hurt his pride.
Wouldn't be like this if he weren't stuck lying in bed.
Startled, the doctor hurriedly looked through the patient's chart again.
After checking it several times, his expression subtly stiffened.
"Your name is... Yu Huiyeong. Isn't it?"
"The hell are you talking about? It's Ryu Gwantae. Aren't you supposed to be a doctor? Where'd you leave your damn brain?"
"Ah... I apologize. It appears we've made a mistake...."
The lead doctor's eyes shifted toward the several doctors standing behind him.
Everyone frantically flipped through their own paperwork, and the doctor standing furthest in the back suddenly sprinted out of the room.
Watching them, Gwantae let out an irritated breath.
Seriously...
What a sorry excuse for a hospital.
Where the hell am I?
He looked down irritably at the hospital gown they'd put on him.
Scowling deeply, he vowed never to set foot in this hospital again.
Just then, the young doctor who had run off came rushing back, panting.
"U-Um... You really are Patient Yu Huiyeong...."
"What the hell are you babbling about?"
Everyone who heard the young doctor's words looked completely bewildered.
The oldest doctor standing in front adjusted his glasses before asking,
"Ahem... Then, Mr. Ryu Gwantae... May I ask your age?"
"This year... Let's see.... Been a long time since I actually counted. Ah, forty..."
"Forty?"
People began murmuring.
"Forty... seven? Or eight. Might be nine."
Internally, Gwantae wondered whether the doctor was at least ten years older than him.
At the same time, he continued speaking rudely without a shred of politeness.
Since he'd never exactly been known for being refined or courteous, Gwantae merely stared blankly at the murmuring crowd.
What, they put the wrong information in?
Kids these days really do half-ass everything.
Back in my day...
While Gwantae mentally launched into one of his ancient old-man stories, the doctor took off his glasses under the pretense of cleaning them, rubbed them vigorously against his coat, turned away, and whispered,
"Everyone leave for now. Request a psychiatric consultation."
"Y-Yes, Professor."
Even as everyone hurried out of the room, Gwantae merely tilted his head indifferently.
The doctor gave one last long look at the pale, youthful face—beautiful enough to look barely twenty years old—before saying he'd verify a few things and return, then quietly shut the door.
...
Who knew how much time had passed afterward?
Half-asleep under the effects of medication, he drifted in and out of consciousness until it was well into the afternoon.
Knock knock.
A polite knock sounded before several people entered all at once.
Among them were a few who looked more like office workers than doctors, making Gwantae frown.
Did somebody royally fuck up the computer records or something...
Why the hell are guys in suits coming in?
His side still throbbed where he'd been stabbed, so he didn't bother reacting and simply lay there.
The doctors quickly raised the hospital bed into a sitting position.
"Um... You're Mr. Ryu Gwantae?"
"Yeah."
A different doctor than before flipped through a chart as he spoke.
He scribbled something down before firing off questions.
"So... you're in your late forties."
"Told you already."
"You have a bit of a regional accent. Were you born in Seoul?"
"Does it sound like I was born in Seoul? I'm from Naju, South Jeolla Province. Grew up there until I was over twenty. More importantly, can't you just look this stuff up? Doesn't the system have all that? Want my resident registration number?"
Answering irritably, he watched the doctor rapidly flip through the documents they'd received from the Center—documents filled with Yu Huiyeong's information.
Born in Yeonnam-dong, Seoul.
The doctor circled the entry before asking,
"I'm sorry, but could you please tell me your resident registration number?"
Clicking his tongue in annoyance, Gwantae recited the number without hesitation.
The doctor hurriedly wrote it down before asking again,
"And your occupation?"
"Ah, well... I worked in a rough line of business."
"What kind of rough business...?"
"Bit hard to explain. I've washed my hands of it now, so let's leave it at that."
"I'd appreciate a more precise answer. Any information you provide is protected under medical confidentiality, so you don't need to worry about it being disclosed."
The doctor continued pressing him with question after question.
Gwantae's patience finally snapped.
"Hey! You deaf or something? Get over here if you want to hear me! Fuck, it's not like I'm carrying some damn infectious disease."
"Ah... My apologies."
The doctor standing at the foot of the bed obediently apologized and stepped closer.
In one swift motion, Gwantae shot out his hand, snatched the ballpoint pen from the doctor's grasp, grabbed him by the collar, and pressed the pen hard against the back of his neck as if driving it in.
Everyone screamed in horror.
Ignoring the pain in his own side, Gwantae playfully jabbed the pen several more times into the doctor's soft skin before grinning.
"Yeah. That's the kind of shit I used to do. Didn't they teach you doctors not to mess with gangsters?"
He released the doctor's white coat roughly.
Huiyeong tossed the pen onto the hospital floor with a clatter.
The doctor's face had turned ghostly white. Staggering backward, he shakily picked up the pen, retreated several steps away, and frantically scribbled something onto the chart.
Watching Gwantae—
No.
Watching Huiyeong—
The Center employees looked even paler than the doctor.
Gangster?
Did he mean... an organized crime syndicate?
The employees exchanged strange looks.
What do we do?
One silently mouthed.
Hell if I know, fuck...
Another mouthed back.
Would anyone these days ever even hear the word "gangster" in real life?
Sure, such organizations had existed a very long time ago.
But organized crime had all but disappeared decades earlier, wiped out after Espers appeared and state authority became overwhelmingly powerful.
Now it was practically an extinct word.
Hearing it spoken aloud made every employee feel dizzy.
The appearance of a long-awaited S-rank Guide had thrown the entire Center into excitement.
Even more so because this Guide had an exceptionally high Matching rate with Han Shinyul, the Center's notorious S-rank Esper and biggest headache.
Unfortunately, before anyone could properly meet him, he'd been rushed to the hospital after being stabbed and remained unconscious for days.
Every employee had anxiously waited for him to wake up.
One of them had even canceled a half-day off that afternoon just to be present.
Only to receive the devastating news that the Guide's mental state appeared to be abnormal.
At first they'd assumed it was temporary confusion caused by severe Awakening fever.
So they'd rushed over immediately.
But seeing him in person...
The condition of the Guide was far worse than they'd imagined.
Han Shinyul's assigned team members all looked utterly miserable.
Holy shit...
This is fucking brutal....
Why are both the Esper and the Guide this damn difficult...?
Even while they silently tore at their own hair in despair, the doctor's questioning continued.
"Y-Yes... I understand. Please refrain from acting violently toward medical personnel in the future.... May I ask how you came to be stabbed?"
"Ah, that's a long story. Anyway, I got stabbed in the back by the young master I raised."
"The young master?"
"Youngest son of our chairman. They picked up a country bumpkin from Naju and raised me. But that brat's personality was rotten from the start."
As if he'd already forgotten the little stunt he'd pulled with the pen, Huiyeong simply clicked his tongue in annoyance.
Only then did he suddenly look around.
"Come to think of it, where the hell's my phone? Fuck... Junsik's probably losing his mind looking for me...."
Watching him, the doctor silently muttered to himself.
Violent behavior.
Confused memories.
Identity substitution....
He wrote furiously:
Schizophrenia.
Suspected Reverse Intermetamorphosis (a type of delusional disorder).
Then underneath, he added:
DID (Dissociative Identity Disorder).
After finishing, he called out,
"Mr. Yu Huiyeong."
"For fuck's sake, I told you that's not my name."
"Have you ever felt as though someone inside your head was calling your name? Or felt that another version of yourself exists... or speaks to you?"
Huiyeong frowned.
He'd mentioned his phone, and this guy suddenly started asking this nonsense.
"What, gonna ask if I see ghosts next?"
"So... you don't?"
"Do I look like I do?"
The flippant answer drew a deep sigh from the doctor.
He asked several more questions just in case, but after confirming the complete absence of any insight into his condition, he crossed out DID with several thick lines.
Then he considered one final possibility.
Turning toward the Center employees, who were still secretly mouthing words to each other behind his back, he thought,
Maybe...
Maybe he grew up in such terrible circumstances that he believes pretending to be mentally ill is the only way to end up in a psychiatric hospital.
If it's an act, he might stop once he realizes how much better his situation has become.
He gestured for the Center employees to explain his Guide Awakening and the treatment he would receive going forward.
Then he quietly stepped back.
The employees awkwardly shuffled forward.
"Mr. Yu Huiyeong."
"For fuck's sake, another idiot who can't remember three damn syllables. Who're you people? Don't look like doctors."
"Are you aware that you've Awakened as a Guide?"
"What Guide? I told you I was a gangster."
"You've Awakened as an S-rank Guide, and your Matching Esper is already waiting—... Excuse me?"
The employee's mouth hung wide open.
Seeing the ridiculous expression, Huiyeong muttered,
"The hell's an Esper? Some new drug? Didn't you say the surgery went fine?"
"Y-You... don't know?"
"Should I?"
"No... no way...."
Another employee smacked the stunned man hard across the back of the head.
"Haha... It's... it's possible not to know! Yes!"
Even though every citizen had been legally required since birth to undergo an Awakening examination every two years as part of their health checkups...
Even though a nation's competitiveness had long since become tied to the number of Espers and Guides it possessed...
Could someone really... not know?
Huiyeong merely frowned.
Whether the employee's lips trembled, or the smacked employee nearly fell over from the blow, he had no idea what they were talking about.
The flustered employee stumbled through a basic explanation of Espers and Guides.
As he listened, Huiyeong's beautiful face twisted into an almost grotesque expression.
His normally gentle eyes narrowed sharply, creating an atmosphere completely different from the cocky attitude he'd shown moments earlier.
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"Huh?"
The employee, who had only just begun explaining the basic relationship between Espers and Guides, froze.
Did I...
Did I explain something wrong?
No...
I barely started five minutes ago.
The two employees looked at each other.
Did I mess something up?
No fucking clue....
They silently mouthed to one another.
Watching the bizarre exchange blankly, Huiyeong turned toward the doctor.
"Aren't those idiots completely insane?"
"Excuse me?"
Says the guy who looks the craziest here?
"No, think about it logically."
"Y-Yes...."
"You're telling me two people rub against each other for a bit and suddenly someone's cured and starts using superpowers?"
"...What?"