“Cha Gweon—!”
Cha Gweonwoo grabbed my arm hard and yanked me in. Then he threw his whole weight into hugging me. It was the desperate, frantic clutch of someone drowning who suddenly found a buoy bobbing on the water.
His chin smacked my shoulder so hard it hurt and I let out a groan. But Gweonwoo only clutched me tighter.
Like a child who trips and instinctively reaches for their mother, an esper in their most terrifying, most helpless moment reaches for their guide. It was instinct.
Shaking, Cha Gweonwoo pressed himself into my chest.
“I’m scared…”
He repeated the words, clinging to me again and again, his voice trembling wetly like it could collapse at any second.
“I looked at my phone, but it was all… all people I don’t know. I felt like I was left all alone, in some strange place, too strange. I was so scared.”
“……”
“I kept begging in my sleep—please, please let me go back. Over and over. But it stayed the same… and now I don’t know what I’m supposed to do.”
Dr. Park’s words came back to me.
“At first he had trouble accepting it, but since he’s so quick at processing situations, thankfully he seems to have sorted his thoughts fast.”
So he has been struggling all this time.
Well, yeah. Who could stay fine in a mess like this?
“…I just want to go back to being me again. Just me. Please.”
My mouth tasted bitter.
Too bad. There’s no way for Cha Gweonwoo to return to being twenty years old, living his old life. Time only runs one way.
In the end, he’ll have to choose. Adapt to this twisted timeline and keep living like this—or recover his lost memories and reclaim his own time.
And finally I understood what the doctor meant: the longer this period dragged on, the more disoriented Gweonwoo would become.
I stroked his back a few times, almost without thinking, to soothe him. He groaned and clutched me tighter.
…Wait.
A thought struck me. I slid my hand behind his back and pressed the wave-reading button on the summoner.
With low-rank espers, rampage often came not from physical limits but from hitting their mental limit.
The first kind lashed out like wild beasts. The second—like Gweonwoo right now—sank into depression, like someone trapped knee-deep in a sucking swamp. Plenty of espers had drowned in that swamp and ended up staging suicide attempts.
I touched the summoner, now in measure-ready mode, to the pale nape of his neck.
His levels were spiking again. If he rampaged now—what then? A red alarm lit up in my head all on its own.
In a panic, I hugged him as hard as I could, but since the depression already had him, the numbers didn’t budge.
With no choice, I tugged up the hem of his T-shirt. When my hand touched bare skin at his waist, the graph that had barely twitched finally jumped.
…Fuck.
Clueless about how dire this was, Gweonwoo kept murmuring in my arms.
“When I was training, it was like my legs broke—I couldn’t move them right. Weird things kept appearing in front of my eyes. My body just… it wouldn’t listen to me.”
“Mm. I see.”
“I couldn’t even call my mom or dad. What if they’re dead?”
Looking at him, it was obvious he was in a dangerous state. I glanced around fast. I hooked a chair with my foot and dragged it over from in front of the table.
“Mr. Cha Gweonwoo, sit down for a moment. Here.”
I tried to lower his heavy body onto the chair, but he resisted, clutching me harder like he was defying me. The strength of it nearly cracked my ribs—I almost died first.
“I’m useless…”
“No, you’re capable. Let’s just sit down for a moment.”
I coaxed him into the chair. Barely seated, he clung to me like a cicada stuck to an old tree.
“I’m worthless…”
“No, you’re worth something. But first, let go for a second and look at me.”
Of course he didn’t budge. Hah. Figures. Doing what he’s told on the first try wouldn’t be Gweonwoo. I didn’t even need to see it—I could imagine his parents suffering through raising this kid.
I patted his shoulder lightly.
“Mr. Cha Gweonwoo, look at me.”
“I’m so, so miserable…”
“Yeah, so look at me.”
I sighed, glanced down at the top of his head like a parent staring at a little kid throwing a tantrum in the toy aisle.
God, this is insane. Do you know how big a decision I’m making right now?
After a brief hesitation, I sucked in a breath.
“Die and…”
“Cha Gweonwoo!”
I snapped at him, my voice sharp and loud, abs clenched. I figured he’d ignore it, but no—he flinched, startled, and lifted his tear-soaked face. His whole face was a mess.
I pulled him away so he couldn’t smear any more tears on my stomach, yanked tissues from the vanity, and started wiping his face down.
It was the first time I’d ever wiped someone else’s tears. My touch wasn’t exactly gentle, but he obediently let me.
—When you’ve seen all kinds of things in the field, your personality just changes whether you like it or not.
What the hell had he gone through, for this gentle Gweonwoo to turn into that sharp-edged bastard?
Like shaking dust off a shelf, my careless wiping gradually softened.
—I ran. Even if it meant smashing my head and dying, I ran higher than the cage could reach. Because I wanted to live.
Gweonwoo raised his damp lashes, pitifully. His eyes still looked dead, like he’d kissed a grim reaper while I wasn’t looking.
No need to check the numbers twice. He’d already said it: he wanted to die. Leave it alone now and tomorrow morning my assigned esper would be found face-down in the flowerbed.
No helping it. I’d have to use that method.
“Mr. Cha Gweonwoo, listen carefully.”
Of course I meant the Cha Gweonwoo after his memories came back.
Maybe I should carry a recorder, I thought—capture proof every time he pulled this shit.
I dabbed his wet lashes with another tissue. “You’re one step away from dying right now, so I’ve got no choice. I’m worried you’ll be found with your head drowned in the sink tomorrow.”
He looked up at me, baffled, his wet face shining. Inside, I muttered to myself:
You can do this, Kim Doweon. You can do this.
I tapped the tissue against the crease of his brow.
“Relax.”
And before he could say a word, I cupped his cheeks and pressed a short kiss to his forehead.
Chup.
Not what I intended, but it made a ridiculous sound. Still, I screwed my eyes shut and counted.
One,
two,
three…
“Pwah!”
I pulled back, then jammed the summoner against his neck like a tranquilizer dart.
The numbers dropped compared to before, but only a tiny bit. I frowned, my head swimming.
So it won’t work anywhere else? It has to be mucosa to mucosa? Huh?
Clueless, Gweonwoo blinked and asked, bewildered, “What are you…?”
“Shut your mouth.”
I couldn’t listen to him right now.
Using the tissue I’d wiped his tears with, I scrubbed his lips like a nurse disinfecting a shot site.
All right. Let’s just do it. What’s the point of holding back? Tomorrow if he jumps out a window and ends up dead in the flowerbed, I’ll be hauled in for negligence, accessory to rampage, interrogated—fuck that. One kiss is better.
I firmed my resolve, grabbed his face again, gave his cheeks two light slaps.
“Relax your lips.”
And without warning, I pressed my mouth to his, hard. My front teeth almost snapped, but I didn’t back down.
One,
two,
three…
“Pwah!”
I pulled back and immediately checked the summoner.
Unbelievable. The numbers, which had been swinging like two jump ropes out of sync, suddenly tightened and leveled out, perfectly stable.
God, what a joke.
So this is why everyone goes on about mucosal guiding. Hug him till my ribs nearly cracked and the numbers don’t move—but one kiss and he’s fine? You bastard.
This time I scrubbed my lips clean with the tissue and asked, for form’s sake:
“How do you feel? Any better?”
Gweonwoo still had his eyes clamped shut like he’d been shocked. After a long silence, his throat bobbed.
“…Uh. Not yet.”
His calm tone made me blink. What the hell? That can’t be right. The graph’s steady as hell. Before I could call him out, he beat me to it.
“I think… one more time will do it.”