Episode 8
Kim Yeohyeon sensed an unusual presence the moment he entered the Annex.
It felt completely foreign—everything about that person.
He was deep in thought about why he felt that way when he was already on the 4th basement floor.
With a body that had been drained to the limit and had only just recovered enough to sit and breathe, it was hard to keep a simple thought going.
He was genuinely exhausted. So, no matter who that was, he decided not to worry about it. Just passing by was the right thing to do. If the AI permitted Annex entry, at least they wouldn’t threaten security. Yeohyeon slowly came to that conclusion.
However, the moment that person’s ashy-brown hair came into his sight, he forgot his decision and couldn’t help but think about it.
A Guide.
He didn’t know why, but he recognized it immediately.
Before he even saw the logo stitched on her clothes.
Before the specific thought and judgment—analyzing the information perceived by his sensory organs—could take place, his body realized it first.
That she was a Guide.
Beep. Beep. Clang.
He parked his car far away from her. While unbuckling his seatbelt, he saw more.
A navy blue oversized short padded jacket with the Center logo on the sleeve. Black tracksuit top and bottoms, also clearly provided by the Centre. A light, short haircut that exposed her neckline.
A strangely cool impression.
An urban, yet not sharp, atmosphere.
The colors that made her up were faint. If you looked closely, they weren’t exactly bright colors, but that was his first impression.
The exact opposite of a presence that overwhelmingly dominated the space.
A slow, sticky shiver traced down his spine.
A pale, young face turned toward him.
Even the color of her eyes was faint. The round, jewel-like irises were more gray-toned than her hair.
The Guide is beyond the glass.
She opened her lips across the transparent wall and called out to him. Even at that low volume, the vibration of the sound wave reached him.
Esper Kim Yeohyeon.
She called his name.
An unfamiliar voice.
A sound that existed nowhere in his memory.
His stomach churned.
So, when Yeohyeon got out of the car, he didn’t look back.
He didn’t want any more coincidences in this life. Right now, he was already overwhelmed by the things he was already destined to face.
“Esper Kim Yeohyeon-nim!”
But the owner of that voice followed him.
A voice similar to her vivid presence, unlike the colors that felt faintly perceived.
That slightly low, yet clear tone came closer and closer.
In the case of extreme match rates, there is no greater legend than Kim Yeohyeon.
Guides with a match rate below 10% are 7 in number in Korea alone, and those in the 20% range cannot be easily counted even when limited to Korea. Among A-rankers alone, there are around 20 with a 20% match rate.
‘That S-rank kid will go berserk and die within a year.’
The researchers were certain.
‘All we can do is quickly build a deep underground bunker to lock him in, to minimize the damage when that S-rank kid starts going berserk.’ ‘He’s a Physical System, not Illusion System.
He’s a weapon of mass destruction himself.’
So, the government immediately started digging a pit at the edge of Gangwon-do and poured concrete like crazy. To bury the power of the nine-year-old boy Kim Yeohyeon where no one could access it.
More cautiously and meticulously than when disposing of nuclear waste.
The information about the boy Kim Yeohyeon and the reality of the project in Gangwon-do were completely hidden under the guise of ‘confidentiality for national interest.’
A year? Nonsense… Most experts predicted a month, or even a week, before he went berserk.
But Kim Yeohyeon survived.
Thanks to a monstrous self-recovery ability and a talent that could only be explained by saying God chose him.
Self-recovery ability. This is the speed at which an Esper replenishes their power vessel without Guiding.
Kim Yeohyeon, in exchange for an atrocious match rate, possessed an unprecedented self-recovery ability.
They were both at the extreme ends when put on a normal distribution graph.
To put it simply, it was the equivalent of receiving guidance from a B-rank Guide 24 hours a day.
Of course, even so… considering his vastly enormous vessel, it was still only like a small stream constantly flowing into a huge dam.
For a person like Kim Yeohyeon, the existence of a Guide was always a hopeful torment.
A mirage that could never be touched.
A terrible Guide who would only exchange pain until the end.
“Esper-nim!”
Despite Yeongwon’s call, Yeohyeon just kept walking away.
“Wait… just a moment!”
The 4th basement parking lot was incredibly vast. Yeongwon eventually had no choice but to run to catch up to Yeohyeon.
‘Why are his legs… so long.’ ‘You said his designated parking spot was over there! Why is he parking somewhere else!’
While running all-out, Yeongwon realized:
“…hyun Esper-nim!”
Her landlorde-nim was intentionally ignoring her call. But she couldn’t give up and back down.
‘Plan revision, sadly, plan revision.’
It was a small relief that the AI didn’t immediately activate the security wall despite recognizing Yeongwon’s security violation.
“Yeohyeon… Huff. Kim Yeohyeon Esper-nim!”
She was getting more and more out of breath.
Clack.
The concrete wall that she could never enter without the AI’s permission.
Yeongwon was barely able to block Yeohyeon right in front of that wall.
“Hah. Ha.”
Thud.
More accurately, she managed to squeeze herself between Yeohyeon and the heavy steel door on the wall.
“…r-nim!” “…”
Bang.
Yeongwon closed the steel door that Yeohyeon had been about to open and leaned against it.
“I, gasp. Hoo-ah.” “…” “Hoo-ee. Ha.” “…”
She was out of breath, and her face was a mess, so she felt awkward meeting him for the first time like this. Yeongwon lowered her head and caught her breath for a moment.
Only the top of her head and the back of her hair, which was disheveled by the wind, were visible to his eyes.
Hah, hah.
All Yeongwon could see were his long legs. So long that they had just given her quite a hard time.
And Yeongwon was suddenly startled. The distance between him and her was too close, much closer than she expected.
So, the time she spent with her head bowed, catching her breath, became longer.
‘Now, I feel a little better.’
Yeongwon checked with the back of her hand that the heat on her face had subsided, and then she parted her lips.
“I apologize for not giving you notice, but…”
She raised her head, calling his name.
“Esper Kim Yeohyeon-nim.”
The one eye not covered by the mask was looking down at Yeongwon.
“…” “…”
From a high vantage point. Quite close up.
Yeongwon blinked twice and quickly lowered her gaze.
Even in the middle of a cold snap, he was dressed lightly, as if he hadn’t considered the outside air at all.
Black slacks. A hidden-button shirt of the same color. A dark navy cardigan. A black mask.
Among all the deeply saturated items, the darkest was his eye.
“…” “…”
A quiet silence descended.
He looked a little thinner than in the photos.
Beep.
Behind Yeongwon’s head, the AI sensor on the steel door activated.
Yeohyeon silently manipulated something with a hand gesture. His neat, beautiful hand floated in the air for a moment, then lowered again.
With that, he took a step back. Yeongwon finally raised her head again.
His slow movements, the trajectory of his arm and hand going up and down, the subtle angle at which his head tilted sideways as he looked at Yeongwon.
Everything… was profoundly languid.
‘He looks tired.’
He was very exhausted. That fact couldn’t be hidden at all.
Yeongwon stood frozen, enduring his gaze.
The single eye slowly swept over Yeongwon.
Force tightened in Yeongwon’s back as she bore his stare.
‘What the…’
She was nervous. Truly, unbelievably so.
This was not the aura a man in his early twenties should possess.
‘What is this, it’s precarious…’
It was intensely decadent.
If he had utilized his height and bone structure to become a model, wouldn’t he have completely dominated the runway with a heroin-chic decadence?
And then he spoke.
At an unexpected moment.
“Yes.”
Just a single syllable.
“I’m, uh… my name is Shim Yeongwon.”
She had prepared words.
“I don’t know if you know, but I’m the sixteenth person to Awaken in the Republic of Korea recently… I’m a Non-Selective Guide.”
These were the words she had prepared, hoping to catch his interest. She had written and erased the sentences repeatedly, refining them.
“You need an exclusive Guide, don’t you?”
A long introduction shouldn’t be necessary. They both knew what the other wanted.
So, she should just briefly summarize the main point, but her mouth was parched.
“I can probably help…”
Flash. Click.
‘Huh?’
Click. Flash. Click.
A camera flash went off in the distance.
Yeongwon wasn’t the only one who noticed it.
Yeohyeon spoke.
“Guide-nim.” “…” “Don’t be verbose, if you have a request, summarize it in one sentence.”
The only thought Yeongwon could have when suddenly asked for this by Yeohyeon was…
‘…His voice is insane.’ ‘…Seriously insane.’
It was a fastball that hit the eardrum’s strike zone at the speed of light, even if you heard it while standing on your head and walking backward.
Click. Click.
At that moment, people came running. Judging by the press passes dangling, they were clearly reporters.
“Excuse me.” “…Pardon?”
Yeongwon didn’t immediately grasp what Yeohyeon was about to do. She was simply guided by his touch.
‘Uh…’
Yeongwon’s arm, encased in the padded jacket, was grasped by his large hand, and her back was pulled away from the steel door.
“Esper Kim Yeohyeon-nim! An interview! Just a moment!”
The steel door opened.
Slam.
The steel door closed.
Yeongwon was left outside.
‘What…’
Yeongwon’s expression was more blank than the reporters’.
She was flustered.
“What is your relationship?” “Is that mark – are you a Center-affiliated Guide?” “What is your name?” “Guide-nim, what is your relationship with Esper Kim Yeohyeon-nim?” “What were you talking about?”
Yeongwon felt dazed.
She was greatly flustered by his unexpected action.
So, she could only apologize to the reporters.
By then, the reporters seemed to realize they wouldn’t get anything out of her, so they followed her for a bit but eventually sighed and let Yeongwon go.
Yeongwon slowly walked to the elevator and pressed the button. Then, she turned around. The black car, no longer occupied by its owner, was visible in the distance.
She thought that, despite being grayscale, it looked magnificent and its structure seemed very solid, just like him.
And just like that, Yeongwon left the Annex in a trance.
She met at the central park of the Headquarters, feeling the cold air. The floating mountain was visible behind it.
A fantastic landscape drawn with surrealism and unreality. Compared to that, Kim Yeohyeon seemed even more detached from reality.
She stood frozen like a statue for a long time.
His voice, actions, and the difference in their eye-level came to mind in sequence. The afterimages endlessly circled in her head.
A voice that needed no description, a body that moved slowly, a gaze that was far too low in temperature.
Also, the story she knew even before meeting him, a narrative that intertwined reason and emotion.
The story of Kim Yeohyeon naturally brought back Yeongwon’s own past.
Danger.
‘…Dangerous.’
Dangerous to me.
That was how Kim Yeohyeon’s first impression was imprinted on Yeongwon.
