Chapter 3
“Don’t talk. Sound is a wave, too.”
Yoon Monan sent his invisible waves flowing out through his peripheral nerves, wrapping them around Jeongwon’s blood vessels. What would have taken seconds back in the day dragged on far longer now. It really had been too long. Still, the waves churning like boiling water slowly began to settle, smoothing out into the calm of a still lake.
People often said a guide’s ability belonged more to the divine than to science. All of humanity had thrown itself into developing wave-control devices, but replacing a guide had proven impossible. Other than skin-to-skin contact, there was no way to stop an overload from tipping into a Trance.
Jeongwon lifted his heavy eyelids and looked at Monan’s face, close enough to blur at the edges. Once, Monan had been a guide with the word “genius” practically welded to his name. He didn’t just calm an esper’s overload; he could suppress their abilities outright.
What was Monan like in his prime? Strong, in the most literal sense. On the battlefield, he would shut down enemy energy all at once and wipe out Trances with eerie, brutal precision.
“That’s enough.”
And now a genius like that was reduced to the level of an ordinary guide. Even skin-to-skin, he had to strain this hard. A national loss. As Monan drew back, Jeongwon reached out and smoothed the sweat-damp pink hair away from his forehead.
“Come join my team. I’ll help you get back to the way you were.”
“Your team only takes people from your own clan, Hyung.”
“I’ll make an exception for you.”
“…What kind of disaster are you trying to bring down on yourself, dragging in a defective like me?”
Monan peeled Jeongwon’s hand off him and let out a bitter laugh. Guides really must be rare. Even a guy whose powers had slipped badly enough to get his own brothers killed was still getting offers.
“My team’s always open. Say the word whenever you feel like it. The kids I’ve got now don’t do it for me. Their numbers are worse than I’d like, too.”
“Harsh review, considering they’re supposed to be top-tier elites. Your standards are way too high, Hyung.”
“That’s the only way nothing goes wrong on the job.”
For some reason, Monan was too tired to keep up a long conversation. Come to think of it, Jeongwon’s younger brother hadn’t said a single word this entire time.
He’d heard the Mu clan kept a strict pecking order even among siblings. Was the kid too scared of his hyungie to get a word out?
“Then how about my brother’s team? Same Combat Corps, and as it happens, they have an opening. They’re desperate to fill it.”
“Hyungnim.”
Only then did Guwon spit out a single word. Unlike Jeongwon, Guwon seemed painfully reticent. Had he spent his whole life crushed under his brilliant brother’s shadow? Monan suddenly found himself strangely interested in Guwon, who sat as rigid as a stone Buddha.
A handsome face. Broad, squared shoulders. Even through his clothes, his solid frame and heavy musculature were impossible to miss. Sitting there ramrod straight, as if discipline were carved into his bones, Guwon gave off an ascetic air.
You could get a rough read on a person’s temperament or skill from posture alone, and his body was ideal—forged by long hours of training. Sparring with a guy like that, trading a few punches—that might actually be fun.
“How’d you end up short on people? You could fill those esper slots from the Bukhae clan alone and still have plenty left over.”
“Ah…”
At Monan’s question, Jeongwon let out a low laugh.
“Truth is, Guwon’s had a bit of friction with his team members.”
And that’s a big deal because…?
Posts’ emotions ran as wild as their powers, so they were forever trading punches over nothing. This time, Monan addressed Guwon directly.
“What, you got into a fistfight? Who’d you hit, and how bad?”
“…The team leader.”
He hit the team leader? This guy’s a loose cannon. Three years in, tops. No matter how wild espers got, once you belonged to the Agency, you obeyed your team leader. No exceptions.
“Three or so…”
“Huh?”
“He beat up three team leaders and five team members. Two of them are in comas.”
There was nothing funny about it, but Jeongwon wore a grin as he laid out every last one of his brother’s shameful deeds.
“That’s why there are no volunteers for Division 2 Team 7, where Guwon is. They say they’d rather not become corpses before they even make it to the field.”
“Huh… And why’d he hit them?”
“Apparently, they were interrupting his prayer time.”
Jeongwon seemed to have recovered enough to laugh softly. Guwon, as if his brother’s laughter were unfamiliar, stared at him a beat too long before looking away. Expressionless. Robotic. It was a strange reaction.
“Put Guwon’s team on your list, too, Monan. It’s about to be dissolved for being understaffed. You’ve got no shortage of places that want you, so I won’t push, but do you have somewhere in mind?”
“No. The team I was on with my hyungs got disbanded, so I’ll have to figure it out when I get there.”
“…Your brothers will be resting in the Mother Goddess’s garden.”
There was something bleak about the way Jeongwon recited a line from the Cheongyeong scriptures, the way people on the Peninsula usually did. But Monan had no interest in the afterlife, in some land of Zoe where the Mother Goddess supposedly dwelled or whatever. Like him, his dead brothers had never been believers. So despite Jeongwon’s attempt at comfort, he doubted the Mother Goddess of Cheongyeong would be watching over them.
The followers of Cheongyeong held that life was a place brimming with death and suffering, and they believed only by affirming that suffering could one gain vital force and achieve the elevation of the soul. The Mu clan fanatics who clung to this belief were single-minded zealots who rejected any interpretation of scripture except the literal word. Because of that, they lived their lives by strict law.
…Monan thought it was all complete bullshit.
The doctrine commanding them to affirm suffering was the very engine that stripped away the fear of death. Cheongyeong used it to brainwash countless Posts into flinging themselves into the jaws of death. That was why the average lifespan of Post ability users from the Peninsula hovered around thirty-two. They raced to die first, all chasing a noble death.
“I’m heading out.”
Monan stood and brushed himself off. He was in no mood to sit through a sermon. Jeongwon read his irritation, smiled gently, and offered his hand.
“See you again soon. We’ll be running into each other plenty at the Center now. If you ever need anything, just say so.”
“Yeah, sure. But why are you still slogging it out in the field as a team leader, Hyung? Someone like you could’ve moved up to a higher position by now.”
“If my son is going to live in a safe country, his father has to do the slogging.”
Ah. Monan immediately regretted the careless remark. Come to think of it, wasn’t this around the anniversary of Jeongwon’s late wife’s death? He’d said he had business in Bukhae; he must have been on his way back from holding the memorial rite.
In a world where losing family was so common, remembering every single person’s loss was more than anyone could manage. Even if the death toll at the hands of Trances was supposedly far lower now than before the Great Holy War.
The Great Holy War was a conflict from several centuries ago, when Trances and Posts clashed on a massive scale. It was a watershed event in human history, bringing most of material civilization to ruin. As long as Posts existed, the rise of Trances was inevitable, and even now, battles broke out frequently in every corner of the world.
“Is the sixteenth heir of the Bukhae Mu Clan growing up well?”
“He’s already three. His power manifested not long ago. Froze the water right in his cup.”
“Like father, like son. If his father’s a top-tier ice esper, the son’s bound to be top-tier, too.”
“And you’re not getting married?”
“What for? The nephews my hyungs left behind will carry on the Namgyeong Yoon line.”
“Your clan won’t see it that way.”
“Who’d marry off their daughter to a bastard with a mental illness? Besides, my family couldn’t care less about me.”
At the self-deprecating remark, Jeongwon gave him a pained smile. Monan bowed quickly and stepped out of the compartment, but Guwon followed him like a shadow. It grated hard on the nerves of a man with three years’ worth of mental illness.
“What is it?”
“You must never breathe a word of what happened today. Give me your promise.”
What the hell is this guy’s problem? You said the exact same thing earlier, and I said I got it, didn’t I? In reality, Monan had never said he got it, but unable to remember that, he scowled with all the nerve of the guilty.
“…Listen here, Junior Guwon. I fixed up your hyungie for you, so you should be bowing your head and thanking me. Why are you repeating the same line over and over like a busted cassette?”
“It is customary not to entrust clan matters to outsiders. This is an exceptional circumstance, so an understanding between us is necessary.”
“Hey.”
“Yes.”
“Shut up and move. Don’t block my way.”
He shoved Guwon’s shoulder and tried to walk off. All at once, a huge hand shot out and clamped around his wrist. He tried to pull free, but the other man’s grip was no joke. Sure, Monan had been off active duty and stuck in a mental health care center for about three years, but he was hardly weak enough to be brushed off by some soft-headed loose cannon like this. His mood soured completely.
…An esper, daring to stand in a guide’s way. Living up to his reputation as the lunatic who beat three team leaders and five team members.
Showing no mercy to whoever picked the fight first was Monan’s creed. Through the skin where they touched, he cut off the flow of Guwon’s energy in an instant. The moment Guwon felt his ability being controlled, his grip loosened slightly. Monan didn’t miss it. He yanked his hand free and slammed a hard fist into the man’s right cheek.
He’d barely put any force behind it. With his ability suppressed, Guwon was flung straight into the train car wall. But his stance, buckled for a moment, quickly found its balance again. Monan gave one final warning to the big, dark man glaring at him with eyes sharp as a hawk’s talons.
“If you don’t fuck off, I’ll fuck you right here. Get lost.”
Guwon remained silent.
As if that line had landed like a killing blow, Guwon flinched almost imperceptibly, wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand, and stepped back. Turning his back on him, Monan scratched roughly at the spot above his eyebrow for no reason.
…Why did I threaten to fuck him?
It had just slipped out, but the more he thought about it, the less the threat fit the situation. Still, you couldn’t exactly deliver a harsh lesson and then go, “Sorry, the part about fucking you was a slip.” So Monan calmly walked back down the long corridor to his seat.