← The Guide Who Hides Their Power is an Otter
Bang, ba-boom.
A man covered in the purple fluid of a creature that had burst apart like fireworks and split into pieces frowned in irritation.
“Filthy bastards….”
The person who had wiped out the creature in one blow and was slowly walking into the gate was an esper. Other espers began to follow him in, one after another in a line.
“Are you hurt anywhere?”
Some people had fainted or collapsed in shock at seeing a creature explode right in front of them, and someone approached a woman who had been staring blankly at it.
“Can you walk? If you go straight in that way, you’ll find a shelter, so please go this way.”
“Yes, yes… Thank you. Thank you.”
The woman, her face still dazed, thanked him again and again and disappeared into an alley. The people who reassured the residents, took charge of the rear, and helped heal the espers were guides.
“Who was that kid who just popped that thing?”
“Who else? Esper Park Gang-u.”
The world had met its end, and no country was safe. Friends you had seen only yesterday died, and people who lost family and homes were left sitting in the streets. Would it have been all right if it had stopped there? The gates had opened.
Creatures that burst out of gates rampaged and went back in, over and over, and warlike days continued all over the country. If there was any fortune in it, it was that ability users had appeared among the humans who should have been destroyed like this.
“So because he’s S-rank, I guess he puts on quite a show. There were citizens right there, and he popped it in front of their eyes? What if they’d died with it?”
“They say he calculated all of that. Nothing has happened so far, has it?”
The guides clicked their tongues, displeased with his conduct. Even so, the reason they could not speak carelessly was that he was the only S-rank esper in the Republic of Korea. Not only did he have unrivaled power and ability, he sometimes went alone into gates of this high a rank, sorted them out, and came back, so public opinion among the citizens praised him strongly.
“Anyway, he’s an unlucky bastard.”
“Hoo?”
Through the hazy fog that had formed when the gate opened, someone came out yawning.
“Guide Heisha. You are late. Too late. Busy. Too busy.”
Having no English to use, the guides pointed at their wrists and awkwardly spat out that he was late. Heisha grinned. Because of the yawn he had just made, there were tears pooled in his eyes, but overall he had a bright, sunny impression.
“Sorry I’m late. Who’s unlucky? What does unlucky mean?”
In the Republic of Korea, which was short on the ratio of ability users, they had searched for Korean diaspora scattered in each country. This was an unavoidable choice. Otherwise, it was a desperate matter in which Korea really could disappear from the map.
“Good luck, something like that. Is that right?”
“Roughly, something like that, I guess.”
The guides muttered and moved away from Heisha. All of the guides deployed today were citizens of the Republic of Korea, and Heisha alone was a member of the Korean diaspora who had lived abroad.
“Unlucky means good luck? I learned that today. Good luck, unlucky.”
On top of that, he was a newcomer who had only just passed a year since entering Korea.
“Has the gate been cleaned up already?”
The reason everyone avoided him like this was that he could not give clear help as a guide. Because among the deployed personnel, he was the one and only C-rank guide, the lowest rank of all. His matching rate was also atrocious, so no esper welcomed meeting him. When they deployed, he was the sort of guide sprinkled here and there to fill up the headcount.
“We haven’t subjugated it yet. Would you go inside and help with treatment?”
“Pardon?”
His Korean was good at certain times, but when asked an unnecessary question, he suddenly spoke English. Damn funny Korean diaspora. As if being C-rank were not enough, he was no help as manpower either, so it did not matter if he was late or did not come. It would be a relief if he would just not come and scramble people’s minds like this.
“Never mind. Heisha. Wait. Has everyone else evacuated all the remaining citizens?”
“Yes.”
“Yes!”
“You, you. Two people stay with Heisha, and everyone else enters the gate. As you all know, Esper Park Gang-u cannot be healed, so everyone watches the fighting only from as far away as possible. Don’t forget to radio if a situation arises. Understood?”
Yes! Everyone’s answer sounded as one. Heisha tilted his head. He had been deployed to a site before, but this was the first time he had seen a case where they said someone could not be healed. Couldn’t an esper not move without a guide’s guiding? What were they going to do if he rampaged, talking like that?
“Guide Heisha.”
“Did you call me?”
“You’ve got it in your ear, right? This.”
One guide pointed to the earpiece in his own ear. Heisha nodded and held out his own ear.
“I’ve got it in.”
“If they say retreat, you have to run away.”
“Why?”
“Because there’s a time bomb in there.”
“A time bomb?”
When the words got a little difficult, Heisha smiled, at a loss.
“I know bomb, but what is sihan? Sihan?”
“It means a bomb that you don’t know when it will explode.”
Was he talking about the esper from before, the one the captain had said could not be healed?
“I understand.”
Heisha smiled with his eyes folded and nodded. An esper no one could heal. He felt an urge to meet him. On top of that, the Center Director had deliberately assigned him a C-rank. The moment they tried to measure him with a machine, they blew up one after another, so the Director seemed to think he had a power that was not S-rank but something even greater.
“You must not guide. Carelessly, to anyone at all.”
He had no reason to refuse, so he had promised he would do that. As expected, because he was C-rank, everyone turned their attention away from him, and with their gazes dispersed, that was not bad either. But… an immensely powerful esper no one could heal was a sentence that captured him at once, to the point where there was no reason not to meet him.
Heisha bared his teeth and grinned. It would be even better if he went right to the brink of exploding. Then he would be given a chance to guide him. That would be really nice….
—Everyone, run!
Heisha tilted his head.
“Run?”
The guides who had been outside with him were running far away without looking back. Heisha, who had been standing still, tilted his head to the side and stared at the gate.
“What does run mean?”
“Hey! Heisha! Why aren’t you running away, what are you doing? Aren’t you going to run, quickly?”
What poured out of the gate in a line was not creatures, but guides and espers. A dozen or so people passed Heisha in an instant. The guide captain shouted.
“Heisha! Run, quickly!”
“Ah. Run means run away?”
He had learned one more. At the moment Heisha grinned, the gate entrance exploded with a bang! A rippling telekinetic force could be felt, and a man with bloodshot eyes lost his reason and began to rampage.
“Heisha!”
“Never mind that, everyone get out of the site! Quickly!”
The captain walked over at a fast pace.
“Heisha! What are you staring blankly at? Do you want to die?”
“What does want to die mean again?”
“Do you really want to die here?”
“Ah. That’s what want to die means?”
He was pretending not to understand, but sometimes there really were words that were hard to understand. He was in such a hurry he could die, and there was no time for wordplay like this. The captain shoved Heisha in the back, but he did not budge an inch, and grinned with his pretty face.
“Captain?”
“Heisha!”
“Lie down.”
He had meant for him to get down, but in the sudden situation the sentence did not come to mind, so it was a word he just threw out. There was no way the other person would understand that, so Heisha grabbed the captain by the collar and flipped him over. With a strange gurgle, the captain foamed at the mouth and fainted.
“Oops. Mistake. Are you okay? Captain, you’re breathing, right?”
Heisha glanced around, watching his surroundings. Fortunately, no one had seen. Except for the esper called the time bomb, a little distance away, who was looking at him.
“Nice to meet you. I’m Heisha. Esper-nim, your name is Park Gang-u, right? Park Gang-u Es….”
Swish. A rock that came flying using telekinesis grazed past his cheek. It was not even sharp, but it passed at such a fast speed that being grazed left a wound.
“That hurts. If it scars, I’m going to bill you.”
Heisha frowned and looked around again. Hmm. No one was there. It was the optimal environment.
“Esper Park Gang-u!”
“…….”
There was no focus in his pupils. Where was he looking, with hundreds of boulders lifted into the air?
“You have no thought of putting these down, do you?”
“…….”
Since a rock could come flying at any time, he pushed the captain as far inward as possible, and Heisha raised his head.
“I guess your matching rate isn’t good because you’re S-rank. But why didn’t the Center Director match me with you? Come to think of it, that’s right. Was I too precious to connect to you?
“Hey! Look at my eyes, please.”
Heisha smiled brightly with his eyes, then spread his arms wide open.
“If you receive my guiding and you like it, get up and be my friend! I have no friends, so I’m lonely!”
Heisha made his eyes shine and looked up at the sky, and his body flinched. Just then a rock came flying and covered Heisha with a huge sound.
Rustle, rustle….
A strange sound came, and then something crawled out from between the rocks. A white face, thick fur, black, soft paw pads, and the sharp teeth of a mammal.
“Couldn’t you wait a bit!?”
He climbed to the very top of the rock and stood majestically, making his body grand.
“Come here. Esper Park Gang-u. Try my guiding.”
He lifted a black paw pad and wiggled it. Standing majestically with both hands raised, the specialty animal of the Aleutian Islands. Heisha, who had been sky-high in popularity even in Alaska, was….
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