← The Resurrected Guide Wants to Live Quietly
"…Am I going insane?"
His self-loathing had passed its limit, but Han Yu-geon’s ordeal wasn’t over. He had to do one more insane thing. He took a deep breath to steady himself and typed a message.
[Me: I’m getting guided, so have a decent guide ready. I’ll be there in 20 minutes.]
The reply came fast — she’d apparently been waiting on the unresponsive guild master. The "read" receipt appeared almost immediately.
But the reply itself was slow. As if the buffering had hit hard, a flood of messages only came up after Han Yu-geon got into the car.
[Oh Yeon-seo: Huh??] [Oh Yeon-seo: ?????????????????] [Oh Yeon-seo: Huh?????] [Oh Yeon-seo: Seriously?????] [Oh Yeon-seo: Han Yu-geon??????? Getting guided???????] [Oh Yeon-seo: ????????] [Oh Yeon-seo: You’re really doing it?? Calling a guide???????]
Watching the waterfall of question marks, Han Yu-geon debated answering but in the end sent nothing.
After all, it wasn’t a call — it was a message. He hadn’t made a typo; he’d written it properly. She’d re-read it and decide on her own.
[Oh Yeon-seo: O;;; looks like he’s serious………] [Oh Yeon-seo: Whoa, what wind blew in all of a sudden??]
What wind, indeed.
Even a sick person’s wish wouldn’t be enough to bend his convictions. "Lee Ha-neul" wasn’t anyone deeply meaningful to him — just a kid he’d met yesterday. Normally that meddling would’ve only annoyed him — so why had he changed his mind? He couldn’t understand himself. And yet, strangely… it felt okay.
Looking at Ha-neul made the memories of Seon too vivid; it felt like the fear of forgetting him eased.
He was clearly a total stranger — nothing alike in age, appearance, or voice — and yet, why did every part of him keep bringing that person to mind? The eyes, the small gestures, the way he spoke, his scent…
"I don’t know either…"
Han Yu-geon scratched his head roughly and started the car.
Guild Seonyeon, which had been quietly on break since the S-class dungeon raid, turned noisy in an instant.
Word was going around that Guild Master Han Yu-geon wanted guiding.
The chance to guide an S-class esper alone was something any career-minded guide would covet — and this one had striking looks and overwhelming strength to boot. On top of that, he was the man who’d debuted the year after the death of Seon Yi-yeon — the famous "esper of tragedy" — and shot his newly founded guild to rank 1 in no time, an unrivaled run.
In particular, the guild master of Seonyeon — respected by all, yet as unapproachable as a solid wall of ice — wanting guiding outside of a dungeon raid or a gate incident was practically a first.
Half anticipation, half curiosity, guides rushed to the guild, most of them paired, so their espers tagged along and Seonyeon was all but fully clocked in…
…which was, of course, anything but pleasant for Han Yu-geon, who’d planned to quietly get guided and leave.
His face twisted the moment he stepped into the guild building.
"Yu-geon! Whoa, you really came? Damn! What’s the occasion!" Thinking this wasn’t it, he turned to leave for any old center instead — but got caught immediately.
Probably the very person who’d caused this. Oh Yeon-seo.
She must have come down to the entrance herself, expecting him to bolt the moment he saw the situation.
"Why’d you call so many?"
"I didn’t call anyone. They all came on their own, dying to guide our esteemed guild master." "…"
"I swear I only said this much: the guild master wants guiding, come to the guild if you’re interested. You’re just too popular — don’t pin this on me!"
"Haah…"
He didn’t even have the energy to vent his rising irritation.
It was less than seeing the wounded Ha-neul — less than when he’d overlaid Seon Yi-yeon onto the ailing Ha-neul — but the mental toll was real this time, too.
He was tired. He just wanted to get guided and go home.
Lips pressed shut, he hurried toward the elevator, single-minded about finding somewhere quiet.
But in the end he had to open his mouth again with a sigh. Oh Yeon-seo was staring at him hard enough to bore a hole through his face.
"…What."
At Han Yu-geon’s glacial look down at her, Oh Yeon-seo flinched hard.
"N-no, it’s just wild. What’s gotten into you? Are you finally a person?"
"What bullshit…"
He really should’ve gone to some nearby center. Regret rising, Han Yu-geon pressed hard at his brow.
"It’s just so sudden. Did guiding with Guide Ha-neul feel so good you want more?"
"…….."
"Kidding, kidding. Don’t get mad. So who should I bring? Most of our guild guides are here except the few with imprints. You liked the guide you tried last time — want them again? Though for the good of the whole guild, giving other guides a chance at the experience might be—"
"Anyone. Doesn’t matter."
Still, there was a reason he’d come all this way. A guide Oh Yeon-seo would approve for the guild was guaranteed competent and unlikely to cause gossip.
But Han Yu-geon had never felt his "wavelength matched" any particular guide, so the conversation felt meaningless. He just wanted guiding, fast. So he wouldn’t get chased off again…
"……."
Why was he thinking things like that — like he wanted to stick around Ha-neul… Irritation at himself bled straight into his voice.
"Anyone who can do it fastest. Hurry."
"Got it. And you — you can’t take it back!"
At her gesture toward the guiding room, Han Yu-geon gave a hollow laugh as he walked.
Why would he take it back? He’d come to get guided, after all.
…Or so, at that point, Han Yu-geon had been utterly confident. With no idea what was about to happen to him.
From the moment he took the guide’s hand for guiding, Han Yu-geon sensed something was deeply wrong.
"…Urgh."
The instant their hands met, his stomach seemed to turn inside out. A violent nausea surged, as if black, sticky bile were boiling up from his chest.
Try as he might to endure it, he let go of the hand in under five seconds.
Face gone white, Han Yu-geon stumbled backward.
"J-just a moment."
"What’s wrong? Are you unwell anywhere… Guild Master!" He had no mental room to respond to the call. Leaving the guiding room, Han Yu-geon headed straight for the restroom. He scrubbed his hands and face with cold water, but the nausea wouldn’t settle easily.
Not quite enough to retch… but three more seconds might have told a different story.
"…What?"
Wiping his wet face, Han Yu-geon still couldn’t make sense of it.
He was picky in his way, but not germophobic. And this guide wasn’t a stranger — he’d received guiding from them before. It hadn’t bothered him at all then. There was no reason for this revulsion.
"What the fuck…"
A bad premonition crept up. A strong, sinking feeling that something that absolutely must not have happened might have happened.
Still unable to sort his thoughts, he came out of the restroom to find Oh Yeon-seo waiting, as expected.
"Han Yu-geon! What is it, what’s wrong? You said you’d get guided — why’d you come out without any? You look worse…"
"Get me another guide."
"Didn’t you like them?"
"Get another guide, I said."
"No, I need to know why—"
"I’ll explain later. Get another guide! Right now!" Oh Yeon-seo shut her mouth. Yu-geon’s mood was off.
At first she thought he was angry — that something in the guiding room had displeased him.
But his face said otherwise. Not anger — he looked badly rattled. Pale, eyes shaking, his wavelength — already unstable — swinging even wilder.
Han Yu-geon would never show an honest emotion besides something like fury, too proud for it. She’d watched him close to ten years since the training-center days and had never seen this face on him. And this wasn’t even about his one and only sore spot, "Seon Yi-yeon" — so why…
She had plenty she wanted to say, but for now Oh Yeon-seo obeyed.
"Fine."
After that, Oh Yeon-seo brought one guide after another into the guiding room, but no one managed to guide Han Yu-geon for more than ten seconds. No matter what methods they tried.
Watching from the side, Oh Yeon-seo realized things were heading in an ominous direction.
After sending the sixth guide out, Oh Yeon-seo locked the door tight and voiced the "uneasy hypothesis" that had been faintly rising.
"Damn. What is this. Han Yu-geon, don’t tell me you…"
Han Yu-geon was S-class, but he hadn’t been a particularly difficult guiding target.
Yesterday had been a genuine rarity — people who knew his habits watched nervously, but he’d always hidden and managed his condition well enough that the outside world never even knew he avoided guiding.
He’d been guided by A-rank, B-rank, even lower-rank guides, and never once shown revulsion. Never burdened anyone. Yesterday was probably the first time he’d ever hurt a guide by failing to control himself.
Espers treated guiding as their lifeline — they felt pleasure if anything, rarely rejection.
When an esper showed this violent a rejection response to guiding, there were generally two cases that came to mind.
When some trauma had left guiding itself as a terrible wound. Or… when he’d imprinted, and was touching a guide who wasn’t the imprint target.
Of those, the chance that Han Yu-geon was rejecting guiding out of trauma was as good as nil. When he’d first walked into the guild, he’d looked like he’d slept well after one round of guiding — everyone had whispered that his face looked better than usual. No way he’d developed trauma since.
Which left…
"Don’t tell me you… did it?"
"Would I have?"
"R-right. Yesterday you came home with me, and Guide Ha-neul looked unwell today — no way you did… No, then why…"
She muttered like she couldn’t understand, but honestly a "reason" came readily to mind.
Yesterday’s guiding. No — from Han Yu-geon’s side, it had clearly been a kiss. She’d thought she should stop it, but hadn’t acted. Ha-neul had been so desperate to guide, and Yu-geon had been winding around him — around his tongue and lips, around Ha-neul himself —claiming him with his whole body as if he were his by right, so all Oh Yeon-seo could do was keep people from seeing them.
No, honestly… it had been so lewd she couldn’t bring herself to intervene, her face burning just watching.
Leave a Reply