* * *
“Haeram.”
Seo Jungwoo reached out and lifted Haeram’s limp hands.
Cho Yunhye, standing right next to him, jumped in surprise, but he hadn’t cared about the eyes of the crowd for some time now.
“Haeram? Look at me.”
“Yes. I’m looking.”
“Don’t mind what Guide Lee Inho said. He’s always been a strange guy….”
Haeram caught Lee Inho pouting in his peripheral vision.
Seo Jungwoo continued, carefully scanning Haeram’s face.
“During our training earlier…… I was worried because you didn’t seem to be in a good mood. You didn’t answer my calls, and when I called the inpatient ward, they said you weren’t there.”
“So you were looking for me?”
He nodded.
“Let’s try a different method starting tomorrow. I’ll work harder.”
Haeram couldn’t answer immediately, his eyes darting between Seo Jungwoo’s.
Suddenly, all of this felt strange.
Why hadn’t he questioned it even once until now?
Why was Seo Jungwoo so dedicated to him, and why was that Guide looking at him as if he wanted him dead?
Taking Haeram’s silence as agreement, Seo Jungwoo prepared to leave.
He gave Haeram’s hands a gentle, affectionate pat and offered a light nod to Cho Yunhye.
It seemed he intended to head down to the underground bunker with Lee Inho and the other Guides.
“……Teacher?”
Haeram grabbed the hem of Seo Jungwoo’s coat as he turned.
The moment he met those questioning eyes, he thought, ‘Oh no.’
Haeram reflexively let go of the fabric and hid his hand behind his back, but the deed was done.
He hurriedly fumbled to invent a reason.
“C-could we move our time up a bit tomorrow? Since Seungjoon isn’t around….”
It was a nonsense excuse, but Seo Jungwoo simply smiled brightly and nodded.
“Of course. Come at whatever time is convenient for you, Haeram. I’ll be waiting whenever that is…. See you tomorrow.”
Seo Jungwoo walked toward the underground bunker with Lee Inho.
Before they were completely out of range, Haeram watched with a still-furrowed brow as Lee Inho glanced back over his shoulder at him.
‘……I think your personality has changed, Hyung.’
Lee Inho’s final whisper was too far away to hear clearly, but Haeram could roughly guess by the shape of his lips.
However, he couldn’t tell if the remark was directed at Seo Jungwoo or at himself.
‘Does he really know me?’
“There are plenty of rude people among Guides. Don’t let it get to you, Haeram-oppa,” Cho Yunhye consoled him, patting his shoulder.
“The more I think about it, the more absurd it is. What kind of jerk is he? Did he step in something on his way here?…. Oppa, are you sure you don’t know him? He acted like he had a personal grudge against you.”
“It’s the first time I’ve even heard his name.”
“Ugh, if it weren’t for that guy, I could have at least shaken hands with Esper Seo Jungwoo today. It happened so fast I just froze.”
“…I guess.”
“I think that’s the first time I’ve seen Esper Seo Jungwoo in person that close. I can see why you wouldn’t be able to fall asleep during Mind Training. Whoa….”
Haeram listened to Cho Yunhye’s chatter with half an ear, watching the group in white uniforms move further away from the plaza.
In truth, his eyes were tracking the massive frame of Esper Seo Jungwoo, who stood a head taller than the rest, but he feigned interest in the Guides like everyone else in the plaza.
Once they had completely disappeared, Haeram picked up his fallen bucket list.
He dusted it off, folded it neatly, and tucked it into his patient gown pocket, making sure it wouldn’t get wrinkled.
He felt powerless, and he felt hurt.
That night, unlike his usual self, Haeram tossed and turned for a long time.
For someone who usually fell asleep the moment his head hit the pillow, this was a major event.
Perhaps the medicine wasn’t working today; his stomach ached and he felt a severe chill.
Haeram curled into a ball and pulled the blanket over his head.
“Ugh, it hurts… it hurts.”
Every time he closed his eyes, he saw Seo Jungwoo and Lee Inho.
A story only they knew, a world of their own.
The fact that he was of no help in that situation, combined with Lee Inho’s mockery, tormented him.
The fact that Seungjoon was away, leaving him alone in the room, also played a part.
Haeram imagined a scenario where every Guide energy measuring machine in Building D would break the next morning so he wouldn’t have to be tested.
That was how heavy his heart felt. The night felt incredibly long, yet he wished morning would never come.
However, as soon as the next morning arrived, an event occurred that chased away the dark clouds—clouds he thought would last a week—in less than a full day.
What was that saying?
A blessing in disguise?
Haeram had brushed off his morning sleepiness to go down to the bank inside the hospital.
Even though he thought he had arrived early, there were so many people that he was forced to go to the ATM.
He was certain his debit card, which he hadn’t looked at in years, would be suspended, but because the wait for the teller was endless, he tried the machine with no line first.
And exactly ten seconds later, Haeram found himself doubting his own eyes at the ATM.
Not only did the debit card work perfectly fine, but…
‘One, ten, hundred, thousand, ten thousand, hundred thousand, million, ten million, hundred million, billion, ten billion…….’
Haeram used his small frame to hide the ATM screen as much as possible and jerked his head up to scan his surroundings.
Beyond the row of automated machines, the bank counter was bustling, and people with numbered tickets sat on the sofas with expressionless faces.
Only the security guard paced around, scanning the crowd.
Lest he make eye contact, Haeram quickly lowered his head.
The world was moving along normally; it was clear this situation was neither a hallucination nor a dream.
No matter how many times he blinked, the numbers on the screen remained unchanged. Haeram gave his cheek a small pinch.
“Ouch….”
Not only did his cheek hurt, but the fingers trembling uncontrollably were definitely his.
This situation was 100 percent reality.
‘Twelve point eight billion…… nine hundred and fifty-two thousand won….’ ($12.8 Billion KRW is approx. $9.6 Million USD).
His account held an amount of money he had never even seen in his life.
“Holy….”
Haeram tried pressing the withdrawal button, but when he saw the daily limit was 6 million won, he gasped, covered his mouth with his fist, and hurriedly hit the cancel button.
He had more money in his account than the daily withdrawal limit!
No, it wasn’t just that. The money in his account was more than 2,000 times the daily limit.
In other words, even if he withdrew 6 million won every single day, it would take 2,000 days—roughly six years—to empty the account.
He might die from his terminal illness before he could even take it all out.
That was the scale of the fortune sitting in his account.
Crazy. Crazy. Crazy. Crazy.
The card the machine spat back out suddenly felt like a sacred relic.
With trembling hands, Haeram took the card and carefully tucked it into the leather card holder hanging around his neck.
The card holder, which he had been forced to make during a hospital hobby class, suddenly felt as heavy as a block of lead.
“My neck… my neck…. Am I going to get a herniated disc at this rate?”
Haeram clutched the back of his neck and staggered to a bench near the bank entrance, sinking down.
His father was a man of immense inferiority.
He felt inferior to his own siblings, to his neighbors, and even to strangers passing by on the street.
Haeram, born with the Guide factor, had become the pride of a father who had nothing else.
He treated Haeram’s birth as some grand feat he had personally achieved.
He had raised Haeram like a precious treasure, but the moment Haeram passed the age of fifteen—the ‘Golden Age of Awakening’—without manifesting, the man changed overnight.
On the morning of his sixteenth birthday, after a year with no signs or symptoms:
‘Something must be wrong. I should call a shaman and hold an exorcism.’
‘Dad…….’
‘How could you do this to me… how could you? After how I raised you.’
First came denial, then resentment.
When Haeram developed a compromised immune system the following year due to his unawakened Guide factor, his father turned his back without hesitation.
He wore a wounded expression, as if Haeram had personally betrayed him.
‘Contact me once you awaken.’
This was a research complex operated by the National Superhuman Association.
In order to be admitted to the specialized hospital for superhumans here, one had to prepare various documents and supplies.
One of those requirements was a bank account in one’s own name and a card capable of deposits and withdrawals.
The only money Haeram expected to be in that account was the 100,000 won monthly living allowance from the state, and even that was likely gone once phone bills and insurance premiums were deducted.
His father’s last words hadn’t been ‘Contact me when you’re better.’
They meant that if he didn’t awaken, he shouldn’t bother contacting him even if he did recover.
So, even if his father had somehow hit the jackpot in Las Vegas dozens of times and become incredibly wealthy, there was no way he would have put money into Haeram’s account.
* * *
