* * *
What Wonho had shown him was nothing like this.
Haebom felt ashamed for even confusing the two.
He couldn’t believe what he’d done to Wonho because of that misunderstanding.
He made up his mind to apologize properly when he saw him at home.
“I’ll say it again—get guiding from your own guide.”
Haebom only softened up when he was in front of Wonho.
From the start, Wonho disarmed him completely.
And as time passed, Haebom found himself growing gentler and gentler around him.
There was no reason to act like that with anyone else.
Especially not Na Hyunjoon.
“Then I’ll just break the pair. That works, right?”
“…Oppa!”
As if she couldn’t hold back, Choi Yoonseo shrieked his name like a broken alarm.
The fact that she still called him oppa after the way he treated her—Haebom had to admit, that took a certain kind of tenacity.
Well, it was the “love of the century” that had so casually tossed Wonho’s life aside, so maybe it made sense in its own twisted way.
At her scream-like voice, Na Hyunjoon clicked his tongue.
“Yoonseo, you’re still here? What are you doing, eavesdropping on someone else’s conversation like a stray cat? That’s a nasty habit….”
Turning toward the now-pale Choi Yoonseo standing behind him, Na Hyunjoon flashed a dazzling smile as he spoke.
His soft voice and charming smile couldn’t have contrasted more sharply with the cruelty of his words.
He said them with the ease of someone tossing out trash.
No hesitation.
No filter. Like it meant nothing. Choi Yoonseo clenched her fists and trembled.
But the sharpness in her gaze wasn’t aimed at Na Hyunjoon—it was directed straight at Haebom.
‘What, am I playing the homewrecker now?’
Haebom let out a deep sigh. He couldn’t understand why he had to deal with any of this. He turned around.
He considered going back to the lab, but in the end, decided to just go home.
He worried Na Hyunjoon might follow, but he didn’t hear any footsteps behind him.
Still, Na Hyunjoon was an esper who moved without making a sound.
But even if he erased all noise, Haebom would still be able to sense his twisted resonance.
There was none of that. So he relaxed a little.
As he walked home, Haebom tried to shake off the image of Choi Yoonseo glaring at him with trembling fists, and Na Hyunjoon spouting nonsense like it was the most natural thing in the world.
“…Huh?”
Haebom blinked in surprise.
As he opened the gate, he locked eyes with Wonho, who was standing in the front yard.
‘Why is Wonho here?’
He’d said he’d be home late today, hadn’t he?
Haebom tilted his head in confusion.
“Sigh… Yoon Haebom. Nothing’s ever easy with you. Why’d you come home so fast?”
“Huh? I should be asking you that. What are you doing?”
Haebom blinked his big eyes repeatedly.
Wonho sighed in frustration, shaking his head.
He muttered to himself about how he’d never met anyone this difficult in his life.
But what really caught Haebom’s attention was the strange item in Wonho’s hand.
A pole?
Why was he holding that?
“You said you wanted to go camping. That fire pit thing or whatever…”
‘What?’
Another strange noise escaped Haebom’s lips.
The thing in Wonho’s hand really was a pole.
He hadn’t noticed it right away because he was so surprised to see him standing there in the yard.
But now he saw—at Wonho’s feet was an unfolded, half-assembled tent.
And beside it, scattered camping gear.
It looked like he was setting up for a camping trip… right in their yard.
“Yoon Haebom, why are you just standing there looking dumb? Forget the surprise, just get over here and help me. I’ve looked at the manual and I still don’t get it.”
“O-oh…! Y-yeah, let’s do it together.”
Wonho sighed again and reached out his hand to Haebom.
He had planned to finish setting everything up, light the fire, and welcome Haebom home with the perfect surprise.
He’d even asked Jin Seyoung to stall him.
But Haebom had come back without a word.
His phone hadn’t buzzed once, so it seemed Jin Seyoung hadn’t even realized Haebom had already returned.
Wonho had swallowed his pride to ask for this favor, and it ended up like this?
He couldn’t help but feel a little exasperated.
Still… doing it together didn’t sound so bad either.
Especially considering that pitching a tent was harder than it looked when you had destructive esper powers.
He had specifically bought one that was supposed to be easy to set up, but it still wasn’t going well.
“Where did you get all this? Did you buy it? Why?”
Haebom placed his hand in Wonho’s outstretched one, blinking dumbly as he looked between Wonho and the tent.
He started to wonder—did Wonho really prepare all this just because he’d once said he wanted to go camping?
He had said something like that before.
It was one of the few hobbies that brought even a flicker of joy to Haebom’s otherwise uneventful life.
Especially when his mind felt like a tangled mess, staring into the crackling, flickering flames of a campfire—fire-staring—was the best remedy.
He’d regretted not being able to do that here.
But even then, he hadn’t seriously thought about trying it in this world.
It wasn’t just anywhere you could casually go camping while keeping an eye on someone like Wonho, an esper who was basically a walking time bomb, liable to explode at any moment.
Haebom couldn’t leave him behind—but he couldn’t exactly bring him along either.
So, he’d just sighed and let the idea go.
But now, even if it was just the front yard, the fact that he could go camping—and that Wonho had prepared it—made his heart beat with excitement.
“Where else? I obviously went out and bought it. Like I said earlier, you said you wanted to do this. You even said it’d be a waste not to. So what do you mean, ‘why?’”
“…Thanks.”
“If you’re thankful, then hurry up and help.”
Wonho, who had clearly prepared the whole surprise to make Haebom happy, now looked a bit sheepish when Haebom’s eyes sparkled as he said thanks.
It hadn’t even cost that much to get all of this.
To be able to make Haebom this touched with just that much—it felt like money well spent. Even if it wasn’t a perfectly executed surprise.
Following Haebom’s skilled instructions, Wonho started assembling the tent and other gear with ease.
When he’d tried to do it alone, it had seemed overwhelming, but working together made everything come together surprisingly well.
Their front yard was starting to look like a real campsite.
Lastly, they stacked firewood in the fire pit.
Wonho initially threw it together haphazardly, but Haebom, watching from the side, reached out and said, “That’s not how you do it.”
“You’ll hurt your hand. Just explain it instead. How am I supposed to stack it?”
Haebom thought that maybe Wonho had forgotten he was also an adult man.
Of course, their hands weren’t the same.
Wonho’s hands were rough and calloused from countless training sessions and real combat.
Scars had come and gone on them, though now they looked clean and unblemished.
But Haebom knew exactly what those hands had been through.
“You’re using your bare hands too.”
“You can’t. Just tell me with words.”
“Ugh, fine. You know how to stack them in a tic-tac-toe grid, right? Let air through like that.”
* * *
