OMH Chapter 6

6. Cha Woojin (5)

“Aaaaaaaah-!”

We were endlessly plummeting towards the ground. I wracked my brain, facing the strong wind from the fall. If we fell like this, only I would be safe, and the others would die.

‘What should I do? At least I, who won’t get hurt, should reach the ground first.’

It seemed like I needed to be at the bottom to absorb the impact as much as possible.

I took out a rope from my belongings and threw it to the kids.

“Grab this, at least!”

If they grabbed the rope, I could pull them together in one place. And then, I could absorb the impact from underneath for the gathered kids!

Seo Rea and Kim Junseo grabbed the rope I threw.

But Song Jooha was unconscious and couldn’t grab the rope? What should I do? I managed to pull the two people up and get them above me, but Song Jooha was left.

We desperately called out to Song Jooha and tried to grab him, but there was less than 30 centimeters left to the ground. Were we going to lose a team member like this? I squeezed my eyes shut in frustration.

‘…Huh?’

Strangely, there wasn’t the heavy impact you’d feel from a fall. I slightly opened my eyes and saw Song Jooha, who had barely regained consciousness, holding us up with his psychokinesis.

But Song Jooha lost consciousness again, and the ability was cut off. Still, it was right before we hit the ground, so we landed safely without getting hurt.

“Whew, I thought I was going to die. Is everyone okay?”

“I twisted my wrist because of a bad landing posture, but I’m okay otherwise.”

“I’m fine too.”

After checking that my team members were safe, I carried Song Jooha on my back and moved. I checked the location with my Smartwatch, and we were in a forest 12km away from our destination.

Our destination was the monster’s habitat. But being attacked so far away from the habitat meant that it was a monster that traveled quite a distance.

And if we were spacing out in such a dense forest, we could encounter not only swarms of monster wasps but also other monsters living in the forest.

We diligently walked to find a place to take a breather, avoiding the monsters. After climbing a sloping road for a while, a sign appeared.

[Mountain Keeper’s Shelter 1.5km.]

‘Was this mountain like a National Park?’

I didn’t know because it had been about seven years since people stopped visiting. Seeing that the sign was intact enough to be read even in this mess meant it was made sturdy.

I encouraged my colleagues that we could rest soon and took the lead. The shelter we arrived at following the sign was like a small wooden cabin. It was a bit collapsed, with no doors and all the windows broken, but it seemed like we could rest there for a while since it had a roof.

I temporarily entrusted Song Jooha to Kim Junseo and checked inside for monsters. It looked fine on the outside, but there might be spore-type monsters or small, clustered monsters like ants.

I scanned the inside with the detector, and fortunately, no signals were detected. Feeling confident that it was safe, I went inside with my colleagues.

We roughly made a place to lie down, spread out sleeping bags, laid Song Jooha down, and started a fire. Looking at Song Jooha’s condition, it didn’t seem like he was hurt anywhere. It seemed like his brain was just overloaded from excessive ability output.

Just when I was about to feel relieved, Song Jooha grabbed his head and screamed.

The surroundings also started to vibrate.

“Aaaah!”

“No! Song Jooha, get a grip!”

If Song Jooha had an Ability Outburst here, we’d all be wiped out. Espers with increased brain pressure due to excessive ability output would unleash their abilities while having a seizure. And S-grade Espers who couldn’t control it were especially dangerous.

“Ugh… I’m sorry. Just bear with it.”

Thwack!

As a temporary measure, I hit Song Jooha hard on the temple, knocking him out. This was just delaying the time and wouldn’t help at all. Song Jooha would soon wake up again due to the headache.

“Seo Rea! Please Guiding him!”

“Ah, yes! I’ll start right away.”

Guide Seo Rea loosened her clothes and took off Song Jooha’s clothes. Then, she held Song Jooha’s hands and overlapped her body with his.

“Ah…”

Guiding is divided into three stages, and the higher the stage, the more effective it becomes. The first stage is Guiding by making contact between the Guide’s hand and the Esper’s body. If the Esper and Guide have the same grade and a 100 percent Matching Rate, Guiding is completed if they are in contact for 15 minutes.

But you can assume that there is no case where the Matching Rate is 100 percent, and since they usually bundle them together at around 50 percent, you can assume it takes about 30 minutes.

The second stage is contacting 50 percent of the body and ingesting saliva. There is a story that the effect of Guiding increases by more than 30% and that ability also increases, but I don’t know well because I haven’t done it much.

The third stage is Intercourse. It is said to immediately calm down a critical situation where brain pressure rises like now. The temporary increase in ability is also enormous, but I don’t really care because I plan not to do it forever in the future. The reason I manage ability output so strictly is to avoid the third stage of Guiding.

And in this emergency situation, Seo Rea is trying to do Guiding of the second stage or higher.

I made a makeshift screen with blankets and sleeping bags. I was trying to get out of the way as quickly as possible, but this bastard Kim Junseo was watching someone else’s Guiding.

I grabbed the hopeless guy by the collar and dragged him out of the shelter.

“Hey, you mannerless bastard. Why are you peeking at someone else’s Guiding? Like a pervert.”

“Peeking, what are you talking about! That Guide did it right in front of us! Isn’t it at the level of advertising to see?”

“This crazy bastard…… it was emergency Guiding. Even if you don’t have field experience, you were in the research team, right? It can’t be that you haven’t seen the third stage of Guiding before, so why are you so mannerless?!”

Medical team member Kim Junseo is a newbie who came to our team for field experience after working at the research center.

If he’s in the research team, he would have seen more diverse Guiding cases than the medical team, so why is he acting like this?

The medical team mainly encounters Guiding cases to save Espers, but the research team is the ones who try to tear everything apart, such as Guiding methods and effects. Anyway, he should know the Guiding manners.

“It’s the first time I’ve seen emergency Guiding done only between women. Have you seen it a lot, senior? Do you see it a lot if you stay here for a long time? It’s kind of awesome.”

‘…No, what is this trash bastard?’

Maybe it’s because there isn’t an EGA Association Guiding Code of Ethics yet, but there were a lot of crazy kids who were obsessed with Guiding.

I’m a little uneasy that I’m with a team member who doesn’t know human decency in this dangerous situation. But it’s probably because of this situation that that kind of guy is revealed.

‘First of all, know that your staff evaluation is ruined. I’m going to spread the word to our whole team. What do you think the same team members are?’

I took the crazy guy and stood guard outside the shelter to protect the team members from the crazy guy. When the day dawned, we joined the support team that found us with the Smartwatch GPS.

Thanks to the Guiding last night, Song Jooha and Seo Rea were safe, and we found the monsters’ nest near the mountain and burned it to the ground. After finally exterminating all the monster wasps, our team returned.

After returning, I separately reported about Kim Junseo to the team leader. The team leader was also quite displeased, so it seems like we won’t be seeing Kim Junseo in our team soon.

*

“We’ve been through a lot lately, so we should take a good rest today.”

I went down to Downtown, stuck a straw in a bottle of beer, and walked down the street while drinking.

This peaceful scent of civilization. Just looking at it is healing.

I always see only post-apocalyptic landscapes such as the EGA Association Center, the remains of broken buildings, and monsters, so it was so nice to walk around this bustling street.

While enjoying the leisure and walking leisurely, I met Kim Sanghyuk in front of a flower shop.

‘Why is he here?’

Kim Sanghyuk, who is tall and muscular, was not a human who was interested in flowers as he looks.

“Hey Kim Sanghyuk, why are you picking out flowers? Are you dating?”

“Dating, what are you talking about. I’m picking out a get-well gift?”

“Whose get-well visit is it? You didn’t hit someone while I wasn’t here, did you?”

“……I’m going to meet my Guide, Go Jeongho.”

Ah, come to think of it, Kim Sanghyuk had a designated Guide. I don’t use it, though.

‘I don’t like the designated Guide thing. It’s like a sex partner the EGA Association paired me with…….’

Seeing Kim Sanghyuk stammering, it seems like there was an unpleasant incident.

I asked Kim Sanghyuk if juice would be a good get-well gift, and Kim Sanghyuk thought it was good, so he said he should buy a box.

‘I should buy some for Cha Woojin too.’

Cha Woojin couldn’t eat liquid food well because his internal organs were porridge, but wouldn’t he be a little better now? If he can’t eat it, Cha Wooreen can eat it.

Kim Sanghyuk and I bought juice and parted ways. I should go see Cha Woojin since I bought a gift.

I was worried because it was a bit late, but fortunately, Cha Woojin was awake. I greeted Cha Woojin happily and entered the hospital room.

“Cha Wooreen was here too.”

Cha Wooreen was lying face down on the guardian’s bed, drawing in a sketchbook. She had scribbled something randomly with black lines, and when I asked what it was, she said it was her brother.

“I see. It’s Cha Woojin. Seeing that you even put a dot on the left side, it’s exactly the same. It’s hyper-realism.”

After appreciating Cha Wooreen’s painting, I took out the juice box I was holding, saying it was a gift.

“Ah, thank you. I’m sorry for keep receiving.”

“Hey, it’s nothing. I’m buying it because I like to. Can you eat it?”

“Maybe, a little…….”

I poured about a third of the tomato juice that I grabbed into a cup and handed it to Cha Woojin.

On a roll, I asked Cha Wooreen what she wanted to drink. Cha Wooreen said she liked strawberry juice.

“Sorry, I don’t have that. Would you like orange juice instead?”

Kind Cha Wooreen said that was okay too.

I chose orange juice from the box and handed it to Cha Wooreen. As Cha Wooreen reached out to grab the juice, Cha Woojin said in a weak voice.

“Cha Wooreen, you have to say, ‘Thank you.'”

“Thank you.”

Cha Wooreen thanked her according to Cha Woojin’s guidance and received the juice. She couldn’t open the lid and asked her brother to open it for her, so I opened it for her instead.

‘Your brother can’t open this either, Cha Wooreen. How can your brother, who can’t even hold a spoon, open a juice lid.’

Still, Cha Woojin’s complexion seems to have improved a bit in the few days I haven’t seen him.

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