OMH Chapter 18

Oh My Hero – Episode 18

18. Esper and Guide (9)

I received treatment for a minor frostbite and briefly met Kim Sanghyuk while waiting for the Guide to arrive.

I wanted to check if they’d caught the culprit after waiting this long.

Kim Sanghyuk, who entered my waiting room, said,

“First, promise me you won’t get angry before you hear this, and that you’ll prioritize the competition. Then I’ll tell you.”

“……”

Right now, I feel like getting angry because of Kim Sanghyuk.

But I’m a civilized person, so I endured it.

“Okay. I won’t get angry, so tell me.”

After hearing my answer, Kim Sanghyuk got close to me.

He whispered softly, as if telling a very important secret.

“…The culprit… is Oh Sein. The Nature-type in your team.”

“Isn’t that the bastard who blew up my dwarf tunnel before?”

A leaky bucket leaks everywhere, causing accidents wherever he goes.

“We should use this opportunity to make him live a life rotting away in the research center as a dangerous person. Shouldn’t we, Kim Sanghyuk? Let’s send Oh Sein to the research center right now!”

Kim Sanghyuk, after hearing my ambition, told me to calm down and sent me back to the waiting room.

‘I wasn’t even excited, what does he mean calm down?’

As I arrived at the waiting room, almost pushed in, a Guide with a tired face was waiting for me.

I received Guiding and prepared for the next match.

My opponent this time is Jang Jaewon, a Special-type.

This person controls gravity.

His specialty is crushing monsters with excessive gravity.

But with Guiding in tight fiscal shape like now, he’ll probably use zero gravity a lot, which puts less strain on the ability.

Beep-

As expected, as soon as it started, he made the place where I was standing weightless before I could even take a step.

I floated up because of Jang Jaewon’s ability.

I stretched out my feet to try to step on the ground to get even a little bit of gravitational pull, but I couldn’t reach it.

‘Since I can’t touch the ground, I can’t approach him and just keep floating around.’

But Jang Jaewon doesn’t have any other abilities besides controlling gravity, so he has no way to strike from the zero-gravity coordinate.

So, if he just floats me like this, he won’t get a very good evaluation from the researchers.

In fact, the purpose of the Martial Arts Tournament is to allow researchers to observe Espers using their abilities to subdue other Espers.

It’s easy to spread strange rumors if you call a bunch of combat Espers to the research center and tell them to fight for observation, so it just takes the form of a tournament.

So, we have to let the researchers see us fighting with our abilities as much as possible.

The researchers really hate it if we don’t subdue our opponent like this and just waste time.

Of course, a good evaluation goes out the window.

The audience also doesn’t like it when you make it impossible for yourself to attack in order to block the opponent’s attacks, like now.

Jang Jaewon will definitely release the zero gravity in order to attack.

‘I just need to look for an opportunity then.’

Jang Jaewon didn’t seem to have thought about how to attack after floating me, as he just stood still in one place and maintained the zero-gravity state.

Thanks to that, I enjoyed plenty of weightlessness.

Since I wasn’t affected by gravity, I couldn’t maintain my balance and my body spun around like laundry in a washing machine.

When my head got close to the ground, Jang Jaewon released the zero gravity.

And then repeated lifting me up and releasing me.

Thump. Thump. Thump.

Thanks to that, I’m diligently slamming my head on the floor.

It’s not like my head is a pestle.

‘It’s not very painful because the height isn’t that high, but it’s really distracting.’

However, unless the impact is enough to make me lose consciousness, I can find an opening.

‘If I can just seize a fleeting moment, I can turn the tables.’

While Jang Jaewon was slamming my head on the floor with his ability, I slowly bent my body and lowered my feet to the floor.

And finally, my soles were in a position to touch the ground.

I took advantage of the gap where the zero gravity was released, stepped on the ground, and escaped the zero-gravity zone.

But Jang Jaewon quickly modified the coordinates to the location I moved to and floated me up. And then released his ability again.

“Ah, really… annoying.”

Jang Jaewon’s coordinate calculation is faster than I thought.

However, he doesn’t have any application skills, so it seemed like he was going to attack me in the same way.

‘Am I stupid enough to fall for that again?’

I used the same method as before to find a gap, stepped on the ground, and jumped up.

This time, I jumped high and far enough as I wanted.

‘Good, this distance and height are enough.’

Jang Jaewon, who doesn’t have much combat sense, will probably use the same method again.

Even if he calculates the coordinates and uses zero gravity, he’ll use excessive gravity again, so I need to unleash enough power in the gap where he’s using excessive gravity to damage Jang Jaewon as well.

I used the force of falling down and my ability to smash the floor with all my might.

Bang!

It wasn’t as much as Ham Soyoung, but it was enough to make the people standing in the stadium stagger from the shock.

Jang Jaewon, who originally lacked combat sense, couldn’t maintain his ability after experiencing the shock of the ground rumbling.

With his ability released, I approached Jang Jaewon, who was still wandering around the stadium, unable to find the coordinates to float me again, and struck the back of his head.

Thwack!

This time, of course, the victory returned to me.

‘Only one match left. Once I finish this, I can go and deal with that bastard.’

The announcer’s voice, which was enlivening the atmosphere, echoed throughout the stadium, and the shouts of people excited about the final betting game echoed.

But I didn’t care about any of that.

“Oh Sein, just you wait. I’ll finish this quickly and go finish you off.”

I hardened my fighting spirit towards Oh Sein amidst the loud cheers.

*

The opponent in the final match is Song Jooha, as expected.

Song Jooha’s ability, psychokinesis, is definitely a cheat-like ability.

If he just concentrates, objects fly around as he wants and magnetic fields just appear.

But in the Martial Arts Tournament, psychokinesis’s magnetic field barrier is prohibited.

So, an unskilled psychokinetic can suddenly get taken out.

However, Song Jooha is a psychokinetic with some experience, and since we’re on the same team, I’ve worked with him a lot, so he knows my fighting style very well.

Conversely, that means I also know Song Jooha’s fighting style very well.

Jooha prefers to subdue his opponents by using the surrounding objects rather than directly subduing them with psychokinesis.

He says that this wastes less ability. So, as soon as the match started, Song Jooha smashed the floor from the bottom up with his ability.

Kugugung!!

The Association’s equipment is not infinitely generated like a cornucopia. Once it’s broken, Espers with recovery abilities repair it again together with architectural experts.

If it’s broken, it means the Association’s money is reduced.

So, the Association charged the Espers for the recovery costs in order to reduce the number of Espers who recklessly destroy equipment.

Of course, since everyone is broke because the world has ended, they end up working without pay up to the amount determined by the Association.

If you work without pay, everyone has to eat only the free menu that the Association’s cafeteria gives out every day and can’t enjoy leisure.

Everyone avoids it because they live like imprisoned criminals, but S-grades are different.

They originally live almost confined to the research center, so they’re not afraid of the prisoner life that others avoid.

Maybe that’s why the S-grades didn’t hesitate to destroy equipment.

Like now.

Jooha divided the stadium floor into large boulders and then tried to crush me with those boulders.

‘You can tell he’s an S-grade by the scale of it all.’

I quickly moved out of the way and ran away as fast as I could.

Song Jooha’s plan is definitely to make me waste my physical Enhancement-Type ability as much as possible to wear me out.

That’s because Song Jooha is an S-grade and I’m a B-grade, so he knows that my maximum output and sustained output are disadvantageous.

But if I just keep running for only 3 minutes, I’ll be at a disadvantage.

I jumped onto the boulder that Jooha threw and climbed up while grabbing it.

Jooha threw another boulder at me, but I moved to a new boulder and jumped towards Jooha from there.

‘Jooha’s weakness is that he doesn’t move away from the position he’s standing in.’

Jooha threw a boulder at me as I jumped, but I used my physical Enhancement-Type ability to break it, softening the impact, and reached Jooha as is.

And Jooha, who was within my range, followed the same steps as the other participants I had met.

Beep!

The whistle signaling the end of the match rang.

“This Martial Arts Tournament too!! The winner is Gang Hana Esper!”

“Waaaaaaa!!”

Cheers erupted from all directions along with the commentator’s cheerful voice.

The Martial Arts Tournament is finally over.

At the closing ceremony, I showed my face on the stage without any victory speech and came down.

After all, the Martial Arts Tournament doesn’t have much prize money, and everyone just participates to get a good staff evaluation, so no one cared.

I have something more important than things like the closing ceremony.

That is, going to the Central Center to check what kind of punishment Oh Sein receives.

*

Seunghwan, who was working even though it was the final match of the tournament, was at the Central Center.

I immediately asked Seunghwan about Oh Sein.

“The Guide that Oh Sein attacked was the one you like? She hasn’t even been officially listed in the Guide introductions yet, and most people don’t know her well. Oh Sein must be very sensitive. There are some ability users who are sensitive to wavelengths, right? The problem is that those guys always cause accidents.”

“More than that, what kind of punishment does Oh Sein receive? If it’s the death penalty, let me carry it out.”

“After the Gate Break, we’re saving every bit of power, what’s with the death penalty? That guy was lucky to have awakened in this era. If it was 7 years ago, he would have been dragged out and shot right away, but he awakened after the Gate Break, so he’s lucky.”

“Then what kind of sentence does that guy get? Originally, all Espers were killed if they committed a crime, but the world has become really nice.”

“I heard it’s temporary confinement. And he got kicked off your team.”

“……What? Is that all?”

“That’s all I heard. They said they won’t let him out of the research center as much as possible.”

“Guides all live in the research center when they don’t have missions, so what’s the point?”

“If he’s in the research center, he’ll be thoroughly managed.”

“No, what are you even saying…!”

“Anyway. I’m sorry about what happened to the person you like, but instead of venting your anger here, wouldn’t it be better to go to that person and properly comfort them? Wouldn’t that be better for them?”

“This, crazy.”

He’s not even being sent to a research team, he’s just being confined in the research center.

The more I thought about it, the angrier I got, but I couldn’t vent my anger here any longer. It’s not Seunghwan’s fault either.

I was angry that nothing happened to Oh Sein, but I decided to go see Cha Woojin first.