TGIC Ch 53

Chapter 53

All the lights in the house were off, and it was dark. Holding my breath in the pitch-black darkness, I turned on the living room light, but Vasily wasn’t there.

Now that I thought about it, my bedroom door was slightly ajar. As I approached, a cold draft seeped through the crack.

He’s in there.

The moment I felt the chill, I instinctively understood. I tensed up and slowly pushed the door open.

In the dark room, Vasily stood with his eyes glowing blue.

“What are you doing he—”

Click.

As I fumbled along the wall to turn on the light, I froze the moment I saw the pill in Vasily’s hand.

“You’re here.”

“T-That’s…”

I stammered without meaning to. Why was he holding that pill?

Sweat trickled down my spine. I instinctively rubbed the back of my neck. Could he have figured out that it was an illegal suppressant chip?

No—that was impossible. This was an illegal suppressant chip. It hadn’t even become widely known yet, and Vasily wasn’t the type to care about things like that. So there was no way he would know.

Which is why I decided to stand my ground.

“What are you doing here?”

“I came to check something.”

“Still, showing up without a word like this is—!”

The urgent priority was to get that pill out of his hand. I tried to approach and snatch it away, but…

Vasily didn’t let go.

“Guide Kwon Gidam, you guided me yesterday, didn’t you?”

“Why would I do something like that?”

I scowled and feigned ignorance. Honestly, even to myself, the act seemed convincing. But Vasily only tilted his head slightly, the corners of his lips curving up ever so faintly.

“That’s strange… The Esper in the isolation room definitely said so…”

“……”

I was at a loss for words. It wasn’t even like he was trying to probe—he was already sure. He was just waiting for when I’d confess. Sighing deeply, I asked,

“…Did you threaten the Esper?”

“Threaten? Not at all. I just asked what happened, and they kindly explained everything in detail. Including exactly what you did, Guide Kwon Gidam.”

Damn it… So he knows I performed mucosal guiding. There’s no point denying it now. I’d been completely found out.

“If it made you uncomfortable, I apologize. But your condition wasn’t good, and under the circumstances, I didn’t have any other viable guiding methods, so I had no choice.”

“I’m not here to talk about the guiding.”

“Then why are you here?”

Vasily didn’t respond right away. Instead, he looked down at the pill in his hand and murmured, almost to himself.

“When I came to, something felt off… I thought maybe it was just my imagination, so I came to check.”

“Check what…”

At some point, the packaging had been removed, and a red pill sat in Vasily’s hand. Before I could even register what was happening, that red capsule disappeared between his lips.

Pop.

The sound of the soft capsule bursting in his mouth rang out clearly. Right in front of me, he slowly chewed it, the corners of his mouth curving in a smooth arc.

“Just as I thought.”

Vasily murmured softly, his expression filled with unmistakable ecstasy.

Alarms blared in my head. The moment I realized I was utterly screwed, I turned to run—but he caught my wrist.

Vasily asked,

“Do you know what’s in the cold medicine you’ve been taking?”

“B-Vasily…”

In a calm, unhurried voice, he added,

“Monster blood.”

“What the—!”

“Cold medicine with monster blood in it… Never heard of that before.”

“W-Wait just a second.”

“Don’t you think we need to talk?”

Vasily reached toward me. His fingers brushed the back of my neck—more precisely… the spot where the suppressant chip was embedded.

“I’ve always wondered. What exactly is this?”

“W-Wait. You said we’d talk—!”

His cool fingers slid along the line of my neck.

“Ah!”

“Let’s make a guess, shall we?”

The nape of my neck iced over. At the same time, a surge of guiding began with staggering force.

“Ah…!”

“Haa…”

I gasped and staggered. While I was struggling between pleasure and pain, Vasily looked immensely satisfied. He radiated a beast-like calm—pleasure bordering on bliss.

Vasily’s face slowly leaned closer. Before I could pull away, his lips met mine.

My exhaled breath mixed with his cool one. His lips grazed against mine, then a cold tongue parted my lips and slipped into my mouth. Like ice, his tongue swept across my palate and coiled around my own.

I tried to push him away, but he didn’t budge. The more this devouring kiss went on, the more energy and strength drained from my body along with the wave transmissions.

All I could do was stay upright, leaning against the arm wrapped around my waist. Vasily explored my mouth for a long while, hungrily seeking guidance.

Eventually, he pulled back just slightly and murmured,

“How long have you been carrying this cute little thing inside you?”

“Ah… Haa…”

“Hmm? Answer me. Or is the stimulation too much?”

“L-Let me go…”

“So even back when we first met, you already had it implanted…”

He whispered, rubbing the protruding area where the chip sat. Every time he moved his lips, they brushed against mine, soft and deliberate.

“With this, our compatibility should’ve been obvious… Did you really have it even before awakening?”

I drew a sharp breath. His following words were so accurate that I couldn’t deny them right away.

“You knew you were going to awaken? Even if that were true, there’s no reason to implant this. Unless… you already knew who you’d be compatible with…”

“…!”

“Haha, seriously? But as far as I know, there’s no way to test compatibility before awakening.”

Vasily continued slowly.

“Could it be that you did all this just to avoid matching with someone else…?”

Then, in a slightly lowered voice, he muttered quietly,

“If that someone was me… I think I’d be really hurt…”

The moment those words left his mouth, Vasily’s gaze turned frigid. It wasn’t hard to realize that he had already concluded it was about him.

He looked… incredibly upset. The intensity in his eyes pierced straight through me, leaving me speechless.

A long silence followed. Vasily continued to stare down at me with those cold eyes before finally speaking again.

“Guide Kwon Gidam, do you know what it’s like for Espers without a guide to live every day in excruciating pain?”

“Let… go of me…”

“Have you ever felt like you were going to melt to death?”

“Ugh!”

The arm he held onto felt like it would shatter. No matter how much I writhed in pain, Vasily paid no attention and simply continued speaking.

“I feel like that every single day. In sunlight, it feels like my body is burning… And when night falls, it’s so cold I can’t bear it.”

He kept going. With each word, his cold breath brushed against me. His silver-gray eyes glinted like shards of ice as they bore into me.

“So I imagine freezing everything. The air, objects, people around me… the entire Earth blanketed in ice… and finally myself, frozen solid among it all.”

I got chills. I could tell he wasn’t just speaking lightly.

The fear that my arm might actually freeze crept up from where he held me. I struggled to pull free, but he didn’t budge an inch.

“But right now, I don’t feel that way at all. Isn’t it strange? I’m just receiving guidance, that’s all…”

Vasily whispered sweetly in my ear, as if to keep me from being scared.

“If only we had met just a little earlier… it really would’ve been nice…”

Thud.

The grip on my arm slowly weakened, and then Vasily collapsed.

“…?”

Did he seriously just fall asleep?

Startled, I looked down at him lying quietly on the floor with his eyes closed. Suspicious, I nudged him with my foot, but his eyes showed no signs of opening.

Maybe the intense guiding had worn him out. Even with just 4% compatibility, he often fell asleep while receiving guidance, so with 91% now, it must’ve been unbearable. Especially considering how bad his condition had been just yesterday—it was no surprise.

Now was my chance. I used the friction from my palm to thaw the frozen spot on my neck. Once it warmed, that familiar ache returned, and I could no longer guide through contact with Vasily.

‘So the device only shuts down while frozen.’

That was a relief. As long as it wasn’t completely broken, my rank and compatibility would remain hidden.

But then again, broken or not, what did it matter? He’d already found everything out.

Damn it, damn it, damn it! Swearing internally, I hastily gathered my things and ran out the door.

Time to flee the country.

That was the conclusion I reached as I fled into the night streets.