Pretending to Be the Lover of an Esper C11

Chapter 11

Sensory sharing. To simultaneously experience the sensations of two people meant that every nerve in the body was just that much more keenly on edge.
That sharp sensitivity was directly linked to concentration, and concentration was in turn connected to the delicate control of one’s abilities.
It was like having to split the skin of a tomato without harming the flesh inside using a blade honed so finely it could cut with the slightest touch.
Such sensitivity was an extremely important matter for Espers.

“It ended clumsily since it was our first time, but I think it’ll feel more natural if we try it a few more times.”
“You seem confident, but what if this time was just luck? There’s no guarantee that something like this… sensory sharing… will manifest properly again next time.”

The switch could remain forever unfound. One might give up after exhausting the search, or decide it was never worth attempting in the first place.
“Well…”

Drawing his gaze away from the fallen robot, Lee Taeon looked around. I lifted my head to follow his line of sight. Only half the robots remained.
As per their programmed behavioral patterns, they no longer charged at us recklessly now that their numbers had dwindled. Instead, they circled us warily at a distance.

“I don’t see it that way,” Taeon said lightly. His half-lidded eyes were counting the remaining robots. No—his lips curled upward. He was smiling.

“……”

A strange feeling prickled at me. It was close to a premonition—a strong sense that it wouldn’t be long before he achieved whatever it was he sought, one way or another.

“By the way, Mr. Ji Yunseong, you seem familiar with this. Have you experienced it before?”
“Sensory sharing? If you mean that, then with Taeyoung-hyung for a moment…”¹

I had answered without thinking and immediately regretted it, shutting my mouth. Wasn’t that name still a little dangerous to mention?
Stealing a sidelong glance at Taeon with the mindset of having broken a taboo, I found him neither offended nor displeased. He merely let out a quiet “Hm.”
Whether that was a positive signal or not, I couldn’t tell. Perhaps he too felt it had been a mistake to ask.

If anyone felt awkward at Taeon’s dry reaction, it was me. Why had he brought this up so suddenly?
“More importantly, let’s hurry.”

Let’s get rid of the rest of them. I was about to change the topic when I felt something abruptly slip away.
It was light yet empty, as if something snugly fitted to me had vanished…

Ah. It’s over. A brief and complicated stirring lingered in my chest.

Instinctively, I glanced at the electric scoreboard. Remaining time: 21 minutes.
Our sensory sharing had lasted nine whole minutes. Nine minutes.

“It’s over. I didn’t expect us to connect to this extent… truly remarkable. The Chief Director’s² grin will be splitting wide open.”
“Yes. Truly… remarkable,” Taeon murmured languidly.

His faint sigh sounded damp somehow, and each flutter of his eyelids as they half-covered his lowered eyes set the long lashes at their ends to tremble gently.
I couldn’t bring myself to keep looking at him. I think I had been holding my breath without realizing it. Quickly, almost without thinking, I turned my head and asked:
“Are you disappointed?”
“…Yes. I am. More than when a ‘test’ fails.”
“…?”

What came back was not sarcasm but an utterly candid confession. I froze for what must have been just a moment. Judging from the distant robots’ unchanged proximity, it couldn’t have been long.

By sheer effort, I turned my gaze towards Taeon. But the man lost in a haze-like trance had vanished, replaced by—

“Mr. Ji Yunseong.”

—a young man whose faint smile looked positively mischievous.
Taeon’s voice calling my name was strikingly clear, as if the brief exchange we had just had was a dream.

It was strange. Undeniably strange. A certain unsettling sense spiraled inside me as if sending a signal.

Tap-tap—the light rhythm of Taeon’s fingertips against the floor preceded him stepping back a couple of paces.
“It seems a bit of a stretch to wrap up within the remaining one minute.”

I stepped back to make room as he shifted his stance like preparing to run. He looked me in the eye and said:
“I’ll finish in five minutes. Since today’s training yielded nothing greater than the sensory sharing, we can call it a day after this.”
“Yes—yes. That… sounds fine.”

His sudden grin made my body jolt slightly. I nearly lost myself for a moment.
Having no real grounds to refuse, I nodded as though entranced. Seeing that, Taeon sprang forward in a swift burst. He was almost like a launched projectile.
The gust of wind he left in his wake scattered my bangs coolly across my forehead. He was already far ahead.

His movements as he dispatched the remaining robots one by one were so fast and unhesitant they were nearly impossible to follow with the naked eye.
Thwack! Thump!

The sound of paint bullets hitting their targets, followed by robots freezing and collapsing to the ground, rang out in succession.
Had those bullets not been a gaudy color, and had the targets been living beasts covered in hide and fur rather than cold metal, the scene might rightly have been called slaughter.

Feeling awkward just standing there, I sat and watched Taeon’s flashy one-man show. I couldn’t tell if I felt futility, helplessness, or awe—or perhaps all three.
“…You really don’t need training, do you?”

The way he moved had nothing to do with following my positioning or abilities—he was simply reveling in his own freedom to go all out. Correcting myself, maybe that wasn’t just my imagination either.
In the meantime, Taeon deftly vaulted off one robot’s head to land in front of another and pelleted its sensor with paint bullets without restraint.

By habit, I checked the time again. 18 minutes now—just hitting 17. Of the five minutes he’d promised, only one was left.

Will he make it? Even as that thought crossed my mind, the blaring wail of the end-of-training siren split the air, signalling the last robot had been dealt with. He made it.

“Impressive,” I said, a plain and honest sentiment. I tapped my fingertips in a soundless clap before stopping, feeling sheepish.

Having finished the job, Taeon shook out his hands and feet lightly, walking back toward me. Everywhere along his path lay the collapsed figures of robots, like puppets with their strings cut.
“Exactly five minutes,” he said abruptly upon reaching my side. He jerked his chin proudly toward the scoreboard.

That look was—
“Ah, right.”
—outright smug. Despite my half-hearted reply, he seemed unbothered, not having expected any dramatic reaction.

Rather, the image that flashed in my mind was Taeon’s expression when sensory sharing had first begun—excited and flushed.
Now, looking again, he was combing back fallen strands of hair and breathing deeply.

With each long breath, his impressively broad chest swelled even larger before settling back down, and his smooth cheeks were flushed as rosy as those of a child thrilled after boisterous play…
“Hm?”
“Yes?”
“Nothing. It’s nothing.”

That prickling unease returned—exactly the feeling I’d had before he went off to finish the robots.

No way. …Could it be? Even so, I couldn’t shake away the suspicion. Surely not… but still.
“Mr. Ji Yunseong, I’ll be reviewing the records, so please go ahead and rest first. We’ll meet in the guiding room in thirty minutes after you’ve washed up.”
“Yes.”

Taeon’s cheeks retained their faint blush. While he checked the training logs, I slipped out quickly—almost running. From behind, I thought I heard something like a soft humming. This time, I hoped it was my imagination.

My head felt as if it had been struck out of nowhere; I tried to chase off the sensation, but as strong denial is kin to strong affirmation, the more I denied it, the sharper my suspicion became until it brushed close to certainty.
“No way. No way.”

I remembered hearing, once, that sometimes an Esper who had experienced sensory sharing would remain in a mild state of elation and languor afterward—almost dazed.
Someone had described the sensation as being tipsy, like after drinking. In more worldly terms, it was compared to being high.

My footsteps down the corridor quickened—then slowed.
“…Seriously?”

Logical deduction based on clear evidence led to a straightforward conclusion: as obvious as a truth could be.
Flushed cheeks. Uncharacteristically buoyant behavior. Unusually friendly demeanor. The repeated smiles.

Lee Taeon was unmistakably… intoxicated by sensory sharing—during it, and even after it ended.

It dawned on me that throughout the training we had been speaking warmly to each other—and that even while talking, neither of us had found it strange!
“Wow. Crazy.”

That fresh realization dragged another fact into the light: Taeon had never had a partner Guide before. Which meant this was his first time experiencing sensory sharing.
He was feeling for the first time every benefit, change, and sense of novelty that came from having a partner Guide.

Which in turn meant… that he was learning what it meant to have a “partner Guide” through me, Ji Yunseong.

¹ Hyung — A Korean term used by males to address an older male friend or brother, conveying familiarity and respect according to age and social closeness.
² Chief Director — The highest-ranking officer or official supervising their organization, likely in charge of mission oversight and personnel management.