HG | Chapter 35

For someone who just obliterated a cluster of monsters, his skin was excessively smooth. Even if he didn’t sweat, if there was at least a hint of disrupted breathing, it would make sense. But contrary to his words, he looked too fine, which left Hakyung feeling a bit conflicted.

It’s not that he wanted his father to be exhausted or hurt….

‘Did he even exert himself?’

Such doubts arose without reason.

“Why are you looking at me like that, child?”

“Huh? Oh, it’s nothing….”

Cheonghyeon confirmed his son’s hesitant expression and gave a sly smile. Hakyung instinctively took a step back. He was definitely smiling, but there was a strangely pouty feeling to it.

“Aren’t you going to give me a hug? Didn’t you say you wanted to guide?”

“Ah!”

A strong hand grabbed Hakyung, who had taken a step back, and pulled him in. It was a force that instantly erased the subtle distance between them.

Hakyung found himself in Cheonghyeon’s embrace. Reflexively, his palm rested on the man’s chest. Due to the nature of the techwear material, the fabric was thick, but the solid muscles beneath were too prominent to be completely concealed by the thick fabric.

The man feigned surprise and spoke.

“I asked for a hug, not for you to touch my chest.”

“T-This is, well…!”

It was as if he was implying that Hakyung had initiated the inappropriate touch.

The shameless behavior left Hakyung momentarily speechless, his mind going blank. It was as if he had been waiting for this exact moment to push him into a corner.

This was just an accident, he was about to protest belatedly when Cheonghyeon spoke first.

“Oh… I see. Now I understand. It’s more comfortable for you to guide while touching my chest, huh? That makes sense. You’re at the age where you seek Dad’s chest…. I understand.”

You’re normal. It’s my fault for realizing it late.

He calmly murmured as if soothing a child on the verge of excitement. Hakyung rubbed his forehead. Once again, he felt dizzy.

‘Whatever I say here will only get me more entangled.’

I do have some learning ability. It’s impossible to win against Dad with words. It’s as difficult as overcoming the gap between S-rank and F-rank.

“…I’ll guide… now.”

Instead of engaging in a never-ending argument, he decided to focus on his task.

The purpose of visiting Haegakryeong was to practice guiding.

Though his words were harsh, it was a perfectly standard process for an esper to come to their partner for guiding after expending energy.

Hakyung embraced his father, fearing he might tease him again. He heard a chuckle above his head but chose to ignore it.

Cheonghyeon didn’t bother to point out that his son’s guiding posture was unnecessarily intimate.

After all, he had taught him that way.

A child who learned to guide by embracing his father. A son who became accustomed to guiding through physical contact with his father.

My son.

Cheonghyeon smirked inwardly. Once, he had focused solely on raising his child as a father, but that was already in the past. He felt no pangs of conscience about the outcome he had created.

‘If you dragged a father who lived quietly between your legs, you should take responsibility.’

Not only did he feel no guilt, but he also thought it was entirely natural.

Meanwhile, Hakyung drew back the wavelength he had emitted outside. The faint energy gathered into one and rushed towards the connected bodies. Cheonghyeon’s esper energy hadn’t yet been fully absorbed into his body. Thanks to that, he easily found his partner’s wavelength and intertwined it.

“Ugh….”

I-It tickles.

Suddenly, his fingertips, toes, and inside his stomach tingled. The energies had successfully connected.

This part was easy. The problem was controlling the intensity. The guiding Hakyung had experienced always occurred naturally while sharing bodies with Cheonghyeon, whose energy was always full, so he had no sense of how it felt or how much force to exert when his body was empty of energy.

Guiding without any finesse, pouring out all his strength. That was Hakyung’s current state. That’s why it felt like a prelude to sex, with pleasure bursting forth.

“Hah, hngh….”

“My child is guiding well….”

Cheonghyeon whispered with a mix of laughter, firmly embracing his son’s nape and shoulders. He bent down, kissing from his temple to his cheek, then below his ear, and buried his nose in his nape, inhaling his son’s scent deeply.

“Hoo….”

The sweet scent became much stronger when guiding. There was no sensation of chewing or swallowing, so the more he inhaled the scent, the more he craved it.

For a high-level esper to become so feverish, Hakyung’s state was beyond words.

“Mmm, mm, hngh….”

With his cheeks flushed red, he buried his face deeply into the broad chest, groaning.

Whether the other’s clothes got wrinkled or not, Hakyung clung tightly to Cheonghyeon’s shoulder blades, trying to hold himself up by force. Unfortunately, it didn’t go as he intended.

Despite his desperate efforts, his slender body trembled all the way to his inner thighs, as if mocking its owner.

“Hngh…!”

Hakyung genuinely found his appearance unsightly.

Did he understand his burning frustration? Suddenly, a familiar status window covered his vision.

※Status Abnormality※

An abnormal phenomenon is detected around the caster, activating the <Regeneration: Recovery> skill. To which target would you like to apply the skill?

▶Im Cheonghyeon

It was the phrase that appeared when he formed a guiding pair with Jang Yuseong.

His eyes widened. It was a skill that had caused an effect even when guiding with ‘that’ Jang Yuseong. A B-rank, with not a single matching wavelength.

‘Im Cheonghyeon!’

He tried calling out internally, wondering if the skill would activate.

Removing all status abnormalities from the target, ‘Im Cheonghyeon,’ for 5 seconds.

‘I-It works…!’

The system understood the feelings of an F-rank. He was in a position where even a slight movement of his lips could reveal what he was muttering. His father knew about the skill, so there was no need to hide it, but instinct made a momentary decision.

Whoosh-!

“Ugh….”

However, the way the skill unfolded was different from last time. A dazzling light covered his vision in an instant, which hadn’t happened before.

The light spread from the caster, Hakyung, and the target, Cheonghyeon, to a radius of several dozen meters. How did he know…?

“……!”

Fresh green sprouts. Tender leaves that seemed like they would form a lush meadow if they grew more, colored the earth within several dozen meters.

It wasn’t the first time Hakyung had turned the contaminated land green. On the day he first awakened the skill, a similar phenomenon had been observed. However, at that time, he was so focused on the vision of his parents that appeared with the skill that he didn’t pay attention to the land’s recovery. The range of recovery had been small back then.

Was it because he was removing Cheonghyeon’s status abnormality now? Or was it because the location was ‘Haegakryeong’? He didn’t know the exact reason, but it was clear that a peculiar result had been produced.

While Hakyung stood there with his mouth agape, Cheonghyeon narrowed his eyes and gazed into the distance.

‘The light… spreads gradually.’

Even as Hakyung squinted from the dazzling light, he observed the process of the skill unfolding clearly.

‘The energy that was slightly depleted from dealing with the monsters has been replenished. While the energy is being restored, the sphere of light expands its range, changing the land…. The time is roughly… 4, 5 seconds?’

Even with just a brief exploration, his guess was almost spot-on. He hadn’t directly read Hakyung’s skill window, so it needed verification, but Cheonghyeon had a feeling his guess wasn’t far off.

Hakyung had briefly mentioned the skill. He remembered him saying it was a ‘regeneration, recovery’ skill. He recalled him saying it was a skill that removed status abnormalities in a short time.

He hadn’t asked in detail then because Hakyung seemed confused.

‘…Interesting.’

Truly, it’s fascinating.

He unconsciously licked his lips and carefully detached Hakyung. It wasn’t just because Hakyung was his beloved son and partner, but because the existence of ‘Im Hakyung the guide’ felt special.

“You picked a good day.”

“Huh, huh…?”

The dazed face looked up at Cheonghyeon blankly. Cheonghyeon, like an excited child, bared his canines while watching the distinct boundary between the new land and the contaminated land.

“It’s your dissection day, child.”

***

※Status Abnormality※

An abnormal phenomenon is detected around the caster, activating the <Regeneration: Recovery> skill….

“I-Im Cheonghyeon…!”

Whoosh!

Before the status window’s message could fully appear, calling out the man’s name again, white light poured out, dominating the blackened ground.

And soon, the ground became moist and tender sprouts emerged. It was the result of Hakyung calling out ‘Im Cheonghyeon’ countless times.

“That’s impressive. Child, look over there. The land you’ve already recovered has expanded that much.”

Cheonghyeon looked back and expressed pure admiration. The monster colony, once filled with large flower clusters, was now neatly cleared.

On the other hand, Hakyung’s eyes were filled with a mix of complex emotions.

‘Ah, why does Dad have to say it like that…!’

Embarrassment and injustice surged together.

‘Why couldn’t he just say, “I want to test your skill” honestly? Cheonghyeon’s tone was so meaningful that it scared Hakyung.

Dissection. The dissection he knew meant cutting open flesh and dissecting the body…!

After inadvertently recovering the land, Hakyung recited all the phrases from his skill window as Cheonghyeon instructed. Cheonghyeon, who had remained silent until the end, said this as soon as he heard the skill window explanation.

‘From now on, when Dad comes back after dealing with monsters, use the ‘Regeneration Recovery’ skill immediately. Can you do that?’

Though bewildered, it wasn’t a difficult task, so he readily agreed. Meanwhile, he secretly hoped his father would reveal what picture he had in mind.

His expectations were lightly missed. Cheonghyeon was busy praising him without a word about his purpose. Whether it was fortunate or unfortunate, as the same pattern repeated, Hakyung roughly grasped what he was trying to find out.

‘Is he measuring the range and limit of the spreading light…?’

The phenomenon of the land recovering appeared simultaneously when guiding to remove Cheonghyeon’s ‘status abnormality.’ Strangely, the more energy he filled, the more the light spread around. The duration of 5 seconds remained unchanged, but the range of recovery per second widened.

Until now, within 5 seconds, Cheonghyeon’s energy was fully replenished, and the range of land recovery was similar. If he used the skill for the entire 5 seconds, the range of the circle became so large that it was difficult to grasp with the naked eye. Cheonghyeon roughly guessed that the diameter was around 100 meters.

“Hmm…. I’ve killed quite a lot, but it’s still ambiguous.”

Cheonghyeon murmured to himself, rubbing his chin. Should he visit the giant monster’s lair?

The giant monsters were something Hakyung feared, so he had deliberately set the route to avoid their habitat by taking a detour. Anyway, the donut-shaped structure meant that if they continued in one direction, they would eventually reach the monster’s lair, so this method was the best.

As Cheonghyeon said, they had moved to a point far from the entrance. It wasn’t just the flower cluster colony. That was merely the beginning.

Flower monsters, ‘Gaion’ resembling pterosaurs, the giant grizzly monster ‘Archiril,’ the venomous wasp ‘Regina’… From named monsters known to awakeners to other small monster groups, everything that caught Cheonghyeon’s eye was crushed into a handful of powder. There were no empty sacks left at Cheonghyeon’s side now, and all of this was solely to test Hakyung’s skill.

‘Wow….’

Hakyung stuck out his tongue inside the mask. He glanced sideways at his father, who seemed tireless, with a stunned look. While the man dealt with monsters, he either stood still, hid, or sat down, and he felt like he was the one who had become more haggard.

“It seems like we’ve cleared this area, so let’s move to the next zone.”

“……Okay.”

I want to go home.

‘I’m hungry, too….’

“Are you tired?”

“…A little.”

Hakyung answered without running away. Just not shouting ‘Yes, a lot!’ was a way to save face.

“A little? Do you want me to carry you?”

“Um……”

Nod.

‘Let’s just get carried while moving.’

Knowing his father’s nature, he wouldn’t finish the dungeon conquest until everything was settled. The fact that he was saying this meant the investigation wasn’t over yet.

From the moment he realized that, Hakyung decided to wait until Cheonghyeon was satisfied.

When Cheonghyeon started the monster subjugation, he first found a place to lean on and plopped down. Of course, at first, he stood and endured with sheer willpower, but as time went on, his bones screamed. Stubbornly holding out would only harm his own body.

Strictly speaking, all Hakyung had to do was mutter ‘Im Cheonghyeon.’

‘Ah, being asked to call out his name is too burdensome….’

Once it was discovered that he had to call out the name to execute the skill, it came to this.

“Up you go.”

Unaware of his inner thoughts, Cheonghyeon easily lifted Hakyung onto his back. Hakyung relaxed his body and leaned against his father’s back. Any sense of guilt had long since vanished.

“Dad… when are we going home?”

It was the first time during this dungeon conquest that Hakyung openly hinted at wanting to go home.

“When the guiding practice is over?”

“I-I think it’s over….”

“Do you think so?”

When you ask like that….

Hakyung soon whimpered like a restless puppy.

Unable to do this or that.

‘I really think it’s over…!’

“Snicker.”

Cheonghyeon secretly chuckled. The son, who couldn’t say anything and just groaned, was as transparent as the palm of his hand.

Well, he must be tired by now.

Where would an F-rank guide without a partner have had the chance to use skills repeatedly? Even having a skill as an F-rank was already beyond common sense.

What Cheonghyeon was investigating was the sense of how much energy was replenished within a specific time frame.

Hakyung said the skill’s duration was ‘5 seconds.’ So how much energy should be consumed for all the empty energy to be filled within those 5 seconds, or not? Cheonghyeon wanted to know that benchmark ‘precisely.’ So he was going through the process of checking after consuming energy to the arbitrary benchmark he set.

Also, to gauge Hakyung’s limits.

Hakyung might stick out his tongue at Cheonghyeon for not getting tired, but Cheonghyeon was the one who was genuinely surprised.

‘When will he get tired?’

Here, getting tired meant energy depletion. Just as an esper’s energy depletes when they overuse skills, a guide also needed time to recover if they guided too much.

However, Hakyung only complained of physical fatigue, while the skill was still being used abundantly. Even though he was clumsy at controlling the intensity, the wavelength or energy he emitted was consistently set to ‘strong.’

Monster subjugation and regeneration skill usage. The two of them repeated only that pattern for a long time. If Cheonghyeon mentioned ‘we’ve done quite a lot,’ it meant that most would have been exhausted by then.

Unexpectedly, Hakyung was holding on firmly. It wasn’t because he was his son that he was looking favorably, but he had never heard of an F-rank who could use skills dozens of times and still be lively. At that level, he was at least A-rank or higher.

The expected response when he asked ‘Are you tired?’ should have been a deathly pale face and limbs trembling with convulsions.

“…It’s really interesting.”

Cheonghyeon was genuinely amused. He licked his lower lip and joyfully pondered how to handle this young one.

Of course, my partner couldn’t be an ordinary human.

When was the last time he experienced such joy that made him hum a tune? Or has it been like this recently?

While Cheonghyeon was chuckling, Hakyung, in a different sense, lost his reason. Without realizing it, he rummaged through the front of his vest and took something out.

Crunch.

The sound of biting into a cookie echoed particularly loudly. Cheonghyeon realized the source of the sound and abruptly stopped in his tracks. No, what is this….

“……”

“……Are you hungry?”

“……Y-Yes….”

Cheonghyeon rarely clutched his throbbing head internally and changed his mind.

‘It’s not A-rank.’

Judging by this crazy tendency….

‘It might be S-rank.’