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'WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON?!'
Silence crushed the lobby.
Taehyun slowly turned toward me. His voice dangerously calm.
"...Higher than A-Class?"
My stomach dropped.
'G.N.A.S?'
The useless piece of digital garbage was silent.
'Hello?!, answer me!'
Nothing.
No cheerful ding. No snarky annoying voice.
'Shit'
Kim Yuri's question cut through the air like a blade. The collective gasps and murmurs from the guides in the lobby died down instantly.
The air became so thick you could hear a pin drop on the marble floor.
Yuri's gaze snapped away from her tablet, sweeping across the crowded lobby.
The sweet, playful tone completely vanished from her face, replaced by the terrifying aura of a woman who ran the nation's most powerful association.
"Anyone who repeats a single syllable of what was just spoken in this room will have their guiding license permanently incinerated,"
Yuri said, her voice dropping to a low, lethal whisper that echoed off the glass walls. "You will be charged under the National Security Act, your registry privileges revoked, your assets frozen pending investigation, and you will spend the remainder of your sentences inside a mana-dampening detention facility."
"Do I make myself clear?"
A dozen high-ranking guides simultaneously paled, frantically nodding as they scrambled backward.
"Clear the lobby," Yuri commanded sharply into her earpiece. She didn't wait for a response before turning on her heel.
"Esper Lee Taehyun, Guide Jung Hanseong. Follow me. Now."
We rode the private elevator down to the lowest floor of Headquarters. In the reflection of the polished steel walls, I looked utterly ridiculous.
I was standing next to Lee Taehyun, a towering, twenty-eight-year-old wall of muscle, radiating a dark, suffocating S-class aura while wearing oversized silk black pyjamas.
Taehyun didn't say a word. His mismatched blue-and-violet eyes were narrowed into sharp slits, fixed entirely on the side of my face. He was calculating. He knew I was hiding something.
I kept frantically tapping the back of my mind.
'G.N.A.S., seriously, this isn't funny. Wake up!'
Still, the system remained dead silent.
The elevator doors opened, revealing the Evaluation Vault. The walls were lined with reinforced, blast-proof titanium plating.
In the very center of the room sat a pedestal holding a massive, black crystalline orb. An energy testing orb, reinforced with heavy runes to withstand the volatile output of high-ranking awakeners.
Yuri walked behind a thick pane of reinforced safety glass and flipped a switch. Her voice crackled through the intercom.
"Place your hand on the core, Hanseong-ssi. Let's see exactly what you are."
I swallowed hard, my palms sweating. I glanced back at Taehyun, who was leaning against the titanium wall, arms crossed over his massive chest. He looked like an apex predator waiting for his prey to trip.
I had no choice. I stepped forward, took a deep breath, and pressed my palm flat against the cold black crystal.
For a second, nothing happened.
Then the orb erupted with a gentle blue glow of an A-class guide.
Then a blinding wave of pure, cosmic-white energy exploded from my chest, flooding the entire vault. The light was so bright it cast violent shadows against the titanium walls. It felt entirely serene, yet utterly terrifying in its magnitude.
CRACK.
A sharp, distinct fracture split down the center of the multi-million dollar crystalline orb.
SHATTER!!!
The orb completely disintegrated, exploding into a thousand glittering pieces of stardust that rained down onto the pristine floor.
Absolute, deafening silence followed.
Behind the safety glass,
I stared at the destruction, my brain struggling to catch up.
'…I did that?'
Yuri's tablet slipped from her hand, clattering against the desk. Her glasses were literally crooked on her face.
Taehyun slowly stood up straight, his jaw tightening as the shadows around his feet flared in sheer, unadulterated shock.
"...Impossible..."
Yuri didn't even look at me. Her fingers were shaking violently as she pulled out an encrypted satellite phone, bypassing the entire government hierarchy to dial a direct line.
"Mr. President," Yuri said urgently. "We have an S-Class Guide."
"The first in existence"
First
The word echoed in my head like a death sentence.
There had never been an S-Class Guide before. Ever. In the original novel, the highest rank was A-Class, and even they were treated like strategic weapons.
I could already see my future collapsing in real time.
Government surveillance. Containment protocols. Endless evaluations.
Every country in the world would want ownership of the first S-Class Guide.
A stunned silence followed.
"…I just landed in Geneva."
"Cancel the summit. We need you back in Seoul. Now."
Another pause. Then a deep sigh.
"Prepare a full briefing by the time I land. And Director… keep this under the highest level of confidentiality."
"Yes, Mr. President."
"Lock the room from the outside. Nobody enters or leaves until I return," Yuri barked over the comms.
She stepped out of the observation booth, aggressively gesturing for Taehyun to follow her into the corridor to discuss containment protocols.
Taehyun cast one last, lingering, intense look at me through the glass before the heavy titanium security doors slammed shut, locking me inside the vault completely alone.
The moment the doors sealed, I collapsed onto the testing bench, burying my face in my hands, the silk of my stupid pajamas feeling ridiculous against my burning cheeks.
I was supposed to be a weak, pathetic guide.
Acannon fodder. A side character who dies in chapter 12.
So why the hell was I suddenly an S-Class guide?
The President of the country was literally turning his jet around because of me.
A guy in pyjamas who died from reading a cringey manhwa at 3 a.m.
A small hysterical laugh escaped my lips.
"Fuck..."
[Host]
A sleek, premium, pitch-black holographic screen materialized directly in front of my face. The chaotic layout was wiped clean. It radiated a cold, absolute authority.
[G.N.A.S 2.0 INITIALIZED.]
[I hope host didn't miss me?]
I stared at the dark interface. My panic instantly flipped into pure fury.
'Why the hell didn't you tell me I was an S-Class guide?!'
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