An F-Rank Veterinarian Physically Heals an S-Rank Magical Beast - Chapter 47
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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 47
[11th Floor: Chaotic Martial Realm – Kairos Branch]
Thirty leagues north of the Murim Alliance Headquarters, an alien steel fortress loomed defiantly amidst a forest of blackened death. Towering smokestacks rose above traditional tiled roofs, belching noxious fumes, while high-voltage barbed wire replaced conventional walls, crackling with lethal current.
It was the headquarters of the Evil Sect and the laboratory of the mad Doctor Kairos.
“Ugh… the building’s aesthetic is abysmal. From a feng shui perspective, it’s absolutely dreadful.”
Kang Jin-hyuk stood before the fortress’s main gate and clicked his tongue. Above the entrance, a neon sign reading “KAIROS BIOTECH – Murim Branch” flickered and crackled.
“Director, I attempted to hack it, but the firewall is impenetrable. Opening the door from outside is impossible.”
Luna tapped her tablet, her frustration evident.
“Then we knock. Team Lead?”
“Understood.”
Baek Mu-young stepped forward. Without drawing his blade, he lightly tapped the steel door with his scabbard.
Crash—!
With a deafening roar, the one-meter-thick steel door crumpled like paper and flew inward. An alarm shrieked violently.
[Warning! Intruders detected! Intruders detected!]
“My apologies. We’re here for a sanitation inspection.”
Kang Jin-hyuk brushed the dust from his clothes and strode confidently inside. Yoo Yi-soo drew her twin blades and surveyed the surroundings vigilantly, while Beris readied his quill pen for documentation.
But the moment they entered the lobby, something unexpected occurred.
Rumble-rumble-rumble!
The floor convulsed. It wasn’t a simple earthquake. The entire building moved like a colossal mechanical apparatus.
“What? The floor is moving!”
Yoo Yi-soo tried to maintain her balance, but the floor fractured like a cube, rotating in opposing directions.
“It’s a trap! Everyone stay together!”
Kang Jin-hyuk shouted, but it was already too late.
Whoosh—Crash! The floor beneath Baek Mu-young and Yoo Yi-soo plummeted instantly as a barrier sealed shut. The section where Luna and Beris stood shot upward toward the ceiling.
“Jin-hyuk!”
“Director!”
In an instant, my colleagues vanished from sight. All that remained was me, standing alone in the empty lobby.
Click.
The massive screen in the center of the lobby flickered to life, displaying the face of a man in a white coat with a mechanical prosthetic eye embedded in one socket.
[Ruler of the 11th Floor: Doctor Kairos]
[Hehehehe… Welcome, esteemed physician of Arcana Hospital. You’ve walked straight into the tiger’s den… or rather, onto my operating table.]
“Kairos? Your hospitality is absolutely pathetic. Where did you send my staff?”
[Fear not. I’ve sent each of them to a ‘playground’ suited to their talents. The aging swordmaster faces mechanical soldiers, the blade-wielding woman confronts laser trap chambers. And you….]
Kairos laughed with a sinister edge.
[I’ve prepared special patients just for you. I wonder if that ‘treatment’ you boast about so proudly will work on them?]
Whirrrr—!
The walls of the lobby where I stood began to shift, and a complex labyrinthine structure rose up. A sealed chamber with no escape. From the darkness, three pairs of crimson eyes gleamed.
Thud, thud.
With mechanical whirring, three shadowy figures emerged.
They were unlike ordinary augmented humans. They were not crude Evil Sect automatons cobbled together with shoddy parts. Their martial robes exuded an air of noble dignity. Yet the bodies revealed between the fabric had been replaced with exquisite chrome metal.
“….”
The aura they radiated was no mere mechanical output. It was the killing intent that only true masters—those who had accumulated power through decades of rigorous cultivation—could possess.
My eyes narrowed.
“You’re not Evil Sect disciples.”
The man in the center raised his mechanical arm. Engraved across his forearm in laser-etched characters was [Iron Fist].
“In the past… I was called the ‘Iron Fist Master.’ Now I am merely a masterpiece of Kairos.”
The woman on the right bore sharp blade-like prosthetics in place of her legs. She was Flying Swallow, once renowned as a master of lightness kung fu.
The elderly man on the left had his entire spine replaced with machinery. He was once called the Poison King, a legendary patriarch of the Evil Sect.
These were legendary masters who once dominated the martial realm of the 11th Floor. Yet seeking greater power, or desiring to shed their aging, diseased bodies, they had willingly sought out Kairos and surrendered their flesh.
“Well, well. All the old stars gathered in one place.”
I clicked my tongue. On the surface, they appeared to be perfect mechanical beings—Kairos’s masterpieces. But my eyes perceived something different.
[Unique Skill Activated: Divine Physician’s Eye]
My vision flared crimson as their status windows materialized before me.
[Patient 1: Iron Fist Master (Lv.75)]
[Status: Body Modification (90%), Self Collapse in Progress, Severe Depression.]
[Diagnosis: Martial Way Loss Syndrome.]
[Patient 2: Flying Swallow (Lv.72)]
[Status: Lower Body Mechanization, Phantom Pain, Self-Loathing.]
[Diagnosis: Body Dysmorphic Disorder.]
[Patient 3: Poison King (Lv.70)]
[Status: Spinal Replacement, Drug Addiction (Painkillers), Suicidal Ideation.]
[Diagnosis: Chronic Nihilism.]
A bitter smile twisted across my lips.
“So that’s it. All gloss on the surface, but rotten to the core underneath.”
They hadn’t grown stronger—they’d surrendered their very souls as warriors in exchange for transcending their limits. They’d traded calluses earned through sweat for cold metal, yet in doing so, they’d lost the warmth of inner energy flowing through their bodies. Regret. A vicious, gnawing regret and sense of loss were devouring their minds.
[Death. That is our only salvation.]
Iron Fist Master launched himself forward with a thunderous stomp. Boom! This was no ordinary punch—a hypersonic strike augmented by rocket thrusters.
I twisted my body with practiced ease, slipping past the blow. The fist that grazed me punched through the steel wall behind me like tofu.
“Impressive power. But far too linear. You used to blend substance and shadow in your strikes—did your mechanical arms rust your mind as well?”
“Shut your mouth!”
Flying Swallow descended from above, her blade-like legs carving through the air in a devastating flurry. I deflected the whirlwind of strikes with an iron pipe, reading each trajectory.
Clang! Clang!
“Fast, yes. But no rhythm. The mechanical motor sounds give away your next move every single time.”
I continued to weave through their attacks, my taunts relentless.
“Don’t you miss that electric thrill of channeling inner energy? Right now, you’re just toys that stop working when the battery dies.”
“Enough! We have evolved! We’ve shed human weakness!”
Poison King released toxic gas from the tubes embedded in his spine.
Hisssss—!
The maze was flooded with highly toxic acidic gas.
But Kang Jin-hyuk had already created a filter around his nose using the [Purification Magic] he’d learned in the 7th Floor Library.
“Evolution? That’s ridiculous.”
Kang Jin-hyuk pushed through the poisonous gas and closed in on the Poison King.
“Look at your eyes. Are those the eyes of the evolved? They’re the eyes of rats drowning in a sewer.”
At my words, the three masters froze. I’d struck a nerve. Every night, they dreamed—of those days when they wore sweat-soaked martial robes and trained relentlessly. Those difficult yet exhilarating times. Each time they awoke in their cold mechanical bodies, they were tormented by the urge to shatter their reflections in the mirror.
“I’ll fix you.”
I set down the iron pipe and walked toward them with bare hands.
“I’ll remove the machinery and make you human again. Of course, you won’t be as strong as before. You’ll have to start training from the beginning. But….”
My eyes locked directly onto their wavering artificial eyes.
“At least when you sleep at night, you won’t think of yourselves as monsters.”
“…!!”
The Iron Fist Master’s fists trembled. Flying Swallow’s blade legs stopped. The Poison King’s gas tubes ceased. The words they had longed to hear.
For someone to see them not as ‘monsters’ but as ‘patients’. To free them from this hellish mechanical prison.
“A lie… my spine is already gone. How could you….”
The Poison King asked in a fractured voice.
“Spinal regeneration is nothing at my hospital. I have divine cells from the 6th Floor.”
I extended my hand.
“Choose. Will you live as Kairos’s playthings until you’re discarded, or will you train as humans until the day you die?”
Oil-like tears streamed from the Iron Fist Master’s mechanical eyes. He slowly knelt down.
“I want to… go back. As a human….”
Flying Swallow and the Poison King lowered their weapons. I had precisely excised the tumor of ‘regret’ that dwelt in their hearts.
“Good thinking. You can repay the medical fees with your body later.”
That was the moment Jin-hyuk stepped forward with a relieved sigh.
Whiiiirrrr—!
Doctor Kairos’s mocking laughter erupted from the ceiling speakers.
[Kahahaha! How touching. I can’t watch this without tears. Are you planning to offer psychiatric counseling?]
“You were eavesdropping? That’s quite the nasty hobby.”
Jin-hyuk glared at the ceiling.
[But I won’t allow my toys to be stolen. And there’s one thing you overlooked.]
“What?”
[A doctor exploits the patient’s weakness, but a villain exploits the doctor’s weakness.]
Crunnnnch!
The wall behind Jin-hyuk opened. From within emerged a colossal [Mechanical Beast: Chimera Tiger].
A vicious predator with steel fangs and serrated claws.
But what made Jin-hyuk’s blood run cold was what rode upon the beast’s back.
“Director…!”
“Let them go! Let them go right now!”
Trapped in a net and dangling from the beast’s back were two figures. Luna and Beris.
“Luna?! Beris?!”
Jin-hyuk’s face contorted in an instant. He wouldn’t have worried about Baek Mu-young or Yoo Yi-soo—they were monsters who could escape on their own. But Luna and Beris were non-combatants. When the maze split apart, it was precisely the two weakest members who had fallen into the trap.
[Kekeke. These women have pathetic combat ability. My pet barely frightened them and they were caught.]
Doctor Kairos chuckled wickedly.
[Now, choose, Kang Jin-hyuk. Kill those traitors with your own hands. Then I’ll release the women.]
The Iron Fist Master, Flying Swallow, and Poison King stared at Jin-hyuk. The doctor who had promised salvation mere moments ago. Now forced into a position where he must kill them to save his companions.
“Please do it.”
The Iron Fist Master spoke calmly.
“We’re already dead men walking anyway. Saving your comrade is the right thing to do.”
“….”
I clenched my fists tightly.
This kind of dilemma. My most despised scenario.
Kill the patient or kill my comrade.
Doctor Kairos was precisely weighing my ‘professional ethics’ against my ‘camaraderie’.
“You’d better decide quickly. My pet’s getting awfully hungry.”
The Chimera Tiger drooled over Luna’s head, growling menacingly. Luna had turned a sickly blue with terror, while Beris trembled violently, his glasses askew.
I lowered my head. My shoulders quivered slightly.
[Oh, are you crying? Even the great Kang Jin-hyuk is powerless.]
But when I lifted my head, my face bore not tears—instead, a smile so unnervingly cold it was almost grotesque.
“Hey, quack.”
[…?]
“You made a mistake.”
I pulled something from my pocket. It was the [Special Summoning Device] I’d brought from the Floor 10 Hospital before ascending to the 11th Floor.
“You thought I’d save people just because I’m a doctor, didn’t you?”
I pressed the summoning device’s button.
“I’m a [Tamer] before I’m a doctor. And in my hospital, I have guard beasts far more terrifying than your little pet.”
Beep beep beep—!
[Summoning signal transmitted.]
[Coordinates: 11th Floor: Chaotic Martial World – Kairos Branch.]
[Summon target: ???]
In that instant, the ceiling of the Kairos Branch tore open with a deafening roar.
Crash—!!!
A colossal shadow plummeted through the dust cloud. A muscular giant wreathed entirely in golden lightning. And beside it stood a demon with wings of pure darkness spread wide.
“W-who are you?!”
Doctor Kairos shrieked.
As the colossal figure landed, the earth trembled beneath its weight. Though sweat drenched his body from operating that massive wheel, his eyes blazed with the very majesty of divinity itself.
[Arcana Hospital Development Director: Zeus]
[Arcana Hospital Administrative Director: Mephistopheles]
“What manner of creature are you?!”
Zeus roared.
“You dare touch my livelihood—trying to cut off the hospital’s air conditioning!”
Mephistopheles ignited hellfire, his laughter dripping with lethal intent.
“You threaten our director? During my salary negotiation period, no less!”
Kang Jin-hyuk grinned wickedly, pointing toward the Chimera Tiger.
“Directors. That heap of scrap metal is biting our employees, isn’t it? Shall we file charges for workplace obstruction?”
“Leave it to us!”
“We’ll show you hell itself!”
The tables had turned. Kang Jin-hyuk had made no compromise—he had summoned the ‘joker’ that overturned the entire game. Now it was Doctor Kairos’s turn to taste true terror.
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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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