Boss, It's My First Time Being Your Resident - Chapter 19

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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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Episode 19. Spotlight (2)

“I’m scared, brother.”

White smoke seeped through the crack in the door, rippling like liquid.
Terrified, Agang burrowed into her brother’s embrace.

“Agang, remember? That story I told you about the journey to the star country?”
“I remember! It’s the fairy tale you read to me when I was scared of thunder.”
“We’re on that train now. We’re passing through the clouds. There’s just a lot of mist, right?”

It was the moment her brother held Agang close.
Bits of corroded plywood, creaking as they burned, began falling from the ceiling one by one.

“Close your eyes, Agang.”
“Why?”
“Because I don’t want dust getting in those pretty eyes of yours.”

She never imagined, not even in dreams, that one side of her brother’s cheek was already melting from the scorching debris.

It was only much later, when she was older, that she understood the tenderness of his composure—the way he went on speaking in that gentle voice, as if nothing were wrong.

“Let me tell you a fun story.”

Until the moment of rescue, she simply listened to the old tales he murmured, her eyes sheltered in the palm of his hand.

As if it were just another peaceful night like any other.

***

“Uncle, you know how interested I am in cosmetics! That’s why I came!”

Agang pulled her lips up in a bright smile for the Prime Minister.

“Agang. Let it go now. Your brother wouldn’t want you carrying guilt.”
“It’s really not because of him! I genuinely chose this specialty because I enjoy it.”
“……Yes, yes! Now that your treatment’s all done, will our Doctor Jo give Uncle a candy? And by the way, is the hospital food any good here?”

Watching Agang tell an awkward lie with reddening eyes, her uncle swiftly changed the subject, as if to say he understood it all.

Light conversation was about to continue when—

“Well, well! Our Prime Minister!”

The door swung open, and the President strode in with purposeful steps.

Dozens of journalists surged into the room along with the rapid-fire clicks of camera shutters, desperate not to miss a single frame.

It happened in an instant.
The hushed VIP hospital room suddenly filled with press.

Under the barrage of flashes from all directions, Agang flinched and shrank back.
That was when a female reporter grabbed Agang’s arm roughly.

“Are you Prime Minister Lim Seok-hwan’s attending physician? Could we get a quick interview?”

In an instant, all the spotlights converged on Agang. Dozens of camera flashes erupted simultaneously in her direction.

Agang threw her arms over her head, desperately shielding her face.

“What exactly is the Prime Minister’s condition? Is there any threat to his life?”
“Could there be lasting complications?”
“Was it a simple accident, or could it be an act of terrorism?”
“We just saw you two smiling and talking—what were you discussing?”

Under the barrage of questions firing at her from every direction, Agang’s heart pounded wildly.

“So you’re Plastic Surgery Resident Jo Agang? There have been rumors that the Prime Minister’s eyes have looked noticeably younger lately—does this have anything to do with you?”

A reporter, reading Agang’s department and name from her white coat, pressed forward with a pointed question.

“Why are you covering your face? Do you have something to hide?”

Who was this rude reporter asking such unfiltered questions?
Agang’s face had gone pale; she didn’t know what to do.

Then, cutting through the chaos, a low, steady voice rang out.

“Don’t speak to our staff that way.”

Taeheon gripped his patient chart tightly and walked deliberately into the room.

He had come to deliver a collaborative consultation note, and had been waiting in the corridor for Agang and the Prime Minister’s conversation to end.

The Prime Minister’s niece, then…
Could she be from Onel Group?
The granddaughter of that meticulous Chairman Ju Young-chun?

Taeheon had already sensed that Agang wasn’t from an ordinary family.
He’d also noticed how desperately she was hiding her identity.

A conversation between Agang and her secretary that he’d overheard by chance last month on Cheonghwa Mountain came flooding back to him.

“Director, I really want to work hard at this new hospital.”
“Agang, the Chairman is deeply concerned. With the Seoul Grand Bridge construction contract bid coming up, she’s become very sensitive. It’s like walking on thin ice. You know as well as I do—this is the Chairman’s last cherished project, her pride and joy.”
“I’ll be careful with my conduct and… I’ll keep a low profile.”
“If there’s any noise right now. If any scandal emerges.”
“I won’t embarrass the company. This is my last chance too.”
“Why deliberately walk such a thorny path? Agang, what you have now is already enough.”
“……It was our brother’s dream.”

He couldn’t forget the image of her lips trembling faintly, biting them to hold back tears, even after he’d come down from the mountain.

“I really want to fulfill his dream. So later, much later, when he comes to greet me from heaven, I want to tell him with a smile that I’ve lived well, that I’ve lived as a wonderful doctor in his place.”

That yearning voice was so vivid in his ears.

Why did those small, solitary shoulders standing before the rude reporters draw his gaze so sharply?
Why did his feet move before his mind could decide?

“I’ll do the interview.”

Taeheon pushed roughly through the crowd and stepped in front of Agang, shielding her completely.

In that moment, the torrent of flashes that had been raining down on Agang shifted entirely to Taeheon.

***

Lunchtime.

Agang and So-dam stood waiting in the long line at the hospital cafeteria.

“Agang! Did you see that news interview with Taeheon earlier? So handsome. Crazy.”

So-dam, unable to hide her excitement, thrust her mobile phone screen in front of Agang’s face.

Holding her tray in one hand, So-dam had even forgotten to grab her spoon, her entire attention fixed on the screen.

“The video’s already all over YouTube! SNS fan accounts—eight of them created in just two hours!”
“You sure he really hates cameras? Today he seemed to volunteer first?”

He’d said he hated filming. He’d said he absolutely wouldn’t do interviews.

Agang absently picked up So-dam’s spoon and set it on her tray, asking the question casually.

She couldn’t forget the moment when Taeheon had stepped firmly in front of her, the flash of light blinding.

His broad back had filled her entire vision, and the sharp light that pierced her eyes had vanished in an instant.

That moment played over and over in her mind like a broken record.

“Yeah, strange, isn’t it? The senior must be having a change of heart. These days, even doctors have to market themselves on their looks.”
“But even so. Did he have to be that eager?”
“Why waste that handsome face by keeping it hidden?”

So-dam was busy glancing back and forth between the serving counter and the screen.

“Do you know what the most famous and delicious menu at our hospital cafeteria is?”
“What?”
“The galbitang!”

So-dam set a steaming bowl of beef short rib soup on her tray and leaned toward Agang conspiratorially.

“When medical students do their surgical rotation, they always serve this galbitang. There’s even a rumor that the professors pressured the cafeteria to put it on the menu. To see if we can still eat well after watching surgery.”
“What? Ugh……”

Agang shook her head in disgust and scooped tteokbokki into her tray instead of the galbitang.

“Wait? That’s Taeheon’s high school photo?!”

Meanwhile, as So-dam scrolled through a new post on a fan account she followed, her eyes went wide.

“Wow. People are really fast. How did they even dig up this relic?”

So-dam held out her phone.

“You look at it too. Seriously stunning.”

On the screen was displayed the legendary photograph from when Ha Taeheon was a pre-med student—the one that had apparently captivated the entire campus.

It was a spring day, fresh green tinted like ink wash painting.

Taeheon, wearing a gray hoodie, sat on a bench beneath the cherry blossoms, arms draped across the back, staring into the camera.

He was endlessly fresh, impossibly vivid.

The sharp, straight eyes visible through his casually tousled hair.
His cool, pillowy lips in contrast to his blade-like nose ridge.

That arrogance, standing aloof in the warm sunlight while radiating cold.

That languid, cold smile—as if indifferent to everything in the world—held all the light to itself, offering warmth to no one, remaining lofty and untouchable.

Sunlight, shadow, and contradiction.

Nothing’s changed at all, Agang thought, smiling slightly.

Even without smelling it, the fragrance of that spring day seemed to brush across the tip of her nose.
That fresh, young scent that had seeped into her entire body that night on the mountain.

Agang found herself staring at the photograph without quite meaning to.

It was as if everything about Ha Taeheon was contained in that single frame, every contradiction poured into it.

But why did the background look strangely familiar?

The unfamiliar brick wall and the arrangement of cherry trees drifted through her mind like a faint afterimage.

……Where have I seen that before?

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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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