Boss, It's My First Time Being Your Resident - Chapter 6

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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 6. Between a Gangster and a Surgeon

“Prisons exist for rehabilitation too, don’t they?”

The woman spoke with genuine conviction.

“I don’t know what brought you there, but if you’ve truly reflected on your crime, there’s real meaning in starting fresh as a member of society again, don’t you think?”
“Is that so?”
“Yes. You saved my life too…….”

The woman pressed on with such earnest, gentle words that Tae-heon found her suddenly endearing.

Like a small puppy, he thought.

“You’ve come all this way to the temple to wash away your past mistakes…….”
“Well then, I suppose I should try to live better this time around.”
“Yes! I’ll root for your new life! And in that spirit, I’ll offer you my friendship!”
“What? My friendship? You’ll offer it?”

What kind of adorable lunatic was this?

At the way she punctuated her words with such careful precision, Tae-heon rubbed his brow and let out a quiet laugh.

“You call me an Underground World gangster and want to be my friend? Who in this world does such a thing?”
“You’re my savior, aren’t you?”

The woman hesitated for a moment, then swallowed and continued.

“In one night, you saved me three times. From nearly charging into a wild animal, from getting lost and stranded, from freezing to death on the mountain.”
“So you want to be friends? Gangster or not, regardless of who I am?”
“Everyone has two sides! Yes, you made mistakes, but you also have a warm side that saves people!”
“Two sides, you say.”
“But what kind of mistake was it, exactly?”
“I stabbed someone.”

I did it to save them, but they said I did it to kill them.

“……What? Stabbed?”

The woman’s voice dropped like someone turning down a speaker. Without even facing her, Tae-heon could tell her expression had grown serious.

“Why? Are you regretting being my friend? Only now?”
“Oh, no! Not at all! Haha! I’m a cool person, you know.”
“Cool, are you? Cool enough to offer friendship to a gangster fresh out of prison?”
“Yes…….”
“Anyway, once we come down from the mountain, we won’t see each other again, will we?”

The dawn was deep. So was the woman’s misunderstanding.

The white winter night had grown long.

***

A-gang hurried down the mountain path behind the man as soon as daybreak came.

Last night, no matter how much she’d circled, she’d ended up in the same place, but with the sun risen, the hidden path miraculously opened before her.

A cold wave warning had been issued, so the hiking trail was empty.

How much further had they walked?
The sharp spire of Baekun Temple’s stone pagoda appeared through the dense trees in the distance.

Phew. Her legs nearly gave out and she almost collapsed right there.

Finding Baekun Temple again after just ten hours—a sigh of relief escaped her as if she were coming home.

“Why, are you afraid of me?”
“Oh, no! Not at all! Haha!”

At his words about stabbing someone, her heart sank.

More than sank—it tumbled down the mountainside.

On the surface, she pretended such a sin meant nothing, affected composure, feigned calm.

In her heart, she’d been talking to him all along.

‘We promised to be friends. So please don’t hurt me. Just until daylight.’

She was glad his back was to her, so he couldn’t see her face.

“Thank you for helping me.”

A safe parting was necessary.
A safe goodbye from this dangerous, disreputable man.

“I should be going then—something urgent came up, so I’ll come down quickly!”
“Suddenly?”
“Yes! I think I left the air conditioner on at home! It just occurred to me! In a flash!”
“In this winter?”
“Oh, not the air conditioner—the heater! The heater! Hahaha!”

The man smiled quietly without answering.

“I’ll cheer you on in your new life! Don’t swing any more pipes this time, and I hope you’ll live well! Virtuously!”
“Virtuously, you say…….”
“If we’re destined to meet again later in life, tell me your name then!”

She’d planned to turn around and sprint straight to her room at the temple.

500 meters left. About 800 steps.

Ten minutes walking. Five running.

“Take your time coming down! There’s no rush!”
“…….”
“Well then, goodbye!”

We’ll never meet again!
We won’t see each other again!

She laughed loudly with exaggerated ease and waved to him.

Even with a parting blessing! Truly perfect.

She’d just spun around when—

“Someone call for help!”

An urgent voice came from far off.

“Hey, you two! Help us, please!”

A man came running desperately with a woman on his back, both in gaudy neon-colored couple’s hiking outfits.

“I’ve called 119! They said three minutes! Please look after this woman!”

The man, breathless, set the woman down on the ground.

“I’m in a hurry.”
“Wait, guardian! First, calm down! Tell us what happened!”

A-gang, gasping for breath, grabbed at the departing man’s sleeve.

The woman’s face had turned a sickly blue-gray as she clutched her throat, losing consciousness. Her blood pressure seemed to be dropping—her wheezing breath grew fainter by the second.

A-gang urgently pressed her fingers to the woman’s carotid artery. Fortunately, there was still a pulse.

When she lifted the eyelids, the pupils responded slowly to the sunlight.

“On the way up, she ate a chocolate bar and it seemed to lodge in her throat. She suddenly collapsed.”

A chocolate bar?
If it were chocolate, it would have melted by now—it shouldn’t cause an airway obstruction. Why did she collapse?

Could it be nuts lodged in her airway?

“Sir, could I see what kind of chocolate bar it was?”
“Anyway, I called quite a while ago, so the ambulance should arrive soon! I’m not a guardian—just someone passing by! Goodbye!”
“Sir!”

By the time A-gang looked back at the patient, the man was already far away, his fleeing figure rather comical.

Looked like an affair, she thought.
Once 119 arrived, things would get complicated. Best to make a quick escape. Tsk.

First, get whatever’s lodged in her throat out!
The Heimlich Maneuver!

“Hey! Could you help support the woman here? I’ll apply pressure to her solar plexus from behind!”

A-gang called out urgently to Tae-heon.

“You! Over here!”

There was no answer. A-gang turned back hurriedly.

“…….”

The woman’s hiking pack was wide open, belongings scattered everywhere.

“……What are you doing right now?”

And in his hand was a hiking knife.

“Put the knife down.”

A-gang steadied her trembling breath and spoke calmly.

“You promised me last night! That you’d live better in this life! That you wouldn’t stab anyone again!”
“Move. Now.”

The man’s voice had dropped to a low tone, utterly different from before—cold and resolute.

“You’re not going to stab her with that, are you?”
“Can’t you hear me? Move!”
“Put the knife down right now!”

A-gang didn’t back down, her own voice rising to match his.

“Stop talking nonsense and get out of the way!”

The man’s eyes, fixed on the knife’s point, were cold and sharp as a freshly honed blade.

***

“I won’t let you!!!”

The woman seized the knife and bolted down the mountain with all her might.

Tae-heon’s right hand, robbed of its purpose, hung suspended in the empty air for a moment. He was exasperated.

He’d been about to reveal that he was a doctor.

That an emergency cricothyrotomy was needed, not a throat-slashing.

That he meant to save her life, not take it.

He couldn’t understand where such courage had come from in a frame so fragile.

Without hesitation, she’d snatched the knife and vanished before his eyes.

Tae-heon immediately pulled the multi-tool and straw from the front pocket of the patient’s hiking pack.

Oral swelling. Respiratory distress. Cyanosis. Rapid pulse.

If the man’s story were true—a chocolate bar lodging in the throat and blocking the airway—there wouldn’t be swelling around the uvula or scattered red welts on the skin.

Clearly, trace amounts of peanut powder in the chocolate had triggered anaphylaxis shock.

An acute systemic allergic reaction blocking the airway—lethal within minutes without intervention.

Not a second to waste. He had to open an airway now.

Tae-heon fixed the arytenoid cartilage with his left thumb and forefinger on either side of the larynx.

Simultaneously, his right hand moved down the center of the neck and paused at the cricothyroid membrane.

The moment he was about to make the incision—

“Get your hands off the patient!”

Paramedics with a stretcher came running urgently, shouting.

Their faces were ashen.

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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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