Doctor’s Rebirth - Chapter 160

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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 160
Pung Ha-eun.
Eun Wang-ya’s eyes opened.
The mask clung firmly to his face, and the weight of the blanket pressed down heavily.
It was the middle of the night.
Outside, I could hear the sound of snow falling instead of rain.
“Ugh.”
As I tried to sit up, a small groan escaped my lips.
“You shouldn’t be moving yet. Though later, you’ll have to move whether you like it or not.”
An irritatingly brazen voice reached my ears.
Seo Baek-ryong—Jin Cheon-hee.
This martial artist possessed beauty so ethereal one might question if he were human, and he was simultaneously a disciple of the Divine Physician.
According to my investigation: a virtuous person, and a good person.
I could understand why his master Jegalling protected his disciple so thoroughly.
Though virtuous and intelligent enough not to be easily exploited by others, it was true he was emotionally generous and had a weakness for children.
Based on extensive investigation and direct observation and experience, if a blade came to his throat, so be it—but he hardly seemed the type to anesthetize a patient and then inject poison.
“No fever… and checking his pulse… yes, the progress is excellent.”
The face of this beautiful young man brimmed with satisfaction—’Truly remarkable. As expected of me!’
He was certainly an eccentric who found joy in healing people.
“Depending on how things progress, if all continues well, we’ll have you consume medicinal gruel and observe your digestive state. There shouldn’t be any major issues, but we still need to check. Once you improve further here, we’ll need to prevent intestinal adhesions, so movement would be beneficial. For now, though, rest today…”
He meticulously wrote down various notes.
In that moment, for some reason, my chest tightened, and I seized Seo Baek-ryong’s wrist.
“Hmm?”
“Do you treat all your other patients this way?”
“You instructed me not to show favoritism, so I treated you accordingly… sir?”
Jin Cheon-hee seemed to be deliberating for three seconds whether he should now prostrate himself and cry out ‘Long live, long live, ten thousand times long live,’ or perhaps, since I was disguised as a king, shout ‘Ten thousand years, ten thousand years, ten thousand times ten thousand years.’
Sure enough, he awkwardly bent his knees at a 120-degree angle.
Seeing that posture, for some reason, my resolve crumbled.
“Do you truly have no intention of becoming an Imperial Physician?”
“I… do not.”
“I suppose. Being a martial artist, you wouldn’t want to abandon the freedom of the outside world for such a prison.”
Jin Cheon-hee still seemed to be deliberating, eyes darting about.
His knees, bent at 120 degrees, now bent further to roughly 100 degrees.
Next would come a full prostration.
“…Don’t.”
“Sir?”
“Don’t do it.”
“Ah, I see. That’s fine then. Haha.”
He laughed awkwardly and straightened his knees again.
“Oh, and there’s one more thing.”
“What is it?”
“I’m talking about chemotherapy.”
“Hmm?”
“Well, that is… anti… I call it cancer. Since this is stage two, treatment is necessary. Fortunately, there’s no distant metastasis, and while the surgery—no, the removal went well—you can’t let your guard down.”
Seo Baek-ryong before me gazed with worried eyes.
“You need to be healthy to govern the state, don’t you? Or rather, to rule. In any case, your term isn’t fixed—you’ll be doing this for life.”
Seeing how he occasionally pulled out rarely-used words, he was certainly an eccentric.
“So?”
“In the end, to prevent recurrence, chemotherapy is necessary. Malignant tumors are terrifying things. But since we don’t have much in the way of technological capability…”
I spoke with regret, yet my eyes gleamed as I continued.
Even after considerable time had passed since ascending to the throne as Emperor, this was the first time anyone had treated him in such a manner.
‘Is this what a Martial Arts World person is like…?’
Different from what I’d imagined, but certainly uninhibited.
* * *
Eun Wang-ya rested in the Juwang House in this manner.
I monitored the King’s prognosis, adjusting herbal medicines, administering acupuncture, and prescribing with the few antibiotics I possessed.
Someone once said it.
Cancer’s real battle begins after surgery.
Even after removing the tumor through surgery, one must manage it for a lifetime.
A long-distance marathon. This exhausts not only the patient but their family as well.
There are such things as benign and malignant cancers, but even benign cancer is fundamentally cancer. One must never take it lightly.
‘And I’ve watched that suffering unfold beside me.’
As a doctor, there are words I don’t want to speak.
When the cancer mass you thought was dead returns.
When you must inform the patient and their family of this.
Whether parents, children, or spouses—when grasping the hand of whoever came with them and listening intently, my mouth won’t open.
No matter how gently it’s phrased, it was hell.
Whether young or old, recurrence made no distinction.
People collapse. And I too felt my heart sink at such moments.
When I had to speak of managing it, maintaining composure somehow, of undergoing chemotherapy again.
It felt like a razor blade scraping across my throat.
I couldn’t collapse with them. The patient had to live.
So I would temporarily remove my heart and store it in some corner of my mind.
Even when I thought it was fine, sometimes it would surge up and overwhelm me.
At those times, not knowing what else to do, I worked and studied.
Fatigue isn’t good for health, but it was good for forgetting something.
Now I must run this marathon in the Martial Arts World.
I recalled everything I could do as a doctor, one by one.
‘The digestive system remains problematic.’
Eun Wang-ya had maintained his physique by consuming medicinal tonics like food with his compromised digestive system, but cancer required a different approach.
Vitality elixirs fundamentally aid patient recovery and invigorate the body’s energy.
The problem is that doing so would also restore the cancer and further invigorate it, causing it to grow more aggressively and consume the body.
Due to this principle, cancer in young people is the most terrifying.
When cancer strikes in old age, its growth becomes somewhat predictable, but in youth, with superior blood circulation and vigor, the cancer’s growth and metastasis accelerate rapidly.
‘I should reduce the vitality elixir… but doing so would compromise digestive function, causing immediate bodily harm.’
Improving digestive function must be the priority.
Another critical factor is vitamin D.
One of the elements the patient must guard as carefully as life itself.
However, since nutritional supplements don’t exist in this era, intake must come through diet.
‘Moderate outdoor activity combined with cutaneous synthesis would be beneficial.’
That would likely be the most common method of vitamin D absorption in this era.
‘Ultimately, to achieve proper nutrition, I must improve the stomach and intestines.’
This circles back to the original problem.
This too would become a long marathon.
‘And regarding anti-cancer treatment…’
There are no antibiotics, no radiation therapy.
Using aqueous qi to sense the meridians appeared promising, but without animal testing, I couldn’t be certain.
Ultimately, a single tumor nodule the size of a pencil dot could drift through the bloodstream and lodge in the lungs or brain, ending everything.
The intestines can be resected, but resecting the lungs or brain means the patient dies.
‘I do have several ideas in mind.’
First, the special elixir that the imperial physicians had formulated.
Examining its components, they were medicinal materials that inhibited bodily growth and regeneration.
Some ingredients were difficult even for Baekrin Uigak to obtain—only possible because he was the Emperor.
The components were so close to poison that prolonged use would harm the body, but conversely, it was better than dying.
This era’s imperial physicians, while not as advanced as modern medicine, understood the basic principles of cancer growth.
However, they didn’t know about benign versus malignant tumors, the principles of metastasis, or how to address them.
‘I must continue using this elixir. But to use it, the stomach really needs to be in good condition, doesn’t it?’
It all circled back to the stomach again.
‘Next would be… the Heavenly Marrow Cleansing Technique.’
It’s the process martial artists undergo to cleanse their bodies before learning martial arts.
Burning impurities to open all meridians throughout the body, allowing qi to flow freely.
However, this benefit only works in childhood, and performing it additional times doesn’t increase internal cultivation.
But what caught my attention was the method of burning impurities.
‘The medicinal materials and labor required are enormous. However, I am a supreme master, and my Master is among the world’s finest experts, so we could safely accomplish this through sheer force.’
An adult is different from a child.
Since medicinal materials must be used together, the expense would be astronomical.
‘Being the Emperor, he’ll handle it himself.’
It should be performed at least twice yearly, or once every six months.
This is anti-cancer treatment only an Emperor could undergo.
‘But it will be incredibly painful… I wonder if he’ll endure it.’
When I first received the Heavenly Demon Scripture from Jegalling, the pain was so excruciating that I suffered nightmares.
Even though my body as a young child had few impurities, it was still unbearable.
‘This can’t be just a digestive issue… No, wait. After the Heavenly Demon Scripture, I need to eat enormous amounts, so that’s a digestive problem too.’
Ultimately, if the digestive disorder isn’t resolved, there’s no solution.
‘I’ll have to go with the Martial Arts World approach.’
It’s an unrefined method, but there is one certain way.
* * *
“So you’re saying you’ll place your hand on my body and forcibly circulate qi through me?”
“Yes. It’s a method Martial Arts World practitioners use in emergencies.”
It’s the kind of scene from martial arts novels where a Master places his hand on a dying disciple’s back and transfers his inner strength to save him.
Usually after using this method, the Master’s face ages thirty years and he says, “It’s enough that you lived. That’s enough,” before shuffling away.
The protagonist embraces such a Master and weeps bitterly, vowing revenge.
‘Master, because I was weak… because of this unworthy disciple…!’
Of course, these days if that development appears, the top comment would be [Dropping this because of the sweet potato angst.]
It’s quite an old-fashioned classical martial arts style.
In any case, I’m not in that situation. King Eun is merely experiencing digestive discomfort, not in mortal danger.
By boosting regenerative power to balance the digestive system, if cancer cells were to grow alongside it, I could detect and treat them immediately beforehand—so it’s killing two birds with one stone.
‘Though the possibility of it reaching that point is extremely slim.’
Regardless, the Jegalling Sect has systematized this crude method somewhat.
The Five Elements True Qi can be used to aid patient recovery by utilizing the generative cycle of the Five Elements.
Without needing to use True Origin Qi, one can efficiently balance the body.
However, efficiency doesn’t mean it requires no inner strength.
One needs at least ten years of cultivation, and to avoid long-term aftereffects, one needs twenty years.
One must be at least a sect elder of considerable standing.
Moreover, after using it, one needs several days of recuperation, so it can’t be done for just anyone.

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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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