Doctor’s Rebirth - Chapter 201
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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 201
Before long, our group parted ways with Hwangbo Sega at a fork in the road.
They seemed to be resting in a separate pavilion some distance away.
As we continued down the path, a pavilion where our group could rest came into view.
Joo Dan-ha, the Chuuna Clan Leader, spoke.
“My, this place is quite spacious compared to last time.”
A considerably large and ornate separate pavilion.
Sima Bing, the Acupuncture Hall Master, replied.
“It seems to mean they’re asking us to stay well… but this old fool is already worried. Will we face the same situation as last year…?”
“Just thinking about it makes me want to flee already.”
At those words, all the Medical Assistants let out sighs deeper than the sea.
I pondered.
‘Now I too have been caught in that millstone.’
Only briefly, before I clutched my head and reconsidered.
‘Let’s think about that later. It’s something that will come whether sooner or later! Yes, yes. Just recall the magnificent ceiling of the Murim Alliance. I came to the martial arts world! I came to the Murim Alliance!’
And here I am running an ER (Emergency Room)!
In any country, the ER is hell.
Korea’s ER is also hell.
What would the Murim’s ER be like?
‘Hehehehe, mostly young martial artists would be brought in then.’
I briefly tried to hypnotize myself that I had come to the martial arts world and this was the Murim Alliance and I was enjoying my fantasy, but the reality that I was doing the same thing made me despair for three seconds.
As I was unpacking inside, a martial artist from Baek Rin Medical Guild entered.
“Patriarch, someone is looking for you.”
Wondering what it could be, I stepped outside and found an unfamiliar young lady standing there.
‘Huh? Who is this?’
A face I had never seen before.
The young lady spoke with a flushed face.
“Big brother! It’s been so long since we’ve met. I heard you’ve been getting injured and wandering around here and there during our time apart. I’ve been so worried about you.”
Her tone was as if she were speaking to a beloved.
‘What, what is this?’
I desperately retraced my memories even activating the Hyeonwon Jeondan Singeong, but this person was not in my recollection.
She approached me and then linked her arm through mine.
I tried to hastily pull my arm away, but her grip was so strong it wouldn’t budge.
I hesitated whether I should use my inner energy, but she grabbed my stomach and laughed.
“Hahaha, look at you being all stiff~”
“W-who are you?”
She kept her arm linked with mine while wearing a bashful expression, then covered her face with her other hand.
In an instant.
The girl’s face disappeared, and a beautiful young man’s face was revealed.
Bewitching and mischievous eyes, exquisite features that resembled a noble prince.
Her lips were a vivid crimson, as if she had swallowed blood itself. Her hands remained firm and strong, with prominent knuckles.
“Sama Hyeon…?”
“Priceless expression. Brother~ Wow, I never thought you’d be this shocked~”
Fortunately, traces of her childhood face remained, allowing me to recognize her.
“What was that just now?”
“Muscle and Bone Reversal Transformation. It’s a martial art that exchanges the positions of muscles and bones. With this, I can…”
In the instant Sama Hyeon covered her face with her sleeve like performing a face-changing act.
Another face appeared. This time, also the face of a delicate-featured girl.
However, it was a different person’s face from the one just before.
“Ta-da! This way I can change my appearance to some degree whenever I want~”
‘Wow, this is something I’d only see in novels. That’s incredible…’
At least she wasn’t flaying living skin to use as a mask, but being able to transform into any desired appearance whenever she wished was essentially the same thing.
Moreover, since this was accomplished without any materials—merely by rearranging skeleton and muscle—it could be called an even more advanced technique.
Just then, the Acupuncture Guild Master poked his head out, wondering what was happening.
As expected.
Sama Hyeon, now in the girl’s face, began acting coy, saying, “Gaga~ I’ve missed you so much~”
In an instant, the Acupuncture Guild Master’s complexion turned ashen.
I considered grabbing Sama Hyeon by the scruff of her neck, but then realized she had her arms crossed and wasn’t about to let go.
‘This insane grip strength…’
This wouldn’t do.
“I’ll just step outside for some fresh air!”
With that, I bolted away with Sama Hyeon tucked under one arm.
“P-please have a good time, Patriarch…”
‘Damn it.’
The misunderstanding would only grow from here.
I caught sight of a few Medical Assistants whispering in surprise out of the corner of my eye.
But regardless, I had to settle things with this damned younger sibling of mine.
* * *
I arrived at a place with minimal foot traffic and found myself alone with Sama Hyeon.
“Hyeon. Change your face back.”
“If it bothers you, brother~”
I thought she’d resist, but she obediently returned to her original face without further complaint.
“Brother, are you angry? I’m sorry. Okay?”
She clasped her hands together and apologized with utmost sincerity, like a child who had done something wrong.
‘Sigh. The prank was excessive, but she’s still just a kid after all.’
I spoke.
“Don’t pull pranks like that again.”
“Yes! I absolutely won’t~ And judging by your reaction, you still don’t have a betrothed, do you?”
“Why?”
“If you did, you wouldn’t have let me off this easily~”
A fox.
“True to form for a heterodox sect. Figures.”
At those words, Sama Hyeon spoke with gravity.
“The orthodox path doesn’t make money, brother. If you want real wealth, the heterodox way is supreme.”
“What?”
“I’ve gone into smuggling.”
*Cough.*
Jin Cheon-hee couldn’t help but cough and speak.
“Smuggling?”
“Yeah. Strength is something I can hone, but after that, this is the best.”
He bent his thumb and index finger together, mimicking the creation of money.
“Let’s head to the tea house and have some tea first.”
The two moved to the tea room.
The Murim Alliance was where martial sects gathered. Naturally, there were many secrets to discuss.
All the tea rooms in the Murim Alliance were designed as small private chambers with a formation to prevent sound from leaking outside.
They ordered Longjing tea and requested several pastries as well.
While conversing with Sama Hyeon, Jin Cheon-hee couldn’t even taste the Longjing tea.
‘In the original story, Sama Hyeon worked as an assassin for the Five Poison Sect.’
Jin Cheon-hee had prevented that.
Sama Hyeon gained the privilege to choose where he wished to go.
And he had chosen smuggling and trafficking.
The Golden Blood Pavilion, which bore a dark mark.
I understood it was led by the Golden King.
“Ah, I thought they sold human flesh too, like the rumors said, but they don’t. I wanted to see it. What a shame~”
The nihilism that burned everything like in the original story had vanished, but he still had a peculiar taste.
‘The Golden Blood Pavilion is a vicious place where gold flows through blood.’
It was truly a gathering place of heterodox sects obsessed with money—not merely smuggling, but also loan sharking and gambling.
Even engaging in what seemed like a strange concept: banking operations.
A place where all the black money in the world converged. There were even rumors that in a single season, more money flowed through the Golden Blood Pavilion than the Murim Alliance’s annual budget.
The Golden King, who led the Golden Blood Pavilion, rarely appeared openly, yet rumors circulated that when he moved, the prices of the entire martial world trembled.
‘Even in the original story, he never stepped forward.’
Wherever money gathered, there was always a dark mark.
Dark marks typically sold things that couldn’t be obtained through normal means, and among them were information unavailable anywhere else.
Even secret manuals known to have been lost from the martial world were sold for the right price.
‘When Sama Hyeon and Yeo Ha-ryun fought, the dark mark remained neutral.’
Hao-mun was a coalition of multiple heterodox sects.
Here, the Golden King declared neutrality.
However, when dealing with Sama Hyeon, he offered a thirty percent discount.
Considering the original Sama Hyeon’s deranged state, one might think this madness, but Sama Hyeon, who was the Hao-mun leader, accepted it.
The Golden Blood Pavilion was also the financial lifeline of Hao-mun.
Everything required money.
The Golden Blood House loaned money to various heterodox sects, held stakes in businesses, or provided funds to bribe officials.
If the original Sama Hyeon had remained, he might have plotted to kill the Golden King from behind, but with his disappearance, it was certain that not just the Hao-mun but the entire heterodox world would be shaken.
Yeo Ha-ryun, the Heavenly Demon, had exploited this weakness multiple times.
Since Yeo Ha-ryun was a rival to the Hao Munzhu, he had to purchase at fifty percent markup.
The Golden King is a madman.
Countless heterodox sects and demonic cultists spoke in unison at the time.
From reading the original work, the victor in the heterodox sects versus demonic cult war was the Golden Blood House.
They extracted money without losing a single leader.
That’s right. Capitalism existed in the martial world too.
Moreover, since this place lacked human rights, it could be said to be even more thorough.
‘So young Sama Hyeon is entering the Golden Blood House.’
A young child chose the Golden Blood House without anyone’s advice?
‘His cunning is truly exceptional.’
Ordinarily, a child who had rolled through the harsh martial world would naturally want to enter a faction that prioritized martial prowess rather than such a place.
Even if he had already learned martial arts, it was almost instinctive to want to enter a stronger faction and become a master.
In such circumstances, the fact that he had no choice but to enter the Golden Blood House to earn money showed he was no ordinary person.
“Who are you studying under?”
At Jin Cheon-hee’s words, Sama Hyeon lowered his eyelids and spoke playfully.
“The Golden King~”
Cough!
Jin Cheon-hee spat out the tea he was drinking.
“The, the Golden King? The one I know…?”
“Yeah. For some reason, he said I caught his fancy. He says I’m cute because I remind him of himself when he was young~”
“….”
“Brother? Oh, I must have choked.”
Saying so, he pulled out a handkerchief.
‘Premium silk with embroidery… wait, is that gold thread?’
The lustrous silk was identical in sheen to the silk robes worn by royalty, the kind that only the Ju Wang wore in the past.
Moreover, the embroidery covering it was laid with actual gold thread.
“How am I supposed to wipe my mouth with this?”
This feeling was the same as when I had heard the price of a certain luxury handkerchief in my past life.
It felt like I should call it a handkerchief lord rather than a handkerchief.
How could one wipe dirty saliva with this?
Jin Cheon-hee wiped his mouth with his sleeve.
“Come on, brother. Dirty. I have plenty of these.”
“Still, how can you use something like this?”
“You’re my benefactor, brother. What’s there to regret? Take it if you need it.”
Now that I thought about it, all the gifts Sama Hyeon had sent were expensive and of unknown origin….
“Brother, if you don’t accept this, I’ll use it to wipe the table.”
As he said this, Sama Hyeon actually moved to wipe away the tea I had spat out.
“Crazy bastard, fine, give it here!”
“Should’ve said so earlier~”
I accepted the handkerchief with trembling hands.
Looking at it more closely, it appeared even more expensive.
‘No, why on earth would anyone need to make a mere cloth for wiping dirt so extravagantly, so luxuriously? It would be far more practical to carry several cheap ones and wash them frequently….’
Now that I thought about it, Sama Hyeon probably owned many such handkerchiefs.
Wasn’t he a disciple of the Golden King?
“This handkerchief has my name embroidered on it…?”
“Yeah. Actually, I prepared it for you originally. It’s made from hundred-silkworm silk.”
“What?”
“I said it’s made from hundred-silkworm silk.”
“What did you…say?”
“It’s not even heavenly-silkworm silk, so why on earth would you do this?”
Hundred-silkworm silk was certainly a special material, but it couldn’t compare to heavenly-silkworm silk.
However, the breeding itself was extraordinarily difficult, and since the material contained semi-precious medicinal components, the cost was astronomical.
The thread this creature produced was impervious to blades.
While it couldn’t withstand attacks infused with sword energy, ordinary blades couldn’t cut it under any circumstances.
It weighed as light as a feather, and was so thin that you could feel the texture of the opposite side of your hand through it.
“Why…. What possible reason could there be for making merely a handkerchief from such material?”
My voice trembled without my realizing it.
“It’s fun, isn’t it~?”
I couldn’t comprehend the psychology of the wealthy.
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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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