Doctor’s Rebirth - Chapter 33

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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 33
Thud—
“Master…?”
Heavy. Like water-soaked cotton pressing down upon me. It didn’t seem intentional.
I shook the body weighing me down.
Yoo Ho spoke.
“Master! Come to your senses! Master!”
Jegalling had lost consciousness.
* * *
Cold and agonizing. It was as though a blade forged from ice were tearing his heart to shreds.
Yet this sensation was familiar to Jegalling.
-Since you won’t live long, wouldn’t it be wise to consider how to live while you can?
It was the conclusion the Gaju had reached after taking his pulse.
When young Jegalling first felt this pain, he had screamed desperately for salvation. But no one in the Jegal Family could cure this suffering.
Sibee handed him a medicinal preparation made from amber with trembling hands.
Though highly addictive, it worked better than anything else for pain.
Young Jegalling accepted the medicine—the kind given only to terminal patients—without complaint.
His parents did not object either.
Jegalling was a child who would soon disappear. Let him go as comfortably as possible.
But the medicine did nothing.
The pain that tore at his heart continued relentlessly.
No matter how much he studied medicine or trained his body, even after overcoming his severed meridians and beginning to accumulate vital energy, the pain persisted.
There was only one time he felt no pain.
When the family fell to ruin, when all his blood relatives died.
Only once, when he swore vengeance amidst those ashes.
Ironically, Jegalling of the Jegal Family—whom everyone expected to die first due to his severed yin meridians—had become the family’s sole survivor.
The pain never became familiar. He only learned to endure it.
The young Jegalling who had howled like a beast had become a withered, gnarled tree preparing for death.
Once twisted emotions, combined with genius, spiraled further into incomprehensible distortion.
‘Perhaps that’s why that child shines so brightly. Because he possesses what I do not.’
Since he had never possessed such things to begin with, there was no room for jealousy to take root.
He was simply captivated by the first light he had ever seen.
Yet knowing he could never possess it himself, he felt it was closer to admiration than desire.
‘Today hurts less.’
Perhaps because of that, even in his delirium, Jegalling felt the pain lessening compared to usual.
* * *
Jegalling awoke half a day later.
As his eyes opened, he felt a soft sensation in his hand.
Turning his gaze, he saw a small child with delicate, fern-like hands grasping his own tightly.
The surroundings were filled with warmth. It was a sensation like immersing oneself in a hot spring, yet it felt even warmer than that.
“Master, you’ve awakened.”
“Yoo Ho?”
“Yes, sir!”
Jegalling’s gaze turned toward me.
“Why are you here?”
Yoo Ho spoke while looking at me lying beside Jegalling, his expression clearly displeased.
“He stubbornly insisted on the pretext of cultivating the Five Elements Spiritual Cultivation. But Master, this entire situation is because of this brat——.”
Yoo Ho could not continue further.
Jegalling had raised his hand to silence him and was now looking down at me.
Jegalling gazed at my sleeping face with tender eyes.
It was like pouring a bucket of seawater into the ocean.
Channeling that small amount of Five Elements true energy would have made little difference.
Yet the pain had lessened, likely because he had continuously supported my body’s broken balance.
‘This time I used fire and metal, and wood energies the most.’
The Five Elements Divine Skill, the superior martial art of the Five Elements Spiritual Cultivation that Jegalling was mastering, relied on mutual generation and mutual restraint, making balance paramount.
A true user of the Five Elements Divine Skill would not collapse from using energy imbalanced in such a manner.
Had it been such an imperfect martial art, it would never have earned the name “Divine Skill.”
It was dangerous precisely because it was Jegalling.
The balance of his Five Elements true energy was what suppressed his illness.
As Jegalling circulated his energy, he sensed a quality similar to his own, yet subtly different. It was freshly begun, pure, and therefore extremely faint.
He laid his young disciple upon his own bed.
“Master?”
“Hush. Be quiet.”
Then, grasping my hand, he concentrated his spirit.
Within me lay an inner strength deficit equal to what he had expended on himself.
The balance was broken, but it was only a bean-sized imbalance. Nothing compared to his own.
Jegalling infused his true energy into his disciple.
Confirming that my sleeping expression had become peaceful, he smiled contentedly.
For the first time in ages, Jegalling felt the desire to live.
How wonderful it would be to witness his only disciple grow into an adult and make his entrance into the Martial Arts World.
* * *
I opened my eyes to an unfamiliar yet warm sensation.
My Master was stroking the head of his only disciple.
“You’re awake?”
If I had parents, would it have felt like this?
I stared blankly at that thought before shaking my head.
The place I came from was an orphanage. It had begun to be called a children’s home recently, but back then the term “orphanage” was more familiar.
Some children didn’t know who their parents were, but there were also those who knew yet had still come.
We became friends to one another, yet there was always a void in one corner of the heart——
comfortable
as if a hole had been pierced through my heart.
It was a strange thirst that could never be quenched.
“Master, are you certain you’re alright?”
“You must have been quite frightened, collapsing so suddenly.”
It was more than mere fright. My mind had gone completely blank.
Until now, I had witnessed countless patients’ lives and deaths unfold before me. Yet among them all, I had never experienced the death of family.
Jegalling was the first person in my life to make me feel this way.
I had become rigid as stone, unable to do anything at all.
The medical knowledge I possessed proved useless. Nothing came to mind.
All this time, Jegalling had shown me only strength and composure—the very image of a noble master of the Martial Arts World.
I had not truly grasped that he too was a person who suffered.
I spoke honestly.
“I was deeply frightened, Master. I truly worried so much about you.”
Jegalling smiled softly.
“How fickle the human heart is. I feel sorry for causing you worry, yet seeing you care for me so deeply brings me joy as well…”
I began to understand why the elders of various sects sometimes feigned illness before their disciples.
At eighty or ninety years old, they would complain of aching joints, loss of appetite, speak of how the time to meet departed seniors was drawing near, and worry their disciples. Then they would come to Baekrin Uigak and subtly ask me to corroborate their stories.
Yet when their disciples weren’t watching, they would move about perfectly fine, unleashing streams of sword energy while cultivating their martial arts.
They would think to themselves that they could not grow old like this—somehow they must reach enlightenment and perform the Reverse Flow Circulation technique once more before departing.
Yoo Ho used to grumble that people become foolish when they age, but now Jegalling understood that sentiment as well.
So this is what it means to have a disciple, he thought quietly.
In that moment, a cough escaped Jegalling’s lips. The coughing grew increasingly violent.
When he withdrew his hand from his mouth, dark crimson blood stained his palm.
I cried out in alarm, calling for Yoo Ho.
“Yoo Ho! Master, he—!”
Before I could finish speaking, Yoo Ho had already opened the door. He then retrieved a spiritual elixir from the drawer beside the bed.
“He seemed to be doing better for a while… oh dear.”
Yoo Ho sighed and handed over the medicine.
Watching this unfold, I realized this was not an isolated incident.
‘The situation was actually far more serious than what the novel depicted.’
I had been careless. Master was a supporting character who disappeared early in the story.
The Heavenly Demon Yeo Ha-ryun only encountered Master when he was in a state capable of meeting people.
‘A novel is not an encyclopedia, after all.’
Readers ultimately follow the protagonist’s perspective.
No matter how remarkable Master was, he remained a supporting character. The narrative would not devote many pages to him.
“I’m fine… truly fine.”
Master swallowed the spiritual elixir and began circulating his energy slowly.
His ragged breathing gradually returned to its normal rhythm.
“Phew.”
Yoo Ho exhaled deeply and placed a hand over his chest.
I spoke up.
“How are you feeling?”
“I’m fine.”
“You said yourself that before being your disciple, I’m also a doctor. Everyone in this Medical Hall knows there’s nothing more foolish than hiding an illness.”
“….”
Jegalling exhaled softly.
‘Even those elders who feigned illness would hide their true ailments when they actually fell sick. I didn’t want to understand that sentiment either….’
Yet inevitably, it comes to light. Many illnesses that could have been cured had they been revealed early remained hidden until the very end, beyond treatment.
Humans are truly walking contradictions.
Jegalling extended his wrist.
“Let’s learn pulse diagnosis while we’re at it.”
“You’ve already taught me the theory.”
“But this is your first time actually doing it, isn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“Since we both use the same type of inner energy, even if you make a mistake, there’s almost no risk of serious harm. You won’t find a better practice partner than me.”
I grasped my master’s wrist.
It was the strong, solid arm of a martial artist. What struck me as odd was how unusually cold it felt.
“Close your eyes and from now on, circulate your inner energy according to the incantations I recite. You must not open your eyes or speak under any circumstances.”
My master slowly chanted the incantation.
I operated the Five Elements Spiritual Cultivation according to the incantation, sending my inner energy forth.
‘U-ultrasound…?’
I could sense my master’s interior. It was like a low-resolution ultrasound.
My inner energy moved along my master’s meridians.
As my understanding deepened further, this sensation would become increasingly clearer.
‘So this is pulse diagnosis through inner energy. This is what they meant by developing sensitivity to qi.’
And then I reached the end.
‘It’s truly serious. Serious enough that even I can feel something is wrong.’
Following my master’s incantation, I gathered my energy back.
My circulated inner energy returned to me.
After completing the pulse diagnosis, I slowly opened my eyes.
My master smiled bitterly.
“What do you think?”
“It’s worse than I expected.”
“Yes. You perceived it accurately.”
My fists clenched with determination.
“I will definitely cure it.”
“I thought you’d be frightened, but instead your resolve has only hardened.”
“I will absolutely cure it.”
My disciple’s voice resonates in my cold heart.
Feeling that warmth, my master nodded.
“Yes. Let us make this effort together.”

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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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