Doctor’s Rebirth - Chapter 405

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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 405
Yoo Ho furrowed his brow, troubled by something, and let out a deep sigh.
“What is the matter?”
“We have a visitor.”
“There was no notice of any visit… So they’ve arrived unannounced. Where have they come from?”
“Gongseon Gang, acting as the Gaju of the Gongseon Family. Along with Gongseon Yeong and Wang Gak-yeon.”
* * *
There exists a book called the Gangho Register of Names.
This book is created and sold by Hao-mun, with Sama Hyeon as its originator.
After all, weren’t the two sects of Hao-mun and Gaebang seasoned professionals in buying and selling information from way back?
However, Sama Hyeon took it one step further, creating this formidable work under the pretext of conducting credible information trading.
The result?
It was a massive success.
Intangible value like information can only command higher prices when backed by trust and clarity, and credibility itself originates from such invisible faith.
This Gangho Register of Names was nothing short of a prized tool in establishing such credibility.
So what exactly is this book?
As the name suggests, it is a compendium containing information about the names and figures of Gangho.
Its distinguishing feature is that it does not delve into intimate secrets.
For example, suppose there is a certain warrior from some distant sect in Gangho. Then the book would record it like this:
Name: So-and-so
Age: Thirty-five
Sect: Such-and-such
Martial Arts: Miscellaneous Techniques
Life: Born in such-and-such year and month. Family circumstances, martial prowess, temperament, and deeds.
Brief, yet containing enough information to understand who this person is.
If someone’s name is even slightly known in a region, they are recorded in this register, which contains over forty thousand individuals and continues to be updated and expanded.
The price is exorbitantly high, but it is trustworthy.
Thus it sold exceptionally well, and alongside this book, Hao-mun gained a slight edge over Gaebang in the information industry.
This remarkable book also exists in Baekrin Medical Guild.
According to that tome, Gongseon Gang is evaluated in the Gangho Register of Names as someone wielding considerable influence in Gangho.
‘Gongseon Gang. Now fifty-five years old. Master of the Gongseon Family’s exclusive martial art, the Gongseon Sword Technique. His martial realm is Hwagyeong, and simultaneously he serves as Chief Manager of the Gongseon Family. Additionally, his distinctive trait is fluency in five languages, if I recall correctly.’
That was not all.
‘He is also the head of the maritime trading operations run by the Gongseon Family. Perhaps because of this, he possesses expertise in crafting siege weapons…’
I consider the information about Gongseon Gang.
Though I have coordinated well with the Gongseon Family thus far, their true business is actually maritime trade.
The Gongseon Family is located in Liaoning Province, and it is said they have divided this region with the Moyong Family for over several hundred years.
The Moyong Family is descended from the royal bloodline of the Yan Kingdom during the Spring and Autumn period, which did not perish but took root in Liaoning Province.
The Gongseon Family, however, is known to be a clan that has dwelled in Liaoning Province even longer than the Moyong Family.
While all other prominent families possess plausible founding legends, the Gongseon Family’s is particularly grandiose.
They are known to be the bloodline of the Yellow Emperor Gongsun Xuanyuan, an existence from primordial mythology itself.
A clan that had flourished since before the Three Kingdoms era and maintained its prosperity to this day—truly worthy of being called a thousand-year family.
These rulers, who divided Liaoning Province with the Moyong Family, sustained their clan through maritime trade.
Because of this, they had formed a strategic alliance with the Unryongpyoguk, one of the ten major pyo guks in the empire, regarding internal circulation.
This was also why Gongseon Yeong had been present when I saved the surviving pyo sa of the Unryongpyoguk in the past.
And the current gaju is Gongseon Hyeon—someone who cherishes her younger brother dearly.
Her younger brother, Gongseon Yeong, possessed a heavenly sun constitution, and I had no way of knowing how he had transformed by now.
In the original work, he was already a deceased character, after all.
However, according to occasional letters, he was healthy, apparently?
Since they only stated he was healthy, I couldn’t determine how much stronger he had become.
I organized such information in my mind while following my Master Jegalling’s footsteps.
Gongseon Gang had come along with Gongseon Yeong and Wang Gak-yeon, and they were already waiting for Jegalling and me in the reception room.
As we walked toward the reception room, my Master spoke.
“The Gongseon Family has been in partnership with the Unryongpyoguk for a long time, but recently several ventures that the Unryongpyoguk’s gukju invested in failed, causing the Unryongpyoguk’s power to drop to half its former strength.”
“I had heard the clan was gradually declining, but I understood it was decisively undermined while I was in Yunnan. However, I didn’t know the power had fallen to such an extent.”
“Indeed. No one expected it to be destroyed to that degree—I myself was able to gauge the scale of losses through merchants dealing with the Unryongpyoguk.”
It seemed he had succeeded in making inferences by consolidating information from multiple sources rather than just one or two.
‘The gukju really took a massive hit this time.’
Fluctuations are inevitable when conducting business.
In a sense, since the novel began with the Unryongpyoguk suffering a blood catastrophe and the clan’s fortune declining significantly from the start, preventing this much of it might mean I had averted considerable fate.
My Master continued.
“The Gongseon Family will likely use this opportunity to completely acquire and merge the Unryongpyoguk, then seriously expand into the pyo guk business by linking it with their maritime trade.”
Merger instead of annihilation.
This was quite a peaceful development.
And considering Gongseon Hyeon and her ambitions, at the point when she decided to enter the pyo guk business, she would have struck down the Unryongpyoguk to eliminate her competition if she could.
“Could it be… that the gukju suspects…”
“…Ah yes, whether Gongseon Hyeon orchestrated a conspiracy. According to my investigation, she did not. Rather, she provided aid. If she had conducted this operation while evading the eyes of myself, Gaebang, and Hao-mun, it would constitute an outright crime. She would have even deceived the Unryongpyoguk’s gukju himself.”
“Hmm.”
“What do you think? Does it seem to you that she would have laid hands on the Unryongpyoguk?”
The Black Ice Poison Dragon, Gongseon Hyeon.
Having read the original work, I knew how terrifying she was.
However.
“I don’t think it was her this time.”
My Master’s blue eyes gazed upon eyes that were blue like his own yet of a different lineage.
The eyes of a disciple.
“Why do you think so?”
“It may sound mad… but it’s because of her cousin, Gongseon Yeong.”
“Hmm?”
“Gongseon Hyeon is certainly known as a cold-blooded strategist type, but there is one exception—her younger brother Gongseon Yeong. As long as she loves the Unryongpyoguk, she will protect that landscape.”
Gongseon Yeong loves the Unryongpyoguk.
He loves the people there.
Upon hearing of this business venture’s failure, she was probably crying with eyes like a calf’s.
Gongseon Hyeon, witnessing this, felt her insides burn, but she could not rejoice.
“Do you believe that knowledge cannot overcome the heart?”
“Rather than heart, it would be connection. Gongseon Hyeon is someone who was willing to hand over the position of Gaju to her younger brother Gongseon Yeong. Would such a person truly make Gongseon Yeong cry just to earn a few more coins for the Gongseon Family?”
“So it means she cherishes her as dearly as life itself.”
‘Yes, that’s how it was in the original work too.’
My Master nodded.
“There is truth in your words. No matter how ruthless one may be, everyone has weaknesses.”
Saying so, my Master gazed intently at his disciple.
“…?”
“You foolish, foolish disciple.”
My Master still remembered that disciple throwing himself at a madman of Hyeongyeong level.
He remembered the scene from when he arrived.
Sama Hyeon was drenched in the enemy’s blood.
How many had he killed? His eyes, wide and gleaming, were no longer those of a human.
-Thud!
Hwang-gu’s tail wagged violently as he charged toward Jegalling.
Noeji sat atop Hwang-gu’s head.
That was it.
Noeji found the direction, and Hwang-gu tracked down Jegalling rushing toward them by scent.
Sama Hyeon had come charging while slaying enemies in his path.
Even as the medical staff stitched his wounds and administered antidotes, his condition would not improve, so in seeking a last resort, Hwang-gu and Noeji sensed Yoo Ho’s presence.
This foolish disciple would never know.
I had no intention of ever speaking of it.
It was a memory too horrific even to voice.
The Bumun-ju of Odok-mun died, and Odok Munzu could no longer engage in combat.
With Jin Cheon-hee losing consciousness as well, Yunnan at that time was chaos itself.
Normally, one could have occupied Odok-mun itself and waited there until the chaos subsided.
But Sama Hyeon, forgetting even that he himself was a patient requiring treatment, had to carve a path to save his brother.
Merely to guide him through a shortcut.
The longer treatment was delayed, the greater the danger to his brother’s life.
And his brother, even now, fought desperately against a madman of Hyeongyeong level to protect those behind him.
In that moment, Sama Hyeon was still the one being protected.
The sight of his brother standing before him as a shield at first, and now standing before him as a shield again.
Within a despair that threatened to drive him mad.
And so the young man went to meet Jegalling, drenched in enemy blood.
That one who was always composed and slick as a white egret suddenly bore an expression containing all the madness of the world upon seeing Jegalling.
Had Jin Cheon-hee not awakened then, Yunnan would have been either burned by Sama Hyeon’s hand or shattered by Jegalling’s—one or the other.
Those hellish twenty days.
This foolish disciple’s secret.
“Still, it seems like the right answer. I agree—Gongseon Hyeon is the type who would bear any loss for Gongseon Yeong’s sake.”
I nodded in acknowledgment.
“Unryongpyoguk primarily operated across three regions: Zhejiang Province as its core, along with Fujian and Jiangsu. So they’ll be withdrawing from Fujian due to this business failure. That leaves only….”
“Jiangsu and Zhejiang. And they’re already substantially scaling back operations in Jiangsu Province.”
My expression grew cold at those words.
“That’s happened because Baekrin Medical Guild has become too formidable. Since Baekrin Medical Guild controls Jiangsu Province, they’ve already resolved much of the Pyo Guk’s business there.”
“Exactly. With independent trade routes already established, there’s barely any need for the Pyo Guk anymore. Did you perhaps feel sorry for Unryongpyoguk?”
I shook my head.
“Not at all. Public matters are public, and private matters are private.”
A place that should have collapsed long ago.
Had I not helped them cross that critical juncture back then?
Baekrin Medical Guild had already shown considerable favor to Unryongpyoguk during this time, so what comes next is a problem I must handle as a businessman.

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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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