Doctor’s Rebirth - Chapter 441

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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 441
Danmok Fortress had been built from the outset to hold back the mounted tribes.
In peacetime, it served as a marketplace for trade with these peoples, but in wartime, it transformed into a brutal military stronghold.
And it was at a considerable distance from such a fortress that the Suksin Tribe’s army appeared.
And astonishingly, these young ones began firing cannons!
Boom, crash-crash-crash!
Of course, the Imperial Army possessed cannons as well.
Since the Divine Thunder Cannon itself was a weapon using gunpowder, it made no sense to claim they couldn’t manufacture cannons.
The simple reason they hadn’t used cannons in the previous battle was straightforward.
Given the casting technology of this era, their considerable weight meant they were only deployed in defensive or siege warfare, not in open field battles.
The cannons of this world, if compared to Earth where I once lived, were the most primitive form that emerged around the fourteenth century.
One cannot compare primitive cannons to modern artillery.
Naturally, destroying fortress walls took considerable time.
They fired iron spheres as projectiles.
Many misfired along the way, and explosions within the cannons themselves occurred quite frequently.
And while their roar was tremendous, they weren’t powerful enough to topple walls in a single strike.
The number of cannons the Suksin Tribe had brought wasn’t particularly large either.
Nevertheless, cannons were cannons.
It naturally inspired dread that the Suksin Tribe had captured skilled craftsmen and begun casting cannons.
Yet General Yuk Heon and his subordinate commanders remained remarkably composed.
They already knew these people possessed such weapons.
The northern mounted peoples rarely gathered in large numbers, but once their numbers swelled, they became massive armies that invaded neighboring states.
Since their primary force was cavalry, they indeed showed weakness in assaulting fortifications—something they themselves understood objectively.
This was the infuriating part.
Our invaders were ruthless, plundering and using captured civilians as human shields, yet simultaneously possessed remarkable capacity for objective self-reflection.
Because of this, they enslaved others.
They captured craftsmen from other peoples to produce weapons or seized and utilized captured ones.
They had likely already attacked villages and cities in the Selim territories, and might have briefly crossed the border to seize craftsmen.
Or perhaps craftsmen captured in past wars still lived and were being forced to train successors.
Having heard countless such intelligence reports, I had already deduced they would possess siege weapons.
“So it’s a defensive siege after all.”
And from one section of the fortress wall, Eunwang and I looked down upon the scene below.
With each thunderous boom of the cannons, one section of the fortress wall was being destroyed.
However, the walls, stacked thick by the finest masons, cracked but did not crumble.
Of course, our forces were also firing cannons in return.
Unlike arrows, the effective range of both sides’ cannons was comparable.
‘Though even that alone was horrifying from the Empire’s perspective.’
Primitive compared to the modern era though they were, these cannons had been crafted by weapon-smiths who applied their ingenuity.
I couldn’t fathom how to accept that cannons made by craftsmen the Suksin Tribe had captured and enslaved possessed comparable range to ours.
In any case, both sides became occupied with defending against the cannon fire.
The Suksin Tribe had erected wooden palisades in front of their cannons to shield themselves from direct fire, while the cannons atop Danmok Fortress’s walls used metal frames as protective barriers.
Observing this situation, I drew slowly on my cigarette.
I wasn’t certain how much calming effect it would have, but now I stood in the very heart of the battlefield.
Gangho martial artists had been mobilized for the defense, and I occasionally glimpsed familiar faces of warriors passing by.
However, I deliberately buried myself deep and remained hidden, making no effort to acknowledge them.
With cannons exploding on both sides, neither they nor I had the presence of mind for such pleasantries, and I couldn’t guarantee what would become of me if an acquaintance fell in this war.
My gaze suddenly fell upon the Wudang Sect.
Among them, Cheonwoo stood out distinctly due to his remarkably imposing physique.
Perhaps he sensed my gaze?
Cheonwoo’s eyes turned toward me.
I gave him a light nod, then shifted my gaze to search for Hao-mun.
Finding Sama Hyeon proved equally effortless.
He wore black clothing to blend into this battlefield, yet adorned himself with strangely ornate accessories—that was unmistakably Sama Hyeon.
But Sama Hyeon had already been watching me.
I offered him a nod as well, wishing for his safety, then turned my gaze back beyond the fortress walls.
“The Suksin Tribe possesses cannons, it seems.”
“Do you think they don’t know siege warfare is their weakness? A hundred years ago, before cannons existed, they obtained blueprints for the Thunderbolt Trebuchet and manufactured them for their own use.”
“The Thunderbolt Trebuchet… That’s the one used during the Three Kingdoms period, isn’t it?”
“It was an excellent siege weapon even a hundred years ago. Of course, cannons are superior now… which is why the fortress walls have been reinforced to be even thicker to withstand cannon fire.”
So there was such history to this.
Boom!
Whiiiiiiish—
As I marveled inwardly, a cannonball flew directly toward Eun Wang-ya and me.
Eun Wang-ya’s eyes widened in shock, and the surrounding military officers cried out.
“Your Majesty! Quickly, take cover—”
“Too late. Block it with your bodies.”
The moment the officers threw themselves forward to protect Wang-ya.
I extended my hand and gently caught the cannonball.
In that instant, everyone’s eyes widened in astonishment.
My pale white hands moved at a speed invisible to ordinary mortals, grasping and spinning the projectile, then struck it with my palm.
Everyone present recognized that some profound martial technique was at work, yet none could discern exactly what that technique was.
Boom—!
The cannonball rocketed back faster and more powerfully than it had come.
It struck one of the Suksin Tribe’s cannons directly, shattering it completely.
Crash-boom-boom-boom!
Eun Wang-ya murmured.
“Could it be… the Tai Chi Palm?”
Only Eun Wang-ya had recognized it.
The essence of Tai Chi itself!
At this astonishing display, even Eun Wang-ya’s eyes widened in shock.
The military officers and soldiers around him were all left speechless.
And belatedly, everyone cried out.
“Uwaaaaaa!”
“Waaaaaaa!”
“The Veiled Madman! The Veiled Madman!”
“The Warrior God! The Warrior God!”
Jin Cheon-hee was slightly taken aback by the sudden roar of cheers, but I smiled and played it off with a jest.
“War is certainly war, isn’t it? Even blind cannonballs come flying.”
“Huh… How is such a thing possible for you?”
Eun Wang-ya had grasped the principle, yet she still seemed amazed.
“I’m at the level of a Hwakyeong Master, so cannonballs are hardly a threat.”
Slow iron spheres that don’t explode on their own could never kill a Hwakyeong Master.
If it had detonated at close range, the shockwave might have caused injury, but this was nothing of concern.
Of course, the technique of adding one’s own force to an incoming cannonball and sending it back—the method of Reciprocal Grafting—was not something any Hwakyeong Master could perform.
‘Wait, now that I think about it…’
Jin Cheon-hee’s eyes rolled as I fell into thought.
‘There was a martial arts novel I read before where the protagonist charged out beyond the city walls and threw thunderbolt pellets at siege weapons before retreating?’
Among the martial arts novels I’d read while living in Korea, there were occasionally ones called “realistic martial arts” that lacked inner force or sword energy.
One of them, a novel called “B’s Meteor Bullet,” featured a siege battle where a master of lightness martial arts named Void Divine Footwork performed such a feat.
‘Ah… I want to re-read it from the beginning.’
The fact that such thoughts came to mind even now was surely because I was a martial arts fanatic to my core.
Or perhaps it was because of the cigarettes my Master had given me.
I roughly adapted the story to fit the conventions of this world and explained it, and Eun Wang-ya nodded.
“Such novels exist? Popular fiction is truly entertaining. But the protagonists in such popular novels must find it frustrating. What you just demonstrated—wasn’t that the technique of Reciprocal Grafting?”
What would you know! What could you possibly understand about the charm that realistic martial arts fiction provides!
‘This is all because of regression, possession, and reincarnation martial arts. These three have ruined the genre.’
Jin Cheon-hee, the Taewongun of martial arts fiction, thought thus.
By that logic, I myself am a protagonist who possessed a book.
However, such is hypocrisy.
That’s what martial arts purists are good at, after all.
The martial arts purist in my heart has risen from the grave, but I still must live in reality.
My life is far too precious to commit the madness of intimidating the Emperor.
Social life of the strong bowing to the weak.
Martial arts purists are also skilled at anger management.
By that standard, everything except D-Ball is basically the same anyway.
‘Eun Wang-ya, by the same logic, game-fiction protagonists with systems would find us frustrating.’
They warp with a “Warp!” and instantly teleport, they heal with a “Heal!” and recover.
Depending on the worldview set by the author, leveling up alone could be a cure-all that heals the entire body.
No matter how severely a hunter is wounded, one sip of a potion and their HP fills up and they’re healed.
It’s a world where doctors go unemployed.
It’s precisely because King would never have seen modern Earth web novels that I can say such things.
“By the way, I’ve never seen that level of Flame Grafting technique from other Hwakyeong masters before.”
“Cheonwoo… will probably be capable of it eventually too. The Flame Grafting technique cannot exclude the Wudang Sect, and Master Gwon Je would naturally be far better at it than I am.”
“Gwon Je… They should have brought him to the battlefield as well.”
It’s not easy to bring someone of that caliber from the Wudang Sect.
Especially since Gwon Je is eccentric—he might just run off if things go wrong.
‘You should give up on Sect Leader level.’
Even those at the Deputy Sect Leader level are already itching to flee, and everyone was desperately trying to exempt them from conscription.
‘Come to think of it, since Dang-a is from Sichuan Province, she’s probably joined the second main force.’
Finding someone you know in this chaotic battle is like plucking a star from the sky.
The Martial Arts Mobile Corps alone has several units.
“By the way, Eun Wang-ya.”
“What is it?”
“Now that I think about it, if Tugoe were here, I think it might actually be possible. That plan I mentioned earlier.”
“You mean jumping over the city wall and destroying the cannons before returning? Hmm, certainly, if Tugoe—one of the Ten Greatest Masters under Heaven—were here, it might be possible.”
She cannot be conscripted.
She who survived the Assassination Decree for such a long time would never answer a summons now.
When you think about it, it’s rather unusual that my Master came along out of concern for me as a disciple.
‘That’s why everyone’s been looking at our master and disciple pair with strange eyes.’
If a disciple dies on the battlefield, they die—it’s not normal in this world for a Patriarch to move personally just out of worry.
Anyway, back to the point: Gong Ya-geon of Tugoe.
A speed that even Cheonma, who has reached Hyeongyeong, cannot catch—that’s truly a human Lamborghini, a human jet.
In an age where humans create mini nuclear bombs and blow up mountains, what’s the point of not being able to cover hundreds of kilometers per hour by running?
‘There are certainly warriors who can manage a few steps at that speed.’
In any case, Tugoe can do it. If it’s Tugoe.
Eun Wang-ya spoke.
“Hmm… Are there no such masters in this fortress right now?”

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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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