Doctor’s Rebirth - Chapter 490

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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 490
035. A Single Needle. Jiang Ziya Fished for the Moon, Yet a Doctor Fishes for Life
Without resorting to grandiose phrases like “daily renewal,” life in Hangzhou was gradually improving.
With so much work to handle each day, it couldn’t be otherwise.
I’d hired scholars to distribute tasks, and beyond the doctors sent from the Baekrin Medical Guild headquarters…
‘I continue to employ and utilize local Hangzhou doctors.’
It was mutual benefit, if you could call it that.
The name of the Baekrin Medical Guild had become absolute in Hangzhou.
Public sentiment improved daily, and even setting aside such sentiment, the skill gap among Hangzhou’s doctors was substantial.
Ordinary medical clinics using apprenticeship-style education versus large-scale medical guilds with systematic training frameworks.
Add to that modern curricula with extremely advanced educational techniques, and the disparity was inevitable.
As a result, independent clinics found it increasingly difficult to survive unless they were affiliated with the Baekrin Medical Guild.
Since the Baekrin Medical Guild itself faced a shortage of personnel, they sought to recruit even a single additional doctor.
‘Though this means I have much to teach.’
Of course, simply joining the Baekrin Medical Guild didn’t instantly fill one’s knowledge.
The first priority was improving diagnostic accuracy.
Patients difficult to treat could be transferred to the Baekrin Medical Guild’s Hangzhou branch.
However, patients treatable locally could be handled at regional clinics.
In a sense, this wasn’t fundamentally different from the existing clinic system.
What mattered was determining whether a patient’s condition was treatable locally, and whether they could be rapidly transferred to the Baekrin Medical Guild’s branch.
Learning these two diagnostic criteria alone was no simple task.
Yet practically speaking, it was the most appropriate approach.
‘Yoo Ho and Muyue… they’re not coming. Damn it.’
I hadn’t even expected the four lords to visit, but these two—claiming they’re busy—don’t even show their faces. I should have known.
Jin Cheon-hee clicked his tongue and, after finishing paperwork as though coughing blood, stepped outside.
‘Eventually I’ll leave this place. Before then, I need to establish everything.’
I couldn’t stay in Hangzhou forever, after all.
I had to hand over operations and return to the Baekrin Medical Guild headquarters where my Master awaited.
I needed to prepare for that time, but the city of Hangzhou itself was formidable.
‘Cheonwoo seems to be wandering in martial combat again.’
Occasionally, I heard of Cheonwoo’s martial reputation.
Of course, all the rumors were tyrannical in nature—the kind that might be mistaken for heterodox rather than righteous—yet his victories were undeniable.
As the air grew colder, Jin Cheon-hee murmured.
“Ah, the scent of winter.”
Winter had begun to descend upon Hangzhou.
A single snowflake adhered to my cheek, and soon countless flakes began to fall.
Yet even with snow falling like this, it wouldn’t accumulate.
It would soon melt into water and flow away.
Such was always the nature of the first snow.
Then it happened.
“Master! Master!”
It was Sama-hye.
“Hm? Hye-a, what’s the matter?”
“You should come look right away.”
An emergency patient had arrived.
Moreover, one that even the medical staff of Baekrin Uiseon couldn’t treat alone.
I immediately rushed after Sama-hye.
* * *
On the bed lay a young child covered entirely in a rash, gasping for breath.
The moment I arrived, the head physician spoke.
“This is smallpox!”
I spoke calmly.
“Everyone, cover your nose and mouth. What are you doing? Have you forgotten everything I’ve taught you?”
At my words, the doctors startled and quickly covered their noses and mouths with cloth.
Smallpox spreads through the respiratory system.
Of course, it wasn’t comparable to modern-day COVID-19, but the patient had arrived at the most contagious stage—right when the rash had just appeared.
I also covered my nose and mouth before entering.
“Ugh… hah…”
The child could barely produce sounds resembling breathing, unable to speak.
The head physician continued.
“It appears the child’s parents have already died from smallpox. This child is also in danger.”
Smallpox.
One could call it humanity’s worst plague.
A disease responsible for at least one billion cumulative deaths throughout history, which the modern world eventually succeeded in eradicating.
But here, there was neither a cure nor any way to prevent transmission.
‘Mortality rate of 30%, respiratory transmission.’
Of course, it might be better than the plague, which kills without mercy, but in some ways it’s worse.
The plague kills its victims quickly.
So quickly that they die before their immune system can even activate.
Looking at historical records, there are documented cases where those who held funerals for plague victims and mourners died the very next day.
‘Smallpox has a 30% mortality rate, which means a 70% survival rate when you think about it differently.’
In other words, if one could strengthen their immune system, survival was possible.
Generally, righteous faction martial artists had high immunity, whether due to my inner energy or cultivation techniques, so they recovered from illness more easily than commoners.
Heterodox faction martial artists too… while they didn’t practice cultivation techniques, their survival rate was still higher.
Learning martial arts itself meant having superior physical constitution compared to ordinary people, and without financial worries, they could maintain adequate nutrition.
Therefore, warriors were far more likely to die from a sword wound than from smallpox.
But commoners were different.
And the 70% of commoners who survived would spread the disease to those around them while battling the illness.
That’s how viruses work.
High mortality rates are extremely dangerous, but conversely, transmission speed slows.
Conversely, if the mortality rate is low, transmission speed increases—a mixed blessing at best.
Smallpox is more vicious than the Plague precisely because it achieves the golden ratio of both mortality and transmissibility.
That’s why smallpox has been discovered in ancient Egyptian mummies and has tormented humanity throughout our entire history.
‘And the fact that it’s a virus makes it particularly insidious.’
Because of this, antibiotics are useless against it.
Antiviral medications are needed, but with this world’s current technology, antivirals cannot be synthesized.
Even in the modern era, smallpox has been eradicated, so there’s no opportunity to test antivirals. However, the hypothesis that they would work is quite credible.
‘Damn it….’
In the end, I can only administer herbal tonics to boost immunity and use qi-healing techniques to keep patients alive until recovery.
If luck is against us, the Doctor performing the qi-healing treatment can become infected as well.
‘But there’s no other method available right now.’
So it comes down to symptomatic treatment.
The Doctors exposed to smallpox are also in a dangerous situation for now.
I need to prepare for that as well.
Before going on medical volunteer work in the past, I’d researched various materials thinking they might be helpful.
According to the materials I reviewed then, if a vaccine made through the cowpox method is administered within 3-4 days of infection, smallpox symptoms are alleviated and the healing probability increases significantly.
‘But… ultimately, even that is just probability.’
Still, I can’t avoid it. I have to do something.
‘Without machinery, I’ll have to make it using primitive methods.’
I have studied the cowpox method in the past.
‘I remember seeing it written briefly in my reference books back in high school.’
I recall being interested in it back then because I wanted to become a Doctor.
First, I isolated the exposed Doctors separately and immediately summoned the other Doctors.
“Everyone here has already learned about smallpox symptoms. I’m sure there’s no one who doesn’t know what smallpox is, how it spreads, or what the treatment is.”
At that moment, one of the middle-aged men raised his hand.
“We were taught that there is essentially no cure.”
“Yes, that’s correct. There essentially isn’t one. The only preventive measure is extracting pathogens from cattle infected with cowpox and using them as a vaccination.”
At the mention of vaccination, the Doctors stirred slightly.
‘Right… this is the natural reaction.’
Even in the modern era, all sorts of wild rumors circulate about vaccinations.
From the simple claim that Bill Gates implants chips for control, to the ability to receive 5G signals through the brain, to the body emitting magnetism—all manner of conspiracy theories exist.
Among them, the most famous and widespread is the claim that ‘vaccinations are extremely dangerous, causing sperm depletion, infertility, and shortened lifespan.’
Because this theory is more plausible than the others, if someone hasn’t received basic education on vaccination principles, they often think ‘Hmm? That could be possible’ and readily believe it.
Of course, if someone received proper public education, they shouldn’t seriously believe this… but they do.
Surprisingly, such people exist.
Of course, vaccinations are not without side effects.
Fever from immune response and general fatigue are typical side effects.
That’s a problem all medicine faces.
But considering the mortality rate of the disease being vaccinated against, and considering the permanent sequelae even if one survives, vaccination is necessary.
With diseases like polio, even if one survives, many cases result in lifelong paralysis on one side of the body.
If human immunity had been that remarkable, the average lifespan in ancient times wouldn’t have been merely thirty years.
Yet in this world, where there was no public education system whatsoever.
In this world, where the very concepts of germs and viruses didn’t exist.
Vaccination seemed like absolute madness—one could easily be beaten for it, accused of employing some sinister sorcery.
That’s right. Even vaccination itself wasn’t well-received at first.
It was only thanks to Hyeolsaeng Nogoe, vaccination’s forced propagator and symbol of fortune, that things worked out.
If I had been a king or emperor instead, I would have simply mandated it by force.
In an era where the very concept of germs and hygiene hadn’t yet taken root.
There even existed the method of variolation—grinding the pustule tissue or pus scabs from someone infected with smallpox into powder and inserting it into the nostrils.
Since this method used actual smallpox pathogens directly, people with weak immunity could die from genuine smallpox.
In such circumstances, if one were to say that to prevent smallpox, one must inject pus from a cow infected with cowpox… that would be the return of Oh Dok-mun.
Even Oh Dok-mun’s people washed frequently and thoroughly.
They used unfiltered water and had no soap, which is why typhoid fever spread.
It wasn’t as though the concept didn’t exist at all—but when people already had their own established methods, displacing those and introducing something completely different made it far more difficult.
Even Edward Jenner, who discovered vaccination, faced initial resistance after discovering the vaccine.
‘Does it make sense to inject cow pathogens into a human body!’
‘How does giving someone a disease prevent disease.’
‘Edward Jenner is plotting to transform people into cattle and dominate England. If you receive that vaccine, people say you’ll start mooing like a cow!’
…and so forth—he encountered all manner of conspiracy theories and opposition from medical practitioners suffering from delusion.
I even considered founding a pseudo-religion for three seconds.
A cult religion where people washed their hands daily and received cowpox vaccination.
However, no matter how much I thought about it, the only ending I could envision was the Gold Silver King being suppressed by the Emperor’s forces.
If this were the old days, perhaps it wouldn’t matter, but now it might actually be possible?
Whether it would work or not.
As expected.
Several of the medical staff seemed skeptical.
It’s easy once it’s done, but difficult before you begin—that’s precisely what this is.

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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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