Doctor’s Rebirth - Chapter 526

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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 526
Namgung Un spoke.
“I told him to ask for anything he needs. The help Samjeolchuho has given the Martial Arts Alliance is beyond price.”
“We’ll need to find another talented tracker to pursue the Hyeolseonggyo in the future.”
“There’s no one quite like her, so it’s troubling. Do you happen to know anyone?”
“A tracker who surpasses the Demonic Cult… Honestly, I don’t know of anyone besides Samjeolchuho.”
“It seems we may fall one step behind the Demonic Cult from now on.”
“We’ll pursue and drive back the Hyeolseonggyo on our own as well.”
“However, if we fall behind in intelligence, we’ll also fall behind in Gangho supremacy later. You understand this, don’t you?”
“Yes. Besides, the Demonic Cult won’t provide information that benefits the Martial Arts Alliance. In the end, the Alliance must solve the problems created by spies within it or within its jurisdiction on its own.”
“Ugh… what a headache. Well, I trust the Alliance Leader will handle it well. Still, I should look for what the Namgung Family can do as well.”
He’s already worrying about the Martial Arts Alliance.
That’s why he became the Alliance Leader.
Namgung Un asked with bright eyes.
“By the way, I risked my life for you. So now, will you call me older brother?”
I couldn’t help but let out a small laugh at that.
“You’ve hit upon the weakness.”
“I stopped you because you were about to risk your life again. You didn’t have much energy left anyway. Why? Were you planning to burn through your innate qi as well?”
“That’s… not quite.”
“Then it should be fine to call me older brother?”
“Have you quit drinking?”
I felt Namgung Un flinch at those words.
Right. You might fool a ghost, but how could you fool a doctor?
“You still have a long way to go. Nam. Gung. Great. Hero.”
“Ouch. You’re being harsh.”
“That’s enough. Give me your wrist. Since we’re on the subject, let me take your pulse.”
“Thank you.”
* * *
After parting ways with Namgung Un, I left Hangzhou.
Fortunately, Namgung Un and his warriors had agreed to support Baekrin Medical Guild’s Bunta branch in Yoo Ho’s location, so I returned to the main headquarters of Baekrin Medical Guild with fifty members of Baekrin.
The journey back was uneventful.
When I arrived at the Baekrin Medical Guild headquarters, my Master was looking down from the top of the stairs.
Hmm. I’m not sure how much he’s heard, but something smells fishy from the start.
“M-Master. Did you do well with the work at the imperial palace?”
“Yes. There’s remaining work, so I’ve been working on it daily. But Hope, you certainly caused quite a stir.”
“Ha, haha… Master! I brought special products from Hangzhou for you!”
Thump!
Hwang-gu wagged his tail enthusiastically at my Master, then placed Noeji on his forehead and did a somersault in midair.
“Wow! Our Hwang-gu prepared a special trick to show you, Master!”
“You’re scheming from the start, Hope. Well, never mind. Come inside.”
That’s a relief. It seems Master isn’t as angry as I feared.
Master immediately led me to his study and poured the tea that Yoo Ho had prepared in advance.
I couldn’t afford to lose here.
I unpacked the special delicacies and bonsai pots that I’d prepared in Hangzhou, displaying them proudly.
I even brought out a particularly rare pot inlaid with mother-of-pearl—the kind typically reserved as bribes for high officials.
But Master…
“Never mind that. Show me your wrist.”
He immediately began taking my pulse and examining my body carefully.
How much time passed?
After inspecting various points, he spoke with a slightly surprised expression.
“Your left arm has improved considerably.”
“Yes! The pain has decreased, and I’ve become able to wield the Hyeongyeong Poison that connects to Hyeolseonggyo.”
My hidden weapon.
My left arm, once a useless burden, had finally become useful.
“…And in the process, you risked your left arm rupturing and becoming permanently disabled.”
“Well… if I hadn’t done it, I would have died anyway.”
“…”
Master reached out his massive hand and stretched my cheek.
“Owwww! Master, I’m sorryyy!”
“I’m stretching out this foolish disciple’s cheek so that better words might come out of it. Perhaps with a stretched cheek, kinder words will emerge.”
After that bit of teasing, Master sighed.
“Hyeolseonggyo has always possessed regenerative abilities beyond human comprehension. Especially the Sip Cheon-gun—those absurd creatures could reattach their arms no matter how many times you severed them. And you developed a poison to counter that. And you captured Geumcheon-gun on top of it.”
Even Master himself seemed unable to believe this achievement.
“M… Master.”
“Haha, my anger hasn’t subsided yet. Hope.”
Ow, ow! It hurts!
Master’s natural physique is such a formidable weapon that even a simple pinch without inner energy feels like my cheek skin is tearing.
When tears began to well up, his heart softened and he finally released his grip.
“Sigh… Hope. Listen. I’m raising a dog, and that beast couldn’t control his nature again—he charged at two Sip Cheon-gun and two Cheongi Sunhaeng practitioners. He’s happy that his arm is healed, but how should I react to that?”
“…That… dog certainly has quite the temperament.”
The words that the two Cheongi Sunhaeng practitioners were dealt with by Yeo Ha-ryun, so this shouldn’t count, almost burst from my throat, but Master wouldn’t accept that excuse.
‘I should stay quiet before I get pinched again.’
Master continued.
“Yes. On the surface, he’s as docile as they come, but his actions suggest he won’t be satisfied until he’s overturned the entire Gangho.”
“But… he came right back after that. And he… he brought Baekrin with him too.”
“Yes. That does make me happy.”
Why is that?
He seems genuinely pleased, not sarcastic or cynical.
Still… even if the outbreak of Hyeolseonggyo near Hangzhou was dangerous and Hye-a needed to go, I prioritized resolving it quickly and meeting Master.
Master is pleased that his disciple possesses at least that much sense. Ahem.
Crack—
“Ahhhhh! M-Master!”
“Haha, looking at that face, you’ve gotten cocky again. Hope.”
Damn. How did he know?
* * *
I shared much conversation with my Master after that.
What my Master had obtained from the imperial palace. What I had obtained from Hangzhou.
The Jegallim Family’s two scholars put their heads together and calculated profits and losses.
Truth be told, there was nothing to calculate. We hadn’t lost anything at all.
Not merely money, but reputation and connections as well.
It was even surprising that Hye-a was managing reasonably well with just the handover from the nearby Bundata Master, without receiving formal education from the main sect yet.
And there was also the achievement in martial arts.
I even felt awe at having come to wield the Hyeongyeong Poison.
“So it’s poison countering poison. By driving Oh Dok-mun’s poison into a rampage with demonic martial arts and refining it with the Jegallim Family’s Five Elements Divine Art, you can now deal a fatal blow to Hyeolseonggyo. Truly… it’s hard to believe even hearing it.”
“Yes. I… well… theoretically it seemed possible. After all, Hyeolseonggyo has always been weak to the demonic path.”
“Pure martial arts from Buddhism or Taoism tend to deal significant damage to demonic arts instead.”
“In a way, it’s a relationship of mutual predation. Though of course, it can’t be viewed so simply.”
My Master raised his blue eyes and spoke thus.
“Hope, what do you wish to become?”
What startled me at those words was this:
It was the very question I had asked myself after Jin Cheon-hee came to wield the Hyeongyeong Poison.
“I’m not sure, Master. Perhaps… a… a sage?”
“Isn’t that a phenomenon that arises when all martial artists eventually witness the end of martial study?”
“Yes. I… suppose so.”
But I couldn’t think of anything beyond that.
“Anyway, I never expected that insect from the demonic path to be this useful. This all happened because my disciple is so excellent.”
Just when I thought he was praising Yeo Ha-ryun, he threw a curveball and praised his disciple instead.
Still, I suppose I got off cheap at this rate.
“In that sense, I shall impose a punishment on you. Hope.”
“Yes?”
“You’ve received two thousand households as a fief, so you must manage them, must you not? Think about how you will manage it.”
“Yes, yes?”
“Why do you have such a vacant expression?”
Uh… I didn’t anticipate this. No, uh… well, I suppose it is true.
What my Master obtained from this war was an honorary title of Third Rank: the Count of Uiguk.
Like honorary professors, honorary chairmen, and all such honorary positions, this too was merely a title without authority.
Yet because the Emperor himself had stamped this powerless title, the Third Rank officials would be cautious in dealing with my Master.
All things with “honorary” attached are like that.
‘He’s definitely a pickled radish, but we’re not excluding him from our game either,’ so from the officials’ perspective, it becomes ‘What are you talking about?’
Therefore, the two thousand households I received this time are technically the Count of Uiguk’s lands, but since “honorary” is attached to this as well, it becomes something rather ambiguous.
First, it’s certain that my Master went from being a mere doctor to becoming a local magistrate.
Generally, there are two major things the owner of a fief can do.
Tax rights and corvée rights.
It’s possible to collect taxes and keep them as personal revenue.
Of course, in the empire, you only need to pay back a tenth of what you collect, so it’s an absolutely tremendous privilege.
Looking at old stories, local magistrates are always lounging around and living carefree lives—those are exactly these types of people.
It’s practically like having several modern landlords combined into one divine occupation.
Next comes corvée rights.
For at least three months out of the year, you can force the people living in two thousand households to labor.
Similarly, if you look at old martial arts tales, don’t poor commoners end up moving massive bricks to build pavilions for the nobility to enjoy, only to get beaten by passing martial artists?
That’s exactly the magic of these corvée rights.
It’s incomparable to Monkey Magic.
Now if my Master hands these people plows and tells them to turn mountains into fields, they become farmland, and if he tells them to turn fields into mountains, that’s what happens.
It feels somewhat like wielding a general’s magic wand.
I recall some soldiers lying in their beds, hoping their discharge would be delayed as long as possible.
Is humanity the same everywhere?
Through all this, administrative authority falls into his hands, but in exchange, judicial authority still remains with the constabulary.
The constabulary must exist, or the moment a local magistrate puts weapons into commoners’ hands instead of plows, hoes, and sickles, he’d be sent on a one-way trip to the underworld.
But here’s the ambiguous part—while it’s written that judicial authority can’t be touched, when orchids, pines, and rare chrysanthemums keep coming and going behind the scenes, it becomes meaningless.
If that continues for three generations, it becomes entrenched.
Even when the emperor changes and the nation’s name changes, administrators are still dispatched and local magistrates continue doing what they’ve always done, so these situations arise.
Originally, important matters like this tend to be handled sloppily.
So when it comes to criminals, the constabulary’s officers and commanders bring them in, but the magistrate hands down the verdict?
This becomes a rather problematic structure.
So here’s the problem.
Jegalling of Baekrin Medical Guild holds the “honorary” title of Minister of Medicine, but should we recognize this person as magistrate or not?
The answer is: “If the Emperor hasn’t specifically appointed a separate magistrate, then the honorary title becomes the magistrate position.”
Office workers might feel this is similar to their own company falling apart somewhere, but that’s correct.
That’s how it works.
So my pickled radish Master is an honorary magistrate.
Because the original magistrate was appointed elsewhere and left, and the regional administrators under him—all former local magistrates—sent official documents saying, “Well, you’ve become an honorary magistrate, so you’re the magistrate now, right?”
My Master sent a memorial asking, “Isn’t a new magistrate coming?” and received the reply, “Yes. Govern it well.”
Politics is a field that runs on improvisation.
In the midst of all this, my disciple happened to crash into two Sip Cheon-gun soldiers and two Cheon Gi-sunhaeng soldiers, then said, “Master, I’ve come back with an upgrade without breaking my arm.”
My Master input the command: “I’m giving you the duties of acting magistrate.”
It looks like I won’t be able to escape until I complete all of this.

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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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