Doctor’s Rebirth - Chapter 846

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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 846
Thus, in the Baekrin Medical Guild’s bamboo grove pavilion.
The dense bamboo forest swallowed sound, preventing it from leaking outward.
“The Baekrin Medical Guild certainly knows how to choose discreet locations.”
“We could have talked in a room, but bringing me here suggests you’re prepared to flee if necessary.”
“No. I simply wanted some fresh air.”
I answered as if to say, what are you talking about?
“….”
“….”
I had genuinely come out for fresh air.
The Aged Taoists were all nursing drinks, and the smell of alcohol permeated everything.
The banquet had ended, but truly it hadn’t.
The elders insisted on drinking through the night—what could I do?
Since it was a rare gathering, I couldn’t bring myself to tell them not to drink, so I simply left.
“By the way, the Jegallim Family dumplings truly lived up to their reputation. I’ve come to understand just how terrifying the legacy passed down through generations can be.”
“You are too kind.”
I bowed respectfully in acknowledgment.
‘Is he really after the Jegallim Family’s dumpling secrets? Absolutely not. That won’t happen.’
Soon, Cheol-san opened his mouth.
“I lost this time, but I shall win next time.”
“By all means. Though if you paid more attention to hygiene, I would gladly accept the challenge.”
That man’s touch.
Cheol-san found my words amusing and laughed heartily before speaking.
“By the way, do you know that the Heavenly Mechanism is nearly shattered?”
This was something I hadn’t anticipated.
So this man wasn’t merely an ordinary dumpling master.
My eyes began to glow with blue light.
“The Cheon Gi-sunhaeng. So the Great Master Cheol-san belongs to them.”
Cheol-san grinned wickedly.
“One of the Cheon Gi-sunhaeng. I am Jongri Cheol-san, inheriting the lineage of Jongri Gwon, one of the Eight Immortals.”
“Jongri Cheol-san!”
In martial arts novels, when the protagonist ascends through tribulation to reach the immortal realm, the first person usually encountered is Master Jang Sambon of the Mudang Faction.
After meeting Master Jang Sambon as a tribulation immortal and exchanging moves, one frequently encounters Jongri Gwon, one of the Eight Immortals.
Typically, Jongri Gwon rarely appears as a tribulation immortal.
The Eight Immortals of Daoism.
Eight famous celestial beings.
Among them, Jongri Gwon is famous for being rotund and carrying a banana leaf fan.
I never knew his successor existed.
“You have no connection to the Jongri Sega? Now that I think about it… the Great Master’s surname was never widely known in Gangho…”
The Jongri Sega.
While they weren’t counted among the eight great Segas of Gangho, they possessed power comparable to them.
And they were known to be direct descendants of the Eight Immortals’ Jongri Quan.
As for Goerycheolbong Cheolsan.
His surname was known to be Cheol.
In other words, he had been hiding the fact that he was of the Jongri clan!
“That side is a branch line. The legitimate succession belongs to my line.”
Family secrets, something like that?
When I stared intently at him, Cheolsan spoke.
“There are complicated circumstances, so don’t ask.”
Well, there must be something.
“Then you’re cooking to hide your identity?”
“It’s not widely known, but… the Immortal Jongri Quan, our ancestor, was also famous as a Food Immortal. So to properly inherit his legacy, I must pursue cooking as a form of cultivation.”
Such a secret?
“Then what business does Cheon Gi-sunhaeng have with me? Besides, not long ago they came looking for me again, saying they’d assassinate me.”
That was true.
When I became a righteous thief punishing corrupt officials, and two thousand assassins descended to unleash the Assassin’s Gathering.
At the time when I swept them all up and handed them over to the magistrate’s office.
An Aged Taoist from Cheon Gi-sunhaeng came as an assassin.
Though he met his end by Sama Hyeon’s hand, it wasn’t a pleasant memory.
“Cheon Gi-sunhaeng is like a confederation similar to the Martial Arts Alliance. Within it, people with different ideologies have gathered. And those belonging to Cheon Gi-sunhaeng have now all decided to move according to their own convictions.”
‘Does that mean the confederation has split apart…? Still, they’re threatening forces.’
I have no way of knowing how many of them there are or what extent of influence they possess.
I don’t even know why they call themselves Cheon Gi-sunhaeng in the first place.
Though they’re said to oppose the Hyeolseon Sect, just as I know almost nothing about the Hyeolseon Sect.
Their identities too are shrouded in secrecy.
“The Heavenly Qi has already completely scattered. Now it’s become a world not of Orderly Heaven but of Chaotic Heaven. As a result…”
I wait for the other’s words.
“The Three Elites will move. Furthermore, the practitioners of Cheon Gi-sunhaeng who have been in seclusion and the executives of the Hyeolseon Sect will clash in earnest, revealing themselves in the mortal world, bringing about the situation of Chaotic Heaven’s Arrival. That’s why I came to confirm what kind of person you are.”
“To confirm for what purpose?”
“Whether to join hands or to aim weapons at each other. That’s what I came to confirm.”
Alliance or enmity.
That’s why he came here.
‘So the dumplings were a deception…’
“Of course, separate from that, the dumpling competition was my sincere intention. But I won’t be discouraged by this! I’ve experienced countless defeats while making dumplings, but eventually overcame them and won. I will definitely surpass the Jegallim Family’s dumplings as well!”
He clenched his fists and trembled with intensity.
I could feel his fighting spirit.
I stared at him blankly.
‘No. Why is this man so sincere about this part?’
But my heart grew hot as well.
My soul as a culinary master burned with passion.
“I see. I look forward to it.”
The path of gastronomy runs deep.
“But Jongri Grand Master.”
“Call me Cheol-san.”
“Yes. Cheol-san Grand Master. You are certainly an absolute master, but… don’t you lack the forces to discuss an alliance with us? Unless you were to become a guest or a retainer of our Medical Guild…”
“This continues from what I was saying earlier, but there are various factions even within the Cheon Gi-sunhaeng. And I belong to the Palseon-do.”
‘Palseon-do? The last character is do, meaning picture… Is the faction name the picture of the Eight Immortals? How peculiar…’
“So you’ve come representing that Palseon-do… Is that what you’re saying? Could it be that the Palseon-do gathers the successors of the Eight Immortals?”
“Exactly so. Beyond us, there are several other forces. Gonglun Mountain and Yangsanbo, and many other places exist as well.”
Gonglun Mountain. Yangsanbo.
I knew those names.
China’s Four Great Classical Novels.
The Investiture of the Gods, The Water Margin, Journey to the West, The Romance of the Three Kingdoms.
Some replace The Water Margin or The Investiture of the Gods with The Golden Lotus.
Why is that?
Because The Golden Lotus is an outstanding adult tale… it sometimes goes unmentioned.
In any case, in The Investiture of the Gods, one of these four great novels, there appears a group called Gonglun Mountain.
A collective of immortals who wage great wars in The Investiture of the Gods.
This name Gonglun Mountain refers both to a specific location and simultaneously to the name of a faction.
There is a myth that Gonglun Mountain is a sacred mountain where Taoist immortals dwell, and the story of immortals gathering there to fight is what is called The Investiture of the Gods or The Investiture of the Gods Chronicles.
Whether drawn from such mythology, there exists an actual geographical name called the Gonglun Mountain Range in reality.
And the Gonglun Sect, a Gangho martial faction and Taoist sect, has established itself on this Gonglun Mountain Range while claiming to be the descendants of that legendary collective known as ‘Gonglun Mountain’.
But then.
There are those who claim to be Gonglun Mountain, that legendary faction of immortals?
What connection do they have with the Gonglun Sect?
Are they completely unrelated?
Or do they maintain a secret relationship?
‘Well, when I look at those Hyeolseon Sect members, they do give off the feeling of the Jindo from The Investiture of the Gods. After all, the Sip Cheon-gun is a splinter faction of the Jindo…’
I continued my thoughts to the next group.
Yangsanbo!
In The Water Margin, one of the Four Great Classical Novels, there appears a group called Yangsanbo.
However, unlike Gonglun Mountain, these are not immortals.
Yet they are beings with superhuman abilities nonetheless.
Depending on the martial arts novel, they are sometimes depicted as the ancestors of the Green Forest bandits, but in Jicheon Cheonma it seems to follow the original source.
‘Could there also be a group from Journey to the West?’
Journey to the West, one of the Four Great Classical Novels.
Journey to the West features the famous Sun Wukong, and The Romance of the Three Kingdoms—well, there’s no point talking about it.
I recalled how the Gonglun Sect typically appears in martial arts novels.
And how the Gonglun Sect exists in this other world where I stand.
‘Come to think of it… the Gonglun Sect. It’s certainly a Righteous Faction, but it doesn’t belong to the Martial Arts Alliance. And its external activities are quite sparse. There’s talk that it’s because it’s located in the remote edges of the Gonglun Mountain Range in the Hwa Empire, but…’
I need to figure out who these people are, I thought, refocusing on the man before me.
“I’ve never heard of such a thing. It seems my knowledge is rather limited.”
“Haha, such modesty! Surely someone like you would have already grasped the clues from just a few of my words?”
Yangsan Fortress and Gonglun Mountain.
Both were groups belonging to the Cheon Gi-sunhaeng.
They couldn’t possibly be ordinary people.
“We don’t involve ourselves in worldly affairs. Disputes over interests and such are none of our concern, so there’s no reason for people to know of us.”
“Is that truly possible?”
“What’s impossible about it? Even I wandered through Gangho for ten years making and selling dumplings, yet I’m merely treated as a monstrous person in Gangho—I’ve never influenced the flow of the secular world.”
That was true enough.
Goerycheolbong Cheol-san.
Though he was a master of Gangho, he had never involved himself in past incidents like the Bidong affair or the major events of Gangho history that followed.
The same was true of Nang-in Wang, who claimed to walk the Cheon Gi-sunhaeng.
They all existed within Gangho, yet remained uninvolved in its greater currents.
“I’ve spoken at length. So I came to propose an alliance.”
I gazed quietly at Cheol-san.
“An alliance…?”
“Indeed. Now that the Heavenly Mechanism has already awakened, we believe it’s better to join hands with you to set the world right and save the people.”
“What do the others think?”
“Yangsan Fortress says they’ll watch and fight only the Hyeolseon Sect. Gonglun Mountain wants you eliminated.”
Not particularly surprising.
How many silver rewards were already hanging over my head?
I hadn’t killed anyone, yet resentment kept piling up—it was unjust, yet thinking it was simply the way of Gangho made it feel oddly bearable.
“Hmm….”
“This isn’t a decision to make in a single day. Take your time to think it over.”
Cheol-san said no more and turned to leave without hesitation.
I quickly called out to his departing back.
“Wait!”
“Oh?”
Had I already made a decision?
He turned with anticipation, and I fumbled through my sleeve, producing something to hand to him.
“What is this?”
“Portable hand sanitizer.”
“….”
“And this is soap.”
“….”
“I’ve also prepared clean towels.”
“….”
“Since I won, from now on please wash your hands thoroughly before cooking.”
“…Weren’t we just discussing matters of life and death for our entire human realm?”
“That’s right.”
“And I mentioned the matter regarding your neck.”
“Yes, that’s true. But that’s one thing, and this is another.”
“No, are you obsessed with hygiene? You’re going on about something as trivial as washing hands.”
I answered Cheol-san, who was exasperated and clicking his tongue.
“It’s not just trivial hand-washing. Sometimes a single filthy restaurant causes ten or twenty customers to be rushed to the medical clinic all at once. Poor commoners will likely just suffer at home, so the actual number is probably much higher.”
“I’ve never had such problems.”
“You shouldn’t speak with such certainty. Become a chef of light, not a chef of darkness.”
‘So he’s calling every housekeeper who cooks without washing their hands a chef of darkness. This madman.’
Yet my eyes remained infinitely clear and pure.
“Once something like that breaks out, there won’t even be space in the clinic for patients to lie down. Think of it as saving the local doctor’s life and wash your hands well.”
One wrong meal can kill a person.
In modern times, there are many medicines, and if necessary, one can survive with intravenous fluids, but in a place like this, there’s no solution.
Cheol-san, unaware of a doctor’s circumstances, reluctantly nodded his head.
“Understood. I’ll… pay more attention.”
Only then did I smile brightly.
When this man smiled, it was as if spring itself was blooming—such was the illusion it created.
“Thank you!”
“Somehow, it seems you care more about me washing my hands than about the fate of the world.”
“That’s why they call me Ilgwang in the Gangho.”
Only a doctor understands a doctor’s heart.
Especially when patients keep pouring in and there aren’t enough hands, one doesn’t understand that desperation.
Cheol-san, the housekeeper, couldn’t understand me, but he seemed to grasp clearly what was more important to me than dumplings.
‘Is he truly a savior of lives?’
He would have to wash his hands thoroughly before cooking from now on.
‘But the more we talk, the more he seems like a madman, doesn’t he?’
Ilgwang is Ilgwang, it seems.

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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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