Doctor’s Rebirth - Chapter 914

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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 914
Jin Cheon-hee’s Alley Tavern
This story takes place after Baekrin Tavern opened for business and the dumpling competition had concluded.
At a time when Jin Cheon-hee’s dry-aged beef dumplings were spreading their fame throughout the realm.
Master Jegalling called his disciple Jin Cheon-hee to share a conversation.
In Jegalling’s study, where a subtle fragrance of white sandalwood drifted, Jin Cheon-hee listened intently to his master’s words.
“Hope. I had a dream a few days ago.”
“A dream, sir?”
“Yes. It was from quite long ago.”
When Master spoke of long ago, it usually meant his childhood.
The time when his clan was annihilated, when he had to flee from those seeking to erase every last drop of Jegallim Family blood.
As a young child, Jegalling wandered the frozen earth during the depths of winter.
In summer, he had to roam cautiously, wary not only of people but of beasts as well.
A martial artist could certainly slay bears and tigers, but only when in their right mind—no matter how skilled, there was no defense against danger while sleeping.
And that was not all.
Venomous snakes, poisonous insects, bites from unnamed ants that would cause collapse and prevent rising—such occurrences were countless.
To prevent even some of this, he would pitch a tent and wrap himself in blankets to sleep, but doing all that alone was far from easy.
‘That’s why even martial artists rarely sleep rough alone in the mountains.’
Jin Cheon-hee himself had Noeji and Hwang-gu, so he could sleep trusting them, but most would use lightness technique to sleep properly at an actual inn.
Much less Master, who was a fugitive—even lighting a campfire would have been difficult.
“That winter happened to be a severe cold. Record-breaking frost filled the land, and I hadn’t eaten anything properly in over ten days. This was after my grain-avoiding pills had run out.”
Walking while pushing his body to its limits in such conditions would normally mean starvation even for a martial artist.
Especially for a child’s body.
“Even when I tried to hunt, that day made finding wild game difficult. Perhaps, true to the record-breaking cold, they all stayed in their nests. I didn’t even see common deer, let alone rabbits.”
Honestly, he had no appetite.
Though he knew eating was necessary to survive, everything tasted like sand, making it seem pointless.
Grain-avoiding pills would have been easier, but obtaining them required going down to a village.
Modern person Jin Cheon-hee recalled severe depression.
On television or the internet, children always appeared bright, running about and happy.
Even alone, they would play with robots.
In reality, of course, even young children suffered from depression.
Especially when all family and relatives were dead, living under threat of death while isolated from the outside world—such a life could not be good for mental health.
It was remarkable that he hadn’t taken his own life.
“Then I reached my limit and lost consciousness. Heh heh, at that time I thought I would simply die like that. Hope, do you believe it? That your master experienced such a thing?”
“….”
The man before him was one who could cleave even the heavens.
It was a story that martial artists who only knew he later became Hyeolrin Gwangssal could never imagine.
Jin Cheon-hee spoke.
“Yes. Everyone has times when they grow weak.”
Jin Cheon-hee himself had experienced the same.
“That’s strange. When I talk with you, sometimes…. Yes. Never mind.”
What had my Master been about to say?
He swallowed the words and continued speaking instead.
“After that, I was alive as expected. Whether fortune or misfortune, someone saved me.”
“Where did you wake up?”
“In a kitchen corner. Lying in the kitchen of some shabby restaurant, no less. It was a place with quite a pleasant aroma.”
And a middle-aged man with a stubborn, weathered appearance saw Jegalling in that state and spoke.
-You’ve awakened. Come here and try a bite of this.
My Master said he didn’t say anything special.
He simply brought out noodles in a broth with a clean, simple flavor.
But.
Jegalling said he could never forget that kindness for the rest of his life.
Not merely that his life was saved, but the warm broth he offered at that moment.
He saved me despite knowing at a glance that I was a young martial artist with circumstances.
And I couldn’t possibly refuse the aroma of that food he presented.
In the end, my Master emptied the entire bowl right there.
“Strangely, that broth didn’t taste like sand. So that is to say, yes. ‘Something edible.'”
My Master has extremely particular tastes.
Rather than force down something inedible, he would consume a grain-abstinence pill that truly tastes like sand.
It was the same when he was young.
So even before the clan was destroyed, he was called an unlucky brat.
Even then there was plenty to eat, but after the blood purge, the things he could eat became even fewer. It must have been due to psychological effects.
When such a Master emptied an entire bowl, the middle-aged man handed him another.
After emptying two bowls there, the middle-aged man spoke.
-If you have nowhere to go, you’re welcome to stay here. If you do the dishes, that will pay for your meal.
It was a small restaurant.
Still, it had quite a few customers.
Yet the middle-aged man seemed to run the restaurant alone.
That warmth shone so brightly that it was more tempting than any gold or treasure in this world, he said.
“If I were asked to choose between the Murim Archives and that shabby inn, I would have chosen that inn.”
My Master closed his eyes.
I wanted to be here.
I wanted to rest here.
It was understandable to feel such things, but young Jegalling pushed away that kindness.
-Thank you for your help. I will repay this debt in the future.
It was like an open-air hot spring.
If one sinks deep into hot water, the outside world feels all the colder.
If that happened, I would grow lazy day after day, continuously.
If the trackers reached this place, the righteous person before my eyes would come to harm.
The young man had already seen a burning village.
I knew that everywhere I went, there was nothing but blood.
‘Before the blood on my hands defiles this place.’
That’s why Jegalling deliberately left that small restaurant with cold indifference.
Yet that warmth remained, keeping the young man alive for a long time.
“The taste was… passable, I suppose.”
“…!”
‘My Master is merciless in his critiques, even of a benefactor’s cooking.’
Despite thinking this, Jin Cheon-hee broke into a wide smile.
“That’s quite a story. Certainly… a debt like that must be repaid without fail.”
“Now that you’ve opened the Baekrin Inn, the memory came back to me.”
The Hyeonwon Jeondan Singeong granted absolute memory, but recalling those memories was an entirely different matter.
‘After all, if one were constantly bombarded with memories of trivial things from the past without wanting them, most would go mad.’
Perhaps that’s why the Hyeonwon Jeondan Singeong was quite strict about this aspect.
Like a storage folder in a computer, it was I who retrieved them.
That’s why I only recalled it now.
“I see. Then now that you remember, you should go repay the debt.”
“I already searched for them. They’re still running their business in the same place as before. But recently, I discovered that my benefactor’s shop is in quite poor condition.”
“Is there some problem with the shop?”
“My benefactor has grown old and is bedridden with ailments of age, and his son inherited the restaurant… but it’s failing.”
Jin Cheon-hee clenched his fists tightly.
“Did the Heterodox Faction use violence to extort protection money? Or did a rival business interfere? I’ll go handle it right away….”
After all, I’m not just a Daesuksu for nothing.
If I wielded power recklessly elsewhere, Gold & Silver would come collecting like credit card installments, but that’s not the issue here.
Isn’t this my Master’s benefactor!
“Simply. The food had no taste.”
“Ah…!”
No taste. That’s why it’s failing.
It was a simple reason.
“Wait, Master, did you perhaps visit in person?”
“I did. Among all the dishes I’ve eaten over the years, it ranked among the three most tasteless. It couldn’t even compare to the cooking my benefactor used to make.”
It seemed he even compared it to the taste of dishes he’d eaten as a child.
But hadn’t he called my benefactor’s cooking merely “passable”?
‘If it’s incomparable to that, how bad could it be?’
Jin Cheon-hee pressed the button of admiration toward his Master.
‘The Hyeonwon Jeondan Singeong even remembers taste—how remarkable!’
“….”
My Master continued speaking.
“That wasn’t all. When I investigated the surrounding reputation, it seems customers simply don’t come because the food truly lacks taste. They say his skills fall far short of his predecessor, the benefactor who was once the head housekeeper… So my benefactor was quite worried.”
It seemed he had already met the benefactor and returned.
Jin Cheon-hee was amazed at how swiftly his Master had acted.
Indeed, Master!
Fast as lightning!
‘But if Master found it merely adequate… that means it was actually delicious by normal standards. The previous housekeeper must have been quite skilled at cooking, I suppose?’
Even at well-known restaurants, Master would say—
‘Absolutely dreadful food. I cannot fathom how anyone avoids stomach troubles eating such things. Perhaps the human digestive system is far more resilient than one would think.’
Unless one possessed the culinary skills of the Imperial Court’s head housekeeper, Jegalling would never praise a dish.
So for Master to evaluate the Baekrin Inn’s cuisine as reasonably palatable…
There was good reason the Baekrin Inn prospered.
In any case.
It was merely adequate.
That meant it was one tier below reasonably palatable.
In other words, it qualified as restaurant-worthy.
But now, under the previous housekeeper’s son, Master called it the absolute worst of the worst…
His culinary skills were clearly not very good.
“I did treat the benefactor’s illness, though he continues to worry.”
“Ah, I see.”
A parent’s heart knows no bounds.
Especially when a long-established inn faced ruin under the next generation.
“Yet he lacks the stamina to continue operating the inn himself. And even if he temporarily ran it, once his son inherits, won’t it inevitably collapse anyway?”
“That’s true.”
‘So what’s the conclusion to this story? I can’t quite grasp what Master is trying to say…’
Jin Cheon-hee listened while thinking this.
Jegalling, who had been watching him intently, finally spoke.
“Hope.”
“Yes, Master.”
“I would appreciate it if you could go improve that son’s culinary skills somewhat. I’m asking this of you.”
Ah, so that’s it!
‘All that buildup was leading to this!’
Now that I thought about it, that was indeed the better approach.
In this situation, neither power nor connections would help.
The food simply tasted bad!
‘If the son’s cooking skills are the concern, then improving them solves everything. That’s the greatest way to repay a debt. Master truly is remarkable.’
This way, I wouldn’t need to use the Emperor’s ‘credit card.’
“That’s an excellent idea. To resolve that benefactor’s worries, improving the son is the right approach.”
“Indeed.”
As Master nodded, Jin Cheon-hee’s eyes sparkled.
“Excellent, Master! This disciple is confident in cooking! While I may not be the greatest chef under heaven, I’m certain I rank among the top ten!”
“Ho, you seem quite confident?”
“I won that dumpling competition last time, didn’t I? Against the dumplings that won the imperial cooking tournament!”
Kwooooooo!
I clenched my fists and thrust them upward with passionate determination.
I was a teacher.
I had confidence in the art of instruction.
Cooking? I had already defeated the greatest dumpling artisan under heaven.
So if I, as the disciple, repaid my Master’s kindness, what could be more meaningful than this?
The Master’s and the previous housekeeper’s kindness flowing down to their disciple and son!
‘This was always the best scene in martial arts novels. Heh, and now I’m actually doing it.’
I spoke.
“The Ten Greatest Housekeepers of All Under Heaven! I, Jin Cheon-hee, Sojakju of Baekrin Uiseon, shall now present you with a true feast of flavor!”
Watching me like this, Jegalling let out a brief sigh.
“Hope. I did ask this of you, but I cannot help saying this. You are a doctor, after all.”
What was this about the Ten Greatest Housekeepers of All Under Heaven?
But I wasn’t listening.
I was too busy chattering away and formulating my plans.
And watching the two of us, Yoo Ho clicked his tongue.
“Really a dog….”
The rest of his words faded so that even the Master could not hear them.
“Ah, I shall lend you Yoo Ho.”
As if saying ‘the world outside the village is dangerous, so take this Pokémon with you,’ my Master spoke casually.
“Thank you so much! Yoo Ho! I’m counting on you!”

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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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