Surviving as a Rogue Hospital Director - Chapter 1

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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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Episode 1.
A resident in the Operating Room spoke to Ui-jin.
“Professor, I’ll finish the closure.”
“All right. Good work.”
It wasn’t a handoff of unwanted work. The skin still needed suturing, one way or another. For the resident, it was an opportunity—a chance to practice.
Ui-jin left the Operating Room, handing the rest to his junior. What he’d done was create an artificial anus below the navel, a procedure called a stoma.
Not particularly difficult. That’s why it hadn’t taken long.
The patient, who happened to be the same age as Ui-jin, had his rectum removed due to cancer and a new anus fashioned into his abdomen. He’d undergone prolonged chemotherapy, but the results had fallen short.
‘Maybe the drug combination wasn’t ideal.’
The cancer had been discovered as it transitioned from early to intermediate stage. The size hadn’t been alarming, so at first he’d spoken optimistically.
‘I’ll do my very best. For now the situation isn’t dire, so please don’t worry too much.’
Encouraged by his words, the patient had steeled himself to endure. To hold strong. Though now he lay on the operating table regardless.
The cancer had grown far faster than anticipated. What had gone wrong? The cancer cells had expanded their reach as if mocking Ui-jin’s judgment, and in the end, he’d been one step too late.
This patient would spend the rest of his life—until death—managing his bowels through his abdomen. If he lived to a hundred, it would be a genuinely bleak existence.
Ui-jin recalled the patient’s face crumbling when he’d broached the subject of the stoma with difficulty. That man, who’d dug deep even through brutal chemotherapy, had finally shed tears.
‘I’d have done the same.’
Still, at least he was alive. Ui-jin had offered what comfort he could squeeze out.
Stripping off his surgical gown as he left the Operating Room, Ui-jin felt everything cumbersome—the latex gloves, the surgical mask, all of it.
“Sigh.”
He breathed deeply. Twenty years since becoming a doctor. Treatment, no matter how much he did it, remained hard. The weight of knowing that other people’s lives rose and fell on his judgment never became any easier to bear.
‘Where did it all go wrong?’
He’d been a good student in high school, and naturally medicine had been the goal. There was no particular reason. Everyone said it was good, so he’d assumed it would be good for him too.
Everyone wanted medical school, and getting into the medical school everyone wanted had been a source of real pride for him. People even had a saying—doctor-gods—for how revered physicians were.
So Ui-jin graduated from a top medical school and joined a prestigious university hospital.
The problem was that after all that filtering, he himself had been filtered out. He’d been first in his entire high school, but at medical school he’d become middle-of-the-pack among geniuses, and he’d barely scraped into the hospital.
The glory had been fleeting. That time when he’d surpassed his rivals and stood at the very front. How ashamed he was of the self who’d believed it would last forever.
In the Professor’s Office, Ui-jin found a moment to read a novel. His only solace these days. Doctor X was a typical medical thriller, but to escape reality, he dove in instantly.
– As if mocking the Hospital Director’s insistence that it was impossible, Im Sung-hyuk saved patients with what seemed like the hands of a god.
The part Ui-jin was reading was a crucial moment where the protagonist, Im Sung-hyuk, showed his true skill. Even under impossible odds, he’d save his patients through divine medical genius. The plot was predictable, but every time Ui-jin read it, he felt refreshed.
‘I should have become a doctor like that.’
The respected figure of Im Sung-hyuk was enough for Ui-jin to live vicariously. Even the Hospital Director who’d tormented the protagonist eventually said nothing in the face of his exceptional talent.
‘Wow, how pathetic. He complains but then just gives in.’
The Hospital Director was an unremarkable character who’d only spout excuses—no funding, not enough staff, the same tired complaints. There was something pitiable about his being pressured by the board, but ultimately wasn’t it his own fault for doing as he was told?
Yet in reality, the Hospital Director dismissed Ui-jin routinely.
“Professor Jung, the Gastroenterological Surgery Department has more procedures lined up this month. How about you take the late afternoon slots?”
Late afternoon in name only—by the time Ui-jin’s surgeries finished, it was already dawn. The newly appointed professor was apparently connected to the Hospital Director, and he was clearly being given preferential treatment.
Since the hospital shared a limited number of operating rooms among everyone, Ui-jin was always going to be last priority.
“Of course, sir. I’m fine with that. Whatever works best for you.”
Yet he made an effort to keep the Hospital Director in good spirits.
“Good, good. And you—the Colorectal Surgery Department’s numbers have been slipping. Next month, don’t forget to hit your surgery quotas.”
This was code for recommending surgeries that didn’t need to happen. The hospital’s biggest revenue came from procedures, after all. It was absurd, but Ui-jin bowed his head. He added a hollow affirmation.
“Yes, I understand.”
A professor was ultimately just a hospital employee. There was no escaping your superior’s mood. Especially when you had no influential connections to rely on. And regrettably, he didn’t have extraordinary surgical skill either.
That’s why Ui-jin had chosen a field that wasn’t brutally competitive—a stable specialty. Colorectal surgery meant occasionally witnessing unpleasant things, but it had consistent prospects.
The reason was that endoscopy was mandatory under the National Health Screening. Every citizen over forty had to undergo it once every two years, guaranteeing steady demand.
‘I need to get out soon.’
In fact, he was preparing to open his own clinic. From the start, he’d planned to use the university hospital only for training and leave as soon as possible.
Of course, he’d lose the prestige of being a medical school professor, but that didn’t matter to him. The only problem was that his wife hadn’t approved yet.
She’d said to hold on until the kids finished high school. Then it was until they graduated college. Now it’s how wonderful it would be if their father were a medical school professor when they got married.
‘She’ll never respect what I want anyway.’
But there was no resentment in it.
She’d wanted a “doctor husband,” not Ui-jin himself. It was even more absurd to expect love from a marriage arranged through a matchmaker.
Ui-jin too had simply chosen the efficient option, and this marriage was the best choice for both of them.
So Ui-jin, now a money-making machine, trudged through his days at the hospital. Every so often peering at Doctor X to decompress.
* * *
His head had been throbbing since morning. The Hospital Director had summoned him to spout nonsense.
“Now’s not the time to be making stomas. Forget those trivial things—you need to do big surgeries. When you see cancer, you cut it out unconditionally, you hear me?”
The Colorectal Surgery Department he oversaw ranked dead last in performance among general surgery fields.
Gastroenterological Surgery was first, Hepatobiliary and Pancreatic Surgery second, Transplantation and Vascular Surgery third. Last month it had been Transplantation and Vascular fighting for last place, but they’d apparently recruited a lot of dialysis patients this month.
For Ui-jin, who saw surgery as a last resort, good numbers were impossible. He refused to force surgeries just to hit quotas, even if it meant forcing a fake smile for the Hospital Director.
Surgery isn’t an upgrade to bodily function. It’s about preserving as much of the original function as possible.
And the scars from surgery don’t just mark the skin. What’s beneath may look the same on the surface, but it’s never truly the same as before.
“Chemotherapy alone won’t cut it. You understand what I’m saying, don’t you, Professor Jung?”
The Hospital Director spoke as though he’d forgotten his days as a tadpole—as though he’d never been a doctor at all.
Ui-jin found the Hospital Director from Doctor X overlapping with the one before his eyes. Though unlike in Doctor X, where the protagonist was prevented from operating, this one was recommending surgeries that shouldn’t happen.
Figures at both extremes wore him out equally.
‘Why do hospital directors always torment doctors like this?’
But Ui-jin’s expression belied his thoughts. He lifted the corners of his mouth. This too was just social life.
“Of course, Director. I’ll persuade suitable patients when I find them.”
“Persuade? If a professor tells them to do it, they do it. You need to be forceful about it! Understand? Forceful!”
Even as Ui-jin said he understood, the increasingly loud Director kept shouting. Ui-jin responded with an awkward laugh.
“Ha ha ha, yes! I’ll be very forceful about it.”
For a moment, the scene from Doctor X flashed through his mind—where Im Sung-hyuk told the Hospital Director to stop spouting nonsense. Something he could never dream of in reality.
In his mind, Im Sung-hyuk rebuked the Director, and the tension drained away satisfyingly.
After more finger-pointing, nagging, criticism, and personal attacks from the Hospital Director, Ui-jin finally escaped the Director’s Office.
The secretary outside the Director’s Office rolled her eyes, apparently having heard the commotion.
“Have a good day.”
He offered a curt greeting and returned to the Professor’s Office. The moment he sat down, he opened Doctor X. It was the most effective way to decompress.
* * *
In the novel, Im Sung-hyuk eventually became a renowned physician of extraordinary skill.
The board, unable to resist, installs him as the next Hospital Director. To avoid leaving evidence of their schemes against him, they assassinate the previous director.
Unaware that the position is stained with blood, the protagonist ascends to his inauguration, and Part One ends.
“What time is it?”
Time had vanished while he read. Finally setting down his phone, Ui-jin stretched.
Ui-jin checked his mobile. Midnight was nearly here. There wasn’t a single call from home asking him to come back. He’d been working late so often that they’d probably gone numb to it.
He gathered his things and left the hospital, taking a deep breath. The cold air filled his lungs all the way down.
Ui-jin sat down hard on the curb while waiting at the Pedestrian Crossing. Even though he’d been sitting all day, standing felt impossibly difficult. It wasn’t his body that was exhausted—it was his spirit.
The road at this hour was relatively quiet. Only the occasional motorcycle passing through.
Ui-jin gazed blankly at a motorcycle thundering past. There was something about its freedom from constraint that looked liberating.
Not long ago, he’d cautiously broached something with his wife.
“I’m thinking of quitting the hospital. You know, how your mother said she’d set me up with a clinic when we got married…”
His wife had flinched at his casual remark, cutting him off sharply.
“Why are you saying this now? We agreed you’d stay until the kids are married.”
He’d never actually agreed to that, but somehow the narrative had solidified into that. Still, Ui-jin wasn’t disappointed. He’d never expected much to begin with.
Above him on the curb, a streetlight flickered precariously, as though about to go dark.
Unconsciously, he synced his breathing to the light—closing and opening his eyes. As his gaze fixed on the bright glow, everything around it went white and blank.
And looking upward like that, he didn’t see the cargo truck and semi-truck collide not far away.
– Crash!!!!
By the time he turned at the sound, it was too late. The semi-truck, bounced off the cargo vehicle, was already upon him.
– Screeeech!
The tires screeched against the pavement so violently it seemed like their eardrums might burst. Struck by the truck, Ui-jin flew through the air and slammed into the ground.
“Ugh… ugh.”
His ribs and knees felt like they were shattering, and something seemed to be flowing from the back of his skull.
The cargo truck driver emerged with trembling hands, while the semi driver, trapped by the airbag, was crying out.
“I… I… I’m… I’m… okay…”
“Call 911 right now!”
Sprawled on the ground, Ui-jin wiped away what was flowing from his head. Bright red blood. At least it was blood, not cerebrospinal fluid. He should probably be grateful for that. He wouldn’t die within the next few minutes, at least.
But beyond that, his mind wouldn’t engage. Ui-jin’s consciousness was fading, unable to maintain lucidity.
‘Is this really how I die? I want to live. I haven’t done a single thing for myself all this time!!’
He couldn’t die like this—it would be too unfair.
With trembling hands, Ui-jin pulled his Professor ID Card from his pocket. The hospital would have information about him. It was close enough—they could make it within the Golden Time. Please….
Clinging to hope, Ui-jin closed his heavy eyes. That was his last memory.
Surviving as a Tyrant Hospital Director
Author:
LEVI
Publisher:
Story Zak
Registration:
No. 2020-000069
Address:
1807, Tower A, Halla One&One Tower, 101 Gasan Digital 2-ro, Geumcheon-gu, Seoul
Phone:
02-2101-2077
Fax:
02-2101-2078
Email:
[email protected]
UCI:
G720:N+A342-20260219122
Published:
March 25, 2026

Copyright ⓒLEVI, 2026.

This e-book is protected by copyright law.

This e-book is published under contract between the publisher and author, and unauthorized reproduction, distribution, or sharing is prohibited without written consent from both parties.

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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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