The Physician of Traditional Medicine Returns from Murim - Chapter 143

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 143

Kang Joyun looked at me with round, glistening eyes.

Hmm, I didn’t expect him to react this much.

“Should we go to the examination room and talk slowly?”

It didn’t seem like something to discuss briefly in the treatment room.

Since Kang Joyun readily agreed, I helped him up and took him back to the examination room.

It was right there when we came out and opened the door, but in that brief moment, Kang Joyun’s tears had flowed down to his chin.

“It hurts a lot and is very difficult, isn’t it?”

When I asked, Kang Joyun nodded his head.

“Does your mother not let you rest?”

This time too, he nodded his head.

“But since the doctor said I absolutely must rest, it should be okay for a while. She wouldn’t force me to do it when you said I won’t be able to do archery if we leave it like this.”

“It seems you’ve been overusing it normally.”

“Yes! When there are no competitions, there should be some rest, but she says that’s when I need to practice even more and takes me to the academy… It’s so annoying. If she wants to do it that much, mom should do it herself!”

“Your mother was wrong. Rest is absolutely necessary for performance too – I’ll make sure to tell her that when I see her next time.”

I’ve seen this a lot among martial artists too.

They considered pushing themselves to the point of breaking their bodies as training, believing they would gain enlightenment from it.

The result was being confined to the Medical Institute with torn ligaments and having their training banned for a while.

But Kang Joyun’s expression was quite strange.

The child’s face became more distorted when I mentioned “for performance too.”

“By any chance, do you not want to do sports at all?”

I asked with a slight suspicion.

Was mom forcing him to do it?

“It’s really too much…!”

Kang Joyun opened his mouth as if he had been wanting to say that.

“…”

But when I actually asked, he hesitated.

“You don’t like it right now, right? Because it hurts?”

“Yes. If mom tells me to go train tomorrow too, I’ll just die. Well, mom wouldn’t want me to be unable to use my arm either, so she probably won’t do that.”

“When you’re all better, would you want to start exercising again right away, Joyun?”

“…I don’t know. I want to rest more, but I’m worried my skills might decline.”

That made me feel somewhat relieved.

It didn’t seem like he absolutely hated archery and was being forced to do it by his mom.

The face that grabbed onto me was so desperate that I was concerned about abuse.

“Um, yes. Right now it’s not that I don’t want to do archery at all. I really, really hated it in the past, but now it’s just… it’s just become something I do. There’s nothing else I can do anyway.”

Kang Joyun let out a sigh as if slightly resigned.

The way he kept moving his lips suggested he had a lot he wanted to talk about.

Given the personality of the mother who had left after the examination earlier, she probably wouldn’t have listened to stories like this.

Is this going to turn into career counseling again?

I checked the chart with my eyes, and fortunately there were no waiting patients.

Since I was filling in for Hwang Sanghun, there were no patients coming according to my schedule, and among the patients who came on Hwang Sanghun’s days, those who knew he wasn’t there didn’t come either.

I put away the chart and asked calmly.

“You’ve been doing archery since you were little, I see.”

“Yes.”

“Then you must be very good at it?”

Kang Joyun smiled bashfully.

“I was when I was little. Since I started from kindergarten, from when I could hold a pencil, I was the best everywhere in elementary school.”

“That’s amazing.”

“No, it’s not. I was just a frog in a well. Back then I could hit everything without practicing, so I didn’t understand why I had to work hard and would get angry and even fake being sick… When I entered middle school, I realized I wasn’t that good.”

“I see.”

“I really hated it then.”

Archery?

Practicing?

Or the fact that there were friends who were better?

“But now I really work hard! I’ve never faked being sick! I do everything I’m told to do! But mom always tells me I’m not trying hard enough because I’m full… saying if she were a middle schooler, she’d shoot arrows all day long.”

Kang Joyun vented his resentment toward his mom.

His feelings toward his mom and his feelings toward archery were mixed up in a mess and welling up.

It was understandable. At an age when he’d have many worries, his guardian was being so forceful.

From an adult’s perspective, if I could go back to when I was young, I should live like this and that – it would seem clear…

But everyone has regrets because they couldn’t live that way, right?

Out of love, they want to share what they’ve learned with their children, but parents and children are ultimately different people.

The world of a parent’s fourteen years and the world of a child’s fourteen years aren’t the same either.

“I’m sorry. I was fighting with mom until just now before coming here.”

“It’s okay. I have plenty of time today, so feel free to talk about things you can’t say to your mom.”

I couldn’t badmouth his mom together with him in front of her son, but I could help him sort out his emotions a little.

“From what I’m hearing, it doesn’t seem like you really hate archery. Do you hate that your mom forces you to do it?”

“Uh…”

“That’s possible. Even kids who study want to do it, but when parents ask ‘aren’t you going to study?’ they immediately don’t want to.”

“…That’s part of it, and I hate having to practice so much. Really, way too much. I wake up at dawn to shoot arrows, skip all my classes to shoot arrows, eat and shoot arrows, and when evening comes other kids rest but I have to go to academy again.”

“Wow, that’s incredible.”

“But nobody understands how I feel. When I say I don’t want to do it, my friends say ‘but you’re good at it, right?’ and my mom and coach just say ‘don’t you know how blessed it is to have talent!'”

I quietly nodded my head.

“But actually, I’m not even that good. Since my mom made me start when I was young, I’m better than kids who started in upper elementary school. I was even on the youth national team in elementary. But when I got to middle school, kids who started later than me started standing out too, and this time I failed to make the U-16 youth national team… Mom got neurotic and nagged like crazy, and I keep not wanting to do it more and more.

Kang Joyun poured out his words like a dam had burst.

At first he answered my questions one word at a time, but it seemed he had accumulated quite a lot with no one to listen to him.

“Oh, my mom used to do archery too. She started when entering high school and never made the national team, so she always tells me to be grateful that she let me start early.”

Kang Joyun let out a deep sigh.

“And then the other day when we fought, she asked me what I can do besides archery – isn’t that really ridiculous? I’m scared that I can’t do anything else either. Who made me only do archery!”

Suddenly his arm seemed to throb, as he gripped the painful area tightly.

“What if this goes wrong? This bicep tendinitis thing? Even if you fix it well this time, I could get injured again anytime. Or maybe I just lack the skill to make the national team. I attended a few classes while resting these past days and I couldn’t understand anything they were saying.”

“Of course you wouldn’t understand classes after neglecting them for so long.”

“…Ah, I think I’m overthinking too much. I should just work hard. Maybe it’s because my effort is lacking like my mom and coaches say? Or wait, is mental strength also a talent? I wish my mom hadn’t gotten the wrong idea because of my mediocre talent.”

Children born into martial families often have these kinds of worries too.

There are those late bloomers who think of nothing else, obsessed with the sword and moving forward looking only ahead, but most hit walls.

When young, they think they were born into the world’s greatest family with heavenly martial bodies, but they see the wider world, realize their talent is ordinary, and become frustrated.

Even so, there are martial artists who continue forward, while others leave the family to walk different paths.

…I’ve even seen guys who left to take the civil service exam, failed, and wandered aimlessly.

“Let’s correct a few things.”

The worries and choices are ultimately Kang Joyun’s to make.

“You absolutely do not have mediocre talent. What place did you get when you failed to make the youth national team?”

“12th place.”

“If you’re 12th in our country, then in the world you’d be…”

“Maybe 20th place.”

What’s not true is not true.

“Ah, but that was only among U-16s, so it would be different if you include U-19s and adults!”

“Well, you can’t compare since your skeleton isn’t fully developed yet. Being good is being good. You’re probably not the only athlete with a parent like your mother, so don’t think it’s just because you started young. And starting early and having that much practice volume is also your ability.”

“Ah…”

“Whether you’ll be grateful for that or resent it is up to you, but I hope you won’t doubt your objectively evaluated skills.”

Kang Joyun nodded his head.

I pointed out a few more things.

“And this time, your mother was clearly wrong to dismiss your arm pain as faking illness. Don’t consider enduring pain and continuing as a virtue.”

“I absolutely won’t do that. Mom was wrong.”

I was relieved there was no disagreement on this part.

“You can be happy about doing well, and what you disliked might become likeable. Getting good results is nice but you might still hate practice. You might dislike your mom but like archery, or vice versa. Emotions just happen. Nothing is wrong with that, so try thinking about them separately.”

“Yes… Thank you.”

“You don’t have anything else you want to do right now, right?”

“No.”

Kang Joyun nodded as if slightly embarrassed.

But it wasn’t strange at all. Having something you want to do is what’s unusual – in middle school, worries about the future are naturally vague.

Rather, Kang Joyun was mature for even vaguely thinking about what he could do.

“Think about that too while you’re resting. You haven’t had a chance to think about it or try other things.”

“Even if I want to do something else now…”

“Honestly, I’d recommend trying archery as far as you can go, then doing something else.”

“Ah, that makes sense.”

“Actually, if you absolutely hate it, you can quit. What can they do if you refuse to budge?”

“Ah…”

“I know it’s not that bad. Just, think about it slowly. You don’t need to rush to decide everything within these 2 weeks of rest. Career worries are lifelong. Your mother is probably wondering what to do after raising you too.”

Kang Joyun’s eyes wavered back and forth.

He looked like he was wondering if that was really true.

“And lastly!”

I clapped my hands, interrupting his thoughts.

“I’ll definitely cure your arm, so don’t worry. At least this tendinitis absolutely won’t force you to quit.

“Ah, yes!”

“Then, let’s go get treatment.”

Before I knew it, Kang Joyun’s tears had stopped.

I had him lie on his side just like before, then injected herbal acupuncture toward the long head of his biceps.

“It’s bearable, right?”

“Yes. It hurts less than when I draw the bow.”

“That’s good.”

I carefully placed needles not only in the biceps and deltoid, but also in the rotator cuff that supports the shoulder.

Energy spread through his solid muscles.

Though I directly treated only his shoulder and arm, Kang Joyun’s pent-up emotions also seemed to gradually unwind.

* * *

“Joyun, how was the treatment? Is your arm okay?”

When he came out after finishing the acupuncture, his mother asked with great concern.

“Oh my, did you cry? Did the acupuncture hurt that much? Should we go to a different hospital?”

Kang Joyun couldn’t help but let out an exasperated shout.

“You think I’d cry because the acupuncture hurt? I cried because I was upset about Mom!”

“What? Your mom is worried about you!”

“If she had worried from the beginning when I first said it hurt, I wouldn’t have been so upset!”

How could a teacher who only saw me briefly understand my feelings better than my mom who I’ve lived with my whole life?

Does Mom really only worry about my arm’s condition because she’s afraid I won’t be able to do archery?

My emotions, which had calmed down, surged up again.

‘Ugh, then what can I even do.’

Kang Joyun shook his head and let go of his anger.

Mom was just in the wrong.

And as the teacher said, if he absolutely refused to do it even if it killed him, there was nothing Mom could do to stop him anyway.

“He said if I receive acupuncture properly and just rest well, it’ll heal without any problems.”

Only when they arrived home and it was time to get out of the car did Kang Joyun finally speak.

Since the past few days had been a continuous cycle of fighting and awkward silence, Mom responded casually.

“Really? That’s a relief. It would be good to get treatment every day, right?”

“Yeah. Lifting it is already much better.”

Kang Joyun raised his arm high up.

Whether there had been some effect from just one session, the stabbing pain that occurred every time he lifted it had reduced to 1/10th.

“That’s great! I could somehow sense there was something special about him. I kept the business card and treatment schedule. You should definitely continue with that teacher…”

“But I’m going to think about what to do with my healed arm from now on.”

He left his delighted mother behind and entered his room.

“What?”

Then he pulled out a math textbook from his bookshelf that he had never once opened since entering middle school.

“…”

30 minutes later.

Kang Joyun thought to himself.

‘Maybe studying really isn’t for me?’

It seemed like having the textbook at home in the first place was already wrong.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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