The Physician of Traditional Medicine Returns from Murim - Chapter 317

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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 317

I went to the treatment room with Gong Maru.

I had deliberately called her during a quiet time and reserved the bed at the far end by the window.

An acquaintance that Jin Minjeong met while attending nursing school works at a Traditional Korean Medicine Clinic that does an enormous amount of moxibustion.

Even though they installed exhaust pipes like those in barbecue restaurants above each bed to suck up the smoke and smell, whenever she met that acquaintance, the scent was always permeated throughout her body.

‘But isn’t the smell of moxibustion quite fragrant?’

When I told her to ventilate, she said they do open the windows, but isn’t it normal for Traditional Korean Medicine Clinics to have a bit of mugwort moxibustion scent and licorice fragrance wafting around, creating a cozy feeling?

“Are we starting right away?”

“Yes. There’s no need for hot compresses or physical therapy for warts.”

After all, I’ll be burning moxibustion to transfer heat deep inside.

Since I needed to treat her feet as well, I had Gong Maru lie face down on the bed.

With her soles exposed and both palms facing up, her fingertips trembled slightly as if she was a bit scared.

“It won’t hurt much, so don’t worry.”

“Not much… Yes, yes. I need to get better quickly.”

It’s understandable she’d be worried since it’s her hands and feet, areas with many nerves.

As I was reassuring Gong Maru, Gong Nari opened the curtain and poked her head in.

“Should I help?”

“I can manage alone, but if you’re curious, feel free to watch from the side. That’s okay with you too, right, Maru?”

“Oh, that’s fine with me.”

I started working right away.

I took out moxibustion mugwort in amounts just large enough to cover each wart lesion, rolling appropriate quantities into shape.

Gong Nari also watched what I was doing from the side and rolled mugwort to hand to me.

Even though there were over ten spots, with both of us working, it was quick.

“I’m placing them generously, so it won’t be hot at the start. It will burn from the top down and the fire energy will be transmitted inward.”

Since I’ve done this more than once or twice, I can time it perfectly for when the patient feels the heat sensation.

I’m also confident in catching the moment when the fire energy sufficiently enters the meridians without causing burns.

Of course, this time I’ll remove them according to the former timing.

Whoosh!

I lit the moxibustion in order from the top.

“Wow, you’re just putting it directly on.”

Gong Nari marveled on behalf of Gong Maru, who had her eyes tightly shut.

That’s why it’s called direct moxibustion. I place only mugwort without anything underneath and light it directly.

Even just laying down ginger or salt as a buffer would make it indirect moxibustion.

Using a torch to light them, I finished quickly.

It would be more romantic to transfer embers from charcoal or an incense burner with a skewer, but oh well.

“Oh, it really isn’t hot.”

Fragrant burning smell and smoke rose up plenty, but since the thickly placed mugwort was still burning, the heat wouldn’t be felt yet.

I smiled reassuringly at Gong Maru and switched tools from the torch to tweezers.

Now comes the real part.

About 5 minutes passed.

When the moxibustion had burned considerably and shrunk quite a bit in size, Gong Maru spoke up.

“Clinic Director, the first one you put on, the palm side feels a bit hot.”

“Just a bit, right? Let’s wait a little longer.”

“Uh…”

It wasn’t time yet.

If I remove it now, direct moxibustion becomes nothing more than a formality. Wouldn’t this be hardly different from using electronic moxibustion?

The size of the remaining moxibustion shrank rapidly.

Gong Maru looked at it anxiously then closed her eyes.

About 10 seconds later.

“Ugh!”

The moment Gong Maru frowned hard, I grabbed the remaining moxibustion with tweezers and threw it into the water container.

“Clinic Director, the one next to it is getting hot too…!”

I knew.

I immediately removed and cleared that one, then sequentially removed the ones on her fingers above it.

“Wow. Clinic Director, how are your hands so fast?”

“Because I’m used to it.”

Gong Nari, who had been holding tweezers to help, was amazed.

With both of us removing all the moxibustion in an instant.

“It feels refreshing somehow. Like it burned all the way to the roots.”

Relieved, Gong Maru felt the tingling afterglow with wonder.

“Right? It’s an interesting treatment, isn’t it?”

“I suppose it might be.”

She nodded in agreement with me, but strangely her expression looked reluctant.

“So now…”

“We need to do it one more time.”

“Yes?”

Oh my, getting up already won’t do.

How long will it take to heal if we only do it once?

It’s not like I did it so hard that you’d get burned, and we’re only treating once a week. I need to do it properly when we do it once.

“Come on, lie down again. I’ll remove it at the perfect timing, so just trust me.”

Gong Maru rolled her eyes once and looked at her older sister.

Gong Nari gave a thumbs up.

“Yes….”

I placed the moxa. Lit it up.

“It’s, it’s hot!”

I removed it.

Placed moxa again. Lit it up.

“Now… is it not time? Ah, now!”

“Maru, you’re getting the hang of it now. Perfect timing, right? No burns at all.”

I repeated it 3 times.

“I think the sensation in my soles has disappeared….”

“Really? That’s great. Since you have no sensation, would you like to try bee venom acupuncture on your plantar warts too?”

“I meant the heat penetrated very well, which is good. Thank you for doing it perfectly.”

Strangely, Gong Maru was afraid of me and politely declined.

“Alright. Let’s see how it progresses next week.”

After sending Gong Maru off.

“The moxa smell is nice.”

“Clinic Director, could you possibly do it for me too…?”

The patients nearby who knew romance were showing interest.

This is really fun and good, but the problem is it takes too much time.

I can’t leave their side in case they get burned.

“Wow…. The clinic downstairs puts lotion or something under the moxa, but putting it directly on is incredibly hot, right? It’s thrilling….”

“Haha, make an appointment next time.”

“Oh, no. I think I’m completely healed today.”

The patients who received treatment together were also amazed by the miraculous therapeutic effects of direct moxibustion.

And a week later.

“Clinic Director, I didn’t touch it at all but some dead skin fell off. The upper part peeled off a lot – is this okay?”

“Does the area that fell off hurt?”

“No. It doesn’t bother me at all.”

“It’s getting better, so don’t worry about it.”

It was the first week and the treatment progress was quite good.

The area hadn’t shrunk yet, but the hardened skin on top was shedding, revealing traces of pinpoint bleeding underneath.

Now I need to burn deeper inside.

“Any discomfort from taking the medicine?”

“None. I actually feel more energetic.”

“That’s good. Oh, Euiiin can induce some satiety, so your appetite might decrease.”

“It helps with dieting too, that’s nice.”

I do deliberately put Euiiin in diet pills too.

Anyway, it was fortunate that there was no particular discomfort.

“We’re doing moxa today too, right?”

“Of course we are.”

Gong Maru squeezed her eyes shut.

We excitedly burned moxa together.

Blocking vision probably allows one to enjoy the energy even more, doesn’t it?

“You worked hard….”

“You endured it well!”

Another week later.

“The ones that appeared recently on my left hand got smaller. The biggest one on my right palm split into two – is this okay?”

Looking at the condition, normal skin was regenerating in the center of the wart that Gong Maru said had split in two.

One characteristic of warts is that the skin deforms, fingerprints disappear, and something like dead skin becomes visible.

But on the smooth skin in the center, fingerprint patterns were appearing.

“Very good. Regeneration has started. Let’s continue treatment without irritating the new skin. Let’s get rid of all the remaining parts.”

“Yes.”

The foot had some blackish discoloration on the surface, but it was just dead skin so it wasn’t a big concern.

This would also shed soon and normal tissue would regenerate.

After finishing today’s moxa treatment.

The sole was as expected, but since the progress was definitely slow, I also administered bee venom acupuncture.

And again, a week later.

After 3 sessions and 3 weeks of treatment, the palm lesions had noticeably disappeared.

The 8 lesions, or 9 if you count the split one, were down to just 2, and even those had shrunk considerably in size.

“I think it’s about 90% better.”

Having become quite accustomed to moxibustion treatment, the fear had completely disappeared from Gong Maru’s face.

“She was so happy that her fingerprint recognition works now.”

“Ah, sister!”

Her thumb had fully recovered so that fingerprints could be read too. Skin regeneration really is amazing, isn’t it?

“It’s going smoothly. For moxibustion, we just need to treat the remaining areas. Take the medicine for a full month to maintain stable condition until there’s no recurrence.”

“I’ll do that.”

The improvement appeared almost exactly as I had expected.

By the one-month mark, all the common warts on her palms had been treated, and her soles were also beginning to show changes.

Those should disappear after just two or three more repetitions.

According to Chu Miyoung, warts sometimes heal dramatically in just one or two sessions, but can also take two to three months.

This was an exemplary case that improved at a reasonably fast pace.

“I’m really glad I asked the Clinic Director. My younger sibling was worried about whether coming to her sister’s workplace would be a bother, you know?”

“No, why would you worry about that? Come anytime! Ah, of course it’s best if you’re not sick though!”

A staff member’s family is like my own family… no, wouldn’t they be much closer than my own family?

“You can come even when you’re not sick. I got a new induction plate, so I was thinking of having a meat party. You could come eat during our company dinner too.”

“Wow, really? At the Clinic Director’s house? That sounds amazing!”

Gong Nari cheered at the mention of an outdoor meat party.

Some people didn’t give me meat, but they gave me things like electric grills for cooking meat, you know?

“Yes yes. Of course, if Maru doesn’t particularly want to join, don’t feel pressured.”

“Yes… I’m grateful just for the thought.”

I’d welcome her if she actually came, but I expected her to decline.

“Hahaha. I also have spare refrigerators and TVs, so let me know if you need them.”

While I was at it, I brought up the topic of appliances.

Thanks to certain people replacing them with the latest models, I had the old ones left over.

Things like computers might be used simultaneously, but refrigerators are really unnecessary to have two of.

“Really? We were actually planning to buy a new one because ours is too small!”

Gong Nari stepped forward and raised her hand to take it.

She considered the TV too, but gave up after hearing about the size.

Even the first one I bought wasn’t small since it was for the living room, so it would be awkward to place.

“Thank you, Clinic Director.”

So the TV’s destination was decided through various circumstances… Seo Inae, who owned an apartment but still hadn’t bought a TV, would take it.

* * *

First of all, having a spacious home is something to see.

Even when living in a studio apartment, there wasn’t any particular inconvenience, but being spacious definitely brought freedom and comfort.

If I had bought an apartment of ambiguous size, there would have been fewer furniture pieces I could fill it with, right?

Electronic products were the same.

I wondered what I’d use expensive vacuum cleaners, stylers, dishwashers, and so on for.

But once I had them set up, they were useful as if I’d never questioned it.

‘Ah, I don’t need two irons either. I should give this away too…’

I organized items I didn’t need to have two of while sorting through things I had already promised to give to the staff.

‘Should I invite Lee Jin to the party too? She’d be happy if I told her to come to the company dinner, but… no, let’s have a separate celebration party apart from the company dinner. She’ll win a medal, right?’

The Olympics haven’t even started yet, and here I am.

Taking out the electric grill somehow reminded me of Kim Ijin.

Since she’d been a regular patient at the clinic since high school, she knew all the staff members.

It was also thanks to Lee Jin that I learned about Seo Inae’s secret.

When I first met her, I never thought Lee Jin would actually compete in the Olympics.

Really, it’s hard to know what will happen in people’s lives even one step ahead.

‘I can’t go, but I should cheer for her from afar!’

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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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