Doctor’s Rebirth

Chapter 43

As expected, when Yoo Ho set down the teapot, Jin Cheon-hee realized what the tea was.

“It’s buckwheat tea.”

It’s good for sound sleep and arterial sclerosis (blocked arteries) .

However, because it has a cold energy that might not be good for his master, he added twelve additional herbs to balance it out.

Thinking it was quite remarkable for a coincidence, Jin Cheon-hee shook the teapot.

The aroma of buckwheat was deep.

Like the night sky over the Medical Pavilion.

***

“It will be a battle with time management.”

The next day, Jin Cheon-hee was able to meet his master with a refreshed face.

Fortunately, it seemed that the master had accepted his disciple’s wishes and gotten proper sleep that night. Nevertheless, his expression was dark, probably due to regret that he could have done a bit more work yesterday.

Jin Cheon-hee said,

“Don’t you need to be healthy to be busy?”

“You must be the only one in the world who worries about me, the one called ‘Unrivaled in the Martial World,’ Hee-ya.”

To outsiders, it might look like a fledgling worrying about a white tiger. That’s how profound and powerful Divine Doctor Baek Rin’s martial arts were.

Although it was said he wouldn’t live long due to the Nine Yin Meridian Obstruction, that was supposed to be a matter of days.

Yet decades had passed since that rumor had spread widely in the martial world, and he was still alive and playing a pivotal role.

He had unintentionally become something of a boy who cried wolf.

As a result, only the members of the Medical Pavilion and a few close friends truly worried about the master.

But even they couldn’t directly feel the master’s pulse.

They only knew from what they heard and saw.

Jin Cheon-hee was the only one who had directly taken his pulse, seen his internal condition, and even set up a treatment plan as a surgeon.

Jin Cheon-hee frowned.

“Isn’t it a physician’s job to look after patients? If it bothers you, you can just dismiss me.”

“Hahaha, it’s just that I’m not used to being worried about by others. By the way, you’re uncompromising when it comes to matters related to my body.”

“It’s because you seem to be forgetting about your own body, Master, that I worry.”

At that moment, Zhuge Rin let out a few dry coughs.

Fortunately, this time no blood seeped out.

Zhuge Rin said,

“Don’t worry. I absolutely won’t die until you’re ready.”

“You shouldn’t die even when I am ready.”

“…Right. I promised I wouldn’t die easily.”

Yoo Ho silently poured tea while listening to their conversation.

It was truly a unique master-disciple relationship. Even in Yoo Ho’s not-so-short life, he had never seen such a relationship.

For Zhuge Rin, who had lived his entire life in his own world, someone had appeared with whom he could finally share it.

It wasn’t simply about sharing knowledge.

It was something a little deeper and more profound.

In a world made of black and white, Jin Cheon-hee was an existence made entirely of a different color.

That’s why Zhuge Rin wanted to give everything of himself to this boy without reservation.

As the boy stepped into his world, what he asked for was simple.

Not to die easily. Under any circumstances.

For the boy, Zhuge Rin was the first warmth he had encountered, in the name of a master. That’s why the boy trained himself even more fiercely.

However, it was uncertain whether that wish could be fulfilled in time.

‘Humans die eventually. But it doesn’t have to be now.’

The boy was desperately trying to protect the world the two of them had created.

Even Yoo Ho couldn’t predict what the outcome would be.

Jin Cheon-hee said,

“I’ll need time for sleep, training, and writing medical texts to establish the Surgery Hall.”

“That’s not all. You’ll need time to teach directly, and time to learn yourself.”

“And at night, I’ll have to share knowledge with you, Master, so we’ll have to subtract that time too.”

Jin Cheon-hee held a writing instrument in his hand. It was a piece of charcoal sharpened and wrapped in a small cloth.

Jin Cheon-hee called it a ‘pencil’.

Although it was difficult to control the thickness of the lines and couldn’t produce elegant handwriting, it was good for quick and accurate note-taking.

This ‘pencil’ was the first thing Jin Cheon-hee wanted to introduce to the Medical Pavilion.

It was easy to manage since there was no need to grind ink, and it was good for quickly writing characters on bamboo slips.

For physicians who always had to write abbreviations for disease names, prescriptions, and so on, the pencil was quite a convenient tool.

“Dividing tasks by day would be inefficient, right, Master?”

“It will be even harder to manage since it won’t be just your schedule alone.”

Jin Cheon-hee furrowed his brow and fell into thought.

Soon, he began drawing lines on the rice paper.

Zhuge Rin said,

“How about dedicating five days out of ten to martial arts training, and the remaining five days to classes and Medical Pavilion affairs?”

“…”

Jin Cheon-hee pondered for a moment. Then he said,

“I think alternating days would be better than five consecutive days of martial arts training. It’s more effective for muscle development that way.”

He said this with the supercompensation graph in mind.

Strength training is one of the most effective modern methods of physical conditioning. There was no reason not to use it.

Zhuge Rin said,

“Then I can help with writing the medical texts while you’re training.”

“If you could do that, it would free up a lot of my time.”

Due to the nature of medical knowledge, most of it was in foreign languages. Therefore, translating it into the local language in an easy-to-understand way was also a big task.

For terms that couldn’t be substituted, they would have to use the original pronunciations, but they still needed to do everything they could for the rest.

The two continued to fill the rice paper.

The master’s large, flowing handwriting and the disciple’s small, angular handwriting covered the white with black.

They erased, revised, and erased again repeatedly.

Yoo Ho continued to pour tea beside them.

Taking special care not to disturb the two’s concentration.

***

It was the first public training session as a hall master.

For this training, the master, the Martial Force Hall master, and Dokgo Junghoo would also be observing.

While it was understandable for the master to observe, it was quite unexpected for Dokgo Junghoo to do so. It was also somewhat nerve-wracking.

“You must do well, young master.”

Before the start, Yoo Ho said while adjusting Jin Cheon-hee’s martial arts uniform collar. Jin Cheon-hee replied,

“Who wouldn’t know that? If I make a mistake, he’ll probably try to teach me himself based on that mistake. That seems to be the Martial Force Hall master’s goal, doesn’t it?”

“As expected, when you learn one thing, you understand two. It seems eavesdropping last night was worthwhile.”

Although his tone was as sharp as usual, Jin Cheon-hee knew what he meant.

“There’s nothing to worry about, Chief Yoo.”

“You don’t know how much the four hall masters covet you, young master. It’s like ants to honey.”

“I’m grateful for their high evaluation. I thought they might be jealous or envious, but I’m grateful they’re not.”

At those words, Yoo Ho responded as if dumbfounded,

“Does that put food on the table?”

Surprisingly, there are places where it does. It was something that happened when politics became intense. But Jin Cheon-hee just kept his mouth shut and smiled.

Yoo Ho said,

“They are people who have been responsible for patients’ lives for a long time. They’re not the type to have the luxury of being picky about means and methods. They’re the kind of people who would do anything if it meant saving even one more patient in their hall.”

Jin Cheon-hee asked,

“In that sense, isn’t the Martial Force Hall master irrelevant? They’re responsible for the security of the Medical Pavilion, not for taking care of patients, right?”

Yoo Ho shook his head.

“If they had the martial power to end conflicts without killing martial artists, they wouldn’t have such worries. The method is different, but their concern about talent is the same as the other medical pavilions.”

‘This is interesting.’

Was it because of the martial world?

Even physicians had a sense of chivalry.

They were different from martial artists. But still, the important things remained unchanged.

Jin Cheon-hee said,

“Chief Yoo.”

“Yes?”

“I really like it here.”

When his true feelings came out, he instinctively spoke informally.

Yoo Ho showed no particular reaction to Jin Cheon-hee’s sudden informal speech.

He may look cute on the outside, but inside he’s a dark kid. There was nothing surprising about it.

“Like master, like disciple, you’re doing the same thing. Saying you like this den of demons. I’m glad, I suppose.”

Yoo Ho’s expression was complex as he said this.

“It seems the master said the same thing.”

“Yes. He said this was the only place in the martial world he somewhat liked.”

‘Hmm, my reasons for liking it are the opposite of the master’s, though.’

It was always like this. Zhuge Rin and Jin Cheon-hee had opposite motivations, but they still moved towards the same conclusion.

Still, Jin Cheon-hee didn’t dislike being told they were similar, so he kept quiet.

Yoo Ho’s hands, which had been adjusting his clothes, fell away.

“It’s just training clothes that will get wrinkled anyway, don’t worry about it too much.”

“That’s true. But someone up there is paying a lot of attention to it.”

‘Oh, Master.’

There’s no greater doting parent than this.

With that, Jin Cheon-hee entered the training ground.

***

Yoo Ho threw stones at Jin Cheon-hee. Even though they were ordinary pebbles, they became formidable when thrown by a master’s hand.

Jin Cheon-hee used the Three-Elements Stride to dodge each attack.

At first, the stones flew in a regular pattern, but they soon began to follow irregular trajectories. Then dozens of stones filled the sky.

While it couldn’t compare to the Sichuan Tang family’s Ten Thousand Flower Rain technique, it was still a force to be reckoned with.

‘You’ve never thrown like this before, have you? Is this bastard trying to feed me now?’

Knowing Yoo Ho’s personality, Jin Cheon-hee thought he was more than capable of doing just that.

Jin Cheon-hee recalled the essence of the Three-Elements Stride.

The Three-Elements Stride is a footwork technique that uses only three directions: left, right, and forward.

It could be considered the most basic footwork for beginners to learn. Therefore, this shower of dozens of stones was something that would normally be done when learning the next level of footwork.

‘Oh, you narrow-eyed bastard!’

Jin Cheon-hee let loose a string of curses he had learned during his internship and then moved his body.

With his shoulders barely moving, his body flowed like water, grazing past each stone one by one.

The Martial Force Hall Master Dokgo Junghoo marveled at this sight.

“Has he reached the level of demonstrating the essence of ‘flow’ with the Three-Elements Stride?”

The master clenched his fist tightly as he spoke.

“Hohoho, why are you surprised by something like this, Martial Force Hall master?”

Although his words were humble, as if it were nothing special, the strength in his fist wouldn’t ease.

There was even an unspoken pressure to acknowledge his disciple, this genius, more strongly, more intensely, more fiercely.

Meanwhile, Jin Cheon-hee had moved on to the next stage.

He climbed onto a thin wooden pole and began dodging the incoming attacks. Seeing this, Dokgo Junghoo questioned,

“When you get on the pole, wouldn’t two of the three directions in the Three-Elements Stride be blocked?”

He couldn’t quite understand it.

Left, right, forward.

Out of these three, wouldn’t the left and right directions be unusable?

If it were him, he could dodge any attack with a smile even on top of the pole, but it would be different if only using the Three-Elements Stride.

Isn’t there only forward left?