A Surgeon Who Uses Martial Arts [EN]: Chapter 522

Chapter 102: New Face (3)

“Hyun Jong, Master!”

A whiny voice called from behind him.

Hyun Jong turned to see a young novice monk with a freshly shaved head running towards him.

The novice monk’s Dharma name [religious name] was So Myeong.

He was ten years old.

His cheerful personality was the life of the temple.

His already round head reflected the moonlight, making it shine even brighter.

“Ah-ko!”

He must have tripped.

So Myeong suddenly tumbled forward.

Hyun Jong quickly approached and helped him up, dusting off the dirt from his robe.

“Are you hurt?”

“My knee is scraped,” So Myeong said, looking down with a gloomy expression.

“Oh dear, that must hurt. I’ll disinfect it and put some ointment on it.”

“Yes. But…”

So Myeong looked up, alternating his gaze between the head monk and Hyun Jong.

“Is the head monk angry? He looks scary. Buddha said we shouldn’t be angry.”

“He’s not angry; he was just scolding me.”

“That’s the same thing.”

So Myeong took Hyun Jong’s side.

The head monk chuckled, and Hyun Jong felt a sense of relief. He had been in turmoil from the head monk’s constant scolding.

Am I not pursuing enlightenment? Did I just run away from the secular world to the temple to avoid suffering?

That can’t be true…

The head monk left without another word.

Hyun Jong took So Myeong to the temple’s only office.

He took out disinfectant from the first aid kit, applied it to So Myeong’s scraped knee, and then applied ointment.

The treatment ended with a square bandage.

For him, a former neurosurgeon, this was hardly even a treatment.

“Thank you.”

So Myeong bowed.

Hyun Jong stroked So Myeong’s head.

“You shouldn’t run around in the temple. You were scolded by the head monk last time, remember?”

“But I wanted to hear the old stories.”

“I would have gone if I had time. Don’t run from now on. Promise?”

“Yes.”

The two of them linked their little fingers together, making a pinky promise before letting go.

For the past few months, Hyun Jong had been telling So Myeong short Buddhist fables every evening.

Like a parent reading a fairy tale to a child.

The reason was simple.

He felt sorry for So Myeong.

So Myeong was a child who had been abandoned by his parents.

He heard from the head monk that one autumn day, a baby wrapped in a blanket had been left in front of the main hall.

The head monk said it was also fate and began raising the child at the temple.

So Myeong had spent more time at the temple than Hyun Jong, so depending on the interpretation, So Myeong could be considered higher in seniority than Hyun Jong.

“Ugh…”

So Myeong suddenly frowned.

He covered his face with his hands.

Why is he suddenly in so much pain? He was so brave even when I applied the disinfectant.

“So Myeong-ah. What’s wrong? Are you hurt somewhere?”

“I’m okay.”

“You don’t look okay at all. You know Buddha said you shouldn’t lie, right?”

Hyun Jong pressed.

Perhaps feeling anxious, So Myeong darted his eyes from side to side. His legs were also trembling.

“My head has been dizzy for a few months now. Sometimes I suddenly lose strength in my body.”

“You should have said something sooner.”

“I didn’t want the monks to worry about me.”

So Myeong bit his lip.

The fact that he had been abandoned by his parents was So Myeong’s deep-seated wound.

If he caused someone to worry, he might be abandoned.

Perhaps such fear was ingrained in his very being.

Hyun Jong’s heart ached at the sight of So Myeong.

Why should So Myeong, who is innocent, have to live with such pain?

Is it a sin to be born?

Buddha’s saying that life is suffering (苦) [dukkha, a core concept in Buddhism] was indeed the truth.

Suffering existed everywhere in the world.

“It seems like you’re anemic due to a lack of protein.”

“What is protein?”

“Um… in simple terms, it’s meat.”

“Monks shouldn’t eat meat!”

So Myeong was surprised and raised his voice.

“You’re still young and growing. You need to eat meat in moderation. And you pretended not to eat it last week when you ate it well.”

Hyun Jong chuckled.

The head monk was an enlightened person.

He didn’t unconditionally force vegetarianism on monks. He preached that physical strength was important for practicing Buddhism, and moderate meat consumption was necessary for physical strength.

In particular, he was more lenient in allowing So Myeong, a young novice monk, to eat meat.

“I saw everything just now. Your Adam’s apple moving up and down.”

“Hehe.”

So Myeong smiled innocently.

After the treatment, Hyun Jong told him a fable related to Buddha and returned to his quarters.

He went to bed but tossed and turned, unable to sleep due to his worries.

The head monk’s harsh criticism replayed vividly in his ears.

* * *

After that, Junhoo visited Hyegum Temple every dawn. He went to work at the hospital only after finishing 108 bows in the main hall.

It wasn’t difficult.

Rather, it was a welcome change.

He had barely slept for years, and he was training his footwork while climbing the mountain and healing with the clear mountain scenery.

“Why does that person come to the temple so early in the morning to bow?”

“I heard he made some kind of bet with Monk Hyun Jong?”

“What kind of bet?”

“How would I know since Monk Hyun Jong doesn’t say anything? Whatever the bet is, that person is bound to lose. He’ll probably do it for a week at most and then quit.”

The monks talked about Junhoo a lot.

However, Junhoo didn’t miss a single day of attending the temple and bowing.

A week passed.

A month passed.

He didn’t even give up when it was pouring rain.

The monks said in unison.

They had never seen such a dedicated Buddhist as Junhoo.

Around that time, he became friendly with some of the monks and even chatted with them.

However, he couldn’t pry into Hyun Jong’s past.

It was an unwritten rule for monks not to talk about their lives in the secular world. Moreover, they had to be even more careful about talking about other monks’ stories…

Meanwhile, Hyun Jong pretended not to know Junhoo every time.

He ignored him.

He didn’t even greet him when they ran into each other.

Junhoo only gave a slight bow and didn’t say anything in particular.

However, Junhoo had no difficulty figuring out why Hyun Jong had left the secular world and become a monk.

The rosary he was wearing on his wrist.

The name ‘Jin Joo’ engraved on the rosary was the clue.

One day, he typed ‘Kwon Jin Joo’ into the EMR [Electronic Medical Record] patient search window.

Hyun Jong’s real name was Kwon Tae Hyuk.

“Ah…”

A heavy sigh escaped as soon as he checked the chart.

15-year-old Kwon Jin Joo came to the emergency room with a traumatic brain hemorrhage and underwent emergency surgery. The surgeon was none other than Kwon Tae Hyuk.

Kwon Jin Joo died during the surgery.

After checking the billing statement, there was a record of receiving a 20 percent discount on medical expenses because she was a relative.

The moment all the scattered puzzle pieces came together!

So, if you reconstruct the events in chronological order, it would be like this.

A niece came to the hospital with a brain hemorrhage, and Hyun Jong lost his niece during the surgery himself.

Unable to overcome the guilt, he left the hospital and became a monk.

‘It’s a tragedy. It’s a tragedy.’

Junhoo felt sorry for Hyun Jong’s unfortunate story.

There is also a kind of unwritten rule for surgeons, which is not to operate on family, relatives, or acquaintances.

This is because operating on a loved one can lead to extreme anxiety, tension, and pressure.

Even for Junhoo.

It would be difficult to maintain composure if he had to operate on his parents or Ah Young.

The same would have been true for Hyun Jong.

If there were enough surgeons available.

Hyun Jong would not have operated directly and would have asked a close colleague to take care of his niece.

But it would have been impossible.

Neurosurgeons were already scarce, so where could he find a pediatric neurosurgeon in a hurry?

At that point, Junhoo had no choice but to reflect on his own actions.

He couldn’t have known Kwon Tae Hyuk’s pain.

Now that he knew the pain.

Was it right to dig into that pain and scout him as a pediatric neurosurgeon?

However, as fate would have it.

Just when he was about to give up on Hyun Jong, another pediatric trauma patient came to the emergency room.

A drunk driver drove onto the sidewalk and hit a child.

The child fell into critical condition.

Junhoo couldn’t operate on the child that day either.

The child arrived at the emergency room just as he was about to start his regular surgery schedule.

On this day, even his secret weapon, Jecheon Gong, faded to a yellowish color.

The time secured by Jecheon Gong, which he had trained by enduring the pain of twisted energy channels and spitting out dark red blood, was 30 minutes.

Even a miraculous surgeon who had mastered martial arts and used internal energy could not finish the assigned surgery within 30 minutes.

The child eventually received only basic first aid and was transferred to another hospital.

He went to two university hospitals before dying in the ambulance.

The tragedy was repeating itself.

And no one could fix that tragedy.

That day, Junhoo cried for the first time in a long time.

He was sad and resentful that he only had one body.

I can’t let Monk Hyun Jong go easily. Let’s ask him to be a surgeon one more time on the 100th day.

Don’t push it too hard.

Junhoo set that as his goal.

Time passed, and it was the 60th day that Junhoo had visited Hyegum Temple.

That day was a weekend.

After finishing 108 bows, Junhoo leisurely looked around the temple.

All around was autumn.

The trees surrounding the temple were dressed in colorful autumn foliage.

Yellow chrysanthemums and purple cosmos were in full bloom everywhere.

The mountain breeze that blew gently swayed the flowers’ heads like waves.

The scenery was beautiful, but Junhoo’s heart was restless.

The world in which humans live was not like nature.

‘Huh? What is it?’

Junhoo tilted his head.

He heard the sound of someone gagging and vomiting from somewhere. It was coming from the bushes quite far from the temple.

He carefully approached the sound.

A familiar novice monk was vomiting a thick liquid with his mouth open.

The novice monk’s Dharma name was Monk So Myeong.

Junhoo also had a moderate friendship with So Myeong.

“Are you okay?”

“Yes. But please pretend you didn’t see that,” So Myeong asked, putting his hands together in a prayer gesture after finishing vomiting.

“Why?”

“I don’t want to worry the great monks. Everyone will be turned upside down if I say I’m sick.”

“Where does it hurt?”

Junhoo approached So Myeong and asked. At least on the outside, So Myeong looked healthy.

“I just get dizzy sometimes and don’t have any strength in my body. Monk Hyun Jong said it’s because I lack protein.”

“That could be true.”

Junhoo nodded.

Anemia due to iron deficiency.

It was common sense to diagnose So Myeong’s symptoms as such.

However, Junhoo, who had survived in the harsh Murim [martial arts world] world, always tended to assume the worst.

“Oh my. You have something on your head.”

Junhoo joked and placed his palm on So Myeong’s head. Then, he channeled his internal energy and passed it through So Myeong’s head.

Woo woong woong. Woo woong woong.

A brain examination using internal energy.

This was a powerful examination method that combined CT and MRI scans.

Since he had been doing it steadily since his residency, he could now perfectly see through the state of another person’s head in about 10 seconds.

“Are you sick somewhere too?”

So Myeong looked at Junhoo’s complexion and worried.

Junhoo’s face had hardened.

Junhoo couldn’t even force a smile.

He couldn’t reassure So Myeong.

A cruel tragedy was growing in So Myeong’s head.

“What are you doing here?”

Just as the awkward silence deepened, Hyun Jong approached. His voice showed that he was displeased with Junhoo being with So Myeong.

Junhoo said without paying attention.

“I have to take So Myeong to our hospital’s emergency room. Immediately.”