Fifth Vital [EN]: Chapter 432

433. Wildlife

In an instant, the vehicle carrying the four people collided with something, creating a significant noise.

It was a wild boar that suddenly came down from the mountain and collided with the vehicle.

Screech-

Bang- Crash-

Lee Jun-hyuk instinctively turned the steering wheel to the side, but the force of the impact caused the car to spin sideways. Only after hitting something again with an echoing sound did the car come to a stop.

“Ugh!”

“Ah… Ah.”

“Ah! Is everyone okay?”

Along with the groans coming from both sides, Tae-kyung, who had lightly bumped his head on the front seat, asked if everyone was alright.

“Ugh! What, what is it?”

Lee Jae-hyun said, lifting his upper body, which had been leaning to one side.

“How about Jun-seok hyung [older brother/friend]? Hyung, are you okay?”

“I’m okay.”

Tae-kyung and his friends all seemed to have only bumped their bodies and didn’t appear to be injured.

In the midst of this, the three of them thought to themselves that it was fortunate they had all put on their seatbelts before leaving the restaurant.

“Did we have a car accident? Did we hit another car?”

“No, I’m not sure, but it doesn’t seem like a car. It seems like a wild animal.”

“That’s right. I think so too. With this much impact, it seems like we hit a wild boar.”

The three people in the back seat didn’t see the wild boar directly.

However, considering that there were no other cars passing by and what Lee Jun-hyuk had said about wild animals frequently appearing, there was no other possible cause of the accident.

They had seen accidents involving collisions with wild boars on the news several times, but they never thought such a thing would actually happen to them.

Tae-kyung thought it was fortunate that it wasn’t an accident between cars and asked Lee Jun-hyuk one last time if he was okay.

“Boss, are you okay?”

“……”

When no answer was heard, Tae-kyung felt an uneasy feeling and called out again.

“Boss?”

“……”

“Lee Jun-hyuk, Boss!”

“……”

Lee Jun-hyuk, who was wearing a seatbelt, had his upper body slumped over, his head against the steering wheel.

“What’s wrong? Why isn’t the boss answering? Boss?”

“B, Boss?”

Lee Jae-hyun and Park Jun-seok called out in succession, but still, there was no response.

In an instant, a chilling feeling swept through the car, and with a moment of silence, the expressions of the three people were gradually becoming serious.

The three of them, being doctors, instinctively felt that Lee Jun-hyuk’s condition was different from theirs.

Clunk-

Tae-kyung, who was sitting in the back seat, unbuckled his seatbelt and got out of the car, approaching the driver’s seat where Lee Jun-hyuk was.

After the collision, the car, spinning and veering off the unpaved road, had come down to a sloping area and crashed into a large tree.

It was an unavoidable accident that no one had anticipated.

Clunk-

Opening the driver’s side door and looking closely, he could see white through the middle of the partially deployed steering wheel.

He didn’t know what the problem was, but it seemed that the airbag hadn’t worked properly.

Presumably, because of that, Lee Jun-hyuk’s head wasn’t protected during the collision, and he seemed to have lost consciousness.

“Boss… !”

Tae-kyung, who was calling Lee Jun-hyuk’s name, suddenly froze like a stone statue and paused.

‘Ah, this can’t be. This shouldn’t be happening…’

Tae-kyung said inwardly, shaking his head.

Suddenly, he felt the fifth vital sign from his body.

‘Damn it!’

It was the formalin smell of stage 4 [a scent Tae-kyung can smell when someone is near death].

Among the people he had encountered while enjoying his vacation on the island, there was no one who emitted a serious smell. So Tae-kyung was even more relieved and relaxed while enjoying his vacation.

But the smell he least wanted to smell was unfortunately coming from Lee Jun-hyuk.

Just before, that is, immediately after the car collided, Tae-kyung had checked first to see if the fifth vital sign was present before asking his friends if they were okay.

Of course, a car accident required careful observation and checking of one’s physical condition for a certain period, but for now, he was relieved because there was no smell at all.

But that wasn’t the case.

The existence of the fifth vital sign, which was not present a moment ago, was now certain.

As if to mock Tae-kyung, the intensity of the smell was gradually increasing.

“Tae-kyung-ah [term of endearment]? How’s the boss looking?”

“Since he lost consciousness, it seems like he hit his head hard.”

Lee Jae-hyun and Park Jun-seok, who had gotten out of the car, approached and spoke in turn.

The faces of the two people, who had been laughing, joking, and having fun throughout the trip, also changed to seriousness, and a slight tension was visible.

“Still, it’s a relief that there don’t seem to be any major injuries on the outside.”

No. It wasn’t a relief at all.

“You never know with car accidents.”

Looking at Lee Jae-hyun, who was speaking in a slightly relieved tone, Park Jun-seok, a specialist in neurosurgery, shook his head as if to say no.

“Especially with car accidents, it can be scarier when someone looks fine on the outside. Unlike external injuries, you can’t know what’s wrong until you examine them.”

That’s right.

Therefore, it is important to get an examination after a car accident rather than simply being relieved that there are no injuries.

Even people who seemed perfectly fine without any external injuries after a car accident could become dangerous from the aftereffects, ranging from a few days to several months later.

“I know that. I know. I just said that because the boss didn’t seem to be in serious condition. Tae-kyung-ah?”

Lee Jae-hyun, who had replied awkwardly, called out to Tae-kyung, who was becoming increasingly serious, beyond just being serious, but there was no answer.

“……”

“Tae-kyung-ah? Are you okay?”

“Are you not feeling well somewhere?”

“No. It’s not me, but Lee Jun-hyuk is in serious condition right now.”

Tae-kyung said accurately to the two people who were asking, seeing his increasingly serious face.

“What? Serious?”

“Who? The boss?”

Park Jun-seok and Lee Jae-hyun asked back as if they couldn’t understand Tae-kyung’s words.

It was an unexpected car accident.

The front bumper was badly dented from hitting a large tree, and one headlight was broken. But the injuries of the four people in the car didn’t seem to be that serious.

Of course, Lee Jun-hyuk, the driver, had lost consciousness, but they thought he would come to soon.

Park Jun-seok and Lee Jae-hyun didn’t think Lee Jun-hyuk’s injury was a major one.

It wasn’t strange for the two of them to think that way. Anyone would probably think similarly to those two.

Because on the outside, Lee Jun-hyuk really didn’t seem to be anything more than a perfectly fine person who had temporarily lost consciousness.

Only Tae-kyung was aware of the serious situation.

“Tae-kyung-ah, I know you get passionate when you see injured people, but the boss will be okay.”

“Yeah, Jae-hyun is right. And as you know better than me, this isn’t that big of an accident at TA [Tae-kyung’s workplace], is it?”

Ha! It was driving him crazy.

The fifth vital sign was an ability that only Tae-kyung could feel, and even if he could smell the scent of sick people, the two of them wouldn’t easily believe it.

“I know what you two are saying, but the boss’s condition isn’t good right now. I’ve seen more patient cases than you two, if nothing else.”

“Well, that’s true.”

“Hyung [older brother/friend], you were at a university hospital, so you know. There’s an instinct that doctors feel when they see critical patients.”

“Ah, I know. So, your instinct is that he’s critical now?”

“Yeah. Let’s search and call the hospital first.”

“Okay. It doesn’t seem like organ rupture, and if it’s serious, it could be a cervical fracture or blood clot…”

Cervical spine, referring to the neck of the spine made up of seven vertebrae, can be easily explained as the neck bone.

If the cervical spine is severely fractured and the nerves are damaged, a very serious situation of total paralysis can occur. But Tae-kyung wasn’t expecting a cervical fracture.

Rather, he suspected the latter of what Park Jun-seok had said, that is, a blood clot.

There was a much more accurate expected diagnosis, but in order to confirm it, the priority was to get Lee Jun-hyuk to the hospital as soon as possible.

“Let’s not worry unnecessarily. I’ll call the hospital first to see if transportation is possible.”

“I’ll go out to the front, so hyung [older brother/friend], please stay next to the boss.”

Tae-kyung said to Park Jun-seok as Lee Jae-hyun took out his cell phone to make a call and walked to one side.

“Why?”

“I’m going to see if there are any cars passing by.”

“To stop a car?”

“We can’t just stay still like this.”

“Okay, I understand.”

“Tae-kyung-ah? Hyung [older brother/friend]?”

Just as Tae-kyung was about to climb the slope, Lee Jae-hyun, who had gone to make a call, hurried over with a troubled expression.

“Why?”

“There is a hospital here, but they’re not answering the phone.”

“What? The phone doesn’t work at all?”

“No, it’s not that, but the signal is going through, but they’re not answering. What should we do? The boss still hasn’t woken up?”

“Yeah. He’s still the same.”

“We need to go to the hospital to do something. This is a problem.”

“I’ll go up and see if there are any cars passing by, so Jae-hyun, you watch the hyung [older brother/friend] and the boss and keep calling.”

“Okay.”

Tae-kyung, who had divided the roles, strode up the slope and onto the unpaved road where cars were traveling.

The island is not a city.

Therefore, there were not many hospitals, and there would be differences in hospital operations and systems.

Presumably, there was a high probability that there would be no ambulance to transport patients.

Tae-kyung thought that stopping a passing car and asking for help would be much more helpful to the patient now than simply waiting for a phone connection.

“Excuse me!”

Less than 5 minutes after coming up, a small sedan was seen, but the vehicle passed Tae-kyung, who was shining a cell phone light, in an embarrassing way.

Thinking about it, the sight of a man holding a cell phone light on a mountain road was a picture that would be perfect for scaring a driver.

From this side, they were just in a hurry because of the injured Lee Jun-hyuk, but the approaching driver didn’t know the situation, so it would be even more so.

“Tae-kyung-ah?”

Lee Jae-hyun approached Tae-kyung, who was looking at the passing small car with a frustrated expression.

“Did you get through?”

“No, I still only hear the dial tone. I was hoping to get help from a taxi driver, so I called, but it’s turned off.”

“Oh, why didn’t you call the tourist information center when we got off the boat this morning to ask?”

“Ah! That’s right. Just a moment.”

Lee Jae-hyun quickly made a phone call, shaking his head. It meant that the call didn’t go through.

As it was late, it seemed that the tourist information center was closed.

“The restaurant!”

Tae-kyung suddenly thought of Lee Jun-hyuk’s restaurant and asked, but he had already made a call.

“While I was calling the hospital, Jun-seok hyung [older brother/friend] did, but they didn’t answer either.”

It seemed that they weren’t answering the phone because the business hours were over when the three of them left the restaurant earlier.

“Tae-kyung-ah, you said the boss wasn’t feeling well earlier. Do you think it’s very serious?”

“I can’t know for sure until I do a detailed examination, but that’s what I feel.”

This was all Tae-kyung could say now.

Now, he could only hope that a passing car would stop here.

“Jae-hyun-ah, turn on your cell phone light and wave it.”

“Okay.”

The two waited for a car that might not come, waving their cell phone lights. And after a while, not long after, a luxury sedan stopped in front of the two.

“What’s wrong?”

With a buzzing sound, the driver’s side window went down, and a man who looked about the same age as Tae-kyung’s group asked the two.

“We had an accident and are asking for help.”

“An accident?”

The driver seemed interested in the word accident and asked back.

“Yes. A person was injured in the accident, but I’m sorry, could you please take us to the hospital?”

“The hospital?”

“Yes, we need to move the patient quickly right now.”

“Okay.”

“Please.”

“Ahem! Are we there yet?”

A woman who was sleeping in the passenger seat woke up and said as Tae-kyung was asking for help.