"Eek! What is that!"
Is Liston really that scary?
Well, I guess there's no need to think such thoughts.
It's just Liston, whom I encountered without any mental preparation.
He often gives off a vibe like a grim reaper straight from hell.
"Th-that!"
But why does it feel like his fingertip is pointing at me?
If it were Liston, he would have grabbed that finger and snapped it.
But unlike him, I'm quite the gentleman, aren't I?
Naturally, I found myself looking down at my own state.
'Right.'
It certainly is grotesque.
Because of the metal cup, it looks like something massive is attached, and since I couldn't find pants that fit over it, I'm wearing a skirt.
Fortunately, it's not yet the era for miniskirts.
If it were, the skirt would probably have been pushed up by the metal cup, making it look even more grotesque.
"Sorry about this. I'm a doctor."
"Y-you're lying... Ah, don't tell me. Park Yeong-sik?"
The man made an even bigger fuss at my words, but then he froze in place after getting a look at my face.
It probably wasn't because he recognized me.
This is an era without TV, let alone YouTube; how could he possibly recognize me?
No, it's a time when not even a single common photo appears in the newspapers.
It seems cameras aren't completely nonexistent, but there are hardly any advanced enough for practical use, I suppose.
But based on my experience so far, there hasn't been a single British person who failed to recognize me or Liston on sight.
Of course.
I, Kim Tae-pyeong, am the only Asian who introduces himself as a doctor.
"Yes, that's right."
"Then... I'm not being taken somewhere, am I?"
The man, who was built like a mountain, was trembling.
This is my power.
It's not 'Maybe I'm pretty strong?' but rather...
"Where does it hurt so much?"
If someone is in pain, shouldn't I treat them?
Especially if they're in this much pain, I need to find a solution somehow.
It's absolutely not because I'm also in a lot of pain in this area right now....
So, this isn't coming from a place of shared suffering.
This is just what a doctor should do.
"Um... I got a circumcision."
"Where?"
"Right here!"
"Ah, from whom?"
"I don't know. Who was it?"
"You got it done without even knowing who performed the surgery?"
"They said it was a simple procedure...."
"Ah."
Hoho.
This is the 19th century for you.
I suspect the saying "one mountain after another" probably originated around this time.
'I really need to establish the concept of surgical consent forms.'
Does it make sense to undergo a surgery, even a simple one, without knowing who's performing it?
Surgery inherently refers to a procedure that causes a semi-permanent alteration...
No matter how simple or low-risk it is, it always carries some degree of danger.
"Jeez."
While I was briefly lost in thought, the patient lowered his pants.
Since 'underwear,' including underpants, is the exclusive domain of the wealthy, just lowering his pants immediately revealed the surgical site.
"Ouch. Aigo."
Now, even Liston, who might as well be considered Korean by this point, started exclaiming "Aigo" repeatedly as soon as he saw the surgical site.
And for good reason.
"An infection has set in. Did you touch this with something? With your hands?"
Post-operative infection.
It's a scary complication even in an era with antibiotics....
And right now, we have no antibiotics.
Plus, the location is... this.
Huh?
It's not a part you can just cut off while saying, "Does this hurt?"
The person who performed this surgery probably deserves to have their head chopped off.
'No.... But it's not entirely our responsibility either.'
It's not that I'm a terrible person for thinking this.
This man's hands, which I just glanced at...
They're really dirty.
If he fiddled with it even once with those hands, it's a done deal.
"N-no! They told me absolutely not to touch it, so I didn't!"
"Then where did the gauze go?"
"Why is this.... Ah, here it is. I never even touched it!"
"Ah. It fell off?"
It seems it came off along with his pants when he took them off.
The smell coming from the area is bad enough, but the smell from the gauze and pants is no joke either.
It's not just from not washing, and it's not solely because of that.
This is the smell caused by inflammation.
And it's the kind of smell that suggests pus has formed..
"You said you didn't touch it?"
"Yes! Really... I swear to heaven!"
"Alright. It seems that way."
Liston is surprisingly perceptive.
He's completely oblivious when he needs to be tactful, but in situations where the other person needs to be careful, he has an almost penetrating ability, should I say?
Especially his ability to discern truth from falsehood is truly remarkable.
Since he's always been in situations where people stood before him like this, I guess it's only natural that he developed this skill.
"Hmm... No, but..."
He says he didn't touch it with his hands.
Could there have been a problem with the gauze?
That doesn't seem likely.
Hasn't Joseph been in charge of all hospital sterilization-related matters for some time now?
- Is anything dirty?
With a guy like him running around obsessed every day, could there really be a problem?
Of course, no matter how obsessive he is, Joseph is just one person, and there's bound to be errors in procedures and such....
'If there was a problem with the gauze, it wouldn't just be this one person.'
Infections caused by instruments usually lead to mass infections.
Even though I wasn't part of the infection control team, I was in a position where I was managed by them, so I've picked up enough knowledge to make this assumption.
"By any chance, are there more patients like this?"
"Huh? Ah... Sometimes? But not a huge number. About ten a day?"
"Ten...? How many patients does our hospital operate on?"
"About a hundred? But we're planning to do more now."
"No..... That's 10%?"
"Isn't that incredibly low? Other hospitals have more than double that rate."
Other hospitals are none of my business.
They probably messed everything up from surgical instrument management.
But 10% at our hospital is too high.
Amputation infection rates for limbs have recently plummeted to below 5%...
I briefly wondered if it was because it's the penis, but the moment I remembered that I'd also been circumcised, I felt that probably wasn't the reason.
One might think infection could occur if urine touches it, but surprisingly, urine is sterile.
It's produced by our bodies; wouldn't it be strange if it had bacteria?
Stool might seem similar if you think about it, but the digestive tract, from the mouth to the anus, is a kind of open space connected to the outside.
It's inhabited by various bacteria, including E. coli...
It's a very dirty space, in other words.
'Comparing urine and stool is disrespectful in many ways.'
Then why on earth is the post-operative infection rate for this surgery twice as high as for other surgeries?
Especially since our hospital's sterilization protocol is becoming more stringent by the day.
Even when I heard that some medical staff were trying to label Joseph as mentally ill and have him forcibly hospitalized, my first thought wasn't "Those bastards are going too far" but rather "Well, Joseph has been a bit extreme lately." That says it all.
"By the way...."
I feel quite embarrassed to say this myself, but regardless, I am a fairly excellent doctor.
I mean, I worked in the trauma center of what is considered the best hospital in South Korea.
And not the old trauma center.
This was after the emergence of the remarkable figure Baek Kang-hyeok, and after the web novel based on his story, not to mention the drama, became a global mega-hit. So of course, it had shed its status as an unpopular department.
But.
Well. Those who chased the dream did collide with reality.
"Why does it smell so strongly of alcohol?"
Back then, it was truly amazing.
Rumor had it that the original novel author, riding on the popularity, was invited not only to the Blue House but also to the White House, and that even Kim Jong-un became a fan of the author and attempted to secretly visit South Korea.
"Did you drink alcohol?"
"Huh? No, well... a little?"
"A little? How can you say that so confidently?"
"Huh? I just drank some beer? It's not even wine."
"Huh?"
Anyway, even while having these thoughts, I demonstrated my exceptional focus and noticed the smell of alcohol in the emergency room, a critically important space.
I never dreamed the source would be a doctor, but even after discovering it, I never expected him to be this brazen.
I even get the feeling our conversation is running on parallel tracks.
"Hey there, Pyeong."
Eventually, even Liston chimed in.
He had a look on his face that said he didn't understand what was wrong.
"Huh?"
"He said he drank beer, right? It's not like the smell is that strong... and his face isn't even flushed red. Aren't you overreacting?"
"No... How can a doctor drink during work hours..."
"What are you talking about? Are you saying you don't drink then?"
"Huh?"
No....
What in the world...
is this?
Just until I heard that circumcision was being touted as a cure-all, I thought, 'Ah, nothing in my life will surprise me more than this,' you know?
But...
I was wrong.
"Everyone here drinks. In the first place, if a person doesn't consume fluids, they die, you know?"
"You should get fluids from water!"
"Isn't water dangerous?"
"Huh?"
Water is dangerous?
What kind of nonsense is this now?
But to dismiss it as just that...
I actually think the same way and take various precautions before drinking water.
For starters, I don't even wash my hands with water drawn from the Thames River, let alone drink it.
I absolutely... use water drawn from upstream.
It's a bit more expensive, but it's much better.
Of course, you can't use that as-is either.
Even water that looks and smells safe surprisingly often contains dangerous substances like parasites, bacteria, and viruses.
"Think about it. Everyone who drank Thames River water died."
"No....."
"And this isn't just a recent story. Didn't your father tell you? Bottled water is the exclusive domain of the poor. A proper citizen should drink beer instead of water."
"No..."
You can boil it.
If you're really worried, you can drink distilled water.
That's not such a difficult task either.
Getting fuel, namely coal, in London is incredibly easy.
"Ah, your father is Korean, right? I guess the water there was okay? But that's strange. How did you survive until now? If you drank water here..."
"Could this guy already have syphilis?"
"Now that you mention it, it is suspicious. You don't do it with just anyone, do you? Is it because you're a doctor and have a conscience?"
"I think I only drank water. Thinking back now..... My family ran a brewery, actually a winery, so they gave me wine instead of water."
"That's a luxurious life... The life of nobility."
"If that wasn't possible, we used beer, of course. You can't make wine all year round."
While I was having these correct thoughts, the conversation was flowing in an uncontrollable direction.
The current was so strong that even I didn't have the confidence to correct it right then and there.
Moreover, one thought flashed through my mind.
"By any chance, patient... did you also drink alcohol?"
"Ah, yes. Beer."
Now that I think of it, this guy's nose is red.
'So that's why... he was enduring it without any medicine.'
He drank... alcohol.
And a lot of it.
'Fuck... So the cause of the inflammation was here!'