My master coolly handed something to me.

“What’s this?”

Unfolding it, I saw a list of chores, from cleaning to all sorts of miscellaneous tasks.

“This is your punishment.”

“Ugh.”

“Honestly, I was in a bit of a bind,” my master admitted. “You’re not the type to listen just because I beat you; in fact, you enjoy it, calling it an opportunity to build your external fortitude. And if I force harsh training on you, you somehow manage to complete it. I’d like to put you in closed-door cultivation, but…”

“…Hahaha… I do have a history of escaping, don’t I?”

Hadn’t I slipped out through the pond to catch the Ten-Thousand-Year Fire Carp? The inner core from that very creature was still protecting my master’s heart.

“In the end, a punishment has to be something you don’t want to do, which leaves me with nothing but menial chores. Oh, and Yoo Ho won’t be helping you.”

Clack—

Yoo Ho deliberately set a teacup down in front of me with a sharp sound.

“…Ugh, I understand.”

“Still, you came back with all your limbs intact, so I’m keeping it at this level. If you hadn’t, you should know that you would have once again felt nothing below your neck.”

I was reminded of the hellish time of acupoint sealing. Those hellish days when I couldn’t move anything below my neck, like a quadriplegic patient. I was only able to endure it because I spent most of the day sleeping due to my injuries. If I had to endure that fully conscious…

Just imagining it is horrible.

Since both my master and I are physicians, there are a lot of methods of punishment that transcend the imagination.

“I’m glad I returned with all my limbs, Master.”

“Yes. It’s fortunate for you, too.”

After saying that, my master looked down at the wooden box I had placed before him. “So that is the Lunar Wood box and Lunar Silk thread from the Heavenly Demon.”

“Yes. I plan to make a fan with it.”

“Hmm. It has been a long time since Lunar Wood was lost, so even I don’t know much about it. However, I do know that it’s difficult to cut the wood using ordinary methods.”

I nodded at his words. “When I received the box, I was told I must use extreme yang and extreme yin energy alternately to cut it. They said there are no artisans left who can cut it properly.”

“It seems the Heavenly Demon wishes to test you.”

I nodded again. Extreme yang energy and extreme yin energy. They could be substituted with the Generative Fire Qi and Icy Water Qi from the Five-Elemental Divine Technique. However, alternating between them to create Sword Qi or Sword Aura would be impossible without a high degree of concentration and a deep understanding of internal energy. I didn’t know how the artisans of the past had cut it, but with those methods lost, the only way left was the brutish method of a martial artist.

My master continued, “The Heavenly Demon herself would know best that the gap between those in the Transformation Realm can be vast. She wants to test what it was that allowed you to overcome that wall. This isn’t a problem that can be solved by simply using Sword Aura. If your understanding of the Five-Elemental Divine Technique is insufficient, the wood will not be cut but will crumble.”

The cut surface would look as if it had been sawn with a dull blade. If that happened, I’d have to give up on making a fan. This small wooden box only contained enough wood to make a single fan, so there was no room for even one mistake.

“I will try.”

“Hmm. Good. If you succeed, it will make for an interesting tale of valor.”

My master would use that fan in front of all the sect leaders of the martial world. And there wouldn’t be a single person who didn’t know that this fan was made of Lunar Wood. If that happened…

…Everyone will be forced into a situation where they have to praise his disciple’s heroic tale.

If they simply ignored it, it would be a blatant admission that they were jealous of his disciple’s success. To be a magnanimous sect leader, they would have to offer praise and build me up. Wasn’t that just the social life of the martial world?

Right. What happens to some other master’s nameless disciple is none of my business.

Whether they went back to their sect and chewed out their own disciple, saying, “The first disciple of the White Dragon Medical Pavilion is already using Sword Aura to achieve the extremities of the Five-Elemental Divine Technique, so what are you doing?” was not my problem. For me, living for today was what mattered.

“Right, Master! If this disciple can repay even a fraction of your grace, you have no idea how happy I would be!”

Like a cultist seeing their leader, I spread my arms wide and beamed.

Hahaha… just smile. Smile!

My master looked at his disciple’s antics, which were clearly just a load of bullshit. “Alright. I will be watching to see if you can do it without a mistake, so be prepared. Once the fan ribs are complete, we can send it to an artisan to attach the silk.”

“Yes!”

I deliberately widened my eyes and made them sparkle. It was the most transparent brown-nosing imaginable. But if I messed this up after all this, then I’d really have to prepare for shackles or forced full-body paralysis. To live, I could not afford a single mistake.

“Take this. It was received from Shaolin as a reward for this recent affair.”

What my master placed down were two pieces of the Scripture of Unsurpassed, Perfect, and Complete Enlightenment. That was how priceless the item Thieving Phantom had stolen was to Shaolin. It was an item that could have easily caused a major bloodbath.

“I’m glad it ended well.”

“Indeed. The great monk said that if it could be ended without killing, then this too was a cheap price to pay.”

I replied to my master’s words. “That is fortunate.”

Suddenly, my master muttered to himself, as if reminiscing about the old days. “No-killing… To think they’d talk about upholding the Buddhist precepts. Those bastards.”

He was clearly recalling his time as the Blood Scaled Crazed Killer. I said nothing, simply waiting for my master’s brief recollection to end.

Finally, my master continued, “With this, you have now obtained the Dual-Mind Intentions Technique, the Conquering Heaven Peerless Divine Arts, the Heavenly Demon Divine Art, and on top of that, two pieces of the Scripture of Unsurpassed, Perfect, and Complete Enlightenment.”

“It is all thanks to you, Master.”

“If you apply these well, they will be of great help. I will research them as well, but my constitution and yours are different, and you should be able to handle this much on your own by now.”

I immediately understood that he was referring to his own constitution, the Nine Yin Meridian Obstruction. The secret martial arts of the Zhuge Clan were for normal people, for the gifted children of the martial world who had grown up eating elixirs like rice. They were not meant for my master, who had been born with the Nine Yin Meridian Obstruction. His way of circulating energy was naturally a bit different from mine. Similarly, my master would have to reconstruct the martial knowledge of the Scripture of Unsurpassed, Perfect, and Complete Enlightenment to fit his own constitution.

That meant he had to compete with the ordinary martial artists of the great families while having weights dozens of times heavier strapped to his limbs. And despite that, the fact that he had earned both the titles “Blood Scaled Crazed Killer” and “Divine Doctor White Dragon” could only be explained by calling him a genius.

I nodded. “I understand. I’ll give it a try.”

“However, I will check in on you from time to time, so if you run into any difficulties, tell me at any time. Of course… I suspect… you will probably come up with another method that defies all common sense.”

I was one who came from outside the box and one who breaks the box. My methods were different from my master, Zhuge Rin’s, but in his own way, the disciple wasn’t exactly normal either.

Hmm. In a way, the Scripture of Unsurpassed, Perfect, and Complete Enlightenment might have some aspects that correspond with modern fitness training.

The martial world calls the Divine Doctor White Dragon a ‘genius’ and his disciple, the White-Robed Divine Dragon, a ‘madman’. I thought that perhaps that perspective saw through to the very essence of things. It didn’t matter. Hadn’t I resolved in that treasure vault not to care what fingers people pointed at me?

“Oh, and Sama Hye has arrived. She passed the Intermediate Physician exam with the top score.”

“She’s here for her residency?”

“Yes. She will be staying at our Pavilion for a while now.”

“Wow!”

“You seem happy.”

“Yes! Of course.”

When I went outside to find Sama Hye, sure enough, she was already on her way to find me. The traces of her childhood had almost vanished, and she stood there as a young adult.

“Benefactor!”

“Ah, no… I told you not to call me that.”

Since Sama Hyeon is my sworn younger brother, Sama Hye is, in a way, family too. Being called “Benefactor” makes my skin crawl.

But to ask her to call me ‘orabeoni’… Ah… for some reason… that’s hard. The middle-aged man’s soul within me is smacking me on the back of the head, asking what I think I’m doing.

Sama Hye hesitated, then said, “Minor Pavilion Master?”

…That feels a bit distant, too.

Well, whatever. What does it matter what I’m called? Hadn’t her older brother, Sama Hyeon, already called me ‘Gaga’? I felt a sense of resignation.

“Hye-ya, you’ve grown up so much!”

“It’s all thanks to you. Benefac—oops.”

“No, it’s fine. Call me whatever you’re comfortable with.”

I’d already been called Benefactor several times. To feel embarrassed about it now felt silly.

“I heard you passed the Intermediate Physician exam with the top score?”

At those words, Sama Hye’s eyes shone brightly. “It’s thanks to the medical texts you sent, Benefactor.”

“Texts of that level were available at the other branches too. It’s thanks to your hard work.”

“Hehehe.”

Sama Hye burst into a bashful laugh, looking pleased. Seeing her, I felt a corner of my heart melt.

It’s a difficult path, so I thought she might give up. But you’ve come this far, Hye-ya.

Thanks to Sama Hyeon, Sama Hye could now live a life of leisure without any financial worries. She could have lived more safely and luxuriously than anyone. That was a blessing. And yet, Sama Hye forged her own path, steady as an ox. The child I had saved had grown up to walk the same path as me. As a doctor, it filled me with an indescribable emotion.

Right… this happened back on Earth, too.

I had once saved a newborn baby. It was a case where I had worked with the pediatrics department, fighting a long battle against illness. The baby in the incubator was so small and fragile that it seemed a single cough could snuff out its breath. On top of that, its organs were so tiny. There was a time I thought it might be impossible to perform surgery, to take a knife to such a minuscule organ.

Anguish and despair. Despite it all, we all clung on desperately, thinking that if we let go, the child would die. Fortunately, that baby lived.

And I met that child again as a medical student.

Amazingly, it wasn’t an experience unique to me. It was a gift that long-time doctors surprisingly experienced from time to time. Even if they didn’t come back as doctors, when they visited as full-grown adults, it would stir up an indescribable feeling.

Feeling my mood lift, I stroked Sama Hye’s head. “You’ve grown up well. You’ve grown up so well.”

“It’s thanks to you, Benefactor.”

“All I did was help you overcome one crisis. You’re the one who came this far on your own two feet.”

Sama Hye looked at me for a long time with touched eyes as I said that. “You never take any credit for yourself, Benefactor.”

“It’s the truth. Of course, my technique was phenomenal! Who else but me, right?”

“That’s the same as always, too.”

Even his boastful words didn’t sound unpleasant for some reason.

Benefactor is still the same as ever.

Sama Hye smiled softly.