The first week of August.
It had already been a month since I'd boldly opened my clinic.
The blazing summer sun poured through the large south-facing windows of my spacious consultation room.
"Wow~ The weather's amazing!"
If it had at least been raining, I could have blamed that.
But there wasn't a single cloud in the sky.
And not a single patient in my clinic.
"...Haaaa."
I let out a long, miserable sigh.
I'd opened the clinic with minimal expenses, but it had still cost me twenty million won I'd saved through years of tutoring during university, plus a forty-million-won loan.
Which meant that even now, at this very moment, loan interest and rent were steadily draining money from my account.
Employee salaries.
Maintenance fees.
Gas.
Electricity.
And countless other expenses.
"Money is literally evaporating as we speak."
Aaaagh!
Why had I made this decision?
An impulsive clinic opening?
Could those words even be used together in the same sentence?
If I'd done absolutely nothing and just freeloaded at Seo-young's place, that money could've carried me all the way into ranked gaming status!
"Location... location really matters, huh."
I should never have opened a clinic so recklessly.
Or if I had, I should've at least called Sang-hoon, who confidently offered to help me find a place.
Then I wouldn't have ended up all the way down in Busan, renting a clinic halfway up a hill.
"I didn't even realize this counted as a slope..."
When I'd examined the area's flow of qi, the energy circulation had been excellent.
From a feng shui perspective, it was practically ideal—a perfect baesanimsu, backed by mountains and facing water.
It was even a wonderful place to cultivate internal energy.
The moment I saw it, I thought it was perfect.
"...Who knew modern people couldn't walk uphill for five minutes without a car?"
When Seo-young heard I'd opened a clinic, she immediately took a train down to visit.
The moment she saw the location, she'd nearly fainted.
She'd actually stopped to rest halfway up.
For me, that reasoning was completely unimaginable.
A clinic this close to civilization was practically downtown.
Back in the martial world, patients had traveled through mountain valleys for hours to reach me.
But no matter how many times I said that, modern humans weren't suddenly going to become capable of casually conquering steep hills.
"Aaaaaagh!"
I screamed silently and spun my reclined chair in a circle.
Then my eyes landed on the true culprit behind this impulsive business venture.
"That person... If not for that book..."
The autobiography of someone I'd briefly respected.
I picked it up.
Why had I read this thing so obsessively?
Actually...
Come to think of it...
I wasn't sure the book had ever suggested opening a business like this.
"AAAGH! Whatever!"
Fwoosh!
I immediately burned the autobiography to ashes with Samadhi True Fire.
Honestly, it felt like a cursed object.
Maybe patients weren't coming because it was sitting in my office.
Once the book had vanished without a trace, I straightened my white coat and transformed back into the image of a friendly, professional doctor.
"I'll just cultivate my breathing."
I opened the window and took a deep breath.
So what if business was slow?
It wasn't like I was losing money.
...Probably.
Erasing a certain person's influence from my mind, I settled into meditation.
Ding~
A moment later, the clinic door opened.
"Oh!"
I shot upright and dismissed my screensaver before pulling up the patient's chart.
"Kim Yi-jin. Nineteen years old. Knee pain?"
The information she'd entered at reception appeared on the screen.
Her address was listed as an apartment complex only five minutes away by my standards.
"Perfect. She lives nearby!"
Until now, the only patients I'd seen were tourists who'd twisted an ankle while hiking.
Half of them recovered so quickly thanks to my treatment that they never needed a second visit.
The other half experienced significant pain relief and left satisfied—but naturally chose one of the dozens of clinics closer to their homes for follow-up care.
But a local patient?
A local patient could become a regular.
She might even bring friends.
"Hello."
A tall girl stepped into the consultation room, greeting me in a husky voice.
Whoa.
I was tall myself, but she had to be at least 180 centimeters.
"Hello~ Please have a seat!"
I smiled brightly, fully determined to win this patient's loyalty.
"Her physique, posture, even her clear aura... Why does she feel familiar?"
The girl carried an oddly martial air around her.
She gave an awkward nod and sat where I pointed.
For athletes, injury was an unavoidable part of life.
But Kim Yi-jin had managed to avoid that fate for a very long time.
"Our daughter is built like iron! Hahaha! She's a natural athlete. Watching Yi-jin bring home medals makes me feel like all those years I played basketball were worth it!"
No one questioned the phrase built like iron.
Of course, she'd gotten hurt before.
But unlike teammates who struggled for weeks after a minor injury, she always recovered within a day or two.
"Ugh."
So when she felt a sharp twinge while landing from a jump, she didn't think much of it.
"It'll heal soon. I can still play. If I sit out because of something like this, I'm not giving my best."
She continued training.
Continued competing.
She didn't want to be seen as someone making a fuss by covering herself in pain patches.
And sure enough, the pain faded after a few days.
"I thought it was healed..."
Then it returned.
Then improved again.
Then returned once more.
The cycle repeated over and over.
"Shoot! Three points—ah?!"
...
Eventually, disaster struck.
Amid cheers and jeers from the crowd, she collapsed to the floor clutching her knee.
"Yi-jin?"
"Captain! Are you okay?"
She'd made a crucial mistake during an important game.
"Kim Yi-jin, let me see that knee. Right now."
The coach had noticed her awkward landing mechanics and immediately started asking questions.
"How long has this been happening?"
"...I don't remember exactly."
"You're the team captain and you've been hiding an injury?!"
It wasn't as though she'd desperately wanted to play this particular game.
Yet the coach was furious.
"You can barely bend it properly. No training until treatment is complete!"
Only then did she realize how serious the problem had become.
"I should've gotten treatment right away."
She was banned from basketball activities entirely.
Her teammates all had something to say about it.
And so she finally went to a hospital.
She told her father everything.
"This isn't some fake injury, right?"
A man who believed in grit and endurance, her father was equal parts skeptical and worried.
He took her to a large hospital downtown.
The entire building was dedicated to orthopedics.
Three floors of inpatient rooms.
Rehabilitation facilities she'd only ever seen on television.
After a long wait, she underwent examinations, X-rays, and CT scans.
"To evaluate the ligament properly, we'd need an MRI, but it appears to be an ACL tear."
"What?!"
The doctor pointed at images on a computer screen.
Of course, she couldn't interpret the black-and-white scans.
All she understood was one thing:
This was serious.
"Let's schedule surgery. Older patients sometimes leave it alone, but you're young. Ligament reconstruction is the right approach."
The word surgery made her head spin.
Her father asked a few questions.
But she only cared about one.
"If I have surgery... can I return to sports right away?"
"Absolutely not. You'll need at least three months, possibly six, focused entirely on rehabilitation."
Father and daughter left without scheduling anything.
Her father was furious.
"That hospital is obviously pushing unnecessary surgeries just to charge huge fees!"
Dragged along by her father, Yi-jin sought a second opinion at a small neighborhood orthopedic clinic.
"Hm? It's not completely torn. Partial tears don't necessarily require surgery. Those big hospitals always..." the older doctor muttered.
"Let's start with conservative treatment."
He prescribed muscle relaxants and painkillers.
Physical therapy.
Observation.
Her father was delighted.
Yi-jin was relieved too.
For nearly a month, she visited every single day.
The therapy involved attaching four cup-like devices around her knee while mild electrical currents pulsed through them.
"Hm? You were here yesterday too, weren't you? You're so young—what's hurting?"
One day, an elderly woman who practically lived at the clinic struck up a conversation.
"I injured my knee playing basketball."
"Oh dear! A young girl doing such intense sports."
"It just kind of happened. What about you, ma'am?"
"My knees have been bad for forty years! Ever since I had my fifth child. Then there was farming, running a business... no surprise, really."
"You've been through a lot... Has treatment helped?"
"Treatment? At my age? I don't expect miracles. I just come because I have nothing else to do."
Yi-jin glanced around.
Half the treatment beds were occupied.
Almost every patient was over sixty.
The same elderly faces she saw every day.
Since her first visit, she hadn't even seen the doctor again.
And her knee wasn't improving at all.
"It'll get better... right? I'm strong."
Then one day, one of her father's friends—a former professional athlete—visited their home.
"The coach is clearly discriminating against my daughter! It's just a knee injury! Why ban her from basketball for an entire month?!"
"If it's an ACL injury, she needs treatment. Otherwise it'll become serious."
"She's played fine all this time! What if she loses all her form?"
"Come on, come on. Just take her to a Korean medicine clinic. Whenever something hurts, I go immediately. Works wonders."
A Korean medicine clinic?
At those words, a place she'd seen during a walk near the mountain behind her house came to mind.
"Seongsu Korean Medicine Clinic. Graduate of Korea University College of Korean Medicine. A doctor from Seoul, maybe?"
Hopefully it wouldn't be as expensive as the first hospital.
Carrying a little anxiety, she stepped inside.
"Ms. Kim Yi-jin, right? Knee pain? How did you hear about our clinic?"
The receptionist greeted her warmly.
The interior wasn't much different from other clinics she'd visited.
"I just had a good feeling about the place, so I remembered it."
Yet somehow, a refreshing energy seemed to drift from deeper inside.
The moment registration was complete, she was guided straight into the consultation room without any waiting.
"Hello~"
A woman doctor?
She relaxed slightly.
Unlike the detached physicians she'd seen before, this clinic director greeted her with a bright, welcoming smile.
"When did the pain start?"
"I'm not exactly sure. I think I hurt it while playing basketball..."
"Oh wow, that's so cool! Are you an athlete?"
"Ah... yes."
"Then that knee is precious! You must've been really worried."
The doctor carefully asked how she'd been injured, what treatments she'd received, and every detail of her medical history.
Nothing like the first doctor, who only stared at a computer and talked about surgery.
Nothing like the second doctor, who barely spoke at all.
"You must really want to recover and get back to playing."
"Yes. I want to compete in my final high school sports festival..."
The moment she said those words, something surged inside her chest.
She'd told herself she was fine.
That treatment would eventually work.
But she'd been anxious and frustrated all along.
"I really do want to get better."
"I really want to play basketball."
The clinic director nodded gently and smiled.
"I'll do everything I can to help make that happen. Let's run a few examinations first."
Nothing had actually happened yet.
And yet, somehow, she already felt reassured.
I smiled softly.
"No wonder she has the aura of a Daoist cultivator. She's an athlete."
The moment Kim Yi-jin entered the room, she reminded me of disciples from Mount Hua or Wudang.
That same clean, untouched aura possessed by people who'd grown up training in the mountains.
Even her reserved manner resembled young martial prodigies seeing the outside world for the first time.
Carefully, I guided the conversation forward.
"Got her."
The moment her eyes lit up while talking about basketball, the corners of my mouth rose.
"This girl is my patient now."
I helped her lie down on the examination bed.
Then I began my assessment.
