Chapter 57
Chapter 57
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Translator: crow
Chapter Title: Chaotic First Conference (Complete)
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Professor Cheon stood there with her arms crossed, eyeing us one after the other.
“Run me through all the questions that got tossed around. Starting from right now.”
I glanced over my shoulder at Kim Ji-hoon, who looked like his soul had up and left his body.
I swallowed dryly and began recapping the questions I’d fielded, one by one.
“Yes, Professor. At first, it was mostly basic stuff about the abstract. Vital signs on admission, peak cardiac enzyme levels, coronary angiography findings—they asked about all that, and I answered just like we’d prepped.”
“Good. Nice and straightforward. What else?”
“Then Professor Kim Hyuk-jae from Oseong Seoul Hospital asked about the key points for differentiating it from non-occlusive mesenteric ischemia.”
Professor Cheon’s eyes widened just a fraction.
“Professor Kim Hyuk-jae? And you handled the answer okay?”
“Yes. Luckily, I explained it well using the abdominal exam findings and lactate levels to show it was unlikely.”
“Well done.”
A satisfied smile crept across Professor Cheon’s lips.
“What about you, Ji-hoon? What questions did you get?”
Kim Ji-hoon’s shoulders twitched.
“I… um… got asked about the utility of urine alkalinization in rhabdomyolysis… but I couldn’t answer properly. I’m sorry.”
His voice trembled at the end. Professor Cheon fell silent for a moment.
“Who the hell asks a first-year something like that? What kind of jerk pulls that on a rookie?”
“It was Professor Park Joo-seong from Seoul Catholic Sacred Heart Hospital…”
“Oh, man.”
Professor Cheon rubbed her forehead.
“Why’d that guy have to go and ask something like that? You drew the short straw.”
An awkward, heavy silence settled over us just then.
From way off in the distance came a booming, unhinged voice.
“Han Hyun-jae!!!“
I turned my head. There was Chief Resident Lee Min-jae, barreling toward us through the crowd like a rabid dog.
“Is it true!!! That you took down a resident from Aseong Hospital?!”
Right as that gruesome, crass metaphor was about to echo through the entire venue,
Lee Min-jae’s gaze locked onto Professor Cheon Eun-jeong’s face, right beside me.
“……Ah!”
His body screeched to a halt like a bus slamming on the brakes.
Every trace of madness vanished from his face like a lie.
In 0.1 seconds flat, he wiped away the crazy and slapped on the mask of the world’s most polite, model resident.
Lee Min-jae bowed at a perfect ninety degrees and bellowed.
“Professor! Good to see you!”
“Yeah, yeah. Min-jae, you’re here? How’d your oral presentation go?”
Professor Cheon took his greeting in stride, casual as ever.
“Yes! Thanks to your guidance, Professor! It went off without a hitch!”
“Good work.”
Where had that psycho gone who’d been yapping about chopping heads? How was this perfectly socialized human standing there instead?
…That’s social life for you.
That miraculous pose switch.
That flawless mask work.
Awestruck by Lee Min-jae’s masterful social skills, I quietly waited for their chat to wrap up.
Professor Cheon tossed a few praises at Lee Min-jae’s oral presentation, then turned her gaze back to us.
“Right! Speaking of which! Hyun-jae here apparently caused a scene at that oral session earlier?”
Lee Min-jae dove right into spreading the gossip with glee.
Professor Cheon’s eyebrow arched slightly.
“Hyun-jae? But he was doing a poster presentation?”
“That’s the thing! He jumped into someone else’s Q&A session and stirred things up!”
Lee Min-jae shouted, unable to hide his excitement.
Professor Cheon’s eyes flicked between me and Kim Ji-hoon.
“What happened? Ji-hoon, you tell me.”
All the spotlight swung onto Kim Ji-hoon, who’d been standing quietly.
“Uh… um… well, Professor… it’s kind of a long story…”
“Doesn’t matter if it’s long. Give it to me.”
Kim Ji-hoon shot me a quick glance, then launched into the full account of the seminar room disaster from earlier.
“…So, Hyun-jae raised his hand and pointed out that the apical muscle looked thickened on the echo images, and there was a giant inverted T-wave on the ECG… and challenged the presenter’s diagnosis. Said it was more likely apical hypertrophic cardiomyopathy than Takotsubo…”
The longer the explanation dragged on, the tighter Professor Cheon’s brow furrowed.
“So, basically, Hyun-jae verbally demolished an Aseong Hospital resident in front of dozens of professors?”
‘No, why do all these hospital folks have such foul mouths? Demolished…’
I clicked my tongue inwardly, but I couldn’t deny Professor Cheon’s phrasing nailed it better than anything.
“And then.”
Professor Cheon looked at me.
“What happened after? Did the presenter burst into tears and slink off?”
“Oh, no… The supervising professor came up, apologized, said they’d contact the patient again, and that wrapped it up.”
“Hmm. And after that?”
“Huh?”
“You publicly humiliated them like that—there had to be fallout. No one came over complaining?”
I hesitated for a second.
Should I even mention this?
Wouldn’t it just make me sound like a cocky jerk?
“Oh… um… I just… got some compliments… from Director Kim Hyuk-jae at Oseong Seoul Hospital and Professor Park Joo-seong at Seoul Catholic Sacred Heart Hospital… said the question was impressive…”
My voice came out tiny as an ant. Professor Cheon just shrugged, unimpressed.
“Huh. You don’t have to tell me stuff like that. Seoul folks love buttering up promising young talent.”
I pulled a crumpled business card from my pocket.
“Actually, Professor. It wasn’t just compliments…”
I handed her Professor Kim Hyuk-jae’s card.
“Oseong Seoul Hospital’s director told me to call him sometime and gave me this.”
In that instant, all the air around me froze solid.
Kim Ji-hoon’s mouth gaped open like a crucian carp.
Lee Min-jae’s triumphant grin locked into place.
And for the first time, a faint crack appeared in Professor Cheon Eun-jeong’s ever-relaxed smile.
“What…!!”
Professor Cheon practically snatched the card from my hand.
As time ticked by, the wariness melted from her face after inspecting it a few times.
Professor Cheon lightly placed Oseong Seoul Hospital’s director’s card back into my hand.
Then, in the softest, kindest voice, she asked,
“Hyun-jae.”
“Yes, Professor.”
“You’re still finishing your residency here in Busan, right?”
Behind her smiling face loomed a chilling aura that seemed to say, ‘Without my say-so, you’re not stepping one foot out of my turf, punk.’
I answered almost on reflex.
“…Yes. Of course.”
“Good.”
Professor Cheon’s smile turned satisfied.
“Finish your residency right, and no one’s gonna complain if you go do a fellowship in Seoul after. Plenty of paths out there.”
Professor Cheon sidelong-glanced at Lee Min-jae beside her.
“Our chief resident Lee Min-jae here’s already scouting fellowship spots at Aseong Hospital. Right?”
“Gasp!”
A deflating whoosh burst from Lee Min-jae’s mouth.
His face flushed beet red.
“P-Professor! How did you know?!”
“You were staring at job postings on your phone every break—only a blind man wouldn’t notice.”
Professor Cheon clucked her tongue and smacked Lee Min-jae on the back.
“Ow! Professor! Spare me! I just… just looked! Prep for the future…!”
“Quiet. Go buy dinner for the kids.”
…Thanks to these folks, maybe. Why else would this hellhole of a hospital start feeling a tad human.
I let out a chuckle.
***
And just like that, the storm of a conference blew over.
Those two days had been a dream.
I fielded a barrage of questions at my poster, got familiar with some professors, even scored business cards.
Night brought pricey beef, and on the bus back to Busan, I passed out cold.
A dream. Yeah, it was a dream.
And now I’d woken from it.
“WAAAAAAAAAAH!!!”
Right by my ear exploded a four-year-old’s lung-busting scream that shredded my eardrums.
“Shhhhh! Seung-hoon, be good! Look, the doctor’s just gonna peek in your ear real quick! See? What’s this? Airplane’s flying! Vroooom~”
I waved the otoscope like a plane, putting on a desperate show.
But the kid wasn’t buying my childish ploy.
He swatted my hand away and wailed even louder.
“Nooooo!! Go awayyyy!!! Mommyyyy!!!”
Here I was, smack in the middle of pediatric ER—the toughest corner of emergency.
And I was right there, stuck in the thick of it.
What good’s being called a first-year genius at the conference?
In reality, I was just a flailing doctor who couldn’t even peek into a four-year-old’s ear for suspected otitis media.
“Mr. Han!”
Mid-battle with the kid, sweat-drenched, a nurse called out—savior or grim reaper, who knew.
“Another little patient just came in. Fever’s at 40 degrees, and the kid’s totally limp…”
I handed the howling child off to the nurse and staggered to my feet.
Ah.
The dream was over.