Chapter 120
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 120
Just as the startled physician scrambled out of bed, the front door burst open with a slam. He took a few trembling steps, only for the bedroom door to be thrown open just as violently.
Slam!
Men so tall they had to duck to enter the bedroom filled the space, their presence so overwhelming the physician found he couldn't breathe. He opened his mouth, but not even a groan escaped.
Shadows thicker than the darkness itself seemed to ripple around them. They dominated the room simply by stepping inside, looking like grim reapers who had come to deliver a death sentence.
Fortunately, the words that came from the reaper who had burst in were not of death.
"Are you the physician?"
"Y-Y-Yes..."
The moment the word left his lips, they hauled him to his feet. His legs were shaking too much to walk, so they practically carried him as they spoke with unnerving urgency.
"We have an emergency patient. You must come with us right now."
The physician's eyes trembled.
In any country, infrastructure grew scarcer the farther one traveled from the capital. This was especially true in the city-state of Pelfe; outside the capital, there was nothing that could be called a proper hospital. In their absence, such areas relied on traveling physicians who made house calls.
He was one such physician, treating patients in the villages near the Rock Forest. Though he was a wandering doctor, his skills were renowned enough that people from the capital sometimes sought him out, making him the most famous practitioner in the region.
Being dragged away in the dead of night was nothing new—patients rarely scheduled their illnesses.
But this time was different.
He had never refused a patient, but he knew with chilling certainty that even if he had tried, these men would have dragged him along anyway. The grim-reaper-like figures were that desperate, that on edge.
They rode their horses at a breakneck pace. Terrified he would be killed instantly if he fell, the physician clung to the arm of the man holding him secure. Just as he thought he might die from sheer terror, a mountain cabin, shrouded in darkness, came into view. Before he could even process its sudden appearance, the galloping horse snorted and skidded to a halt.
The man he had been clinging to for dear life coldly shook his arm off. After dismounting, the physician shook his head vigorously, trying to clear the dizzying fog.
"W-Where is the patient?"
At his question, the man who had brought him gestured for him to follow. His head still spinning, the physician stared at the ground as he took a step forward, then looked up.
He froze after only a few steps, his feet refusing to move.
Before him, a scene unfolded in absolute, unnerving silence.
Figures with an overwhelmingly heavy presence, men he couldn't fathom how he'd missed, rose from various spots in the darkness. They were every bit as intimidating as the ones who had brought him—some even more so. They were the kind of men who made the hair on his arms stand on end just by sharing the same space. What kind of lives had they led to exude such an aura? The physician knew instinctively: one wrong breath, one misplaced word, and his head would be severed from his neck.
Someone nudged him from behind.
As the physician was ushered forward, the man who had brought him whispered to another man with red eyes who was smoking a cigarette.
"They say he's the most famous in the area."
The smoker turned to look at him. His distinct, arrogant demeanor suggested he was a noble. His striking red eyes swept over the physician from head to toe.
It was then.
The cabin door slammed open. The figure who appeared shattered the silence, his presence so immense it made the physician forget everything that had terrified him up to that moment.
"The physician?"
A terrifyingly low voice seemed to coil around the physician's heart.
The red-eyed man, who had been scanning him, quickly hid his cigarette behind his back and answered.
"Yes, they say he's the most famous in this area..."
"Follow me."
Cutting him off, the man stared intently at the physician. Like a moth drawn to a flame it knows will burn it, the physician walked toward him. As the man’s face, which had been a dark silhouette, came into focus, the physician met a pair of fierce, piercing blue eyes that seemed to glow even in the backlight. Goosebumps erupted across his skin, as if he had come face-to-face with a wild beast in the dead of night.
The man turned and walked into the cabin. Everything about him was coldly refined—his breath, his gaze, even his stride.
Usually, when entering a place with a critical patient, the very air felt different. It would be thick with frantic screams, weeping, and a desperate heat like warm blood.
Had there been a mistake? Was there no urgent patient after all? Or was the sick person simply unimportant to the man before him?
As the physician stepped inside, the door closed behind him.
The interior of the cabin was warm and free of drafts, the walls blocked on all sides by black cloth.
The blue-eyed man stood silently by a bed set up in the inner room. And on the bed he was staring down at lay a woman.
She must be the patient.
As the physician hurried over, the man, who had been quietly watching the woman, spoke.
"She was caught in an explosion. Not a direct hit, but she was buried under stones that collapsed from the impact."
His low voice was calm, almost detached. It was the physician who felt his own heart race.
Hurriedly setting down his medical bag, the physician went to pull back the blanket, only to notice that the woman’s face, her eyes gently closed, was remarkably clean. Furthermore, a purple ointment of some kind had been applied to the minor scratches on her skin.
It seemed someone had been tending to her before he arrived.
"It would be helpful to have an assistant for the examination. If you could call the person who treated her..."
"Just examine her."
The physician paused and looked up, only to find those piercing blue eyes—which he had thought were merely cold—fixed on him with a terrifying intensity.
Oscar stared straight at the physician, his sharp eyes pinning him in place as he forced out the words, each one sounding as if it had been torn from deep within him.
"I can assist. I will do whatever is needed. Just tell me if she's alright."
A chill ran down the physician’s spine.
"...Yes."
He lowered his eyes as if mesmerized.
Paradoxically, a palpable madness bled through the man's highly rational demeanor. His calm composure and clear gaze felt like a dangerously thin sheet of ice covering a raging abyss.
The man before him seemed to have only one purpose.
The woman caught in the explosion had a clean face, at least. But having treated people crushed by heavy objects before, he swallowed hard and pulled back the blanket. He had been tense, knowing that even if her face was fine, her body might not be. Fortunately, her body was also intact.
The only sign that she had been in an explosion was the stone dust clinging to her unwashed hair. The physician felt a wave of relief.
He began to examine the patient more carefully than he ever had in his life. The man who had said he would do whatever was needed was dead serious; he did everything himself, ensuring the physician never had to lay a single finger on the woman's body. Or perhaps, he simply wouldn't tolerate any unnecessary touching.
After a while, having thoroughly examined the patient, the physician let out a long sigh.
"Her breathing is stable, and there doesn't appear to be any immediate threat to her life. As you can see, her external injuries are minor..."
"What about internal injuries?"
"If they were severe, there would be internal bleeding, or her breathing would sound abnormal."
"Then why isn't she waking up?"
The physician swallowed hard several times.
"The shock m-might have been to her head. Sometimes, even if everything looks fine on the outside, there can be issues internally..."
Unable to meet those piercing blue eyes, the physician quickly averted his gaze and added, "For now, we can only wait. However, you must refrain from moving her before she wakes. If there is trauma inside the head, even a minor shock can cause severe complications."
The man didn't even seem to breathe.
The physician suddenly realized that he was shirtless. The muscles and scars starkly revealed in the lamplight seemed to tell the story of the violent life he had led.
The composure the physician had barely managed to regain while treating the patient began to shake. He felt as though he would suffocate if he stayed with this man any longer.
"T-Then, I will... take my leave."
Keeping his head low, he turned around. He had no idea where he was, but he had to get away from this place—this beast's den—as quickly as possible.
He reached the cabin entrance in a few quick strides, threw the door open, and fled outside. He strode forward blindly, but he didn't make it very far.
"Ah..."
Dozens—no, easily hundreds—of wolves with glowing eyes were lurking in the dark. Whether they had been there all along or had gathered in the brief time he was inside, they were everywhere.
As his legs trembled, he saw their fierce eyes turn as one toward a single spot. These suffocatingly powerful beings bowed in unison, as if by a prearranged signal. The wave of loyal bows was directed toward the cabin he had just fled.
Oscar looked out at the Wolves who had rushed to his call.
Simon, hastily stamping out his cigarette, approached him and reported the information that had just come in.
"The King of Pelfe is heading to the Rock Forest himself. All the palace physicians and doctors from the royal hospital are moving with him."
"......"
Oscar didn't laugh, or get angry, or light another cigarette. He simply stared intently at the retreating back of the physician, then pulled something from his pocket and tossed it to Simon.
The object he threw like a piece of trash was none other than the Marquis's Insignia. It was a sight that would have made Barbara, who handled it like a sacred treasure, gasp in horror.
Even Simon, who was careless with most things, would never treat the Marquis's Insignia so lightly. Above all, no matter how casually Oscar treated everything else, he had never entrusted the insignia to anyone but Barbara.