Chapter 181: Venereal Diseases Never Come One at a Time [1]
Chapter 181: Venereal Diseases Never Come One at a Time [1]
Kang Hyeok looked at Yeoni while holding the scalpel in a short grip.
Yeoni still wore a sour expression as she held Dolseok’s thing.
It was a sight that made anyone feel sorry just looking at it.
Of all things, it had to be something this hideous.
Still, no matter how wretched it looked, it was surely more precious to Dolseok than anything else.
Under no circumstances could it be cut off.
Well... though it already feels a bit too late for that.
Dolseok would probably have to give up on ever seeing a child who looked like him.
Of all things, an abscess down there.
It’s too deep.
If one looked carefully, there were thin cord-like lines passing right beside the abscess.
This kind of anatomy was not exactly Kang Hyeok’s specialty, but he knew enough.
He had been trained far too brutally in it in the past.
Those are probably the vas deferens... both of them got invaded.
In other words, it was practically the same as having undergone a vasectomy. There was a high chance he would become a seedless watermelon.
Clicking his tongue in pity, Kang Hyeok looked back at Yeoni.
Now that he looked at her, she seemed at least less pitiful than Dolseok.
Thanks to that, he was able to give his instructions without much difficulty.
“Yeoni, spread this abscess cavity wide open now.”
“The cavity?”
With a deep frown, Yeoni looked where Kang Hyeok pointed.
An enormous amount of pus had already drained out, yet the inner wall was still coated thickly with yellowish pus.
It was not just ordinary pus. It was something formed by layers upon layers of gonococci and their corpses.
The thought alone made Yeoni retch.
“Ugh.”
“Why, did you suddenly get motion sickness? That won’t do.”
“N-no... I’ll do it.”
“Good. You’ve had it rough. That bastard Dolseok... still, he’s pitiful, so don’t chew him out too much later.”
“Yes, well... ugh.”
Yeoni shook her head, then pulled the abscess cavity wide open just as Kang Hyeok instructed.
“Thank you.”
Kang Hyeok was finally able to inspect the inside of the abscess cavity thoroughly.
Mm. This is really bad.
Once he looked inside, it was truly no joke.
A bacterial film has already formed.
This was exactly why doctors got annoyed every time the media talked about the overuse of antibiotics.
Of course, using antibiotics for a mild cold that did not need them at all was a problem.
But the problems caused by failing to use antibiotics in time were far more serious than that.
Just like the film right in front of him now.
Antibiotics won’t work on this anymore...
For antibiotics to work properly, they had to come into contact with the bacteria, whether through the blood or by being applied directly.
But when a film formed like this, it acted like a protective barrier, making the bacteria impossible to kill.
Then, whenever the host weakened, it would slowly spread the bacteria and eventually lead the host to death.
So if he wanted to treat this, he had to scrape the inner wall clean with a scalpel.
That kind of stimulation was not something Dolseok could endure with a mere medullary strike.
“Yeoni, sorry, but put that down for a second. Hand me the local anesthetic.”
“The anesthetic?”
“Yeah. It’s going to hurt like hell. The inside is a complete mess. Why the hell did this bastard hold out until it got this bad?”
“All right.”
Yeoni handed over the anesthetic much more briskly than before.
At first, she had thought it was just some ridiculous disease Dolseok had caught after fooling around with Makbong.
But judging by Kang Hyeok’s face and the way he spoke, that was clearly not the case.
No matter how she looked at it, Dolseok must have let the illness worsen far beyond what it should have.
Otherwise, there was no way this Baek Kang Hyeok would be making such a huge fuss.
“Here it is.”
“Good. Let’s see...”
Kang Hyeok carefully injected the local anesthetic into the inside of the abscess cavity.
It was the kind of procedure where the injection itself could spread the inflammation even deeper if he was careless, so his expression was extremely serious.
If I inject it into a blood vessel, that’d be a disaster. There shouldn’t be any major vessels back here, but still...
Even shooting a clump of bacteria into a small vessel would be catastrophic.
That could lead to bacteria entering the blood—in other words, sepsis.
So, just as he had been drilled to do since his student days, Kang Hyeok pulled back lightly on the plunger and only injected the anesthetic after confirming that no blood came back.
“That’s done. Makbong, how’s he doing?”
“Heart rate’s still at sixty. Respiratory rate’s hovering around fifteen too.”
Makbong answered like a seasoned anesthesiologist.
Kang Hyeok did not really need to check for himself.
At least in this field, Makbong was pretty accurate.
Looks like he’s still holding, but I should finish this quickly.
Holding the scalpel in a short grip, Kang Hyeok began scraping the inner wall of the abscess cavity hard.
He had to remove the firmly formed film completely, so there was no choice but to use force.
On the parts of the wall where the film had not fully formed yet, blood streamed down.
There was no way to avoid some damage to the wall.
“You’re still okay, right?”
“Yes, yes.”
“If you move now, you’re seriously screwed.”
“Yes.”
Makbong and Yeoni might not have known, but thanks to his damned anatomical knowledge, Kang Hyeok could clearly picture the structures behind the abscess cavity.
The prostate had to be back there, with the seminal vesicles pressed close to it.
Most importantly, there was the rectum.
If that got punctured by mistake, Dolseok would no longer need to worry about not being able to have children.
He would be too busy shitting out of his dick to care about something that minor.
No. Absolutely not.
To avoid that kind of disaster, he had to finish as quickly as possible.
Fortunately, Dolseok lay there like a stone statue until Kang Hyeok had scraped out everything to his satisfaction.
The second medullary strike must have been pretty intense.
“Okay... I’m mostly done with the cutting. Hand me the Betadine.”
“Betadine... here.”
“Let’s wash the inside with this.”
“Do we really have to go that far?”
“Yeah. Gonorrhea’s that nasty. If this isn’t treated properly, Dolseok will turn into a walking gonococcus.”
“Ugh.”
Yeoni made a face just hearing that, then unscrewed the Betadine cap.
She poured it straight into the abscess cavity.
Using gauze, Kang Hyeok scrubbed and wiped the inside vigorously.
Fortunately, after all that scraping with the scalpel, what came off now was only a little blood and Betadine solution.
“Young Master, here.”
“Mm?”
“Aren’t you going to suture it?”
Yeoni asked, shrinking back a little in embarrassment at the hand she had automatically extended.
Naturally, she was holding a needle holder.
It even had a needle on it of just the right size for suturing the abscess cavity.
But Kang Hyeok quietly shook his head.
“We have to leave it like this for now.”
“You’re... not going to suture it?”
“No. If there’s even one bacterium left inside, it’ll grow again. We need to irrigate it with Betadine every day, just like this. For about three days.”
“Three days...”
Three days was the exact amount of time it would take them to reach Dongnae.
That meant Dolseok would have to live on the boat the entire time with a three-centimeter incision beneath his dick.
Pity appeared on Yeoni’s face once more.
“So the saying that fooling around with your dick will get you in big trouble really wasn’t made up for nothing.”
“Mm. Well, that’s true.”
Normally, that saying would not be used in quite this sense.
But since it fit the situation so perfectly, Kang Hyeok just nodded.
“Ugh.”
Right then, Dolseok let out a groan and raised his head.
After that enormous abscess had been removed, his face looked much better than before.
At the very least, the feverish flush that had reddened him all over was gone, so he looked far better now.
“Ugh... my...”
The moment he regained consciousness, Dolseok tried to check his lower half first.
Kang Hyeok smacked him hard on the back of the head.
Come to think of it, because of this bastard, he had been forced to focus on that disgusting thing for quite a while.
“Bastard. If it was that precious to you... you should’ve treated it like it was precious.”
“Ow... huh? I can’t feel... Did you cut it off?”
Dolseok looked at Kang Hyeok in a panic.
He really could not feel anything down there.
If only that expression could have been captured properly.
Even Yeoju would not have been able to paint such a subtle expression onto canvas.
It was the kind of face that made one wonder whether even someone who had lost everything in the world could look like that.
“Cut what off?”
“I can’t feel... no, wait, it’s there, but...”
“That’s because of the anesthetic. It’ll wear off in a bit.”
“R-really?”
“Yeah. Don’t touch it with your filthy hands. I didn’t suture it.”
“Huh?”
Only then did Dolseok sit up properly and look at the surgical site.
The abscess cavity that had tormented him relentlessly for more than half a month was now open.
Truthfully, Dolseok could probably have managed at least the simple act of opening it himself.
But Dolseok was no Guan Yu.
He was more of a coward than some country bumpkin from the neighborhood.
So he had forced himself to endure it and endure it again, and that had led to the major disaster he was in now.
“Uh... is this, is this okay?”
“No, it’s not okay.”
“Then please stitch it up...”
“No. Not now. It has to stay open until all the bacteria inside are dead.”
“If you leave it like this, will I die?”
“No. Lie back down.”
Dolseok lay back down with a face that looked close to sobbing.
Even so, his hand kept drifting toward his lower half. Since he could not feel anything, he seemed to want to confirm it that way instead.
Kang Hyeok shoved that hand far away, then opened the Betadine cap again.
“Yeoni, gauze.”
“Gauze... yes.”
“No, a lot of it. Enough to pack it full.”
“Ah... yes.”
Kang Hyeok soaked the gauze Yeoni handed him with Betadine, then packed the inside of the abscess cavity full.
“Ugh. That hurts...”
“Endure it, bastard. Unless you really want it cut off.”
“Y-yes, sir.”
After cowing Dolseok into silence, Kang Hyeok firmly packed in the Betadine gauze.
It looked rough, but he was following the manual exactly.
In fact, with patients suffering from infections this severe, the principle was to treat them like this without closing the wound.
“Today too... right?”
“Yeah. Pull your pants down.”
That treatment continued the entire way to Busan.
At first, Dolseok had resisted with every fiber of his being, but now he had more or less resigned himself to it.
He still had not forgotten the shock of pulling out the Betadine gauze from the first day.
It had clearly gone in with Betadine’s original brown color, but when it came out, it had been almost yellow.
That meant there had still been that much bacteria and pus left inside.
“So... how is it?”
“What do you think?”
Grinning, Kang Hyeok held up gauze that was exactly the same color as when it had gone in.
There was not the slightest trace of pus on it.
“Ooh!”
“That’s it. I’ll suture it up right away now.”
“Yes, yes!”
“But just in case, keep taking the medicine.”
“Yes... but when I take that, the diarrhea gets really bad.”
Dolseok stared at the sea with a dark face.
Over the past three days, he had sent a great many lumps flowing into it.
Every time, it had felt raw, and it had been miserable.
Even now, it burned like it was on fire.
“Take it anyway, bastard. You still haven’t come to your senses after getting beaten up like this?”
“Isn’t it all healed now?”
“Mm.”
At Dolseok’s words, Kang Hyeok tilted his head.
Certainly, the gonorrhea did seem to be almost gone, just as the fool said.
But what doctor could tell a patient to stop taking medicine?
Even if the doctor himself drank and smoked, he still had to tell his patients not to.
“Take it anyway.”
“Yes, well. All right.”
Dolseok answered readily enough, but inwardly he had other thoughts.
If I secretly throw it away, how would Kang Hyeok ever know?
It was obvious his dick was already healed, so now he figured it was time to start protecting the health of his ass instead.
He realized that thought was mistaken around the time the group passed Busan and approached Daegu.
“Hey, why’s your hair falling out so much lately?”