Chapter 8 Part 1. Ninth Yin Pulse

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Translator: Hiro02

Editor: Taochaidee

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As he was startled, two people entered the room with a knock.

One was Jeong Da-jeong, whom he saw earlier, and the other was Kwon Sung-joo, a middle-aged man and doctor wearing white clothes.

“Your father is here.”

“Yes, sir. Good afternoon.”

“I heard about your story. You must have been through a lot.”

“No, I was lucky.”

Kwon Sung-joo spoke as if he was genuinely happy. Do-joon shook his head and smiled bitterly.

So-eun bowed when she saw the doctor come in.

“Hello, sir.”

“Hello, So-eun. How are you doing today?”

“Great!”

Kwon Sung-joo pulled a chair and sat in front of So-eun.

“Then I’ll start the examination.”

“Yeah~”

Do-joon stepped back slightly. Kwon Sung-joo began to inspect skillfully. Looking at the eyes and mouth, checking the machine’s numbers.

It was a routine inspection, not a grandiose one.

Kwon Sung-joo, who had been observing So-eun’s condition for a while, opened his eyes wide. And he talked to Do-joon.

“The symptoms have subsided a lot. The swelling in her neck is gone and the complexion is good. Don’t you feel like she’s in her best condition lately?”

“Is that so?”

Do-joon’s expression brightened up.

He didn’t put it into words, but he was deeply moved.

Every time his child was sick, there was nothing he could do. In his heart, he wanted to get sick himself instead of her. He wished he was the one sick and his child was healthy.

But all he could do was hold his sick child’s hand.

But now there was something he could do for her.

‘I’ll come and make copies whenever I have time.’

It wasn’t a cure. However, it will allow So-eun to live longer and more comfortably.

Perhaps she understood Kwon Sung-joo’s words, So-eun jumped and hung on Do-joon’s arm.

“It’s because you’re here~! It didn’t hurt when I saw my dad.”

“Really? Is Daddy our So-eun medicine?”

“Yes!”

Kwon Sung-joo smiled warmly and talked to Do-joon.

“She is good enough to go out for a while.”

“Really?”

“But please do not leave the hospital grounds. In case something happens.”

“Okay. So-eun, do you want to go for a walk with your dad?”

“Yes!”

So-eun nodded and jumped out of bed. Then she ran and opened the closet.

“Dad, please take this out for me~.”

“Which one?”

“This one, Pika***!”

Do-joon approached and took out the clothes So-eun was pointing to. It was a yellow hooded jacket with ears and tails like Pika***.

(T/N: It’s… Pikachu!!)

He dressed So-eun. The clothes were a little big and baggy. This was because he bought it in a slightly large size in preparation for her growing body.

“Oh my, So-eun is looking so cute!”

“Really?”

As So-eun twirled to proudly show off, Jeong Da-jeong clapped and liked it. It wasn’t her usual words, but she really had a completely relaxed face.

In a peaceful landscape, Do-joon laughed and said,

“So-eun, can you wait a minute? Daddy needs to talk to the doctor.”

“Yeah~”

Instead of Do-joon, Jeong Da-jeong took care of So-eun. She even trimmed her clothes and put a child’s cross bag. She also made her put on shoes.

After leaving the child to Da-jeong for a while, Do-joon approached Kwon Sung-joo.

“Can I ask you something for a second , sir?”

“Yes, of course.”

Kwon Sung-joo also smiled generously when he saw Jeong Da-jeong and So-eun. Do-joon glanced at So-eun. In his eyes, So-eun’s status window was visible.

State

– Ninth Yin Pulse

Of course, that letter.

Do-joon, who did not study hard in his school days, could not understand what those Chinese characters meant. Seeing the ‘Status’ pops up, he could only guess that it has something to do with So-eun’s illness.

Do-joon asked with a grain of salt.

“Have you ever heard of a ninth yin pulse?”

Then Kwon Sung-joo’s eyes opened wide.

* * *

Kwon Sung-joo looked surprised for a moment. It was an instant, but he couldn’t avoid Do-joon’s eyes.

Why did he have to say that? Do-joon swallowed his saliva.

Eventually, the words that came out of Kwon Sung-joo’s mouth.

“What’s that?”

It made him feel relaxed. Dojun smiled despondently.

‘Maybe it’s just that he doesn’t know.’

He thought he shouldn’t have guessed it.

When Do-joon was about to open his mouth again, Jeong Da-jeong interrupted the conversation from behind.

“A ninth yin pulse? Doesn’t that sound like a word from a martial arts novel?”

“The martial arts?”

“A martial arts novel?”

Both men looked at Jeong Da-jeong with a curious and puzzled look on their faces. She, who was holding So-eun, shrugged her shoulders.

“Have you never read a martial arts novel? Usually, a lot of old men watch it.”

Do-joon and Kwon Sung-joo looked at each other once again and shook their heads. Neither of them had ever read a martial arts novel in their lives.

“If it’s martial arts, you mean of that kind? A man flying through the air and a long wind blowing out of his hand?”

“I’ve seen a few movies but,……. Isn’t that all nonsense?”

“That’s right. And in this day and age, it’s not really a baseless story. If you look at Hunters, some people are flying around and some people produce energy waves with their hands.”

That was true, he has heard about those.

Apparently, Jeong Da-jeong seemed to be the most knowledgeable among us. Then she tilted her head and asked Do-joon.

“Anyway, why did you ask?”

“Oh, that……. A friend of mine told me that So-eun’s disease was similar to that.”

It was pretty plausible for a rushed lie. Jeong Da-jeong giggled when she heard that.

“This shrug.Your friend must be a martial arts fanatic.”

“I guess so, haha…….”

“Now that I hear it, it seems like there’s a similarity. Generally, the setting for the yin pulse disease of short-lived includes a child born with a strong energy. But in exchange, they are set-up with an outstanding appearance and excellent intelligence.”

Intelligence? So, does she mean smart?

It’s not a word he usually hears, but the meaning is conveyed. It seemed to fit in with her. Isn’t So-eun the prettiest and smartest girl in the world?

Do-joon nodded to himself with a serious look.

Kwon Sung-joo, unable to understand his thoughts, talked while stroking his chin from the side.

“Hmmm……. So, the martial arts novels talk about a disease which is similar to the mana disease. I’ll have to look into it.”

“Ah, sir. It’s all just fiction, fiction.”

“Still…”

He was a good doctor. He has talent as well as passion. And always take the patient seriously.

Do-joon was grateful to him. So, for several years, he was able to trust and entrust his daughter to him.

“I’ll have to look into it, too.”

That’s what Do-joon said. Jeong Da-jeong shook her head, saying she was serious about mere novels, but it was still worth looking for.

At least in his own eyes, the letters of the ninth yin pulse are clearly reflected.

He could not have blown away the clues he had found in six years, calling them fictional stories. In the first place, this era of world tree would have been just fiction decades ago.

“Dad, when are we going for a walk?”

“Huh? Oh, yeah, yeah. Let’s go now.”

So-eun urged him with a nagging expression. Then Kwon Sung-joo spoke to Do-joon.

“Then, I’ll be going now, daddy.”

“Yes, thank you, sir.”

“So-eun, take care~. Have fun with your Daddy, see you later~.”

“Yeah~ You too~”

After seeing off Kwon Sung-joo and Jeong Da-jeong, the father and daughter also left the hospital room.

So-eun held Do-joon’s finger tightly with her dainty hands. When Do-joon suddenly looked down, their eyes met. So-eun smiled when she saw Do-joon.

How long has it been since he saw her like this? His daughter looked so healthy.

Feeling sentimental emotions, Do-joon slowly headed out of the hospital.

Do-joon left the hospital after confirming that So-eun was asleep.

On the way back home, the moon was unusually clear and bright, and stars twinkled that day.

He returned to the store in the cold night’s breeze.

‘It’s a martial arts novel…….’

The first thing he did when he returned to the store was search for martial arts novels with the setting of the Ninth Yin Pulse.

If he looked for it, there seemed to be a lot of variations like Moon Vein and Solar Vein. But, many people called them Yin Body since they lumped them together as the same.

(T/N: Yin Pulse and Yin Body are interchangeable words.)

‘Maybe I should look for it under Yin Body.’

He searched on Google and found various novels. Some were free to read and some had to be paid for.

He doesn’t have to read all the books from the first to the end. He just needed to read the part where the Yin Body appears.

Do-joon read the novels that came up on Google search one by one. For novels introduced through blog reviews and other sources, he even went to the novel websites and paid for it.

1 hour… 2 hours…… 3 hours…….

Time passed and eventually it became dawn. Even if he looked only at the parts where the Yin Body occurred, time flew by as he was reading several novels.

Do-joon came out to the terrace to cool off for a bit. Before he noticed it, he already had a can of beer in his hand.

Sip! Slurp!

He took a sip of beer leaning on the railing and lowered his eyes to his cell phone again.

The content shown in most of the novels were about the same.

The main character, who gained strength, defeats the antagonists and shows off his ability. Then, a character who was caught in the Yin Body appeared mainly as one of the female protagonists.

The first martial arts novel he read was quite macho.

The content itself was bloody, so cruel and sensational content appeared frequently.

But Do-joon’s feelings after seeing all of that.

‘It’s like a fairy tale book.’

Surprisingly, the opposite.

It wasn’t that he was used to cruelty or that the bloody scenes like these in the story were just fairy tales.

It was just because Do-joon focused on characters with symptoms of yin body, and not on the main character of the novel.

In most novels, a desperate female character is saved by the main character.

As Jeong Da-Jeong said, they were beautiful, pitiful and intelligent, and were waiting for the day when they would die.

The main character, like a prince on a white horse, appears to cure their illness.

After that, naturally, she fell in love with the main character, but the back story was good.

What was important to Do-joon was that the main character uses magical powers to “cure” the incurable disease of the yin body. That was all.

Smash!

Suddenly, his emotions soared and he clenched his fist without realizing it. The can of beer he was holding was crushed, and the beer that was half left flowed down his hand.

Without even thinking about wiping it, Do-joon kept his mouth shut.

In the novel, the women suffering from the yin body disease were like princesses. Similar to being kidnapped by a demon king or an evil dragon, a princess hoping for the prince’s help.

And since it’s a novel, of course, the prince appears and saves her. A few cliffhangers, or a few drops of perspiration, to the point of futility.

Such was the story. Characters were set on the premise that they will be saved from the beginning. And a disease set on the premise that it will be cured.

Snow White ate the poisonous apple because the prince would kiss her, and Cinderella would be persecuted by her stepmother because she would marry the prince and be saved.

However, there is no such convenient character in reality.

‘…… I’m the only one.’

There was no such thing as an expedient prince. Even if it existed, he could not guarantee that it would appear in front of him.

After all, it was just him. A person who can devote everything to So-eun.

It may be the prince who will save the princess, but parents are the only ones who will save the child.

‘…… It’s not that I didn’t get any hints.’

He learned something while reading a novel. The yin body was a disease that was commonly caused by a strong yin energy, in other words, it was a congenital yin qi, it was also mentioned that they would be cured by giving them cores of spirit animals or elixirs that were imbued [filled] with yang qi at the same level of yin qi in the person’s body.

(T/N: Qi [pronounced “chee”] means [vital] energy.)

In other words, a potion containing the yang energy can be a cure.

‘I can’t believe it completely since it’s just a novel…….’

However, this was the first clue that he discovered in six years. Although, the bizarre things of the labyrinth, the ability to copy, and the insight were gained by him.

Do-joon wrote down this method in his mind, “Treatment for So-eun: No. 2.” Of course, he didn’t forget to put in the parentheses and write “I need to check first.”

Why was it number two?

Number one was actually something he has known for a long time.

‘The Golden Covenant.’

A mythic-grade potion that appeared only once in the world in the decades after Yggdrasil appeared. An unearthly elixir that can cure all diseases in the world and wake up even the dying.

He has to find it.

“I never had a chance.’

For Do-joon, who was only a potion maker and collector, the Golden Covenant was something he could not even dream of.

Mythic-grade items are valued by the entire world as soon as they appear. In fact, whenever a mythical grade item appeared, there would be wars and battles all over the world to acquire the treasure.

What if the potion promises that even the dying person could be revived?

It’s a treasure that you can’t save even if he pays a billion won. To ask Do-joon for the Golden Covenant, it was like picking up a star in the sky.

‘But it’s different now.’

He has the ability to reach for the stars, maybe.

It’s still weak. Maybe it’s not as powerful an ability as he thinks. Or, even a great ability may not be able to reach the Golden Covenant.

However,

It was enough to stand on the starting line.

A faint ray of light reflected in a dark cave. If that’s the only way, shouldn’t he follow it even if he falls and gets hurt?

‘I’ll save my daughter.’

Do-joon jumped up from his seat. He tossed the can in the trash and went back to his store.

Even in the cold night air, the reason your body burns hot is not just because of alcohol.