“What should we start with?!”
The moment they entered the dormitory, Hwang Seoyoung dropped her books onto the table with a thud and declared dramatically.
“Let's start with the third subject. The Internal Medicine professors make easy questions, and we've at least been studying Acupuncture and Medical Law because we've had tests in those already.”
The class representative opened her textbook and immediately got to work.
“Huh? We're starting already? I ordered pizza. Can't we eat first—”
“We can cover half the material before the pizza gets here.”
I promptly forced Seoyoung back into her seat before she could wander off track and began briefing them on the important points.
Since I'd already worked through five years' worth of National Licensing Exam questions and, on top of that, reviewed past exams written by our university's professors specifically for the graduation examination, the material wasn't particularly difficult for me.
“This section doesn't show up often on the national exam, but Professor Jin absolutely loves it, so you need to memorize it.”
“Ah! I remember this one! I got it wrong on last year's finals too!”
Neither of them had completely neglected their studies.
Still, it didn't take me long to identify the areas they'd only skimmed through.
“How are you better at teaching than professors who've been lecturing us for four years?”
“No amount of flattery is going to get you anything.”
“No, seriously! I could never memorize this no matter how hard I tried. But after you explained it using one of your treatment cases, it clicked immediately!”
Hm.
This body had cultivated medical insight.
Unlike professors who could put even top students to sleep, I'd spent years teaching medicine to people who couldn't even read.
I puffed out my chest proudly and continued.
Originally, I'd only intended to help them through one or two difficult subjects.
But somehow I got carried away.
Even after the pizza arrived, the lecture continued.
Exam periods always made time pass unnaturally fast.
As always, studying became a blur of nearly identical days.
I had planned to spend only a day or two with my classmates before retreating to study alone.
Instead, I ended up spending several consecutive days with them.
The two of them could barely maintain concentration for six hours a day.
I found myself constantly scolding them and forcing them back into their books.
Let's finish strong.
Now there were less than ten hours left until the graduation examination.
On the final day, everyone reviewed the entire curriculum alone.
That was simply common sense.
Sitting in the library, I carefully read through all the notes I'd compiled over the past weeks.
I've already memorized the herbal medicine characteristics yesterday. I'll just review the gynecology prescriptions that keep confusing me.
Honestly, I probably could have gotten away with less.
But because of my rivalry with Jo Haneul, I'd been forced to relearn everything using modern medical terminology.
In the long run, that would probably prove valuable.
I pushed my concentration to its limit and finished reviewing.
I'll grab some chocolate from the convenience store and get a little sleep.
Pulling an all-nighter wouldn't have been a problem.
Still, maintaining peak condition mattered.
After packing up my belongings, I left the library, intending to get some fresh air before returning to the dormitory.
I exited through the main gate and headed toward a convenience store that stayed open late.
Then I noticed two familiar-looking cars blocking the middle of the road.
“Huh?”
One of them was a blue Porsche.
The same model as the car that had nearly hit Jung Gwang-cheol before.
“It's probably the same one.”
I whistled softly.
“Drove like a maniac, and now he finally got into an accident.”
The blue Porsche had slammed into the left rear side of a white sedan.
Both vehicles sat motionless in the middle of the street.
Judging from the positioning, they'd attempted to make a right turn simultaneously.
The Porsche, which had been in the outer lane, appeared to have struck the white car that had started turning first from the inside lane.
“But why haven't they moved the cars?”
They were clearly obstructing traffic.
For a moment, I wondered whether someone had been injured.
Suppressing my presence, I approached.
“I'M GOING TO SUE YOU!”
A booming voice rang out from behind the Porsche.
A huge man was currently grabbing a very familiar individual by the collar and shouting at him.
Why is Jo Haneul here?
Tilting my head, I listened.
A little earlier...
“God damn it. Why are they studying so hard when all they have to do is perform at their normal level?”
Jo Haneul downed another glass of whiskey at his favorite bar.
He'd already memorized everything Hwang Sanghoon had highlighted for him.
At the same time, the thought of reviewing entire textbooks from the beginning was overwhelming.
I wonder if Han Yeowon finished everything.
He snorted.
That's why he never gets first place. Every time he starts from page one and studies everything like an idiot.
Kim Min-gyu and Lee Cheol-jin were the same.
Why work so hard?
As long as you focused on the important parts, nobody was going to fail.
He sent messages to his friends asking them to come out drinking.
More than an hour passed.
Nobody even read them.
“Are they seriously planning to pull an all-nighter?”
Jo Haneul glared at his phone.
After turning the screen on and off several times, he stood abruptly.
“Forget it. I'll just go home.”
He frowned.
“Why am I not even getting drunk tonight?”
Maybe it was because tomorrow was the exam.
Despite knowing he would obviously win, an uncomfortable pressure lingered in his chest.
After paying the bill, he climbed into his car.
“Hm-hm~”
As music poured from the speakers, his mood improved slightly.
Maybe I should drive to the beach instead of going home.
The thought occurred suddenly.
Eulwangri Beach... about an hour away?
He opened his navigation app and searched for the destination.
Then—
“Huh? Huh?!”
A car suddenly emerged from the right.
CRASH!
There wasn't even time to turn the wheel.
The collision slammed his body sideways.
Because he hadn't been wearing a seatbelt, he struck the steering wheel hard.
“FUCK!”
The curse escaped automatically.
His chest throbbed.
His head spun.
What the hell just happened?
Still, he calmed down surprisingly quickly.
This wasn't his first traffic accident.
All he had to do was call his insurance company—
Then realization hit.
I drank.
His face paled.
I have to settle this somehow.
If I get caught this time, my license is gone.
Holding his aching head, he reconstructed the accident.
He'd been preparing to turn right.
A blue car had been stopped in the far-right lane.
Assuming he could turn first from the adjacent lane, he'd accelerated.
Then the blue car had suddenly moved and struck him.
Maybe it wasn't actually stopped.
He'd been looking at his navigation app.
Perhaps he hadn't checked carefully enough.
Whose fault is this? Fifty-fifty?
He desperately tried to convince himself.
I entered first. Doesn't that make it his fault for failing to watch the road?
But even he knew it looked bad.
Settlement. That's my only option.
Having reached that conclusion, Jo Haneul immediately lowered his window.
The other driver had already gotten out and was approaching.
The man was huge.
Tattooed arms.
The face of a gangster.
“Can't you keep your damn eyes open while driving?”
The man roared exactly as expected.
Sports car. Modified to hell. Typical wannabe thug.
Cold sweat ran down Jo Haneul's back.
But he forced himself to remain calm.
“I-I'm sorry.”
Arguing about fault would only hurt him.
Even if it's some modified sports car, repairs won't be cheap.
And if I cause another scandal...
Mom will kill me.
He immediately got out and bowed deeply.
Then he glanced at the car's emblem.
Holy shit.
It's actually a Porsche?
Not some fake badge?
From that moment onward, his lips began trembling.
No way.
This can't be real.
He wasn't enough of a car enthusiast to recognize every Porsche model.
The vehicle looked different from the Porsche Hwang Sanghoon had once driven.
But surely Porsche made more than one model.
He wanted to search online immediately.
Instead, the driver stepped closer.
Threateningly.
“Let's not do this.”
Jo Haneul bowed again.
“I think I made a mistake, so let's settle things cleanly. I'll pay for the repairs and—”
The Porsche owner ignored him and continued advancing.
“AUGHHH!”
Then something unexpected happened.
Rather than attacking him, the man grabbed his own neck and screamed.
“WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO?!”
He looked horrified.
“MY NECK WON'T TURN!”
Jo Haneul swallowed hard.
Stay calm.
His goal is money.
Calculating how much money he could secretly access without his mother's knowledge, he spoke politely.
“Maybe you're just shocked. Would you mind if I checked?”
The man didn't stop him.
Jo Haneul carefully rotated his neck.
“IT DOESN'T MOVE AT ALL!”
It was true.
The range of motion wasn't even thirty degrees.
The driver's panic intensified.
So did Jo Haneul's.
“Y-You didn't break it, right?”
The man's grip shook violently.
“I'm suing you!”
This wasn't acting.
The fear was genuine.
“Absolutely not.”
Jo Haneul hurriedly reassured him.
“You probably strained it. It's called a whiplash injury. The ligaments and soft tissues... uh... muscles can stiffen up like this.”
He began reciting information he'd crammed for the exam.
Then stopped halfway.
Why bother explaining anatomy to someone like this?
“This muscle here has tightened up.”
He pointed.
“A few acupuncture needles and you'll be fine.”
Had this man seriously never had a stiff neck before?
Jo Haneul's own neck locked up regularly after heavy drinking.
Then he remembered something.
The first lecture with Professor Lee Min-seok.
The day his own neck had frozen.
Han Yeowon had answered immediately.
Levator scapulae.
And then—
“We'll needle Fengchi (GB20), Quyuan (SI13), Jianwaishu (SI14), and Jianzhongshu (SI15) around the origin and insertion points of the levator scapulae. After identifying tender points, we'll also treat the trapezius, sternocleidomastoid, supraspinatus, and infraspinatus muscles.”
He remembered the answer perfectly.
Afterward, Hwang Sanghoon had inserted a few needles during class.
The neck had started moving almost immediately.
That idiot showed off on an airplane too.
Why can't I do it?
Confidence surged.
Treat the man.
Settle the accident.
Everyone wins.
“Yeah.”
Jo Haneul nodded confidently.
“I can fix this. I'm the top student at Korea University's College of Korean Medicine, after all!”
“Oh?”
The Porsche owner's eyes widened.
At the mention of Korea University.
Okay.
There should be a needle somewhere in my bag.
Digging through it, he found a pack he'd been carrying around while preparing for Professor Lee's practical exam.
“Just a few points.”
He smiled reassuringly.
“You'll be fine in no time. I'll make it hurt as little as possible. Please sit down for a moment.”
The Porsche owner attempted to nod.
Failed.
Then awkwardly grabbed his own neck.
Apparently terrified it might remain permanently frozen.
Without further resistance, he sat in the driver's seat.
Jo Haneul gently palpated the muscles.
Searching for landmarks.
Fengchi... beneath the occipital bone. Behind the mastoid process. In the depression between the trapezius...
He'd needled this point before.
Once.
A classmate had complained of headaches.
Slowly, carefully, he inserted the needle.
“AAAH!”
“I-It's almost done!”
His hands shook every time the man yelled.
Even so, he somehow managed to insert needles into all four points he remembered.
Then he stepped back.
“Try turning your neck.”
And silently prayed.
“......”
“Ah...”
“IT STILL DOESN'T MOVE!”
Nothing.
The neck remained frozen.
Jo Haneul tried turning it himself.
No change.
Maybe four points aren't enough?
Maybe the stimulation was too weak?
Should I use manipulation techniques?
What if that makes things worse?
Should I check other trigger points?
What if I fail again?
Now Jo Haneul was panicking too.
If he made another mistake, the situation might become completely irrecoverable.
This isn't even a serious condition.
Any clinic could fix this easily.
Yet the fact that he couldn't do it himself filled him with crushing self-loathing.
I should've practiced more whenever my friends complained about pain.
He squeezed his eyes shut.
At this point, there was only one option left.
“Well... tomorrow, there's Sky Korean Medicine Clinic Gangnam Branch. My mother owns it, so—”
“Aigoo~”
A voice interrupted him.
“So after all that, you're pulling the Mommy Card?”
Click.
Someone clicked their tongue in mock disappointment.
Then a thoroughly irritating face stepped into view.
Han Yeowon had arrived.
