Chapter 36

Episode 36 Possession (3)‌

While Sung-hoon Yoo lifted the patient's jaw and attempted to secure the airway, Nam Joo-hyun spit out a self-deprecating curse with his mouth, struggling to find a blood vessel in the patient's arm. However, because the blood vessels had all contracted due to shock, the needle repeatedly stabbed the void.

“I can't get a line! Han Hyeonjae, come over here and apply direct pressure to the wound! Press with all your might!”

I overlapped both hands over the wound where blood was gushing out and pressed down like a crazy bastard, putting all my body weight into it.

“Looking at FAST! Move!”

Park Se-young grabbed the ultrasound probe. She placed the probe all over the patient's abdomen, and her brow furrowed in despair as she looked at the monitor.

“The entire abdominal cavity is a sea of blood? It's worse than the patient from earlier! At this rate, he won't last ten minutes!”

A sharp alarm blared like crazy from the monitor. I held on desperately while applying pressure to the wound. Hot blood kept forcing its way through my fingers.

I stole a glance at the faces of my seniors. Cold sweat drenched the forehead of Park Se-young, who was always cool-headed, and the hands of the usually adept Sung-hoon Yoo were trembling faintly.

“Secured one line!”

The numbers on the blood pressure monitor were falling ruthlessly past the 60s.

58, 55, 52…

“Blood pressure is dropping into the 50s! At this rate…”

Park Se-young's voice cracked with despair. They were squeezing in O-type blood packs as if wringing them out, but it was like pouring a single bucket of water into a burst dam. The patient's body was spilling blood like a bottomless pit, and all our efforts were just delaying the time of death by a very minuscule margin.

“What about the Trauma Surgery call? When did they say they're coming!” Sung-hoon Yoo shouted, his face glistening with sweat.

“The fastest team will take at least 15 minutes to arrive! They are currently in the middle of another surgery….”

The nurse's reply was no different from a death sentence.

15 minutes. In this state, forget 15 minutes, he wouldn't even last 5. The patient's face was already no longer that of a living person. Everyone knew it. We were losing right now. This fight was slipping out of our hands.

I felt the strength gradually draining from my hands pressing on the wound. The warmth of the blood felt through the gloves felt heavy. Is it over like this? Before my eyes, beneath my hands, is a person going to die just like this?

It was at that exact moment. Inside my head, a very cold and alien possibility sprouted.

[Possession]

[Price: 5,000 LP]

‘Fuck.’

There was no choice. My pride, the gaze of my seniors, the hospital rules, and the hellish pain of 12 hours that would strike after using the skill. I put all of that on the scale. And on the opposite side lay this man's life.

The scale tilted to one side.

‘…I'll do it.’

I closed my eyes while keeping the blood-drenched wound pressed down. I blocked out all the noise inside my head. Then, putting all my will into it, I envisioned just one name.

‘Possession. Mes of the God (Male).’

At that instant, the world flipped. It wasn't that my vision went dark or that I lost consciousness. Rather, it was the exact opposite. Everything became incredibly vivid.

The cold air of the Resusc, the stench of blood piercing my nose, the loud monitor alarm sound. Every sense seemed to be amplified dozens of times.

So this is what Possession feels like. It's my vision, but it feels like it's not my vision…?

The world was still visible through my eyes. However, the subject looking at that world was not me. Should I say it felt like becoming a terrified spectator pushed into the absolute corner seat of the cockpit that was my body? The feeling that my arms and legs, my voice, my everything was no longer mine. Something unfamiliar took complete control over this body.

My hand moved. No, his hand moved. And my mouth opened.

“…What is this place?”

It was my voice, but it wasn't my accent. With that one word, all movement in the chaotic Resusc ceased. Park Se-young, Sung-hoon Yoo, Nam Joo-hyun, and even the nurses. All of them stopped what they were doing and stared at me with dumbfounded expressions.

“What? Han Hyeonjae, what are you talking about all of a sudden?” Park Se-young asked back, bewildered.

“…Intra-abdominal hemorrhage?”

“I told you earlier! Han Hyeonjae, snap out of it!” Sung-hoon Yoo couldn't hold back and roared. His eyes held the conviction that under this crazy situation, the 1st-year rookie had finally lost his mind from the pressure.

The me inside myself screamed.

‘Hey, you crazy, socially-stunted ghost bastard!! Use honorifics! Honorifics!!!!! Those people are all your seniors… no, my seniors, you bastard!!!!!’

However, my outcry did not reach him. The owner of my body completely ignored Sung-hoon Yoo’s roar as if it were background noise and scanned the stainless steel tray. And finally, he revealed his true objective.

“Blade.”

With that one word, the air in the Resusc froze.

“…What did you say?” Nam Joo-hyun asked back, unable to believe it.

“Give me the blade.”

This time it was a bit clearer. A voice mixed with annoyance. At that moment, everyone's reason snapped.

“Are you crazy?” A low curse escaped Park Se-young’s mouth. “Hey, Han Hyeonjae! Are you in your right mind right now? What are you going to do looking for a blade here! What, are you going to split open the patient's stomach here? Did you watch a drama yesterday? Do you want to lose your license? Do you want to end your doctor's life!”

“Are you really not going to snap out of it?” Nam Joo-hyun’s face flushed bright red with anger. He looked ready to grab me by the collar at any second.

“Hey! Just because you hear people calling you a genius and talking about preparing for a Double Board or whatever, do you really think you've become the main character of a drama? This is crazy! Crazy!! If you touch a blade to a patient's body here right now, it's all over!” Park Se-young’s scream filled the Resusc.

Feeling the anger, contempt, and the faintly mixed fear within it, the me inside despaired.

‘Fuck… I'm screwed. This ghost bastard is ruining my life…!’

Ignoring all the blame pouring over him, Mes of the God (Male) reached his hand toward the tray and said, “No. 10 blade.”

“No, seriously, this is suffocating me to death. Hey!!! You're a 1st year!! And in Emergency Medicine at that!! You are not in a position to hold a mes right now, you crazy bastard!!” Park Se-young shouted, almost wailing.

“Han Hyeonjae! Hey, somebody grab Hyeonjae! Hyeonjae is not in his right mind right now, grab him!” Sung-hoon Yoo’s desperate shout split the Resusc.

Taking that speech as a signal, the 2nd-year Nam Joo-hyun and an intern standing nearby rushed in to subdue me.

I was screwed. If a physical scuffle broke out here, this patient would just be finished. Please, just listen to that ghost bastard for a second.

However, as if scoffing at all that chaos, Mes of the God (Male) started moving at a crazy speed.

Mes of the God (Male) reached his hand over the stainless steel tray. The thing my hand—no, Mes of the God (Male)’s hand—picked up first was not the No. 10 blade. It was a pair of sterilized forceps and a giant lump of sterilized cotton firmly clamped in those forceps. And a container of betadine filled with a reddish-brown fluid.

“Hey, you…!”

Before Nam Joo-hyun could shout anything more, he had already popped the bottle cap off. And in the next moment, Mes of the God (Male) just tilted the container and poured the gushing betadine solution straight over the sterilized cotton.

‘This crazy bastard! You need to save hospital supplies!’

However, Mes of the God (Male) possessed no such trivial spirit of thriftiness. Holding the dripping cotton soaked with betadine, Mes of the God (Male) leaned over toward the patient's abdomen. And with a single movement, he wiped down the entire abdomen from the patient's sternum to the upper pubic bone, drawing a giant circle.

A fast, wide, and unrestrained movement.

“……”

At that scene, Nam Joo-hyun, who was trying to grab me, and Sung-hoon Yoo, who was shouting, both ended up freezing on the spot.

Simultaneously with finishing the disinfection, his other hand was already tearing open a package containing sterile drapes. The blue sterile drape unfolded with a rustle in the air. Mes of the God (Male) covered the patient with the giant drape with absolute precision.

“Crazy…” someone muttered in a low voice.

The movements did not stop. Like a possessed craftsman, Mes of the God (Male) spread out the sterile drapes on both sides and the upper body in an instant. Unfolding the folded drapes, positioning them, and unfolding the next drape—that entire process continued as if it were a single motion.

The me inside just watched the show my body was putting on with eyes full of wonder.

‘Ah, so that's how you do it. So fast, yet so precise.’

Lastly, Mes of the God (Male) firmly secured the edges of the four sterile drapes with towel clips.

Click, click, click, click.

A mere 30 seconds. That entire process, which would have taken me at least 5 minutes of fumbling if I had done it normally, finished in just 30 seconds.

Everyone in the Resusc fell into silence.

Everyone in the Resusc was no longer looking at the 'insane 1st-year Han Hyeonjae'. They were witnessing something that soared far beyond their common sense. Wouldn't they view him as something that, while ignoring all the words of the seniors inside the Resusc, covered the sterile drapes in an instant, disinfected the patient's belly, and was truly preparing to split it open?

And finally, the hand of Mes of the God (Male) picked up the No. 10 blade.

Under the cold light of the Resusc, the silver blade shone chillingly. Han Hyeonjae, which is to say, Mes of the God (Male) who had occupied my body, looked down at the perfectly prepared surgical field while holding the knife. Well, to be precise, it was an ultra-temporary operating table that was embarrassing to even call a surgical field, but still.

The moment he saw that appearance, Sung-hoon Yoo’s face turned stark white.

He had realized it. This is not a joke. That crazy 1st-year bastard is really going to split him open.