WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: LilGuyBlastoise
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ Plague Doctor in a Peaceful World ◈
Chapter 24: The Monk Flew Away
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“...?”
I pulled my hand free and stopped the music.
I had turned off the translator app, so I had no idea what he said, but...
Did I really need to check when someone whose condition had improved so dramatically in seconds was looking at me with shining eyes?
Scratch scratch.
[Is there a cat in the next room, by any chance?]
I showed Mr. Sato my sketchbook.
“Yes, there is. But... are you finished?”
When the [Contagious Disease Patient] tried to sit up on his own, Mr. Sato hurried over to support him.
[Are you all right, Chairman?]
[I’m fine. The coughing... Haha, my throat is a little dry, but I’m not coughing as much as before. The dizziness is gone too.]
[I’ll take your temperature. ...This can’t be.]
Lee Mun-yeong came over and interpreted instead of using the translator app.
I nodded and put my pen to the sketchbook.
[May I take a look at the cat too?]
When Lee Mun-yeong relayed the message, the [Contagious Disease Patient] nodded.
[Miko too? Please open the door.]
[Yes, Chairman.]
Mr. Sato carefully opened the next room’s door.
It was a lavishly furnished room for a cat.
I patted my increasingly numb legs and stood up.
Miko was lying limply on a cushion.
Even as a strange person dressed all in black approached, Miko seemed too weak to be wary.
[Contagious Disease Patient]
Actually, I had seen that green text even before treating him.
[This is a Contagious Disease Patient. Would you like to treat them?]
[(Expected MP Cost: 40)]
Thankfully, it was not that high.
Scratch scratch.
[This isn’t a curse. Miko has been infected with a bad virus. You should take Miko to a hospital for tests.]
[...Is that really true?]
Scratch scratch.
[And I will conduct the second treatment prayer at 5 a.m. tomorrow.]
* * *
They offered to let me rest in a guest room, but I declined. My suitcase was at the hotel, and I did not think I could relax in an unfamiliar house with a maze-like layout.
Besides, unlike Korean homes, it did not have heated floors, so cold seeped up from the ground.
[Then I’ll see you tomorrow.]
After exchanging farewells, I left the [Contagious Disease Patient]’s room.
I was back in the corridor surrounding the courtyard.
The charlatan monk who had insisted it was a curse was still standing there, watching me.
“...”
“...”
“Mr. Plague Doctor?”
When I stopped walking and looked at the monk, Lee Mun-yeong cautiously called out to me.
I pressed my palms together and gave a small bow.
This was the composure of a victor.
“...”
The charlatan monk could not hide their displeased expression, but bowed back.
I turned and started walking again.
A little later, in front of a hotel.
I got out of Lee Mun-yeong’s car.
“Then I’ll come pick you up at dawn tomorrow. Get some rest.”
I gave a small bow and waved.
After watching Lee Mun-yeong’s car until it disappeared, I slipped between the buildings, quickly took off my bird-beak mask, and walked in the opposite direction.
Just in case, I had given her a different hotel.
A little later.
I arrived at the hotel where I was actually staying.
“Hashimoto... Kichiro.”
Sitting on the edge of my bed, I searched the [Contagious Disease Patient]’s name on my phone.
“Oh.”
He was the former chairman of a very large and famous company in Japan.
The current chairman was his eldest son.
No wonder his mansion was so grand, and he had readily offered one million yen for a suspicious treatment prayer.
Had he said there was something he urgently needed to finish, but the flu had disrupted his schedule?
I was a little curious about what it was, but it probably had nothing to do with an ordinary nobody like me.
We were not even from the same country.
What I needed to worry about was how a person’s mindset could change between entering a restroom and coming back out.
For now, he was amazed that his condition had improved so much. But as time passed, he might start wondering, “Was I already getting better, and did the placebo effect just make it feel more dramatic?” Then he might regret the money.
Or...
Could this be the time I finally got kidnapped and imprisoned because someone decided I had suspicious supernatural powers?
That mansion was so vast and complicated that if someone deliberately hid a person there, I doubted anyone would find them properly.
“Hmm...”
After thinking for a while, I left my room.
Early the next morning.
I got into Lee Mun-yeong’s car at the place where we had parted the night before.
“Hello, Mr. Plague Doctor. Huh? Did you buy a new cane? It’s cool.”
I nodded, then sat with my back ramrod straight.
“Is something bothering you?”
Lee Mun-yeong asked with a puzzled expression.
I gestured that I was fine and looked out the window.
Actually, last night, I had gone to a famous shop called Don Quijote that sold just about everything.
There, I bought several long and short needles suitable for use as weapons, along with a cane that suited the Plague Doctor.
Go ahead and try something.
I would not hesitate to activate Bloodletting and Divine Punishment.
It was still very early, and the sky was extremely dark.
We met Mr. Sato, who was waiting in front of the mansion’s annex, and headed together to the [Contagious Disease Patient]’s room.
There was no one in the courtyard.
“Welcome.”
The [Contagious Disease Patient] greeted me warmly while sitting on his bedding.
In clumsy Korean pronunciation.
After giving a small bow, I looked toward the room where Miko had been.
[Contagious Disease Patient]
[Contagious Disease Patient]
The lower one was probably Miko.
Was the one a little higher up the seated person?
Mr. Sato quietly informed me.
“The Chairman’s eldest son, Mr. Kenichi, is waiting in the next room to pay his respects. He will not enter without the Chairman’s permission, so there is no need to worry.”
Paying his respects at five in the morning?
Now that he knew my treatment prayer worked, was he not really here to see whether it was genuine?
I nodded for now, then knelt beside the [Contagious Disease Patient].
[This is a Contagious Disease Patient. Would you like to treat them?]
[(Expected MP Cost: 60)]
Was it because of his existing condition?
It had gone up again already.
His voice was getting hoarse again too.
However, thanks to the recovery from wearing the Silver Cross Necklace, I had recovered 54 MP. With the effect of wearing the Plague Doctor Mask added in, I could treat him in one go.
[Please lie down comfortably.]
I wrote it in the translator app and showed it to him.
The [Contagious Disease Patient], who had been watching me with fond eyes, nodded.
“All right.”
Mr. Sato helped him lie down properly, then stepped back.
Today’s selection was choir music.
A grand piece began to play, and I calmly raised my hand.
Just as I was about to make the sign of the cross.
[You must stop this wicked ritual immediately!]
A booming shout rang out from outside.
[It is a ritual to pass the curse clinging to the Chairman on to his descendants! Please stop!]
It sounded like that charlatan monk from yesterday.
What were they going on about?
“That person?”
Lee Mun-yeong muttered with a dumbfounded look before interpreting for me.
[Chairman! Why do you think that person hides their face? If they had not a speck of shame before Heaven, they would have shown their face proudly long ago! Their name too! You must not be taken in by the tricks of someone whose name and face are both unknown!]
I was impressed.
...Wow.
This was the dignity of a true cultist.
I had known it from the moment the monk insisted a simple contagious illness was caused by a curse and all that.
That level of shamelessness must be a basic qualification.
As a novice cultist, I should take it to heart.
[Kenichi, he was your guest, was he not?]
The [Contagious Disease Patient] asked with a stiff expression.
The other [Contagious Disease Patient] moved beyond the next room’s door.
[I apologize. But they are not someone who would say such things carelessly. Previously, with the Niwa family...]
[Enough. Take your guest and leave at once.]
[Chairman...!]
Outside, the charlatan monk started loudly ranting again. Perhaps he was using difficult words, because Lee Mun-yeong, who had been interpreting, tilted her head and muttered.
“Um... the energy of yin? Huh? Dark clouds filled with the energy of a curse to the west...”
Either way, it was extremely noisy.
Noisy enough that I did not even need to hide the skill command in the music.
I quickly made the sign of the cross and muttered.
Talk all you want.
I’ll do my job.
“Treatment, yes.”
[System]
-You used ‘Plague Treatment.’
-‘Plague Treatment’ Proficiency +1
-Experience +2.95%
[MP 0/130]
The moment the treatment ended, the [Contagious Disease Patient] sprang upright.
[Kenichi! Do you take my words for nothing!]
His voice boomed.
It was hard to believe such a powerful voice belonged to a sick man in his eighties.
Mr. Sato’s eyes widened.
[Chairman? Your voice...]
[Ah...]
Hup.
The [Contagious Disease Patient] took a deep breath in, then exhaled.
[Breathing... is much easier.]
[Your voice has improved as well, Chairman. I will take your temperature.]
Outside, it fell quiet for a moment.
[I will open the door, Father. Forgive my rudeness.]
The door to the next room slid smoothly open.
The [Contagious Disease Patient]’s eldest son, the [Contagious Disease Patient]... No, Hashimoto Kenichi, came out.
He had the presence of a chairman of a large company.
“...”
“...”
He looked at me with a flustered expression, then examined his father.
Mr. Sato checked the thermometer.
[Your temperature has returned to normal.]
[What...?]
[Ha ha, remarkable. Truly remarkable. What do you say, Kenichi? Will you still insist that I have gone senile and let a swindler in? Listen to my voice. Is it not clear, as though the phlegm has vanished completely?]
[No, how could this be...?]
[System]
-You equipped a Stick.
-You can use the skill ‘Divine Punishment.’
I gripped the cane I had set beside me and stood.
[This is a Contagious Disease Patient. Would you like to treat them?]
[(Expected MP Cost: 40)]
At least the son seemed to have only a mild cold.
Aaaah~.
Click.
I turned off the music where beautiful harmonies were building.
[I will call the attending physician immediately. Until we have the results...]
[Kenichi. Now that you sit in the chairman’s seat, do I seem beneath you?]
[I apologize, Father. But...]
As befitted someone who had invited a charlatan monk, Hashimoto Kenichi’s eyes were full of suspicion toward me.
Suspicion that perhaps his father’s recovery overnight had truly been the result of some wicked trick, just as the charlatan monk had said.
From head to toe, I was dressed in black, wearing a bird-beak mask with tinted lenses. I probably did look more like a cultist than a monk from his own country.
Hmm, I understood.
[Chairman, will you even bring the evil energy of the West into your household? No! You must not!]
The charlatan monk started shouting again.
[Kenichi.]
[...Yes.]
Hashimoto Kenichi, who had been hesitating, stood and passed by me. Then he opened the two doors leading to the corridor and courtyard in succession.
The charlatan monk stood there holding a ringed staff, his expression completely stiff.
[I apologize, Mon...]
[You would go this far...!]
After seeing old Mr. Hashimoto sitting upright, the charlatan monk glared at me.
[You really did this!]
How much had the charlatan monk expected to receive to put on such a performance?
Lee Mun-yeong frowned before speaking to Mr. Sato and old Mr. Hashimoto.
[The treatment prayer is over, so I will take Mr. Plague Doctor and leave now.]
It was also a way of saying she did not want to deal with the charlatan monk directly.
[I am sorry. Once the uninvited guest has been dealt with and things are quiet again, may I invite you back?]
After hearing Lee Mun-yeong’s interpretation, I shook my head.
[Ha ha, what a shame. Sato, see them out properly.]
[Yes, Chairman.]
Lee Mun-yeong, Mr. Sato, and I started walking.
When were they going to pay me...
Jingle!
The charlatan monk’s ringed staff blocked my path.
[You cannot let him leave like this, Chairman.]
[Kenichi, are you not finished yet?]
[I apologize, Father. Monk, I am sorry, but...]
Hey, hey, someone is going to get hurt at this rate.
[At least verify his face before sending him away. That way, should something happen, you will be able to find this man...]
[Excuse me. I have listened long enough...!]
[Do not touch me!]
Jingle!
The moment Lee Mun-yeong finally stepped in, the charlatan monk shook his ringed staff threateningly.
This charlatan bastard.
I was getting annoyed too, so I lightly pushed his staff aside with the cane I was holding.
Move, you...
Shhhk.
A faint blue light flowed from my hand and instantly wrapped around the cane.
[System]
-‘False One’ has been detected.
-‘Divine Punishment’ activates.
The charlatan monk flew two meters through the air.
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