Village Doctor's Women-Chapter 172 - 167 Brain Treatment
The human brain is the most mysterious and, in modern medicine, the one area that has yet to be fully understood. This is true not only for Chinese medicine but also for Western medicine, where exploration is still ongoing.
When Wang Jian took Teacher Song’s pulse, he used his Qi to probe the man’s general condition. Although he had suffered a stroke, it was clear he had been very well cared for over the past two months, as his bodily functions were still well-maintained.
"Have you been the one taking care of the teacher these past two months?" Wang Jian glanced up at Song Tianran before lowering his head to continue the examination, his question spoken softly.
Song Tianran stood beside him, watching his diagnosis intently. When she heard the question, she nodded, but then remembered he was looking down and couldn’t see her. She murmured in affirmation, "Yes. After all, this happened because of me. If I don’t care for him, who will?"
Wang Jian looked up again, his eyes filled with surprise. He hadn’t expected Song Tianran to place this burden entirely on her own shoulders.
"The teacher’s body has been well-maintained," he said, deciding to change his approach. "You don’t need to worry too much. I will cure him."
The comforting words Wang Jian had prepared got stuck in his throat. Song Tianran’s expression told him that she did not need comforting right now. Besides, she was different from other women; she disliked being comforted because, in her eyes, showing weakness to a man was like admitting women were inferior. That was something she would never do. During the days they had been entangled, he had come to understand some of her personality traits. Wang Jian knew her well enough to realize that offering simple reassurances would surely backfire.
Of course, it wasn’t that she was completely immune to needing comfort. It was just that she was more complex than most women and needed to be comforted in a more roundabout way. So, Wang Jian went straight to the topic of the treatment to shift her focus.
As expected, hearing Wang Jian say he could cure her father, her attention was immediately captured. "Can you really cure him?" she asked, then quickly added, fearing he might misunderstand, "I don’t mean to doubt you, it’s just..."
She explained further, "My senior brothers have all come to see him, and strokes are very difficult to treat. The focus is mainly on post-operative recovery and conditioning... Besides, at his age, my dad is already in a high-risk group."
Wang Jian was, of course, aware of everything she was saying. However, he didn’t interrupt. He simply stood up, looked at her, and waited patiently for her to finish speaking. It was this patient demeanor that filled Song Tianran with a sense of confidence. 𝗳𝗿𝐞𝕖𝘄𝗲𝕓𝗻𝚘𝚟𝕖𝐥.𝚌𝕠𝕞
But just as Wang Jian was about to respond, a sound came from the doorway. His hearing was sharp, and he heard voices. "Someone’s coming."
"Hmm?" Song Tianran was startled, thinking he was changing the subject. But a moment later, she heard a knock on the door, followed by two men’s voices calling out.
"Tianran!"
"Sister Ran!"
The moment she heard them, she knew who it was. "What a coincidence," she murmured. "It’s two of my father’s other students."
"Do they know you’re here?" Wang Jian asked.
Wang Jian had already recognized the voice of Chairman Kang. The other man speaking with him was the Eldest Senior Brother, an early disciple of Teacher Song who was now the director of a hospital. He was one of New Huaxia’s second-generation doctors and among the most distinguished in the industry.
In theory, even without a revered teacher like Song Yijin, whose disciples were widespread, having such a senior brother should have meant Wang Jian wouldn’t be in his current ’miserable’ state. But the truth was, he had never even met this senior brother. He had only heard his voice during phone calls with their teacher; beyond that, their paths had never crossed. To Wang Jian, this senior brother existed in name only. Even Chairman Kang, whom he had just met, felt much closer to him than this so-called senior brother. It was a feeling he knew he shouldn’t have, but it was the reality of the situation.
"You continue," Song Tianran said. "I’ll get the door."
"Okay."
Wang Jian resumed his examination of Teacher Song, but his expression was grim. Even without the stroke, Teacher Song’s condition was not optimistic. After all, he was getting on in years, and his body had entered a phase of decline. Not everyone could be like his master, Xu Changqing. Given this physical reality, there was a limit to what Wang Jian could do. A stroke causes severe brain damage; the blood stasis from the hemorrhage and the resulting neural compression all contributed to his current state. Wang Jian’s goal was to first resolve the damage in the brain.
He began massaging Teacher Song’s head, using his Qi as a needle to stimulate key acupoints. With his current sensitivity to Qi, he could clearly perceive the condition inside Teacher Song’s brain. Even so, cranial acupuncture was an extremely risky procedure.
Thankfully, my perception of Qi is worlds apart from what it used to be. Otherwise, I wouldn’t dare attempt this.
With his enhanced senses, he could perceive the state of Teacher Song’s brain as clearly as if he were looking at an X-ray. This allowed him to stimulate the acupoints with both speed and precision. He could even use Qi Needles to stimulate the areas of blood stasis. Under his guidance, the Qi within Teacher Song’s body grew active, and this dual stimulation began to rapidly dissolve the clots in his brain.
As he worked, Song Yijin’s fingers twitched.
It was at this exact moment that Song Tianran returned, accompanied by Chairman Kang and a man of about fifty wearing a Tang suit. Seeing Wang Jian massaging Song Yijin’s head, the man in the Tang suit immediately roared.
"What are you doing?"
"Is that an area you can just massage so carelessly?"
"Don’t you know that with blood stasis in the brain, this kind of massage could cause compressive damage or even secondary injuries? What if you cause an even bigger problem?"
"Is this something a doctor should be doing?"
"This is absolutely reckless!"
Wang Jian’s senior brother strode over, a furious scowl on his face.
"Senior Brother Murong, you misunderstand."
"It’s not..." Wang Jian began, but he was shoved aside before he could finish. His senior brother didn’t berate him further, instead immediately grabbing Teacher Song’s hand to check his pulse and assess his condition.
It all happened so fast that even Song Tianran and Chairman Kang, who had entered with him, were unable to react. This senior brother, Mu Rongyu, had been a hospital director for many years and carried an imposing air that brooked no argument, a truly oppressive presence.
Even before becoming Song Yijin’s personal student, Wang Jian had heard of this renowned senior brother. The name "Murong" was indeed connected to the Murong Family of the Capital City. Therefore, in terms of both family background and medical achievements, Mu Rongyu far surpassed Wang Jian. It was precisely this power and status that gave him the audacity to scold Wang Jian without a second thought for what he was actually doing. In his eyes, if he deemed the massage to be wrong, then Wang Jian was not allowed to do it. If a simple massage worsened their teacher’s condition, a few harsh words would be useless to fix the damage. When it came to medicine, he, Mu Rongyu, had to be meticulous. The man performing the massage was his junior brother, and the patient was his teacher; naturally, he would treat the matter with the utmost severity. A shouting match was the least of it; if anything had happened to their teacher, he might even have resorted to hitting him.
Indeed, since learning he had a junior brother, he had looked into Wang Jian’s situation and had a general idea of what he looked like. Not to mention, Song Tianran had just told him at the door that this junior brother was inside. It would have been a problem if he hadn’t recognized Wang Jian.
However, after checking the pulse and examining the teacher, he made a strange discovery. The teacher’s physical condition was significantly better than when he had checked it just two days ago.
Is it my imagination?
After the first examination, Mu Rongyu wore a thoughtful expression. He gave Wang Jian an odd look but said nothing more, leaning in to check one more time before he was satisfied. Only then did he truly confirm that his examination was not mistaken.
The teacher’s condition had genuinely improved.
"This is wonderful!" Mu Rongyu stood up and smiled at Song Tianran. "The teacher’s condition has improved greatly! There are signs of recovery. It seems the recent conditioning has been effective."
This improvement definitely couldn’t be the result of a massage from Wang Jian. In his experience, if head massages were that effective, what was the point of doctors like them? So, Mu Rongyu instinctively attributed the change to the ongoing treatment regimen. He added happily, "If this continues, the teacher might make a full recovery."
After delivering the good news, he didn’t forget about Wang Jian. Now that he knew the teacher was fine, he still had to lecture his junior.
"Junior Brother Wang Jian, this is our first time meeting, isn’t it?" Mu Rongyu adopted the authoritative air of a hospital director reprimanding a new doctor. "If I’m not mistaken, you graduated two or three years ago and have been a resident at a major hospital. Why are you still so impetuous? You’re lucky nothing happened to the teacher. If your massage had caused a problem, could you have taken responsibility?"
His tone was three parts anger, four parts sternness, and a few parts brotherly admonishment. From Mu Rongyu’s perspective, his words were perfectly justified.
But Wang Jian frowned. His intentions had been good, and his actions weren’t reckless. He just didn’t know how to explain himself. The oppressive aura from his senior brother was too intense; trying to explain now would only escalate the conflict. He chose to listen to the lecture in silence.
He never imagined that his simple frown would be interpreted by Mu Rongyu as defiance.
Mu Rongyu nearly lost his temper. His mood, which had lifted due to the teacher’s improvement, was now souring again because of Wang Jian’s attitude. Tension crackled in the air between them, so thick that even Chairman Kang and Song Tianran could feel it. Chairman Kang felt his words carried no weight here. He wanted to ease the conflict between the two senior brothers but didn’t know how to start. He could only look to Song Tianran for help.
Song Tianran, however, was in an awkward position, because Wang Jian had only done so with her permission. Receiving Chairman Kang’s silent plea, she stepped directly between the two men. "Senior Brother Murong," she said softly, "actually... this isn’t Wang Jian’s fault. It’s mine. I asked him to check on Dad because I thought he might have a way to cure his illness."
"What?"
