Losing to someone who's only been dabbling for a few months?
That can't happen.
Of course, if you ask me if I've done a lot of nose jobs, well, that's not exactly true.
But if you ask if I'm a complete outsider, that's not it either.
'Korean surgery... has been dead and buried for a long time.'
I'm not sure if I, a certified surgeon and even a former professor at a major hospital, should be the one saying this, but...
By the 2020s, surgery was no longer a popular specialty.
No, even saying that pricks my conscience a little.
It's ruined...
It's tough, you don't make money, and there aren't even many proper jobs available.
So naturally, friends with slightly lower grades started coming in.
No, let's be precise.
Even students with lower grades hardly come, so we have a shortage.
'You have to find your own way to make a living.'
Just because you get your board certification in surgery and then a subspecialty, does that mean you can go out and perform those surgeries?
No.
Do you know what a skilled senior who used to handle hepatobiliary-pancreatic surgery was doing after failing to become a professor?
He started doing hair transplants.
I'm not saying anything against hair transplants.
It's just lamentable that you have that level of expertise but can't use it in reality.
Well, even so, it's better than thoracic surgery or obstetrics and gynecology...
-"Now, now, welcome everyone to the rhinoplasty conference. Occasionally, surgical specialists show up. If you see any unfamiliar faces around you, please let us know."
So, I had to learn surgeries that I could use out in the real world.
Among them, the best were undoubtedly plastic surgery procedures.
Things like two-jaw surgery weren't something you could learn just anywhere.
Rhinoplasty, at least, wasn't as expensive but was difficult and had many complications, so it was a procedure often avoided in plastic surgery, which is why I was given the opportunity.
Even that, well... was followed by all sorts of disdain and hardships.
-"Over here! He's a military surgeon!"
-"Get him!"
Luckily, I was fortunate and didn't get caught.
Thinking back, I've always been lucky.
I died and came back to life, didn't I?
I'm not sure if getting cancer, getting hit by a truck, and ending up in the 19th century is considered good luck or what...
"You look somewhat familiar?"
Anyway, recalling those memories, I cut off the nose of the newly arrived corpse.
It wasn't that difficult if you had a rough understanding of the nasal structure.
Just avoid the bone and slice it off with a snap.
"Ah... Well, that's just basic."
"Cutting off a nose is basic?"
"No, I mean, you just need an understanding of anatomy, right?"
"Y-yes."
I sliced it off with a snap, but perhaps it was too fast. I felt the people around me hesitate slightly.
But...
Aren't they all people from the 19th century?
Their bewilderment was brief, and each of them started cutting the noses of the corpses assigned to them.
Liston?
That guy...
"Hmm. Why is the shape different?"
"You cut all the way to the bone!"
"This? Is this thin thing the bone?"
"It's the bone... It's this hard."
No, it's not even a Liston knife, it's a scalpel—how does a human nose get cut like that?
Really...
"Why are you staring like that?"
"No, I was just wondering if there was some kind of mana."
"Mana?"
"I guess not."
Is he a Sword Master or something?
What if it turns out he can shoot out sword energy and all that?
Pushing these suspicions aside with difficulty, I checked that the others had also all cut off their noses.
Except for Liston, everyone did it properly—that is, they performed a standard nasal amputation.
It's a bit strange to begin with that you shouldn't cut off the nose, yet they give it a seemingly proper name like 'nasal amputation surgery'. Anyway.
"Bring them all here."
"Yes."
So, Colin and Alfred, weaving between the corpses lined up left and right, brought the literature on rhinoplasty they had diligently searched for.
I thought it wouldn't exist, but it was there.
If you expect something to be there, it isn't; if you don't, it is.
It's a confusing 19th century, one way or the other.
Ah, what about Joseph?
"Why are you cleaning the corpse?"
"Disinfection is a habit."
"I... see."
He's disinfecting the corpse.
Normally, things should be settled at the Liston-level, but since his madness isn't the kind that can be stopped with moderate violence, even Liston left him be.
Well, if we used immoderate violence, we could probably stop him...
But then he might stop forever, so this was the wiser course.
Frankly speaking, there's no harm in over-disinfecting, right?
"Let's see... Ah."
Anyway, as I looked at the reconstructive surgery texts my students had found, I was at a loss for words.
It's too...
It's too horrific.
I know it might seem laughable to say this now, but before I dreamed of a trauma center, I dreamed of transplant surgery, and from my perspective...
"Oh... This seems plausible."
"Indeed... Heh..."
Of course, this was just my opinion.
Liston and Blundell were continuously stroking their chins and nodding.
"Replacing the bone framework with iron..."
"And making the skin from calf leather. Hmm... How did they come up with such ideas back in those old days?"
The 19th century is also the old days.
But compared to the 17th century, it's modern.
I felt that while looking at this document.
Iron instead of bone... Of course, even in the 21st century, we implant metal supports.
But that's just conveniently called a 'metal support', and it's a specially treated alloy that can be implanted in the human body.
Just plain iron... you shouldn't implant this.
Aside from rusting, it causes rejection.
'And they replaced the nasal flesh by sewing on calf leather?'
I can guarantee it.
Everyone who underwent this surgery must have died.
No, well, since time has passed, they'd be dead even if they hadn't had it...
"Shall we try it?"
The problem was, 'how on earth do we stop them?'
Would a high-level concept like 'rejection' be possible to explain?
It probably wouldn't work.
"No, wait a moment."
Even if persuasion is impossible, what can't be done, can't be done.
"Why?"
Liston, asking me purely in return, stands facing me.
Behind him...
Though not visible, the patients gathered by the Director are lined up.
They're gathered somewhere in the hospital.
When he first said he was gathering patients, I wondered where he'd find patients without noses, but as if there's truly nothing London doesn't have, he soon gathered a whole bunch.
As expected, most were poor people.
-"Ah, they are syphilis patients. I heard there were even more of them in the past... Anyway, if you get syphilis and leave it untreated, sometimes your nose disappears like that. So, people who lost their noses for other reasons suffer greatly. They're often mistaken for syphilis patients."
I didn't know that.
You'd only know if you'd ever neglected syphilis.
In the 21st century, we not only have king god Penicillin but also a plethora of antibiotics that can kill much stronger and more varied bacteria.
"This... Would this be clean? The miasma on the iron and the miasma on the calf leather would cause infection..."
"Can't Joseph just clean it? If you tell this guy to clean, he'll do it excitedly and even go crazy."
"That's right. Leave it to him, Pyeong-ah!"
Argh, stop smiling so brightly!
Don't smile while you're about to kill people!
"Ah, but then."
Just then, Blundell stepped in.
It didn't feel like a good thing.
This guy...
He's really progressive.
Even thinking back, that attempt he called a blood-mixed transfusion...
"Let me see the later records. They are attempting a completely different surgery. There must be a reason, no?"
"Oh."
But there wasn't.
Well, there was a reason this guy was progressive, wasn't there?
He tried new attempts because what he was doing before wasn't working well.
A new attempt made in a state of complete ignorance is bound to be dangerous.
But he was also the type to stubbornly discard his ideas and follow along well if guided properly.
Thus, he knew how to read the flow of the records.
"That's right, this can't be for no reason. Moreover, this one! This was made by the French, wasn't it?"
"Ah, was it? Then it won't do. There's no way the methods of those frog-eaters could be superior."
"Exactly."
Furthermore, upon closer inspection, that thing we saw earlier—the atrocious surgery about making bones from iron and skin from calf leather... it's the method of those frog-eaters.
Fortunately, Liston is a fine Englishman who would ignore even correct things if they were methods of the frog-eaters, so that particular surgery was promptly discarded.
Joseph?
He's just a difference in degree, but since he's also English, he didn't insist any further.
"It doesn't seem to work well."
Moreover, Colin's high-quality bag, made from calf leather, had already been ruined by phenol.
"Y-you son of a bitch!"
"It'll be safer than before, though."
"Ah, safer?"
Colin had a fit, but what could he do?
I, for one, welcome that kind of challenging spirit.
Anyway, as I watched the chaotic discussion, everyone started reading the next record.
"Drawing a picture on vellum according to the shape of the patient's nose..."
"Then, using a knife on the patient's forearm according to that shape..."
"Attach that flesh to the nose?"
"Hmm... It says to attach it like that and separate it from the forearm after 3 weeks... Is this correct?"
"Are you reading it right? Does a surgery like this exist?"
"Do you think I'm illiterate? Of course, I read it correctly."
Liston made a face as if he were deeply wronged and clenched his fist.
Blundell hastily assured him that of course he wasn't illiterate.
Seeing him like this, Blundell is also quite a madman.
How dare he pull that shit with Liston?
'But...'
I understand.
No matter how you look at it, it's strange, isn't it?
So I looked myself, and it wasn't entirely a strange surgery.
'Ah-ha... So this is, for example...'
Reconstructive surgery basically refers to filling a defective area using another part of the body.
It's usually performed when there's a defect in areas like the face or breasts, and the methods can be broadly divided into two types.
One is free flap surgery, the other is local flap surgery.
The terms are difficult, but simply put, it's a method of detaching tissue from a distant site and attaching it, or rotating it from a nearby site and attaching it.
'It's a mix. They mixed the two.'
This is a method of rotating tissue from a distant site and attaching it.
If you rotate from a nearby site, it inevitably involves another scar on the face, but by doing this, you can substitute it with a wound on the forearm, which is a significant advantage.
Despite these advantages, in the 21st century, we don't do this kind of thing anymore.
Why?
First, you have to keep the arm attached to the face for three weeks.
According to the literature, they fitted it into an iron frame.
It's practically torture.
'Even if you do this, the rotated flesh probably didn't survive unconditionally.'
Three weeks is a period where adhesion is possible.
But it's unreasonable to expect new, large blood vessels to form.
And expecting a chunk of flesh to survive solely on small blood vessels is impossible.
"Let's try this!"
"Grab the... no, bring the patient."
The fortunate thing is that there is a sufficient way to stop these madness-possessed guys.
"Wait!"
"Huh?"
"Why again?"
Our impatient 19th-century gentlemen were already pulling out their knives and heading towards the patients.
They're really going to 'grab' them, meaning...
"I don't know who created this, but they seem to lack anatomical knowledge compared to us."
At my seemingly knowledgeable words, they all stopped in their tracks first.
"What do you mean?"
No use in questions and answers.
Instead of continuing the explanation, I made a long vertical incision down the forehead of the corpse with my scalpel.
"Again, he's at it again."
Liston and the others cursed but couldn't take their eyes off it.