The Physician of Traditional Medicine Returns from Murim

Oh Ji-young loved dancing from a young age.

Even before anyone taught her, she would mimic the dance singers she saw on TV, and after getting a smartphone, she taught herself by watching NewTube.

“Who wants to perform in the talent show~?”

“I’m definitely going!”

In elementary school, she found like-minded friends.

They were children who, like Oh Ji-young, dreamed of becoming idols and shared hobbies of singing, dancing, and dressing up.

“Girls, could I ask you to dance a song for the opening of the sports festival?”

Teachers who noticed how much the children enjoyed dancing and being in the spotlight would ask them to perform at events.

“Nana will be dancing here, so Ji-young, you come in from the side!”

They would also film TikTok challenges with friends and upload them.

Then one day…

“Wow, look! A K-pop dance academy is opening in front of the station!”

A dance academy opened within walking distance from home.

“That’s amazing!”

“I checked their website, and there’s even an instructor who was a backup dancer for Idol U-way! They must have met lots of celebrities!”

“Isn’t the choreography director even more impressive?”

“Wow, I’m going to ask my parents to register me as soon as it opens!”

All the friends she hung out with enrolled in the academy.

“Which class should we join? K-pop dance? Girls’ hip-hop? Is kids’ dance for kindergarteners?”

“They’ll probably tell us when we go for a consultation, right?”

“Ji-young, you’re going too, right?”

“I’ll ask my mom and let you know.”

Of course, Oh Ji-young wanted to go to the academy too. She wanted to join the K-pop dance class with her friends, learn proper dancing, and maybe even audition if given the chance.

“What? Dance academy? Where would we get the money for that?”

But her family wasn’t particularly well-off.

“…I guess that’s how it is.”

Her father was a civil servant, and she had often heard that after paying the principal and interest on their home mortgage, there was nothing left after feeding their family of four.

Oh Ji-young had no choice but to watch her friends’ skills improve steadily.

“Do you want to go to the academy that badly?”

“It’s fine.”

Even without going to an academy, talent would shine through anywhere!

She believed this and practiced alone, watching NewTube videos.

“This is called a wave. See how the angles are different?”

“Do that thing where you ride the waves with your hands!”

“This?”

“Wow, that’s cool.”

But her friends’ skills kept improving, and she could only watch.

‘I used to be the best dancer before!’

Around this time, her younger brother Oh Ji-hoon entered elementary school.

And her mom announced that she would start working too.

“Go to school with your sister, and don’t come home alone after school, come with your friends. Can you do that?”

“Yes~”

Oh Ji-young didn’t think much of it.

She was just happy that she could use her phone freely since her mom wouldn’t be at home.

But as her mom looked for jobs, enrolled in a nursing assistant academy, passed the exam, and started working, quite a lot changed.

“I couldn’t do much for you before, right? If you still want to, should we enroll you in the dance academy now?”

“Yes! Yes, yes, yes!”

“I’ll have to work hard to support my daughter!”

Oh Ji-young enrolled in the academy.

“You must have practiced a lot, huh?”

“Yes! I practice every day after school!”

Within two months, she was promoted to the intermediate class where her friends were.

“Ji-young~ Welcome~!”

“Hi? Nice to meet you!”

There were friends from her school and many children from other nearby elementary schools.

Oh Ji-young quickly became friends with them.

They practiced dancing together, went to karaoke, and enjoyed window shopping in Seomyeon.

One day, Oh Ji-young watched a movie at the academy…

– Bam bam! Bam ba bam~! Bam bam! Bam ba bam!

Wasn’t the dance battle scene on water in the movie just so cool?

“Is this how you do it?”

“Wow, that’s crazy! How can you copy it after seeing it just once?”

It happened to be raining that day.

– Bam bam! Bam ba bam~! Bam bam! Bam ba bam!

As Oh Ji-young was recreating a scene from the movie…

Splash!

“Ji-young, are you okay?”

“Oh no! Can you get up?”

She slipped and fell.

She was terribly embarrassed, but she got up as if nothing had happened and finished the dance.

“What happened to your clothes? How did they get so messy?”

“…I fell.”

“You’re soaked in muddy water. This won’t come out in the wash. We’ll have to throw it away. Are you hurt anywhere after such a bad fall?”

“My ankle, a little?”

“Come to the Korean medicine clinic where Mom works for treatment tomorrow!”

“It’s not that bad. It’ll get better with just a pain relief patch.”

She wasn’t particularly afraid of needles. She just didn’t want to miss academy classes to go to the hospital.

“Is your ankle really okay now? Shouldn’t you take a break from the academy?”

“It’s fine. It doesn’t hurt at all now.”

A week later, when her mom closely examined her ankle, Oh Ji-young insisted she was fine.

The pain had indeed improved by over 80%, and it would heal completely soon anyway.

“Hmm.”

But the pain lasted longer than expected.

She was talented not only in dance but also in running, representing her class in relay races. As the sports day approached, her ankle started throbbing severely.

“Ah, it’ll get better.”

But she ignored that too.

There weren’t any other girls in Oh Ji-young’s class who could represent them in the relay race.

“……”

Even after that, her ankle continued to hurt.

It had been almost 6 months since she first fell.

If she said it hurt now, wouldn’t she get scolded?

They’d get angry asking why she didn’t say anything back then, and tell her to quit the dance academy, right?

“This won’t do. You can’t perform the choreography. Let’s switch positions. Ji-young, you take Bo-kyung’s role, and Su-min will be Ju-on.”

“…Is that okay?”

“Yeah. Actually, Ji-young, you be the center! I can’t do this!”

That absolutely couldn’t happen.

The mayor was coming, and they were performing at the opening ceremony of a local event, hosted by a celebrity she’d never heard of before.

Her ankle would be fine somehow.

She’d endured well until now, right? As long as she didn’t bend it at certain angles or dance too much, it was bearable.

She’d think about it after the performance!

So Oh Ji-young, hiding the fact that her ankle hadn’t healed…

Went to school, went to the academy, and stayed behind to practice more.

◆◇◆◇◆

“Come on, let’s just take a look. It might heal quickly.”

I persuaded Oh Ji-young to sit on the waiting room sofa.

Jin Min-jung, who had finished processing the payment and settlement, also approached Oh Ji-young.

“I’m really fine.”

Oh Ji-young pouted, insisting she was okay, but from my examination, that wasn’t the case at all.

There was still visible swelling in the anterior talofibular ligament.

“Ah!”

Sure enough, she complained of severe pain even when I applied light pressure.

I carefully palpated not only the inner side of the ankle but also the knee and hip joint.

“The anterior talofibular ligament is in tatters, it doesn’t seem like something that happened just a day or two ago. The peroneal muscles have weakened too… This has been going on for a while, hasn’t it? When did you first sprain it?”

“Not really…”

“The first time? That’s right, she fell once on a rainy day about 6 months ago!”

“Ah, Mom!”

Oh Ji-young shook her head, but Jin Min-jung recalled her daughter’s medical history.

“Did you hurt it again now? Or has it been continuous since then? Oh no, I shouldn’t have believed her when she said it was all better!”

“…It really did get better.”

Even as Jin Min-jung blamed herself, clutching her chest, Oh Ji-young vehemently denied it.

But there are things you can leave alone thinking they’ll get better, and things you can’t.

As the saying goes, “hypochondriacs live to 80,” naturally sickly people go to the hospital immediately for even minor ailments and take good care of their health.

It’s not uncommon for healthy friends like this to miss the proper treatment time by trusting their self-healing ability. Even a tough person like Kim Yi-jin came in late and ended up needing prolonged treatment.

“Ji-young-nim, you need to treat this. If it becomes a habitual sprain, you’ll twist it all the time, and if it gets worse and the ligament ruptures, you might even need surgery. If that happens, you’ll have to wear a cast for two or three months, let alone dance.”

I exaggerated a bit to scare Oh Ji-young.

I didn’t forget to signal to Jin Min-jung that it wasn’t actually that severe.

Fortunately, she understood well and supported me.

“That’s right! Do you want to get into big trouble? Like the doctor said, stop dancing and get treatment until you’re better!”

“Ah, I’m telling you it’s fine!”

Oh Ji-young kept looking anxiously between her mom and me.

Hmm, maybe just scaring her won’t work.

“When is the performance? Can’t you take a break for just a week?”

“There are… two weeks left.”

“I won’t tell you not to perform. Let’s take a break for a week, no, just 5 days, starting with today’s treatment.”

“……”

Five days is okay, right?

I mixed the stick and the carrot to coax Oh Ji-young.

“If you get treatment after the performance, it won’t take 5 days but over a month. You’re going to overwork yourself tremendously from now until the performance day, right? Your ligament is at its limit now. We need to treat it while you still have some self-healing ability left.”

“…Will it really get better in 5 days?”

Finally, Oh Ji-young seemed interested.

I nodded.

Typically, a chronic sprain doesn’t heal that quickly, but Oh Ji-young has good physical conditions.

I calculated that with the treatment I had in mind and infusing her with energy, she could recover sufficiently.

“It won’t be 100%, but from 5 days on, you can dance while continuing treatment. Of course, with taping and carefully.”

Oh Ji-young thought for a moment.

Jin Min-jung looked very frustrated, but I waited for her answer.

“Okay. I’ll tell my academy teacher that I’m taking a break.”

Oh Ji-young reluctantly nodded.

That’s it, that’s how it should be.

You made the right decision.

After moving everyone to the treatment room…

I took out the torch.

“Are you going to use that?”

When I brought out the long metal rod, Oh Ji-young was startled by the visual of the torch.

She probably thought she’d just be getting regular acupuncture, so it’s understandable she’d be surprised by this strange device.

“Yes. Heated fire needles are very good for habitual sprains. You’ll feel the difference right away after today’s treatment. I think it’ll get better with just 2-3 more sessions of regular acupuncture after this.”

“Heated fire needles… Do you heat the needles in fire before inserting them?”

“There are fire needle techniques like that, but today we’ll insert the needles first and then apply heat.”

“Oh.”

Regular acupuncture would take quite a while, and then we couldn’t meet the performance date.

From what I could see, Oh Ji-young’s ankle pain was definitely not light.

She had hidden it for 6 months because dance was so crucial to her.

…I wanted to help her get on stage if at all possible.

That’s why I brought out this special weapon to treat her as quickly as possible.

Heated fire needles involve inserting needles deep into the connective tissue where the inflammation is, and then applying heat stimulation.

Fundamentally, it works by causing damage to promote regeneration through increased blood flow, similar in principle to regular acupuncture but with stronger stimulation.

“Should I apply it?”

“No, I’ll do it. Let me insert the needles first.”

You’d think patients or guardians might be scared when told we’re going to apply fire, but Oh Ji-young was just happy at the prospect of quick recovery.

Jin Min-jung wasn’t too worried either, having seen other patients receive this treatment several times.

I immediately inserted needles into Oh Ji-young’s ankle and leg.

I needled the Qiuxu and Shenmai points, which were the main problem areas, along with points up the Bladder meridian including Weizhong and Weiyang, and also Yanglingquan and Zusanli where the peroneal muscles originate.

“Nuna, doesn’t it hurt?”

“Not really?”

Fortunately, Oh Ji-young tolerated the needles well.

“I’m going to heat it now. It won’t be as hot as you might think at first. If you suddenly feel it getting hot, let me know right away.”

“Okay.”

Whoosh!

As the torch ignited, her previously expressionless face lit up.

When I was in Murim, we used to transfer fire with candles, but isn’t it great to have a torch?

“Wow, it’s a fire show!”

Oh Ji-hoon, watching from the side, started filming a video on his phone, saying it was amazing.