Chapter 2
Becoming the Attending Physician of a Dying Emperor
At first, the suspicious priest’s behavior made my guard shoot up instantly, but only briefly.
After taking refuge at the temple, I’d been living there without any particular problems. If anything, my days had been too peaceful.
They even pay weekly wages, albeit a small amount. It’s not a bad place to live at all, so why are they suffering from such a manpower shortage?
I learned the reason exactly ten days later.
“So… one person from this temple must volunteer for that place?”
Throughout the temple were notices from various organizations requesting medical assistance.
Usually, people simply chose wherever they wanted to volunteer. Even if one place lacked personnel, there was no obligation to fill the vacancy.
However—
There was exactly one exception.
“You see that notice over there? Someone absolutely has to go there.”
The priest with the suspicious smile—the same one who had first welcomed me—pointed toward a certain spot.
In the middle of a temple pillar hung a single recruitment notice.
Recruitment Notice for Medical Clergy
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Extremely high pay (negotiable)
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Very little work
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Simple, repetitive tasks
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Short working hours
※ Personnel needed as soon as possible
“The problem is that absolutely no one wants to go there.”
Hanmaeum Temple was practically a medical volunteer organization, so patients weren’t required to pay money in exchange for treatment.
And yet, despite the client offering unbelievably generous conditions, there were still no applicants.
The priest sighed heavily.
Just how shady is this place?
As if he’d read my thoughts, the priest continued complaining.
“People leaving after only thirty minutes—or at most a day or two—has become incredibly common.”
No, thirty minutes was absurd.
If it was happening to nearly everyone, they should’ve outright refused the request for personnel.
But then the priest revealed an unexpected reason.
“The truth is… the client is such an influential figure that we don’t even dare refuse them.”
That was the main reason this once-busy temple now felt deserted.
“In fact, another priest went there just a few days ago, but he couldn’t even last an hour before returning. So now we urgently need to choose a new replacement.”
“You mean…?”
“Since you are now officially a member of this temple, Saintess, you’ll naturally participate in the selection lottery.”
“A lottery?”
That was unexpected.
I had assumed they’d simply shove the newcomer—me—into the role.
This place was more reasonable than I thought.
Meanwhile, the priest looked baffled by my lack of resistance.
“…You don’t suddenly feel like running away?”
“Not particularly.”
Considering I literally risked my life fleeing across the border just days ago.
Compared to that, this was hardly worth calling a hardship.
Thinking that, I unfolded the lottery slip handed to me.
—Failed.
That single word was written across the pure white paper.
Then who had drawn the winning slip?
Just as curiosity rose in me, I heard someone nearby sobbing miserably.
“I still have three little siblings to feed! They can’t do anything without me…!”
The unlucky winner looked about my age and had striking reddish-orange twin tails.
“Her name was… Chloe, wasn’t it?”
At that moment, an elderly priest nearby clicked his tongue sympathetically while looking at her.
“Tsk tsk. Such a pity at such a young age.”
According to him, Jack—the previous selection and the former person in charge—had fled in terror in less than an hour.
And when he returned to the temple, he supposedly looked like a dried-up skeleton.
“I still can’t forget the sight of him being carried out on a stretcher. In the end, he took indefinite medical leave.”
“Ahhh!”
After hearing that, Chloe burst into even louder sobs, practically pounding the floor.
Meanwhile, everyone else merely looked on with pity.
Not a single person stepped forward to volunteer in her place.
At this point, I could no longer suppress my curiosity and quietly asked a nearby priest,
“What exactly is this job that everyone’s so terrified of?”
The priest glanced around cautiously before whispering,
“The truth is… they’re selecting the Emperor’s attending physician.”
What?
The Emperor’s physician?
That shocking statement only made me more confused.
“But being the Emperor’s physician should be an incredible honor, shouldn’t it?”
“That’s only on the surface. Once you know the reality…”
As it turned out, he himself had been the very first person from this temple appointed as the Emperor’s physician.
If memory served him right, it had been around four years ago.
“At first, I was thrilled to become His Majesty’s physician. But the moment I met the Emperor, I suddenly felt like I couldn’t breathe and blacked out on the spot.”
“What? Just like that?”
“That’s exactly what’s strange. His Majesty didn’t do anything threatening, but the moment our eyes met, an indescribable fear overwhelmed me.”
And according to rumors, the Emperor had become extremely violent lately.
“So what kind of fool would willingly step forward to treat him? I don’t know the exact details, but it seems he’s suffering from some terrible illness…”
A terrible illness?
At those words, a memory from before my regression suddenly surfaced.
It was exactly one week before I’d been captured by the Pope.
News had spread that the young Emperor of Lun had died.
The entire continent had been thrown into chaos.
And afterward, when it was revealed that he had secretly been terminally ill, everyone fell into shock.
I quietly closed my eyes as I recalled the event.
Terminally ill…
Under the Pope’s shadow, every person I saved had stood at death’s door.
Though I didn’t know the Emperor’s exact illness, he surely wouldn’t be an exception.
If that were the case…
If I somehow managed to cure him completely—
I’d essentially have the Emperor backing me.
I had managed to escape for now, but there was no telling when the Pope would track me down again.
And when that day came, what I needed most was obvious:
A powerful ruler whom not even the Pope could dare touch.
Thinking back to the recruitment notice, I unconsciously wore a determined expression.
The priest beside me visibly flinched.
“…I can do this.”
Murmuring those words, I slowly walked toward Chloe.
“I’ll go in your place.”
“—?!!!”
Instantly, every gaze in the room snapped toward me.
Whispers filled with shock erupted from all directions.
She must be insane.
What kind of courage is that…?!
Is she drowning in debt or something?
The most stunned person of all was Chloe herself.
She could only stare blankly while hiccuping repeatedly.
“Y-You really mean it?”
“Yes. I’ll go instead.”
Chloe still looked unable to understand.
As though suspecting I was joking.
But once she realized I was serious, words poured from her mouth like rapid-fire bullets.
She swore she’d repay this kindness someday, that she’d never forget it, no—that she’d remain grateful even after death.
Feeling overwhelmed, I awkwardly waved my hands in the air.
“It’s fine. I genuinely want to do this.”
That statement made the spectators gape like fish.
At the center of countless shocked and suspicious stares, I gave an awkward smile.
And quietly, where no one could hear—
I made a vow to myself.
No matter what happened, I would cure the Emperor.
At that same moment, inside the Imperial Palace—
Rishard sat expressionlessly, signing documents while holding a fountain pen crafted from hardened alloy.
At the same time, the accursed madness continued to torment him.
A crushing pain squeezed his brain, stealing his breath and violently distorting his vision.
Already accustomed to the agony, he casually scrawled his signature across another document.
Crack—
Suddenly, the pen tip snapped with a shrill sound.
The veins bulging across the back of Rishard’s hand slowly twitched as he forcibly endured the pain.
Without even a trace of interest, he tossed aside the shattered pen.
Nearby already lay dozens of broken fountain pens piled together like a graveyard.
“Your Majesty.”
His aide, Alec, cautiously spoke from beside him.
“I heard the temple recently sent another attending physician, but it seems the results were once again—”
“That idiot.”
Before Alec could even finish, Rishard let out a bitter laugh.
“The moment he saw me, he practically panicked. What’s the point of keeping someone around as my physician when he wets himself at the sight of me?”
Weariness settled deeply into his golden eyes, dulled by exhaustion.
“That makes eighty of them now, doesn’t it?”
“…Yes, Your Majesty.”
At that answer, Rishard muttered,
“No need to think about it any longer.”
Then he gave the order mercilessly.
“Stop.”
“Pardon?”
“I mean stop bringing them to me. Saintesses, priests—doesn’t matter anymore.”
Alec’s face immediately stiffened.
“You cannot do that!”
He began listing dozens of reasons why the order couldn’t be followed, trying desperately to persuade him.
Though Alec was normally highly competent, moments like this made him unbelievably troublesome and stubborn.
Letting out a small sigh, Rishard finally lifted his eyes from the paperwork and looked directly at him.
“Alec. You know it too, don’t you?”
As if telling him to give up already, Rishard continued firmly,
“No matter how hard you search across the continent, there’s only one person who can cure this disease anyway.”
