The Doctor With a Diagnosis System

CHAPTER 7: Master's Hands

"Intern Ryeong, put it down!" Nurse Yu Mi-Sun cried out. Her voice was shrill, completely unraveled by panic. She backed away toward the door, her hands pressed over her mouth. "You're suspended! If you cut him, it's murder! Daewon said let him go!"

I didn't look at her. My eyes were locked on the glowing blue text hovering above Mr. Han's chest. 

[Mission Update: Perform Emergency Thoracotomy.]

[Objective: Open the chest cavity. Cross-clamp the aorta.]

I was a twenty-six-year-old intern. I had held retractors in the OR. I had suctioned blood for senior surgeons. I had never opened a human chest by myself. Doing it here, without anesthesia, without a sterile field, without an attending physician—it wasn't just malpractice. It was a guaranteed prison sentence. 

But I looked at Mr. Han’s face. It was completely slack, turning the color of wet cement. He had a family. He had come to the hospital trusting us, and Dr. Si Jae had sent him to die with a packet of antacids. 

I swallowed the dry lump of terror in my throat. I silently accepted the System's prompt. 

The blue screen flashed a brilliant, blinding white. 

[Reward Activated: Skill - Master Surgeon's Hands (Temporary)]

[Duration: 15 Minutes]

The change was instantaneous. The violent trembling in my fingers simply vanished. A cold, unnatural calm flooded my nervous system, washing away the bone-deep exhaustion. It felt like my hands no longer belonged to me. They felt incredibly loose, perfectly calibrated, and hyper-aware of the microscopic textures of the scalpel grip. The medical textbooks I had memorized over years of sleepless nights suddenly locked together in my mind, forming a flawless, three-dimensional map of the human thorax. 

I knew exactly where to cut. I knew exactly how much pressure to apply. 

"Mi-Sun," I said. My voice didn't shake. It was dead calm, a terrifying contrast to the blood pooling around my sneakers. "Grab the bag-valve mask. Hook it to the oxygen port and turn it to fifteen liters. Now."

"I... I can't be a part of this!" she sobbed, shaking her head aggressively. 

I snapped my head up and locked eyes with her. "If you walk out that door, you are watching a man die when we could have saved him. Bag him! Push one milligram of epinephrine IV! Do your job!"

The absolute authority in my voice hit her like a physical slap. The years of nursing discipline kicked in, overriding her panic. She lunged for the crash cart, grabbing the plastic Ambu bag and slamming it over Mr. Han's mouth and nose. 

Squeeze. Release. Squeeze.

"Epi is in," she gasped, her hands shaking violently as she pumped oxygen into his lungs. 

[Time Remaining: 00:03:12]

I pulled the decompression needle out of his chest and tossed it onto the tray. 

I didn't have time for iodine or surgical drapes. I pressed the pad of my left thumb against the left side of his sternum, locating the fourth intercostal space—the gap between his ribs, right below the nipple line. 

I brought the scalpel down. 

I pressed the blade into the taut skin and dragged it horizontally in one smooth, brutal motion, slicing from his sternum all the way to his armpit. 

The skin parted instantly, revealing the bright yellow layer of subcutaneous fat and the dark red intercostal muscle beneath. Because his blood pressure was critically low, it didn't spray. It just oozed thick, dark blood that immediately coated my fingers. The metallic smell of copper filled the small room, thick and suffocating. 

I dropped the scalpel onto Mr. Han’s abdomen. I didn't have a bone saw. To open the chest in an ER setting without an OR kit, you had to use brute force. 

I reached into the crash cart and grabbed a heavy pair of stainless-steel trauma shears. I shoved the blunt end of the shears directly into the incision, wedging the thick metal between his ribs. 

"Oh God, what are you doing?" Mi-Sun choked out, turning her head away as she squeezed the bag. 

"Cracking the ribs," I grunted. 

I squeezed the handles of the shears. 

The sound was nauseating. It sounded like snapping a thick, wet branch in half. The heavy cartilage and bone gave way. I moved the shears and cut again. 

Sweat poured down my forehead, stinging my eyes, but I didn't blink. The [Master Surgeon's Hands] skill kept my movements perfectly efficient, but it didn't numb the physical exertion. My shoulders burned as I forced the heavy shears through the dense tissue, extending the opening. 

I threw the bloody shears onto the floor. I grabbed a heavy metal Finochietto rib spreader from the bottom drawer of the cart. I jammed the metal blades into the gaping, bloody incision. 

I grabbed the crank handle and turned it violently. 

The metal gears clicked loudly. The ribs protested with awful, tearing sounds as the spreader forced the chest cavity open, widening the gap inch by inch until it was six inches wide. 

The inside of Mr. Han’s chest was fully exposed. 

It was a nightmare of anatomy. His left lung was deflated, pushed aside by the sheer volume of blood pooling in the cavity. In the center, beneath a layer of fat, was the pericardial sac—the tough membrane holding his heart. It was bulging, purple, and distended, still slowly filling with blood despite the needle I had used earlier. 

[Time Remaining: 00:01:45]

"His pressure is gone," Mi-Sun cried, staring at the monitor. "He's in pulseless electrical activity. The heart isn't pumping."

"It's being crushed," I said, grabbing the scalpel again.