The surgery began.
Maomao and the others on the postsurgical team waited outside the operating room.
Dr. Liu would be wielding the scalpel, with two upper physicians as well as Tianyu assisting. Luomen’s bad leg left him unable to stand holding a knife for very long, but he was stationed in the operating room so they could benefit from his wealth of experience.
For all their history, I think Dr. Liu likes my old man.
The chief physician might gripe and grumble, but he trusted Luomen implicitly. Otherwise he wouldn’t have him there to offer advice should anything happen.
With that crew present, they should be able to handle some unexpected development.
Then, however, Maomao heard a crash from the operating room.
Did something happen?
There was a collective gasp as Dr. Liu emerged, blood pouring from his right hand. In the operating room, a doctor was collapsed on the floor, his face pale.
“What’s going on?!” someone exclaimed.
“Calm down,” Dr. Liu said in a low voice. “It happens all the time.”
“I’ll explain,” said Luomen, who emerged behind him, walking with his cane. “Liu, you focus on stopping the bleeding.”
“All right.”
“It seems the effect of the anesthetic wasn’t quite strong enough for His Majesty. Just as the assistant was passing Liu a scalpel, His Majesty’s arm moved, and the blade nearly cut it. The doctor instinctively avoided that, but unfortunately hit Liu instead.”
The man on the ground in the operating room was the first assistant, one of the upper physicians. He’d stuck a scalpel into Dr. Liu’s dominant hand, even if he hadn’t meant to, and the shock of doing something so awful must have overwhelmed him.
“We can look for the lessons to be learned later. For now, we have to go on with the surgery,” Luomen said placidly, looking at each of the people around him in turn. “I think the young man needs to wait here outside until he’s feeling calmer. Would someone kindly bring him out?”
“Yes, sir.” Tall Senior went into the operating room and helped the shocked first assistant to his feet.
“Now, as to our surgeon...”
The other upper physician was the second assistant. With the first assistant effectively useless, the second would have to do it. He was clearly scared out of his wits. “I... I couldn’t! I can’t!” His face contorted and his hands shook.
That left only one person.
Why did it have to be him, of all people? Maomao wanted to clutch her head.
While everyone else cowered and panicked and stewed in anxiety, one man stood looking absolutely the same as he always did.
“Tianyu, will you do the job?” Luomen asked, looking at him.
Tianyu pursed his lips and looked at the ceiling. Maomao would have expected him to jump at the opportunity, but evidently not. “Hmmm,” he said.
“What’s the matter? You’re not going to do it?”
Concern mounted among the doctors.
“Aww, it just sort of takes the wind out of my sails, you know? Everyone talks about the ‘jade body,’ so I was sure he must have gold blood flowing in his veins!”
The doctors exchanged a look that said: What the hell is he talking about?
Maomao was better acquainted with Tianyu’s personality than the rest of the staff. She knew about his interest in autopsies, and that he had become a physician not out of any altruistic desire to help others, but simply because it would give him a legal means to chop people up and observe their insides.
That absolute crackpot had been curious about the “jade body” of the Emperor himself, but now that they had actually opened it up, so to speak, he’d discovered that His Majesty was nothing unique. He was made of the same stuff as the commoners Tianyu had operated on.
It was just like the surgeries he’d practiced. Of course he was disappointed.
Some guy...
“Foo... I think I’m tired of this.”
“What do you mean, tired of it?!”
“Let someone else do it,” Tianyu said.
“What?!” the physicians exclaimed in unison. Unfamiliar with Tianyu’s mental framework, they were at a loss for how to respond. Even Luomen looked more distressed than usual.
If this surgery went wrong, everyone there could die, but that didn’t concern Tianyu. To him, it was a simple procedure. The other physicians had probably likewise assumed he could do it easily. His hand never shook from nerves.
Maybe I should explain, Maomao thought, but there wasn’t even time for that. Tianyu would get hung up on some stupid detail, she felt sure.
“Is that so?” Luomen looked at Dr. Liu, who was still trying to stanch the bleeding from his hand.
“I’ll do it,” Dr. Liu said.
“You can’t, Liu. You have to stop bleeding first. And you have to make sure your hand can still move.”
“So, what? You’re going to do it?”
“I suppose so—it seems to be our only option. We can’t leave this any longer.” Luomen was quick to appraise the situation. “Do we have any backup assistants?”
“Here, sir.” One of the middle physicians raised his hand. He was clearly anxious, but just as clearly prepared to do what he had to do.
“Go inside. And I want...” Luomen looked around. As everyone shuddered and quailed, he tapped Tall Senior, who had entrusted the incapacitated first assistant along with Dr. Liu to Auntie Liu, on the shoulder.
“Do you have experience assisting in surgery?” Luomen asked.
“Yes, sir,” Tall Senior said.
“Can you do it?”
“Yes, sir.”
He slapped himself hard on the cheek, then pulled on a spare surgical gown.
“And you, Maomao,” Luomen said. “Do you know how to assist?”
“I do.”
“All right, well, I’ll need you to support me. I can’t very well do the surgery while sitting in a chair.”
“I understand, sir.”
Maomao immediately began getting ready. She put on one of the surgical gowns, but it was too big. She tied the sleeves back so they wouldn’t get in the way.
Luomen turned to the frightened second assistant. “You may not be able to wield the scalpel, but you can at least assist, can’t you?”
“Yes,” the man said slowly, biting his lip, and then he went into the operating room.
“Hey, what about me?” Tianyu asked, obviously puzzled.
“We don’t need you,” said not Luomen, but Maomao. “You’ll just get in the way. You can stay out here sucking your thumb. It’s the only thing your hand is good for if you’re not willing to do surgery with it.”
She was careful not to raise her voice, but she was angry—of course she was. He vexed her to no end.
“Once this procedure is safely over, maybe I can ask the Emperor for a favor,” Maomao joked, but no one replied. They were too busy. “Maybe I’ll have him give me a few of your fingers, Tianyu. If you don’t have any use for them, I can dry them out and put them on display—tell people they belong to a mummy! At least they’d serve some purpose then!”
Oops, now she was really leaning into it. She barely even cared that she was addressing him without any title of respect. The crowd around them muttered, but she ignored them. She had to say something, or the fury would keep her from doing her job.