Chapter 140: New Achievement and New Skill

Early morning.

Ling Ran had a long and good sleep. He only woke up at six o’clock.

He got out of the bed and washed up. When he opened the door to the courtyard, he saw that someone was already waiting outside the door.

“Old Man Liu? Why didn’t you knock on the door?” Ling Ran was surprised. Since his family ran a clinic, they would inevitably encounter patients who needed emergency treatment. This was especially true some time ago when it was not so convenient to go to the hospital’s Emergency Department. It was very normal for people to knock on the door in the middle of the night to seek treatment. Those with senior citizens or young children at home were Lower Groove Clinic’s frequenters.

Even though Old Man Liu was of advanced age, his body was still strong. With his hands behind his back, he smiled with squinted eyes. “I’m not in a rush. I’m here to get a massage from you. My shoulders were so sore last night that I couldn’t sleep. That’s why I came early.”

Old Man Liu was a stand-up guy. When he came to the clinic ten years ago, he always brought gifts with him like homemade Chinese dumplings, vegetables he planted in his own yard, homemade braised meat, and homemade pickled vegetables. The most delicious gifts were the baos Old Man Liu made himself. Those baos were authentic northern baos with thick skin and ample amount of fillings. They were different from the southern soup buns where people tried their best to make the skin thin and the fillings huge to pursue freshness as well as enhance the savory taste. The skin of northern baos needed to be of a certain thickness. Because the thick skin was made of leavened dough, it was soft and elastic. Plus, all the juice from the fillings would dissolve into the skin without soaking it entirely. If you ate them while they were hot, they would taste rich and pure. It was extremely satisfying…

Even though Old Man Liu stopped cooking recently, Ling Ran salivated a little when he saw him. He coughed a few times before he opened the courtyard door and said, “Just have a seat for a few minutes, drink some water and relax. I’ll go and get prepared.”

“Thank you, I can sit actually on any place available.” Although Old Man Liu put on a show of politeness, he still went in and sat inside the house in the end.

Ling Ran washed his hands again before he looked for a bottle of alcohol-based hand sanitizer.

There were bottles of alcohol-based hand sanitizer everywhere in Yun Hua Hospital. The hospital was even worried that the doctors were not willing to use them, and held talks every few months, which fervently stressed the importance of disinfection.

To cut cost, the doctors in Lower Groove Clinic had always washed their hands with hand-washing liquid.

In the beginning, doctors in the clinic did not perform surgeries and only prescribed medication. Doctor Xiong would only perform surgeries when the weather and administration were good on that day. In recent years, Lower Groove Clinic, which mainly provided fluid transfusions and prescribed medication, started to become a clinic that provided only fluid transfusion, and the treatment room was not of much use anymore.

Under such circumstances, it was naturally impossible for Ling Jiezhou to use alcohol-based sanitizer in his clinic. It was expensive even though it was easily available.

Ling Ran did not find a suitable bottle of alcohol-based hand sanitizer after he went through the whole treatment room. He had no choice but to retrieve a clean and dry towel before he washed his hands with soap under the tap.

The act of washing one’s hands with soap was actually an extremely good method of disinfection. The hands would end up a lot cleaner than when one washed them using disinfectants, foamaseptics, or disinfectant wipes. The hands would also be cleaner than when one washed them using alcohol-based hand sanitizer. It was very suitable for daily usage when it came to normal people. But for doctors, the main issue with washing their hands with soap was it taking up a lot of time. Besides, their hands could get hurt due to repeated washing.

“Lean back against the chair and find a suitable position.” Ling Ran put the dry towel on Old Man Liu’s shoulders. He waited until Old Man Liu adjusted his position before he used the pulling technique on him.

Old Man Liu wanted to say something, but the moment Ling Ran grabbed a hold of his neck, he stopped moving instantly, just as a cat stopped moving when it was grabbed by its neck. The top and bottom rows of his dentures rubbed together a few times.

Ling Ran earnestly massaged him for a few minutes. He massaged his head too while he was at it. He then said, “How does your back feel? Let me massage it too, since we’re at it.”

“I don’t want to waste too much of your time…” Old Man Liu put on a show of feeling embarrassed.

Ling Ran smiled. “No problem. Come and lie on the bed.”

Ling Ran then started massaging Old Man Liu while looking at the progress of his mission.

After the concert ended the day before, Ling Ran went home and massaged his parents. Then, he massaged a few patients in the clinic while he was at it and later went to rest. His mission completion status was at a sharp 28,000.

After Ling Ran finished massaging Old Man Liu, his mission completion status slowly rose to 28,150.

One hundred and fifty hours was only equivalent to around six days of pain relief. It was not that Ling Ran did not work hard, but the old man’s body was too weak, and there were more factors that could contribute to the pain. It was very hard for there to be any major progress.

Old Man Liu was very happy though. He placed his hand on his neck and chuckled a while before he said, “My whole body feels so much more relaxed. Young Ran, you’re truly skilled. Ah, no, I should be calling you Doctor Ling now.”

“There’s nothing wrong with calling me Young Ran. Do sit for a while before you leave. Your body’s hot right now, and exposure to cold air isn’t good,” Ling Ran said with a smile.

As Ling Ran spoke, he draped a woolen blanket over Old Man Liu.

*Ding.*

A silvery white treasure chest appeared in front of Ling Ran.

The [Patient’s Sincere Gratitude] prompt also appeared in front of Ling Ran immediately after.

While Ling Ran drank some water, he took the opportunity to open the treasure chest.

As usual, it was a bottle of Energy Serum.

Satisfied, Ling Ran put the bottle of Energy Serum in his pocket. He had used up a bottle of Energy Serum during the past two days at the sanatorium. Now, he had to work hard to make up for it.

…..

Ling Jiezhou only came down from the first floor of the house around seven o’clock.

At that moment, there were already people sitting in twos and threes at the courtyard.

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Ling Jiezhou immediately felt a surge of happiness. ‘Is this because there’s an influenza break out?”

When he looked carefully, the people were not crowded around Doctor Xiong and Juan Zi. They were also not crowded around Miao Tansheng, whom he recently hired to suture patients. Instead, they were crowded around his son, Ling Ran.

Ling Jiezhou could not help but furrow his eyebrows and say, “Young Ran, why aren’t you at work yet? When it comes to injections and the prescription of medication, Doctor Xiong as well as the others can do that when they’re here.”

“Old Ling, you always ask your son to inherit the family business and treat patients in your clinic, right? Why are you unwilling now that your son’s really inheriting the family business?” Boss Qin, who owned a claypot restaurant in the alley, was waiting for his turn to get massaged. Business in his claypot restaurant only started blooming in the afternoon. After buying the necessary ingredients early in the morning and passing them to his staff, he liked to saunter around the neighborhood.

Ling Jiezhou was tongue tied. “I’m paying two doctors right now. I’ll have to lay off one of them to make space for my son. Or else, it’ll be such a waste,” he said with a huff.

Ling Ran coughed a few times and said, “I’m doing massages.”

“You don’t need to go to work anymore?”

“Don’t worry, I have no surgeries scheduled for today.” Ling Ran was not worried indeed. The lack of hospital beds was not his problem alone. Even though he had not performed any surgeries for just two or three days, the vacated beds were still extra beds. It would be a stretch to say that there would be beds available. He could indeed perform two or three surgeries using the M-Tang technique if he were to return to the hospital right now, and he would have probably gone to the hospital to perform surgeries if he had nothing else to do. However, the mission related to massages was still ongoing for another half a day. He preferred to stay and continue with the mission.

Problems such as work attendance had long since ceased to be a problem when it came to Ling Ran.

Ling Jiezhou agreed when he thought about it. He then considered the fact that Ling Ran’s massage technique was quite good and quickly asked, “If you have nothing else to do, just stay at home and massage some people. It’s good to earn some money to subsidize the cost of your petrol anyway. By the way, how much do you charge for each massage?”

Ling Ran never charged any money for the massages he did ever since he learned how to do it. At that moment, he froze for a while.

Ling Jiezhou knew it the moment he saw his son’s reaction. He sighed and said, “All right, I’ll reorganize the system for us. How about this… Let’s not charge the amount that hospitals do. Hospitals charge people too much. We’ll cut it down by 75% to 20 RMB for each body part. Is it appropriate?”

The people in the neighborhood naturally complained that it was too expensive.

Ling Ran only took two to three minutes to massage each body part, and 20 RMB for each massage was actually close to the standard price of hospitals.

Ling Jiezhou followed the flow and lowered it to 15 RMB before he continued to bargain with everyone.

Right then, Ling Ran coughed a few times and said, “Dad, why don’t we do this? Print a statement and paste it on the wall. State that the massage for each body part costs 15 RMB and lasts for around two minutes, but it will continue to be free until six o’clock in the evening today. What do you think?”

What Ling Ran said made the neighbors feel rather embarrassed. After all, everyone who was present at that time would obviously receive free massages.

Ling Jiezhou also agreed when he thought about it. But he said rather regretfully, “Why don’t you just do it for free until the afternoon? There’s no need to extend it until six o’clock in the evening. That’s quite long.”

“It’s all right. It’ll be just enough time to let everyone in the neighborhood get a taste of it.”

Since Ling Ran was insistent, it was naturally inconvenient for Ling Jiezhou to raise any objections.

Soon after, Ling Ran asked him to call the pharmaceutical sales company to order bottles of alcohol-based hand sanitizer and a lot of towels. He then started to massage his patients with a relaxed expression.

Neighbor after neighbor came and went, as though they were part of an assembly line.

Those who left felt good and introduced the service to their friends, family, and neighbors. It was the free trial period anyway, and it was a good time to come over and enjoy a massage.

More and more people came, and very soon, they had to give numbers to the people who were waiting.

Before ten o’clock, Ling Ran had already received three Treasure Chests courtesy of “Sincere Gratitude”, and obtained three bottles of Energy Serum.

At that moment, there was a prompt from the system again.

[Achievement: Obtain one hundred bottles of Energy Serum]

[Achievement Description: Time-consuming surgeries are a doctor’s biggest test.]

[Reward: Replantation of Severed Finger (Perfect Level)]

Ling Ran calmly accepted the reward and continued the task at hand of massaging a patient. He then asked his next neighbor to wait for a moment so that he could make a phone call to Huo Congjun.

“Department Director Huo, I would like to carry out a surgery which involves the replantation of a severed finger… I understand… All right… Then, do ask Chief Physician Wang to be the chief surgeon. I’ll assist by the side.”

Ling Ran put down his mobile phone and started to massage a patient’s neck in a calm manner.

The neighbor who was next in line was a van driver. He was of a stocky and imposing build, he had wide shoulders and a lot of meat on his bones. He was a famous man of steel among the people of Lower Groove Market. Right now, his eyes were wide open, his nostrils flared, and his lips were slightly parted. He was hissing.

The neighbors queueing up around him discussed among themselves.

“Master Wang’s shoulders and neck aren’t in really good condition.”

“Whoa! He’s sweating.”

“Even his cheeks are flushed.”

“Amazing! I reckon that all his muscles will loosen up after this. He’ll feel amazing.”