Tokyo, 1994, starting with medical training

Chapter 36 The Cake Was Terrible

Imagawa Ori blinked.

Happy birthday?

These words sound a bit unfamiliar. When was the last time I heard someone say these words to me?

Was it 3 years ago?

Was it the day your mother came home from work, carrying a small cake box?

I remembered.

When I opened it, the cream inside had collapsed a bit, and the cake base was also very dry.

It tastes like cheap saccharin and is greasy like vegetable cream; you can even taste undissolved sugar granules.

It tastes terrible.

That was the worst cake she had ever eaten in her life.

The following year, she and her mother bought the same cake on the evening of December 23rd, just as the cake shop was about to close.

She deliberately waited until after midnight before taking a bite.

Soft, sweet, and melts in your mouth.

So she took the cake and waited outside the cake shop all night.

When the store manager came to open the door the next day, she made a huge scene.

She yelled at the manager, asking why the taste had changed, whether they had cut corners, and why it didn't taste as good as before.

The store manager said she was a lunatic.

In a fit of anger, she threw the cake at the shop manager's face.

Of course, the store manager didn't let her get away with it and immediately called the police.

Fortunately, the police who arrived knew about Imagawa's situation and persuaded the shop owner not to pursue the matter, considering that her mother had just passed away.

Since that year, she has never celebrated her birthday again.

For her, December 24th was nothing special except for Christmas Eve.

Imagawa Ori didn't speak, nor did she reach out to take the cake that Kiryu Kazusuke offered.

boom--

She slammed the door shut, leaned against the cold door panel, and gasped for breath.

after awhile.

She heard footsteps fading away in the corridor outside, and began to slowly slide down the door panel until she was squatting on the ground.

Imagawa Ori hugged her knees and buried her face in her arms.

Why should I remind her?

Why remind her that she's still alive, and why make her continue to struggle in this world filled with the stench of money and disinfectant?

……

Thirty minutes later.

Imagawa Ori raised her head, her eyes already red-rimmed.

She took a deep breath, composed herself, and reopened the door.

The corridor was empty; that annoying resident doctor was gone.

Her gaze shifted downwards.

On the ground by the door, there sat that simple cake box, all alone.

Imagawa Ori crouched down and picked up the cake, which was only the size of her palm.

The discount tag on the side of the box is still there—[50% OFF, December 23rd]

These are clearance items that convenience stores are selling at a discount to get rid of products nearing their expiration date.

Imagawa Ori bit her thin lips.

It was the same before.

My mother would always rush to buy a cake on the night of the 23rd, before the convenience store or supermarket closed.

Because after midnight, these fresh foods with a shelf life of only one day will become waste, and the store staff will sell them at a discount.

Back then, my mother always said it was to save money, and that it was the wisdom of a housewife.

It's really just that I'm poor.

Despite living in the prime real estate of Bunkyo Ward and guarding the old house left by his grandfather, he lives like a beggar.

Every year, just collecting the fixed asset tax has exhausted all of my mother's savings from odd jobs.

But at least we can still get by like this.

Until the height of the bubble economy, when everyone went crazy.

By mortgaging your house to the bank, you can get a large sum of cash, which you can then invest in the stock market and make money even if you buy blindly.

Back then, anyone who didn't buy it was a fool.

My mother thought so too.

All she wanted was for her daughter to have a better life, so she wouldn't have to get up early to queue for discounted eggs at the supermarket.

Thus, the house that held all the memories of the mother and daughter became NTT stock.

Then, the bubble burst.

The Nikkei index plummeted from a high of nearly 39000 points, rendering stocks worthless.

Then, the bank staff came knocking on the door.

The bank employees, dressed in suits and smiling kindly, took away the house and forced them into cheap rental housing in Adachi Ward.

They also ended up with a debt they could never repay in their lifetime.

The mother worked three jobs every day and eventually died from exhaustion in the kitchen.

The house was auctioned off by the bank.

Imagawa Ori worked herself to the bone to earn money and climb the social ladder, even going so far as to drink with lonely women, all to raise 100 million yen.

One hundred million yen.

That's the price for redeeming them.

Imagawa Ori sat by the door and opened the cake box.

I used the included plastic fork to scoop out a piece of cream and put it in my mouth.

Very dry.

It's too greasy.

The vegetable shortening didn't melt on the tongue; it felt like a lump of inferior grease.

Although it doesn't taste like the one I remember.

But it's still very hard to eat.

As Imagawa Ori devoured the expired, discounted cake, large tears streamed down her face.

Salty.

……

First Surgical Department, Duty Room.

Kiryu Kazusuke was sitting in a chair, flipping through tomorrow's work schedule.

A faint reddish light suddenly appeared before my eyes.

[Imagawa Ori's world timeline has been completed]

[Bonus: Basic Joint Dislocation Reduction Technique]

As the words faded, a not-so-large flow of information flooded into my mind.

That was about the anatomical structure of the major joints in the human body—the shoulder, elbow, hip, and knee—as well as the most basic repositioning techniques.

For example, the Cocker method for anterior shoulder dislocation uses the lever principle to apply traction, external rotation, adduction, and internal rotation to allow the humeral head to slide back into the glenoid fossa.

Another example is the Orlis method for posterior hip dislocation, which involves lifting the thigh and using gravity and traction to reduce the dislocation.

Kazusuke Kiryu flexed his wrists.

That's it?

He couldn't help but complain in his mind.

The Worldline Convergence Project initially offered "Kirschner wire fixation - Perfect", then it became "Surgical incision suturing - Advanced", and now it's "Joint dislocation reduction - Basic".

Is this what they call a decline in consumption?

As an orthopedic surgeon, joint dislocation reduction is a required course of study.

He studied at medical school, did his internship there, and in his previous life, he had dislocated countless arms and legs in the emergency room.

For him, this "basic" level skill reward did not bring about a qualitative leap.

If I had to use an analogy, it would be like improving a test score from 69 to 70.

There are definitely differences.

My understanding of the angle of force and the direction of muscle movement has become clearer. Joints that might have needed two attempts to reset before can now be successfully reset on the first try.

The foundation is more solid now.

But that's all; it's tasteless, yet too good to throw away.

Kazusuke Kiryu shook his head.

It doesn't matter anymore.

Anyway, that half-price cake only cost him a few hundred yen.

In orthopedics, where all the work is physically demanding, mastering a reliable reduction technique can save you a lot of energy.

After all, realigning the hip joints of muscular construction workers or 300-pound obese people is an extremely physically demanding task.

Kiryu Kazusuke shook his head, climbed into his bed, and prepared to catch up on his sleep.

Tomorrow is Christmas and also the weekend, so it's foreseeable that there will be a significant number of drunk people coming to the emergency room and young people injured in fights.

You need to get enough rest and energy.

However, just as I was thinking about it, the duty phone on the table suddenly rang.

"I am Kiryu."

"Dr. Kiryu, a patient with a dislocated shoulder has come to the emergency room. He's screaming in pain. Could you please come down and take a look?"

"Okay, I'll be right there."

No, what a coincidence?

I just got the skill and I'm already getting a job?

Here's an explanation, something that's not really appropriate to include in the book.

To give an easy-to-understand example, consider an old, dilapidated apartment in downtown Shanghai or a hutong (alleyway) within the Second Ring Road of Beijing. The apartment might be worth tens of millions of yuan, but the family consists only of an elderly person and a laid-off daughter. The toilet is frequently clogged and leaks when it rains, and they can't afford to repair it. Fixed assets simply mean that you don't have to pay rent in this city, but you still need money for daily living expenses.

If you think this is unreasonable, then that's just how reality is; there are related videos on video websites as well.

Why not just sell the house directly?

1. Japan has a huge "transfer income tax". The tax rate for the transfer of land held for a long time can be as high as 20%-39%. Who can afford that?

2. Many people have a strong attachment to "protecting the family business", especially the older generation.

3. In the late 80s, banks were going crazy for lending. For housewives with no financial knowledge, this was an irresistible temptation—after all, they could make money in the stock market, and mortgage loans could both save their homes and make them rich.

How did Imagawa Ori manage to afford medical school? Because she had student loans.

(End of this chapter)