LGHTNOVELBOOK Chapter 4: Chapter 4 - My Body is Cursed by Pain
As if the nurses around Ernest were mothers who saw a discount sign on a product in a grocery store, Ernest's bed was pushed from one room to another to do various examinations like a shopping trolley.
They took blood samples, checked Ernest's insides with some kind of MRI device, and performed various examinations with various other medical devices.
The whole examination process took a whole day.
Finally, when the whole process ended, he was returned to the room where he was previously treated.
"You can rest here first. When the results of your examination come out, we will let you know."
Olivia stood near Ernest's bed while jotting down something on a paper.
As if Olivia remembered something, she closed the paper she was holding and started intending to ask a question. "Mm..." She said hesitantly.
"If you want to ask, just ask."
"So, do you have any family members you can contact as guardians?"
Olivia continued, explaining that the Circle of Hope hospital had tried to find Ernest's guardian, but the hospital had been unsuccessful in finding someone who could be his guardian.
"I don't think so," Ernest replied while forcing a smile. "Has anyone been looking for me for the past two years?"
"...No."
After answering that, Olivia bit her lower lip as if she felt bad.
Seeing Olivia's furrowed brows and narrowed eyes, Ernest automatically imagined the contents of her head. 'Is he a criminal?' That was Olivia's facial expression according to Ernest's guess.
"Don't worry, I'm not a criminal or an international fugitive." Before Olivia asked, Ernest emphasized first.
"..."
Olivia was unable to reply to Ernest's words.
Her eyes widened and her head tilted to the side, which caused her long hair to look like a fountain, plunging down.
She wondered why Ernest could conclude that she was suspecting him of being a criminal? She was just curious why no one ever came to see him. Or at least someone looking for him.
For two years, while caring for Ernest, Olivia had always pitied his situation.
Olivia bit her lower lip even harder. She decided to pull every word that wanted to come out of her mouth.
Olivia wanted to ask about Ernest's background, but, although Ernest was always smiling, the aura he gave off seemed to say that he would never want to tell his past to someone he just met.
Knowing that prying into a patient's past that was unrelated to the patient's medical condition was inappropriate, Olivia chose to follow the guidelines of her job as a professional doctor. There was no need to interrogate the patient. All sick people are the same, her job is only to heal.
Leaving Ernest's room, Olivia thought that what she should care about was focusing on treating patients until they recovered, including Ernest.
***
While alone in the ward room, Ernest began to organize his complicated thoughts.
As he was taken to the various examination rooms, he peeked into the rooms of many patients. Unlike Ernest who was alone, almost everyone was accompanied and guarded by their family members.
Ernest was indeed an orphan—a victim of war, but he had a foster family.
He had hoped that there would be one person who would be able to find him and visit him.
He thought of the person who brought him to his foster family.
'At the very least, old Yang Jian... Ah, what was I thinking.'
Ernest regretted thinking that.
After all, he didn't deserve to think like that.
Two years ago, he decided to leave the protection of his foster family due to shame and inferiority.
All those feelings of shame and inferiority arose because of the condition of his body since he was a child or since the time he started being cared for by his foster family.
Pain Cursed.
He called his body condition like that.
From the moment he woke up from the vegetative state, he had felt pain that he hadn't felt for two years. Even now, that pain continues to eat away at all the pain receptors in his body. It was a permanent, ongoing pain that always stuck with him.
It might have been okay if it was just pain, but it wasn't just pain when it reached a certain point where it hampered his activities.
He couldn't think too seriously because it would make his head feel like it was going to explode.
He also cannot do strenuous activities because it would make him feel that his body was being mutilated.
If he forced himself to do strenuous activities or think too hard, he would faint even if he managed to endure the pain in his body.
Without a usable body and mind, he automatically became a trash who could not awaken or even work normally and earn money.
Hence, two years ago, he decided to run away from his foster family that raised him. The family was currently still in China, so it would be quite natural that they did not hear about him being in a vegetative state for two years.
He was grateful actually. He didn't know about the other family members, but if that old Yang Jian heard about him, he would definitely fly all the way to where he was. Regardless of the sins he had committed against the old man.
At that time, Ernest's mind only contained how to escape reality. His priority at that time was only to escape from the mental pain he always felt and from the insults of his friends and foster family members. His immature mind could not think about how the people close to him would feel when he ran away.
A wise man once said that there was no problem that could not be solved. However, you won't always get the right answer if you just follow your stupid mind, like Ernest at that time.
His answer to his problem at that time was to take money from Yang Jian, the only good person and the person who took the initiative to adopt him, for provisions to go to the United States.
If you think about it, he was a disobedient and insolent adopted son. So it didn't make sense that he would expect the old man to find him and visit him.
Not only that, Ernest's sins continued to grow even when he arrived in the United States. He still owed a lot of money to an underground organization in Orlando and went to Miami just to gamble and get drunk.
Then he intended to commit suicide, but a truck hit him, so here he was.
He had asked Olivia if anyone was looking for him. Actually, it was not only to hope that someone would come to see him, but Ernest was worried that people from the organization he owed money to would break in to see him.
That was also the reason why he immediately ran away from this hospital in his previous life.
He was afraid that they had found him and were preparing to ambush him when he regained consciousness.
However, in the end, he was captured and made a slave by that organization until he finally died, which then sent his soul to the Netherworld.
Until he died in his previous life, he never managed to meet his foster family.
'Now things will be different from before.'
While sitting on the bed, he looked at the night sky and tried to think about what he should do from now on.
'Since it's still 2026, there's still about ten years before The Second Disaster hits the earth. I still have plenty of time to change the unfortunate future that will befall me.'