Improvised Tracheal Intubation

Judging by the seating arrangement in the hall, it was obvious that the priest held the highest status among this group.

At his command to "let him go," even the knight offered no objection. With a grim face, he stepped aside. Gret was immediately released, staggered to his feet, gave the priest a perfunctory nod, and scrambled toward the child.

"Hmph! How rude..."

The knight snorted. The priest cut him off in a low voice. "Don't speak. Watch!"

Gret could not have rushed over at a better time. With only two or three steps left, the boy whose throat had been cut seemed to wake from a dream. His limbs flailed as he burst into tears. He cried fiercely, yet barely any sound came out. This only terrified him further; tears and snot streamed down his face, his arms and legs twitching as though he were about to pass out again.

That was when Gret reached him. He threw himself forward, pressing his entire body over the child and pinning down those little kicking legs with his weight. Then he seized both of the boy's arms with one hand while stroking his cheek with the other, soothing him over and over:

"Don't be afraid. You're okay now, you're okay... As long as you can breathe, you'll be fine... Don't be scared, don't be scared... Breathe with me. Breathe in... breathe out... breathe in... breathe out..."

His voice shifted from high to low, from hurried to slow, filled with concern. The child truly calmed under his reassurance. With wide, round eyes, he began breathing along with Gret's voice. Inhale, exhale, inhale again, exhale again...

Before long, the spasms gradually stopped. Though his neck still hurt and he continued to cry in little shuddering sobs, he looked far more peaceful.

Surgical textbooks and treatment guidelines never mentioned this. Gret had learned it orally from his teacher in his previous life, the old director of the emergency department. After performing a tracheotomy without anesthesia, one absolutely had to calm the patient down!

They were already hypoxic and suffocating. If their neck was suddenly cut open, their panic and struggling would consume oxygen even faster. Without proper reassurance, they could go into shock within minutes.

...Right, the family and bystanders needed calming too... Otherwise, the moment you put down the knife, righteous citizens might beat you senseless, or the police might slap cuffs on you. Don't say I didn't warn you.

Gret's thoughts raced, and he felt a thousand emotions. It was not that he had forgotten his teacher's advice earlier; he simply had not had time to do it before that knight sent him flying. Fortunately, the knight had held back and had not killed him on the spot. Otherwise, Gret figured he might have had to transmigrate again.

At the thought of the knight, he heard him speaking behind him. His voice was kept low, as though he were whispering to the priest beside him:

"Cutting open a throat can save someone?"

"...I've never seen anyone treat a patient like this," the priest replied. Perhaps because he was a spellcaster, his voice was calm and clear, quite unlike the knight's deep, resonant tone. Even though Gret had only met them that day, he could immediately tell their voices apart. "Still, he seems very confident. And that child really isn't gasping anymore. His neck was cut open, yet he didn't immediately spray blood and die..."

Of course not. I'd known the anatomical structure of the neck inside out since university. If I managed to cut a carotid artery during a cricothyrotomy, I might as well die on the spot!

Gret grumbled silently.

After soothing the boy in his arms, he let out a breath and straightened up. The priest had been watching with great interest. Seeing him stop, he could not help asking:

"Is that all?"

"Not even close." Gret answered with a slight pant. He looked around but did not see what he needed, so he knelt on the ground, raised his head, and shouted at the crowd gathered nearby:

"Get me a tube! Something hard! Something clean! Hurry!"

"Did you hear him? A hard tube! A clean one! Go find it, now!"

A deep voice took up the call. Gret glanced over and saw that it was Uncle Edmond, the farm owner who had welcomed them earlier. This farm owner carried considerable authority here. At his order, seven or eight people immediately ran off, clearly searching for something.

Gret relaxed a little. Turning his head, he saw the farm woman who had rushed in holding the child. Her face was streaked with tears as she cowered nearby, wanting to reach out and hold her child but not daring to. Gret exhaled and asked gently:

"When did the child start feeling unwell?"

"At dinner... Then he got worse and worse, so I..."

The onset had been about an hour ago. Gret silently noted down the medical history and continued asking:

"What did he eat and drink at dinner? Did he have anything unusual?"

"Black bread, beans... Everyone ate the same thing. We eat them every day, and nothing ever happened before..."

"Then did he touch anything uncommon? Was anyone painting nearby? Did he pick any fruit? Touch any flowers?"

Gret continued his questions patiently. He was already used to tracking down allergens, asking about food, then the surrounding environment, whether they had touched, encountered, or smelled anything strange, and whether they had done anything out of the ordinary. Nothing could be overlooked, no matter how trivial the detail.

He remembered once resuscitating a patient with severe allergies. In the end, the cause they found was that a gust of wind had happened to blow over from a fruit stall as the patient walked past...

An allergy to peach fuzz.

It had practically turned the doctors into celebrity detectives.

He spoke softly, questioning her through every possibility. The farm woman kept shaking her head through her tears. While asking, Gret kept part of his attention fixed on the child and also answered the priest's questions:

"What do you need a tube for?"

"To insert into his trachea, obviously! Where's the tube? Why isn't it here yet?"

"Coming, coming!"

Someone came sprinting out of the kitchen. His left hand stretched outward, waving hard to signal the others to move aside and clear the way, while his right hand held something high overhead. Reaching Gret, he bent over, gasping, and shoved it into his hand.

"The tube's here! See if it works! It took me forever to clean it!"

Gret lowered his eyes. Resting quietly in his palm was a Chicken Leg Bone, with both ends chopped off to reveal its hollow interior. He tilted it and took a look. The marrow in the middle had been mostly cleared out too; he could see candlelight shining through from the other end.

...Fine. It would do.

There were no sterile, disposable PVC endotracheal tubes, not even a piece of bamboo—bamboo probably did not grow in this land—but a hollow chicken bone would have to make do for now.

Gret shrugged. Brushing his thumb over the cut end of the Chicken Leg Bone, he frowned and handed it back.

"The edges are too sharp. Smooth them out a little."

"This..."

Uncle Edmond looked troubled. Then a hand reached out lightly from the side. The priest took the chicken bone from Gret's palm and passed it to the knight.

"Roman, lend us a hand."

Roman Knight's expression darkened again. He said nothing, taking the chicken bone and rubbing the pad of his right thumb across one cut end. He flipped it over and rubbed the other end as well. Bone dust fell in a soft stream, and the sharp edges left by the cleaver visibly became smooth.

Gret's eyes widened, and he could not stop himself from letting out a soft "Wow."

He was rubbing it with his bare hand!

His thumb was acting as a whetstone!

Just like that, with barely any effort!

Were the knights of this world really that physically strong?

Before he could even close his hanging jaw, the priest handed back the polished chicken bone. As he did, he urged Gret on curiously:

"Insert it into the trachea? How? Why?"

"—Wow! It really went in!"