A World Without Hippocrates

"Come to think of it, I think I saw you just now." Kraft's memory began turning over, pulling the newly stored details back from the background. "Did it start hurting after you fell forward? Your shoulder, right?"

He had merely happened to pass by them, yet the entire sequence had unconsciously been etched into his mind in remarkable detail: droplets flung from the fish tail, sleeves raised to shield themselves and step aside, the collision, the loss of balance, then the forward fall. The student reflexively extended both hands to cushion himself. His palms hit the ground first, followed by his entire forearm striking the floor, and he cried out in pain.

The sleeve over the arm he was supporting still bore marks from scraping against the ground. There were several abrasions on his hand as well, which he had not yet had time to treat. He was holding his elbow, but in truth, he was limiting movement in his shoulder.

That was right. It matched perfectly. It was him.

Seeing that they still looked unconvinced, Kraft added, "Try this. Press your elbow and fist against your chest at the same time." He demonstrated, bending his left arm and easily placing both his fist and elbow against his chest. "If I'm right, you can't do this no matter what. Either your hand or your elbow won't be able to touch your chest."

The student sitting on the ground gritted his teeth and tried. Just as Kraft had said, only one of his elbow and fist could touch his chest at a time.

His Law School companion and the three Medical School students curiously tried it on themselves as well. Without question, they could all press both their elbows and fists against their chests simultaneously. The little experiment made them acknowledge Kraft's professional expertise, while his noble status further boosted his credibility.

Good thing they had no idea about the actual knowledge level of military nobles from the lower ranks, Kraft thought. His grandfather's understanding of medicine amounted to washing wounds clean with water, then finding someone who could pray over them. Even that was already quite an advanced idea, at least a whole generation ahead of people who smeared ash into wounds. Only he could come up with nonsense like "my family knows a lot about trauma."

Well... perhaps it was not entirely a lie. After the brand-new merged version of Kraft came into being, the family did have someone with a normal understanding of medicine. Though that did not sound quite right either. Given the social environment here, Kraft's medical knowledge was just a tiny bit beyond the "normal" level—so far beyond it that most of it was probably useless.

But the situation before him did not belong among that useless "most."

Once he sorted through the sequence, the logic became clear: a student who did not usually exercise much had fallen, landed on his forearm, then began supporting one arm. His shoulder hurt, and he could not press his elbow and fist against his chest at the same time.

A free point question. A free point question! It had practically been fed into his mouth, the sort of question where, during an exam, he could exchange a knowing smile with the teacher.

If you were a medical student who had genuinely studied before an exam—not the three black-robed people standing beside him now, of course, but the sort Kraft had known in the otherworld, those who stayed up late until their hair fell out—you would probably encounter an old-fashioned term in some excessively thick textbook: the Hippocrates Method.

At first glance, it looked no different from any other term. But once spoken aloud, it sounded awfully familiar, remarkably like the name of some famous historical figure.

And it really was him: Hippocrates, the Hippocrates of the Hippocratic Oath. Many people, Kraft included, had never expected that something devised by an ancient Greek could still appear in textbooks a thousand years later, remaining a standard treatment for shoulder dislocation.

"Shoulder dislocation. I mean, one end of your bone has slipped out of where it was supposed to be in your shoulder. Based on my personal experience, it was caused by the moment you fell forward." Kraft explained. Unfortunately, this world seemed to have no Hippocrates, making its already underdeveloped medicine even worse.

After Kraft finished speaking, the medical students beside him neither let out an enlightened "Ahh," nor nodded as if to say, "We learned that." Instead, they looked at him with admiration that made Kraft deeply uneasy. The enthusiastic brown-haired student was especially obvious. His face practically said, Your noble families really do have deep inherited learning, and he looked like he desperately wanted to ask for detailed instruction.

Seriously? Without Hippocrates, didn't you people have someone like Hippocratop studying this sort of thing?

Kraft was overcome with sorrow. This was not right. Wenden Port was the only city in a vast region, and the Medical School students at Wenden Port Academy were at this level? Then there was probably no point hoping for much else. If he developed even a minor illness in the future, appendicitis alone might have a chance of sending him straight to his death.

The Law School student sitting on the ground found what he had said a little frightening. Seeing Kraft's mournful expression only made him more nervous. "Then... can this arm still be saved?"

"Of course, of course. Your condition isn't serious." Kraft recovered from his despair over the bleak future. "Can you still walk? I need a bed for you to lie down on before I can treat you properly."

He stepped forward and helped the patient up, then looked around. The empty square did not even have a public bench. It did not seem like a good place to show off his skills.

"Why not come to our Medical School? We have lots of beds there." The brown-haired medical student, whose knowledge was average but who was genuinely a good person, made the offer.

"Ah, but wouldn't that be..."

"Don't worry about it being too far. Our carriage is nearby. Besides, once you're treated, you'll have to return to the Academy to rest anyway, right?"

"My name is Lucius, Lucius Sharp. I've been in Wenden Port for four years." The enthusiastic brown-haired young man introduced himself from the driver's seat of the carriage. "Meeting you today was incredibly lucky. If you don't mind, could we observe?"

In the end, they boarded the Medical School carriage, sitting in the cargo space at the back as it rattled and swayed toward the Medical School. Trusting Kraft, and also finding the sword at his waist rather reassuring, the two Law School students considered it briefly and did not refuse.

As Lucius had said, they had indeed gone out to buy experimental materials. There were bottles and jars of unknown contents by the passengers' feet, while beneath their backsides was a somewhat heavy wooden crate. Something large inside shifted with the carriage's vibrations. Beside the crate lay some dried plants resembling hay and twigs, while other odds and ends had been piled into a corner. They had to be careful not to step on them.

Kraft rode alongside the carriage and did not reject Lucius's request. "That depends on whether the patient agrees. By the way, why does your Medical School have so many beds? Do you receive patients at the Academy?" He had not expected this era to already have connections between academies and hospitals. Perhaps they even taught through clinical practice. Their ideas seemed rather advanced.

"..."

Lucius fell into an odd silence and did not answer.

But the Law School student in the back heard their conversation. They had borrowed the Medical School's carriage and would soon need to borrow one of their beds as well. He felt that his earlier behavior had been somewhat improper. Suspecting his classmates based solely on rumors was truly contrary to the spirit of law.

So, out of guilt and self-reproach, he agreed to Lucius's request. "It's fine. We owe you for helping us today. You only want to observe the treatment. Why would I refuse?"

Thus, amid a harmonious atmosphere, Lucius led Kraft through the Academy gates without obstruction. After several turns, they arrived at the part of the Medical School Kraft had never visited before. Not a single guard stopped to question Kraft, an outsider not wearing Academy clothes. Lucius simply got them through by showing his face the whole way.

Once he entered the room and lay down on a Stone Matter bed, however, the Law School student with the dislocated shoulder began to feel that something was off.

Though it was called a stone bed, its square shape made "stone platform" seem more appropriate. It was difficult not to wonder what it was used for.

Lucius had thoughtfully laid a cushion over it, but wasn't this room a little too large? And why were there tiered rows of seats all around it?

Kraft fell silent as well. He had seen old Medical School classrooms like this in educational videos. What kind of classroom it was, he could not say. And what sort of people usually lay on that bed was probably not something he should say either.

Considering the patient's feelings, he did not explain. He merely told the student to lie still and remove his shirt. Once the shirt came off, the acromion on the injured side was visibly prominent. The shoulder had a slightly squared shape, distinctly different from the normal rounded contour, fully confirming his diagnosis.

He confirmed that there was no abnormal movement or pain in the left arm, then bent the elbow ninety degrees and checked that the bony landmarks were in their normal positions, ruling out possible fractures and elbow dislocation.

"Next, I'm going to kick your bone back into place. Relax. Don't tense up." Kraft removed one boot, planted his foot in the armpit beneath the dislocated shoulder joint, and gripped the student's left arm, assuming the classic reduction posture with a history of over a thousand years. "Someone, help hold him down. Don't let him move around."

The moment the words left his mouth, five or six black-robed figures sprang up from the seats behind them and pinned down the student's limbs and body. Kraft had not even noticed when they entered.

He began steadily pulling on the arm, using his foot to press the humeral head outward while rotating the arm. Accompanied by a characteristic pop, the humeral head returned to its original position, and the shoulder's shape returned to normal as well.

"All right, let him go. Could someone get me a triangular piece of cloth? About as big as a chest." Kraft reached out to stop the patient from moving his newly freed shoulder, placing his hand against his chest. "For the next twenty days, this arm can only hang against your chest."

Fortunately, this was the Medical School. Kraft quickly received a freshly cut triangular piece of linen. He secured the injured limb against the student's chest, reminded him not to move it for twenty days, and let the Law School student—who had already become a teaching specimen—go.

In that short time, two more rows of black-robed figures had appeared in the classroom. If he did not leave now, he was no longer sure whether he would make it back to the Law School.