Kazuo and Kazuhiro entered Kirinji's infirmary carrying toiletries and breakfast. After Kirinji's emergency healing last night, their forearms and hands had returned to normal.
"Big Brother, thanks for all your hard work. Go wash up and have something to eat!" The brothers set everything on a small table nearby and respectfully bowed to Kirinji.
Kirinji had saved them from the brink of death over thirty years ago, and they had been his assistants ever since. No matter how many "medical accidents" like yesterday's they went through, in their hearts, they would always see Kirinji as their big brother.
"How do your arms feel?" Kirinji splashed water on his face and asked, turning his head.
Kazuo and Kazuhiro flexed their arms to show they had recovered. "Your healing is flawless, Big Brother. We feel even better than we did yesterday!"
"Mm. Before we discuss how you're feeling, there's something I need to say..." Kirinji had washed his face and hair. He wiped them dry as he spoke in a low voice.
Kazuo nodded and waited respectfully for him to continue. "Go ahead, Big Brother."
"When are you two idiots going to remember to bring me my hair oil after I wash up!?
How am I supposed to keep my pompadour without hair oil??? Hold it up with my own hands???"
The brothers were instantly subjected to a torrent of abuse. Kazuhiro hurriedly dashed out of the room and ran toward Kirinji's quarters.
Kirinji glanced at Lin Nan on the bed, then said casually to Kazuo, "This kid should be stable now. Tell me about you two!
Yesterday, when your arms turned to bones, what did it feel like?"
Kazuo looked down at his forearms and hands, which had only recently been restored by healing and still looked a little pale. He recalled:
"At first, our skin felt itchy, and the parts submerged in the water felt sore and swollen. Then it was like something was trying to burst out from inside our muscles. It happened so fast—the moment one symptom became noticeable, the next one had already begun.
By the time we realized something was wrong and pulled our hands out of the water, the flesh and skin on our forearms had already rotted away and fallen off."
Kirinji sat at Lin Nan's bedside, eating breakfast absentmindedly as he closed his eyes and thought over Kazuo's account. His thoughts soon hit a dead end.
"The skin and flesh rotted away, but there was no pain. And they felt like something was trying to burst out..." He turned over every possibility in his mind, chopsticks frozen in his hand.
"Could the Reishi proportions have turned toxic? Causing some abnormal reaction in the body?..."
Kazuhiro returned to the infirmary with the hair oil. Seeing their big brother still deep in thought, he stood beside Kazuo. The two waited silently and respectfully.
Just then, Lin Nan shifted slightly on the bed and unconsciously scratched himself. "Why am I so itchy?"
He slowly opened his eyes. The first thing he saw was Kirinji's gaunt, knife-like face, along with his ridiculous hairstyle, which he hadn't had a chance to fix.
"What the heck! What's this supposed to be? Are you using my sleeping position as an appetizer?"
Seeing Kirinji frozen in place at his bedside with chopsticks in hand, and Kazuo and Kazuhiro standing stiffly nearby, Lin Nan immediately sat up on instinct.
He cautiously lifted the edge of his blanket and looked underneath. Once he'd confirmed his clothes were still on, he sighed in relief.
He'd woken up so suddenly this time, nothing like before.
Previously, when he returned from the Playback Room to the real world, there had been a clear process. His figure would slowly fade in that dim space before his consciousness returned to reality.
But this time, Lin Nan had just been carefully studying Kirinji's Shunpo movements along with the recording. The next moment, he'd opened his eyes to find Kirinji's huge face filling his vision.
It was even more shocking than waking from an erotic dream to find the woman from it lying beside him.
Unfortunately, this was the bad kind of shock.
"Wait, where's your bike seat?" Lin Nan studied Kirinji, who was still frozen in place. "Though you look a lot better like this..."
When Kirinji still didn't react, Lin Nan turned to the brothers nearby, puzzled.
Kazuo shook his head and mouthed in an almost inaudible whisper, "Big Brother's thinking. Don't disturb him."
At that, last night's memories suddenly came flooding back to Lin Nan.
He slowly got up, put on his outer robe, and climbed out of bed. After waiting for the sudden dizziness to pass, he made his way over to Kazuo and gestured for him to come outside.
The two went out into the corridor. Lin Nan rubbed his still-itchy skin and spoke quietly.
"Let him keep thinking in there for now. Tell me what happened yesterday. I only remember you guys pushing me into the water. Then I opened my eyes and here I am."
Kazuo quietly closed the door behind them so they wouldn't disturb Kirinji's thoughts, then recounted everything that had happened the day before.
Lin Nan listened and thought it over. As a devoted reader of the original story, he remembered many of its details clearly. Comparing them with what had happened yesterday made it easy to figure out where things had gone wrong.
In the original story, Kirinji Tenjiro's signature treasures were the two hot springs in the Kirinji Palace: White Bone Hell and Blood Pond Hell.
Patients entered White Bone Hell to purge damaged blood and Reishi from their bodies. Then, in Blood Pond Hell, the crimson water replaced their old blood, giving them the effect of a complete rebirth.
But at this point in time, Kirinji clearly hadn't reached that level yet. Yesterday's "prototype hot spring" was obviously a crude precursor to those two pools—not even a true prototype.
"I don't think the cause was toxicity, like he just guessed," Lin Nan said as he scratched himself, recalling the details mentioned in the manga.
"I think the water in that pool was too strong, causing the body to regenerate too much. Once it went beyond what the body could handle, the flesh began to rot..."
Whoosh! The sliding door beside them was suddenly yanked open.
Kirinji stood in the doorway, chopsticks in hand, staring fixedly at Lin Nan. "What did you say?"
Lin Nan jumped. "Are you crazy? How come you make no sound when you walk over?"
Kirinji kept staring at Lin Nan, excitement shining in his narrow eyes. "Say that again. What you just said—quick!"
It was the first time Lin Nan had seen Kirinji wear such a dazed, almost vacant expression. "Calm down. I just recovered from a serious illness. Don't scare me into passing out again."
To avoid revealing that he'd come from another world, Lin Nan explained his theory again in simpler terms, drawing on the original story. After all, he knew nothing about healing and couldn't possibly have mastered all the technical jargon.
As Lin Nan explained, Kirinji's eyes gradually brightened. He suddenly threw both hands into the air and laughed loudly. "Hahaha! Yes, that must be it! That's exactly it!! I really am a genius!!"
Lin Nan stared at him, speechless. "Genius, huh? I'm the one who just told you the idea. What are you getting so excited about?"
A smug smile appeared on Kirinji's face. "You ordinary folk could never understand a genius. Once I figure out the principle, I can improve my hot springs—that's what makes me a genius."
Looking at his infuriating expression, Lin Nan suddenly had a daring idea.
Now that he knew how the story went, why not have a little fun?
He cleared his throat. "I think your hot spring combines treatment and recovery into one, making its energy too powerful. If you don't control it properly, something terrible could happen—just like what happened to the three of us yesterday.
So, what do you think of this idea..."
He gestured with both hands, describing in detail how White Bone Hell and Blood Pond Hell were designed to work, using his own words. Of course, he thoughtfully left out their names, giving Kirinji a little room to come up with things himself.
As he explained, Kirinji and the brothers standing beside him were so stunned that their jaws nearly hit the floor.
"Y-How did you come up with all that?" Kirinji's little eyes twitched incessantly as he stared at Lin Nan in disbelief, as if he were looking at a monster.
Lin Nan held back his laughter and put on a thoughtful expression, explaining it simply with words Kirinji would understand.
"Of course, I've only thought of the principle. You'll have to handle the actual details and construction yourself, Genius."
Kirinji's expression changed completely. He no longer looked down on Lin Nan with disdain. Instead, he looked at him the way one genius looked at another.
"It'll work! This idea really will work! The Reishi concentration was too high, causing excessive regeneration—how could I have been so stupid not to think of that?" Kirinji was so excited he scratched at his head.
Lin Nan suppressed a laugh, thinking, If you'd lived in a dorm and dealt with the power going out because someone plugged in a high-wattage appliance, you'd understand it too.
The two brothers were even more stunned, left speechless. This young man had solved the problem that had been troubling their genius big brother so much he'd lost his appetite and sleep—with just a few words???
"Lord Lin Nan, thank you for easing our burden! We brothers thank you on behalf of our big brother!" The two bowed deeply to Lin Nan.
Lin Nan remained composed under their reverent gazes, thinking to himself:
So this is how good it feels to be Xia Luo...
Before you continue