"I didn't realize there was a clinic here, it just looks a little small, it's not a shady store, is it?"
On the streets of Baka, Lizardman Jack stood at a distance, surveying the small clinic with only the word 'clinic' on the sign, his expression torn.
"Hiss! It hurts so much! If I don't carry out medical treatment on my hand, it will be completely wasted, right!"
"If my hand is broken, surely no lizard beauty will look at me, and my lizard life is completely over!"
"But I only have three coins in my pocket, so if I don't pay after treatment, I'll be killed, right?"
Jack's right hand rested on his scale-covered left arm, torn and worried.
Last night he suffered his eighty-first night attack in the Abyss.
Although he had achieved the final victory, he still couldn't figure out why those guys hiding in the shadows were always staring at him, a big guy with thick armor, but very poor indeed.
And this assault resulted in a knock to his left arm.
As the iron rod bent, he also heard the heartbreaking sound of cracking bones.
This is not an injury that will heal with a nap.
At first light, Jack, unable to sleep after a night of excruciating pain, immediately took to the streets in search of help.
In the Abyss, falling into a period of weakness is a very dangerous situation.
And as an orc mercenary, breaking an arm was bound to reduce his strength drastically, which would make it impossible for him to continue to gain a foothold in the industry.
Losing his means of earning a living, he may just have to fall like those guys hiding in the shadows.
The small clinic on Baca Street was something he had heard about in mercenary circles.
Mercenaries are a high-risk profession, and injuries are commonplace for them; some injuries can be resolved by simply purchasing a potion or two to stop the bleeding, but some injuries necessitate the help of a doctor.
There are only seven or eight hospitals in total in the Abyss, ranging in size, all backed by major powers.
The hospitals varied in strength, but all at least had healing wizards on staff, enough to deal with most injuries.
Accordingly, the fees are extremely high!
The slightest injury could bankrupt a mercenary.
Being the poor guy who was already on the verge of bankruptcy before he even entered the hospital, Jack had to rule those hospitals out for now.
If you want to go to a place like this and renege on your debt, you're looking for death.
The small clinic on Baca Street was a little different, rumored to be run by a human with no power behind it.
This human doesn't know magic though, only potions, and is rumored to operate on patients with bizarre, but sometimes quite effective, methods.
The point is, credit is supposedly available here!
With the three coins in his pocket, Jack wanted to save them for breakfast, and if he could get credit, he could wait until his arm was better to take on quests to earn money to pay back the bill.
After agonizing for a while, Jack, who really didn't have a better option, went up and knocked on the clinic's door.
The clinic door quickly opened, and the one who opened the door was a young orc girl, she was wearing a long black dress, with two orc ears coming out of her black hair, which was quite cute.
"You're a doctor?" Jack looked up at the sign with some confusion, didn't it say this was a clinic run by a human?
"No, I'm Dr. Charlotte's assistant, can I help you?" Vivian said hastily, her voice trembling slightly, more than a little nervous about her first reception.
"Yes, my life is over!" Jack nodded his head in a huff.
"Hmm?" Vivian looked at him quizzically.
"I mean, I broke my hand, and if I can't get it back together, my life is completely over." Jack held up his left hand with a pained look on his face.
"You may come in." Vivian sidled up to let him in while her eyes went to Charlotte.
If it was just a broken bone, she could restore it for him with just a healing spell.
But Charlotte didn't know any healing spells, and there were no mid-level potions on the counter that could heal broken bones.
And what would he do with this patient?
As soon as Jack entered, he saw a young human, white and somewhat affected looking.
Aw shucks! That's not what he likes!
His hopes for life rested on this weak human, and that left him a bit unsettled.
He thought of some rumors that many mercenaries never made it out of this clinic after stepping into it.
"Doctor, please help me!" Jack said stiffly, looking at Charlotte.
"Please sit down." Charlotte made the tall lizardman sit down on a stone bed on the side, while saying, "This patient, tell us about your injuries."
Charlotte was quite pleased with Vivian's reception, which allowed him to focus more on the matter of treating his patients.
The lizardman in front of him, who was over two and a half meters tall and covered in yellowish-brown scale armor, looked as if he had broken his left hand.
"I was attacked ... ah shucks, a sneak attack, yesterday by someone at night, and my arm blocked the iron bar, and it seems to have broken." Jack held up his left arm, grimacing in pain from the movement.
Charlotte reached out and touched his left hand, the fine scales the size of fingernails were cold to the touch and felt nothing but hardness.
As an experienced veterinarian, he really hasn't seen a broken bone in a lizard, either!
It was impossible to feel, but the lizardman's arm was indeed misaligned to the naked eye, which meant that he had indeed broken a bone, and a very serious one at that.
Fracture surgery isn't a big deal, Charlotte has done a lot of fracture surgeries on dogs and cats and has some experience in this area.
Of course, he wasn't quite sure if that experience could be applied to lizardmen.
According to the diary, the predecessor didn't do a lot of fracture surgeries on patients.
Of course, the success rate continues to be touchy, and often, when it's done, it turns into an amputation.
"It is indeed fractured, but we can't confirm what's inside, so we'll need to cut it open to see what's going on, and then reposition and immobilize it as appropriate." Charlotte said with a frown, the uncertainty of the surgery would be much higher without the aid of imaging.
"Cut it open!" Jack exclaimed.
How can this guy, make such horrible words, sound so light?
"Yes, in your case, surgery is necessary." Charlotte said with a serious expression.
"Just ... can't it be healed with magic or potions?" Jack whispered.
Charlotte shook her head, "If it's healing magic you need, I'm sorry I can't help you, but you can go to another hospital for treatment."
The corner of Jack's mouth twitched, if he had the money to go to a major hospital, would he still be here?
"This surgery, it's not going to hurt, is it?" Jack asked carefully.
"The process will be a little painful, but it shouldn't be too much of a problem for you." Charlotte looked at the thick-skinned lizardman, cold-blooded animals shouldn't be that sensitive to pain, right? After all, lizards were ruthless characters that could break their tails to survive.
"So surgery will definitely save my left hand?" Jack was still unsure.
Charlotte spread her hands and said, "I'm not going to make any guarantees, both about the success of the surgery and the post-operative management that will affect the final outcome."
Isn't this a hooliganism? Jack was drumming in his heart, but the pain coming from his arm made it impossible for him to continue to endure, so he could only grit his teeth and say, "I'll do it!"