Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Even though Silva looked as calm as an Englishman on the outside, he was as agitated as a Brazilian on the inside.
But when he watched Ma Yanlin remove his bandage, the calmness on his face faded faster than the calmness crumbling in soldiers when they participated in World War Two.
“Is the infection serious?” Silva was a mercenary, and he knew the dangers of having an infected wound very clearly. This was especially true when a person was in an environment that lacked adequate medical care and drugs. Even though an infection did not sound serious, it could be life-threatening under these circumstances.
A person could grasp how serious wound infections could be just by looking at the death rate of the American Civil War. Without adequate drugs, wound infections had an extremely high possibility of causing death.
Ma Yanlin’s expression was extremely solemn, and he shook his head a little.
‘Am I going to die?’
As Silva looked at Ma Yanlin, he suddenly had a mental breakdown. His expression became as agitated as that of a Brazillian’s, and he said in a burst of explosive rage, “I was only scratched by a stone.”
“The infection isn’t serious. It just needs a bit of treatment.” Ma Yanlin gave a simple reply, and Selena translated it.
After Silva heard what Selena said, he had another mental breakdown. “If it’s not serious, why did you shake your head!?”
Ma Yanlin raised his head and saw that Silva was almost in tears. He said with a puzzled expression, “It’s habitual for us Chinese. Whenever we are about to say no, we’ll shake our heads first.”
“Is there such a thing in China?” Silva looked at Ling Ran with a dumbfounded expression.
Ling Ran was too lazy to pay any heed to their sociolinguistic misunderstanding. He said in a straightforward manner, “I’ll need to debride and suture your wound right now. Because your wound was not debrided right after you got injured, the foreign substances in the wound caused an infection. You’ve probably eaten some antibiotics, haven’t you?”
Silva nodded furiously and said, “I used a first aid kit.”
The captain, who was standing beside Silva, said, “We get injured all the time, and usually treat ourselves with the supplies inside the first aid kit. Our wounds aren’t usually infected when we head to the hospital after that.”
Ling Ran hummed in acknowledgment and nodded.
Ma Yanlin, who was standing beside Ling Ran, explained, “It might be because Brazil is a tropical country. Moreover, there’s a lot of microbes in the floodwater. Fatigue might also cause your immune system to weaken. There’re plenty of reasons that might have caused the infection.”
“Are you saying that it depends on a person’s luck?” Silva asked.
“Infection is a game of luck, anyway.” Ma Yanlin shrugged. “If you were stabbed by a needle that was used by an AIDS patient, there is a one out of three hundred chance of getting infected. Moreover, the success rate of a condom is only 85%…”
“Huh? The success rate of condoms is only 85%!?” The expressions of both the captain and Silva changed.
If you were to compare the look on their faces, Silva’s change in expression was more drastic.
Like a community doctor, Ma Yanlin smiled and said, “You don’t have to be too worried. If the condom is used correctly, the success rate will go up to 98%. The main reason for the 85% success rate right now is many people are using them wrongly.”
“How should we use it?” Silva no longer had time to pay any heed to the wound on his waist.
“Don’t move.” Ling Ran put on a pair of gloves and placed his hand on Silva’s wound. He even moved his hand up and down a few times as he got a feel of the wound, and he looked like he was giving a handjob.
Selena translated what Ling Ran said.
Silva almost went crazy. “So, I shouldn’t move when I’m f*cking!?”
Selena’s cheeks reddened. She glanced at Ling Ran and did not translate what he said. She merely replied, “What Doctor Ling meant was that if you were to move around now, he might need to remove your kidney.”
Silva immediately went stiff.
Ling Ran poked Silva’s wound a few times.
Silva gritted his teeth and maintained his composure. He had used up all the life experiences and determination he gathered after being a mercenary for five years, being in university for four years and being a soldier for three years to stop himself from moving.
Ling Ran raised his head in astonishment and glanced at Silva. He muttered to himself, “He seems tough.”
Ma Yanlin did not understand the conversation between Silva and Selena either. He praised Silva in English. “Tough guy!”
Silva flashed an indecipherable smile.
When Ma Yanlin saw that, he said, “His neural processing should be relatively slow. Can we use a lesser amount of anesthetics later and save them for when we really need it? We don’t have many drugs left.”
“Hm…” Ling Ran could not help but consider Ma Yanlin’s suggestion.
“They’re here to deliver drugs to us. So if one of the mercenaries were to use up a lot of drugs the moment he arrived, he would have a guilty conscience, wouldn’t he? Of course, the main reason I made this suggestion is because of his physique. He doesn’t look like he needs a lot of anesthetics. He may even suffer from side effects if we were to administer too much.” Ma Yanlin came out with a conclusion that sounded pretty logical. He then started preparing to administer anesthetics.
There were no anesthetists presence, and even though Ling Ran possessed Master Level Regional Infiltration Anesthesia, it was merely a subskill. Since he did not have any equipment to aid his judgment, it was hard for him to come out with any conclusion by only observing the wound with his naked eye.
“I’ll carry out local debridement first before administering anesthetics.” Ling Ran notified Silva before he started debriding the wound.
When debriding and suturing a wound, debridement had to be carried out before anesthetics were administered to prevent further infection. This was because the bacteria on the surface of the needles might enter the wounds.
Since Silva had been a mercenary for quite a few years, he had gone through this process many times and understood the reason behind it. He had no choice but to watch with gritted teeth as Ling Ran cleaned the skin around his wound with a soft-bristled brush and washed it with saline.
Ling Ran debrided the wound carefully with a smile on his face.
Ling Ran had stayed in Guozheng Charity Hospital for three days. More than a hundred patients were sent on the first day he was there, and he had operated on all the patients who needed surgery. Even if a patient was badly wounded, Ling Ran treated them as best as he could and ensured their survival.
Hence, there were not any patients left in the hospital who required surgery.
Fortunately, the mercenaries came injured. For example, Silva had already treated his wound while he was on his way. By night time, the disease progression of the wound was just right and it was an appropriate time for surgery.
“Can you bring me more saline solution?” Even though Ling Ran was trying to use less saline, one basin was definitely not enough.
If a person were to judge Silva’s wound in relation to wounds sustained in battlefields, it was not serious. However, in reality, the skin on the right side of his abdomen was full of abrasions, and a few of the wounds were muscle-deep. Aside from this, some of the wounds were filled with pus due to infection. Ling Ran had to clean all of them.
Compared to other kinds of drugs, Guozheng Charity Hospital was equipped with enough saline. The nurse quickly brought another bottle of saline over. She squatted on the ground and poured the saline into a basin.
Ling Ran removed a few large fragments of tree branches using a pair of forceps. He then applied pressure to a few small bleeding points to stop the bleeding.
After he was done, Ling Raid said, “The wound is relatively deep. Do send him to the operating theater.”
“Is there going to be a surgery?” The mercenaries became anxious again.
“Debridement and suturing is a minor surgery,” Selena answered right away without waiting for Ling Ran to say anything.
“The operating theater is cleaner, so the chances of the wound getting infected there is lower.” Ling Ran paused for a moment and continued, “We don’t have enough drugs on our hands right now, and we can only use generic broad-spectrum antibiotics. We’ll have our hands tied if your wound is infected by some troublesome bacteria.”
Silva was extremely shocked, and he no longer dared to refute. His gaze was empty as he was wheeled into the operating theater.
The captain and the other mercenaries were not allowed inside the operating theater, and they could only stare at the light on top of the door of the operating theater in a daze.
An injection was given.
The infected flesh was sliced off.
The wound was debrided again.
The wound was bandaged.
Soon, Silva was wheeled out of the operating theater.
The mercenaries crowded around Silva as he was wheeled into the ward.
They then stood around him in a daze.
One of the mercenaries said in a soft voice, “Captain… Are we done with our mission?”
“I guess so…” The captain looked around, and the place was full of bored patients and their family members. There was no hell, and they could not be of any help here.
“What do we do next?”
“What do you want to do?”
“I want to go fishing.”
“Go ahead.”
