Zhang Fan finished his rotation in the neurosurgery department. All of the patients he managed had now been discharged, including the previous patient who had been hospitalized after losing a one against three fight. The other three men’s parents paid him 30,000 yuan in compensation before he finally reluctantly left the hospital. Before he left, he even tried to ask for Zhang Fan’s cell phone number. “Bro, take care of me next time I have a problem!”

“Just go properly work at a job and stop trying to cause trouble. This time, you were really lucky. Things might not go so well next time!” Zhang Fan tried his best to give the patient honest advice.

Although he hadn’t been friendly with this patient even once, the patient had constantly addressed him as “Bro”, being really respectful to Zhang Fan. Nobody would mind manners. This was why Zhang Fan tried to give him advice when he left the hospital, no matter if it was effective or not. If the patient continued acting in the same way, he would suffer majorly sooner or later.

Zhang Fan was then rotated to the oncological department. This department was nicknamed the “final” department because many patients’ lives would end here. Work pressure wasn’t actually that high in this department, because most patients’ family members had already signed agreements indicating they understood that the patients had a high chance of dying. Although the oncology department had good income and wasn’t very tiring to work in, it still wasn’t very popular with younger doctors to join.

The oncological department would have to deal with death on a daily basis. Even those who weren’t very emotional would still be affected if they saw death every day. This was why very few people voluntarily chose to join the oncology department. Zhang Fan looked over his rotation paperwork for quite a while. He also really didn’t want to go to this department.

In northwestern China, the oncological department was basically a department that cared for patients in their final moments. Oncological departments here almost never received any development or invented new treatments.

Zhang Fan could avoid going to the oncological department if he really wanted. He didn’t even need to ask Superintendent Ouyang. He simply had to ask the hospital administration director. However, Zhang Fan hesitated for a long while before finally deciding to go to the oncological department for rotation. He felt that he would eventually have to face death again, and that avoiding it would be no solution.

The oncological department was on the easternmost side of the hospital, on the first floor. The hospital morgue was also right behind it.

Earlier this spring, a female intern doctor who came to the oncological department had been so scared that she cried for an entire night.

Her teaching doctor was a male doctor, so she slept by herself in a patient room at night for a night shift. It was quite common for intern and rotation doctors to have to catch some sleep in patient rooms.

She wasn’t the brave type at all. Three patients had passed away in the oncological department earlier that day. She went to sleep with an anxious heart, and while she was feeling hazy, she suddenly heard what she imagined to be a young child crying right on the windowsill!

The intern doctor was so scared that she covered her head with her doctor’s coat and cried for an entire night! On the next day, her eyes were completely swollen as she quit her intern doctor job!

Actually, what she heard had been a wild cat in heat!

The director of the oncological department was a middle-aged woman named Anar who was in her 40s. She was neither pudgy nor skinny. She spoke rather gently and with the border province’s accent. The doctors in this department were also the calm type, unlike other departments’ doctors who were often hasty and impatient.

Even as Zhang Fan stood outside the oncological department, he felt as if an aura of defeat suffused this entire place. The patients and their family members in this department all had distant expressions of having given up already. They were merely waiting for death, giving the department a suffocating atmosphere.

The doctors and nurses in this department were quite different from those in other departments who would all be hurried and strict. Here, the doctors and nurses were all rather calm and quiet. They were similar to the director, speaking softly and unhurriedly.

When Zhang Fan gave his rotation paperwork to Director Anar, she smiled, and told him, “Doctor Zhang, our department’s work is mostly on writing medical reports. It’s not that busy in other areas. You may need to learn about certain medications that we use in this department for chemotherapy, although we don’t have many chemotherapy patients. Most of the time, patients who require chemotherapy are taken by other departments instead. You won’t need a teaching doctor in this department. Just get accustomed to things for the first week. Since you have a medical license, would it be alright for you to work independently starting next week?”

“Sure, Director Anar.”

“Alright then. Take this first week to get used to our work. The work in our department is actually quite simple!”

There were six doctors in this department, four men and two women, along with two other rotation doctors. The department had plenty of personnel, which meant that there wasn’t even much work for Zhang Fan to do even though he wanted to help out. In the oncological department, discussions about patients’ deaths were incredibly simple. There was very little to even discuss.

Compared to other departments, the most common work in the oncological department was actually writing death certificates. The oncological department would need to issue one on almost a daily basis.

Zhang Fan heard one doctor tell a rotation doctor, “Come take the electrocardiogram away from patient #5’s room. He just passed away!”

The other two rotation doctors had teaching doctors, but Zhang Fan didn’t, because he had a medical license already. Besides, he was now quite famous in the hospital. That was why there was no need to give him a teaching doctor. Plus, the oncological department figured that he wasn’t destined to stay in their department.

Zhang Fan was bored with nothing to do, so he flipped through the oncological department’s medical reports. Liver cancer, lung cancer, rectal cancer, pancreatic cancer, bone cancer, and all sorts of cancers in the late stages could be found in the medical reports here. These patients had all been summoned by the god of death. At most, the patients’ family members could only try their best to satisfy the patients’ final requests.

The unique trait of this department was that there would be an especially high number of patients’ friends and family members coming to visit the patients in this department. The doctors and nurses here wouldn’t stop such a thing. These would be the final meetings between patients and their friends and family. All the patients in this department would realize already that their condition was incredibly dire.

People would have all sorts of different attitudes when at death’s door. There were those who were optimistic, while others despaired. It would be really uncomfortable to watch a patient look at you with such a despairing expression. Zhang Fan was unable to read any more after going through just a few medical reports.

Zhang Fan suddenly received a phone call from Kang Hua, whom he hadn’t talked to for quite a long while—not since the incident at Chark City Hospital. Ever since that unpleasant incident there, Zhang Fan had immediately blocked the phone number of Chark City Hospital’s surgical department director.

At most, Zhang Fan would send Kang Hua a text message whenever there was a holiday to wish her well. He almost never talked to her otherwise. However, he was still currently living in her apartment which she loaned to him. Although he had mentioned the idea of moving out to her before, Kang Hua hadn’t agreed. She even called him to ask if there was anything that dissatisfied him about the apartment. Since she was being so direct, Zhang Fan didn’t say anything else.

Kang Hua was quite a powerful woman. She was a skilled politician who could instantly grab on to even a small opportunity. Tang Jingjing had worked as her secretary for many years. Kang Hua gave her a good job as the vice director of the Economic and Trade Bureau in Chasu City as a reward for her service. Kang Hua’s new secretary was the daughter of a certain government official. Thanks to this government official’s support, Kang Hua started changing out the Bureau of Health members in Chark City since she was now the City Leader there. Kang Hua replaced a large number of people in Chark City Hospital and Chark City’s Bureau of Health, promoting those who were skilled and able. The surgical director that had a conflict with Zhang Fan was fired.

However, Chark City Hospital was in terrible condition to begin with. It had already been in bad decline for several years, so all the highly skilled doctors had already left. Although its internal medicine doctors were still barely passable, there wasn’t even a single capable surgeon left in the entire surgical department. All the surgeons were old and waiting for retirement. Not only that, they would also have many complaints.

Kang Hua had hired a vice director of general surgery from another city to become the new surgical director at Chark City Hospital. She promoted a new superintendent from Chark City Hospital’s original directors. Although the new surgical director she hired was quite capable, he only knew how to perform the easiest surgeries of gall bladder surgeries and appendectomies. He didn’t even know how to perform the slightly more complex thyroid gland surgeries. There was no helping it. Conditions in Chark City were poor. It wouldn’t be possible to attract truly talented doctors here.

Kang Hua changed out the personnel of Chark City Hospital. However, the hospital was still doing poorly. Other government officials under her kept constantly complaining. Basically, they said that she was wasting money without anything to show for it. Kang Hua was having difficulty with successfully reviving the hospital. But, she couldn’t retreat from this. That was why she recalled Zhang Fan.

“Doctor Zhang, are you busy lately? If you have the time, come to Chark City and see me! I bet you’ve almost forgotten about me!”

“Oh, hello, Leader Kang! I’m not that busy, but I was worried that you would be busy, which is why I haven’t bothered you.” Zhang Fan was quite perplexed at how warm and friendly Kang Hua suddenly sounded after such a long period of no contact.

“Then come visit me in Chark City tomorrow. I’ll treat you to a meal. I heard from Sister Wang that you have a girlfriend now. Bring her with you tomorrow and I’ll treat you both.”

“Oh! I’d definitely bring my girlfriend to visit you if it was the weekend, but she needs to go to work tomorrow. Leader Kang, what do you need? Feel free to ask me directly.” Zhang Fan knew that Kang Hua definitely had something she needed from him. Otherwise, she wouldn’t contact him and be so friendly for no reason.

“Ah! Then I won’t act reserved. Come to Chark City tomorrow. We’ll talk in person.”

The phone call then ended. Zhang Fan had no idea why she insisted that he go visit her in Chark City.