Rehabilitation Therapist for the Broken Warrior

It’s already the second week since I started Sion’s rehabilitation.

“Thank you again today, Mrs. Baker.”

“Oh my, it’s my pleasure if it helps with your work, Director.”

Every morning, my day begins with receiving bread from the Baker family’s bakery.

The person in front of me now is the mother of a patient who successfully completed rehabilitation at our center.

She is a grateful person who brings freshly baked bread from the famous bakery ‘Baker Baker’ to our house every morning.

“By the way, Director. I’ve heard a rumor these days, can I ask you about it?”

“What kind of rumor is it?”

I always greet the bakery lady, but I’ve never had a conversation beyond that…

What kind of rumor is it that she wants to ask me about?

“Well, I wonder if it’s okay to tell you this…”

“?”

Is it a rumor that’s even difficult to talk about?

“I heard you have a young and pretty patient you’ve been seeing a lot lately, and that you take her home every time you leave work…”

“What?”

What? Did I hear that correctly?

“Could you… say that again?”

“Yes? You want me to say it again?”

“I think I misheard…”

“Aaaaaah!! Director Hope!!!!!”

“?!”

What? Suddenly, I heard a scream calling me from Sion’s room.

“Oh, my goodness… there really is a young woman at home… and until morning…”

“Aaaah, no!! I don’t know what you’re thinking, but it’s not like that!!”

“Director Hope!!!”

The house became a mess with the sudden scream.

Why is Sion suddenly acting like that?

What happened?

“I’ll be right there, so be quiet, Sion!!”

“Sion?”

“Mrs. Baker. I’ll explain later, so could you please go back? It seems the patient’s condition has worsened, so I need to go check on her.”

“Oh… so it’s a patient in bad condition that you’re taking care of. I didn’t know and said something strange… Oh my, I’m so sorry.”

“I’m fine, so please go back. I’ll enjoy the bread.”

I hurriedly sent Mrs. Baker back and opened Sion’s door and went inside.

Sion, whom I checked after entering the room, was lying straight on the bed, looking up at the sky with a severely frowned face, groaning.

When I opened the door and went in, she barely turned her head, opened her eyes, and looked at me.

“Di… Director…”

“What’s wrong, Sion?”

“I can’t move my body at all!”

“It was like that originally.”

“I’m not joking, it’s real!!! And it hurts so much!!!”

Is she really unable to move at all?

Sion has been under my care almost all the time while living with me.

There were no signs that her condition would worsen…

“Sion. How do you mean you can’t move? You can’t put any strength in?”

“No. Every time I try to use strength, my legs hurt so much…”

“Where? Your joints?”

“No. Well, my whole legs…”

An impossible anomaly.

This was a situation that required more detailed confirmation.

“Sion. I’m going to take off the blanket.”

“Ugh…”

When I lifted the blanket, Sion’s slender body, surrounded by pajamas, was revealed.

Sion’s legs, which she said were hurting, were stiff and rigid as if they were really in pain, but occasionally they would twitch and spasm with a “Gasp!” sound.

I sat down next to Sion’s bed to conduct a thorough examination and grabbed one of her legs.

“Sion. Tell me if it hurts. Here…”

“Aaaah!!!”

Sion complained of severe pain when I pressed on the muscle area. I already had a feeling I knew what had happened.

So that’s what it was…

“Then here…”

“It hurts there too!!”

“Here…”

“Th-there, it might be bearable?”

“Is this where it hurts the most then?”

“Kyaaaah!! I-is this an examination? You’re tormenting me again?!”

“You still think I’m that kind of person?”

“Hwaaaah… It hurts so much…”

I have a rough idea of what happened, but I need to finish the check-up.

I also need to check her joints…

“Then how about here? Does it hurt if I rotate it like this?”

“No, that’s okay.”

“If I lift it like this?”

“Aaaah!!!”

It was amusing to see Sion screaming at the slightest pressure, but I only did the examination as much as necessary. I didn’t enjoy making her suffer.

“It’s muscle pain. You can’t train today, so just stay still.”

Muscle pain, even though she doesn’t have any muscles.

Sion looked up at me with a troubled expression upon hearing the examination results.

“What? I can’t train? But that’s not good!”

“Sigh, Sion…”

Even if she makes a sad face and says it’s not good, what’s already happened has happened.

The reason why things turned out this way was primarily Sion’s hasty attitude, but

I also had some responsibility for not telling her something important, knowing that Sion was impatient.

“You exercised behind my back, didn’t you?”

“H-how did you know?”

“How could I not know when your body is in this state?”

Since I’ve identified which muscles are in pain, I can clearly tell what kind of exercise she did.

“I thought if I exercised a little more, I would get better faster…”

“Sion… I clearly told you that if you rush, you’ll fall.”

Now that I’ve received Sion’s confession, the cause identification is over.

The examination is also over, and Sion, lying in bed, was clearly exposed and looked cold, so I covered her with the blanket again.

“That’s true, but still…”

And Sion, as if embarrassed, pulled the blanket and half-covered her face, leaving only her eyes peeking out.

“Well, I also have some responsibility.”

“What? Director Hope, you did nothing wrong! I just arbitrarily…!”

“I didn’t tell you not to exercise secretly. It was something important, so I should have told you.”

When doing rehabilitation, it’s most important to maintain a constant pace and not overdo it.

Exercise, in fact, doesn’t heal the body but uses it.

If you use something, it will inevitably wear out.

However, in the case of the human body, there’s a system in place that automatically repairs the body if it’s worn or damaged, so building muscle or recovering through exercise is just an effective way to utilize this system.

Therefore, in the case of patients with little muscle and reduced recovery ability, they must train according to the instructions of a specialist, and Sion violated that.

“Sion, since I’m watching you all day, I thought this wouldn’t happen.

Besides… in Sion’s case, the training at the center is designed to be almost at the limit of what your’s body can handle. So, even if you exercised a little more, you would quickly overdo it.

Both causes ultimately stem from me.”

If I had told Sion not to exercise secretly, or if I had planned the Rehabilitation Program a little more leisurely, this situation wouldn’t have happened.

Except for sleeping time, I’m always watching Sion, and she exercised secretly during that time.

I let my guard down while working with Sion… It was a mistake that made my heart bitter.

“No, Director Hope. It’s all my fault. I thought I could do seated leg raises on my own. I could have asked you, but I arbitrarily did it for 3 hours…”

“What? 3 hours?”

“…….”

3 hours?

She did leg exercises alone for 3 hours?

“No wonder you were screaming!! How on earth did you exercise that much?”

“I was concentrating slowly and before I knew it… My legs started to hurt, so I stopped and fell asleep.”

“No, no matter how much you say that…!”

An unexpected twist started to give me a headache.

In the middle of the night, in a dark room without the lights on, she sat on the bed and did leg raises until it hurt?

“Whew…”

I take a deep breath and calm myself down.

What’s done is done. I had to think about what to do from now on.

“If you exercised that hard, it won’t just hurt for one day.”

“Is it… a big deal?”

Since she had pushed herself far beyond the expected range, the muscle pain could last for several days. Patients recover slowly.

But if she asked if it was a big deal, the correct answer would be,

“It’s not a big deal. If Sion just rests quietly.”

That’s it. Sion probably regrets it enough, but she needed to feel more acutely what she had done.

“Until Sion is completely better, exercise and training are prohibited. Understood?”

“Yes…”

“And I’m telling you in advance, just because you can’t train, there’s no such thing as making up for it by doing a little more later. I emphasize again, you shouldn’t rush. You understand this too, right?”

“I understand…”

As I kept nagging Sion, she gradually curled up in the bed, and now her eyes were no longer visible.

“And lastly,”

She’s already completely hidden. I still have more to say.

“I’m the one who knows Sion’s body best, not Sion. So, if you’re going to do something other than what I tell you to do, you have to ask me first. Understood?”

“Yeees…”

If I’ve said this much, she should understand.

I sighed deeply again and calmed myself down.

I had a lot of things to do today as well.

“Then rest as you are. I’ll be going to work soon, so if you need anything, tell me before that. You have to rest quietly!”

“…….”

Sion was still hidden under the blanket.

Just as I was about to turn around and leave the room to prepare for work,

“Work…?!”

I heard Sion’s flustered voice, so I turned back to her.

She had pulled down the blanket again, peeked out her head, and was looking at my back as I held the doorknob with a distressed look.

“I… I can’t move at all right now? Are you going to leave me like this and go to work?”

Ah, that’s right…

“Don’t leave me alone. Director Hope, please…”

Sion’s scarlet eyes, shaking pitifully beyond the half-hidden blanket… had become something I could no longer ignore.