Chapter 40

Lin Xiuran had been a forensic doctor for nearly ten years and least liked dissecting two types of bodies: the elderly and children. These bodies posed greater difficulty, especially children, always stirring a sense of compassion in him. He touched the body to assess the situation, saying, “The body has been soaked in water, and given the higher water content in children’s bodies, decay is faster than normal. Lao Li and I might not be enough; which one of you will help me get the body out?”

The body had been buried underground for almost three months, now reduced to a putrid mess, emitting a nauseating odor. Additionally, there was corpse water. Beneath the moldy black flesh, one could see the eerie white bones, a truly gruesome sight. Zhang Dahai and the young police officer, who had just vomited, exchanged glances, both hesitating.

Just as Song Wen was about to step forward, Lu Siyu suddenly stood up and said, “I’ll do it.”

Seeing him stepping forward, Song Wen reached out to stop him, saying, “Don’t get involved. I’ll handle this.”

Lu Siyu calmly pulled out a pair of white gloves from his pocket and put them on his slender fingers. “I’m fine now.”

Song Wen, still concerned, whispered, “You weren’t feeling well just now. Make sure not to vomit again.”

Lu Siyu knew Song Wen was recalling the incident on the train. He had a bit of germophobia, but it only applied to living people. He was uncomfortable with the smell, breath, and sweat of living people, feeling nauseated if too close or encountering strong odors. However, he didn’t mind dead bodies and, if anything, had adapted to the smell of decay. He didn’t dislike the odor of rotting flesh; to him, it was just flesh, even if it was rotten.

Seeing Song Wen’s concern, Lu Siyu explained, “I just don’t like the smell of people; the smell of a corpse is much more pleasant.”

Song Wen found this hard to understand. As time passed, the foul odor in the air became more intense, and he was barely holding back the churning in his stomach. He wondered how Lu Siyu could remain so composed. Lu Siyu glanced at the corpse, his expression solemn. “Moreover, this body is small and fragile. If we handle it with too much force, we might cause secondary damage to the corpse.”

Lin Xiuran didn’t expect Zhang Dahai and the young police officer to volunteer. Watching Lu Siyu and Song Wen bicker over it, he reached into the investigation box and took out a spare plastic apron. “Who’s going to do it?”

Song Wen rolled up his sleeves, revealing strong forearms, and decisively said, “Enough, I’m here. It’s not your turn, intern, to endure this hardship. Besides, with your guidance and Lao Lin’s, I won’t mess it up.” Without waiting for Lu Siyu’s response, Song Wen jumped into the pit, accepting the clothes handed to him by Lin Xiuran.

Only then did Lu Siyu give up, watching his direct superior personally take charge.

Thus, Song Wen, Lin Xiuran, and the forensic expert Lao Li worked in the pit, preparing for the retrieval. Zhang Dahai stood at a distance, glancing at Lu Siyu by his side. He had noticed in the morning that this young police officer had a snow-white complexion like winter frost, with exceptionally attractive dark eyes. However, at this moment, crouching by the corpse, he focused intently, displaying neither the usual aversion nor disgust. His expression was one of rationality and indifference, as if it were not a repulsive corpse but rather an ordinary object. The scene appeared somewhat eerie.

In his interactions today with these three individuals, Zhang Dahai had encountered Lin Xiuran before, a professional to the extreme, precise like a machine. As for Song Wen, the decisive and authoritative captain of the Criminal Investigation Team, and this young police officer, although he didn’t speak much, Zhang Dahai had a feeling that he was not ordinary.

Zhang Dahai was somewhat afraid of Song Wen, and at the same time, he felt a bit in awe of him. As for Lu Siyu, he found him mysterious and even a bit intriguing.

Sensing someone looking at him, Lu Siyu raised his head and met Zhang Dahai’s gaze. In a hurry, Zhang Dahai averted his eyes, waiting until Lu Siyu lowered his gaze before daring to look at him again.

Lin Xiuran gradually spread a piece of plastic sheet beneath the corpse, then shouted, “One, two, three.” The three of them exerted force together, pulling the body out of the wooden box. The child was only a few years old, not too heavy, but the task was disgustingly unpleasant.

Song Wen stood at the head of the corpse, holding the decomposed body. Lowering his head, he could see the rotting face of the child. At this age, other children would be playing around with their parents, but this child had already passed away, dying here. The foul smell and the sight made him extremely uncomfortable, but in his mind, he resolved to find the culprit if there was any foul play in the child’s death.

Lin Xiuran signaled them to lay the body flat on the nearby open ground. “Let’s do a simple examination here first.”

Song Wen had been holding his breath, only exhaling after they finished. However, Lu Siyu seemed unperturbed, approaching with a mask and joining Lin Xiuran to examine the body. His face, small compared to the large mask, left only a pair of bright eyes exposed. When he lowered his gaze, the eyelashes were notably long.

Zhang Dahai couldn’t help but glance at Lu Siyu again, then pinched his nose and stood a few meters away. “Look, if everything’s fine, bury it here. I can see the body is almost rotten through. No need to transport it to the funeral parlor.”

Forensic expert Li also said, “I’ve thoroughly examined the body. There was fluid in the lungs; it’s definitely a drowning case.”

“Whether it needs to be transported to the funeral parlor for a detailed examination, your words won’t count. The body has to speak.” Lin Xiuran, through the mask, spoke in a muffled voice, then lowered his head and skillfully began inspecting the body.

The torso of the body did show signs of dissection. Lu Siyu extended his hand to help hold it down while Lin Xiuran, using scissors, carefully cut away the stitches from the earlier autopsy. Now that the body had been left in place for so long, much of the flesh had rotted and been bitten by insects. Song Wen, enduring the nausea, stood on the side, covering his mouth and nose with tissues, still feeling dizzy from the smell. Forensic expert Li also bowed down, not daring to breathe. The scene fell into a heavy silence, with only the sounds of birds in the forest.

It was already 6 PM, nearing summer, and the sky was growing dark. The clouds on the horizon appeared as if they had been scorched by fire, bathed in a reddish glow. However, nightfall was inevitable. Lin Xiuran seized the time, completing a full examination of the child’s body. He stood up and removed one side of his mask, saying, “Multiple fractures on the body, with one more severe fracture on the head.”

Forensic expert Li added, “I also found some fractures. The body must have drifted in the stream; the water there is rapid, some fractures might have resulted from colliding with rocks in the stream.”

Lin Xiuran shook his head. “The fractures on the body occurred post-mortem. As for the one on the head, you didn’t shave off the hair at that time, did you?” He could sense, by touch alone, that the wound on the head was not ordinary. The scars on the body would be concealed beneath the hair, making them impossible to observe. A good forensic doctor would undoubtedly be a skilled barber as well, but this forensic expert, despite examining the body, had not shaved the head.

Forensic expert Li felt a bit frustrated. “Initially, Zhou Chuguo was reluctant to allow an autopsy. However, the child’s mother, Yang Li, wanted it, and in the end, Zhou Chuguo compromised. He agreed to the autopsy but insisted that the child be buried in the same condition as found. The appearance of the deceased should not be affected. If we shaved the hair, it wouldn’t grow back, so I didn’t dare to shave the body.”

Lin Xiuran also knew that many relatives of the deceased had reservations about such things. He instructed someone to help turn the body over. The wound was at the back of the head, and with hair and scalp in place earlier, the wound was not easily noticeable. However, now that the body had decomposed, revealing the white bones, the injury became more apparent.

Lin Xiuran carefully examined it and said, “The wound is at the back of the head, a parallel injury. It doesn’t seem like caused by a stone but more like a blow from a wooden stick or a heavy object. To be certain, we need to take the body back to the funeral parlor, strip the flesh from the bones, fully expose the wound, and then draw conclusions.” It seemed that another trip was inevitable.

Lu Siyu remained squatting, removed his mask, and seemed unfazed by the unpleasant smell, breathing naturally.

Lin Xiuran continued, “There should have been a considerable amount of bleeding from the head wound at the time, with vital signs. If I’m not mistaken, the child might have been hit on the head with a heavy object, causing unconsciousness, and then thrown into the stream to drown. That’s why there is fluid in his lungs and stomach, consistent with drowning.”

The term “vital signs” referred to reactions that could only occur while the victim was alive due to the circulation of the body. In other words, when the child entered the water, he was still alive, although he might have fainted. He fell into the rising tide, water entered his lungs, leading to his eventual death.

Zhang Dahai hadn’t expected them to find anything, and only now did he react. Surprised, he sat on the ground. “Oh my God, was this child also murdered? Four people died in this family?”

Forensic expert Li blushed. “I said at the time that the body was different from a typical drowning victim; it was stiff. But the parents wouldn’t let us investigate further.”

Lin Xiuran asked again, “Did you check the stomach contents?” The body was no longer intact, and he needed to ask Forensic expert Li to understand more about the situation at that time.

Forensic expert Li recalled, “Yes, I checked. There was chicken in the stomach, undigested. At the time, Yang Li said they didn’t eat chicken for lunch, but Zhou Chuguo mentioned that he bought a chicken leg for the child to eat in the afternoon when they went out. I was just thinking that the father was good to his son, how did he not pay attention and let the child drown.” He hadn’t thought much of these details before, considering them normal. But now, looking back, everything seemed suspicious.

“Good to his son? Didn’t you see Zhou Chuguo beating his son? Sometimes he even used a broom to hit the child until he was covered in bruises,” Zhang Dahai continued, “And now… are we dealing with another case?”

The family murder case hadn’t been solved yet, and now they found something peculiar about this child’s death. These consecutive incidents left Zhang Dahai feeling overwhelmed and clueless.

Lu Siyu, squatting beside them, pondered and said, “I think the drowning case came first, followed by the family murder case. The two cases should be related, or even the drowning case might be the key to the family murder case. To understand how this family died, we need to figure out how the child died first.”

TN:

What kind of grudge did the killer have to even murder an innocent kid?! Also fuck Zhang Dahai! He, as a police officer!, knew ZC was abusive towards his kid but didn’t do shit?! What kind of backwards village is this where bruising your child is overlooked probably in the name of discipline? I mean my parents have smacked us around a bit when we misbehaved but never have we ever been injured. The pain would fade in like 2 mins. There’s discipline and there’s violence. The difference should be learned.