National Forensic Doctor
Chapter 696 - 639: Science and Innovation Building

Chapter 696: Chapter 639: Science and Innovation Building

"Wow, this beef is really good, and nicely cut, too. Where did you buy it?"

Yu Wenshu also had a taste for good food and would often find various excuses to not go home, choosing instead to dine out.

Jiang Yuan laughed and said, "It’s from my dad’s cattle."

"Isn’t your dad..." Yu Wenshu wanted to say a demolition relocator but paused, then tactfully said, "a professional landlord or something?"

"No, he’s quite good at raising things. We used to have a pig farm at first, but stopped raising pigs after it was demolished." Jiang Yuan briefly introduced the situation.

"Raising cattle is different though, right? Is it harder or easier than raising pigs?"

"It used to feel harder. My dad originally ran a cattle fattening farm, which was quite difficult due to high costs and the risk of failure. Later, when the cattle farm was demolished, we stopped raising them. Now, we raise range cattle, which should be a bit simpler," Jiang Yuan explained in more detail.

What everyone heard was simply the word "demolished."

As one of the big shots in the police force, Yu Wenshu could only shake his head and took a few big bites of beef.

Jiang Yuan, very observant of everyone’s appetite, dumped two plates of beef into the pot, eager to eat. Everyone knew that it wouldn’t be quite right to continue eating once the news arrived.

The beef was quickly devoured.

Next came the goose intestines and black tripe, followed by the thousand-layer stomach and the pig brains that thought they had escaped their fate.

Buzz buzz...

Yu Wenshu’s phone started to ring.

Yu Wenshu looked seriously at everyone, solemnly put down his chopsticks, picked up the phone, pressed the speaker button, and said, "This is Yu Wenshu, I’ve put it on speaker."

Then, Yu Wenshu took a paper towel and wiped his greasy mouth.

"Chief Yu, we found one. It’s in a resident’s home in the Jianghua Kechuang Building," a policeman reported cryptically, hinting that the homeowner might be nearby.

Jiang Yuan put down his chopsticks and said, "Please send me the address; I’ll be there in 20 minutes."

"Okay," the policeman on the other end immediately replied.

"I’m going ahead," Jiang Yuan said, nodding to Huang Qiangmin before quickly getting up and leaving.

Downstairs was a dedicated forensic examination vehicle with fully equipped gear and protective suits, unlike in the county where each item had to be picked and packed on the spot.

Mu Zhiyang also made a "woo woo" sound and followed Jiang Yuan down.

...

Jianghua Kechuang Building.

This was one of the older residential buildings in Changyang City. When it was built 20 years ago, it was reputed to be a wealthy district. Time, however, had changed that. The four-elevator, 20-unit-per-floor slab-type buildings had fallen out of favor with contemporary aesthetic standards, but their robust image matched that of construction workers.

The scene this time was on the 21st floor, which was a decent floor level. The apartment measured 148 square meters with a small percentage of shared area and a three-bedroom, two-living-room layout, including a TV wall in the middle.

When Jiang Yuan and the others entered, the homeowner’s family of three was still sitting on the living room sofa, looking at the arriving policemen with distrust.

However, when Jiang Yuan, clad in a white lab coat, walked in and began to put on latex gloves, both husband and wife collapsed.

"We spent so much money on this apartment, and its value dropped drastically, losing hundreds of thousands, not to mention the renovation costs of tens of thousands. And now you tell us there’s a corpse in the wall? I might as well die myself!" The wife couldn’t sit still any longer, stood up to stop Jiang Yuan, and yelled, "You can’t demolish it; this is our home, our beautifully renovated home. What right do you have to demolish it?"

Jiang Yuan looked at her, sighed, and said, "If we don’t demolish it, should we just leave the corpse inside?"

The female homeowner was momentarily at a loss, then angrily retorted, "There’s no corpse, you’re making this up!"

At that moment, the husband came over and embraced the woman, and they both broke down, speechless.

The daughter, no older than a primary school student, burrowed into her parents’ embrace.

Qian Tongyi mumbled and gestured for the police officers standing in front of the TV wall to start working.

Woo woo woo...

After a messy clatter of sounds, a bone fell out from within the wall.

Rattle rattle...

The long bone rolled more than a meter away.

The couple, who were holding their heads, stared at the long bone for several seconds before letting out a piercing scream.

Qian Tongyi let out a sigh of helplessness, "I told you so."

The homeowners fled the room as quickly as they could, not looking back as they ran downstairs.

Jiang Yuan watched the people excavating bones nearby, while offering them some guidance on their work.

Mu Zhiyang stepped forward to help, working very enthusiastically and with a research-like tone said, "This TV wall doesn’t seem very thick, yet it could fit such a large corpse."

"As long as the head can fit, the other parts of the body can be squeezed in," explained Jiang Yuan, a professional with a level 4 wall-building skill, describing on the spot, "First, construct the base of the TV wall, slightly wider than the width of the corpse’s head will suffice. Then, build the wall to half a person’s height, use quick-drying cement, and you can quickly place the corpse inside. If the wall, like this one, is narrower, you can just put it in sideways, head first."

"Like a cat, if the head can fit through, the body can too, it’s the same for humans?" a police officer asked curiously from the side.

"Not for humans," Jiang Yuan stopped, then corrected, "Not for living humans."

"Eh, but shouldn’t a dead body be even stiffer?"

"So even though the killer was a wall builder, why did he remove the organs? His initial purpose was probably not for preserving the body or making a mummy," Jiang Yuan speculated, looking at the corpse and muttering, "Look at the handprint on his chest; the whole chest cavity has been compressed flat."

The chest cavity, which is protected by the ribcage and mainly contains the lungs and heart, would free up a significant amount of space if everything were pulled out.

The police officers working in front of the TV wall all felt queasy in their stomachs. Compared to a complete corpse, the sheer materialization of the body by the perpetrator made most people uncomfortable.

The extracted corpse also appeared somewhat putrid.

Jiang Yuan this time directly located the pelvic bone of the corpse, pulled away some of the remaining decayed material, examined it for a moment, then looked at a few other bones and said, "32 years old, male, about 175 cm tall, with an old injury on the right ankle... It closely matches missing project manager number three. Let’s confirm with a DNA test when we go back."

"A missing person’s case that’s actually become a murder case, and then a series of serial killings!" Qian Tongyi said, his tone turning unexpectedly joyful, laughing as he added, "It’s always interesting to work with Captain Jiang!"

To a police officer like Qian Tongyi, herding one sheep and herding ten is the same job, and working on one influential case is more meaningful than tackling a hundred minor ones.

Jiang Yuan chuckled and said, "Just don’t call me a jinx."

"How could I? It’s because you are skilled that you discovered this case. Otherwise, Shang Geyong’s case could have become a cold case, and who knows when this wall builder would have been discovered," Qian Tongyi, being a police officer, wouldn’t believe in something like a jinx.

Actually, domestic serial killings are not uncommon, it’s just that they rarely make it to the news, and unlike in Europe and America, they aren’t allowed to be adapted into films or TV shows.

Even so, domestic serial killers have emerged one after another, especially in the 1980s, when there was a high incidence, with cases involving over 20 deaths, such as the 1983 Hohhot massacre with 27 people killed, the Long Zhiming murder case with 48 people, the Huangnihe train explosion with 33 deaths, Li Shangkun with 26...

Some demons, once they start killing, become reckless. They don’t even worry about being caught and become more and more wanton until the moment they are arrested.

"Better a single hammer blow, quick and clean," Jiang Yuan remarked, frowning slightly at the injury behind the corpse’s head.

Hammering is a very efficient method of killing. Compared to a weapon like a short knife, the effect of a hammer blow is better; a hammer to the back of the head can knock someone out if they aren’t wearing a helmet, and if they aren’t killed outright, at the very least they’re dazed. By contrast, a stab with a short knife might meet with a vigorous counterattack from the stronger victims, which is riskier for a killer.

If the victim and the murderer know each other, and the victim is unguarded, murder can indeed be as simple as one hammer blow.

"Keep looking. This person is probably not the first victim," Jiang Yuan instructed, as he began picking up bones one by one.