National Forensic Doctor
Chapter 798 - 741 The Corpse Jungle

Chapter 798: Chapter 741 The Corpse Jungle

The air-raid shelter where the body was discovered was located in the distant eastern suburbs, far from the hustle and bustle.

Here, amidst birdsong and fragrant flowers, there were also two-lane asphalt roads; here, amidst dense forests of towering trees, there were neatly manicured lawns and old-fashioned buildings; here, high walls were paired with vigilant surveillance, as well as sturdy civil defense facilities and expansive spaces.

By the time Jiang Yuan arrived at his destination, not only were police cars parked in front of the "Jianxing Crystal Green Food Co., Ltd.", but there was also an armored vehicle equipped with two small, slender, long barrels that did not resemble cannons, agilely swiveling about.

"So, our initial thoughts were not wrong—the opponent not only has an isolated building in the suburbs but also, as before, it is surrounded by walls and monitored," Jiang Yuan commented with some surprise as he got out of the car.

In fact, it wasn’t surprising after giving it some thought. Although they might have moved in a bit of a hurry, the venue they moved to must have been prepared in advance. Even if it wasn’t ready at the time, it now met their original needs. The buildings they produced looked similar to before and had excellent security measures, both inside and out, all the while being removed from others’ prying eyes.

Liu Jinghui got into the car halfway, and as they approached the factory together, he too couldn’t help feeling a bit helpless: "This factory must have been marked for attention. Perhaps it wasn’t conspicuous before, and only after adding the air-raid shelter element did it come to light. However, being sated on the eighth cookie doesn’t mean the others were eaten in vain..."

"That’s the idea," Jiang Yuan knew he was talking about the investigation.

At this time, Xu Taining also came over and nodded to the two men, saying, "This place used to be a repair shop, specially built in the mountains as a bomb shelter. Later it transformed to produce several different things, all hanging by a thread. At its peak, it had hundreds of workers, primarily to solve employment issues. A few years ago, the property rights were clarified, and it was sold to a private owner."

Xu Taining pointed towards the gate and continued, "They claimed to be making food, obtained the certification, and said they were using the existing air-raid shelter for cold storage, growing mushrooms. Since the year before last, they’ve been building it, though actual production and sales were close to none, but continuous supplies were being procured."

"Under the guise of constructing a factory?" Liu Jinghui understood immediately upon hearing.

"Yeah, it’s basically the same drill as those involved in religious activities," Xu Taining said, taking a deep breath. "Logically, this building meets the investigation criteria, but it has always evaded detection. When the officers responsible for the investigation came here, they would hide people inside the air-raid shelter until they started to check the shelters and finally caught them all at once."

Without initial suspicion and verification, it wouldn’t have been possible to uncover it during the air-raid shelter search," Liu Jinghui sympathetically helped explain for Xu Taining.

Xu Taining grunted in agreement: "They can’t run, just a matter of which round they’re caught in."

After all, this was a factory under normal construction, with very strong concealment capabilities.

Moreover, the factory had accumulated a very complete set of elements, similar to the structures of the residences previously discovered. It was built just outside an air-raid shelter, where the shelter’s main gate adjoined the compound wall, which also had a separate small door for entry and exit.

Given its current state, if Xu Taining’s first round of investigation yielded no results, the second round would have thoroughly checked it. However, the fact that it wasn’t included in the first round distressed Xu Taining, even making him feel a little humiliated: "I just didn’t expect it to be so brazen, with all its licenses in order, especially being in an unfamiliar area..."

Liu Jinghui patted Xu Taining with a smile, comforting him, "Add it up, and it’s only been a few days, and less than half the funds have been used, right? If the people from the Beijing Bureau were to do it, it would have cost several times more. Besides, investigation is like sifting through a sieve. There’s no way one pass suffices to produce a finished product; that would just mean the sieve is too fine."

Xu Taining felt cheered up by these words, waved his hand and said, "You don’t need to comfort me. We’ve got results from the investigation, and it’s full of ’should have knowns’ and ’what ifs’. Go see the body. Now that we have experience, next time, we’ll handle it."

It wasn’t just the body; the people from the factory were also hiding deep within the air-raid shelter, putting up resistance. Liu Jinghui and Jiang Yuan went inside first.

The body was also inside the air-raid shelter.

Guided by a police officer who had arrived earlier, the two of them entered through the dormitory building of the factory, passed through a courtyard covered with a black canopy, and then went into a row of bungalows close to the mountain, which was already connected to the air-raid shelter.

The entrance to the air-raid shelter was somewhat narrow, leading to a gathering hall of about a hundred square meters, which then branched into several functional areas.

At that moment, the gathering hall was fortified like a battlefield, tightly locking down the two roads on the east side.

A few police officers were discussing in hushed voices near the road entrance on the west side.

As they got closer, they could hear people whispering:

"To think that such a place could be uncovered. I heard they insisted on seeing the air-raid shelter and then they found it. The locals really know their way around."

"Actually, we should be more like the locals. If we’re going to search, we should do a thorough search. We just look at their documents and if everything seems in order, we leave, which is just like doing nothing. The places people don’t want us to see are exactly the places we should be looking."

"That’s why I say they have their own ways. If we did things like this, we’d be swamped with complaints."

"I heard that the first time they also just checked the documents and left. It was the air-raid shelter that was linked this time, and they insisted on getting in."

"Xu Taining is really putting on the pressure. Only he would conduct so many spot checks and review so many bodycam recordings. It’s not something ordinary people can do."

Jiang Yuan and Liu Jinghui hadn’t expected there would be people discussing Xu Taining here. After listening for a while, they felt it was inappropriate to eavesdrop any longer and pretended to cough twice.

"Captain Jiang."

"Director Liu."

The officers from the Zhengguang Bureau recognized them at a glance and exchanged smiles with no embarrassment about their discussion on the people from Shan Nan.

"Are the bodies inside?" Liu Jinghui asked.

"Yes, nothing has been moved. Tao has specifically said to wait until Jiang Yuan has seen them to decide," said an officer.

"Thank you," Jiang Yuan said, not further prolonging the conversation. He started putting on protective gear at the entrance before entering the shelter.

The place seemed to have once been a storeroom or something similar, with a row of structures resembling bay windows along one wall where four skeletons were now sitting.

Below the windows were four jars, and it was clear that they contained bones. In addition to this, there was a pile of bones in the corner of the room, with two skulls placed on opposite sides of the pile.

Now Jiang Yuan understood why they said there were at least six bodies, for there were undoubtedly six skulls. A well-known fact is that a person can lose four long bones or take a few extra ribs for some religious reasons without it being fatal, so it’s not certain death. However, if someone loses their head, current technology has no remedy for that.

"Is this some kind of religious ritual?" Jiang Yuan examined each bone one by one.

"Whatever it is, it’s not legitimate," Liu Jinghui sighed and said, "With so many bodies, this is quite a serious matter. There must be more than six, right?"

Jiang Yuan nodded, "Don’t know what’s inside the jars yet, but from a rough look, there are at least seven bodies. There are quite a few extra bones over here, but..."

"But what?" Liu Jinghui tensed with uncertainty.

"Of these four bodies up here, at least two suffered from bone cancer before they died, and they had treatment. Judging by the spread, these patients didn’t need to be killed—they could die at any time, and they would need to be well taken care of," Jiang Yuan directed Mu Zhiyang to take some photos and continued, "The bone quality is basically shot. At this stage, the patient couldn’t be without painkillers, and even during medication, they would be in so much pain that it would be very difficult for them to stay conscious."

Liu Jinghui was not surprised; instead, he felt a sense of relief, "Nothing special then, just another case of exploiting severe illness and death. So, it looks like the skeletons in this room fall into different categories."

"Not just the skeletons in the room," Tao Lu, having heard of their arrival, came over on purpose and stood at the entrance, "More bodies have been found in the factory area."