National Forensic Doctor
Chapter 800 - 743 Corpse Wax

Chapter 800: Chapter 743 Corpse Wax

"Clear out the hall," Jiang Yuan instructed.

"Take apart a few beds and bring them here. No need for autopsy tables, could you even move them? Just take the beds from the dormitory. Actually, forget the beds, we just need the bed boards. Also, bring some tables over to arrange alongside them."

The Autopsy Center was bustling. As soon as Director Liu Jinghui heard the situation, he cheerfully abandoned his plans to celebrate the holiday with his wife and rushed to the Autopsy Center, first figuring out how to prepare beds for the bodies.

Truth be told, even Beijing’s Autopsy Centers were not prepared to normally accommodate a group of twenty corpses.

Setting aside the center’s capacity, other bodies were currently being autopsied. Beyond the Zhengguang Bureau, there was a shift from district bureaus and various other units, as well as individuals, who all had needs.

Luckily, most of the bodies were already skeletonized, so there was no need to worry about corpse fluids leaking out. Ordinary beddings would suffice for this task.

In fact, it wasn’t necessary to lay all the corpses out for a normal autopsy, which is more of a plot device in TV dramas, seeking to provide a visual shock to attract viewers. But speaking of viewers, if audiences appreciate it, wouldn’t leaders appreciate it too?

For such a big case, there’s a good chance leaders would come to the scene and might even want to see the bodies. After all, leaders often share the same tastes as audiences; what viewers find cool, leaders usually do as well; and viewers who lack knowledge, common sense, understanding of the business, practical experience, and are lazy to think or to reflect, comfortable in ignorance—so are some leaders.

Liu Jinghui spread out the workspace in the first-floor hall. The artificial hill in the large water tank had been removed, and the water had been drained to a puddle where a group of fat fish lay pitifully and fearfully before being taken away with the water tank to some office.

Two tables placed together, topped with a bed board and covered with a plastic sheet, now served as makeshift mortuary tables. Lined up neatly in rows and columns, they presented a rather chilling sight.

Liu Jinghui just put up a couple of screens at the entrance to prevent anyone from accidentally wandering in and getting a scare. Why someone would inadvertently walk into the Autopsy Center was beyond him at that moment.

Just as everything was about ready, the first batch of corpses arrived.

"Decomposing bodies go to the autopsy room; skeletons can be taken straight to the hall," Liu Jinghui directed with enthusiasm, arranging the placement of guests like a wedding planner at the reception.

Every arrival was a guest, even though they were strangers, and one by one, they were laid out on the tables.

Jiang Yuan followed with the last batch of fragmented bones.

On the way, Jiang Yuan had already sorted the bones. Upon arrival at the Autopsy Center, Zhan Kan and others each carried a large box and entered.

"These are the sifted ones," Zhan Kan said, setting down the box and gasping for breath.

Bones were also not light. According to China Medical University in Shenyang’s past sampling and weighing, the average weight of a wet male skeleton was around 10 kilograms, and about 4.4 kilograms when dried. For females, it was 6.8 and 3.2 kilograms, respectively. Additionally, bones of males from the north were heavier than those from the south.

When laid out, the bones appeared fragile and delicate. Judging by the size, it was hard to imagine that such skeletal frames could carry over a hundred pounds of flesh, even up to two or three hundred pounds.

"If we can lay them out, then let’s arrange them from head to toe," Jiang Yuan said, seeing that Liu Jinghui had prepared so thoroughly, and began organizing accordingly.

It was necessary to do so. Not to mention anything else, starting from the skull and laying the bones down to the toes involved over two hundred bones altogether. Even professional forensic doctors would need to pay close attention. Non-professionals—referring here to those still trapped in the air raid shelter—were highly unlikely to manage it.

Therefore, after collecting the bones, although they had assembled something resembling skeletons, Jiang Yuan doubted whether the number of bones was correct or if they all belonged to the same person.

Now, forensic doctors at the Autopsy Center started arranging the bones, with Jiang Yuan washing his hands and lending a hand.

The main objective was to determine the cause of death of the bodies, as well as to analyze their origins and identities.

At this point, the identity wasn’t too important; these weren’t nameless corpses in the wilderness. Even if they were used by fringe religious groups, most would still have records, or there would be some knowledge of their identities. A comparison could be made later.

So, the primary task at hand was to determine the cause of death.

You couldn’t expect the killer to confess; only by discovering the cause of death and determining whether it was homicide or an abnormal death did they have grounds for interrogation.

On the bright side, the murderer wasn’t too careful. Among the eight decomposing corpses found earlier, four showed clear signs of strangulation, which suggested a rather casual approach.

In reality, with the favorable conditions of a factory and the crime being a collective one, it would have been possible to opt for more targeted ways of killing and disposing of the bodies. Like... right? Though the killer had been sought after, evidence could still be easily found, but the difficulty and risk involved were vastly different.

"This person was quite old, around 80, and also had metastasized bone cancer," Jiang Yuan said after inspecting another skeleton. He walked over to Liu Jinghui, who was taking notes, and added, "An 80-year-old cancer patient would probably have relatives around, wouldn’t they? Where has the family gone?"

"That’s a good question," Liu Jinghui noted, tapping his notebook. "I was considering this too. There are basically four possibilities: they don’t know, they know but don’t care, they know and want to intervene but can’t, or they’re involved."

"There are likely many relatives. Even if they knew but couldn’t do anything, word would get out, wouldn’t it?" Jiang Yuan suggested.

"Actually, that’s difficult to say," Liu Jinghui replied, exhaling before continuing, "These fringe cults can be quite patient compared to other money-making schemes. Plus, they are selective. You see an 80-year-old cancer patient, but they might have interfered in his life when he was 70."

Jiang Yuan frowned as he listened, having indeed had very little contact with this kind of thing.

Seeing this, Liu Jinghui smiled and said, "No problem, all the informed parties in this case are still here. Even if nobody in the cave is left alive, there are still five people arrested outside, and there may be more. We could get the information by questioning them."

Jiang Yuan couldn’t help but smile, "I thought you would use deduction."

"They are a non-mainstream religious group; how could they act according to conventional patterns?" Liu Jinghui also smiled.

Jiang Yuan grinned, his mood relaxing a lot. The current case, as terrifying and large-scale as it seemed, was actually nearing its conclusion.

As of now, the forensic doctors’ main job was basically concluding the investigation, and the same was true for the criminal police. The search teams had also been promptly scaled back, and more tasks were falling to people like Tao Lu and others in white shirts.

The forensic doctors in the hall seemed to feel this relaxation too, gradually starting to chat more casually.

Doing a puzzle with more than ten bodies was still a sizeable amount of work. It was not difficult to place most bones in their correct positions, but one would indeed be embarrassed as a technician in the department if they placed anything incorrectly.

Thus, it was only right to spend more time double-checking.

Soon, bones were being carefully taken out from those four large urns.

The bones from one urn were placed on a bed, and the puzzle process continued.

Jiang Yuan naturally wandered over to look, and as he watched, he started picking up a bone himself.

"This is corpse wax."

Jiang Yuan pinched the long bone and scratched it with his hand.

Oily, hard, and somewhat dry, the gray color confirmed without a doubt that it was corpse wax.

Zhan Kan couldn’t help but come over, curiously examining it. Corpse wax was not something forensic doctors saw often; theoretically, it was a derivative form developed during the decomposition of a body, a substance made from the saponification of body fat. However, since the saponification process requires an anaerobic environment, it only occurs in soil or water, and it’s not guaranteed.

Zhan Kan had seen many bodies, but he had not encountered corpse wax often. He asked, "Can I touch it?"

"Go ahead," said Jiang Yuan, handing it over to Zhan Kan while picking up another bone with some corpse wax remnants.

Zhan Kan felt it and observed, "It’s slippery, really does feel like soap. It feels different from what I’ve touched before."

"Let me feel it," said a young forensic doctor from the neighboring table, who also wanted to try.

Soon, several forensic doctors put down their work, changed their gloves, and came to look at the corpse wax. Those who had felt it before asked similar questions to what Zhan Kan had mentioned.

Jiang Yuan had already been thinking, and after contemplating for a moment, he said, "The difference could be due to two reasons. First, this corpse wax has been artificially cleaned. Because the presence of corpse wax suggests the body was better preserved, someone likely cleaned it, making it feel different, like scraped soap."

Pausing for a moment, Jiang Yuan continued, "The second reason for the difference could be the conditions of formation. The corpse wax you’ve encountered before was from bodies buried in soil, right?"

"Yes," nodded Zhan Kan, and then he said in surprise, "This body was in water? How can you tell?"

"It’s hard to tell, but there are indeed differences, mainly in the degree of saponification..." Jiang Yuan briefly explained, and five minutes passed by.

The surrounding forensic doctors quickly exhausted their mental energy. The issue of body saponification is a cutting-edge topic, still under research. Some conclusions have been reached, but the subject is not yet fully understood, and some conclusions remain doubtful. Thus, discussing and analyzing at this time was naturally very intricate because this field doesn’t have direct indicators or clear standards.

Liu Jinghui also stood nearby, but he didn’t listen to Jiang Yuan’s technical explanation. Instead, he pondered for a while, and when Jiang Yuan paused, Liu Jinghui asked, "Can we be sure that the body with corpse wax was submerged in water for a long time? Are all the bodies in these four urns from water?"

"We can only confirm that the body with the corpse wax was immersed in water for a long time," Jiang Yuan answered, then added, "As for the other three, what the burial conditions were like at the time, if necessary, will require additional analysis."

"So, these guys did sink bodies, at least some bodies, into the water," Liu Jinghui summed up, glanced at Jiang Yuan, and then explained, "Zhang Lizhen’s body floated in from the water, with dumbbells inside. The intention must have been to sink the body; otherwise, there would be no need for the dumbbells..."

"Is submerging in water a transitional period?" Jiang Yuan was referring to the previous discussion with Liu Jinghui about the transition between overtly brutal body disposal techniques and more surreptitious ones.

Liu Jinghui nodded, "Zhang Lizhen’s case may have involved some accidents. If they managed to retrieve all the submerged bodies to put into urns here, it indicates that the bodies were originally meant to be controlled... Should we call Tao? If we can’t get anything from the interrogations here, it might be necessary for Xu to take action again."

The exact burial locations of the bodies might not be easy to get out during the interrogation since the associated penalty could be death, and suspects confessing in hopes of leniency wouldn’t do so just to find death.

With precautions in mind, Jiang Yuan said, "You call Tao, and I’ll talk to Director Huang again."