flstandardbreds Chapter 1051 Discoveries on the Corpse
Chapter 1051 Discoveries on the Corpse
Xiao Wang put on latex gloves and lightly touched the skin with his fingertips: "Rigoletto is fully formed, the cornea is moderately cloudy, and the time of death is 12-24 hours." He noticed the wear marks on the waistband of the pants, "which belong to the same style of work clothes as the arm found at the garbage station."
Three hundred meters downstream from the sewage ditch, a culvert became the second breakthrough point. Xiao Zhou lay prone at the entrance, his flashlight illuminating drag marks on the culvert wall: "The width matches the shoulder width of an adult male, and there are fiber remnants at the edges of the drag marks." As the metal detector beeped in the silt, the team members dug out a black plastic bag with a shovel. Inside was a curled-up torso, its chest cavity ripped open with a sharp instrument, dark red muscle tissue still hanging from the broken ribs. "Contact Zhang Lin immediately and prepare for an on-site autopsy," Xiao Wang's voice echoed through the culvert, startling several roosting bats.
When the search area was expanded to the green belt west of the garbage station, the police dog "Heizi" suddenly started barking incessantly. Its nose was pressed against the ditch under the bushes, and its front paws were frantically digging at the soil. Xiao Zhou squatted down and used tweezers to pick up the exposed bone fragments: "The distal end of the ulna has obvious cuts." As the soil was cleared away, an object wrapped in a waterproof cloth gradually came into view—a complete left hand, with blue fibers embedded in the fingernails that were exactly the same as those found before.
“The most troublesome part is the head.” Xiao Wang looked at the tactical map, his finger tracing the abandoned boiler room on the north side of the garbage station. “The killer may have hidden the vital parts in a more concealed place.” When the team members pried open the rusty iron door of the boiler, the stench of the rotting corpse was almost suffocating. The searchlight swept across the piled coal ash and found a tin box deep in the furnace. The moment it was opened, everyone held their breath—a complete head lay supine inside, eyelids half-open, pupils cloudy and grayish-white, with a black mole the size of a mung bean behind the right ear.
"Assemble the body." Li Ming's order came through the walkie-talkie as dawn broke. On the makeshift autopsy table in the garbage dump, Zhang Lin, wearing protective gear, held a bone saw with the steady hand of a robotic arm: "The humerus length is 34.5cm, which fits the height range of 173-178cm for Asian men." He used a probe to lift the skin on the waist of the torso. "There are tattoo remnants here. Although severely decomposed, flame-shaped totems are still visible."
The most crucial discovery came from the teeth of the skull. Zhang Lin examined the upper jaw with a dental endoscope: "The second molar on the right side is missing, and the first premolar shows signs of amalgam repair, dating back more than ten years." He pulled up the portable X-ray image: "There is a depressed fracture of the occipital bone, 4.2cm in diameter, consistent with blunt force trauma." When all the body parts were placed within the outline of the human body, a complete male torso gradually took shape—aged 45-50, about 175cm tall, with calluses on the right hand and a former flame tattoo on the waist.
“The time of death is uniformly estimated to be 20-24 hours ago.” Zhang Lin took off his goggles, the fog on the lenses leaving watermarks on the glass surface. “The cause of death was mechanical asphyxiation combined with craniocerebral injury. The dismemberment was completed within 4 hours after death, and the murderer had basic anatomical knowledge or used professional dismemberment tools.” He pointed to the cuts on the torso, “Chainsaw cutting marks, the saw teeth spacing is 3.2mm, which is completely consistent with the Dongcheng brand J1X-FF03-355 chainsaw commonly found on the market.”
Xiao Wang stared at the remnants of the tattoo on the deceased's waist and suddenly remembered the button found at the garbage dump: "In the employee files of Yuanfang Building Materials, are there any right-handed former employees with tattoos on their waists?" Xiao Zhou looked through the photos on his phone and compared the button with the buttonhole of the deceased's work pants: "The material and model are completely consistent. This clue must be investigated further."
Morning light pierced through the corrugated iron roof of the garbage station, casting dappled shadows on the autopsy table. Li Ming looked at the pieced-together corpse, recalling Zhang Haitao's description of the silver Wuling van: "Notify the traffic police to investigate all Wuling Rongguang vans registered under Yuanfang Building Materials, especially those that have entered or left the garbage station in the last three days." His fingers traced the calluses on the deceased's hand. "What could have caused this ordinary man, who dealt with garbage every day, to meet such a tragic end?"
When Zhang Lin placed the blue fibers from under the victim's fingernails into the mass spectrometer, the results were a revelation—the fibers contained polypropylene and the antioxidant BHT, a fabric used in workwear by a certain brand. The brand's largest purchaser was Yuanfang Building Materials Co., Ltd., registered in the suburbs. With this, the scattered body parts finally pieced together the first piece of the puzzle, but what awaited the special investigation team was a more complex chain of interests and an even more cunning killer.
The air conditioning in the autopsy room was blasting, the smell of formaldehyde mingling with the stench of decaying corpses, creating a nauseating odor. Zhang Lin donned a light green dissection gown, double-layered latex gloves, and a protective mask. Every movement was precise and mechanical, as if it were etched into his muscle memory. Under the stark white light of the operating lamps, the reassembled cadaver lay silently on the stainless steel dissection table, like a silent witness awaiting the revelation of its secrets.
Zhang Lin began with the deceased's head. He picked up a scalpel and carefully cut along the hairline, slicing open the skin. The moment the blade entered, dark red blood mixed with tissue fluid slowly seeped out, forming small streams on the table. "The deceased had a depressed fracture of the occipital bone, with irregular wound edges and obvious radial fractures," he calmly described into the recording equipment, while carefully cutting open the skull with a bone saw. With a hissing sound, white bone fragments flew everywhere. When the complete skullcap was removed, the exposed brain tissue showed signs of localized liquefaction, emitting a pungent odor. "Severe cerebral contusion and laceration, presumably one of the important causes of death," he said. He used tweezers to pick up a small piece of diseased tissue and placed it in a specimen bottle. "We will extract a sample for pathological analysis to confirm the time and extent of the injury."
Next, the neck. Zhang Lin gently pressed his fingers against the deceased's throat, feeling the shape of the bones and muscles. "The thyroid cartilage is fractured, and the cricoid cartilage is also cracked." His voice remained steady as he used the scalpel to cut along the midline of the neck, exposing the trachea and blood vessels inside. "There were no obvious foreign objects in the trachea, but there was a small amount of bloody foam, indicating that the deceased was still breathing when he was strangled." He carefully separated the carotid artery and found a tear in the intima. "This is typical vascular damage caused by mechanical asphyxiation. Combined with blunt force trauma to the head, the deceased must have been strangled to unconsciousness and then suffered a fatal blow to the head."
When the chest cavity was opened, a strong stench of decay assaulted the senses. Zhang Lin frowned, but didn't stop what he was doing. "Both lung lobes are congested and dark red, characteristic signs of death by asphyxiation." He skillfully cut the ribs and removed the heart. "There are scattered bleeding points on the surface of the heart, consistent with the pathological changes of mechanical asphyxiation."