Chapter 19-1 - Case 2-The deadly chocolate

Thank you so much Beverly for the wishes. Dedicating this update to you. ❤⃛

It reminds me on how I was going through the jobless period of my life and feeling unmotivated. Now I feel that picking up translating work was one of the best things I’ve done.

I had no idea how nice it felt until I got my first comment, 1st review on NU and 1st Ko-fi. (｡•́︿•̀｡)

Chapter 19-1

At four o’clock in the morning, the corpses were transported to the funeral home and Lin Xiuran had already started his work.

The two bodies were placed on two stainless steel autopsy tables, waiting to be dissected.

The entire autopsy room was windowless, with shadow-free LED lighting, and two super-powerful ventilation systems were specially added.

The forensic department in South City was ahead of all the other cities. The modern autopsy room in the Bureau was divided into three parts: a standardized autopsy room, a monitoring and conferencing room, and a body storage room, which was mainly used for the autopsy of difficult bodies.

However, considering that the body has to be transported between the funeral home and the City Bureau, which was relatively troublesome, the bodies whose cause of death was more certain and awaiting burial, would be processed in the Autopsy Room of the funeral home.

As there were two corpses, in order to save time, in addition to Lin Xiuran, there was also a young forensic doctor from the City Bureau to perform an autopsy with him. Lin Xiuran was in charge of Dong Fang’s body, and the other was in charge of Ma Aijing.

The forensic doctor was called Wan Zong, and his nickname was Duanwu (Dragon Boat*). He was a young forensic doctor with glasses. He graduated from the Forensic Medical Department after three years, this year. As the number of forensic doctors in South City were insufficient, he, with the requirement qualifications, was taken in to work independently on the case.

(T/N: 端午 : duān wǔ : Dragon Boat. This is a part of 端午节 which is Duan Wu, which occurs on the 5th day of the 5th month of the traditional Chinese calendar.)

Speaking of the nickname, Duanwu, has something to do with Lin Xiuran. Because the Zong in his name was the same as Zong in Zongzi*, his original nickname was Xiao Zongzi*.

(T/N:Zongzi or simply zong is a traditional Chinese rice dish made of glutinous rice stuffed with different fillings and wrapped in bamboo leaves, or sometimes with reed or other large flat leaves. Simply called rice dumplings or sticky rice dumplings. Xiao: little/small, Zongzi: dumpling )

Later when he arrived at the Bureau, afraid that everyone would not remember his original name, he mentioned his nickname and asked everyone to call him that. Those were the years when Grave Robbers’ Chronicles( Dàomù bǐjì* ) were popular, Lin Xiuran heard his nickname and frowned.

(T/N: Dàomù bǐjì : variously translated as Grave Robbers’ Chronicles, Grave Robbery Note and The Lost Tomb is a novel series about the grave-robbing adventures of Wu Xie, a young man hailing from a family that had been tomb-raiders for centuries.)

Although they were all feudal superstitions, people pointed fingers at them and think that their Forensic center was engaging in Fraudulent corpses*.

(T/N:Superstitious legend: Fraudulent corpse is when an animal soul possesses an almost/just dead body. Another way to explain is like a sudden update of the software/TV series/anime, etc. that had been announced to stop/end originally.)

Lin Xuran said “Then your nickname might as well be Duanwu.” So this ‘Duanwu’ was used more often than his actual name at the Bureau.

The autopsy room was quiet, and the temperature there was much cooler than outside. The two bodies had been dead for about four hours, and rigor mortis generally appeared between ten minutes to seven hours after a person’s death, which gradually eases. Now the corpses were at their stiffest, lying unnaturally on the autopsy table.

Duanwu, who had just been woken up from his sleep, was still a little dazed. He observed the appearance of the corpse and said “Today, it seems the case is not too troublesome. Should be poisoned to death.”

Lin Xiuran reminded him: “Do not be careless. You should properly examine first, before jumping to conclusions.” A forensic doctor must never hastily jump to conclusions. Sometimes, the simpler the case seems, the easier it is to miss some details due to carelessness.

Duanwu’s guts were quite big and he was a little careless. Fortunately the previous case was simple and there were not any big mistakes.

The two began to get busy and exchanged information while observing. Lin Xiuran re-measured the temperature of the body: “The time of death is consistent with the rectal temperature, between 12:00 and 1:00 am.” According to the current temperature, every hour, the body is cooled by about 1℃. Compared to Dong Fang, Ma Aijing’s rectal temperature was slightly higher.

While communicating, the two of them filled out various inspections on the form. This step was to check off the post-mortem form where all traces on the corpse must be checked. The two people walked around the autopsy table, Duanwu said: “There is no external trauma, the pupils of the deceased are dilated, the mucous membranes are congested, and the livor mortis spots on the bodies are bright red. It is an obvious sign of poisoning.”

Lin Xiuran finished examining the external appearance of the corpse and began to lower the knife. With the knife edge cutting down, the skin and flesh were sharply separated and a capital ‘Y’ was cut on the corpse. The air was flooded with a strong smell of bitter almonds. The examination started from the upper end and gradually reached the digestive glands.

“The muscles, the blood are bright red. Digestive tract edema is filled with blood…as the deceased vomited, the stomach contents were not too much. There were just particles of dark chocolate.” With Lin Xiuran’s skillful movement, stomach contents and blood were quickly extracted. Finishing it with full concentration, the contents were transferred to test tubes, ready for testing.

Duanwu on the other side, also was making smooth progress; the corpse was quickly opened up, the internal organs were taken out and weighed.

Time passed quickly, and the two were busy for nearly two hours. Duanwu completed first, and kept the dissecting tools on the side, he said: “This side is finished, basically it is a case of poisoning. If there is no problem, I am here ready to suture the body back up.”

“Wait, I’ll come over and take a look.” Lin Xiuran put down the work in his hand, came over and looked at Ma Aijing’s body. He is the head of this Forensic Appraisal Center. He is the one who has to sign all the inspection reports and is responsible for these dead people.

Lin Xiuran looked at the corpse for a few seconds, his expression heavy, and he frowned deeply in thought. Now Lin Xiuran was a little sleep deprived and was extremely tired. As soon as he closed his eyes, the image of the young girl’s corpse and the quilt tightly entwined emerged before his eyes, somehow haunting. As if, suggesting to him, something in the dark……

One did not know if it was affected by the high-powered freezer located next door, the temperature inside was much lower than outdoors. The internal organs of the two young girls on the dissection table were taken out.

Lying there side by side, their skin was illuminated by white shadowless lights, transmitting a creepy light.

South City Funeral Hall was located in the Northern suburbs of the city. It’s construction was very atmospheric and covered a large area with a sparse population. Not to mention that in this dark night, there were only two of them except for the staff on duty. There were more dead than living.

Previously while working, one didn’t feel but this kind of silence, made even the courageous Duanwu a little unbearable. He looked at the serious Lin Xiuran, feeling uncertain, and carefully compared the corpse in front of him. He still couldn’t see the clues, and asked in a low voice, “Aren’t these all typical characteristics of cyanide poisoning?”

“This corpse is not quite right.” Lin Xiuran did not quickly jump to conclusions, but walked to Ma Aijing body to check again. He opened the deceased’s eyelids and stared at the deceased’s eyes for a moment. Then he let go of his hands before he continued, “There is nothing wrong with the conclusion of being poisoned, but this corpse obviously has some subtle gaps with mine. For example, poisoning does not cause blood spots on the eyelids and cheeks……”

Lin Xiuran said, reached out and pulled a white light over. Under the light, once could see some bright red blood spots on the face of Ma Aijing’s corpse. These traces were not clear when she first died, but with the passage of time, these had become more and more obvious.

Duanwu came over to observe. The red dots scattered on the face were very small and were not easy to find without careful observation. It seems that all the capillaries on the face have burst for some reason. Looking up so close, it was a little weird, like someone sprinkled a handful of cinnabar on the face of the corpse.

“Also, her nails were painted to cover up the sign of cyanosis* on her fingers.” Lin Xiuran pointed to the tip of Ma Aijing’s fingers again, where the color turned purple.

(T/N: Cyanosis is the bluish or purplish discoloration of the skin or mucous membranes due to the tissues near the skin surface having low oxygen saturation.)

He poured some chemicals on a cotton pad and wiped away the remnants of Ma Aijing’s nail polish. The young girl’s fingertips glowed blue and purple, and the color of her nails was abnormal, with more obvious signs of cyanosis.

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“The rest are……” Lin Xiuran pointed to some spots on the deceased’s internal organs.

As clues appeared one by one, a chilling truth gradually surfaced, Lin Xiuran felt his heart sink slowly.

This murderer was too heartless.

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So, any guesses on what LXR might have discovered?

Personally I struggled a lot with this chapter more than anything. All the references killed my soul. But I recollected there are many more to come. So…phewww, let me brace myself for the upcoming releases.