Chapter 132: If It Weren't Absurd, Would It Come to You?

The duty officer's body trembled uncontrollably; he curled into a ball and hid under the window.

No one knew how long had passed before the corpse's footsteps finally reached outside the duty room.

Terrified, he dared not even draw a breath, his entire mind stretched to the utmost tension.

Fortunately, at that moment, the corpse ceased all movement.

At least it did not push open the duty room's main door and burst straight in.

The duty officer, having held his breath for so long, felt his brain growing dizzy in waves and could only quietly tilt his head upward to check.

He saw that the corpse stood right outside the window above his head, its entire face pressed against the glass, staring at him with total concentration.

This close-range eye contact left him completely paralyzed.

Fear, panic, and disbelief surged up all at once...

His vision went black, and he fainted.

When he woke again, his entire mind was a tangled mess of paste.

He kept suspecting he had dozed off during his night shift and had a nightmare.

He originally wanted to go check the morgue, but his courage had been utterly shattered by fear.

He hid in the duty room until dawn, waited for the relief shift to arrive, and only then did the two of them go count the bodies to prepare for handover.

As it turned out, not counting would have been better; once they counted, the duty officer turned even paler with fright.

After one night, four bodies were missing from the morgue!

"This case is a bit absurd."

Yu Dazhang looked at the case file, and the duty officer's experience from that night surfaced in his mind.

The more active one's thinking is, the easier it is for text-based material to form images in the mind.

This is beneficial for solving cases, but when looking at this case file in his hands, Yu Dazhang felt as though he were watching a horror movie.

"If it weren't absurd, would it have come to your head?" Li Jun replied with a smile.

"Yes, how did a case from Qingpu Branch end up with us?" Yu Dazhang had wanted to ask while reading the file.

Every year there are unsolved cases; if there are no leads for now, just keep investigating. There is no need to hand the case over to another branch.

Moreover, judging by the dates, this case only occurred two days ago; did Qingpu Branch give up treatment so quickly?

"Transferring you over is the Municipal Bureau's decision," Li Jun explained.

"The impact of this case is too negative; if it gets out, it will inevitably cause social panic. Furthermore, the families have already started making a scene, so the case must be closed as soon as possible."

Special treatment for special cases... Yu Dazhang immediately understood the uniqueness of this case.

Precisely because the case is absurd does it need to be solved quickly.

Even in today's internet information age, superstitious people still exist, and in considerable numbers.

If this matter gets out, some people will surely seize the opportunity to Du Zhuan it into feudal superstitious content and spread it everywhere.

And the families are also a problem.

They were waiting to cremate their relatives, only for the relatives' bodies to run away on their own shortly after arriving at the morgue.

No one could accept such a thing happening to them.

They will definitely demand an explanation from the hospital.

He continued flipping through the case file; below were the investigation records of the Qingpu Criminal Investigation Detachment.

Through on-site inspection and surveillance records, the bodies indeed walked out of the morgue on their own.

After the first corpse walked out, three more corpses successively sat up from their beds, their limbs stiff, moving inch by inch toward the door.

Until they disappeared from the surveillance footage.

After the Technical Section finished their inspection, the criminal investigators from the team conducted another inspection.

The results matched the conclusions reached by the Technical Section.

The criminal investigators from Qingpu Branch naturally did not believe such nonsense.

They first focused their investigation on the person who reported the case, namely that morgue duty officer.

After all, a thief crying thief and stealing while on duty are nothing new.

However, after interrogation, no problems were found with the other party.

What he described matched the inspection results almost exactly.

Moreover, with surveillance as evidence, he basically had no opportunity to tamper with the bodies. Yu Dazhang closed the case file, thought for a moment, and said:

"I want to meet the officers who investigated this case first."

"The other party is already waiting for you at Qingpu Branch; you will see them very soon." While Li Jun spoke, he drove with full concentration.

The car stopped at the entrance of Qingpu Branch.

Ji Bin, the captain of the Qingpu Criminal Investigation Detachment, came forward to greet them.

"Welcome, welcome. This time, it's trouble for you, Old Li."

While Ji Bin exchanged pleasantries with Li Jun, his gaze drifted over to Yu Dazhang.

Following the recently concluded case at the Grade-A Third-Class Hospital, personnel were drawn from various branches across the city to provide support.

Consequently, Yu Dazhang's name had become known among the leaders of these branches.

Otherwise, when Qingpu Branch encountered such a thorny case, they would not have immediately turned to Yu Dazhang.

Although requesting external help requires owing favors, compared to failing to solve the case, those few favors are nothing.

Please... collect... 6... 9... Book... please...!

After a few brief and reserved words, Ji Bin cut straight to the point and asked the two of them:

"Shall we go see the scene first?"

Since it involved a case, Li Jun naturally looked at Yu Dazhang, waiting for him to make the decision.

Ji Bin glanced and knew the rumors were true.

Yu Dazhang, who had originally intended to ask the officers for details first, heard Ji Bin's proposal and could only nod in agreement.

For the police, the crime scene is the most critical element in solving a case.

A good officer can always find enough clues at the scene.

These clues are the sharp blades police use to cut through the fog.

Although two days have passed since the incident and the Qingpu Branch has already conducted a scene investigation,

Yu Dazhang was still willing to take a look at the scene if possible.

His eyesight now surpasses that of ordinary people; he wanted to see if any subtle details had been overlooked.

Qingpuer Academy, despite having the character 'Two' in its name, is actually the largest public hospital in the Qingpu District.

The morgue is also quite large, housed in a separate small building.

Fifteen minutes later, two police cars arrived and stopped outside a small building; Ji Bin came over personally to introduce:

"Inside this building, the third and fourth floors are cold storage rooms, while the second floor is a dedicated autopsy room. We and the Municipal Bureau occasionally come here to borrow it."

"The incident occurred on the first floor, which is used for temporary body storage."

"Patients who die in the hospital are temporarily stored on the first floor, waiting for their families to transfer them to the crematorium."

Hearing this, Yu Dazhang paused his steps:

"So that means the bodies on the first floor were all just brought in?"

Ji Bin nodded:

"Yes. Any body stored for more than twenty-four hours is sent to the freezers upstairs."

Yu Dazhang said nothing, but he already had some thoughts forming in his mind.

Ji Bin glanced at him, did not rush to press further, and the group walked into the body storage building.

Since the cold storage rooms on the third and fourth floors were large enough, this temporary morgue on the first floor was sealed off immediately after the incident occurred.

Although the other bodies inside had been removed, the relevant evidence from the time of the incident was still preserved.

Stepping on the aluminum alloy planks set up on the ground, Yu Dazhang had just entered the morgue when he couldn't help but shiver.

It wasn't that there were any ghostly winds here; the temperature was simply too low.

In August, the average temperature in Songhai is around thirty degrees, while inside the morgue it is only two to four degrees.

It was as if one step took a person from the equator to the North Pole; anyone would shiver.

"Because the temperature inside the morgue is so low, the duty room is isolated separately."

Following Ji Bin's words, Yu Dazhang turned his head and saw the duty room located on one side of the morgue.

At the time of the incident, the duty officer inside there was frightened into fainting.

He swept his gaze over the floor of the morgue.

Although special planks were set up for entry and exit, the place is kept at a low temperature and dust-free year-round, leaving no very obvious traces.

However, following the numbered tags placed on the ground, Yu Dazhang still spotted several distinctive footprints.

(End of this chapter)