Chapter 234: Garbage Sorting

Jiang Yuan automatically began changing into his protective suit, preparing to resume work.

Two corpses and one corpse are two entirely different concepts.

In China's environment, a single corpse is considered a normal homicide case. In Ningtai County, if one corpse appears, the county bureau chief and the deputy chief in charge of criminal investigation immediately respond, the entire criminal investigation team mobilizes, and the case is reported to the municipal bureau.

If the municipal bureau has resources, it often provides some support—such as laboratory assistance, fingerprint analysis, or, if forensic pathologists are available, sending one to assist with the autopsy.

But if two corpses appear, the case immediately escalates to the provincial department's attention.

If the investigation proceeds smoothly, fine; if not, the provincial department will quickly dispatch a supervisory team or technical experts to assist.

So, if someone accidentally kills another person, their evasion techniques might still work. But if they kill two people at once—say, a young couple or a married pair—the case immediately draws the attention of provincial-level experts.

At that point, fingerprints, footprints, bloodstains, and even video footage may all receive support from the provincial department's technical units.

In short, killing one person versus two is a world of difference in terms of investigation.

And some killers, in a frenzy, commit mass murders—killing an entire family of three. Such killers face the scrutiny of ministerial-level criminal investigation agencies and personnel.

Sometimes, fingerprints that grassroots units cannot extract can be easily recovered when sent to ministry-level laboratories.

As for special task forces and officers, their attitude toward cases varies drastically depending on the case's level.

Not to mention, if another corpse turns up now, Xu Taining doesn't even need to consider returning—he must extract something concrete from this case.

And based on current conditions, the likelihood of a third corpse appearing is extremely high.

The newly excavated body bag was repackaged into a new body bag, and Forensic Officer Niu half-sank his body into the basket, cradling the corpse bundle as he ascended to the mine shaft's top.

The travel bag's quality didn't seem great, and no one dared pull it up, since no one knew how long it had been buried underwater.

Moreover, the bottom of the hoist basket wasn't flat—it was a steel grid with mesh openings. Forensic officers feared the basket's jerky motion might damage the body, even if already dismembered; at this point, the body was the only clue left to find.

When the basket rose, several forensic officers rushed forward, carried the body bag onto a flatbed cart, and prepared to transport it directly to Qinghe City for autopsy.

As for Forensic Officer Niu, he was filthy all over and was only pulled up last.

Jiang Yuan hesitated whether to follow the body, when Wang Lan called out to stop him.

"Jiang Yuan, let's start with the crime scene investigation first," Wang Lan said in front of the superiors: "Jiang Yuan's crime scene investigation is among the best among forensic pathologists. Autopsy can be handled by others first; we'll review it later."

Forensic pathologists also conduct crime scene investigations, especially under such conditions—where the forensic pathologist's own scene examination differs subtly from that of the crime scene investigators.

Jiang Yuan had no objections and nodded: "I'll go up."

"Hard work," Xu Taining said, unusually taking a moment to offer words of comfort.

Ye Liang smiled and followed Wang Lan back down into the mine shaft.

After nearly ten hours of work, the silt in the mine shaft had been mostly cleared, and large concrete chunks had been pulled out by excavators and other equipment.

The massive excavator, resembling a stubborn donkey, now groaned as it dug upward through the garbage.

Under tens of meters of water pressure, the garbage had hardened into dense, compacted masses, like solidified slabs, making excavation extremely laborious.

When Jiang Yuan arrived, Wang Lan reassigned his area and called out loudly: "Do you think this corpse was killed by Liu Jinghui?"

The killer in the reservoir body-dumping case, Liu Jinghui, has been confirmed to have killed over ten people, yet his accounts of later cases were extremely vague.

Regarding cases tied to Zifeng Mountain, Ye Liangmei had always been evasive—this was one reason Wang Guoshan believed further investigation was unnecessary.

Ye Liang now couldn't be certain, so he said: "Regardless of whether it was Ye Liangmei or not, if he was involved, there must be accomplices."

"You mean the tire-puncturing case?" Wang Lan immediately recalled.

"Yes."

"Could the tire-puncturer be an accomplice in only one or two cases?" Wang Lan had encountered similar cases before.

Serial killers who commit multiple murders differ fundamentally from Western descriptions of serial killers. Most killers murder for some form of personal gain.

Under such circumstances, the killer might temporarily seek accomplices—something akin to the idea that an enemy of your enemy is your friend.

But some temporary alliances lead to continued killings; others lead to lifelong torment over secrecy.

Compared to that, such cases are naturally easier to solve.

Jiang Yuan understood Wang Lan's meaning and knew what answer he expected.

But Jiang Yuan still shook his head: "It's not a novice. I studied the tire-puncturing case involving Liu Chu thoroughly—the perpetrator acted with decisive precision, demonstrating both boldness and meticulousness. Had he not been lucky, Liu Chu would have died in a car accident then."

He paused, then added: "If the car accident had caused a fire, or if the accident location matched the killer's expectations, he could have set another fire—the tire-puncturing case might never have existed."

Wang Lan nodded quickly: "So the other killer is the main perpetrator?"

"Liu Jinghui is still in prison—he can't act independently or gather others to commit new crimes," Jiang Yuan said. "But if you asked me to handle this case, I wouldn't link it to Ye Liangmei."

"Oh? Why?" Wang Lan was surprised—linking cases was often the best way to solve them.

"Liu Chu must have considered linking cases. He didn't solve them quickly," Jiang Yuan replied simply.

Before arriving in Zifeng Town, Jiang Yuan had consciously chosen a different focus from Wang Guoshan's.

In Jiang Yuan's view, Wang Guoshan's deductive ability was still extremely strong.

I spent a month failing to crack a case; if I followed his approach again—even accounting for the killer's hidden breakthroughs or self-correction after being alerted—Wang Guoshan wouldn't need another month.

If the goal were merely to solve this case, Jiang Yuan felt it was unnecessary to wait months longer—delaying further would be pointless.

And the most urgent task now was still to locate Wang Guoshan.

Seeing a person—or a corpse—is better than facing a disappearance.

Moreover, Jiang Yuan's methods align with Wang Guoshan's—he only needs to follow the evidence.

Linking cases tests precisely deductive and analytical ability.

That is not Jiang Yuan's strength.

Wang Lan partially understood Jiang Yuan's reasoning, but didn't fully agree.

Still, the case's lead investigator was Xu Taining—it wasn't up to two forensic pathologists to direct the investigation's course.

The two began speaking again, continuing to excavate the mine shaft.

More and more garbage and construction debris were unearthed.

By evening, another miniature excavator was brought in, slightly increasing the pace.

Then, another gray plastic bag was unearthed.

"Wait. Don't remove it yet," Jiang Yuan called out from afar as he walked over.

When the next body bag was dug up, everyone confirmed it contained a corpse—this time, no one needed to say it; everyone could guess.

A specialist took photos. Jiang Yuan studied the body bag and surrounding garbage calmly and said: "Photograph all the garbage too. Confirm their positions."

Wang Lan immediately understood: "Right—the garbage should be from the same batch of landfill. That could help analyze the body's origin."

We hadn't seen the bodies yet, but reports from the front indicated that while the bodies provided very little information, they weren't entirely useless for determining origin.

In fact, identifying the origin of a teenage corpse is extremely difficult. The proportion of bodies whose origin can be identified is extremely small.

There are no official statistics on criminal identification rates, but the difficulty is evident from another angle—some regions' infamous mass graves have deployed top-tier anthropologists to identify bodies, even among known local populations, yet identification rates remain low.

For the forensic officers present, anything that could improve identification rates was helpful.

Jiang Yuan immediately changed his gloves, added two more layers, and began sorting the garbage on-site.

Previously, handling the case of a scavenger had granted him "Garbage Sorting (Lv4)"—now, applying it, his efficiency was quite high.

The other forensic officers, though possessing some evidence identification skills, watched Jiang Yuan's movements and gradually fell silent, watching closely.