Chapter 889

Tao Tao Yajie stared intently at the photos on the table, remaining calm for thirty, forty, fifty, sixty seconds.

Just when the people at the table thought she was going to question him, Tao Tao Yajie took out her phone and said with a smile: "Excuse me, I'll verify a few of the remains. Because the remains discovered earlier have already undergone some anthropological identification..."

As she spoke, she flipped through the photos in her album.

A waitress came over to change the bone plates, circling around from the doorway, and arrived at Tao Tao Yajie's side just in time to see the bright, clear photos of remains on Tao Tao Yajie's phone. The bones in the photos were black, gray, and white; there were gruesome close-ups of skulls, tangled leg bones, and sternums lying silently on shiny stainless steel.

The young girl rubbed her eyes, and when she looked up, she saw that Jiang Yuan's table was also covered with photos of remains, only they looked cleaner, more uniform, and more chilling...

The young girl couldn't help but open her mouth, her eyes wide as saucers.

Tang Jia, who was sitting next to her, was worried she would scream, so she hurriedly stood up and said: "Don't be afraid, we aren't bad people..."

"I know. You're from the Medical Department, right... Looking at these things while eating isn't very good for your health..." The young girl had already adjusted her mood and continued working.

"We are from the Archaeology Department." The president, Wang Wang Weiqing, smiled at the waitress.

The young girl said "Oh": "That's fine then. The teachers and students from the Medical Department who come here to eat often bring these kinds of terrifying photos too."

"So, in the end, the Medical Department is the scariest, right?" Zhang Zhang Jiao, also a graduate student, twirled the finger-bone keychain in her hand. The finger bone had been stolen from the lab, violating rules and discipline, but she did it anyway, just like an ordinary person who frequently violates rules, ignores discipline, scorns unit regulations, is irresponsible, acts recklessly, and only cares about her own emotions.

The young waitress thought for a moment while changing the bone plates and said: "The scariest are the ones from the Biology Department, especially the freshmen; they often bring frogs, rabbits, and the like, some even skinned, and have the restaurant process them."

Zhang Zhang Jiao frowned, and the finger-bone keychain stopped spinning. They lost even at this?

Before she could say anything else, Tao Tao Yajie put down her phone and said in a surprised tone: "The age judgments for the first few remains are basically consistent with your judgment, Forensic Expert Jiang; the time difference is less than a year."

Compared to remains at a crime scene, judging the age of remains at an archaeological site is only more difficult, not less. After all, they have been left for much longer, and the environment inside the tomb is different from the outside environment. Over the accumulation of years, it is often easy to accumulate very bizarre innate conditions.

Therefore, in addition to her surprise, there was a hint of admiration for Jiang Yuan in Tao Tao Yajie's tone.

Jiang Yuan said naturally: "Which remains had a discrepancy in the age judgment?"

In terms of forensic anthropology alone, he wasn't using his temporary +1 skill right now, so he was purely at LV3, belonging to the top tier of the Shannan archaeological community, though perhaps not ranked on a national scale. But the skill of judging the age of remains is closely related to the skill of judging time of death. Jiang Yuan's time-of-death judgment is LV6, which is not just a top-tier domestic level, but also top-tier internationally.

Jiang Yuan also wanted to use this to judge the strength of the domestic archaeological community; after all, he had basically been working in the police force for the past few years.

Tao Tao Yajie couldn't help but smile, thinking Jiang Yuan was unconvinced, and couldn't help but say: "It's already very accurate; you only looked for a few minutes... No, it wasn't even a minute, and you judged the age of the remains..."

As she spoke, seeing Jiang Yuan's dismissive expression, she wisely stopped and said: "Looking at my records, for the third and fourth ones on the left, our expert group's judgment was one year younger than yours—34 and 20."

Jiang Yuan said "Oh," leaned over to take another look at the photos of the third and fourth ones, and still said quickly: "The fourth one should just be the difference between the beginning and the end of the year. For the third one, your judgment has an error; you used the pelvis for the age identification, right."

"Yes." Tao Tao Yajie nodded.

If you have a pelvis, use the pelvis; it is the best bone for identification in anthropology. Whether it's the deceased's age, sex, height, whether they have given birth, etc., it can all be seen relatively easily. At the very least, the pelvis is the bone from which this information is easiest to see.

Jiang Yuan only said: "The pelvis of this body does indeed have a certain level of deceptiveness, but this body is complete. Therefore, referring to the conditions of the costal cartilage and sternum, 35 is more accurate."

Tao Tao Yajie also knows a little anthropology, just not much. Hearing Jiang Yuan explain it now, she just nodded. After all, identifying the age of the deceased is important, but whether it's 35 or 34 actually isn't that important. On this point, the rigor of archaeology is not as high as that of criminal investigation.

However, this simple exchange also gave Tao Tao Yajie a clearer understanding of Jiang Yuan.

Tao Tao Yajie raised her glass to drink some wine, then said: "When we get back to school later, I'll introduce you to the experts on the expert group; you will definitely have a lot to talk about."

"Okay." Jiang Yuan replied simply.

The group had things on their minds, so they finished their meal casually and returned to the school.

The campus of Shannan University is very large, but the Archaeology Department is a small department under the School of Social Sciences, and there aren't many professors in total. Tao Tao Yajie led the group into the teaching building, and after only a few greetings, many students and teachers came to hear the news.

The Yongwang Tomb is the biggest news for the Archaeology Department recently, and Jiang Yuan has also been in the news quite a bit. The combination of the two made the archaeology students very interested.

"This is Professor Sun."

"Professor Li."

"Professor Zhang."

Tao Tao Yajie introduced the people in the office one by one, then said: "These are the current members of our expert group. Forensic Expert Jiang, would you like to say a few words?"

"Let's start working directly." Jiang Yuan is very accustomed to working in external units. Under the gaze of several professors, he stood up, walked casually, chose a position he liked, and said: "I am personally more skilled at judging time of death; why don't I start with that?"

"That's great, I was originally going to say..." Tao Tao Yajie said, telling the others about what happened during the meal today, then smiled: "If Forensic Expert Jiang can maintain his previous speed, our work progress will be greatly accelerated."

Jiang Yuan nodded and said to Wang Wang Chuanxing: "Set it up."

Wang Wang Chuanxing followed the workflow of a homicide case without a word. After one phone call, in less than a quarter of an hour, the prepared police officers brought eight laptops from the car in front of the building.

Wang Wang Chuanxing and the others set up the laptops on the spot and connected them to the printer in the office, clicking away as photos began to print.

Several students were also directed by Wang Wang Chuanxing. For example, the president of the Archaeological Society, Wang Wang Weiqing, was called out because he was standing too close, and thus began his career of taking care of the photos.

As for the professors, they were dumbfounded.

They did have graduate students, doctoral students, or temporary undergraduate students they could use, but the discipline of college students is not on the same level as that of police officers, and neither is their execution.

Therefore, Jiang Yuan's subordinates looked efficient and resolute; in minutes, they had set up the computers and, under the guidance of a member of the research group, categorized the photos of the remains.

Jiang Yuan waited a little while, and after the first batch of remains was categorized, he sat in front of the computer, found paper and pen, and began measuring, labeling, and giving conclusions on the spot.

Just like at the dining table, Jiang Yuan could give a result in about ten-plus seconds, at most a few dozen seconds.

The experts present were all dumbfounded.

Is age judgment this easy to do? Impossible!

Several people gathered around in unison, preparing to take a good look at Jiang Yuan's judgment process and then debate it with him.