[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":-1},["ShallowReactive",2],{"origin-the-nation-s-forensic-medical-examiner":3,"chapter-the-nation-s-forensic-medical-examiner-the-nation-s-forensic-medical-examiner-chapter-978":6},{"origin":4,"title":5},"chinese","The Nation's Forensic Medical Examiner",{"chapter":7,"nextChapterSlug":19,"prevChapterSlug":20,"totalChapters":21,"novelImage":22},{"id":8,"novel_id":9,"title":10,"slug":11,"index":12,"content":13,"wordcount":14,"created_at":15,"updated_at":15,"volume":16,"translator":17,"content_hash":18},2327673,4551,"Chapter 978: The Flying Claw","the-nation-s-forensic-medical-examiner-chapter-978",978,"\u003Cp>Wang Futing’s interrogation video was very long, replayed many times, extremely tedious, and even made viewers tired.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The interrogators also put in tremendous effort, providing Wang Futing with nearly two packs of cigarettes.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Smoking while declaring one’s intent to die was the last bit of romance for male inmates.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Later, the branch leadership frowned and commented: “No remorse whatsoever!”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Tao Lu sat beside him and added: “He came up from the underworld—he started running with gangs at sixteen, even followed Pan Renwu, the one executed in the late 90s. Everyone he ran with got executed twice over.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“So they didn’t execute him?”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Those who survived were just lucky. He rose to vice president of Enda, had many connections under Lü Qiang. Many who joined before him ended up only as directors, spending their days chasing women in every possible way.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Why was he so lucky?” The leader, knowing how hard promotion was, distrusted those who claimed merit through hard work.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Tao Lu paused, thought for a moment, then tried again: “Maybe it’s his adaptability. From what I know, Wang Futing was always good at communication—he had several masters in his youth, served under multiple bosses, and when he joined Lü Qiang, he went from gang leader to demolition manager, excelling at demolition work—he knew how to use threats and bribes fluently, never just relied on brute force.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“He knows how to read the situation.” The leader nodded, accepting this logic.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“You summed it up perfectly…” Tao Lu quickly offered emotional value—commonly called flattery.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Hmm, that explains it.” The leader now understood why Wang Futing became vice president. He could speak well, had specialized skills, and excelled at fulfilling his superiors’ psychological needs—that was the mold for promotion.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Other officers who watched the video each had their own thoughts, whispering among themselves.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Wang Futing had completely given up, so he spoke at great length.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>But all this information was from over twenty years ago—how much of it was actually useful became another challenge.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Some officers doubted the truthfulness of Wang Futing’s testimony—this multiplied the difficulty, for the same reason: verifying testimonies from over twenty years ago was extremely hard.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“I’m going to study the claw Wang Futing mentioned.” Jiang Yuan finished watching the video, felt sleepy, and simply yawned.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>At the same time, his emotional intelligence had nearly hit rock bottom.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Song Tiancheng asked beside him: “What’s the investigative direction? Should we settle on it first?”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“I want to ask Liu Chu to review it first,” Jiang Yuan shook his head. Wang Futing provided too much evidence, much of it unreliable—this wasn’t Jiang Yuan’s specialty, and it would waste too much of his time.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Song Tiancheng hesitated. Though he knew Liu Jinghui of Shannan Province, by national standards, Liu Jinghui clearly had less fame than Jiang Yuan. Still, Song Tiancheng understood specialization—plus, he was familiar with Jiang Yuan’s case-solving history—so he simply remained silent.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Tao Lu noticed Song Tiancheng’s unease and said openly: “Liu Chu assisted remotely before—smoothly. Should we call him over? Can he spare the time?”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“He pushed back later cases—he’ll need to repay Liu Chu’s favor,” Jiang Yuan said, then added: “The case files are too numerous now, and most photos are still on film—remote assistance won’t work well.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>In the late 90s, crime scene photos were taken by professional criminal photographers using film cameras; a roll of Kodak film cost over twenty yuan. Even with an in-house darkroom, the average cost per photo was one yuan.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>So the habit of snapping hundreds of photos carelessly—“better too many than too few”—simply didn’t exist in police stations back then.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Weaker bureaus, like Ningtai County Bureau, often didn’t even take photos for ordinary theft cases. Only major cases got thousands of photos—because homicides were common, funding, especially for photography, was limited, so some murders were downgraded to ordinary homicides.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>In that era, criminal photographers had three tiers of value: low-end completed assigned shots; mid-end delivered full crime scene context and key evidence details with minimal cost; only the high-end accurately reconstructed the truth.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The Jianmen Academy case had also hired criminal photography experts. That was the advantage of being in the capital—Jingcheng Bureau hadn’t cut corners on film or photographic skill back then.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>But after so many years, some photos had faded, some negatives couldn’t be developed—this was normal. Liu Jinghui would come to re-examine them.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>After all, Jiang Yuan’s expectations of Liu Jinghui differed from his own.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>When Jiang Yuan investigated cases, his core approach was always to find evidence first, then use evidence to locate suspects.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Liu Jinghui often found killers through simple reasoning—but the Jianmen Academy case required rigorous, detailed reasoning regardless.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Theoretically, even if he could deduce the killer through simple logic, the Zhang family still needed to see comprehensive, meticulous reasoning to prove Zhang Xiaoya was truly the murderer.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>In reality, the Jianmen Academy case had been studied repeatedly—there was no possibility of solving it through simple reasoning.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Still, this case genuinely attracted Liu Jinghui.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The more investigations and experts a cold case had, the more valuable it appeared—and Liu Jinghui had long abandoned promotion; solving cases was his greatest pleasure.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Morning.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>When Liu Jinghui arrived at the Zhengguang Bureau’s Criminal Investigation Brigade compound, he arrived just as the Jianmen Academy task force held its regular meeting.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>This was the first official meeting since the Jianmen Academy task force had been officially reactivated—so many people attended that speakers needed microphones.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The meeting focused mainly on updates, with virtually no specialized discussion.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>As the saying goes: small meetings decide big things; large meetings decide small things—such a massive gathering couldn’t allow for meaningful discussion.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>After the meeting ended, Liu Jinghui approached Jiang Yuan and saw two thin case files on his desk—he instinctively frowned.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Did you find these results from studying the claw?” Liu Jinghui knew Jiang Yuan’s ability too well. Tool mark analysis was a century-old technique, but few did it well—fewer still did it as well as Jiang Yuan.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Classic tool mark analysis: if a kitchen knife has a notch, and you use it to kill your neighbor’s eldest son, then the second son downstairs, police compare the notches—if they match, it’s likely the same knife.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Of course, the knife that killed the second son might have more notches—that’s also part of tool mark analysis.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>In Liu Jinghui’s view, such a rare weapon as the flying claw, Jiang Yuan would surely make major discoveries.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Jiang Yuan tapped the two files before him: “I was puzzled too, but after searching, I only found two cases connected to this flying claw.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“In all these years, only three cases nationwide involved flying claws?” Liu Jinghui couldn’t believe it.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Jiang Yuan shook his head: “Not all flying claws are the same. They’re hard to forge, and skilled users rarely switch them. So while the killer might have been involved in two other cases, as far as we know, there are only three total.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Impossible,” Liu Jinghui immediately shook his head: “Unless they never used it—but who learns the art of scaling walls and rooftops and never uses it? I thought the flying claw might crack the case.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Looks like it won’t.” Jiang Yuan spread his hands: “Besides, the other two cases were thefts, with much smaller amounts involved.”\u003C\u002Fp>",1210,"2026-06-20T18:55:03.377Z",1,"Qwen3-Next 80B","36ea75bdced359016279d4f9775cde87815e473d6fddffa08d1c3f1684870184","the-nation-s-forensic-medical-examiner-chapter-979","the-nation-s-forensic-medical-examiner-chapter-977",1000,"https:\u002F\u002Fnovelzhen.com\u002Fimages\u002Fcovers\u002Fthe-nation-s-forensic-medical-examiner-cover.jpg"]