Chapter 204: , Recruit a Real Forensic Pathologist!

The incredibly busy Special Mission Unit had all four of its current members exhausted; Miss Minami was fine, as she mainly worked in the office, but Police Inspector Okada, who was responsible for going to the scenes, was wailing in fatigue. As a young master and son of the Financial Services Agency Commissioner, this guy had followed Uesugi Muneyuki to crime scenes repeatedly, and after a month, he had lost quite a bit of weight and his skin had darkened.

However, upon seeing that he had worked 180 hours of overtime in July and received a pay stub from the Metropolitan Police Department's Accounting Division for 540,000 yen in overtime pay—choosing not to take compensatory time off—Police Inspector Okada immediately stopped complaining.

(If Japanese police officers give up compensatory time off, the hourly overtime rate is theoretically 3,000 yen, but well, that is only in theory; in reality, most Japanese police officers often work unpaid overtime and receive no money at all. It is just that the Special Mission Unit is a special case, and the money and benefits are absolutely provided in full.)

As for Ikeda Erena, well, our tall beauty was full of energy in every sense; for her, she wouldn't even stand for sitting in the office all day!

She loved going on field assignments with Uesugi Muneyuki, especially the kind that required staying overnight.

Hehehe~ Whenever she thought of this, Ikeda Erena couldn't help but blush; compared to only being able to go to Sakata Bridge once a week before, once they stayed out overnight, Uesugi Muneyuki belonged to her alone for the whole night!

Combat, awesome!

So this month of busyness was very fulfilling for Erena—well, fulfilling in every sense, so fulfilling that it was overflowing. She loved this rhythm: today looking at a body of a lonely death in Mitaka, tomorrow going to Hachioji City to examine a body that died from an accidental fall. Uesugi Muneyuki would explain everything to her throughout the process, and then at night, the two would return to the hotel, intimate and sweet as honey.

As for Uesugi Muneyuki himself, although he was very tired, he had collected a massive amount of Soul energy this month.

In the Maichakra technique, among the Seven Wheels, Senior Mai had only transplanted the Sacral Chakra, which is the Seishokurin, into him; the remaining six wheels were dead and required the injection of massive amounts of Courage to activate.

This month, Uesugi Muneyuki collected a massive amount of Courage, and the other six wheels showed signs of loosening. Once the other six wheels were fully activated, Senior Mai would, according to their agreement, engage in Dual Cultivation with him to recast her own Seishokurin, after which the two wheels would merge, becoming each other's lifeblood, One Lotus Together Born, sharing their lives and living on endlessly.

It was just that he had been very busy lately.

And Senior Mai had also been very busy lately; after the filming of Kamitantei Garireo 2 was completed, it was immediately followed by the theatrical version, Seika Hōteishiki. This production also gathered a massive cast, followed by a series of movie promotions. Afterward, Senior Mai would also appear in the second half of NHK's annual morning drama, "Amachan," to perform a scene opposite the lead actress, Nōnen Rena.

In short, everyone was very busy.

Only the newly appointed Investigation Division 1 Chief, Sugishita Ukyo, was very free; he had recently been studying the four ways to brew English black tea.

Among the cases in July, the vast majority were local precincts making trouble out of nothing and wasting time, but there were also three special cases that were successfully solved because of Uesugi Muneyuki.

The first case was a sudden death in Mitaka; in a late-night ramen shop, a customer suddenly suffered a cerebral hemorrhage and died. Although the Mitaka Police Station had obtained the judgment of a local clinic doctor, they still decided to invite Uesugi Muneyuki.

Uesugi Muneyuki immediately discovered that the deceased's pupils were constricted.

After a person dies, the spirit becomes paralyzed and the pupil sphincter muscle relaxes; as the muscle relaxes, the pupils should rapidly dilate. At the same time, the anal sphincter and bladder sphincter also paralyze, so it is very normal for a corpse to be incontinent, but the deceased's pupils had not dilated.

Uesugi Muneyuki then re-investigated the case and soon discovered that the proprietress had a problem. As a result, the proprietress soon confessed, stating that she had killed him by poisoning.

And this was not the first time she had done this; previously, after her husband died, she had poisoned her annoying mother-in-law. Afterward, she told the arriving police and doctors that her mother-in-law had died of a sudden illness, and the police and doctors actually did not suspect anything and directly issued a death certificate.

From this, one can see how useless the police in local precincts are, and to what extent they fear trouble and avoid it! And how serious the lack of forensic pathologists and autopsies in Japan is.

Having obtained all the inheritance and a large sum of insurance money, the proprietress, having tasted success, noticed while running the ramen shop that the deceased was carrying a large amount of cash in his bag, so she had the idea to try poisoning the ramen again.

This was how Uesugi Muneyuki discovered it. Later, during the dissection, ethyl parathion—an old-fashioned, highly toxic pesticide—was indeed found in the deceased's body.

It was a pity that the mother-in-law's body had already been cremated, otherwise the proprietress would have faced additional charges.

The second case was also very interesting.

A young woman committed suicide at home by taking an overdose of sleeping pills due to workplace bullying and discrimination, but her back door was not closed tightly. An underage junior high school boy accidentally wandered into her house, thinking "the big sister was sleeping," so out of curiosity and instinct, he took off her clothes, scribbled on her body, touched her, and did some indescribable things, leaving his DNA at the scene.

After the Itabashi Police arrived at the scene, they naturally assumed it was a rape-murder case and made a huge fuss about it.

As a result, after Uesugi Muneyuki performed the autopsy, he discovered that the woman had died from an overdose of sleeping pills, not homicide but suicide. Later, they found the junior high school boy; because he was under 14 and not the killer, under Uesugi Muneyuki's advocacy, the police only criticized and educated him, and ultimately did not prosecute.

However, looking at him, he probably wouldn't forget this encounter for the rest of his life.

The third case was a swimming athlete who drowned while training.

This case was also particularly bizarre; a swimming athlete who could easily hold his breath underwater for several minutes, how could he drown in a training pool?

The police therefore suspected this was a homicide and invited Uesugi Muneyuki to observe.

But the deceased's Dead Soul told Uesugi Muneyuki that he had indeed drowned; he accidentally choked on water while swimming, then became dizzy and disoriented in the water, unable to find his direction for a moment, and subsequently drowned.

It really was drowning?

How embarrassing is that?

However, Uesugi Muneyuki discovered that although he understood the reason, he did not know how to explain all of this!

Having no choice, Uesugi Muneyuki had to invite Professor Okochi from the Tokyo Medical and Dental University. The master and apprentice performed the dissection together, and under Professor Okochi's guidance, Uesugi Muneyuki finally understood the cause of the drowning.

Due to choking on water, the swimming athlete's nasal cavity had water enter deep into the ear canal that connects to the eardrum. Because the ear canal is long and narrow, and the deceased, as a professional athlete, had powerful breathing, the water formed a water plug in the ear canal. During continuous choking, the water plug acted like a piston, becoming a "water bullet" that burst into the mastoid air cells of the temporal bone, damaging the mucous membrane and capillaries. Bleeding within the capillaries and mucous membrane then affected the normal function of the three semicircular canals at the base of the skull, thereby affecting the brain.

Therefore, although the deceased was conscious at the time, he felt the world spinning, could not distinguish direction, and could not control his breathing, eventually drowning in the training pool.

Because he was a professional swimming athlete, when the deceased was thrashing in the water, his family didn't take it seriously. When he was drowning, his wife even thought he was practicing breath-holding for diving and cheered him on, thinking, "The world record is about 20 minutes, honey, you can prepare to apply for Guinness!"

"Uesugi-kun, your dissection ability and pathology are still somewhat lacking," Professor Okochi said slowly after finishing the work. "A true master always maintains a humble heart; do not get carried away just because your autopsy ability is excellent. I do not object to you doing this job, but have you ever heard the cries of every deceased person? Any mistake you make could lead to a life fading away in misunderstanding and injustice."

"Thank you very much for your guidance, Professor, I will keep it in mind!"

Uesugi Muneyuki did not dare to be arrogant at all; he knew where his outstanding autopsy ability came from—he was cheating!

But precisely because of this, Uesugi Muneyuki wanted a truly excellent Forensic Pathologist Assistant more than ever.

And this opportunity had just arrived.

The reason was simple: the three Forensic Pathologists in the Forensics Division couldn't take it anymore!

Because of the large number of headquarters interventions in local cases, as long as it was a case handled by Uesugi Muneyuki, the three people in the Forensics Division—Higashiyama Takeshi, Kamioka Hideo, and the newly hired Nakadō—had to write the Forensic Autopsy Reports for Uesugi Muneyuki.

You must know that Uesugi Muneyuki had examined 180 bodies in one month! An average of 6 bodies a day, and because it might involve criminal charges, every body required a dedicated Forensic Autopsy Report explaining the reasons.

Naturally, Uesugi Muneyuki could not write the Forensic Autopsy Reports himself. First, his greatest value lay in "picking up bodies," and he could not waste his time on paperwork. Second, as Professor Okochi said, Uesugi Muneyuki was... relatively weak in true forensic science and true pathology; he was not much better than the few forensic pathologists in the Forensics Division. If he were asked to write the reports, he wouldn't know how to explain the reasons even if he had the facts, and he himself didn't participate much in the dissections.

Regarding this problem, Uesugi Muneyuki proposed to the Criminal Investigation Department to transfer a forensic pathologist from the Forensics Division to the Special Mission Unit to serve as his assistant.

But this opinion was rejected by the Criminal Investigation Department Chief, Uchimura Kanji, because the Special Mission Unit had essentially already encroached on the ecological niche of the Forensics Division. If they transferred more people, the Forensics Division would exist in name only. Moreover, the Forensics Division was not only responsible for autopsies, dissections, and writing reports; they had many other duties and tasks. If people were transferred away, what would the other divisions do?

But Department Manager Uchimura Kanji was, after all, a loyalist to Watanabe Eiji. Although he rejected Uesugi Muneyuki's proposal for fear of trouble, he privately found him and Minami to tell Uesugi Muneyuki how to handle this matter.

Think about how you came to work at the Metropolitan Police Department?

You can arrange for the Forensic Pathology Department of the Tokyo Medical and Dental University to recruit another physician, and then we can borrow the person to the Metropolitan Police Department by way of secondment to serve as your Forensic Pathologist Assistant in the Special Mission Unit. As long as you speak up, with your influence, the headquarters cannot refuse!

When the time comes and you have made a contribution, the headquarters can formally hire them as a Forensic Assistant just like you!

After hearing this, Uesugi Muneyuki felt it made sense.

As for how to convince the Tokyo Medical and Dental University to add a position, the Metropolitan Police Department would handle that.

After all, we are a powerful department!

If it were a place like the University of Tokyo Hospital, they might not be so wary of the Metropolitan Police Department, but for other hospitals, it's just a matter of one word.

Thus, as July came to an end, Uesugi Muneyuki, who carried the 23 wards, 26 cities, 5 towns, and 8 villages of Tokyo on his shoulders alone, officially put out the word.

Due to being overwhelmed by a heavy workload, we are now recruiting a Forensic Assistant from the general public; those with extensive experience in Dissection, a willingness to go to crime scenes to assist in investigations, and the ability to handle a large number of field tasks are preferred!

Excellent compensation, don't miss this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity!

The legendary rookie Forensic Pathologist, the final trump card of the Metropolitan Police Department, Forensic Examiner Uesugi of the Special Missions Unit, Criminal Investigation Division 1, Criminal Investigation Department, Kasumigaseki Sakuradamon, needs you!

(End of this chapter)